MoJo Articles

Afghan Guards Out of Control

By Alexandra Andrews — Tue, 01 Dec 2009 15:56:28 -0800

This story first appeared on the ProPublica website.

"Trigger-happy" private security guards in Afghanistan are killing civilians and undercutting counterinsurgency efforts, reports today's Army Times.

About twice a week, convoys up to 50 vehicles long snake westward on Highway 1 in Afghanistan, ferrying supplies to coalition bases in Helmand province. The road runs through the Maywand district in Kandahar province, where more than 30 civilians have been wounded or killed in the past four years by the private guards tasked with protecting the convoys, according to the district's senior Afghan intelligence representative.

The Obama Surge

By David Corn — Tue, 01 Dec 2009 13:02:43 -0800

President Barack Obama is surging a war to end it.

That's how he's selling his decision to expand the mess in Afghanistan he inherited from George W. Bush and Dick Cheney. In a much-anticipated speech Tuesday night that followed weeks of high-level deliberations, Obama announced what had already been purposefully leaked by the White House: that he has ordered another 30,000 American soldiers to Afghanistan. This deployment—in keeping with the request put to him by General Stanley McChrystal, the commander of US and NATO troops—will raise the total number of US troops to nearly 100,000 by next summer, ten times the force level in 2003. But speaking before an auditorium of cadets at West Point, Obama contended that the boost in troops will be temporary, a means to "create the conditions for the United States to transfer responsibility to the Afghans" for securing their own country and, most important, keeping the Taliban and al Qaeda at bay.

Brodner's Cartoon du Jour: Call to Duty: Modern Warfare 2

By Steve Brodner — Tue, 01 Dec 2009 11:31:38 -0800

Tonight Pres. Obama lays out the escalation into Quicksandistan. 30,000 more young people and their families to die or get permanently broken.

So today we ask why?

To stop a culture of war that has been ongoing there for 25 years?

To help our friend Karzai?

To kill the 100 Al Qaeda who live there (moving in and out of Pakistan)?

To prop up Obama’s brand with the military and its industrial and media complex?

Street Food Fight

By Josh Harkinson — Tue, 01 Dec 2009 04:00:00 -0800

Two weeks ago, the Culinary Institute of America held a three-day conference to celebrate what CIA president Tim Ryan called "food democracy," which he defined as "an endless variety of great foods served quickly anywhere, anytime, at affordable prices to anyone." For $1,095, here's what you got—face time with Taco Bell execs and a reigning Iron Chef, a nearly limitless supply of Spanish wine and Singaporean pepper crabs, and a chance to see Ruth Reichl make top chefs cry.

About 700 people came to California's Napa Valley for the conference, which focused on the recession's hottest food trend. With America's economic growth curbed, curbside has become the place to make waves in the food world. This year, the food truck manufacturer Armenco and the hot dog cart maker Kareem Cart saw their orders double. A new food truck rental company in Los Angeles, Road Stoves, has leased 30 rigs to chefs serving everything from Korean tacos to California-style dosas. "Across the country, taco trucks are no longer exceptional," said John T. Edge, director of the Southern Foodways Alliance and the author of several food books, including Donuts: An American Passion. "They are inspirational."

Afghanistan: Can Obama Sell Bush's Used Car?

By David Corn — Tue, 01 Dec 2009 03:00:48 -0800

At the White House daily press briefing on Monday, the reporters naturally peppered Press Secretary Robert Gibbs with many questions about President Barack Obama's coming speech on Afghanistan—and about the gate-crashers at last week's state dinner for the Indian prime minster. Gibbs, though, offered no new talking points. He reiterated that Obama was determined to get the job done in Afghanistan but that the president did not view his administration's commitment there as "open-ended." Once again, Gibbs was eliding the obvious contradiction between these two statements. Gibbs also restated Obama's belief that success cannot be had in Afghanistan if there is no credible partner in Kabul—without acknowledging that the Kabul government of President Hamid Karzai is widely regarded as inept and corrupt and without explaining what the Obama administration might do if the Karzai government cannot reform itself (a distinct possibility).

The Obama White House has been sidestepping these inconvenient truths for months, and there's no indication that Obama is going to do anything different in his West Point speech Tuesday night. But what was intriguing was how Gibbs described the US mission in Afghanistan: "We are there to partner with the Afghans" to train and stand up a military and police force "to wage the fight against an unpopular insurgency." Notice anything missing? He didn't mention Al Qaeda.

From Tea Party to Treason

By Stephanie Mencimer — Tue, 01 Dec 2009 03:00:00 -0800

Tea-party style activism has taken some nutty turns before—the Hitler references, the Holocaust pictures. But Walter Fitzpatrick III may be about to push anti-Obama activism to new heights. On Tuesday, he plans to walk into the Monroe County courthouse in tiny Madisonville, Tennessee, and attempt to convince a local grand jury to indict the president on treason and fraud charges.

Fitzpatrick is one of those alternate-reality Americans who believe that Barack Obama is actually one Barry Soetoro, a man who is not an American citizen and thus ineligible to serve as president. Fitzpatrick claims that since March, he has been trying to get federal prosecutors in Tennessee to bring treason charges against the president. All that effort earned him, however, was a visit from the Secret Service.

But then Fitzpatrick evidently discovered that Monroe County has rather liberal rules about grand juries. In most places, only a local prosecutor can present evidence to a grand jury and request an indictment. In Monroe County, any private citizen can show up with a petition and seek an indictment. The most common initiators of such proceedings are usually victims of robberies or assaults, however, not activists trying to unseat the president.

Brodner's Cartoon du Jour: You Betcha!

By Steve Brodner — Mon, 30 Nov 2009 11:19:45 -0800

For the last two weeks Sarah Palin has been blitzing the media with her blame-all, victim-athon book tour (my take on her tends toward the extra-toony). It used to be that a candidate who aspired to higher office would struggle to prove her knowledge of issues and ideas on new directions for the country. Instead, in order to solidify her standing with a sector of the boobwazee, she struggles to show how wrapped in paranoia she can be.

Sam Tannenhause puts it this way in today's New Yorker piece:

It happened...in 1976, when Ronald Reagan battled the incumbent Gerald Ford all the way to the National Convention; and in 1992, when Pat Buchanan harried George H.W. Bush during the primaries and then, in a televised address at the Convention, in Houston, thundered, "There is a religious war going on in this country." A similar revolt is under way today, though as yet no insurgent tribune has emerged—except, possibly, Sarah Palin. Polls taken last November showed that she had alienated centrists, and a majority of people still eye her with mistrust. But this is beside the point. Populists, from William Jennings Bryan and Huey Long through Joseph McCarthy and George Wallace, have always been divisive and polarizing. Their job is not to win national elections but to carry the torch and inspire the faithful, and this Palin seems poised to do. That she is the first woman to generate populist fervor on such a scale enhances her appeal—and makes her, potentially, a figure of historic consequence.

Housing Meltdown, Ground Zero

By Andy Kroll — Mon, 30 Nov 2009 09:58:10 -0800

This story first appeared on the TomDispatch website.

I. Rescuing the Dream

At the end of a week in mid-October when the Dow Jones soared past 10,000, Goldman Sachs recorded "just another fantastic quarter" with a $3.2 billion quarterly profit, JPMorgan Chase raked in a cool $3.6 billion, and a New York Times headline declared "Bailout Helps Revive Banks, And Bonuses," I spent a Saturday evening with about 100 people camped out in a northern California parking lot. A passerby, stealing a quick glance, might have taken the crowd for avid concertgoers staked out for tickets. There was, however, no concert here—just weary, huddled souls, slouched in vinyl folding chairs, covered by blankets, windbreakers, and knit hats against a late autumn chill.

A ragged line of them wound through the lot outside the entrance to the Cow Palace, a dingy arena decades past its prime on the southern edge of San Francisco. These people, and thousands more like them who had streamed into the arena all day long from as far away as Los Angeles, Phoenix, and Las Vegas, were unemployed, broke, bankrupt, or at their wit's end. They were here waiting for help—for their chance to make it inside the warm arena to participate in "America's Best Mortgage Program."

For these homeowners, the last shot at saving their homes—and their personal version of the American Dream—lay under the glow of the floodlights in a expanse where tiers of brown and yellow seats encircled a desk-lined floor more accustomed to livestock shows and rodeos. This was, in fact, the latest stop on the "Save the Dream" tour, a massive homeowner-relief event organized by a consumer advocate group, the Neighborhood Assistance Corporation of America (NACA).

Climate Change: Survival Kit

By Kiera Butler — Mon, 30 Nov 2009 04:02:00 -0800

Are there low-cost ways to adjust to a warming world? The United Nations' Local Coping Strategies Database tracks techniques already being used as communities feel the heat.

Problem: Droughts degrading soil quality in Cameroon
Adaptation: Farmers lay the horns of freshly slaughtered cattle in their fields; the horns attract insects, whose secretions fertilize the soil, increasing crop yields by as much as 75 percent. Cost: Free

Problem: Drought in Himachal Pradesh, India
Adaptation: Villagers line ravines with rocks to catch water from a melting glacier—families use what they need and sell their surplus, creating a new, water-based trade economy. Cost: Free

Problem: Floods in northeastern Thailand
Adaptation: Rice farmers once planted during the wet season, but as floods grow more common, they are switching to rice varieties that can be planted in the dry season instead. Cost: Free, thanks to foreign grants

Problem: Stronger and more frequent storms in the Philippines
Adaptation: Low-cost, easy-to-build, storm-resistant houses. Four-sided roofs protect structure from wind; supports anchor each corner to cement foundations. Cost: $1,377 per house

Problem: Growing schistosoma populations in Africa
Adaptation: These parasites cause anemia and malnutrition in 200 million people worldwide. Berries from the desert date tree kill the snails that harbor the parasites. Cost: Free

Climate Change: Desperate Measures

By Corbin Hiar — Mon, 30 Nov 2009 04:01:00 -0800

While politicians still debate the when and if of climate change, some governments and corporations are already bankrolling massive projects to stave off the catastrophic effects. But are they just global warming boondoggles?