SRB: The Face that Launched an Oil Tanker

SRB Picks of the Week 25 July 2008
By Jeremy Rose for the Scoop Review of Books
Condoleezza Rice may not have launched a thousand ships, but she has had an oil tanker named after her and helped launch a war or two. But is the US Secretary of State, who is visiting New Zealand this weekend, a war criminal as claimed by the Auckland University Association?

The AUSA press release doesn't provide much in the way of a legal argument for Rice's indictment but its offer of a $5000 reward for anyone who makes a successful citizens arrest of the Secretary of State is attracting international attention.

The association's international affairs officer, Omar Hamed, seems to be limiting Rice's crimes to being a spokesperson for the invasion and occupation of Iraq.

"Rice is the public spokesperson for an illegal and immoral occupation that has resulted in tens of thousands of deaths and the continued oppression of the people of Iraq. We believe Rice should be arrested and detained in accordance with the law and tried fairly at the International Criminal Court for her role in these war crimes."

Someone who has taken the time to prepare the legal case against Rice is Elizabeth de la Vega a former federal prosecutor with more than 20 years of experience. De la Vega has even drawn up the indictment papers . She didn't limit her sights to Condi Rice and called for the indictment of the whole Bush cabinet in her book United States v. George W. Bush et al. (Available for as little as 34 cents US from Amazon. Disclosure if you click on the link at the bottom of this page and buy said book we'll receive four percent of that 34 cents.)

Award winning journalist Robert Parry also makes the case for Rice being guilty of war crimes. He argues that Rice's belated championing of a strategic rationale for the Iraq war puts her on the wrong side of the Nuremburg principle that deems aggressive war the supreme international crime. Read more here.

If the Tehran Times is anything to go by the powers that be in that country will be hoping that Condi Rice manages to leave New Zealand with her freedom intact. The paper - which is presumably the mouth piece of the regime has republished this excellent piece from the Independent arguing that Rice is the one thing standing in the way of a US attack on Iran.

Finally, the public lending library is one of America's great contributions to civilisation and this portrait of librarian Anne Carroll Moore and "the "battle that reshaped children's literature" makes for fascinating reading.

Published this Week on the Scoop Review of Books

CHICK LIT – Braunias in Birdland
How to Watch a Bird by Steve Braunias
Awa Press, $25. Reviewed by DAVID GEARY
It’s hard to write about birds without a flock of avian literary devices dive-bombing you, so stuff it, I’m going to let’em all come to roost. Let it be a testament to how much birds are part of our lives, our language and imagination. Yet, as Braunias laments, for too long we’ve relegated our feathered friends to second-class citizenship. He puts them back on their proper perch, as creations of joy and wonder. His book swoops, it soars, it pecks a few eyes out. Read more »

Poem of the Week: Under Mt St Bathans
From: Into The Wider World by Brian Turner
Random House, $45. (August O8)
Read more »

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