The sordid murder-suicide of Tacoma Police Chief David Brame is finally headline news, as opposed to the perfunctory Local News stories when word of Brame's attack broke. But amidst all the justified (but just a little fucking bit late) finger-pointing over Tacoma officials' consistent refusal to take reports of Brame's past abuses (including a widely believed rape charge) seriously, a number of aspects of the story are still being ignored. Here are a few: the widespread prevalence of domestic violence among law enforcement, the military, and other professions that train their employees to control situations at all costs; and use violence, extreme violence if necessary, if that control is threatened; the complete failure of cops, whether their dads and siblings were cops or not, in Tacoma and every other police department in America, to hold each other accountable for all but the most egregious offenses--and often not even then; and the fact that Crystal Brame's death was not an isolated incident of murder. It was an assassination, part of an endless and unacknowledged (by men) wave of assassinations of wives and ex-wives and girlfrields and ex-girlfriends and would-be girlfriends who are raped and/or killed because they are women. Crystal Brame didn't die because she was the wife of a cop. She died because she was a woman wanting independence, and because too few men speak up when they see another man who can't accept women wanting independence. Until we men learn to police our own, the casualties will continue. --Geov Parrish

Last week, the United States government became an official sponsor of terrorism, according to its own definition. The US military signed a ceasefire agreement with the Mojahedin Khalq Organization (MKO) in eastern Iraq. The MKO is currently on the State Department's list of terrorist organizations, but the US military has allowed the MKO to keep its weapons and camps in Iraq and continue its cross-border attacks into Iran. The MKO, widely believed to have been sponsored by Saddam Hussein, has carried out a number of bombings and assassinations against political leaders in Iran, a nation that has competing political parties, democratic elections, and a strong democratic reform movement in progress. In the war on terrorism, it has now become the duty of every American (patriotic or not) to push for regime change in Washington DC.--Maria Tomchick

In other words, when it's their guys, it's terrorism; when it's our guys, it's freedom fighting. Such double standards in US foreign policy have been noted for decades, but rarely have they been embodied by the same group on consecutive days. --Geov Parrish

Donald Rumsfeld and George Bush Jr. have been forced repeatedly to assure US reporters that weapons of mass destruction will eventually be found in Iraq. As each week passes, the clamor for results grows louder, while the indignation becomes a little bit stronger. Last week, the hot story was all about why Saddam's major military, intelligence, and scientific advisors captured so far have all said the same thing: Sadddam's weapons of mass destruction were destroyed long ago. The only guy who has contradicted that testimony is a low-level Iraqi technician who thinks that some WMDs were destroyed just before the US invaded (but he's not absolutely sure, he's made outrageous claims about connections to Osama bin Laden and the Taliban when he has no access to that kind of information, and his expertise is "limited"). Furthermore, the Los Angeles Times and the Guardian of London have reported that infighting within the Bush administration and long delays in sending needed equipment and staff to Iraq is hampering the WMD search. Many former weapons inspectors have said that any WMDs that might have existed will be long gone by now, either removed by fleeing Ba'ath Party members or looted by former Iraqi state employees, who could sell them abroad to other governments or terrorist groups. So much for the fools who thought that a war would prevent the proliferation of weapons of mass destruction.--M.T.

Don't forget that June 2 is the date the FCC will officially announce their decision to lift some, most, or all of the remaining restrictions on consolidation of corporate control of the media. It's not too late to get your outrage in. E-mail FCC Commissioners and demand that public interest, not just the drive for corporate profit, guide their decision: FCC Chairman Michael K. Powell, mpowell@fcc.gov; Commissioner Kathleen Q. Abernathy, kabernat@fcc.gov; Commissioner Michael J. Copps, mcopps@fcc.gov; Commissioner Kevin J. Martin, kjmweb@fcc.gov; and Commissioner Jonathan S. Adelstein, jadelste@fcc.gov. --G.P.

Back in Iraq, human rights groups have now confirmed that the US military dropped anti-personnel cluster bombs in urban areas of Iraq, including Baghdad, Mosul, Kirkuk, and Jalula. The use of anti-personnel weapons in urban areas where they endanger large numbers of civilians is a violation of international law. The UK-based Mines Advisory Group is attempting to clear landmines left over from Saddam's rule and to find unexploded cluster bomblets. They have asked the Bush administration to provide more details on where cluster bombs were dropped, but have received little information so far. The Advisory Group has, in particular, condemned a new type of US cluster bomb, the BLU 108, a device that spews out lethal, circular discs that are designed to cut through heavy armored vehicles. What makes the BLU 108 so terrible is that, so far, the Advisory Group has found that up to 75% of the bomblets fail to explode and remain lurking in fields, gardens, playgrounds, schoolyards, streets, marketplaces, buried in mud, lying on the roofs of homes, and hanging in trees, just waiting to be picked up by children or triggered by passersby. In many areas of Iraq, deaths have increased even though the fighting is over, and most of it is due to unexploded ordnance, including US cluster bombs. Is this what it means to be "free?" --M.T. Sources: "US Misleading on Cluster Munitions," Human Rights Watch, www.hrw.org/press/2003/04/us042503.htm, "US Use of Clusters in Baghdad Condemned," HRW, www.hrw.org/press/2003/04/iraqclusterbombs.htm, "Fighting is over but the deaths go on," Michael Howard, The Guardian, 4/28/03 and "Lack of Data Slowing Cluster Bomb Cleanup," Paul Watson, LA Times, 4/27/03.

"The war is over," sez Dubya; as usual, he's wrong. US troops are still killing Iraqis who dare to demand that their US occupiers--I mean liberators- -get out of the way and let them create the government they want. And more US tax $$ are slated to help escalate the war on Columbian dissidents, while the "roadmap" to a Palestinian state is paved with dead civilians and US weaponry. The domestic war is escalating, with tax breaks for the rich, disappearing health care & services for the poor, with surveillance and intimidation for all.

In other words, we still need to be on the street corners waving sign, holding vigils, handing out flyers--the war is not over, though Cheney/Bush would like those pesky protesters to get out of the way and let the imperialist machine roll on. I know of a few vigils in the Seattle area that are still happening: in my neighborhood, Rainier Beach Neighbors for Peace hands out literature every Sunday from 3-4 PM at the corner of Rainier Ave. S and S Henderson streets. Eastside Fellowship of Reconciliation is a welcome presence at Bellevue Way and NE 8th from 11 AM-1 PM every Saturday. Women in Black continue their powerful silent vigils (see www.scn.org/womeninblack.) Let me know if your group is still active--and be sure to update your listing on the SNOW Coalition website (www.snowCoalition.org/contact.php) and Jean Buskin's superb calendar (www.scn.org/activism/calendar.) Tragically, we are only enjoying a brief respite in the war on democracy, and the community we create at peace actions will become even more essential in coming months. Rainier Beach Neighbors for Peace is working with Hate Free Zone (www.hatefreezone.org) to reach out to our neighbors who have been targeted by the INS--what's your neighborhood doing to challenge the war on democracy?--Valerie Rose