Editorial: Do the disappeared count if even 'democratic' countries ignore them?

On Sunday, the UN noted the disappeared, it was The International Day of Victims of Enforced Disappearances.

The UN noted it.  The US press?  They had so much time to waste but none to pay attention.

That includes the petty and greedy 'independent' press always dipping their hands in your pockets -- THE NATION, THE PROGRESSIVE, COUNTERPUNCH, etc.

Here's C.I.'s post that appeared Sunday:

 The number of the disappeared only increases

 No circumstance can justify someone's disappearance. 

Sunday is the International Day of Victims of Enforced Disappearances. https://bit.ly/2Ql9R45

5:01 PM · Aug 29, 2020

The United Nations Tweeted that yesterday.  Today is the International Day of Victims of Enforced Disappearances.  In previous years, countries like Argentina came to mind (under the tyrant and criminal Augusto Pinochet) came to mind.  Sting wrote and recorded "They Dance Alone" about the disappeared in Argentina on his 1987 album . . . NOTHING LIKE THE SUN.

The only form of protest they're allowed
I've seen their silent faces, they scream so loud
If they were to speak these words
They'd go missing, too
Another woman on the torture table
What else can they do?
Dancing with the missing
They're dancing with the dead
They dance with the invisible ones
Their anguish is unsaid
They're dancing with their fathers
Dancing with their sons
They're dancing with their husbands
They dance alone
They dance alone

One day we'll dance on their graves
One day we'll sing our freedom
One day we'll laugh in our joy
And we'll dance
One day we'll dance on their graves
One day we'll sing our freedom
One day we'll laugh in our joy
And we'll dance

Ellas danzan con los desaparecidos
Danzan con los muertos
Danzan con amores invisibles
Con silenciosa angistia
Danzan con sus padres
Con sus hijos
Con sus esposos
Ellas danzan solas
Danzan solas

The Iraq War, ongoing, is the story of the disappeared.  Ethnic cleansing has taken place (especially carried out by Shi'ite forces from 2006 through 2008).  Nouri al-Maliki's government (2006 through 2014) terrorized the people of Iraq -- everyone was an enemy to Nouri, even Shi'ites.  He had secret torture cells and hidden prisons.  Hundreds of thousands were disappeared in Iraq.  This is part of turning Iraq into a land of widows and children.  It's why the median age in Iraq now is 21-years-old.  Neighboring Iran?  31.3-years-old.  Neighboring Kuwait?  36.8-years-old.  Neighboring Turkey? 31.5-years-old.  Are you getting it?  

Because some days it seems like no one gives a damn except BRussels Tribunal.

The disappeared include the people of Anbar Province, the people of Mosul, the people throughout Iraq.

UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres issued the following today:

The crime of enforced disappearance is rife across the world.  We see new cases almost daily, including the disappearance of defenders of the environment, who are often indigenous peoples.  Meanwhile, the excruciating pain of old cases is still acute, as the fate of thousands of disappeared people remains unknown, making the crime a continuous presence in the lives of the loved ones of the lost.

The United Nations Committee and Working Group on Enforced Disappearances have identified additional worrying trends, including reprisals against relatives of the victims and members of civil society, often in the name of security and counter-terrorism.  Enforced disappearance also has gendered consequences particularly affecting women and LGBTI persons.

Impunity compounds the suffering and anguish.  Under international human rights law, families and societies have a right to know the truth about what happened.  I call on Member States to fulfil this responsibility.

With the support of international human rights mechanisms, States have a duty to strengthen their efforts to prevent enforced disappearances, to search for victims, and to increase assistance to victims and their relatives.  It is equally critical to pursue credible and impartial judicial investigations.

On this International Day, let us renew our commitment to end all enforced disappearances. I call on all States to ratify the Convention for the Protection of all Persons against Enforced Disappearances and to accept the competence of the Committee to examine individual complaints. This is a first, but crucial step, towards the elimination of this atrocious crime.

 

António Guterres

Sadly, the disappeared exist around the world.  Our focus is Iraq so that's what we're zooming in on.

The ICRC in Iraq Tweets:

Thousands of families of missing still live in ambiguity as they seek answers on the fate of their loved ones who went missing in #Iraq as a result of four decades of conflicts. We remember them today on the International Day of Disappeared.

Iraqi Families of Missing: The wounds that do not heal

In Iraq, decades of successive conflicts and periods of violence have led to one of the highest numbers of missing persons in the world. Hundreds of thousands of individuals remain unaccounted for,

Netherlands Embassy in Iraq Tweets:

Each conflict in #Iraq has resulted in a new generation of disappeared, putting Iraq among the countries with the highest number of #MissingPersons. Families of up to a million people are waiting for answers #DayoftheDisappeared #TheSearchMustGoOn

Lovely World Tweets:

More than a million absentees in Iraq don't know their fate, for years. families of disappeared are tired of waiting without hope. state of militias has killed , kidnapped, in the name of religion. human rights and United Nations must reveal the fate of these people. #وينهم

7:03 PM · Aug 30, 2020

The Baghdad Post Tweets:

#UN mission to #Iraq calls for independent probe to find whereabouts of 1,000 Iraqis who disappeared in #Anbar #BaghdadPost #Iraq

9:16 AM · Aug 30, 2020

Zuhair Hussain Tweets:

U.N. calls on Baghdad to investigate the fate of 1,000 civilians disappeared in Anbar https://bit.ly/34Tfy1s #Iraq #forceddisappearances

Iraq: UN calls for renewed efforts to investigate enforced disappearances in Anbar Governorate

BAGHDAD (30 August 2020) – A UN report on enforced disappearances calls for independent and effective

Ahmad al-Almeed Tweets:

Years passed and the file of the forcibly disappeared in Iraq is still being raised from time to time without any government treatment or disclosure of their fate despite repeated requests from the Sunni and popular political forces from their families, #وينهم

6:38 PM · Aug 30, 2020

Linda Hemby Tweets:

#Iraq: UN report on #EnforcedDisappearances calls for independent/effective investigations to establish the fate of 1,000 civilian men and boys disappeared during military operations against ISIL in #Anbar in 2015-2016 and to hold perpetrators accountable

Human Rights Watch's Belkis Willie Tweets the following thread:

@UNIraq says in Anbar in 2015/16, pro-gov forces subjected at least 1k mostly Sunni Arab men/boys to disappearances, executions, torture, arbitrary arrest and unlawful detention https://uniraq.org/index.php?option=com_k2&view=item&task=download&id=3871_202346c5cf0214b6968e56cafb45bc06&Itemid=650&lang=en

12:06 PM · Aug 30, 2020

At the time of the abuses,

@hrw

wrote about the hundreds of men from Saqlawiyah, from al-Mahamda tribe that were tortured, disappeared in 2016 https://hrw.org/news/2016/07/07/iraq-fallujah-abuses-inquiry-mired-secrecy

12:06 PM · Aug 30, 2020

And the thousands of other men and boys who armed forces disappeared from 2014-2017 in other anti-ISIS operations Iraq: Secret Detention, No Recourse https://youtu.be/6YEq_IAsor0 via

@YouTube

https://hrw.org/news/2018/09/27/iraq-secret-detention-no-recourse

Iraq: Secret Detention, No Recourse

Iraqi military and security forces have disappeared dozens of mostly Sunni Arab males since 2014, including children as young as 9, often in the context of c...

Sadly,

@UNIraq

in its newest report concludes limited progress made re establishing fate of the men, boys missing; holding accountable individuals, including commanders, responsible for enforced disappearances; and respecting the right of victims to justice, truth and reparation.

12:06 PM · Aug 30, 2020

Any "@" whatever in a Tweet is taken out by me because otherwise some browsers will show this page with a big, black box covering words.  I've noted before the browsers you can use to avoid that; however, e-mail still come in complaining about those black squares.  For that reason, we remove any @ that I notice.  We also cannot include the Twitter id because the 'blue check' also creates a black square.  

The Committee to Protect Journalists Tweets:

At least 64 journalists are currently missing around the world. Nearly one third have disappeared from #Iraq, #Syria, and #Lebanon

. These journalists are #MissingNotForgotten. #InternationalDayoftheDisappeared https://cpj.org/missingnotforgotten

8:15 AM · Aug 30, 2020

TV: Who gets represented?

 Will Sasso stars in the sitcom UNITED WE FALL so we weren't at all surprised when ABC friends started talking about how bad the reviews were.  The Water Cooler Set hated the show.

Will is a frequently funny guy in film and TV roles.  He was a major reason MAD TV lasted as long as it did (in fact, we wish it was still around).  He's never had a problem being funny.  His problem is being believable when doing anything else.

If this had been a work sitcom, we still would have raised an eyebrow over Will being the male star of the show but a family sitcom?  In the past, Will was visible but not much more.  Meaning?  He didn't connect with his co-stars.  He shined, he grabbed the spotlight, but everyone on stage with him tended to come off as an extra, a background player.

Eight episodes of UNITED WE FALL were filmed and aired.  And that should be the end of the series, right?

Wrong.

We spent the weekend watching all eight episodes.  UNITED WE FALL is better than over two-thirds of ABC's primetime schedule from last fall.  

Will is much, much better than we expected.  For example, he and co-star Christina Vidal have real chemistry.  You don't need a backstory of how they ended up together because their characters, Bill and Jo, belong together.  As a viewer, you relate to them and you root for them.  

As a Water Cooler Set member?

Of course not.  They don't like anything that's popular or geared for the mainstream.

They attack the series with all the built up rage they've been carrying around since 1982 when Ricardo Montalban showed up in a Farrah Fawcett wig to reprise his role of Khan in STAR TREK II: THE WRATH OF KHAN.

And Ricardo's an interesting reference point. Ricardo became a star in Mexico before traveling to the US and working for MGM where he made numerous films including three with Esther Williams (FIESTA, ON AN ISLAND WITH YOU and NEPTUNE'S DAUGHTER), LATIN LOVERS with Lana Turner and two films directed by William Wellman (BATTLEGROUND and ACROSS THE WIDE MISSOURI).  He starred for two years on Broadway with Lena Horne in the musical JAMAICA.   Later films include THE SINGING NUN, MADAM X (again with Lana Turner), SAYONARA (with Marlon Brando), SWEET CHARITY (with Shirley MacLaine), THE DESERTER (with John Huston), ESCAPE FROM THE PLANET OF THE APES, CONQUEST OF THE PLANET OF THE APES, THE TRAIN ROBBERS (with Ann-Margaret), 

 He did numerous television programs -- including THE LORETTA YOUNG SHOW, HERE'S LUCY, GUNSMOKE, WONDER WOMAN, COLUMBO, MISSION IMPOSSIBLE, THE DEFENDERS, THE DORIS DAY SHOW, I SPY, THE DINAH SHORE CHEVY SHOW, THE WILD WILD WEST, THE MAN FROM UNCLE, DR. KILDARE, IT TAKES A THIEF, MURDER SHE WROTE, BEN CASEY and, of course, FANTASY ISLAND.  His other TV work included STAR TREK (1967's "Space Seed" episode) where he first played Khan. It also included the mini-series HOW THE WEST WAS WON for which Ricardo won an Emmy -- one of the few Latinos to win an Emmy.

Another who has?  Rita Moreno.

Rita Moreno is someone we've long applauded -- excepting only that hideous NETFLIX LAUGH-IN 'special' which was garbage and an embarrassment.  She is also a true EGOT.  An "EGOT" -- for anyone who doesn't know -- is someone who has won an Emmy, a Grammy, an Oscar and a Tony.  It's a small and select group.

Barbra Streisand has long promoted herself as someone in that group.  Hmm.  She's not a true EGOT because that Tony isn't for a performance.  It was a one-time award that they gave to her in 1970 after she'd moved on to film, "Star of the Year" -- or, as it was really known, "Come Back To Broadway, Barbra Joan, Barbra Joan."  She never did.  She didn't win a Tony in a competitive race (she was nominated twice -- for I CAN GET IT FOR YOU WHOLESALE and FUNNY GIRL -- and lost both times).  So she's not a true EGOT.

Rita won in competitive races.  There are no 'honorary' or one-time awards.

Rita's a one-of-a-kind superstar.  And she was in the news recently with Michael Schneider (VARIETY) reporting:

The new “One Day at a Time” has been virtually ignored by Emmy voters, save an annual nomination in the multi-camera picture editing for a comedy series category (where the competition is limited anyway, since there aren’t many multi-cam shows out there). The Television Academy Honors at least smartly recognized the show in 2018 with its “television with a conscience” award. Critics have bestowed much love on the series, and fan support kept the show alive when Netflix canceled it, spurring a move to Pop TV.

“One Day at a Time” boasts a predominantly Latinx cast, and sadly such shows still aren’t getting their due at the Emmys. In a year where African American performers and shows with Black leads saw a boost in representation at the Emmy nominations, there wasn’t room for similar strides among Latinx, Asian American and other groups. Such an omission is a bit mystifying, particularly as the Imagen Awards — which also just announced their nominations — demonstrated there’s no shortage of Latinx contenders.

In comedy, this year that included “One Day at a Time,” “Vida,” “Gentefied” and “Little America,” and stars such as Justina Machado (“One Day”), Mishel Prada (“Vida”) and, yes, Moreno. According to Imagen, this year’s awards submissions increased by 55% from 2019.

Before anyone e-mails, we quoted Schneider; ourselves, we don't use the term "Latinx."  It seems imposed, not arising from a community. 

But Rita's not nominated and Justina's not nominated and Mishel's not nominated . . . 

Where's The Water Cooler Set?

Oh, that's right, ripping apart UNITED WE FALL.

Latina Jo is married to Anglo-White Bill.  Guillermo Diaz plays Jo's brother Chuy, Natalie Ceballos plays Chuy's wife Brie, Juan Alfonso plays Jo's brother Javier, J.R. Villarreal plays Jo's brother Felix, Greg Romero Wilson plays Jo's brother Benicio -- Those are just some of the adult cast members.  Victor Gonzalez directed one episode as did Gloria Caleron Kellett.  Gloria also receives a writing credit on one episode.  Others receiving writing credits?  Stephanie Escajeda who is also the basis for the character Jo is a producer with her husband Julius Sharpe (the basis for Bill).  

There's not another Latino show on network television.  This fall, CBS will fill out their sparse fall schedule by airing past seasons of the rebooted ONE DAY AT A TIME. At least 60 million Latinos in the US, at least 18% of the population.  Where's the representation?

Do you know how few Latinos have won primetime acting Emmys?  There's Rita and Ricardo, America Ferrera, Jharrel Jerome, Albert Paulsen, Edward James Almos, Jimmy Smits, Alexis Bledel and John Leguizamo.

Nine.

Nine have won for performing on a prime time show -- series, movie, special, mini-series, etc.

Albert Paulsen won his supporting Emmy in 1964 and he was the first Latino to win.  56 years later, only eight more Latinos have won Emmys.  And don't think it's because Jimmy Smits swept the awards each year on NYPD BLUE. Despite being nominated four times for best lead actor in a drama for NYPD BLUE, Jimmy never won once.  His sole Emmy comes from the supporting category and is for LA LAW.  In fact, only one performer listed has won more than one Emmy -- Rita Moreno won for THE ROCKFORD FILES and she won for THE MUPPET SHOW.  She has two Emmys.

The lack of Latinos with Emmys is a serious topic -- and one that should be explored before Steven Spielberg's WEST SIDE STORY comes out and we all start talking about the lack of Latinos in that feature film (note, if you declare,  "I present as black and I do have African-American lineage, but I’m also part-Italian," then you sure as f**k shouldn't be playing one of the few famous Latina roles in film and on Broadway -- Anita in the 2020 film WEST SIDE STORY).

UNITED WE FALL is a funny sitcom.  Watching Bill and Jo scramble to get some me-time in on a Sunday is funny.  Watching them question the way they raise their children, or how they handle 'teens' (Jo's niece Marta and Bill's mother Sandy) is hilarious.  The show has one-liners, physical comedy, insight, you name it.

And, again, there's real onscreen chemistry between Will and Christina -- the bulk of sitcoms can never make that claim.

The Water Cooler Set gets a little nervous if the skin color goes beyond peach.  They also struggle to handle any sitcom that's not a mockumentary (MODERN FAMILY, PARKS AND RECREATION, THE OFFICE, etc).  They certainly can't handle a sitcom that's actually funny -- as they've demonstrated over and over -- praising one pathetic and dead-on-arrival 'sitcom' after another (MY NAME IS EARLE, GALAVANT, THE MICHAEL J. FOX SHOW, WORST WEEK, SAMANTHA WHO?, BETTER OFF TED . . .).  

Unlike their picks -- predominately White cast and single-camera shows -- UNITED WE FALL is actually funny.   The show and -- the audience -- deserve more than eight episodes.

 

Come November . . .

If/when Joe Biden loses, what are you prepared to do? 

Put on a pink hat? Aren't you just the most pathetic person to ever take a breath. Think you might be up for being a warrior? No, we don't mean go protest at Trump Tower or at the White House. We mean something much more important: A truth warrior.

A truth warrior battles for the truth.

There weren't a lot of them following the 2016 election.

It's a small list -- one that we're on and that all the community sites are on. Besides us? BLACK AGENDA REPORT, Ray McGovern, Caitlin Johnstone, CONSORTIUM NEWS, Aaron Matte, Max Blumenthal, Rania Khalek, WSWS, Stephen F. Cohen and INFORMATION CLEARING HOUSE are among those who stood strong.

Had the lies about Russia been defeated -- as they should have been -- people would have dealt with reality regarding Hillary Clinton's loss and we wouldn't see the corporate replay in 2020 where Joe Biden offers even less to the American people than Hillary did. Had the truth been demanded and the b.s. called out, the DNC would have been forced to be responsive. Instead, they lied Russia! Russia! Russia! and refused to address how campaign based on nothing but personality and nonsense like "I'm with Her" [see Ava and C.I.'s "So, uh, we weren't with her? (Ava and C.I.)"] aren't what the American people want or need. We would have seen 2020 bring about a responsive candidate and not someone like Joe Senile Biden. 

If Joe loses, it's not because of Russia.

If Joe loses, it's not because of Jill Stein.

Or Howie Hawkins (this year's nominee).

Or Jo Jorgensen.

If Joe loses, it's because of Joe.

He's running for office. He needs to get the most votes in order to win. At present, he's done nothing to offer the people anything.

In fact, his campaign is more out of touch than his 2007 effort to become president (he dropped out after his poor January 2008 showing in Iowa).

Joe is out of touch. He's a groper and we also believe he assaulted Tara Reade. He shouldn't be running. But the DNC wanted him and they need to be held accountable.

No one owes Joe their vote. As someone running for office, it's his job to earn votes and if he can't earn enough to be president, that's on him. We've entered an accountability free zone where every politician is suddenly above the law and beyond criticism. That needs to change.

 

Preparing for the future, preparing for the fight

What do we want? In four years, there will be another election. What should we be demanding? 

For starters, Medicare For All. Healthcare is a right, not a privilege. There is no reason that Canada, France, England, etc can provide universal healthcare and the US cannot. We are aware, right, that when the US government overthrew Iraq's government in 2003, they still made a point to include universal healthcare for all Iraqis?

But citizens of the US do without.

That's wrong. It's wrong, it's unacceptable and it needs to be fixed.

We need to have our demands in place and we need to be ready to stand by them.

It's a two-part process, you understand. Demands have to be made. And then you don't back down. If you roll over, they know you aren't serious and they're not going to work to meet your demands. The power of no, remember.

Sometimes it's all you have. You have to be willing to walk away from the table.

In 2020, that's not happening. There are things we need and if we're not willing to fight for them, no politician is going to. Senator Bernie Sanders certainly caved and there's no other word for it. We carried his tired ass for months and then, when we needed him to have a spine, he showed that his only spine was collapsible.

He wasn't the only one. Another thing we need to be demanding is an end to these forever wars. Remember US House Rep. Tulsi Gabbard? She talked big about this . . . when she was on Joe Rogan's podcast. Face to face with a War Hawk on a debate stage, Tulsi crumbled like moldy, expired cheese. Tulsi was given not one but two chances by moderator Jake Tapper to weigh in on Joe Biden and the Iraq War. She brushed Tapper off both times. Joe had said he made a mistake voting for the Iraq War (no, he didn't -- he said he made a mistake trusting Bully Boy Bush) and that was good enough for 'anti-war' Tulsi. She then spent three days of media appearances assuring the country that Joe Biden was someone to trust.

Can we be honest? Bernie and Tulsi both betrayed the people who supported them. That's a simple fact. Instead of being outraged by the betrayal, too many offered lies and justifications. Forever and a day, Tulsi groupies circulated claims by her 'brother' that Bernie had done this or that to her and that's why, when she dropped out, she refused to endorse Bernie.

Instead of expressing justified outrage -- the kind of outrage that could send a message to all politicians -- too many made like whores. Don't they know that politicians have paid staff who spin and whore for them? Why do it for free?

Honestly, why do it at all?

We the American people have gone from the cheapest date to the post-midnight booty call. Grasp that. We're not even getting wined and dined anymore. We're now just a pump-and-dump, a slap-and-tap. It's only going to get worse until people start standing up and demanding that public servants, you know, serve the public.

It's not that complicated.

 

Voices that got us through the early '00s

 

The pandemic is a serious concern to the whole world.  But times were tough before.  The years '00 through 2006, for example, saw the theft of the presidency, 9-11, the start of the never-ending wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, the PATRIOT ACT, the torture chamber at Guantanamo, and so many other vile and evil things while Bully Boy Bush occupied the White House.  Here are 70 voices that helped get us through that era.  Some are still worth listening to, some are dead and some are just dead to us.  (Some also just went bat-s**t nuts -- see Naomi Wolf.)

1) Dalia Hashad

2) Camilo Mejia

3) Sandra Lupien

4) Michael Ratner

5) Andrea Lewis

6) Deepa Fernandes

7) Heidi Boghosian

8) Peter Hart

9) Bonnie Faulkner

10) Dennis Bernstein

11) Naomi Klein

12) Dahr Jamail

13) Robert Knight

14) Auga Bogado

15) Michael Parenti

16) William Rivers Pitt 

17) Margaret Kimberley

18) Peter Phillips

19) Nora Barrows-Friedman

20) Bruce A. Dixon

21) Greg Palast

22) Bruce A. Dixon

23) Doug Henwood

24) Margaret Prescod

25) Katrina vanden Heuvel

26) Alexander Cockburn

27) Laura Flanders

28) Lila Garrett

29) Howard Zinn

30) Christian Parenti

31) Jim Lafferty 

32) Jack Valinski

33) Naomi Wolf

34) Joan Didion

35) Nancy Chang

36) Michael W. Smith

37) Marjorie Cohn

38) Tom Hayden

39) James Branum

40) Cindy Sheehan

41) David Zirin

42) Norman Finkelstein

43) Glen Ford

44) Pablo Paredes 

45) Jasim al-Azzawi

46) Cynthia McKinney

47) John Stauber

48) Malihe Razazan 

49) Mira Nabulsi

50) John V. Walsh

51) Arundhati Roy

52) William Greider

53) David Bacon

54) Tariq Ali

55) Helen Caldicott

56) Molly Ivins

57) Peter Kornbluh

58) John Pilger

59) Gore Vidal

60) Marilyn French

61) Barbara Kingsolver

62) Alice Walker

63) Sheldon Rampton

64) Robert McChesney

65) Chee Yoke Ling

66) Phyllis Bennis

67) Frances Moore Lappe

68) Robert Parry

69) Ken Silverstein

70) Janet Coleman