The New American articles from July 2006

The New American archives from July 2006

"One world" not needed.(LETTERS TO THE EDITOR)(Letter to the editor)
July 10, 2006... Commenting on the article "Openly Attacking American Sovereignty," in your April 17, 2006 issue of THE NEW AMERICAN, I can only say that I wholeheartedly agree that world government would be bad, bad, bad. Many idealists who insist the...

Climate-change conclusion.(LETTERS TO THE EDITOR)(Letter to the editor)
July 10, 2006... Issue after issue, THE NEW AMERICAN belittles those calling attention to the issue of climate change. While in agreement with 90 percent of your excellent articles, this belittling troubles me greatly. In warning of economic calamity due to...

"Please speak English" sign captures attention.(social conflicts arise at Geno's)(Brief article)
July 10, 2006... "This is America," says the sign at the Geno's cheesesteak joint in South Philadelphia, the neighborhood featured in the Rocky movies. "When Ordering Please Speak English" In ordinary times such a sign would probably not even be noticed. But...

Texas-size gap between Bush and his party's faithful on immigration.(immigrations)(Brief article)
July 10, 2006... The recent state convention of the Republican Party of Texas in San Antonio provided further confirmation that the president's guest-worker/amnesty proposal is not in accord with his own party's faithful--not even in his home state. The...

Secret titles of nobility.(United States. Constitution)(Brief article)
July 10, 2006... Article I, section 9 of the U.S. Constitution specifies: "No Title of Nobility shall be granted by the United States: And no Person holding any Office of Profit or Trust under them, shall, without the Consent of the Congress, accept of any...

Zarqawi: manufactured menace.(Abu Musab al-Zarqawi)
July 10, 2006... In June 2002, Abu-Musab al-Zarqawi, a small-time Jordanian thug who aspired to become a terrorist leader, was comfortably embedded in Kurdish-dominated northern Iraq, an area not under Saddam Hussein's control. After the war began, U.S....

Portrait of "victory"?(harassing on dressing habits)(Brief article)
July 10, 2006... A June 6 memo produced by the staff of the U.S. embassy in Baghdad and leaked to the Washington Post offers snapshots of the grim and terrifying life led by local Iraqis. "Islamist and/or militia groups" have begun to exercise effective...

Bilderberg elites pushing for further Islamification of Europe?
July 10, 2006... An interesting sidelight to the annual secret meeting of the super-elite Bilderberg group in Ottawa June 8-11 (see article on page 19) is the unusually large contingent of attendees from Turkey. Does this signal a major push from the...

Scottish drug Czar: "war on drugs" can't be won.(Tom Wood's war on drugs)(Brief article)
July 10, 2006... Tom Wood, Scotland's former chief deputy constable and Current head of the Scottish Association of Alcohol and Drug Action Teams, describes the "war on drugs" as "long lost," reported the Scotsman for June 18. "We can never as a nation be...

Profiting from panic.(Department of Homeland Security)(Brief article)
July 10, 2006... The Department of Homeland Security may be a dubious instrument to protect the public from terrorism and similar calamities, but it's proving to be immensely profitable to its architects. "Dozens of members of the Bush administration's...

House Homeland Security chairman opposes amnesty.(Peter King)(Brief article)
July 10, 2006... "People would rather see no bill than to see 11 million illegals legalized." Representative Peter King (R-N. Y.) is a powerful voice in preventing amnesty for those who have entered our nation illegally.

Fake IDs proliferate among workers in Massachusetts State jobs.(identification numbers)(Jonathan Saltzman and Yvonne Abraham)(Brief article)
July 10, 2006... "One laborer who helped build the new jail in Billerica submitted a [Social Security Number] that should have immediately raised eyebrows: 666-66-6666." Jonathan Saltzman and Yvonne Abraham reported that more than a third of several...

Attention-getting statements help to sell books.(Caryl Rivers criticizes Ann Coulter )(Brief article)
July 10, 2006... "Coulter's books are a mishmash, seemingly put together with a trowel instead of a pen, a blend of invective, jokes, outrageous statements, and, from time to time, a modicum of common sense." Boston University journalism professor Caryl Rivers...

Hispanic-named hurricane gains entry to United States.(Jay Leno)(Brief article)
July 10, 2006... "There's a big storm named Alberto heading toward Florida. See, even hurricanes are getting smarter. They know a Hispanic hurricane has a better chance of getting into the United States." Comedian Jay Leno obviously knows that our southern...

Foreign aid deemed counterproductive.(Raghuranm Rajah and Arvind Subramanian)(Brief article)
July 10, 2006... "Aid inflows have systematic adverse effects on a country's competitiveness." In a report published by the International Monetary Fund, Raghuranm Rajah and Arvind Subramanian conclude that foreign aid from the United States generally does...

Lawmakers accept pay raise while refusing to vote for it.(Brief article)
July 10, 2006... "House lawmakers accepted a $3,300 raise that will increase their annual salaries to $168,500. Lawmakers easily squelched a bid by Rep. James Matheson (D-Utah) to vote on the cost-of-living raise." Noting that, in 1989, Congress arranged...

Conditions in Iraq continue to deteriorate.(Sajid Saad Hassan)(Brief article)
July 10, 2006... "I cannot talk with you. I haven't joined a party and no militia is protecting me." Formerly unaffected by much of the conflict, the port city of Basra now experiences the same kind of terror as the rest of Iraq, prompting this comment...

Chechen rebel leader betrayed by drug addict ally.(Abdul-Khalim Sudulayev)(Brief article)
July 10, 2006... "He urgently needed to buy a dose of heroin, so he sold his leader for heroin." Reporting on the capture and death of terrorist chief Abdul-Khalim Sudulayev, Chechnya Prime Minister Rarnzan Kadyrov explained that his forces were led to the...

Jekyll & Hyde? The two faces of Bush conservatism: public opinion--including conservative public opinion--is turning against Bush-style "big government conservatism." It's about time.(Cover story)
July 10, 2006... Asked to define the term "conservatism" as applied to contemporary politics, most reasonably well-informed Americans would offer a reply focusing on small, non-intrusive, fiscally responsible government. To that description some might add an...

Dealing in secrecy and power: a secret global meeting of government officials and private power elites was just held in Ottawa. Why are they exempt from accountability? Why does the media ignore them?
July 10, 2006... Another Bilderberg gathering has concluded. As usual, this exclusive annual conclave of some of the world's richest and most powerful individuals was shrouded in secrecy. Central bankers, financiers, corporate moguls, government ministers, and...

The conservative index: our third look at the 109th Congress shows how every member of the House and Senate voted on key issues, including foreign aid, immigration, and the Patriot Act.
July 10, 2006... HOUSE VOTE DESCRIPTIONS 21 Foreign Aid. The final version (conference report) of this appropriations bill (H.R. 3057) would provide $21 billion for U.S. foreign aid programs in fiscal 2006. The House passed the final version of this...

Beyond rudimentary reasoning: two books, one on the effects of inflation and the other on the existence of God, offer thought-provoking perusal for those who savor analytical reasoning.(Age of Inflation Continued by Hans F. Sennholz)(The Answer to the Greatest Question by F. John Perna)(Book review)
July 10, 2006... Age of Inflation Continued, by Hans F. Sennholz, Grove City, Pennsylvania: Libertarian Press, Inc., 2006, 45 pages, booklet. (For ordering information, see page 6.) Hans F. Sennholz has long been one of the nation's best economists. In his...

Trust in God & fear nothing: confederate Gen. Lewis Armistead and Union Gen. Winfield Scott Hancock--like many of their contemporaries--were good friends who found themselves on opposite sides in the Civil War.
July 10, 2006... The humid air hung thick and heavy on July 3, 1863, blanketing the men of Brigadier General Lewis A. Armistead's brigade as they nervously waited for the command to advance upon the Union center situated along Gettysburg's Cemetery Ridge. His...

Miracle in fiery crash.(rescue of driver in an accidents)(Brief article)
July 10, 2006... On December 16, 2004, James Lonnie Hensley of Skygusty, West Virginia, and his wife, Regina, were driving from Norfolk to Welch. Hearing a loud noise, Hensley checked his rearview mirror and observed the aftermath of a head-on collision between...

A firefighting hero.(fire fighter's injuries during its rescur operations)(Brief article)
July 10, 2006... Lieutenant Rich Montoya, a 30-year veteran of the Denver Fire Department, was just two months away from retirement when, on May 14, he and his crew responded to fight a house fire and successfully rescued a 16-year-old girl from the burning...

Dramatic rescue.(reports of accidents)
July 10, 2006... On February 2, the city of Santa Cruz, California, police department received a request for assistance from the Santa Cruz County Sheriff's Department. A paroled ex-convict had stolen an SUV and was leading sheriff's deputy Stefan Fish on a...

Volunteering dynamo.(services of Arlene Holzman)(Brief article)
July 10, 2006... Arlene Holzman, a 74-year-old grandmother from Symmes Township, Ohio, first heard about the Juvenile Diabetes Research Foundation 18 years ago. Since that time, she has given countless hours to help the foundation and other worthy causes in...

Big burglar.(EXERCISING THE RIGHT)
July 10, 2006... A burglar barged into the Anchorage, Alaska, home of Brian Knowlton at 2:30 a.m. on June 2. Thoughtless and destructive, the burglar broke some dishes and took a box of chocolates, obviously ignoring his already ponderous waistline and...

Justice served with sense on the side.
July 10, 2006... On August 20, 2005, Sergeant Matthew Young of the U.S. Army, his friend, and their girlfriends were leaving a bar when a group of about seven apparently intoxicated people "accosted them and wouldn't let them leave," reported the Olympian...

Insurance company pays to defend suit.(wrongful death suit against Alfred Cook)
July 10, 2006... Two men who had known each other for over 40 years, Alfred Cook and Richard Barber, got into an altercation over construction equipment. Barber said that Cook simply took the equipment. "Cook said the men struck a deal that Cook would keep the...

Spirit of the law.(Georgia law)(Brief article)
July 10, 2006... In Lawrenceville, Georgia, 17-year-old Alrazi Basher was doing a criminal's version of shopping, breaking into houses and taking whatever he wanted, when the owner of one of the houses came home. When Ronald Ramsey returned to his house, he...

"Faith-based science"?(myths on darwinism)
July 10, 2006... ITEM: "Mayor [Michael] Bloomberg lashed out against conservatives yesterday," reported the New York Daily News for May 26, "for ignoring science and common sense on issues such as stem-cell research, global warming and even evolution. Making...

Lessons from Haditha.(Abu Gharib prisoner scandal)
July 10, 2006... Haditha, Iraq, remains in the news. Perhaps not since the Abu Ghraib prisoner scandal, or even the infamous My Lai massacre in Vietnam in March 1968, when American troops killed hundreds of Vietnamese civilians, has the U.S. military received...

From the editor.(Editorial)
July 24, 2006... Every country needs to possess the ability to protect itself against enemies both foreign and domestic, or it will lose its freedom. Necessary protections include not only police and armed forces but also intelligence services. But the...

Deep-sixing Senate inquiry into Iraq Intel failure.(INSIDER REPORT)
July 24, 2006... During 2004 Senate hearings into prewar intelligence on Iraq, Senator Pat Roberts (R-Kan.), chairman of the Senate Intelligence Committee, deferred until after the election an inquiry into the most contentious issue: whether Bush administration...

CIA disbands unit that has tracked bin Laden.(Central Intelligence Agency special unit for al-Qaeda leader Osama bin Laden shuts down)(Brief article)
July 24, 2006... National Public Radio reported on July 3 that the CIA's special unit that has been searching for al-Qaeda leader Osama bin Laden has been shut down. The New York Times, citing unnamed intelligence officials, reported on July 4 that the CIA's...

Falling into al-Qaeda's trap.(Brief article)
July 24, 2006... Defenders of the Bush administration's war in Iraq have often invoked the "flypaper strategy"--namely, the idea that by attracting Islamist radicals to Iraq, the United States would be fighting them "over there" rather than "over here." ...

Costs of war--and bad intelligence.(Lawrence Lindsey)
July 24, 2006... In September 2002, then-White House economic adviser Lawrence Lindsey predicted that war with Iraq would cost as much as $200 billion. His candor about the costs of the war got him fired. After all, Lindsey's estimate was denounced as "very,...

NSA and CIA domestic spying programs presaged in proposed TIA.(National Security Agency)(Brief article)
July 24, 2006... The ongoing partisan wrangling over exposure of two major domestic spying operations by the Bush administration was to be expected: Clinton-Gore-Reno Democrats (who ignored Clinton-Gore-Reno spying abuses) are shrieking that the Bush-led...

White House, GOP, Dems Court La Raza Radicals.
July 24, 2006... The National Council of La Raza announced on June 21 the stellar political lineup of speakers for its annual national conference in July. Leading the listed notables are former President Bill Clinton and Karl Rove, President Bush's political...

Hamdan case: a victory for individual rights.
July 24, 2006... The U.S. Supreme Court handed devotees of individual liberty a victory with the June 29 Hamdan v. Rumsfeld decision, where by a 5-3 margin justices struck down a military tribunal called by the president for trying alleged terrorists at...

Whom are we arresting?(Osama bin Laden)(Brief article)
July 24, 2006... "Osama bin Laden is happy. In my country today, instead of arresting terrorists, we're arresting those who are hunting terrorists." European Parliament member Jas Gawronski of Italy is not happy that the Italian government is seeking the...

Bin Laden is still hunted.(QuickQuotes)(Brief article)
July 24, 2006... "The efforts to find Osama bin Laden are as strong as ever." CIA spokeswoman Jennifer Millerwise Dyek put a positive spin on the disbanding of the CIA unit known as "Alec Station," which was tasked with finding bin Laden.

War crimes panel member comments on CIA use of Nazi informants after WWII.(Central Intelligence Agency)(Brief article)
July 24, 2006... "Using bad people can have very bad consequences." Elizabeth Holtzman, a former congresswoman from New York and a member of the Nazi War Crimes and Japanese Imperial Government Records Interagency Working Group, says the CIA used former...

Top UN official discusses attitude of world toward United States.(Brief article)
July 24, 2006... "There is currently a perception among many otherwise quite moderate countries that anything the U.S. supports must have a secret agenda... and therefore, put crudely, should be opposed without any real discussion of whether [it makes] sense...

Scholar predicts more strife if West continues present course.(Brief article)
July 24, 2006... "Notwithstanding its military superiority, unless the West accepts the East's fight to determine its own future, the bloodshed that currently marks the contest will continue." In addition to issuing the above statement in his recent book,...

Iraqi teen welcomed at West Point.(QuickQuotes)(Brief article)
July 24, 2006... "I'm going to help rebuild the Iraqi army because most of the officers now in the Iraqi army, they are not very well qualified. I'll try to transfer what I learn here." Incoming cadet Jameel declined to give his last name to the press for...

Bush defends spying on Americans.(Central Intelligence Agency)(Brief article)
July 24, 2006... "The disclosure of this program is disgraceful." When President George W. Bush offered this assessment of the media's disclosure of the secret CIA "Swift" program for monitoring bank data, he added that "the American people expect this...

Spy nation: does the vast, immensely expensive, and largely unaccountable centralized intelligence system created by the Bush administration really make us safer?(Central Intelligence Agency)(Hassan Mustafa Osama Nasr)(Cover story)
July 24, 2006... Hassan Mustafa Osama Nasr, a radical Islamic cleric residing in Milan, was on his way to the mosque for noon prayers when he was seized by several men and stuffed into a van. From there he was taken to the U.S. Air Force Base in Aviano, and...

Emerging police state: imprisonment without trial and the torture of prisoners are hallmarks of an oppressive police state, yet George Bush and his administration openly promote these practices.
July 24, 2006... CIA prisoner Benyam Mohammed al Habashi, an Ethiopian refugee who obtained residence in Britain in 1994, hung by his hands from electrical cords in a secret Moroccan jail in August 2002. After the Muslim convert had been picked up by Pakistani...

Administration resents "swift" kick: after the press reported that a secret operation following the money trails to terrorists was including financial dealings of innocent citizens, the neo-conservatives lashed back.(Society for Worldwide Interbank Financial Telecommunication)
July 24, 2006... On June 23, Vice President Dick Cheney harshly criticized the nation's news media for disclosing information about the Society for Worldwide Interbank Financial Telecommunication, or Swift. According to the disclosure appearing in the New York...

The NSA and domestic spying: the Bush administration's warrantless surveillance has become a concern for both sides of the political spectrum, but it's still being defended.(National Security Agency)(National organization overview)
July 24, 2006... The Central Security Agency, the not-so-fictional entity where soccer morn Cathy Davis (played by actress Lea Thompson) works part-time in the Hallmark TV mystery movie Jane Doe, seems to be totally dedicated to catching the "bad guys." If any...

Before 9/11: it's now five years since the 9/11 attacks and serious questions remain unanswered. Among these is whether or not the U.S. government had prior warning of the attacks.
July 24, 2006... The day after the attacks on 9/11, journalists Alexander Cockburn and Jeffrey St. Clair reported that both the World Trade Center and a nearby military base had been moved to high alert just weeks before. The Trade Center went on heightened...

What government can do to you: our government has steadily, and increasingly openly, treated Americans as dispensable assets--to be used or discarded at will.(Viewpoint essay)
July 24, 2006... About 15 years ago, I was reporting and writing for the Washington Times editorial page. Until that time, I was a conventional conservative Republican, a Reaganite raised by conservative parents, and generally believed that most of what...

Players, plans, and betrayals: as WWII proceeded, Soviet and British intelligence operatives and American private interests sought to infiltrate and influence American operations.
July 24, 2006... May 1941, New York City. The 33-year-old woman stepped out of the office building lobby onto Broadway. It was late in the evening. "The street as usual at that hour was deserted," she would later recall, "except for two young men, one on either...

TV's 24: entertaining--as fiction: weekly "lifeboat" decisions of super-agent Jack Bauer protect the lives of fictional millions, but without addressing the real moral consequences of situational ethics.
July 24, 2006... A Disclaimer: Before starting this review, you should know that I love the television show 24. I may even be addicted to this unusually timely and thrilling show about the intelligence world, a fast-paced hour-long adventure that follows the...

Alert and ready.(Burt Bellows on his self defense at his jewelry store)(Brief article)
July 24, 2006... Burt Bellows, a storeowner in Mooresville, Indiana, was really on the ball on the night of May 26. Not only did he have a gun ready in his store in case of criminals, he was alert enough to notice that an unidentified man was outside his...

Protecting someone else's property.(Mark Diamond defence on his neighbour's house burglary)(Brief article)
July 24, 2006... An Oakfield Township, Michigan, man named Mark Diamond learned recently that it is legal in his state to use a gun to defend someone else's property--if your own life is in danger. Diamond had been keeping an eye on his neighbor's house...

Car wash washout.(McRon Thompson on his carjackers case)(Brief article)
July 24, 2006... McRon Thompson of Richmond, Texas, stopped at a car wash to clean his vehicle at about 1 a.m. on May 26, shortly after leaving work. While he was cleaning his car, he noticed three vehicles slowly cruise through the parking lot. When he noticed...

War at home.(Willie Brown reports on his home burglary)(Brief article)
July 24, 2006... Korean War veteran Willie Brown said that at 6:45 a.m. on the morning of June 15, he imagined he was back in a foxhole in Korea because an intruder was menacing him in his house. And like in Korea, when threatened, he fought. Brown...

People problem.(robbery, shooting increases)(Brief article)
July 24, 2006... On Saturday, May 20 in Memphis, Tennessee's small Lauderdale Market, two robbers made a clerk lie on the floor and took $600 and cigarettes. The next day just before midnight, three men attempted to rob the same store as the owner, Adam Obsiye,...

Increasing unemployment with minimum effort.
July 24, 2006... ITEM: "In an election year," said the Christian Science Monitor for June 22, "it's a dream issue for the Democrats: The Republican-controlled Congress has not raised the federal minimum wage in nine years, despite strong public support for an...

Immigration & integration.(free trade brings economic reform in Europe)
July 24, 2006... Open any international business college textbook these days--granted, this isn't something that an average person would do in his spare time for fun--and one will likely find some discussion about a topic called "regional integration." Sounds...