AfterDowningStreet.org

Wisconsin Democrat Asks Senate to Rebuke the President for NSA Wiretaps
By ED O'KEEFE, ABC

March 12, 2006— - In an exclusive interview on "This Week with George Stephanopoulos," Democratic Sen. Russ Feingold called on the Senate to publicly admonish President Bush for approving domestic wiretaps on American citizens without first seeking a legally required court order.

"This conduct is right in the strike zone of the concept of high crimes and misdemeanors," said Feingold, D-Wis., a three-term senator and potential presidential contender.

By Sean Rayment, The Telegraph UK

An SAS soldier has refused to fight in Iraq and has left the Army over the "illegal" tactics of United States troops and the policies of coalition forces.

After three months in Baghdad, Ben Griffin told his commander that he was no longer prepared to fight alongside American forces.

He said he had witnessed "dozens of illegal acts" by US troops, claiming they viewed all Iraqis as "untermenschen" - the Nazi term for races regarded as sub-human.

http://www.newsmax.com

Sen. Russ Feingold said Sunday that Congress needs to censure President Bush as a possible first step towards impeachment for authorizing the wiretapping of terrorists based in America, adding that Bush's alleged lawbreaking was "much more serious, clearly, than anything Bill Clinton ever did."

"This conduct is right in the strike zone of the concept of high crimes and misdemeanors," Feingold told ABC's "This Week." "What the president did, by consciously and intentionally violating the Constitution and the laws of this country with this illegal wiretapping, has to be answered."

Feingold Says Congress Must Condemn the President's Violation of the Public's Trust Through Illegal Wiretapping Program

Washington, D.C. – U.S. Senator Russ Feingold has announced that he will introduce a resolution in the U.S. Senate on Monday to censure the President of the United States. Feingold's resolution condemns the President's actions in authorizing the illegal wiretapping program and then misleading the country about the existence and legality of the program. Feingold calls the resolution an appropriate and responsible step for Congress to take in response to the President's undermining of the separation of powers and ignoring the rule of law.

Articles Of Impeachment Against George W. Bush, President Of The United States,
For The High Crimes Of Making False And Fraudulent Statements To Congress
That Iraq Had Sought Uranium For A Nuclear Weapon, And For
Conspiring To Defraud Congress
And
Memorandum In Support Thereof
By
Francis T. Mandanici
Attorney At Law
Bridgeport, CT
PDF

By Charles R. Babcock, Washington Post

Custer Battles is told it should pay more than $10 million in damages.

Two Army veterans and their company cheated the US government on a contract to furnish Iraq with a new currency in 2003 and should pay more than $10 million in assorted damages, a federal jury in Alexandria ruled yesterday.

In the first civil fraud verdict arising from the war effort, the eight-member panel decided, after two days of deliberation, in favor of two former workers who claimed in a lawsuit that Custer Battles LLC created phony Cayman Island companies to overcharge the Coalition Provisional Authority that ran Iraq after the US-led invasion in 2003.

http://www.truthout.org/multimedia.htm

On Monday, March 6th, Cindy Sheehan and three others were arrested while attempting to deliver a petition to the US Mission at the UN. t r u t h o u t's Rebecca MacNeice was on the ground and filmed the arrests.

By Mike Hersh

I spoke with Cindy Sheehan just before she had to leave for medical
tests in the DC area. She was badly hurt, much worse than when she was
roughed up and jailed for wearing a t-shirt at the State of the Union. I
saw her just before and after that fiasco as well. She showed me her
bruises which hadn't fully healed before this latest brutality.

The violence against Cindy and others keeps escalating in parallel with

Congress Must Act To Prevent Similar Deals In The Future

Congressman Dennis J. Kucinich (D-OH), Ranking Member of the House Government Reform Subcommittee on National Security, Emerging Threats and International Relations, today, introduced a rarely used Congressional procedure called a Resolution of Inquiry to demand documents from the Administration about the security review of the port deal that would have allowed a United Arab Emirates (UAE) company to take control of six US ports.

By Cindy Sheehan

As I lie here in bed recuperating from the injuries that I received from a federal agent and the NYPD in front of the US Mission to the UN (USUN) the other day, I have had time to reflect on the experience, the state of our union and its descent into a fascist state.

The plain-clothes police or US Dept of State Diplomatic Security agent with the cell phone is the one who assaulted Cindy Sheehan and Ann Wright in New York.

STAR OF HOPE
Global Agenda for a Peaceful Future

By John McConnell: 90 year old founder of Earth Day.

Faced with a growing global danger of total catastrophe, we need a worldwide agenda that will enable us to continue the human adventure.

The original Earth Day (March 21, 1970) followed two events I was responsible for -- the global Minute for Peace (December 22, 1963) and my Star of Hope Satellite proposal which obtained front page attention around the world in 1957.

There are now 30 Congress Members sponsoring House Resolution 635, which would create a select committee to investigate and make recommendations regarding grounds for possible impeachment.

Michael Capuano and Bernie Sanders are the two latest Members to sign on. Sanders received a great deal of pressure after five towns in Vermont passed resolutions calling on him to introduce articles of impeachment. Sanders initially posted this statement saying it would be impractical to talk about impeachment. He has not introduced articles, but backing this bill sure amounts to "talking about it." This success demonstrates the usefulness of

Getting your city or town to pass a resolution.

Please Email Your Congress Member.

LEARN MORE

By Don Williams

I'm learning to love ugly letters to the editor. Honestly, they help sell
books, fill my writing classes, and they let me know who my friends are when
we meet in public. Sometimes they prompt brave admirers to write lovely
letters in my behalf-something I truly appreciate.

I'm also learning to appreciate angry emails. If emails full of bluster and
indignation, along with others brimming with praise, didn't arrive almost

jay woodson (215) 868-8377 [email protected]

Slam War!!!

WASHINGTON - March 9 - "Now, it should be incandescently clear that no one who has any concern for the integrity and life of America today can ignore the present war." Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. 1967

Over 4 years after U.S. centers of military and financial imperialism were attacked, the U.S. military and coalition forces continue to occupy Afghanistan and Iraq.

http://thinkprogress.org

The Bush administration has appointed 28-year-old former White House
staffer Doug Hoelscher as the executive director of the Homeland
Security Advisory Committees.

In his new position, Hoelscher will gather expert advice "on behalf of
the president and the Homeland Security secretary" from 20 other
advisory boards covering "key areas of homeland security, including

By Fred Kaplan, http://www.slate.com

It's a tossup which is more galling: that Donald Rumsfeld digs himself
a few feet deeper with each remark he makes before a congressional
committee, or that his interrogators don't seem to notice.

Take this morning's hearing before the Senate appropriations
committee, at which Rumsfeld appeared alongside not only the chairman
of the Joint Chiefs of Staff and the commander of U.S. forces in Iraq

By Suzanne Goldenberg, The Guardian UK

4,500 inmates to be moved to other jails. Buildings will be handed over to Iraqi government.

Abu Ghraib, the prison which will be forever linked with images of Iraqi detainees stripped naked and humiliated by their American jailors, is to be closed, US military officials said yesterday. The sprawling, low-slung prison in the western suburbs of Baghdad, a torture chamber under Saddam Hussein that gained even more notoriety with the photographs of abuse committed by US troops, is likely to close within three months.

By American Progress Action Fund

Yesterday, Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice and Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld appeared before the Senate Appropriations Committee to request $65 billion in emergency security funds for the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, on top of the $369 billion the United States has spent already. This appearance came amidst deep dissatisfaction among the U.S. public over the war (only 30 percent approve of President Bush's handling of Iraq), increasing sectarian violence, and a troubling human rights situation. The testimony by Rice and Rumsfeld did little to reassure the American people that the administration is using taxpayers' money wisely, amounting to "more or less a recitation of the administration's standard formulations on Iraq," according to the New York Times. Rice and Rumsfeld's testimony yesterday ignored the U.S. responsibility for Iraq's current state of instability. The administration's post-invasion failure to properly train security forces, oversee detainee interrogations, and plan for reconstruction have left a situation of chaos and insecurity in Iraq. (American Progress has a plan to move forward.)

WASHINGTON, D.C. PREMIERE SCREENING - JUST RELEASED

Wed., March 15 - The Ides of March
AFL-CIO - 815 16th St. NW
Peace Fair/Reception - 6 pm
Movie - 7 pm
Discussion - 7:30 pm
Afterwards: Candlelight walk to the White House

SEE: A 30-min. movie on the June 2005 tour of six Iraqi labor leaders
to 25 U.S. cities, sponsored by U.S. Labor Against the War. This
documentary captures the energy and emotions of the tour while