PlameGate: 'Slate' is the best.

PlameGate - John Dickerson: Matt Cooper testifies at the Libby trial. - By John Dickerson, Dahlia Lithwick, and Seth Stevenson - Slate Magazine
The best coverage of the Scooter Libby trial, to me, is Slate's. It is a day-to-day report of what really happens in court.
It has become evident, already, that:

'Scooter' Libby, Leaving the White House, October 2005, after
having resigned because of his indictment

* Libby was NOT informed of Valerie Plame by reporters, but that we have to deal with a full-fledged campaign, initiated by his boss
Cheney;
* Libby's own counsel sketched a version of the facts, that depicts Libby as a victim of the White House's efforts to keep Bush's witch Rove out of the line of fire;
* and that there was panic in the White House, following Wilson'sq revelations in his NYT op-ed in July 2003.
US justice is good, mostly, but often slow.
We cannot expect an outcome that permits an indictment of Cheney and Bush before the end of their term, in 2008.

Wall- und Raumfahrt in Bremen - Gröpelingen 29.12.06 [DE]

Grau war der Himmel über Gröpelingen.

Es regnete in Bremen. Ich machte eine kurze Wallfahrt nach das Ort, wo ich im Jahre 2002 oder 2003 ein URBAN-Schlussfest überrascht hatte mit dem Philosophen Peter Sloterdijk. Dieser deutsche Philosoph hat die modische Errichtung von Themaparks als Ersatz für das reale Leben angeklagt in seinem Buche, wo er von "Menschenparks" spricht.

Tierpark - Menschenpark: Es ist nur ein kleiner Schritt.

 

Die freie Hansestadt Bremen hat sich als Raumfahrtstandort durchsetzen wollen. Das Millionenmanna des URBAN Programms (II) sollte helfen den Traum wenigstens parkenhaft zu verwirklichen. Deswegen schuf man auf dem Gelände der stillgelegten Werften an der Weser ein "SpacePark", oder, genauer, ein "Space Park Center". Beton- und Glas Architektur. Riesenhaft. Ein horizontaler Babelsturm.

Ein kommerzielles Bereich war vorgesehen, um die Exploitation zu ermöglichen (deswegen das "Center" in der Name).

Aber nach sechs Monaten eröffnet gewesen zu sein, musste das ganze Center schliessen wegen ungenügendes Besuchs. Das geschah aber zwei Jahre nach meiner pessimistischen Prophetie.

 

Diese Letzte wurde vorgetragen im "Lichthause", ein Überrest vom Werftencomplexe, das im Rahmen des "Kohesionsteils" des Urban Programms mit kargen Mitteln umgebaut war zur Klienbetrieben- und Ateliers-Behäusung.

Die kleine, begeisterte Gruppe die am Grossprojekt angehängt war (und zugleich abgehängt) und die als Aufgabe hatte, um im dorfhaften Arbeiterviertel Gröpelingen eine Erwachung aus der Lethargie der Dauerarbeitslosigkeit hervorzuzaubern, hatte, mit Hilfe eines Grosswohnungsbauvereins, etwas geschaffen, das aus dem Dorfe ein Kulturpark machte. "Kultur Vor Ort" lässt verborgene Brunnen von Schaffungskraft und versteckte Fähigkeiten der deutschstämmigen und der türkischstämmigen Bevölkerung üppig fliessen.

 

Aber es ist, im Vergleich zu dasjenige was möglich gewesen wäre mit den Euromillionen, und auch als "Kohesion" (dauerhafte gegenseitige Anregung der Projektelementen zur Weiterentwicklung - ich bedenke diese Definition hier und heute, aber sie scheint mir richtig), viel zu schwach, beinahe nichtig.

Hauptfehler ist, dass die Kohesion nicht im Perspektive der Wieder- und Weiter-Entwicklung der Bewohner und der Arbeitnehmer, sowie der Ökonomie der Nachbarschaften (Gröpelingen, Waller, usw.) gesehen worden ist, aber nur als Anhängsel des Grossparktraumes.

 

Wäre das "Center" mit seinen kommerziellen Grossflächen wirklich instandgesetzt sein, dann hätte das Kleinladenbestand Gröpelingens seinen letzten Überlebenschancen verpasst. Keine Anregung zur Anwerbung der Dauerarbeitslosen Gröpelingens im Center war vorgesehen. Reparatur dieser Situation ergab sich als unmöglich.

Einsam hebt sich der Kopf der Ariane Rakete über das leere Space Park Center. Sie wird nie zum Himmel steigen.

Hundert Meter weiter erhebt sich das Minarett des neuen türkischen Grossmoschee. Himmelfahrt ist dort nicht vorgesehen. Ein ironischer Bildreim von verfehlter Kohesion.

 

Frei nach Heinrich Heine:

 

"...Die Chinesen haben die Industrie, das Meer gehört den Briten, 

aber im Traumreich des Parks, herrscht der Deutsche unbestritten." 

 

Ich habe trotzdem etwas Postives, ein winziges Prinzip Hoffnung gefunden. Nur Träumer können einen so riesigen Beitrag zum zukünftigen Urban Blunderbook leisten. Es handelt sich hier um einem Monumentalen Fall von "worst practices", das uns so viel lehren kann. Vielleicht mehr als the best of the best practices.

 

Ha, ich bin wieder froh, dank der Deutschen. Ich hole mir einen "Space Cut" bei dem gröpelinger Friseur. Der einzige Laden in ganz Gröpelingen bei dem ich eine Hoffnung auf Kohesion mit dem Space Center beobachtet habe ...

Mehr Photos (mit Kommentar) von meiner verregneten Wallfahrt sind im "eurban"-Bereich bei "Flickr" zu sehen.

Photos aus dem Jahre 2005 sind in der e-urban Gallery "Bremen 2005 - Gröpelingen, Oktober". 

London Thieves and Police 22.12.06

London, November 9, 2006. X-Mas decorations appearing everywhere. Me meeting my best friend in the UK, Gabriel, between our afternoon meetings and his departure by train from Victoria Station. We found a moderately quiet public place to sit and talk, in clubchairs in a sort of corridor between the Hotel lobby and it's bar. Afternoon tea was served.

Wet get up, having finished our talk. I reach for my bag with laptop, camera end papers - but no bag any more...

Stupid. STUPID! I should have kept it closer. A seasoned traveller like me can be robbed, yes, but not in such a simple way. It should have been more dramatic.

But here are the good things that the event produced:

The CrimeStoppers of Belgravia Police Station delivering...The London Police, contacted the next day, were quite different from other big-city polices I have had to do with. In spite of the fact, that thefts and robberies of foreign tourists happen 20 to 30 times a day in their sector, the Belgravia force handled my case, as if they were happy to serve and eager to deliver. I cannot exclude, that they really were.

The CCTV recording of the theft, I had meanwhile discovered with the gracious help of the Hotel Security Manager, identified the group of thieves. In stead of an uninterested typist, moaning under the charge of making his keyboard rattle, I got an efficient young woman who could have been my grandchild and who set a real chase for the criminal in motion. The eventual problems of the victim were not forgotten either. On my journey home, to Brussels, I was followed closely by a letter from a specialised department of London Police, who offered psychological help for victims. 

Not of any possible use for me, of course, but the letter in itself healed most of the mental wounds I had incurred from this event.

On former occasions, this would have been the end of the story. Those robberies are filed, and it becomes quickly and exclusively a matter for insurance companies. But not here. On an early Saturday morning, my Brussels phone ringed, and a voice belonging to a London detective with an accent "à couper en deux", as the French say, announced the arrest of one of the suspects. That jewel of civilisation which is called "habeas corpus" and that restricts detaining powers (without inculpation) to maximum 24 or 48 hours, necessitated some supplementary statements from me, so that a judge could decide upon further detainment of the suspect during the weekend.

Which was done. And -also a new and unusual kind of care- was confirmed by letter to me. With a number of details, that are restricted and I will not betray the confidence of the senders of the letter by publishing it here. Anyhow, all this will not restore my belongings to me. But this normal and consequent behaviour, which can, in my opinion only be delivered by a public service (No privatisation of the Police! - See European Petition on Public Services and Market that is featured elsewhere on e-urban.) is a positive experience.

This small adventure is worth remembering at the closure of this first e-urban year. It conveys some hope for a civilised Europe of sustainable communities. Hope that had to be so painfully absent from most of the other articles we published in 2006...

Dutch Iraq Torture: Documents show it really happened

The Dutch prominent daily "NRC" today confirmed that Dutch army security agents tortured Iraqi detainees in 2003.
The paper obtained documents from the The Hague Defense Ministry (under a Law for Government Transparency, the "Wet Openbaarheid Bestuur" or "WOB") that tell a part of the story that was left out of the comments of Dutch Government in November, when the scandal broke.
The Dutch Marine Batallion that controlled the southern Al-Muthanna Province during eighteen months in 2003/2004 had a particular status. It was not part of the occupying powers (the "Coalition"). It had to restore and maintain law and order in the province under British supervision. Eventual detainees had to be handed over to Iraqi authorities (common criminals) or to the British army with headquarters in Basra (insurgents, Baath people, intruders from other countries).
The Dutch miltary Intelligence "MIVD" ("Militaire Inlichtingen- en Veiligheids Dienst") people were also subject to those rules. In spite of that, they set up their own headquarters in the "Coalition" post in the provincial capital, where they "interviewed" detainees for some days, between their capture and their transfer to the British military in Basra.
When the Dutch commander was alerted about the "robust" methods of interrogation being used by the MIVD, he asked expanations, which he got.:

• Waterboarding of detainees was explained in that report as "the need to keep the detainee awaked" during nocturnal interrogations,
  
• while the use of deafening sound was justified by the need of avoiding communication between detainees.
  
• The use of darkened ski-goggles on detainees (as blindfolds) was needed to avoid identification by them of their interrogators.

The man accepted this, until he got another report from his liaison officer in Basra, saying that the MIVD had explained to the British, that the mentioned interrogation "techniques" had been used as a means of coercion. That was not only in contravention to the Dutch rules of engagement, but also of the Geneva Conventions.
The commander alerted the General Staff in The Hague. An inquiry was ordered by the Minister to be done by the Military Police.

And, after that, NOTHING. The stories differ. The Minister (still in office as caretaker after the general elections lost by his party, and the fall of the Balkenende III government), says that he got no further information and assumed, that a conclusion had been reached that there had not been any reprehensible conduct. The (former) Commander in Chief says that Military Justice did not see a reason to act in this case, while the Chief of the MP thinks, that the report wasn't even transmitted to Military Justice.

Our opinion is, that this is not merely a sad story of overzealous intelligence people.
It shows a state of mind that points to:

1. Contamination by the Guantanamo methods, transmitted by the American Commander of that camp to Iraq during his 2003 mission;
2. an undisciplinary attitude of the intelligence agents
3. their probable coverage by elements within the armed forces and, perhaps, the minister himself;
4. and, as their exactions remained unpunished, a probable continuation of those practices in Afghanistan during the Dutch "commando" support to the American campaign "Enduring Freedom", and:
5. a documented follow-up of these doings during the Dutch "reconstruction" mission in Afghanistan (Tarin Kowt, Uruzgan), where they effectively terrorize the populations, thus making any effort by the regular Dutch troops to do some peaceful reconstruction work, ineffective and impracticable.

My supposition is, that the actual General Staff provoked the "leak" about Iraq, in order to get rid of these undisciplined contingents in Afghanistan, and, probably, at the same time, of the Minister, who condoned tacitly this devious practice, in order to please the US, without hurting the Dutch Parliament, that had insisted on a peaceful mission, completely separate from the "Enduring Freedom" campaign.

The cunning Government Minister, Mr. Henk Kamp, may expect a similar fate as has befallen to his colleague Rumsfeld. The mewly chosen Parliament has a tiny progressive majority, and it seems improbable, that his party will take part in Government during the coming four years.