Œl’1 |Llnrtlanò ffihserüer Page A4 October 31. 2007 O pinion Opinion articles do not necessarily reflect or represent the views o f The Portland Observer A Great Nation, Poisoned by War Paying a heavy price for oil and empire il ti focusing n on these vulnerable The full-page Army ad in the minority parents, recruiters are NAACP magazine reads, ‘’You nowadays even trolling home­ made them strong. W ell make less shelters, their lures baited them Army Strong.” Besides with offers of $20,(XX) to leave uv by y i i in c W illiam A. Í C ' í ollins VA, n i i i A H ie f r v 'iic in o Jilnrtlanb (fllhsvrvwrEstablished 1970 USPS 959-680 4 7 4 7 NE Martin Luther King, Jr. Bivd., Portland, OR 97211 Charles H. Washington ichael Leighton D is tr ib u tio n M anager : M ark W ashington C reative D irecto r : Paul N eufeldt A d v e r t is in g : K athy Linder O f f ic e M anager : Sharon Sperry R eporter : Raym ond Rendlem an E ditor - in -C h ie f , P ublisher : E d it o r . M The Portland Observer welcomes freelance submissions. Manuscripts and photographs should be clearly labeled and will be returned if accompanied by a self addressed envelope. All created design display ads become the sole property of the newspaper and cannot be used in other publications or personal usage without the w ritten consent of the general manager, unless the client has purchased the composition of such ad. <5 1996 THE PORTLAND OBSERVER ALL RIGHTS RESERVED. REPRODUCTION IN WHOLE OR IN PART WITHOUT PERMISSION IS PROHIBITED The Portland O bserver-O regon's Oldest Multicultural Publication- is a member o f the National Newspaper Association-Founded in 1885. and The National Advertising Representative Amalgamated Publishers. Inc. New York, NY. and The West Coast Black Publishers Association P ostmaster : Send address changes to Portland Observer, P0 Box3 1 3 7 , Portland, OR 9 7 2 0 8 CALL 503-288-0033 FAX 503-288-0015 news@portlandobserver.coni ads @portlandobserver. com subscription@portlandobserver.com “home.” Further, enlistment standards have been lowered for intellec­ tual capacity, emotional stabil­ ity, and criminal record. These are our own homegrown mer­ cenaries, sifted largely from among the poor. And while such troops may sound expensive to muster, they're a bargain com pared with the real live mercenaries we hire for Iraq and A fghani­ stan. American civilians over there get paid like generals, and foreign workers command princely sums compared to the s c ra b b ly farm s or b ru ta l sweatshops back home. Like the Romans and British be­ fore us, our imperial military has become totally dependent on p riv a te w o rk e rs . Halliburton and Blackwater are the new Hessians. L ocally a heroic-looking young man has just returned from early boot camp to start his senior year in high school. He wants to give something “back” to his country. His dad's not worried. After all, he sur­ vived war in his native El Salva­ dor. His son probably will sur­ Smoke around your children and they could inhale equal to 102 packs of cigarettes by age 5. vive too. Maybe. Battlefield care is surely outstanding now, and only 3,800 troops have actually died at the front. Unfortunately, we don't keep such close tabs on the wounded. Too depress­ ing. If we did publish true figures of the emotionally maimed or the economically disabled, it might discourage some of our potential cannon fodder from Expo. An impromptu peace dem onstration ensued, where the vets discovered that the recruiters were not soldiers at all, but civilians looking m ili­ tary. Such is our shortage of troops. For Iraqis, of course, the war is infinitely worse. Wedon'teven count their casualties. We just assume that everyone we kill is an al-Qaida “suspect.” Iraqi This poisonous oppressing o f another country is quietly doing its insidious work on our souls. enlisting. That in turn could un­ dermine the $700 million we spend each year on recruiters and the $583 million for adver­ tising and promotion. But even recruiting has now gone mercenary. At the Vet­ erans for Peace convention in St. Louis this summer, a group o f Iraq vets stum bled upon an army recruiting team at the adjacent A frican A m erican tagon and the Veterans Ad­ m inistration for data on who will be returning in need of care. U n fo rtu n a te ly , such recordkeeping conflicts with a W hite H ouse p o lic y of downplaying the wounded, so as not to sap enthusiasm for the battle. And now, verifying what we already knew in our hearts, Alan Greenspan, of all people, has confirmed that the war is actu­ ally just about oil. No kidding. Good thing our potential high school recruits don’t read the financial pages. They might be­ gin to wonder just what it is they’re giving “back” to their country. This poisonous oppressing of anothercountryisquietly doing its insidious work on our souls. W e’re becoming hardened to dead and dying foreign civilians, hom eless refugees, M uslim bashing, and destroyed cultures. Such forsaking of conscience is a heavy price for a little more oil and empire. wounded are simply assumed to die of their injuries in the privacy of their own battered homes. This is probably not a bad guess, since we have contrived to de­ molish their hospitals and water purification plants, and to chase their doctors abroad. O ur own wounded remain William A. Collins is a nearly as uncounted. G over­ form er state representative nors and veterans officials and a form er mayor o f continually plead with the Pen­ Norwalk, Conn. <4 STUDY ÌA B IA C K XVÀD NVHrre ) peace PEA CE N O B EL LAUREATE NOBEL LAUREATE 4L Ö 0RE- DESMOND TbTU. 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T dhs Smith always sides with Bush on judges TOBACCO ANO EDUCATION PROGRAM Paid for by the Oregon Department of Human Services by J eff M erkley THE SPINA COLUMN An ongoing series of questions and answers about Amenca’s natural healing profession Dr. Billy R. Flowers Part 10. Fatigue: A cure for people sick and tired of being of being sick and tired. : I seem to be tired a lot lately. Does that mean I need iron? Q A : The most common reason / » p a t i e n t s come intoouroffice is because of some type of pain. But many of these people are also suffering from fatigue. Fatigue that makes the eyes hum slows down the healing process and makes you wonder why you don't feel as well as you used to. Obvi­ ously, there can be many causes of fatigue. Diet is certainly one of them. It’s a subject w e’d be happy to discuss with you in detail. Another cause, however is often stress. Many of you have prob­ ably heard of the “Fight Or Flight” rested, telling us they just had syndrom e. W hen the body is their best night’s sleep in ages. If stressed, it responds with a com­ you think the stress of everyday bat-ready posture. In analyzing life might be wearing you down many such patients’ x-rays, we find and preventing your body from the head angled forward and the warding off illnesses, call usfor an back arched in this highly-stressed appointment. Or if there are any position. AfterChiropractic adjust­ other questions you might have ment, this condition is often vastly about your health, just call us at improved. Patients come back well- the phone number below. Flowers' Chiropractic Office 2124 NE Hancock, Portland Oregon 97212 Phone: (5 0 3 ) 287-5504 It isn’t surprising that Gordon Smith has given the thumbs-up to another one of Bush’s judicial nominees. S m ith's vote last week to confirm Judge Leslie Southwick to the Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals is very trou­ bling because of Southwick’s history on the Mississippi Court of Appeals, routinely deciding against plaintiffs in cases in­ volving racial discrimination, in­ jured workers, and consumers. Southwick has built his judi­ cial career on denying justice to workers and minorities. His de­ cisions include one reinstating a white employee who was fired for using a vulgar racial epithet in reference to a black co­ worker. He also joined a court opinion which found that a m other’s sexual orientation alone was grounds for denying her custody of her children. When the President packs the bench with judges like Southwick, he pits the g o v ern m en t ag a in st the very people it should be serving. Gordon Smith has voted in favor of ev­ ery c o n tro v ersial nominee to the fed­ eral bench that Bush has offered during his term in office. They include J. Leon Holmes, U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Arkan­ sas who as past president of Arkansas Right to Life wrote that “concern for rape victims is a red herring because concep­ tions from rape occur with the same frequency as snowfall in Miami.” He voted fo r C h arles Pickering to the Fifth Circuit C o u rt o f A p p eals. Like Southwick, Pickering also had a very checkered past on civil- rig h ts issu es. He fav o red strengthening Mississippi’s laws against interracial m arriage, appealed for leniency i n a cross­ burning case, and personally o p p o sed the D em ocratic P a rty ’s in te g ra tio n of Mississippi’s national conven­ tion delegation. Smith backed Bush on the nomination of Miguel Estrada to D.C. Circuit Court of Appeals and William Pryor to the I Ith C ircu it C ourt o f A ppeals. Estrada had a long history of opposition to worker’s rights, civil rights and the environment; and Pryor called the Voting Rights Act an “affront to feder­ alism,” opposing a provision that protects minority-voting rights. Like 90 percent of the votes he casts in D.C., Smith is in lockstep with President Bush, but way out of step with the people he represents. He had a chance to take a stand for fair treatm ent of all Americans. Instead, he stood up for the kind of divisive politics that is tearing America apart. Jeff Merkley is the Oregon Speaker of the House and a Democratic candidate for the U.S. Senate seat held hy Re­ publican Gordon Smith.