Why do they hate us? That's the question that has been often asked, but never truly answered, for the past seven years.

Anyone who has read "Dangerous Nation" by Robert Kagan, "Blowback" (et. seq.) by Chalmers Johnson, and "American Armageddon" by Craig Unger knows the answer, and it's not what some claim.

They don't hate us because of our freedom; they couldn't care less.
They don't hate us because of religion; that's merely a tool used -- make that "abused" -- by their leaders.
They don't hate us because of our wealth -- exactly.
They don't hate us because of our power -- exactly.

Syngman Rhee
Ngo Dinh Diem
Ferdinand Marcos
Suharto
Reza Pahlavi
Saddam Hussein
Fulgencio Batista
Jean-Claude Duvalier
Manuel Noriega
Augusto Pinochet

What do these people have in common? Every one of them was a murderous and incompetent dictator whom we put and/or kept in power because he temporarily served some short-term, short-sighted policy objective.

Here's the infamous, ghoulish video that ran during the Republican National Convention. This is republicans ripping the remains of the victims of the 9/11 terror attacks from their graves and rubbing them in the faces of the electorate in their desperate plea to stay relevant.

Dead Americans, dead New Yorkers, used, dishonored, exploited. It's shameful. Republicans think they died to give them dramatic footage.

They weren't murdered in their thousands, on the watch of a republican administration, to be a tool of sleazy republican operatives. On 9/11 itself, it didn't matter what your party affiliation was; not to the hijackers of the planes, not to the victims in the towers, not to the police officers and firemen who died trying to save lives.

It shouldn't matter now. So what to do?

The best way to stop republicans from dishonoring our dead is to hold them to account. Call them, and demand that they repudiate their nominee's sickeningly cynical exploitation of dead Americans. Contact info for New York City republican Senators and Majority Leader Skelos is over the fold.

Where is Osama bin Laden SEVEN YEARS after his 9/11 attack on my city? Same place he was seven years ago only stronger than ever.

Seven years.

Mr. Bush...what part of "Osama bin Laden determined to attack the US" didn't you understand?

And why haven't you stopped al-Qaeda and caught bin Laden? Seven years after Pearl Harbor we had decisively won the war and rebuilt and gotten our economy booming. Seven years after Pearl Harbor Hitler was dead and many of those responsible for atrocities brought to justice in an international court of law. Seven years after 9/11, where is Osama bin Laden?

My friend Elizabeth Upton teaches English as a Second Language at LaGuardia Community College. I went to her class to talk to them about what new things people are trying to do with technology to foster a more participatory democracy.

I have a longer post on my field trip, I just wanted to give you the students clips first.

Here's Susana (Colombia) with a question about terrorism:

Olga (Uzbekistan) on the future of the middle class:

And Miguel Ángel (Mexico) on drug trafficking:

I used to love flying. I used to love airports. Well, the cost and increasing inconvenience have taken the fun out of flying in America. Only when flying overseas does my former love of flying come out because overseas the security is more sensible, the flights more comfortable, and the personnel more friendly.

What are we getting for our inconvenience and increasing costs? Supposedly increased security, but does it really make sense to force parents to pour out their child's milk or juice or to prevent parents from taking aquafor onto planes? Does this really make us safer?

A friend of mine in California flew back from a trip to Europe recently. She flew from her European destination through Paris, to a stopover in America and then home to Los Angeles. In her carryon was an unopened jar of Nutella. For those who don't know about this, it is a hazelnut spread that some Europeans love on toast. Obviously a threat to our national security.

As negotiations (such as they are) between George W. Bush and the Democratic leaders in Congress for our continued occupation of Iraq drag on, the only "progress" that seems to be made is in the rhetoric being spouted by Republican talking heads. The latest phrase they've come up with is calling any withdrawal a "surrender date."
The implication of this phrase is that anyone who favors pulling our troops out of Iraq is somehow un-American. But the Republicans who use this phrase are once again ignoring the facts, and they are putting America in greater danger than ever.

Rudy Giuliani has just shown that he is as much a lying fearmonger as Karl Rove or any other Bush administration toady. From Politico:

Rudy Giuliani said if a Democrat is elected president in 2008, America will be at risk for another terrorist attack on the scale of Sept. 11, 2001.

But if a Republican is elected, he said, especially if it is him, terrorist attacks can be anticipated and stopped.

“If any Republican is elected president —- and I think obviously I would be the best at this —- we will remain on offense and will anticipate what [the terrorists] will do and try to stop them before they do it,” Giuliani said.

Ummmm...let's review some history, Rudy. Ronald Reagan and the elected Bush both SUPPORTED the Muslim fanatics that evolved into al-Qaeda. Bill Clinton is the one who first recognized them as a threat and tried to get them. The attack he ordered after the bombing of the USS Coles hit the location where bin Laden had JUST LEFT. The Clinton administration PREVENTED the millenium attacks. Clinton was so focused on getting al-Qaeda that the Republicans called him "obsessed" with al-Qaeda and he TOLD Bush that al-Qaeda would be the number one focus of Bush's administration.

April 20th is Hitler’s Birthday. In 1943, Heinrich Himmler wanted to give Hitler a particularly nice birthday present. He decided that in honor of Hitler’s birthday he would eliminate the entire Jewish Ghetto of Warsaw, which had been causing trouble in the early months of 1943.

Instead, the Jews of Warsaw gave Hitler a present that he certainly didn’t want: months of armed rebellion that DEFEATED the German army repeatedly and wasn’t completely crushed until October 1943, though major combat operations, to borrow a phrase, were completed around May. Including the periods of more sporadic fighting, this resistance lasted far longer than the German take over of Poland as a whole, which took scarcely one month. It is pointed out in Melvin Konner’s book Unsettled that the Warsaw Ghetto uprising, largely fought by Jews but with some Polish uprisings occurring at the same time and inspired by the Jewish uprising, also lasted longer than the time it took Germany to defeat France, though again you have to include the period of more sporadic fighting as well as the main combat.

The uprising was partly inspired by the Socialist Zionist organization Hashomer Hatzair (coincidentally, my mother briefly belonged to this organization in her youth). Insurgency started in January, 1943. By the end of January the Ghetto was actually controlled by two armed Jewish organizations, one led by Mordechai Anielewicz, of Hashomer Hatzair, and Zivia Lubetkin (who survived the uprising) and the other led by Dawid Mordechaj Apfelbaum, a former officer in the Polish army. As Passover began on April 19th, Himmler’s birthday present to Hitler also began, with thousands of German, Polish and Ukrainian forces attacking the Ghetto. They moved in at 4 a.m. They moved throughout the Ghetto and believed they had occupied it within 4 hours. Then, at the intersection of Mila and Zamenhofa Streets, the insurgents struck with a single captured machine gun, ample small arms fire, and many Molotov cocktails. The Germans were completely routed by the Jewish insurgents by 2 P.M., providing Hitler with a major embarrassment for his birthday.

We keep hearing from the Republicans about how somehow the McCain/Bush/Lieberman escalation of the Iraq quagmire will somehow bring us victory and solve all of our problems. My main questions I have had to date is just why are our soldiers dying in Iraq in the first place, what do they MEAN by victory (no exit strategy has yet been formulated!) and just where is Osama bin Laden, the guy who actually attacked America and who has never set foot in Iraq?

But now I have a new question. Just who is it who is winning? From what I can see, it sure as hell isn't us.

In Afghanistan, things have deteriorated so badly, that Republicans like Bill Frist are practically begging the Taliban to help us out. Remember the Taliban? Our enemies who are allied with Osama bin Laden? Well, Bill Frist wants us to patch things up with the Taliban and get them to pull our asses out of the fire in Afghanistan. So, Osama bin Laden is still free, al-Qaeda still operating in both Afghanistan and Pakistan, and we are begging the Taliban to rejoin the government. Who's winning in Afghanistan?