“Speak out for those who cannot speak,
for the rights of all the destitute.”
Proverbs 31:8
this diary is dedicated to all who suffer because of war and other disasters
we honor courage in all its forms
cross-posted at DailyKos, Booman Tribune, European Tribune, and My Left Wing.
april is national poetry month
6 images and poem below the fold
Black smoke billows from the site where a car bomb exploded in Baghdad. Five Shiites walking on a pilgrimage to the shrine city of Karbala were wounded by a roadside bomb in western Baghdad.
(AFP/Sabah Arar)
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Iraqi passer-by look at the flak jacket of an Iraqi policeman, following a roadside bomb, in Baqouba, 60 kilometers (35 miles) northeast of Baghdad, Iraq, Sunday, March 19, 2006. A roadside bomb exploded Sunday targeting a police patrol, killing three policemen and injuring ten civilians.
(AP Photo/Mohammed Adnan)
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Residents try to extinguish a fire in house of a civilian after an attack by unidentified gunmen in Ramadi, 115 kilometers (70 miles) west of Baghdad, Iraq, Sunday, March 19, 2006. Two civilian bystanders were killed Sunday and ten others injured as U.S. troops, stationed at the governor’s office of Ramadi, clashed with unidentified gunmen attacked the building with light weapons, police said.
(AP Photo/Bilal Hussein)
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An injured Shiite Muslim man who was on his way to Karbala, is transported in hospital in Baghdad, Iraq, Friday, March 17, 2006. Gunmen targeting streams of Shiite Muslim pilgrims, many parents with children in tow, heading for the holy city of Karbala, shot and killed three people on Friday morning and wounded two others in a Sunni Muslim neighborhood of Baghdad, police reported.
(AP Photo/Karim Kadim)
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An injured victim of a roadside bomb attack gets treated in a hospital, in Baghdad, Iraq, Saturday, March 18, 2006. A roadside bomb exploded Saturday on a traffic police patrol which was parking near a bridge in eastern Baghdad, wounding one civilian and damaging the patrol vehicle, police said.
(AP Photo/Karim Kadim)
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An injured Iraqi Shiite man who was on his way to Karbala, gets treated in a hospital, in Baghdad, Iraq, Friday, March 17, 2006. Gunmen targeting streams of Shiite Muslim pilgrims, many parents with children in tow, heading for the holy city of Karbala, shot and killed three people on Friday morning and wounded two others in a Sunni Muslim neighborhood of Baghdad, police reported.
(AP Photo/Karim Kadim)
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An Iraqi man cries as he takes the body of his relative, after doctors were unable to save his life, who was brought critically injured from a roadside bomb explosion, in Baghdad,Iraq, Sunday, March 12, 2006. Bomb blasts, rocket and gunfire killed at least 10 people and injured 23 in the Iraqi capital as the work week got under way Sunday, police said.
(AP Photo/Hadi Mizban)
Someone
by Dennis O’Driscoll
someone is dressing up for death today, a change of skirt or tie
eating a final feast of buttered sliced pan, tea
scarcely having noticed the erection that was his last
shaving his face to marble for the icy laying out
spraying with deodorant her coarse armpit grass
someone today is leaving home on business
saluting, terminally, the neighbours who will join in the cortege
someone is paring his nails for the last time, a precious moment
someone’s waist will not be marked with elastic in the future
someone is putting out milkbottles for a day that will not come
someone’s fresh breath is about to be taken clean away
someone is writing a cheque that will be rejected as `drawer deceased’
someone is circling posthumous dates on a calendar
someone is listening to an irrelevant weather forecast
someone is making rash promises to friends
someone’s coffin is being sanded, laminated, shined
who feels this morning quite as well as ever
someone if asked would find nothing remarkable in today’s date
perfume and goodbyes her final will and testament
someone today is seeing the world for the last time
as innocently as he had seen it first
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put a meaningful magnet on your car or metal filing cabinet
read Ilona’s important new blog – PTSD Combat
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
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
Rub I was honored to have spent the afternoon and also pinkescort a truly brave woman. Her name is Eman Ahmed Khamas and she’s a journalist and human rights activist from Iraq.
She had to leave her two daughters behind to come and speak out as a delegate of the Women say no to war campaign.
She is now my shining light. My candle.
She begs us to stop this war, this killing, the murderes. She says life is worse than ever for all. To “please leave us alone”.
… I can’t bare that another days goes by that more women in Iraq are going to be killed.
Impeach before it’s too late.
Peace
Light A Candle For
Peace, Tolerance, Understanding
and For The Children – Innocence Lost!
“To initiate a war of aggresion…is not only an international crime, it is the supreme international crime, differing only from other war crimes in that it contains within itself the accumulated evil of the whole.”
Nuremberg Tribunal
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Three Years After U.S. Invasion Two Wounded Iraqi Children and Their Fathers Tell Their Stories * On the third anniversary of the U.S. invasion of Iraq, we hear about two Iraqi children who suffered near life-threatening injuries in the war: 8 year-old Ahmad Sharif lost his eyesight and right arm after being caught in crossfire and 3 year-old Alaa Khalid Hamdan was seriously injured when a U.S. tank opened fire on her family’s home. Their fathers join them to tell their stories and two activists speak about their efforts to bring the children to the U.S. for medical treatment.
Listen/Watch/Read
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“the US-led invasion of Iraq was an illegal act that contravened the UN charter.”
UN Chief Kofi Annan – -September 2004. Source BBC
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They Called It “The Black Room”
An elite Special Operations unit in Iraq, Task Force 6-26, beat detainees and used them as target practice. Their motto? “No Blood, No Foul.”
Task Force 6-26
In Secret Unit’s ‘Black Room,’ a Grim Portrait of U.S. Abuse
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“Knowledge makes a man unfit to be a slave.”
Frederick Douglass
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March 18, 2006
The ‘Long War’? Oh, Goodie
by Molly Ivins
AUSTIN, Texas — President Bush has once more undertaken to explain to us “Why We Fight,” which is also the title of an excellent new documentary on Iraq. According to the president, “Our goal in Iraq is victory.” I personally did not find that a helpful clarification.
According to the president, we are doomed to stay in Iraq until we “leave behind a democracy that can govern itself, sustain itself and defend itself.” That’s not exactly getting closer every day. But, the Prez sez, “A free Iraq in the heart of the Middle East will make the American people more secure for generations to come.”
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Number Of Iraqi Civilians Slaughtered In America’s War? As Many As 250,000
Number of U.S. Military Personnel Slaughtered (Officially acknowledged) In Bush’s War 2317
The War in Iraq Costs $248,302,671,361 See the cost in your community
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The star-spangled fantasyland of the fake and home of the bogus
US politicians aim for rugged, macho images because insecure voters want to feel that real men are in charge
Linda Colley
Saturday March 18, 2006
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“As a result of the war, corporations have been enthroned and an era of corruption in high places will follow, and the money power of the country will endeavor to prolong its reign by working upon the prejudices of the people until all wealth is aggregated in a few hands and the Republic is destroyed. I feel at this moment more anxiety for the safety of my country than ever before, even in the midst of war. God grant that my suspicions may prove groundless.”
U.S. President Abraham Lincoln, Nov. 21, 1864 – (letter to Col. William F. Elkins)
Ref: The Lincoln Encyclopedia, Archer H. Shaw (Macmillan, 1950, NY)
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The farcical end of the American dream
The US press is supposed to be challenging the lies of this war
By Robert Fisk
Mr Welshofer, it transpired in court, had stuffed the Iraqi General Abed Hamed Mowhoush head-first into a sleeping bag and sat on his chest, an action which – not surprisingly – caused the general to expire. The military jury ordered – reader, hold your breath – a reprimand for Mr Welshofer, the forfeiting of $6,000 of his salary and confinement to barracks for 60 days.
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They (corporations) cannot commit treason, nor be outlawed, nor excommunicated, for they have no souls
Lord Edward Coke
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Pledging to Vote for Peace
By The Nation
How many Americans would pledge to cast their votes in November only for candidates who want to end the war in Iraq?
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criminal, n. A person with predatory instincts who has not sufficient capital to form a corporation
Howard Scott
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Organizing Voters to End War
Protests and Petitions are Not Enough
“I will not vote for or support any candidate for President or Congress who does not make a speedy end to the war in Iraq, and preventing any future war of aggression, a public position in his or her campaign.?
Click here to make a difference.”
PASS THIS ON
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It is part of the moral tragedy with which we are dealing that words like “democracy,” “freedom,” “rights,” “justice,” which have so often inspired heroism and have led men to give their lives for things which make life worthwhile, can also become a trap, the means of destroying the very things men desire to uphold.
Sir Norman Angell (1874 – 1967), 1956.
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“Never again shall one generation of veterans abandon another.”
made me think of the witnesses here.
DJ, they say a picture is worth a thousand words. Thank you. That is so telling.
this took place?
Powerful!
Yes, in Portland at the rally and march. I have a photo diary of it
and you can see tons of photos here
http://portland.indymedia.org/
Bread and Puppets were in Portland
http://www.gpdesigns.com/puppets/
For the love of God, will the killing stop! Seriously this group of ppl in the WH and their administration, has to be stopped and then tried in the highest court for the war crines they do on a daily basis. Get us out…….
Military Investigating Deadly Raid in Iraq
When? Impeach before it is too late!