[Photo: A man cleans up glass and blood after a suicide attack]
Two and a half years into the occupation, war still rages on in Baghdad, Iraq. Two of the deadliest attacks in the last month occurred at the Palestine Hotel and the Hamra Hotel. Although Westerners frequent these hotels, the casualties were almost exclusively Iraqis living and working in the area. Yet just a few hours after the attacks, citizens were back on the streets, as if nothing had happened.
Even paradise has its seedy side, a fact that comes through clearly in Louise Brown's important book, Sex Slaves: The Trafficking of Women in Asia (Virago, 2000). Examining the region's sex trade and shedding light on its abuses and exploitations, Brown's book is a wake-up call and a condemnation. But mostly it is a chronicle of commodification, filled with very sad stories about the lives of innocent girls and women forced to sell their bodies as if they were just so much meat.
To say that George Clooney's new film "Good Night and Good Luck" is one of the most important films of this year is to be guilty of significant understatement. Not since Michael Mann's 1999 thriller "The Insider" has a Hollywood film director made a media-focused mainstream movie this important or timely.
A co-founder of both the International Media Project, Making Contact alternative media group and the Northern California 9-11 Truth Alliance, Carol Brouillet is one of the most energetic, creative and politically productive West Coast-based anti-war activists.
Toward Freedom: Since October 2001, you've been organizing weekly "Listening For Peace" anti-war protests in Downtown Palo Alto, California. In what various ways have people in Palo Alto responded to your weekly "Listening For Peace" actions during the last four years?
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On July 11, 2004, Rajinder Singh Khalsa, an Indian Sikh man, was accosted by a group of men as he stood in front of his brother's restaurant wearing a turban. "Give me that dirty curtain," one of the men said. "It's not a curtain," Khalsa said. "It's a turban." "Go back to your country," another man shot back. Khalsa said: "But we are American, where should we go?" The man suggested Iran. Khalsa said: "We are not Iranian. We are not Muslim. We are Sikhs from India." He said: "Then go back to India." The men began to attack his brother. "Don't do this, he's innocent," Khalsa said. The men then turned to him. They beat him on the nose, eyes, head, everywhere, not stopping until he was unconscious on the pavement. Before they left, they took off his turban and threw it away.
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