I have an idea. Actually, to give due credit, it comes from ETS! fan (and Pinkos lead singer) Vanessa Veselka. The idea is this: send in nonviolent delegations of US citizens, in waves, with food, into Afghanistan. Dare the US to bomb them. And again, to the next wave, and so on. If they do, you have dead Americans and, perhaps, enough of an uproar that Bush and the Pentagon will stop and millions of Afghans will be fed. If Bush and his executioners keep killing American resisters and the food does not get in, at least we will have tried, and at least the world will know that not all US citizens will stand idly by and allow their country to be responsible for the death of millions. Some of us, in fact, will risk our own lives to stop it.

Time is short. That's the idea. Anyone interested? E-mail me: gparrish@seattleweekly.com. --Geov Parrish

Two weeks ago, reporters following the Northern Alliance troops in Afghanistan were writing that the Northern Alliance forces had reached the outskirts of the key northern city of Mazar-i-Sharif. They gleefully predicted that the Northern Alliance would take the city in 24-48 hours. Then, suddenly, the joyful news stories ceased and there was only silence, particularly in the US press. That's because the Taliban began a counter-offensive that drove the Northern Alliance back 40 miles from the city, where they've been bogged down since. Since then, Reuters and BBC reporters have commented on how the Northern Alliance troops are rag-tag, disorganized, ill-equipped, unmotivated, lacking food for the winter, and ready to desert as soon as the snows and cold weather set in. Naturally, there's no mention of this in the US, where the press only reports Rumsfeld's statements about air-dropping weapons and food to Northern Alliance troops. But, if true, where are the weapons and food going? Think "black market," and you'll be close to the truth.

In the meantime, US efforts to cobble together a new government for Afghanistan are failing miserably. Our two main allies in the region--Russia and Pakistan--are dead set against allowing the Northern Alliance to rule the country, even if it could get its act together. The former Afgani king is a royal ditherer. Efforts to organize an uprising among southern Pashtun tribes have been a joke, as each Afghani exile sent into the country is ambushed by Taliban militias--first Abdul Haq and now Hamid Karzai. Somebody must be tipping off the Taliban: either loyal Pashtun tribesmen or Pakistani intelligence officers. Both scenarios spell trouble for the US war effort.

As to killing or undermining the Taliban leadership, no progress has been made. The US commando raid that was hailed as such a success in the US press weeks ago was reported very differently in the UK, where at least two publications-the Independent and the Telegraph--reported that the raid "ran into unexpectedly fierce resistance and almost ended in disaster...The attack was meant to be a purely cosmetic exercise for the benefit of the media and the public against a relatively safe and poorly defended target. But there was a failure of intelligence, and the troops from the elite 75th Rangers Regiment ran into such heavy fire on the ground near Kandahar that they had to beat a hasty retreat." [Independent, 10/26/01.] Which is why no further rapid ground attacks have been ordered in the weeks since.

Instead, US planes are carpet bombing Taliban front lines, to no avail. The New York Times (11/2/01) reports that the Northern Alliance troops are pissed that the bombs aren't killing Taliban soldiers: "...the [Northern Alliance] soldiers gave identical reports: that the waves of American bombs that fell there today delivered plenty of flash and thunder but appeared to have largely missed their targets. Shells and bullets flew out of the Taliban positions almost as soon as the smoke had cleared, the soldiers said, and hardly let up through the day." A senior Northern Alliance official "complained that the American bombing campaign appeared increasingly misguided and ineffectual."

Only the Irish Times (11/2/01) has thought to print an analysis by a military person, Col. E.D. Doyle, who gives us some information as to why the bombs are not killing Taliban troops. "...old-fashioned 'carpet bombing' with 'iron' bombs proved devastating to Iraqi troops...The target area was comparatively small and concentrated in open desert. There was no foliage; the trenches were visible from above and relatively easy to hit." But the Taliban are hiding in caves in mountainous territory where the trenches are invisible and the caves, which have been dug deeper into the mountains throughout two decades of war, are impenetrable, except by "bunker-busting bombs." But to use those bombs the US military has to have really good intelligence about where particular caves are and how deep they are. And they don't have it. In the meantime, "iron" bombs are killing Afghani civilians.--Maria Tomchick

You probably already know this, since the news is all over the Net that a Green Party USA national board member was forcibly prevented last week from flying from Maine to Chicago (for a GPUSA organizing meeting) because, she claims, of her (and the Green Party's) outspoken criticisms of the war. But law enforcement is starting to declare open season on legitimate, nonviolent, constitutionally protected dissent. The GPUSA incident appears to be the work of an overzealous local National Guard goon, but the fact that Nancy Oden's name showed up on a list in the first place is the chilling part. And it's not the only incident. Ronnie Gilbert has an article in the current issue of the Progressive describing FBI "anti-terrorist" harassment of Women in Black. SOA Watch ran into trouble a few weeks ago with its activists detained at the border coming into the U.S. at Blaine. These are the verified incidents; especially with the Bill of Rights on life support after our latest round of "anti-terrorist" (sorry, those quotes again) laws, rumors are flying around thickly. Don't get too paranoid, but don't take your freedoms (or privacy) for granted, either. Remember the old truism: governments don't give you rights, they only take them away.--G.P.

In the wake of this anthrax scare, I decided to look at some death statistics to see how our current "epidemic" compared with other causes of death in the US. According to "Deaths: Preliminary Data for 2000" by the Center for Disease Control, here are some numbers for some causes of death from last year:

3 people died of measles last year 12 died of whooping cough 26 died of salmonella 551,833 died of cancers ("malignant neoplasms") 934,110 died of cardiovascular diseases 3922 died of malnutrition 5291 injuries at work 15,852 drug-induced deaths 18,539 alcohol-induced deaths 1510 hernia deaths 41,804 car accidents

http://www.cdc.gov/nchs/data/nvsr/nvsr49/nvsr49_12.pdf , (table 2) --Jake Sexton