Objectively Pro-Rape

Al Franken went out deep on a limb and made his first amendment to face a roll-call vote to stop the practice of defense contractors essentially allowing consequence-free rape on their overseas bases:

On Tuesday night, the Minnesota Democrat got his first piece of legislation passed by the United States Senate via roll call vote. The amendment stopped federal funding for those defense contractors who used mandatory arbitration clauses to deny victims of assault the right to bring their case to court. It passed by a 68-30 margin with nine Republicans joining each voting Democrat. And in the immediate aftermath, Franken was granted the chance to revel, ever so slightly, in his victory.\

"The story came to my attention of Jamie Leigh Jones who, when she was 19, went to Iraq to work for [defense contractor] KBR and she was put in the barracks with 400 men and was sexually harassed," Franken told the Huffington Post in a brief interview shortly after the vote. "She complained. But they didn't do anything about it. She was drugged and gang raped and they locked her up in a shipping container. She tried to sue KBR and they said you have a mandatory arbitration clause in your contract. She tried to fight back and said this is ridiculous. She took it to court and they have been fighting her for three years."

"This bill would make it so that anybody in business with the Department of the Defense can't do this," he concluded emphatically. "They can't have mandatory arbitration on issues like assault and battery."

You'd think this kind of amendment wouldn't only get 100 votes, but somehow former Senators would storm the floor and demand that they too could offer their support for the legislation. Instead, in the culture we now have in Washington, 30 Republicans voted against this. I don't know how you characterize this other than saying that they think it's perfectly reasonable for women to be raped on Defense Department-funded American bases, left in shipping containers, and barred from bringing up charges subsequently. They actually called this a political attack aimed at Halliburton, even though the bill named no contractor specifically.

Um, what would you call the "Defund ACORN Act," exactly? And while I know that was the biggest scandal in the history of scandals, AFAIK ACORN has never protected their employees from raping someone and detaining them in a shipping container. Again, to the best of my knowledge.

These Republicans should be completely ashamed of themselves.

I would be remiss if I didn't mention that, while the Franken amendment was nice, the overall defense authorization bill includes lots of spending for the war in Afghanistan, and would ban the transfer of any detainee at Gitmo to the United States. As Franken would say, "Oy."

No, "The Left" Isn't Apologizing For Roman Polanski

I haven't proffered an opinion on the Polanski case, but let me say now that I am against people raping 13 year-olds and getting away with it! Yes, I'm going out on a limb! According to Howard Kurtz, that makes me no longer a liberal, since he quotes wingnut Ed Morrissey, who lazily attributes defenses of Polanski to "the Left." Which, as Jamison Foser points out with multiple links, isn't true. Scott Lemieux piles on. Indeed, the most prominent defenders of Polanski are certain friends in the movie industry, which of course becomes "the Hollyweird Left" in the wingnut construction, as well as Anne Applebaum, whose husband is a Polish government official working to free Polanski (Applebaum casually forgot to mention that in her piece). In other words, friends of his. They saw a documentary that put the whole thing in a favorable light for Polanski, and that allowed them to assuage their guilt.

Steve Lopez has a very good piece today, noting that far too many of these defenders have elegantly chopped out the most damning parts of the testimony from the trial:

Q: What happened then?

A: He reached over and he kissed me. And I was telling him, "No," you know, "Keep away." But I was kind of afraid of him because there was no one else there.

She testified that he put his mouth on her vagina.

"I was ready to cry," she said. "I was kind of -- I was going, 'No. Come on. Stop it.' But I was afraid."

She said he then pulled off her panties.

Q: What happened after that?

A: He started to have intercourse with me.

At this point, she testified, Polanski became concerned about the consequences and asked if she was on the pill.

No, she told him.

Polanski had a solution, according to her.

"He goes, 'Would you want me to go in through your back?' And I went, 'No.' "

According to her, that didn't stop Polanski, who began having anal sex with her.

This was when the victim was asked by the prosecutor if she resisted and she said, "Not really," because "I was afraid of him." She testified that when the ordeal had ended, Polanski told her, "Oh, don't tell your mother about this."

He added: "This is our secret." [...]

Q: Did you resist at that time?

A: A little bit, but not really because . . .

Q: Because what?

A: Because I was afraid of him.

It's pretty outrageous that Polanski's gotten away with claiming victimhood for 30 years after serving 42 days in jail (before the trial) for drugging and raping a 13 year-old. I like his movies but I don't have to absolve his behavior for that reason. We don't have a cultural exemption - or a political one, for that matter - in the US justice system. Let him do his time.

And by the way, that's the prevailing opinion of many on "the Left."

...Many are making use of the fact that Samantha Geimer, the victim, is willing to show compassion and doesn't want to see Polanski prosecuted. After a guilty verdict in a trial, I don't think that's her decision to make anymore, actually.

Forget It Roman, It's... Switzerland?

I thought the Swiss were the neutral ones...

After more than 30 years as a fugitive from U.S. justice, Roman Polanski, the director of legendary films including “Chinatown” and “Rosemary’s Baby,” was arrested in Switzerland on an international warrant as he arrived in Zurich for a film festival featuring a retrospective of his work, the Swiss authorities said Sunday.

Mr. Polanski was detained by the police Saturday upon his arrival at the Zurich airport, said Guido Balmer, a spokesman for the Swiss Federal Justice Department. The director was being held in provisional detention in preparation for a possible extradition to the United States based on an arrest warrant dating to 1978.

Mr. Polanski, 76, was convicted that year in a California court of unlawful sex with a 13-year-old girl whom he had lured to the home of Jack Nicholson and drugged. Faced with a prison term, he fled the United States just before his sentencing.

Samantha Geimer, the girl with whom Mr. Polanski had sex, has since publicly forgiven him.

Defense attorneys actually tried to get the Polanski case thrown out of court in Santa Monica this past year, but to no avail. And Polanski could still challenge the arrest warrant and potential extradition, in an appeals process that will last a while.

Laurie Essig has a real interesting story about this. I saw "Wanted and Desired," the movie about the Polanski case which led defense attorneys to try and nullify it, and there are certainly lots of shades of grey in there, including some prosecutors with an agenda and a headline-chasing judge who apparently backed out on a plea deal. Jeralyn Merritt calls the arrest outrageous.

I'm just stunned that the Swiss would involve themselves in this complicated issue, after letting Polanski in their country dozens of times over the past 30 years. They seemed so averse to controversy!

...the LA DA's office set up the arrest warrant. When a judge refused to throw out charges this year, he did so on the grounds that Polanski couldn't have them dropped while he was a fugitive from justice. It could be that Polanski gets extradited to the US, in a process that could take anywhere from a couple days to several months, only to appear before a judge who agrees to drop the charges.

Ending Prison Rape

Being sentenced to prison is supposed to be the punishment. People who commit crimes should not be subject to another crime, the crime of rape, as a consequence of their incarceration. It's brutal, cruel and wrong. Too often, corrections facilities look the other way at this practice, thinking wrongly that it maintains order among their populations. I'm heartened that a commission has offered concrete steps for corrections officials to reduce and eventually eliminate prison rape.

The number of rapes committed by detention staff members and other inmates remains a subject of intense scrutiny. A 2007 survey of state and federal prisoners estimated that 60,500 inmates had been abused the previous year. But experts say that the stigma of sexual assault often leads to underreporting of incidents and denial by many of the victims.

Too often, the report says, sexual abuse of prisoners is viewed as a source of jokes rather than a problem with destructive implications for public health, crime rates and successful reentry of prisoners into the community.

"If you have a zero-tolerance policy on prison rape and it is known from the highest ranks that this will not be tolerated and there will be consequences for it, that goes a long way in sending a message," said U.S District Judge Reggie B. Walton, the commission chairman. "Just because people have committed crimes and are in prison, that doesn't mean that part of their punishment is being sexually abused while in detention."

These recommendations from the panel go to the Attorney General, who has a year to create national standards. Our jails are a mess, and reducing the brutal crime of rape will start us down the road of rehabilitating them.

And I'm pleased to have an ally in Eli Lehrer of the National Review. There's no reason for prison rape to ever be a partisan issue.

The federal report’s conclusions — a zero-tolerance policy, more direct monitoring, and the like — almost are all common sense. State, local, and federal governments should take immediate legislative and administrative action to implement nearly everything in the report. (Most of the practices are already commonplace in the federal and better-run state systems.) Although giving trial lawyers more business rarely makes sense, Congress may also want to reconsider laws that make it very difficult for prisoners to sue prison authorities absent concrete evidence of physical harm. It’s quite possible that many legitimate prison-rape claims get thrown out of court under current laws. And prison rape needs to stop.

I can't believe I'm saying this, but what the guy from the Competitive Enterprise Institute said.

Rape At Abu Ghraib

We were told by the President that the photos he chose not to release were nothing particularly sensational and would do nothing to shed more light on the debate. British papers tend toward the lurid and dramatic, but they have an on-the-record source who is fairly unassailable.

Photographs of alleged prisoner abuse which Barack Obama is attempting to censor include images of apparent rape and sexual abuse, it has emerged.

At least one picture shows an American soldier apparently raping a female prisoner while another is said to show a male translator raping a male detainee.

Further photographs are said to depict sexual assaults on prisoners with objects including a truncheon, wire and a phosphorescent tube.

Another apparently shows a female prisoner having her clothing forcibly removed to expose her breasts.

Detail of the content emerged from Major General Antonio Taguba, the former army officer who conducted an inquiry into the Abu Ghraib jail in Iraq.

Allegations of rape and abuse were included in his 2004 report but the fact there were photographs was never revealed. He has now confirmed their existence in an interview with the Daily Telegraph.

The Pentagon denied these allegations, as did Press Secretary Robert Gibbs. They dismissed the Telegraph report and essentially called them untruthful. But of course, they're not attacking the source, and that is Major General Taguba, who knows more about the Abu Ghraib scandal than anybody.

“These pictures show torture, abuse, rape and every indecency.

“I am not sure what purpose their release would serve other than a legal one and the consequence would be to imperil our troops, the only protectors of our foreign policy, when we most need them, and British troops who are trying to build security in Afghanistan.

“The mere description of these pictures is horrendous enough, take my word for it.” [...]

Maj Gen Taguba’s internal inquiry into the abuse at Abu Ghraib, included sworn statements by 13 detainees, which, he said in the report, he found “credible based on the clarity of their statements and supporting evidence provided by other witnesses.”
Among the graphic statements, which were later released under US freedom of information laws, is that of Kasim Mehaddi Hilas in which he says: “I saw [name of a translator] ******* a kid, his age would be about 15 to 18 years. The kid was hurting very bad and they covered all the doors with sheets. Then when I heard screaming I climbed the door because on top it wasn’t covered and I saw [name] who was wearing the military uniform, putting his **** in the little kid’s ***…. and the female soldier was taking pictures.”

The translator was an American Egyptian who is now the subject of a civil court case in the US.

Three detainees, including the alleged victim, refer to the use of a phosphorescent tube in the sexual abuse and another to the use of wire, while the victim also refers to part of a policeman’s “stick” all of which were apparently photographed.

These aren't really even new allegations - Seymour Hersh made them several years ago, and has continued to make the charge. Not to mention that, aside from the decision to release the photos, there are legal issues at play here.

Gen. Taguba says he supports President Obama's decision to withold the photos, arguing that "The mere description of these pictures is horrendous enough, take my word for it." Fine—the debate over whether to release the photos is legitimate. I have a more immediate question. If the government is in possession of photographic evidence of an American soldier raping someone, has that soldier been prosecuted? The relevant section of the Uniform Code of Military Justice is here:

(a) Any person subject to this chapter who commits an act of sexual intercourse with a female not his wife, by force and without consent, is guilty of rape and shall be punished by death or such other punishment as a court-martial may direct.

It would take a pretty incompetent prosecution to fail to convict someone of a rape for which there is clear photographic evidence. But I can't find any public reference to such a court martial, let alone a conviction.

Maybe that would be "looking backward" and not forward.

This is outrageous and the Administration risks a major credibility gap when they continue to stand mute instead of addressing it. They lose authority at home and around the world by the day.

The CIA Endorses Marital Rape

Welcomed With Flowers, Sweets And Prescriptions

by dday

I suppose I shouldn't be alarmed by this, but I have to confess to being a little taken aback by the snickering and high-fiving in the blogosphere over the CIA's attempt to curry favor with Afghan tribal leaders by offering them Viagra.

The Afghan chieftain looked older than his 60-odd years, and his bearded face bore the creases of a man burdened with duties as tribal patriarch and husband to four younger women. His visitor, a CIA officer, saw an opportunity, and reached into his bag for a small gift.

Four blue pills. Viagra.

"Take one of these. You'll love it," the officer said. Compliments of Uncle Sam.

The enticement worked. The officer, who described the encounter, returned four days later to an enthusiastic reception. The grinning chief offered up a bonanza of information about Taliban movements and supply routes -- followed by a request for more pills.

There's a certain logic to using personal items as barter (or bribery, if you prefer) for warlords and tribal leaders to extract information about the Taliban insurgency. At the same time, does anyone credibly think that those four women this guy is married to are entirely willing spouses, and the consequent sex performed as a result of the Viagra entirely consensual? One of the most persistent problems in Afghanistan - indeed, one of the ostensible reasons used by people like Laura Bush to justify the invasion beyond the need to root out al-Qaeda - is the terrible life circumstances for women. I fail to see how use of erectile dysfunction pills created by men and for men improves their quality of life. Megan Carpentier gives the explanation with which I concur:

SPENCER: So what should we understand to be the anticipated effects on Afghan women of this Viagra-based counterinsurgency effort?

MEGAN: Well, one could argue that by supplying the aging warlords with Viagra, you are depriving their wives of a needed and biologically expected semi-permanent respite from performing unwanted sexual acts that would otherwise be forced upon them. In the interests of fairness, I suppose its possible that these warlords attempt to treat their wives with the utmost care and respect and provide them with sexual satisfaction instead of using them as living, visible extensions of their power over people that the warlords can additionally stick their dicks into.

SPENCER: But that's not where we should take this discussion! Are we in a situation where the expected consequence of the CIA Viagra program is marital rape? Should everyone who isn't Dennis Prager find this problematic?

MEGAN: Well, are we in a situation where we would deny that such is a possibility? I don't think we make good policy by ignoring the consequences, nor am I saying that giving the dudes Viagra is not preferable to giving them, say, weapons. But is it possible that we're providing them with the means to force themselves on their wives (who likely had no choice in being their wives) that nature has otherwise denied them? Yes. Plus, I did have to go find a way to relate it to women's issues [...]

SPENCER: Right, but now that we've got that covered: what should we do next? Stop the program?

MEGAN: Well, I'm not exactly one to go around advocating marital rape. Nor are — one assumes — operatives on the ground in any position to survey the wives of the warlords to determine whether the dick pill sex is consensual or wanted. Nor do the women in question have the vocabulary — culturally speaking, that is — to likely describe the sex as coercive or forced. In a society in which wives are expected to submit to their husbands and sex is not intended for their benefit or pleasure, nor are their moods or desires taken into account, they probably wouldn't consider a formerly impotent husband with a handful of Viagra and some impotent time to make up for much more than their unlucky lot in life. And, if the benefit — as you stated above — is not only that the formerly impotent husband doesn't take said impotence out on our troops but also refrains from taking it out physically on the wives, are they substantively better off being unhappily sexed than physically beaten? The fact that women in America have those choices and the freedom to think about them is a great thing, and handing out or not handing out Viagra to impotent warlords doesn't give Afghan women those choices or freedoms. Nor does allowing a Taliban or al Qaeda-led insurgency to win back the government. But that doesn't mean that our choices should remain unexamined.

There's a top-rated diary on Daily Kos right now entitled Dennis Prager Endorses Marital Rape. Somebody explain to me how the CIA isn't doing functionally the same thing.

And there's a larger point. We barge into foreign societies without a coherent understanding of the underlying culture and try to use whatever means to get the locals on our side, and the unintended consequences that result are never examined either before or after the fact. They are considered prices to be paid for "success," whatever that means. I think it's actually fairly impossible for me to determine the full effects of giving Viagra to Afghan warlords, in much the way that introducing a change in where a butterfly flaps its wings in the past can alter the future. But I'm fairly certain that those effects are completely ignored by the elites who think they can control events thousands of miles away through little inducements and bribes. I haven't read all of
Legacy of Ashes but I wonder if I'd find anything if I searched the index for the part where anyone games out the ripple effects of the agency's actions. Probably not.

Maybe what should be considered, instead of the boner pills, is why we're in Afghanistan in the first place. Rather than social engineering, we could use local law enforcement and intelligence sharing to limit or remove the capacity of anyone in the region striking beyond their borders, and we allow local and regional actors to determine their own way forward instead of arrogantly assuming we know what's best for these people, and trying to install a central democracy where none has ever existed. Alternatively, we could figure out what other drugs they might like.

Media Follies

Sarah Palin took questions from the traveling press corps for the first time today, and they decided to ask her if she's going to show up on Saturday Night Live. Hard-hitting!

Ruth Marcus doesn't know anything about health care.

CNN proudly boasted that they wouldn't be heading into the spin room because there's no value in it. Bold! Then they asked their twelve pundits, including Republican and Democratic operatives, to give their obvious opinions.

That "town hall" was a nightmare.

The media is claiming that the Palin rape kit story has been debunked. It hasn't.

And about 20 others, but I'll save them for tomorrow.

Out Come The Tough Ads

When the Obama campaign finally unleashed the 527s, albeit tacitly, to run some ads hitting John McCain the thought was that it would be too late to have an impact. Well over the last week, a stream of ads have been released by all kinds of organizations, and I think there will be a cumulative effect.

The fantastic Defenders of Wildlife ad, the best of the cycle IMO, is expanding into more swing states as its effectiveness is undeniable.

Then Planned Parenthood has readied an ad on the "Sarah Palin charged victims of rape for their own medical exams" controversy. It's similarly powerful and a clear recitation of fact; she approved city budgets in Wasilla with this policy on the record.



Campaign Money Watch has a Keating Five ad that ties that corruption to the current corruption of McCain's campaign manager Rick Davis taking secret payments for influence:



And the California Nurses Association hits McCain and Palin in the same ad in a pretty vicious way:



I don't know if all this negativity on the air is going to be a good contrast with Obama's attempt to carry a statesmanlike message these past few days, but politics ain't beanbag. These are facts which deserve to be in the public sphere.

Stonewall Palin

If you track this from where we were to where we are, it's kind of incredible. So Sarah Palin was caught, on tape, trying to persuade Walter Monegan to fire her ex-brother in Law Michael Wooten. She promised to cooperate with the investigation. Then John McCain picked her to become his Vice Presidential nominee, and the Republican lawyers flooded the zone. Since then, aides who agreed to testify clammed up, cooperation was cut off, and subpoenas were issued. In the past 24 hours:

• Palin said she would not testify, despite pledging to do so earlier.

• She's decided the investigation is politically motivated and partisan, despite there being twice as many Republicans on the Alaska Legislative Council doing the investigating as Democrats, and despite the Republican from her own hometown of Wasilla casting the deciding vote to subpoena aides.

• She's flipped lawmakers who supported the investigation just a couple months ago. Five other Republicans have filed a lawsuit to shut the investigation down entirely.

• The McCain campaign has clearly fed their friendly media the line that this is partisan and part of a sexist plot to bring Palin down.

• She's changed her story about why Monegan was fired, now suggesting it was because of a "pattern of insubordination," which Monegan calls a lie. And get this - she's claiming he went over her head to go to Washington to seek funds for sexual assault prevention. That's right.

This alleged pattern of "outright insubordination" is said to have culminated in Monegan planning a trip to Washington to go after federal funds for an initiative to fight sexual assault crimes, which had not yet been approved by the governor. (Van Flein's account was in sync with the line taken last night by a McCain campaign spokesman at a press conference in Alaska.)

The issue of Monegan's work on the sexual assault initiative doesn't come completely out of the blue. In a lengthy exploration of Palin's record on combating sexual assault crimes, ABC News reported yesterday that Monegan was the "chief proponent" for an "ambitious, multi-million dollar initiative to seriously tackle sex crimes in the state," and that Palin's office "put the plan on hold in July," just days before Monegan's firing.

But whatever the role of the sexual assault initiative in Monegan's departure from state government, this is by now the third substantive explanation given by Palin for that departure. And, to one degree or another, all those explanations contradict each other.

It's interesting that Palin faulted Monegan for trying to combat sexual assaults in Alaska, particularly child sex assaults. This is a woman who as mayor of Wasilla charged rape victims for their own exams, and in a state with a troubling record on sexual assault, for her to fire those who wanted to make combating it a priority is very curious.

Evangelicals and social conservatives have embraced McCain's vice presidential pick for what they call her "pro-family," "pro-woman" values. But in Alaska, critics say Gov. Sarah Palin has not addressed the rampant sexual abuse, rape, domestic violence and murder that make her state one of the most dangerous places in the country for women and children.

Alaska leads the nation in reported forcible rapes per capita, according to the FBI, with a rate two and a half times the national average - a ranking it has held for many years. Children are no safer: Public safety experts believe that the prevalence of rape and sexual assault of minors in Alaska makes the state's record one of the worst in the U.S. And while solid statistics on domestic violence are hard to come by, most - including Gov. Palin - agree it is an "epidemic."

Despite the governor's pro-family image, public safety experts and advocates for women and children struggled when asked to explain how Palin's leadership has helped address the crisis. And current and former officials from Palin's administration confirmed that an ambitious plan to tackle the crisis has apparently sunk into doldrums after arriving at the governor's office.

"She's really done a lot of work on oil and gas, but when it comes to violence against women and children. . . we haven't been on her radar as a priority," said Peggy Brown, executive director of the Alaska Network on Domestic Violence and Sexual Assault. The Juneau-based group is an umbrella organization for shelters and anti-violence programs around the state.

I don't know if it has to do with a far-right belief that treating rape victims equals abortion or what, but clearly Palin has turned a blind eye to a very serious epidemic in her own state, and on numerous occasions has actively worked against preventing sexual abuse.

But this is kind of a tangent. Clearly there's a massive cover-up going on here, complete with lies, politically motivated stonewalling and personal attacks against public officials. Right-wing lawyers are suing to shut the whole thing down, smearing Democrats involved with the probe in the process, in an effort to muddy the waters and create the impression that this is a partisan witchhunt. The goal is to pressure everyone involved into refraining from tackling the real issues here.

And if you want a comment out of Palin about this, forget it. She ain't talkin'.

Given the kind of disrespect for the rule of law and the Constitution that we've been through over the past eight years, this kind of steamrolling and stonewalling should be met with great concern. Sarah is growing up in Fourthbranch Cheney's image here.

OR-Sen: Smith Freaks Out

Gordon Smith had a problem last week. Jeff Merkley's campaign released an internal poll showing him with a small lead, and there was a stirring controversy over his frozen foods plant hiring illegal workers. So, he decided to charge that his opponent is soft on rape.

In Smith's despicable ad, he enlists Tiffany Edens, a well-known rape victim in Oregon, "to appear in an emotional TV ad" that falsely accuses Merkley of "failing to crack down on serious sex offenders."

Here is the ad Gordon Smith approves:

Tiffany Edens is seen speaking on camera: "I was just 13 when he broke into our house, attacked and raped me. Later he confessed to raping eight others. But Oregon's time limits for prosecuting the rapes ran out. Jeff Merkley voted against changing that law. That's why I'm speaking out. Jeff Merkley, you should have voted to protect women, not rapists."

You won't be surprised to learn that the charge is false. But often, this kind of campaigning works.

The facts: Edens and Smith campaign officials acknowledge that Merkley's vote on the bill in 2005 had no impact on the Gillmore case, which was prosecuted many years before. The ad could leave voters believing it could affect the Gillmore case. Edens said she hoped toughening the law would help protect potential future victims.

Merkley spokesman Matt Canter says Merkley supported lengthening the statute of limitations for rape and several other serious crimes, and he pointed to his vote in favor of another bill -- House Bill 2015 -- that would have done exactly that. Canter said Merkley voted against the measure cited in the Smith ad -- HB 2316 -- as a protest against the "backroom deals" made by legislative leaders at the end of the session to determine which bills would go forward. At the time, Merkley headed the Democratic caucus, which was in the minority, and he was excluded from the negotiations. Canter says Merkley voted against the bill knowing it had enough votes to pass.

Merkley's returned fire with an ad calling out the lies, but of course, he's not a trusted source.

There's not much difference between political election season and Somalia. No rules, no laws, no arbiters.

They Found A Nut

It seems that on the message side, the Obama campaign has been searching for a line of attack against McCain all week. They're hinting at the "he's old" thing. They're having Biden release tax returns to try and make it look like McCain and Palin have something to hide. They're using the line McCain said last night that he's divorced from America's day-to-day challenges to paint a picture of him as out of touch.

Some of these are effective, some maybe not. They could always do more - the Palin charging victims for their own rape kits story needs to be its own ad. I mean, holy crap.

When Sarah Palin was mayor of Wasilla, the city billed sexual assault victims and their insurance companies for the cost of rape kits and forensic examinations.

Palin had been in office for four years when the practice of charging rape victims got the attention of state lawmakers in 2000, who passed a bill to stop the practice.

There's new evidence on this, too. She knew about it directly. That should really hurt her with women and moderates.

But for my money, this is the line that they can run with from now to the end of the election.

Today on "The View," John McCain defended his campaign's latest ad campaign, which has been debunked repeatedly as both false and sleazy. In running the sleaziest campaign since South Carolina in 2000 and standing by completely debunked lies on national television, it's clear that John McCain would rather lose his integrity than lose an election.

This is about honor. John McCain has none. And they have used the line now in multiple statements, and the media is picking up on it. While there is an absolute bias toward anything out of the "assertive" McCain campaign's mouth, traditional media does respond to a fight. They'll be happy to capture that on camera. And that's what they're getting from the Obama campaign today.

Keep this on honor and the lies and pretty soon nothing McCain says will be credible. Everything should be answered with "this is the guy who's been lying the whole campaign, who would you believe?"

...from Obama himself at a campaign event today:

"Just ask the Machinists in Pennsylvania who build Harley-Davidsons," Obama said of McCain's record. "Because John McCain didn’t just oppose the requirement that the government buy American-made motorcycles, he called Buy American provisions 'disgraceful.' Just ask the workers across this country who have seen their jobs outsourced. The very companies that shipped their jobs overseas have been rewarded with billions of dollars in tax breaks that John McCain supports and plans to continue.

"So when American workers hear John McCain talking about putting 'Country First,'" Obama said, "it’s fair to ask – which country?"

This will drive McCain nuts. Keep saying it.

Today In Palin

As we await the hard-hitting, brutally frank, just-the-facts-ma'am interview that I'm sure Charlie Gibson is about to throw down for his prime-time special on 20/20, today options for questions sprouted up practically all over the place.

First, we have yet another of her "accomplishments" called into question as just a substanceless catch-phrase. The natural gas pipeline she claims to have built is anything but.

Certainly she proved effective in attracting developers to a project that has eluded Alaska governors for three decades. But an examination of the pipeline project also found that Ms. Palin has overstated both the progress that has been made and the certainty of success.

The pipeline exists only on paper. The first section has yet to be laid, federal approvals are years away and the pipeline will not be completed for at least a decade. In fact, although it is the centerpiece of Ms. Palin’s relatively brief record as governor, the pipeline might never be built, and under a worst-case scenario, the state could lose up to $500 million it committed to defray regulatory and other costs.

Indeed, claiming any kind of major fiscal success in Alaska at a time of record energy prices is kind of like saying that the King of Saudi Arabia is a competent fiscal steward. It's not his leadership, but the resources in the ground that provide the wealth. Alaska is a petro-state that nevertheless steals from the federal government treasury billions upon billions in largesse to finance themselves. It's true that its proximity demands some manner of federal aid, but look at what Palin has requested in earmarks over the past year:

According to Alaska's 2009 catalog of earmark requests the state's sea life are in great need of federal money. As Politico points out, Palin's office requested $2 million in federal monies to study crab mating habits; $494,900 for the recreational halibut harvest and $3.2 million for seal genetics research.

Those requests for the study of wildlife genetics and mating habits seems pretty antithetical to the long-standig views of Palin's running mate, John McCain.

Might be a good question for either Palin or McCain.

Meanwhile, the continuing saga of Troopergate has added more surprises and revelations. Palin was apparently warned by a judge to stop disparaging her sister's ex-husband, even before she became governor of the state.

Court records obtained by NEWSWEEK show that during the course of divorce hearings three years ago, Judge John Suddock heard testimony from an official of the Alaska State Troopers' union about how Sarah Palin—then a private citizen—and members of her family, including her father and daughter, lodged up to a dozen complaints against Wooten with the state police. The union official told the judge that he had never before been asked to appear as a divorce-case witness, that the union believed family complaints against Wooten were "not job-related," and that Wooten was being "harassed" by Palin and other family members.

Court documents show that Judge Suddock was disturbed by the alleged attacks by Palin and her family members on Wooten's behavior and character. "Disparaging will not be tolerated—it is a form of child abuse," the judge told a settlement hearing in October 2005, according to typed notes of the proceedings. The judge added: "Relatives cannot disparage either. If occurs [sic] the parent needs to set boundaries for their relatives."

Indeed, after she clearly fired Public Safety head Walt Monegan for his refusal to fire Wooten, an adviser to her warned her of the abuse of power perception, telling her that "'the situation is now grave' and recommended that she and her husband, Todd Palin, apologize for 'overreaching or perceived overreaching' for using her position to try to get Trooper Mike Wooten fired from the force." He also told her to fire any staff members who contacted Monegan over the firing.

Of course, Palin didn't step back then, and she's certainly not now, enlisting her state Attorney General to help quash subpeonas that may arise during the legislative investigation.

"The eyes of the nation have now turned upon us,'' senior Assistant Attorney General Michael Barnhill wrote. "We think there is a legitimate concern that this investigation is no longer being conducted in a fair manner.''

Barnhill complained in a seven-page letter about public comments made by Hollis French, a Democratic senator, that Palin or her aides may have broken the law by allegedly obtaining personnel files of the fired state public safety commissioner, Walt Monegan.

TPM Muckraker is skeptical that much will come of the investigation, as Republicans in the state who were eager to look into this before Palin was made their party's Vice Presidential nominee feel less inclined to do so now.

But there's one story that could absolutely get lots of attention, and should, especially by women.

Speaking to a teleconference audience of reporters around the nation, former Gov. Tony Knowles and current Ketchikan Mayor Bob Weinstein -- both Democrats -- accused Palin of misleading the public in her new role as the vice presidential running mate of Arizona Sen. John McCain.

While some of their complaints have already been aired, Knowles broke new ground while answering a reporter's question on whether Wasilla forced rape victims to pay for their own forensic tests when Palin was mayor.

True, Knowles said.

Eight years ago, complaints about charging rape victims for medical exams in Wasilla prompted the Alaska Legislature to pass a bill -- signed into law by Knowles -- that banned the practice statewide.

"There was one town in Alaska that was charging victims for this, and that was Wasilla," Knowles said.

Note that it essentially was an Obama surrogate that pushed this story into the mainstream. It's getting other traditional media pickup, too.

I cannot imagine someone so callous as to charge victims of rape for their own exams. That's shocking. Disgusting. It speaks to judgment. And it should be known by every family in America.

UPDATE: Great catch by Jed - McCain voted against Joe Biden's bill which ended the practice of charging victims for rape exams. McCain and Palin really are soulmates.

This HAS to be an ad.

Military Industrial Complex Raises The Stakes In Iraq

This happened a few days ago, but given that the Bush Administration is frantically renegotiating the status of forces agreement with Iraq, and caving in on every detail just so they can keep a foothold in the country, I thought this framing from the real power-brokers in the military-industrial complex was significant.

An American contractor said Thursday that the U.S. mission in Iraq will be undermined if the Iraqi government succeeds in revoking blanket legal immunity for American security contractors.

Carter Andress reacted to a Wednesday government report that said the removal of legal immunity for American private security contractors could set off an "exodus" from war-ravaged Iraq and "impose significant limitations" on American reconstruction efforts.

The scenario is outlined in the quarterly report issued to Congress by the Special Inspector General for Iraq Reconstruction.

Andress, whose firm builds bases for the Iraqi army and police and supplies those places with water, food, fuel and maintenance services, said that about 40 percent of his staff is involved in security.

"We would undermine the U.S. mission here because they are so reliant on contractors," said Andress, co-founder of the American-Iraqi Solutions Group. "For better or for worse, that's reality."

Even though 90 percent of his employees are Iraqis, he fears that new laws could force him to shut down.

You can see here the blackmail that has come out of this over-reliance on private military contractors. Decisions that should only take into account the goals of the mission and national security interests now must involve pleasing the likes of Halliburton and Blackwater. There literally is no Iraq war without these contractors, in a very real sense. And that's why the government allows for their protection and their invulnerability, and carries this to ludicrous heights:

Defense contractor KBR Inc. said it has banned the use of personal cell phones by its employees in Iraq for security reasons.

(KBR spokeswoman Heather L. Browne) said the decision was because of "a safety and security concern." She declined to elaborate, but did say KBR officials are reviewing the matter that led to the directive.

What the spokeswoman did not say is that "the matter" leading to the directive was the rape and forcible detention of a KBR employee, Jamie Leigh Jones, who used a colleague's cell phone to notify her father in Texas of the attack. There may be dozens of other victims who have yet to come forward, and KBR's move to tighten down communication is yet another effort to prevent any accountability for the actions of the company or its employees.

We have built this parallel mercenary structure supporting the US military, which is so large and so powerful that it's hard to figure which entity is calling the shots on the relative presence or withdrawal of occupying forces. The contractors in the report is literally trying to dictate a governmental decision about an international treaty - and there's no reason to believe he won't get away with it. Note too how they are really suggesting that if his people aren't allowed to shoot at random without fear of reprisal, your kids will be killed and good Americans will be strung up:

Andress said the removal of immunity would have a big impact on his business.

"You've still got remnants of the insurgents out there. You've still got ... the thieves. So, you've still got to have convoy security," said Andress, whose firm has won a quarter of a billion dollars in Defense contracts.

A security contractor, who asked not to be named because he could lose his job for talking to reporters, said he believes a removal of immunity would have a chilling effect for contractors. He said Iraqi contractors taking over security duties have improved but haven't reached the level of proficiency that Americans have.

The contractor, who said he has worked in Iraq and other countries, believes that non-Iraqi contractors could be be treated brutally and unfairly.

"It's like putting a police officer in the middle of Folsom Prison, on murderers row with five guys he put away," the contractor said. "They're not going to get a fair trial."

One of the most persistent problems we face with respect to foreign policy is that these powerful interests, which extend to practically every state and even every Congressional district, creating incredible amounts of inertia to dismantle them, have become a de facto driver of US foreign policy, and until they are put on ice, questionable interventions and occupations will continue.

When Government Breaks Down

Here are just a few stories I've collected over merely the past week, the little outrages that aren't as substantial as, say, killing over a million Iraqis in an unnecessary war or leaving 47 million without health insurance or torturing prisoners at Guantanamo. But they provide shocks to the conscience nonetheless.

• The Department of Labor is rushing to make rules that would make it tougher for the government agency to regulate the amount of chemicals and toxins in the workplace.

• The Wage And Hour division of the Labor Department has been charged by the GAO with delaying and misplacing hundreds of overtime and minimum-wage complaints from individuals being shortchanged.

• Fifteen percent of all women serving in Iraq and Afghanistan who have visited a VA facility have tested positive for sexual trauma through rape, assault or harrassment.

• An immigrant was handcuffed while giving birth in jail and separated from her infant within two days and she continued her imprisonment.

• In Louisiana, Baron Pikes was tasered nine times and killed after failing to comply swiftly enough with police demands. He wasn't resisting arrest, he just didn't comply fast enough.

• Supplies designed to go to victims of Hurricanes Katrina and Rita were massively undercounted due to a math error, resulting in a reduction of $70 million worth of aid.

• Pentagon auditors, whose role is to conduct oversight over government military contracts, were pressured by superiors to produce reports favorable to the contractors and shielding them from wrongdoing and overbilling, according to a GAO report. And at that time, the Air Force was spending counterterrorism funds on comfort capsules that can spirit them around the world in the height of luxury.

Now mind you, this is simply a partial list of the last week or so. This kind of venality, callousness and contempt for anyone but the rich and connected has characterized the last eight years. Corporations are to be protected instead of the poor. Authority is to be demanded but assaults on the downtrodden tolerated. Regulations are eliminated and help for the needy denied. This has become America in the first decade of the 21st century - an authoritarian kleptocracy. The level of rot is so great that the next President won't be able to get at all of it. Remember that these are just some of the LESSER stories.

God Save This Blessed Court

It's getting so I try not to read anything with "Supreme Court" in the headline on the last week of June, because that's when all the most controversial cases come down, and given the current makeup of the Court it means "pound progressives into the cement" week in America.

The Court did rule that the death penalty shouldn't apply to child rapists, which, while a horrible crime, is not proportional to state-sanctioned murder. Sen. Obama short-circuited the inevitable Kitty Dukakis question by saying he disagreed with the ruling, but the fact that he did so on state's rights grounds is alarming. I don't know if Justice Kennedy made a well-argued case here, but I don't believe in the death penalty as a deterrent (I don't think rapists and murderers are all that rational) or as a properly applied system of jurisprudence (look at all the problems with cases at the state level) so anything that blocks its expansion is generally fine with me. I wish we had a court that would throw the whole practice out as cruel and unusual punishment and recognize that life in prison without possibility of parole is a pretty stiff punishment.

The other decisions were varying degrees of horrible. The Court stepped into the Exxon Valdez civil case in an activist fashion and lowered the damages to citizens affected by the oil spill. It's outrageous that the shattered lives on the Alaskan coast are worth $15,000, according to the law. And moreover, it shows corporations that they can appeal and appeal and appeal and they will eventually get their way in the highest court, where fealty to corporations is really the order of the day.

Today, in a 5-4 decision the Court overturned the Millionaire's Amendment which ruled as part of the McCain-Feingold campaign finance law that candidates facing a rich, self-funded challenger can raise above the contribution limits if their opponent pumps millions into the race. The ruling also waives several disclosure requirements on the part of the self-funder. What is key here, a signal that this Court will rule against any and all public financing laws, is that Congress cannot seek to "level the playing field."

The argument that a candidate’s speech may be restricted in order to "level electoral opportunities" has ominous implications because it would permit Congress to arrogate the voters’ authority to evaluate the strengths of candidates competing for office. See Bellotti, supra, at 791–792 ("[T]he people in our democracy are entrusted with the responsibility for judging and evaluating the relative merits of conflicting arguments" and "may consider, in making their judgment, the source and credibility of the advocate"). Different candidates have different strengths. Some are wealthy; others have wealthy supporters who are willing to make large contributions. Some are celebrities; some have the benefit of a well-known family name. Leveling electoral opportunities means making and implementing judgments about which strengths should be permitted to contribute to the outcome of an election. The Constitution, however, confers upon voters, not Congress, the power to choose the Members of the House of Representatives, Art. I, §2, and it is a dangerous business for Congress to use the election laws to influence the voters’ choices.

This sounds reasonable enough, but it could be the wormhole to end public financing and eliminate contribution limits. Considering that we're in the age of the Internet where the low-dollar revolution has taught that there need not be a reliance on big corporate money, that could be OK. But not if limits start getting removed. McCain-Feingold was reinforced by a 2003 ruling, so hopefully it'll remain robust. I'm worried that this will challenge "fair fight" funds in use in public money states like Arizona and Maine, where the publicly financed candidate gets extra money if a privately funded challenger spends above certain thresholds.

Finally, there's the Second Amendment case of the DC handgun ban, and in another 5-4 ruling the Court asserted an individual right to gun ownership and struck down the DC law. This is really the end of the gun issue as a political football; the 2nd Amendment has been defined. I don't know if it was defined correctly, but even such Constitutional scholars as Russ Feingold assert an individual right to bear arms. Here's Sen. Obama on the issue:

“I have always believed that the Second Amendment protects the right of individuals to bear arms, but I also identify with the need for crime-ravaged communities to save their children from the violence that plagues our streets through common-sense, effective safety measures. The Supreme Court has now endorsed that view, and while it ruled that the D.C. gun ban went too far, Justice Scalia himself acknowledged that this right is not absolute and subject to reasonable regulations enacted by local communities to keep their streets safe. Today’s ruling, the first clear statement on this issue in 127 years, will provide much-needed guidance to local jurisdictions across the country.

“As President, I will uphold the constitutional rights of law-abiding gun-owners, hunters, and sportsmen. I know that what works in Chicago may not work in Cheyenne. We can work together to enact common-sense laws, like closing the gun show loophole and improving our background check system, so that guns do not fall into the hands of terrorists or criminals. Today's decision reinforces that if we act responsibly, we can both protect the constitutional right to bear arms and keep our communities and our children safe.

Actually, that kind of strikes the right balance to me. What I do find striking is that not long ago, Justice Scalia assured us that the Court's ruling in Boumediene would "surely cause more Americans to be killed," yet he doesn't see the same consequence of allowing firearms in everyone's hands. Overall, we have a Court that bounces back between activism and restraint when it suits their ideological needs. It reinforces the need for a Democratic President to retain our core values and not continue on this path of a hard-right agenda in the highest Court in the land.

UPDATE: According to Phillip Carter, the ruling in Heller is pretty restrained, and most current forms of gun control wouldn't fall under it, outside of total bans.

McCain's Shadow Cabinet

Here are some brief sketches at some of the people floating around John McCain's world. For the sake of brevity I'm going to leave out all the lobbyists and those who traded with our enemies.

We'll start with fundraiser Clayton Williams.

ABC News is reporting that John McCain was “forced” to cancel a fundraiser with Texas oilman Clayton Williams. The same Texas Republican who, while running for Governor against the late great Ann Richards, was quoted saying:

“Rape is like the weather, if it’s inevitable relax and enjoy it.”

Now here's key surrogate Rudy Giuliani, carving out a unique niche as a loanshark:

WASHINGTON — With the Republican Party in need of money for the November elections, former Mayor Rudolph W. Giuliani has offered to appear at fund-raisers around the country for G.O.P. candidates. But there is a catch: He wants some cash out of the deal.

Rudolph W. Giuliani is trying to reduce a $3.6 million campaign debt through joint fund-raisers.
Mr. Giuliani’s aides have told the National Republican Congressional Committee and Congressional candidates that if he makes an appearance, he wants the candidates to help him get rid of his presidential campaign debt.

And finally, there's the newest bright hope in Republican politics, the wunderkind, the golden boy, Bobby Jindal:

As others noted during his 2003 and 2007 gubernatorial campaigns (see update), in an essay Jindal wrote in 1994 for the New Oxford Review, a serious right-wing Catholic journal, Jindal narrated a bizarre story of a personal encounter with a demon, in which he participated in an exorcism with a group of college friends. And not only did they cast out the supernatural spirit that had possessed his friend, Jindal wrote that he believes that their ritual may well have cured her cancer.

Reading the article leaves no doubt that Jindal -- who graduated from Brown University in 1991, was a Rhodes Scholar, and had been accepted at Yale Law School and Harvard Medical School when he wrote the essay -- was completely serious about the encounter. He even said the experience "reaffirmed" his faith.

It could be worse, of course. McCain could know this guy.

Making the Political Personal

Maybe because flying is something we all do and something we all dread, and because we've all been shafted by the airlines at least once or twice, yesterday's hearing about the closeness between airline chiefs and the FAA struck a nerve. But it's part and parcel of a continuing project to delegitimize regulation of any kind by installing as the chief regulators of industry the very people who headed those industries in the first place.

Three veteran Federal Aviation Administration inspectors told lawmakers on Thursday that their agency supervisors looked the other way while Southwest Airlines neglected to inspect planes as required, and continued to fly them even after discovering cracks in some of them.

The inspectors said that their F.A.A. supervisors knew of the problems but had discouraged them from pursuing the safety problems or addressing problems within the agency, even threatening to relieve them of their duties.

One was removed from his job as an office manager and another was encouraged to apply for a transfer, they said. A third said he was temporarily removed from his role overseeing Southwest, as a result of complaints by the airline.

It's just one example, but because we have a real stake in it, because our lives were basically put at risk because the FAA was in bed with Southwest Airlines, it made a real impact. You know, we all know that the President is eliminating numerous laws government the environment and Native American land management to put up his border fence, but most of us don't live there. We know that the military is using the FBI to obtain all kinds of private records on Americans, including phone and financial data, but we don't know which one of us is having their privacy invaded. We know that the Justice Department is firing lawyers not only for their political affiliation but their sexual orientation, but we aren't those lawyers, and while many of us have been victims of discrimination, it's still abstract. We know that private military contractors are unaccountable monsters whose employees commit crimes like rape and are never held to account, but we aren't involved intimately in the case. The airline issue is maybe a smaller thing, though if there was a crash it would have been scandalous. But we all have a stake in it. We all have a history with it. We can very easily see ourselves on that faulty airplane.

The project for progressives is to connect that feeling of outrage to the systematic conservative goal to deregulate all industry to maximize corporate profit. It's to connect this explicitly to conservatism, not George Bush or some other random legislator. This is a CONSERVATIVE vision of America.

The Basra Aftermath

Well, in the aftermath of the great Basra debacle of Aught-Eight, the Coalition of the We Can't Leave Yet is assessing its options.

The Bush administration was caught off-guard by the first Iraqi-led military offensive since the fall of Saddam Hussein, a weeklong thrust in southern Iraq whose paltry results have silenced talk at the Pentagon of further U.S. troop withdrawals any time soon.

President Bush last week declared the offensive, which ended Sunday, "a defining moment" in Iraq's history.

That may prove to be true, but in recent days senior U.S. officials have backed away from the operation, which ended with Shiite militias still in place in Basra, Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri al Maliki possibly weakened and a de facto cease-fire brokered by an Iranian general.

"There is no empirical evidence that the Iraqi forces can stand up" on their own, a senior U.S. military official in Washington said, reflecting the frustration of some at the Pentagon. He and other military officials requested anonymity because they weren't authorized to speak for the record.

The British had the same reaction, which is not a promising one given five years of training the Iraqi security forces. And yet this shouldn't necessarily be the response. The Basra nightmare showed that the surge had limits and that it was doing little more than keeping a finger in the dike - standing in for the Iraqi security forces and paying off Sunni militias so that everyone keeps a lid on the violence. The Iraqi forces have no power because their loyalty is paltry compared to the tribal militias. And the mission exposed the degree to which Iran - in this case controlled by a guy on the US terrorist watch list - exercises territorial control over the nation and the region. In response to the failure, Nouri al-Maliki has recruited 10,000 Badr Brigade militia into the security forces, essentially joining the Mahdi Army militia since he couldn't beat them (it's clear that the regular forces were defecting by the thousands). The fact that Maliki added 10,000 Shiite militia after telling the Sunni militia groups that he had no room for them is sure to raise tensions. As is the continuing air raids in Sadr City.

' "We realized what kind of government we have: They are like foxes," Abu Amir said. "The Americans are our enemies, not our friends. Maliki is an agent of the Americans. '

So, we have the professional armies transformed into militias protecting sectarian power groups. The Americans are superfluous and quickly growing hated. And the Joint Chiefs of Staff recognize that the Army will be disintegrated without a draft if forces continue to be deployed at the same levels. No wonder nobody in Washington wants to release the next intelligence estimate on Iraq publicly. What's already out there is damning enough.

You can add to all this the moral depredations of our Iraq policy. We are either unable or unwilling to rescue those Iraqis who helped us and bring them to this country. A female soldier is more likely to be raped by one of her colleagues than be killed by enemy fire. And the contractors are either overcharging the government or poisoning our own soldiers due to lax environmental standards. All of these regrettable episodes would end with a complete withdrawal.

All the while, professional liars like Robert Kagan are so utterly and completely clueless about events on the ground that even Joe Klein has to kill him for it.

Fresh from his assertion that the Iraq civil war was "over" a week ago, here's Fred--plus added bonus attraction Kimberly--Kagan reinforcing their profoundly warped view of Iraq in the Weekly Standard. There are several truly disingenuous, and flat out misleading, things here:

1. The promulgation of the myth that Maliki's Folly was to clean out "terrorists" rather than a violent election-year ploy to clear out his legitimate Sadrist political opposition.

2. Perpetuation of the myth that effective Iraqi Security Forces actually exist and aren't primarily composed of (a) pro-Maliki and pro-Hakim militias and (b) former Iraqi soldiers more interested in making a living than in fighting. (Add: No acknowledgment that U.S. troops in the field simply do not trust their Iraqi counterparts...Oh, and I should also add: Some of the most "effective" ISF units are Kurdish pesh merga militias.)

3. Conflation of the "special groups"--trained and supported by the Iranian Qods force--and the Jaish al-Mahdi, which is the main Sadrist Iraqi nationalist militia. Kagan, a military historian, should check with David Petraeus about the relationship of those two separate forces. Indeed, part of Sadr's cease-fire strategy was allow the U.S. to cleanse Iraq of the "special groups." Sadr's no hero, but if he's a terrorist then so are the majority of Iraqi Shi'ites--i.e. his supporters.

4. No mention at all of the Badr Corps, the pro-Iranian Hakim militia that is Sadr's main enemy in Basra and Maliki's best friend. No mention of the widely held belief that the Iraqi Army units in Basra are riddled with Badr militia members.

5. No acknowledgment of the sheer complexity of the situation--the fact that all Shi'ite militias are receiving support from Iran, the fact that Sadr may be the most popular political figure in Shi'ite Iraq, courtesy of his father's fierce anti-Saddam, anti-Persian nationalism. No acknowledgment that our policy toward the various Shi'ite factions might be more successful if we were as nuanced as the Iranians.

The situation is truly complex and our presence is only making things worse. Whether we leave now or in ten years the same fundamental dynamic will be in place if we don't change course. And so rather than pause our drawdown of forces I think it makes more sense to see the Basra mess as a moment of clarity, where we recognize that the situation is untenable, our soldiers are only targets, and that the only surge needed is diplomatic and regional, not military. It's time to leave.

The Horror Of It All: Raped And In Legal Limbo

I interrupt the usual campaign gloating and trash talking and pie fighting to bring you a disturbing and important story of the consequences of unrivaled corporate power and the shifting of our armed forces into mercenary operations.

Mary Beth Kineston, an Ohio resident who went to Iraq to drive trucks, thought she had endured the worst when her supply convoy was ambushed in April 2004. After car bombs exploded and insurgents began firing on the road between Baghdad and Balad, she and other military contractors were saved only when Army Black Hawk helicopters arrived.

But not long after the ambush, Ms. Kineston said, she was sexually assaulted by another driver, who remained on the job, at least temporarily, even after she reported the episode to KBR, the military contractor that employed the drivers. Later, she said she was groped by a second KBR worker. After complaining to the company about the threats and harassments endured by female employees in Iraq, she was fired.

For the last several years, we have in Iraq created a lawless society administered by similarly lawless corporate entities, all blessed with their own immunities and legal black holes, so that even abhorrent episodes like rape change nothing and get nobody fired except the accuser.

“I felt safer on the convoys with the Army than I ever did working for KBR,” said Ms. Kineston, who won a modest arbitration award against KBR. “At least if you got in trouble on a convoy, you could radio the Army and they would come and help you out. But when I complained to KBR, they didn’t do anything. I still have nightmares. They changed my life forever, and they got away with it.”

Mary Beth Kineston is not the only woman. According to former Halliburton employee and gang-rape victim Jennifer Leigh Jones, 38 women have told their stories of rape and assault to her, but none can come forward due to arbitration agreements:

Jamie Leigh Jones is testifying on Capitol Hill this afternoon. She says she and other women are being forced to argue their cases of sexual harassment, assault and rape before secretive arbitration panels rather than in open court before a judge and jury.

Jones returned from Iraq following her rape in 2005. She was the subject of an exclusive ABC News report in December which led to congressional hearings.

After months of waiting for criminal charges to be filed, Jones decided to file suit against Halliburton and KBR.

KBR has moved for Jones' claim to be heard in private arbitration, instead of a public courtroom, as provided under the terms of her original employment contract.

In arbitration, there is no public record or transcript of the proceedings, meaning that Jones' claims would not be heard before a judge and jury. Rather, a private arbitrator hired by the corporation would decide Jones' case.

Corporate power is the thread tying all of this together. We know they can get the government to grant them amnesty for breaking the law. And in this case, they hire their own arbitrator to conduct sham hearings looking into malfeasance by their own employees.

And honestly, the only one saying much of anything about this is a Republican.

Congressman Ted Poe, R-Texas, who has been involved in the Jones case since the beginning, will also appear at today's hearing. He disagrees with the arbitration solution.

"Air things out in a public forum of a courtroom," said Rep. Poe in an earlier interview with ABC News. "That's why we have courts in the United States."

It's his constituent that's come forward, but there are apparently dozens of others. All of them have been subject to humiliating and dehumanizing conditions, had crimes committed against them by their co-workers, and these corporations are claiming that they signed away their Constitutional right to due process of the law with a trial by jury. Not only that, but since the crimes took place in a foreign war zone, the military justice system doesn't apply to them, either.

This breeds lawlessness inside the contractor zones, for obvious reasons. When there's no accountability, why modify behavior?

Paul Brand, a Chicago psychologist who counsels contractors who have served in Iraq, said the harassment of female workers by male colleagues was common. “The extent of the harassment varies greatly from contractor to contractor, depending on how diligently they screen job candidates and management’s willingness to encourage women to report problems,” he said. “In many instances, very little or nothing is done.”

Comprehensive statistics on sexual assaults in Iraq are unavailable because no one in the government or the contracting industry is tracking them. Court documents, interviews with those who were victims, their lawyers and other professionals, along with the limited data made available by the Bush administration, suggest a troubling trend.

The Criminal Investigation Command of the Army has reported that it investigated 124 cases of sexual assault in Iraq over the last three years. Those figures, provided to Senator Bill Nelson, the Florida Democrat who has taken the lead in the Senate on the issue, include cases involving both contractors and military personnel, but do not include cases involving contractors or soldiers investigated by other branches of the military.

This is especially abominable because there's no need to have so many contractors doing work previously reserved for the US military and under military control, and because it's a symptom of how corporate power has almost totally overtaken our government.

Take a few minutes out of your election coverage and really take a look at this story. It is the expected consequence of the Bush Republican era of corporate dominance.

Playing Out The String

The bottom line of this article is that there will be 100,000 or more troops in Iraq on Election Day 2008, there will still be a moral tragedy of a prison at Guantanamo, Osama bin Laden will still be at large, Iraq will still be a breeding ground for lawless contractors who allow their employees to rape and imprison, the fundamental problems of Sunni/Shiite distrust and a lack of a political solution will persist, and all of these messes will be dumped on the next President. In that sense, Robert Gates is doing exactly the job he's been asked to do by the President. Mukasey too.

UPDATE: Just let me flesh out this link a little more. Abdulaziz al-Hakim is saying that the neighborhood patrols set up as part of the "Anbar Awakening" must be under federal control. This is the last thing the Sunni former insurgents in those patrols want. The key quote is when Hakim says “Weapons should only be in the hands of the government.” Keep in mind that this is supposed to be the tangible success of the surge. It's actually heading inexorably toward confrontation. Also in the article is a UNICEF report that two million Iraqi children have suffered from "humanitarian ills" in 2007, with 60% unable to access potable water. Also there's an imminent battle for northern Iraq that'll explode at any time, with open pledges of violence by both Kurds and Sunnis. The middle of next year, in the heart of election season, could be a nightmare.