THE FEDERAL ELECTIONS ARE UPON US

by Betty Luks:
I thought during this moment in our nation's history, it would be good for us all to take time out to consider what could be our long-term future if we can't change its direction. Individually, personally, we must take responsibility for the votes we are about to cast. A question concerned Australians will ask themselves -- as they bring to mind the whole corrupted system -- is summed up in a question form from the second verse of the Royal Anthem: How do we… "Confound their politics and frustrate their knavish tricks?"

We need to be reminded of some important lessons from history. To this end, I offer a portion of a speech a Roman soldier made to the Roman Senate during the worst of Rome's licentiousness, corruption and decay. As a professional soldier, he had served his nation in many parts of the Empire before finally retiring to his family estate near the capital of Rome. He was so appalled at the state of his nation on his return, at the risk to his own freedom and life, he felt compelled to address his fellow Romans thus:

"In this very Senate, not many years ago, a senator was done to death because he spoke the truth. Not by knife or sword or spear was he murdered, and not by honest stones. No honourable hand struck him down, for there was no honourable hand here. He spoke of Rome. He cried out that Rome was no longer a republic, and that she had become a bloodthirsty empire, ruled not by men of wisdom and not by law, but by Caesar and his legions, and his generals and his rapacious freedmen and his palace politicians.
That senator was a young man with a bright eye and a heart like a sacred bull, fired by his love for his country. A brutal young man, who used no polished phrases and had no elegances. He had only love for his country. A passionate young man who believed that truth was invulnerable, and that lies were as fragile as a spider's web. But, you see, he only loved his country, and only fools love their country.
"For greed", that young senator cried to you, "the mobs in this city supported evil Caesars, who lusted only for power, because those Caesars promised them loot from the public treasuries. Venal senators supported those Caesars, for profit and power.
The lying Caesars spoke to the mobs and told them that our country could not defend itself against barbarians without allies, who must endlessly be bought and cajoled and flattered.
And the traitorous Caesars plotted against their nation, mad with the lust to be gilded like gods by the whole world, and to be acclaimed by millions of thieves and beggars and wrestlers and freedmen men and the pusillanimous, who never felt a pulse of patriotism in their vultures' hearts!"
"Look at my scars, the evidences of my wounds," said the old Roman soldier. "You senators, you scoundrels, you perfumed liars, look at my wounds! You sleek rascals who bed in silk to the strumming of lyres and the murmurs of prostitutes and dissolute women and bought concubines - look at my wounds!
Are they on your smooth flesh? Are similar wounds in your hearts, you who betray Rome with every breath and lead her to hell with every law? …
Bow no longer to false Caesars, who, defying our very Constitution, issue mandates against the welfare of Rome and place themselves above the law which our fathers formulated, and for which they pledged their lives, their fortunes and their sacred honour…
Rome was conceived in faith and in justice, and in the worship of God, and in the name of the manhood of man. Return our country to the rule of law and strike down the rule by men. Restore the treasuries. Withdraw our legions from foreign lands which hate us, and will destroy us at a moment's notice when it serves their interests. Repeal the taxes which crush those who work hard and industriously… Drive from the Palatine itself the masses of toadies and self-seekers and thieves!…
Romans! In the name of God, in the name of Cincinnatus, the Father of his Country, in the name of heroism and peace and manliness and freedom and justice, I beg of you to restore yourselves as the guardians of Rome, to cast out the usurper of the powers which rightfully belong to you, to impeach and to punish those who seized those powers in order to pervert the laws of our fathers!
Let your Roman hearts speak and your Roman spirits cry out against the expedient and the corrupt, against the vainglorious and the traitors, against Caesars who anoint themselves as gods and hold court for the depraved and the ambitious and those who would dissipate the strength of our people, our Constitution and our traditions!
If you turn from your country, then she will die, and a thousand, thousand legions shall not save her and a thousand bloody Caesars will vainly shout to the winds."

ANOTHER EXAMPLE OF "HOW THE VIRGIN BECAME A WHORE"

BAGHDAD YEAR ZERO

by Naomi Klein, Common Dreams Centre. Published in the September, 2004 issue of Harper's Magazine, September 26, 2004.
"It was only after I had been in Baghdad for a month that I found what I was looking for. I had travelled to Iraq a year after the war began, at the height of what should have been a construction boom, but after weeks of searching I had not seen a single piece of heavy machinery apart from tanks and humvees.
Then I saw it: a construction crane. It was big and yellow and impressive, and when I caught a glimpse of it around a corner in a busy shopping district I thought that I was finally about to witness some of the reconstruction I had heard so much about. But as I got closer I noticed that the crane was not actually rebuilding anything -- not one of the bombed-out government buildings that still lay in rubble all over the city, nor one of the many power lines that remained in twisted heaps even as the heat of summer was starting to bear down. No, the crane was hoisting a giant billboard to the top of a three-story building. SUNBULAH: HONEY 100% NATURAL, made in Saudi Arabia.

The Flies are around the honey
Seeing the sign, I couldn't help but think about something Senator John McCain had said back in October. Iraq, he said, is "a huge pot of honey that's attracting a lot of flies." The flies McCain was referring to were the Halliburtons and Bechtels, as well as the venture capitalists who flocked to Iraq in the path cleared by Bradley Fighting Vehicles and laser-guided bombs.

A country had just been 'cracked wide open'
The honey that drew them was not just no-bid contracts and Iraq's famed oil wealth but the myriad investment opportunities offered by a country that had just been cracked wide open after decades of being sealed off, first by the nationalist economic policies of Saddam Hussein, then by asphyxiating United Nations sanctions.
Looking at the honey billboard, I was also reminded of the most common explanation for what has gone wrong in Iraq, a complaint echoed by everyone from John Kerry to Pat Buchanan: Iraq is mired in blood and deprivation because George W. Bush didn't have "a postwar plan." The only problem with this theory is that it isn't true: The Bush Administration did have a plan for what it would do after the war; put simply, it was to lay out as much honey as possible, then sit back and wait for the flies.

The honey theory of Iraqi reconstruction stems from the most cherished belief of the war's ideological architects: that greed is good. Not good just for them and their friends but good for humanity, and certainly good for Iraqis. Greed creates profit, which creates growth, which creates jobs and products and services and everything else anyone could possibly need or want. The role of good government, then, is to create the optimal conditions for corporations to pursue their bottomless greed, so that they in turn can meet the needs of the society. The problem is that governments, even neoconservative governments, rarely get the chance to prove their sacred theory right. Despite their enormous ideological advances, even George Bush's Republicans are, in their own minds, perennially sabotaged by meddling Democrats, intractable unions, and alarmist environmentalists.

The old Iraq to be erased
Iraq was going to change all that. In one place on Earth, the theory would finally be put into practice in its most perfect and uncompromised form. A country of 25 million would not be rebuilt as it was before the war; it would be erased, disappeared. In its place would spring forth a gleaming showroom for laissez-faire economics, a utopia such as the world had never seen. Every policy that liberates multinational corporations to pursue their quest for profit would be put into place: a shrunken state, a flexible workforce, open borders, minimal taxes, no tariffs, no ownership restrictions.
The people of Iraq would, of course, have to endure some short-term pain: assets, previously owned by the state, would have to be given up to create new opportunities for growth and investment. Jobs would have to be lost and, as foreign products flooded across the border, local businesses and family farms would, unfortunately, be unable to compete.

But to the authors of this plan, these would be small prices to pay for the economic boom that would surely explode once the proper conditions were in place, a boom so powerful the country would practically rebuild itself. The fact that the boom never came and Iraq continues to tremble under explosions of a very different sort should never be blamed on the absence of a plan. Rather, the blame rests with the plan itself, and the extraordinarily violent ideology upon which it is based.

Economic 'shock therapy' needed
Torturers believe that when electrical shocks are applied to various parts of the body simultaneously subjects are rendered so confused about where the pain is coming from that they become incapable of resistance. A declassified CIA "Counterintelligence Interrogation" manual from 1963 describes how a trauma inflicted on prisoners opens up "an interval -- which may be extremely brief -- of suspended animation, a kind of psychological shock or paralysis. . . . [A]t this moment the source is far more open to suggestion, far likelier to comply."
A similar theory applies to economic shock therapy, or "shock treatment," the ugly term used to describe the rapid implementation of free-market reforms imposed on Chile in the wake of General Augusto Pinochet's coup.

The theory is that if painful economic "adjustments" are brought in rapidly and in the aftermath of a seismic social disruption like a war, a coup, or a government collapse, the population will be so stunned, and so preoccupied with the daily pressures of survival, that it too will go into suspended animation, unable to resist. As Pinochet's finance minister, Admiral Lorenzo Gotuzzo, declared: "The dog's tail must be cut off in one chop."

That, in essence, was the working thesis in Iraq, and in keeping with the belief that private companies are more suited than governments for virtually every task, the White House decided to privatise the task of privatising Iraq's state-dominated economy.
Two months before the war began, USAID began drafting a work order, to be handed out to a private company, to oversee Iraq's "transition to a sustainable market-driven economic system." The document states that the winning company (which turned out to be the KPMG offshoot Bearing Point) (Goodbye KPMG - The Editor) will take "appropriate advantage of the unique opportunity for rapid progress in this area presented by the current configuration of political circumstances." Which is precisely what happened.

L. Paul Bremer, who led the U.S. occupation of Iraq from May 2, 2003, until he caught an early flight out of Baghdad on June 28, admits that when he arrived, "Baghdad was on fire, literally, as I drove in from the airport." But before the fires from the "shock and awe" military onslaught were even extinguished, Bremer unleashed his shock therapy, pushing through more wrenching changes in one sweltering summer than the International Monetary Fund has managed to enact over three decades in Latin America. Joseph Stiglitz, Nobel laureate and former chief economist at the World Bank, describes Bremer's reforms as "an even more radical form of shock therapy than pursued in the former Soviet world."

The tone of Bremer's tenure was set with his :-
· First major act on the job: he fired 500,000 state workers, most of them soldiers, but also doctors, nurses, teachers, publishers, and printers.
· Next, he flung open the country's borders to absolutely unrestricted imports: no tariffs, no duties, no inspections, no taxes.
Iraq, Bremer declared two weeks after he arrived, was "open for business."
One month later, Bremer unveiled the centrepiece of his reforms. Before the invasion, Iraq's non-oil-related economy had been dominated by 200 state-owned companies, which produced everything from cement to paper to washing machines. In June, Bremer flew to an economic summit in Jordan and announced that these firms would be privatised immediately. "Getting inefficient state enterprises into private hands," he said, "is essential for Iraq's economic recovery." It would be the largest state liquidation sale since the collapse of the Soviet Union.

But Bremer's economic engineering had only just begun. In September, to entice foreign investors to come to Iraq, he enacted a radical set of laws unprecedented in their generosity to multinational corporations:-
· There was Order 37, which lowered Iraq's corporate tax rate from roughly 40 percent to a flat 15 percent.
· There was Order 39, which allowed foreign companies to own 100 percent of Iraqi assets outside of the natural-resource sector. Even better, investors could take 100 percent of the profits they made in Iraq out of the country; they would not be required to reinvest and they would not be taxed.
· Under Order 39, they could sign leases and contracts that would last for forty years.
· Order 40 welcomed foreign banks to Iraq under the same favourable terms.
· All that remained of Saddam Hussein's economic policies was a law restricting trade unions and collective bargaining.

If these policies sound familiar, it's because they are the same ones multinationals around the world lobby for from national governments and in international trade agreements. But while these reforms are only ever enacted in part, or in fits and starts, Bremer delivered them all, all at once.
Overnight, Iraq went from being the most isolated country in the world to being, on paper, its widest-open market.
At first, the shock-therapy theory seemed to hold:
Iraqis, reeling from violence both military and economic, were far too busy staying alive to mount a political response to Bremer's campaign. Worrying about the privatisation of the sewage system was an unimaginable luxury with half the population lacking access to clean drinking water; the debate over the flat tax would have to wait until the lights were back on. Even in the international press, Bremer's new laws, though radical, were easily upstaged by more dramatic news of political chaos and rising crime.

A Wal-Mart can take over the country!
Some people were paying attention, of course. That autumn was awash in "rebuilding Iraq" trade shows, in Washington, London, Madrid, and Amman. The Economist described Iraq under Bremer as "a capitalist dream," and a flurry of new consulting firms were launched promising to help companies get access to the Iraqi market, their boards of directors stacked with well-connected Republicans. The most prominent was New Bridge Strategies, started by Joe Allbaugh, former Bush-Cheney campaign manager. "Getting the rights to distribute Procter & Gamble products can be a gold mine," one of the company's partners enthused. "One well-stocked 7-Eleven could knock out thirty Iraqi stores; a Wal-Mart could take over the country."
Soon there were rumours that a McDonald's would be opening up in downtown Baghdad, funding was almost in place for a Starwood luxury hotel, and General Motors was planning to build an auto plant. On the financial side, HSBC would have branches all over the country, Citigroup was preparing to offer substantial loans guaranteed against future sales of Iraqi oil, and the bell was going to ring on a New York - style stock exchange in Baghdad any day.

In only a few months, the postwar plan to turn Iraq into a laboratory for the neocons had been realised. Leo Strauss may have provided the intellectual framework for invading Iraq pre-emptively, but it was that other University of Chicago professor, Milton Friedman, author of the anti-government manifesto Capitalism and Freedom, who supplied the manual for what to do once the country was safely in America's hands.
This represented an enormous victory for the most ideological wing of the Bush Administration.
But it was also something more:
The culmination of two interlinked power struggles, one among Iraqi exiles advising the White House on its postwar strategy, the other within the White House itself…
To be continued…

Editor's note: It is not possible to publish the whole lengthy article in On Target. Those who would like to read it in full can request a copy from: P.O. Box 27, Happy Valley, S.A. 5159. Please include $5 to cover costs and don't forget to include postal details

SOLDIERS TOLD TO RE-ENLIST OR FACE DEPLOYMENT TO IRAQ

As you read the following news report, ask your self: How many children from the Bush, Cheney or Blair or Howard or Downer families are enlisting to fight their wars? These wars are not in genuine defence of our own nation. Why should my children be maimed and killed in their wars for more power and control?
According to the Colorado Springs Rocky Mountain News' reporter, Dick Foster, 16th September, 2004 - American soldiers from a Fort Carson combat unit say they have been issued an ultimatum - re-enlist for three more years or be transferred to other units expected to deploy to Iraq. Hundreds of soldiers from the 3rd Brigade Combat Team were presented with that message and a re-enlistment form in a series of assemblies last Thursday, said two soldiers who spoke on condition of anonymity. The effort is part of a restructuring of the Army into smaller, more flexible forces that can deploy rapidly around the world.

A Fort Carson spokesman confirmed the re-enlistment drive is under way and one of the soldiers provided the form to the Rocky Mountain News. An Army spokesman denied, however, that soldiers who don't re-enlist with the brigade were threatened. The form, if signed, would bind the soldier to the 3rd Brigade until Dec. 31, 2007. The two soldiers said they were told that those who did not sign would be transferred out of the 3rd Brigade Combat Team.
"They said if you refuse to re-enlist with the 3rd Brigade, we'll send you down to the 3rd Armoured Cavalry Regiment, which is going to Iraq for a year, and you can stay with them, or we'll send you to Korea, or to Fort Riley (in Kansas) where they're going to Iraq," said one of the soldiers, a sergeant.

The second soldier, an enlisted man who was interviewed separately, essentially echoed that view. "They told us if we don't re-enlist, then we'd have to be reassigned. And where we're most needed is in units that are going back to Iraq in the next couple of months. So if you think you're getting out, you're not," he said. The brigade's presentation outraged many soldiers who are close to fulfilling their obligation and are looking forward to civilian life, the sergeant said. "We have a whole platoon who refuses to sign," he said.

A Fort Carson spokesman said Wednesday that 3rd Brigade recruitment officers denied threatening the soldiers with Iraq duty. "I can only tell you what the retention officers told us: The soldiers were not being told they will go to Iraq, but they may go to Iraq," said the spokesman, who gave that explanation before being told later to direct all inquiries to the Pentagon.
Sending soldiers to Iraq with less than one year of their enlistment remaining "would not be taken lightly," Lt. Col. Gerard Healy said from the Pentagon Wednesday. "We realize that we deal with people and with families, and that's got to be a factor," he said
"There's probably a lot of places on post where they could put those folks (who don't re-enlist) until their time expires. But I don't want to rule out the possibility that they could go to a unit that might deploy," said Healy.

Under current Army practice, members of Iraq-bound units are "stop-lossed," meaning they could be retained in the unit for an entire year in Iraq, even if their active-duty enlistment expires. A recruiter told the sergeant that the Army would keep them "as long as they needed us."
Extending a soldier's active duty is within Army authority, since the enlistment contract carries an eight-year obligation, even if a soldier signs for only three or four years of active duty.
The 3rd Brigade recruiting effort is part of the Army's plan to restructure large divisions of more than 10,000 soldiers into smaller, more flexible, more numerous brigade- sized "Units of Action" of about 3,500 soldiers each.

The Army envisions building each unit into a cohesive whole and staffing them with soldiers who will stay with the unit for longer periods of time, said John Pike, head of the defense analysis think tank Global Security. "They want these units to fight together and train together. They're basically trying to keep these brigades together throughout training and deployment, so I can understand why they would want to shed anybody who was not going to be there for the whole cycle," Pike said.
But some soldiers presented with the re-enlistment message last week believe they've already done their duty and should not be penalized for choosing to leave. They deployed to Iraq for a year with the 3rd Brigade last April.

"I don't want to go back to Iraq," said the sergeant. "I went through a lot of things for the Army that weren't necessary and were risky. Iraq has changed a lot of people." The enlisted soldier said the recruiters' message left him troubled, unable to sleep and "filled with dread." "For me, it wasn't about going back to Iraq. It's just the fact that I'm ready to get out of the Army," he said.

Soldiers' choice at Fort Carson
WHAT THE FORM SAID
o "Elect not to extend or re-enlist and understand that the soldier will be reassigned IAW (in accordance with) the needs of the Army by Department of the Army HRC (Human Resources Command) . . . or Fort Carson G1 (Personnel Office).'"
WHAT IT MEANS
o Soldiers who sign the letter are bound to the 3rd Brigade Combat Team until Dec. 31, 2007.
o Soldiers who do not sign the letter might be transferred out of the brigade and possibly to Iraq.
https://www.rockymountainnews.com/drmn/state/article/0,1299,DRMN_21_3185596,00.h

JEREMY LEE FOR LAUNCESTON, TASMANIA

BOOKS, BOOKS, BOOKS

"Killing Hope: US Military & CIA Interventions since WW II," by William Blum.
The West has been soundly conditioned to react Pavlovianly to a number of psycho-political terms; 'swear words' such as 'communist' or 'fascist', terms intended to conjure up mental pictures from Stalinist purges to slave-labour camps. A 'Them' agin 'Us' reflex.
"Them" can mean a peasant in the Philippines, a mural-painter in Nicaragua, or a legally-elected prime minister in British Guiana - but all, somehow, presented as part of the same monolithic conspiracy; all in some way, a threat to our Way of Life. William Blum has done a mammoth service to his people by listing the destabilising, revolutionary activities of the U.S. Military and the CIA, from China in the 1940s to the invasion of Iraq in 2003. Price $40.00 posted.

"Responsible Government in a Free Society" by Dr. Geoffrey Dobbs. What are Christians to think about the centralisation of power? How do we go about regenerating our society? It is one thing to be aware of the problems now besetting us. It is another thing to present some constructive solutions. In this little gem Dr. Dobbs deals with the historical understanding of the responsibility of the People and 'government'. Price: $7.00 posted.

"Republic? More Power for Politicians" by Dr. David Mitchell.
As we face the latest push for 'a republic' it is worthwhile to read again Dr. David Mitchell's booklet explaining the foundational principles of our system of government. It provides a simple guide to the philosophical and historical background of Australia's governmental structure. Price: $5.00 posted.