Stephen Zunes: Iraq War Vote Shadows Clinton Candidacy

Award-winning Investigative Journalist Robert Parry (1949-2018)

Award-winning investigative journalist and founder/editor of ConsortiumNews.com, Robert Parry has passed away. His ground-breaking work uncovering Reagan-era dirty wars in Central America and many other illegal and immoral policies conducted by successive administrations and U.S. intelligence agencies, stands as an inspiration to all in journalists working in the public interest.

Robert had been a regular guest on our Between The Lines and Counterpoint radio shows -- and many other progressive outlets across the U.S. over four decades.

His penetrating analysis of U.S. foreign policy and international conflicts will be sorely missed, and not easily replaced. His son Nat Parry writes a tribute to his father: Robert Parry’s Legacy and the Future of Consortiumnews.

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The Resistance Starts Now!

Between The Lines' coverage and resource compilation of the Resistance Movement

"The man who predicted Trump presidential win now says Trump impeachment could happen," AM Joy with Joy Reid, MSNBC, Jan. 21, 2018
"Sketchy Kazakh money finds its way into Trump dealings," The Rachel Maddow Show, MSNBC, Jan. 15, 2018
"Red flags seen in many Trump real estate deals," The Rachel Maddow Show, MSNBC, Jan. 15, 2018
"Secret Money: How Trump Made Millions Selling Condos To Unknown Buyers," BuzzFeed, Jan. 12, 2018
"The Scandals of Donald Trump: Presidential Edition," The Atlantic, May 15, 2017
"Here's what we know so far about Team Trump's ties to Russian interests," Washington Post's ongoing compilation
"What Comey Was Investigating, Explained," The Moscow Project, Center for American Progress

"Donald Trump's Financial Ties to Russian Oligarchs and Mobsters Detailed In Explosive New Documentary from the Netherlands," Dutch TV documentary, Alternet.org, May 12, 2017
Ongoing compilation of Trump's creeping authoritarianism," MotherJones.com
Full resource list ...

SPECIAL REPORT: "The Resistance - Women's March 2018 - Hartford, Connecticut" Jan. 20, 2018

Selected speeches from the Women's March in Hartford, Connecticut 2018, recorded and produced by Scott Harris

SPECIAL REPORT: "No Fracking Waste in CT!" Jan. 14, 2018

Jen Siskind Jennifer Siskind, local coordinator for Food and Water Watch, describes the campaign to stop fracking waste in Connecticut, which so far has led to fracking waste bans in 34 towns around the state. Interviewed by Richard Hill on Mic Check, WPKN Radio, Bridgeport, CT

SPECIAL REPORT: "Resistance Round Table: The Unraveling Continues..." Jan. 13, 2018

Lindsay Kanaly The panel discusses Trump's long history of racism and the Republican voter suppression juggernaut confronting Democrats leading up to the 2018 elections. Special guest: Lindsay Kanaly, a lead organizer of the Women's Marches planned for Jan. 20, 2018. Panel: Scott Harris, Ruthanne Baumgartner and Richard Hill on Resistance Roundtable, WPKN Radio, Bridgeport, CT.

SPECIAL REPORT: "Capitalism to the ash heap?" Richard Wolff, Jan. 2, 2018

Richard Wolff, Economics professor Richard Wolff declares U.S. capitalism to be beyond repair and suggests the need for a radical alternative. Interviewed by Richard Hill

SPECIAL REPORT: Maryn McKenna, author of "Big Chicken", Dec. 7, 2017

Maryn McKenna, investigative journalist and author of Big Chicken, talks about the widespread use and dangers of antibiotics in commercial poultry, beef and fruit production. Interview by Bill Duesing, Richard Hill and Guy Beardsly on WPKN's Organic Farm Stand.

SPECIAL REPORT: Nina Turner's address, Working Families Party Awards Banquet, Dec. 14, 2017

Nina Turner, president of Our Revolution, talks about the fight ahead for progressives as she receives the Working Families Organization Award for Exceptional Leadership Towards Advancing Progress. The event was held in Meriden, CT. Produced by Richard Hill.

SPECIAL REPORT: Mic Check, Dec. 12, 2017

Working Families Party of CT talks strategy and issues for 2018.
Lindsay Farrell, executive director of the Working Families Party of Connecticut, discusses the state's electoral landscape and lays out the issues and strategies that could lead to progressive victories in 2018. Interviewed by Richard Hill.

SPECIAL REPORT: Resistance Roundtable, Dec. 9, 2017

Disturbing developments in the Trump/Republican Agenda
Focus on the tax bill, destruction of our public lands, North Korea and Trump's private CIA. Panel: Scott Harris, Ruthanne Baumgartner and Richard Hill. Special guest: Jo Macallero of Rise and Resist.

SPECIAL REPORT: On Tyranny - one year later, Nov. 28, 2017

Professor Timothy Snyder, author of the highly acclaimed resistance manual On Tyranny, discusses his book and offers a fresh assessment of the state of our beleaguered republic. Timothy Snyder, history professor at Yale, is introduced by Stanley Heller, administrator of Promoting Enduring Peace, a Connecticut-based organization that sponsored this event at the United Church Parish House in New Haven on Nov. 28. A brief interview with Snyder conducted by WPKN radio producer, Richard Hill, follows his talk.

SPECIAL REPORT: Mic Check, Nov. 12, 2017

Lynne Ide, director of program and policy with the Universal Health Care Foundation of Connecticut, talks about the current state of health care coverage in Connecticut. Interviewed by Richard Hill, WPKN radio producer

SPECIAL REPORT: Resistance Roundtable, Nov. 11, 2017

Focus on the Republican tax plan, the just-released autopsy on the Democratic Party, and Internet censorship by Google, Facebook and Youtube. Including an interview with Hilary Grant, a lead organizer with Action Together Connecticut, who discusses the local results of the recent election, with hosts Richard Hill, Scott Harris and Ruth Baumgartner WPKN producers

SPECIAL REPORT: Rainy Day Radio, Nov. 7, 2017

Two leaders from Redneck Revolt, an anti-racist, anti-capitalist movement, talk about their work organizing with white working class people in Suffolk County, New York. Interviewed by Richard Hill, WPKN radio producer

SPECIAL REPORT: Rainy Day Radio, Nov. 7, 2017

Bruce Gagnon, coordinator for the Global Network Against Weapons and Nuclear Power in Space, describes the extent of -- and motives underlying -- the vast US network of military bases around the globe. Interviewed by Richard Hill, WPKN radio producer

SPECIAL REPORT: Resisting U.S. JeJu Island military base in South Korea, Oct. 24, 2017

Joyakol, South Korean peace activist and singer, discusses the crisis on the Korean peninsula and focuses on the resistance to the U.S. huge military base being constructed on Jeju Island. The event was sponsored by the Greater New Haven Peace Council and this audio was recorded by Richard Hill, WPKN producer.
Joyakol discusses Americans' biggest misconceptions about the conflict between North and South Korea and the U.S., Interview by Richard Hill, WPKN producer.

SPECIAL REPORT: John Allen, Out in New Haven

John Allen, founding director of the New Haven Pride Center, Connecticut, talks about his new LGBTQ television show, Out in New Haven, which presents a range of political and cultural issues to the community. Interviewed by Richard Hill on WPKN's Rainy Day Tuesday, Jan. 2, 2018.

2017 Gandhi Peace Awards

Promoting Enduring Peace presented its Gandhi Peace Award jointly to renowned consumer advocate Ralph Nader and BDS founder Omar Barghouti on April 23, 2017.

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THANK YOU TO EVERYONE...

who helped make our 25th anniversary with Jeremy Scahill a success!

For those who missed the event, or were there and really wanted to fully absorb its import, here it is in video

Jeremy Scahill keynote speech, part 1 from PROUDEYEMEDIA on Vimeo.

Jeremy Scahill keynote speech, part 2 from PROUDEYEMEDIA on Vimeo.

Between The Lines on Stitcher

Between The Lines Presentation at the Left Forum 2016

"How Do We Build A Mass Movement to Reverse Runaway Inequality?" with Les Leopold, author of "Runaway Inequality: An Activist's Guide to Economic Justice,"May 22, 2016, John Jay College of Criminal Justice, The City University of New York, 860 11th Ave. (Between 58th and 59th), New York City. Between The Lines' Scott Harris and Richard Hill moderated this workshop. Listen to the audio/slideshows and more from this workshop.

Listen to audio of the plenary sessions from the weekend.

JEREMY SCAHILL: Oscar-nominated documentary filmmaker "Dirty Wars"

Listen to the full interview (30:33) with Jeremy Scahill, an award-winning investigative journalist with the Nation Magazine, correspondent for Democracy Now! and author of the bestselling book, "Blackwater: The Rise of the World's Most Powerful Mercenary Army," about America's outsourcing of its military. In an exclusive interview with Counterpoint's Scott Harris on Sept. 16, 2013, Scahill talks about his latest book, "Dirty Wars, The World is a Battlefield," also made into a documentary film under the same title, and was nominated Dec. 5, 2013 for an Academy Award in the Best Documentary Feature category.

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Iraq War Vote Shadows Clinton Candidacy

Posted Feb. 10, 2016

Interview with Stephen Zunes, professor of politics & coordinator of Middle Eastern Studies at the University of San Francisco, conducted by Meinda Tuhus

Apart from mentions of Hillary Clinton's emails when she was secretary of state, foreign policy issues have not received much attention thus far in the Democratic presidential nomination campaign. While Republican candidates try to outdo each other in the machismo of their proposed harsh treatment of refugees, targeting family members of alleged terrorists and attacking rogue nations, Democrats have mostly focused on issues like the economy, higher education and health care, with some talk about how they'd tackle climate change.

The one exception is Vermont Sen. Bernie Sanders' repeated criticism of Clinton's 2002 Senate vote authorizing the U.S. invasion of Iraq, while pointing out that he opposed that same war resolution. Clinton has since said that her vote was a mistake, but also couched her admission in ways to minimize the negative fallout.

Between The Lines' Melinda Tuhus spoke with Stephen Zunes, professor of politics & coordinator of Middle Eastern Studies at the University of San Francisco. He examines some of the details of the debate in Congress leading up to that vote, which was followed a few months later by President Bush’s decision to launch the U.S. "shock and awe" invasion of Saddam Hussein's Iraq. Here, he explains how Clinton's vote supported President Bush and Vice President Cheney's war, and also discusses Clinton and Sanders’ positions on another key foreign policy issue – U.S. support for Israel.

STEPHEN ZUNES: One of the most disturbing things about Hillary Clinton becoming the Democratic nominee for president was that she was among the right-wing minority among the Democratic members of Congress to vote in favor of the authorization for the use of military force against Iraq. Most Democrats at the time opposed this, and many people, myself included – who were strategic analysts, Middle East scholars, others familiar with the region and the procurement process of non-conventional weapons – had informed her, along with other members of Congress, that the Bush administration's claims about Iraq having these so-called weapons of mass destruction or ties to al Qaeda and the like, were completely false, and of course, we were correct on that. We also pointed out the fact that engaging in an aggressive war like this was a direct violation of the U.N. Charter, the Nuremberg Principles and other tenets of international law and it would be a very bad precedent for the U.S., which sees itself as a world leader, to insist that somehow it could not play by the rules. Also, we informed her that it would be very likely that if the U.S. invaded Iraq, we would be bogged down in a long, bloody counter-insurgency war in the midst of the rise of sectarianism and ethnic violence, as well as encouraging the growth of radical Salafi Islamic extremists and terrorism, and unfortunately we were right about that as well.

This came to light the other night during the town hall meeting where Hillary Clinton claimed that Hans Blix, the U.N. inspector, supported the resolution. That is completely untrue. He did not support that or any other piece of legislation. He did say that inspectors should be allowed to return to Iraq and the U.N. should make sure there were serious consequences if they did not. And the U.N. did that in the U.N. Security Council resolution 1441. But he did not say that the U.S. Congress should do that, that the U.S. Congress should act unilaterally.

What's also striking was that there were several war authorization resolutions. One was introduced by Carl Levin, Democrat from Michigan, that said it authorized the president to use military force if the U.N. found that Saddam Hussein was not cooperating with U.N. inspectors, if he did not let them in, if he did not give them unfettered access to various suspected sites. If she was only really interested in getting the inspectors back in, she would have voted for that resolution; instead, she voted against it and instead voted for a Republican resolution – the administration resolution – which basically gave President Bush to invade Iraq at the time and circumstances of his own choosing. And indeed, inspectors had been in Iraq for four months, unfettered inspections, they weren't finding a damn thing, and Bush invaded anyway, and Clinton defended it, she supported it.

BETWEEN THE LINES: Whenever Bernie talks about this, he uses the exact same words to say he voted against it and she was for it and that demonstrates he has better judgment. But they don't seem to talk about any other foreign policy issue. What can you say, for example, about their differences, if any, around Israel and Palestine? And any thoughts about why this important issue isn't playing any role in the campaign so far?

STEPHEN ZUNES: Both Bernie Sanders and Hillary Clinton support Israel's right to exist; support Israel's right to self-defense. Bernie Sanders worked on a kibbutz as a young man; he's Jewish; and like Hillary Clinton, he does see Israel as a homeland for the Jewish people. But the big difference is that while Bernie Sanders supports the peace and human rights community in Israel, the more left-leaning Zionist parties, the ones that believe that Israel should withdraw from the occupied territories and allow the Palestinians a viable state of their own – those who believe that Israel has been violating human rights and has been unnecessarily bombing civilian targets and committing war crimes – Hillary Clinton has been defending all that. In fact, even when Israel bombed a U.N. school that was housing refugees during the war on Gaza a year and a half ago – there was no Hamas military activity anywhere nearby – Sen. Sanders condemned it; the Obama administration condemned it; but Hillary Clinton rushed to the Israelis' defense, claimed that, despite any evidence, there was Hamas firing rockets from an annex of the school; again, an investigation showed that wasn't true.

BETWEEN THE LINES: Stephen Zunes, I do think uncritical support for Israel is slipping in the U.S., but this issue is still a third rail in American politics, and I'm wondering if Bernie isn't highlighting any differences because he's afraid it will hurt him.

STEPHEN ZUNES: I don't think necessarily. I think part of it is there are some elements that don't just oppose the occupation, but oppose Israel itself and he doesn't want to encourage that end of things. And he is certainly ahead of the curve in terms of most Democrats. There are a lot of otherwise liberal Democrats who take pretty right-wing positions on this issue, which is unfortunate. But I think most of it is that until very recently, when he started bringing Iraq up more often, he hasn't really been addressing foreign policy much at all.

For more information, visit Stephen Zunes' website at stephenzunes.org.