Rassegna stampa - news dai giornali statunitensi

[Sabrina Fusari <safusar at tin.it> (by way of Alessandro Marescotti <a.marescotti at peacelink.it>)]

Ciao a tutti,

come mi è stato chiesto, ecco una rassegna stampa delle notizie che ho
trovato sulla stampa americana di oggi e che mi sembrano degne di nota.

Nell'ordine:

1) dal Washington Post "Journalists Worry About Limits on Information Access"
2) dal Christian Science Monitor "How US strike might ripple around world"
3) dal Christian Science Monitor: "Voices of America: Patriotism, anger
flood US airwaves"
4) chicca finale: "Campus Aftershocks": cosa fanno gli studenti dei campus
secondo il Christian Science Monitor. Parla anche dell'uso dell'e-mail e di
Internet, e in una e-mail riportata si fa riferimento ai fatti di Genova.
Da leggere, anche se è decisamente lungo.

-----

1) Sul WP si dice che i giornalisti sono piuttosto preoccupati da certe
affermazioni dell'Amministrazione che lascerebbero presagire che vi sia e
vi sarà una carenza di informazioni in relazione alle azioni che gli USA
intendono intraprendere (in primo luogo, pare che non sarà rivelato quando
e come le operazioni verranno intraprese). Si fa riferimento nell'articolo
alle "bugie di guerra" ed altri concetti a cui purtroppo siamo avvezzi. Ma
mi sembra sia una delle prime volte in cui i giornalisti della mainstream
lamentano le bugie di guerra anziché dirle (mi si perdoni il cinismo! a
volte non riesco a trattenermi....) Naturalmente dall'Amministrazione si
levano voci di "rassicurazione" che dicono pressappoco "vi diremo tutto il
possibile ma non vi daremo informazioni che possano mettere in pericolo
l'operazione e/o i nostri soldati". Ma si capisce bene che non vogliono
sbottonarsi.

Ecco l'articolo per chi vuole approfondire rispetto al mio scarno riassunto:



>Journalists Worry About Limits on Information, Access
>
>By Howard Kurtz
>Washington Post Staff Writer
>Monday, September 24, 2001; Page A05
>
>
>In 1988, Pentagon officials circulated word that a U.S. aircraft carrier
would be delayed in heading to the Persian Gulf, where Iran and Iraq were
at war, and the story was promptly leaked to a network correspondent.
>
>The information was wrong -- the carrier was quickly dispatched to the
region -- and the military brass were pleased.
>
>"We actually put out a false message to mislead people," said Jay Coupe,
then the spokesman for the Joint Chiefs of Staff. "The idea was not to give
information about the movement of our carrier. We were trying to confuse
people."
>
>As the administration gears up for what President Bush has described as a
new kind of war, many journalists are growing concerned that they will have
less information and less access to U.S. troops than ever before. Even the
use of deliberate disinformation cannot be ruled out.
>
>"This is the most information-intensive war you can imagine. . . . We're
going to lie about things," said a military officer involved in the
planning. "If it is an information war, certainly the bad guys will lie."
>
>Whether or not that comes to pass, senior administration officials have
made clear in recent days that much of the operation will be shrouded in
secrecy.
>
>"Let me condition the press this way: Any sources and methods of
intelligence will remain guarded in secret," Bush said. "My administration
will not talk about how we gather intelligence, if we gather intelligence
and what the intelligence says. That's for the protection of the American
people."
>
>At a briefing on Friday, White House press secretary Ari Fleischer was
pressed about what proof exists that alleged terrorist Osama bin Laden was
behind the attacks in New York and Washington.
>
>"You have the right to ask those questions," he said. "I have the
responsibility not to answer them."
>
>In time of war, Fleischer said in an interview, "some things the public
wants and demands to know, other things they're satisfied they need not
know. The press is caught in the middle and it's frustrating for the press.
This administration will be committed to full disclosure of information,
which keeps the country strong, while making certain that no information is
disclosed that could lose lives or undermine missions."
>
>Journalists, of course, cannot report such information without sources in
the government, and Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld has strongly
cautioned potential leakers of classified information that "the lives of
men and women in uniform" could be jeopardized.
>
>Torie Clarke, the Pentagon spokeswoman, has been consulting with numerous
journalists and plans to meet with Washington bureau chiefs this week.
>
>"Our inclination, our desire, is to put out as much information as
possible, without, of course, compromising any operations," she said.
"We're very much working on this together."
>
>Clarke said the Pentagon would try to have journalists accompany combat
troops, or at least "pool" reporters who share their information, although
"there may be some operations where it's just not possible."
>
>More than military information is at stake. Attorney General John D.
Ashcroft is no longer disclosing the arrests of material witnesses in the
probe of the Sept. 11 attacks, citing the confidentiality of grand jury
proceedings.
>
>And after the Justice Department said 115 potential suspects had been
detained on immigration charges, spokeswoman Mindy Tucker said the figure
was wrong and that no further estimates would be made public.
>
>In the wake of the president's ultimatum that Afghanistan's Taliban regime
turn over bin Laden or face the consequences, the Pentagon is ground zero.
>
>"The information flow has really clamped down," said Mark Thompson,
defense correspondent for Time magazine. "It's not surprising. It's
frustrating but also somewhat understandable. We're in a new kind of war
and they don't want to telegraph any of the punches, and I'm not going to
sit here and grouse about that."
>
>In past conflicts, journalists were allowed onto military bases to
interview the departing troops, which generated a wave of sympathetic
coverage while sending a clear signal to American adversaries.
>
>CBS News national security correspondent David Martin said government
officials are playing "a different game now."
>
>"They used to hope that if Saddam Hussein or Slobodan Milosevic saw the
nature of the force being arrayed against him, he might relent," Martin
said. "In this case, there's no real prospect that the Taliban is going to
meet these demands. This force is definitely going to be used."
>
>Retired Air Force Gen. Perry M. Smith said the administration's approach
is justified. "Rumsfeld's trying to clamp down on everything and, at least
for the moment, he's been very successful," Smith said. "In Kosovo and the
Gulf War, keeping secrets wasn't all that important because everyone knew
the bombing campaign was coming.
>
>"Now, with a lot of special operations stuff and going into dangerous
countries, if you telegraph what you're going to do, it might cause a lot
of deaths."
>
>But Thompson suggested a different motive, saying that attempts to capture
terrorists will be "like a professional ballplayer -- more misses than
hits. I don't know how much attention the military will want focused on
repeated forays into the mountains of Afghanistan that come up empty."
>
>Military attitudes toward the news media have undergone a sea change over
the past 35 years. During the Vietnam War, journalists had free rein to
accompany U.S. troops, and military leaders blamed that unfettered coverage
for helping turn the country against the war.
>
>In the Persian Gulf War, the Pentagon slapped severe restrictions on the
press, even censoring some dispatches, and made it all but impossible for
journalists to accompany U.S. forces during the brief ground war.
>
>The public clearly sided with the first Bush administration. Nearly eight
in 10 Americans in a 1991 Times Mirror poll supported the Pentagon's
restrictions on journalists, and 60 percent said there should be more limits.
>
>In recent days, Fleischer has called top executives at the New York Times,
The Washington Post, the Wall Street Journal, the major networks and other
news outlets. He has urged them not to report on the advance schedules of
Bush and Vice President Cheney, on security at the White House or on the
details of intelligence sources and methods.
>
>"If someone were to say that a cell phone call was intercepted, once it's
published, people around the world can see it, including the bad guys," an
administration official said.
>
>In the current environment, the reporting of even nonsensitive but
unflattering information can trigger a backlash.
>
>One e-mail message to a Washington Post reporter said: "Criticism of the
administration at this critical time is more than unpatriotic -- to the
extent it undermines our national confidence and political will to proceed,
it gives comfort to the enemy."
>
>Coupe, now an international consultant, said the military's restrictive
approach should "never be used simply to mask embarrassing situations." He
added: "But there's definitely a reason to do it to mask troop movements.
There are instances in which the less information put out, the better."
>
>
>
>© 2001 The Washington Post Company



2) Sul CSM si discutono gli svantaggi di una guerra a tutto campo e le
possibili alternative al vaglio dell'Amministrazione. Anche qui si parla
della "war of words" e del fatto che un pericolo di una guerra è che
anziché ridursi, l'antioccidentalismo potrebbe pure aumentare. Aggiunge
poche cose a quanto detto negli approfondimenti delle TV italiane, quindi
si può anche leggere rapidamente, per chi non ha tempo.


How US strike might ripple around world

An overly broad military campaign could erode US standing in Mideast, South
Asia.

By Howard LaFranchi | Staff writer of The Christian Science Monitor

WASHINGTON - With the first riposte in an international war on terrorism
looking more imminent each day, a quiet chorus of diplomatic, anti-terror,
and Middle East experts is cautioning the United States that the pitfalls
of military action could be severe.
Over recent days, support has solidified in several key governments -
including those of Pakistan, Europe, and China - for the US to take some
military action against Afghanistan's Taliban government. At the same time,
military action that is too broad, hits civilians, or is seen widely as an
attack on Islamic countries could severely deteriorate America's lot in the
Middle East and South Asia, experts warn.

The result could be inflamed opinions of America in regions that already
view the US negatively, the spawning of more terrorists to fill No. 1
target Osama bin Laden's ranks, and even the overthrow of friendly regimes
in favor of more hostile ones.

Few voices, at home or abroad, appear to hold that no military response is
appropriate for the Sept. 11 attacks in New York and Washington. This
reflects not only the universal opprobrium the attacks have met, but also
some support for the idea of the US aiding rebellious Afghanis to oust the
Taliban.

But as the Bush administration weighs the risks of military action, there
is unease that it may give the long-term impact of war short shrift. Others
see not enough soul searching over conditions that feed international
terrorism - ranging from US support for unpopular regimes to the
Israeli-Palestinian conflict.

"Our first priority has to be not to create more enemies than we already
have," says Daniel Benjamin, a counter-terrorism expert who served in the
National Security Council in the Clinton administration. Joining other
analysts in emphasizing Pakistan, he says actions that destabilize the
already weak regime of the country's military ruler, Gen. Pervez Musharraf,
could lead to a much less friendly regime in Pakistan - a country with
nuclear-arms capabilities.

While calling some military action "the necessary response for a country
deeply wounded," Mr. Benjamin says that an ill-conceived war presents
extraordinary risks. "If we turn the Afghanis into martyrs, we'll have
extreme problems in the moderate Islamic world."

President Bush's advisers are discussing the dangers of military strikes,
with the Defense Department's civilian administrators, including Secretary
Donald Rumsfeld and Deputy Secretary Paul Wolfowitz taking the most hawkish
stand.

At the other end of the scale are State Department officials, including
Secretary Colin Powell, who caution that broad military strikes could upset
allies - such as Egypt and Indonesia - that the US wants to keep on board
in the antiterrorism war.

Mr. Wolfowitz and Defense Department advisers, including analyst Richard
Perle, a member of the Defense Review Board, favor extending the military
campaign to countries like Iraq.

Other officials temper that by saying proof of a country's links to
terrorists who are acting against the US should be found first.

Still other analysts say the US will come up short unless it approaches
this battle as essentially a struggle between ways of thinking.

"We can't counter people's minds with smart bombs and missiles," says
Jerrold Post, a political psychologist who was consulted extensively by the
American government during the Gulf War. "This is as much a war of words as
a war of bombs."

The "genius" of Islamic terrorist Mr. bin Laden has been to focus economic
despair and dissatisfaction with authoritative regimes - widespread in the
Arab and Islamic worlds - on the US. "It becomes a moral imperative to
strike the US," Mr. Post says.

To counter extremists' attraction, Post says, the US must do more to
discourage potential recruits from joining terrorist groups, while
promoting dissension within those groups.

Some negative consequences of military action are probably unavoidable,
says terrorism expert Martha Crenshaw. But she adds that the US will lose
sight of long-term goals to its peril.

"We won't be able to do all that we want to do at once," she says, but a
"war" in the short term makes other aspects of that struggle against
terrorism - "alleviating poverty, addressing grievances, and reducing
anti-Americanism" - more difficult.

Some analysts, warning against overreliance on a military solution to
terrorism, see encouraging signs that a consideration of risks is playing a
key part in the Bush administration's deliberations. For example, experts
say Mr. Rumsfeld's acknowledgment that referring to the military campaign
as "infinite justice" was potentially offensive to Muslims indicates
sensitivity to the US impact on the region.

Others say Bush's own words are beginning to suggest that the US wants to
retaliate militarily in a way that avoids making matters worse. Shibley
Telhami, a Middle East expert at the University of Maryland, found
reassurance in Bush's speech last Thursday, in which the president said the
target is terrorist organizations "with global reach."

"There are always risks to military intervention, but not as grave as when
the definition of what we are going after had been much broader," says Mr.
Telhami.

What no one suggests is that the right calibration of a military response
will be easy to develop.

"We don't want to fight the jihad (holy war), but we have to do what we
have to do," says Mr. Benjamin. "It's an extraordinary challenge

3) Sempre dal CSM, un follow-up sulla nostra breve discussione di che cosa
trasmettono le radio (si parla anche del provvedimento della Clear Channels
Communications). Su qualcuno lo traduce, per carità, "people are really mad
right now" ovviamente non vuol dire che sono tutti "matti": "mad" in questo
contesto significa "arrabbiati", mi raccomando. L'articolo è molto
inquietante, per certi versi. Se qualcuno lo traduce, mi raccomando faccia
attenzione a smussare gli angoli perché rischia di suonare come
anti-americano ad un lettore non-statunitense (in realtà è
matter-of-factish per un lettore americano o cmq anglofono, ma in Italia
farebbe decisamente un altro effetto). Da leggere comunque.


Voices of America: Patriotism, anger flood US airwaves

By Mark Sappenfield | Staff writer of The Christian Science Monitor

RAPID CITY, S.D. - In recent days, DJs Chad Bowar and D. Ray Knight have
done the unthinkable - they've voluntarily played a country music song.
Messrs. Bowar and Knight are, after all, irreverent hosts of Top 40 station
KRCS's morning show here - more likely to lampoon the twang of Dwight
Yoakam than to give him airtime. Yet, after the terror of Sept. 11, they
were only too eager to play Lee Greenwood's "God Bless the USA."

From this remote hill town of farmers and Air Force pilots to the
dust-encrusted streets of New York, Britney Spears is taking a back seat to
the Boss, as titles like "Born in the USA" make a comeback. The shift is
but one part of the nation's resurgent patriotism, as Americans respond to
the worst act of terrorism in the nation's history with reams of red,
white, and blue ribbon and millions of dollars of aid.

Indeed, for many younger citizens, the attacks of Sept. 11 have aroused a
love of country previously felt only faintly through snippets of
grandparents' stories or films about World War II.

With a renewed national pride, however, has come a demand for retribution.
Few have an answer as to what should be done. But in this crucible of
American patriotism - bracketed by Mount Rushmore to the south and
Ellsworth Air Force Base to the east - the overwhelming sadness of the past
two weeks is gradually giving way to a new resolve to act, increasingly
evident on street corners and over the airwaves.

"We've seen people go from grief to anger," says Knight, whose size lends
him more the appearance of a linebacker than a small-town radio "shock
jock." "People are really mad right now."

Throughout the past few weeks, radio stations have been barometers of this
public mood. Immediately after the attacks, requests led DJs to play
anything that had an American theme.

Eric Andrews of KIQK country in Rapid City says the huge volume of requests
for "God Bless the USA" prompted him to play it three times during his
five-hour Tuesday show. He plays only the most popular songs twice, at most.

In addition, many stations are overlaying news clips on older songs with
poignant titles - like Kid Rock's "Only God Knows Why" and Jewel's "Hands."
Some have even gone so far as to nix songs that could be considered
inappropriate.

Clear Channel Communications in Houston sent a list of 150 songs to its
affiliates, suggesting that they might not want to play tunes such as
R.E.M.'s "It's the End of the World as We Know It," the Dave Matthews
Band's "Crash," and, oddly, Simon and Garfunkel's "Bridge Over Troubled
Water."

Here in Rapid City, an unassuming city of 50,000 swaddled in the first
gentle folds of South Dakota's Black Hills, the changes have been welcome.

"Stations are playing a lot more patriotic music, and it really moves you,"
says Rick Ewing, a young Wal-Mart employee pinned with a red, white, and
blue ribbon, who conscientiously walks as he talks, because he's "on the
clock."

Yet as the initial shock over the audacity of the attack recedes, DJs here
have also noticed a desire among listeners for songs with more of an edge.

Last Tuesday, Bowar and Knight began running a parody of a rock song called
"Learning to Fly." It includes the lines: "Time to change the name on the
map to Af-GONE-istan," and "He [Osama bin Laden] and all his terrorist
buddies are gonna fry."

"Haven't gotten a single complaint call," says Bowar, who wrote the lyrics.

To some degree, the hardening sentiment can be traced to the town's
intimate relationship to Ellsworth Air Force Base.

With local jets being deployed to the Mideast, the six radio stations of
Rushmore Radio Ltd. have taken to playing more songs like "Danger Zone"
from the movie "Top Gun," and "Eye of the Tiger" from "Rocky."

Knight adds that many requests have come in for the punk classic "Rock the
Casbah," quipping that "the minute the bombs fly, that goes into heavy
rotation."

Moreover, Rapid City - at its heart - seems a town more tied to its
heritage in the quick-draw days of the American frontier than to the modern
world of conferences and coalition-building. This is a place where the
tallest building is a grain silo, and where the city's flagship store on
the corner of Main and Sixth is famous for its buffalo skulls and hide
paintings.

One block away, leaning on a cowboy-hatted statue of Ronald Reagan,
high-schooler Jordan Mason offers this blunt, if historically inaccurate,
assessment: "As bad as World War II was, we didn't have another war for 20
years. If you can scare ... another country, it's not going to rise up as
quickly."

Thirty minutes away at Mount Rushmore - where license plates are more
likely to read Colorado or California than South Dakota - the feelings are
largely the same, suggesting that, for now, Rapid City is in tune with the
rest of America.

As visitors file down a row of state flags toward the immense granite faces
of greatest leaders in American history, many express gratitude for US
leaders today, and acknowledge that this place means more to them now than
it would have a few weeks ago.

"We just got off the plane an hour ago, and this is the first place we
came," says Utahn Lisa Stearns, who is in the area for a friend's wedding.

For most, though, these feelings of awe are tinged with a deep disgust over
the attacks. Pausing before an impromptu memorial that has sprung up
beneath the Pennsylvania flag, Pittsburgh native Matt Holewski says America
must make a significant military response, not only against Osama bin
Laden, but also against the whole of Afghanistan.

"Tuesday, I was just in denial. It was the worst day of my life. I felt
emotions I didn't even know I had," he says, looking vacantly toward the
ground. "But we have to do something.... I think it's almost time for us to
start thinking like [the terrorists] do."


4) Da leggere assolutamente (è lungo, ma non difficile), e prometto che
cercherò di saperne di più dalla viva voce di alcuni miei amici nei
prossimi giorni

Campus Aftershocks

Students rally, fire off e-mails, and hold vigils to help shape the future
of a suddenly changed world

A Christian Science Monitor Roundup

On Sept. 11, as TV networks began to run loops of disaster footage, Tom
Graham sat with his friends on the couch, "snuffling and crying and
watching the news."
But after a couple days of that, he'd had it. Though the University of New
Mexico graduate student had never been a political organizer - never even
taped a flier in a store window - Mr. Graham decided to hold a candlelight
demonstration and open forum for the Albuquerque community. He ran all over
the city, asking people for advice. "They just took me by the hand and led
me through it," he says. "All kinds of people. It seems like they wanted to
do something - to be a part of something."

First a local newspaper, then radio and TV stations, pitched in to
advertise the event. In the end, "like 500 people showed up. It blew me
away," Graham says. "I thought there'd be 50 people there, and mostly my
friends."

Across the nation, young people who never gave activism a second thought
have been catapulted into action by the terrorist attacks on Washington and
New York. Overnight, they put together vigils, donated blood, and organized
rallies. On campuses better known for niche interest groups with clearly
defined boundaries, thousands of students have sought ways to confront a
suddenly new world - together.

The surge of activity may have been a natural response to the shock of the
news. Nonetheless, some say the broad outreach that's stirring among
students could well outlast the initial drive to lend a hand or wave the flag.

"I think people didn't recognize the responsibility of being a citizen, of
being a member of a community before," says Deepinder Mayell, a member of
Boston University's Global Justice Project. "There's something to be said
about individualism and living in an isolated bubble, particularly on
college campuses. Something like this makes people more aware of their role
in our government, and our government's role in the world."

The ways in which that bubble abruptly burst has altered some schools'
long-standing images: Flags have fluttered across campus at the University
of California, Berkeley, famous for antiwar protests during the Vietnam era.

Elsewhere, there is simply the sense that students had been jolted into a
new set of priorities.

Welena Pozharsky, a junior at New York University, says political interest
has spiked sharply on her campus, just north of the World Trade Center.
"Every class now starts with a discussion about this," she says, adding
that the students had "zero political interest" prior to the attack. Now,
she says, CNN is on constantly. "We're talking about a lot of things we
wouldn't have been talking about a week ago."

At Emerson College in Boston, junior Elisabeth Colabraro has been working
furiously on a peace banner for students to sign. She detects a new urgency
among the politically involved.

"It's a lot different now," she says. "We could have war tomorrow, so you
can't take a minute break. It's like a 24/7 job."

Campuses, of course, have long been fertile ground for organizing. But the
political fervor and mass protests of the late 1960s that set a high-water
mark in the postwar era, have been more studied than emulated by college
students in recent decades.


Renewed commitment

Still, over the past decade, many schools have seen a renewed commitment to
grass-roots rallying around such issues as the environment and sweatshop
labor. Just last year, "living wage" protests put Harvard University in the
hot seat. And the number of students committed to protesting globalization
at the meetings of world leaders has been growing steadily.

At George Washington University, activists were in high gear this fall for
the now-postponed meeting of the IMF and the World Bank. Anticipating tens
of thousands of demonstrators, GW had announced it would shut the campus,
which sits across from the World Bank in Washington.

The decision sparked protests among some students. But when the National
Guard and camouflaged Humvees took up residence on street corners after the
attacks, disapproval rained down on those who persisted in criticizing the
school's earlier decision. Meanwhile, the student association put its
energy into enabling students to use debit cards to make donations.

"We had students saying, 'This isn't the time to be protesting something
else, we need to be focused,'" says Russ Rizzo, editor of the GW Hatchet,
an independent student newspaper.

That focus, Mr. Rizzo adds, stems from the feeling many students have that
they're witnessing history in the making. "We're just waiting to see what
happens.... We know we're on the brink of something huge," he says. "[T]
his is definitely the largest event that's happened in our lifetime.... It
seems like it's going to require more of a sacrifice."

Suddenly feeling part of something larger prompted shows of patriotism
unseen on most campuses in recent years. Young people accustomed to making
cynical comments about government joined hands and sang "God Bless
America." Foreign students chimed in as well, voicing support for the
United States even as some feared being the target of anti-Muslim sentiment.

"I'm from India, and this is the first time I've felt such an
identification with this country," says Babita Thamkappan, a senior at
Berkeley who has experienced terrorism before and favors retaliation. "The
whole world is looking to the US to do something. If anyone can stop bin
Laden and the global terrorism he creates, it's America."


The Army or the peace vigil?

Some students have made the choice to be part of whatever military action
the US takes. Brian Davis, a junior at Southwest Texas State University in
San Marcos, signed on for four years with the Army within hours of the
attacks. "It's a lot more serious now," says Mr. Davis, a criminal-justice
major who had been considering enlisting. "I could have chosen the
reserves, but I wanted to actively serve the Army."

Other students defined supportive action quite differently. And to align
their forces, they turned to the tool most available to college students:
the computer.


'National Day of Action'

Even as they were absorbing the news about the Pentagon and the World Trade
Center, students at Wesleyan University in Middletown, Conn., fired up
their e-mail networks, getting in touch with classmates, friends at other
schools, and national activist lists. Within a week they organized Peaceful
Justice, a coalition of groups that participated in a "national day of
action" at more than 150 campuses last Thursday to promote awareness of
alternatives to military retaliation.

To Sarah Norr, a veteran of the 1999 WTO protests in Seattle and a driving
force behind Peaceful Justice, it was an opportunity to share the
exhilaration of making your voice heard. "In Seattle, we saw that when we
all got together, we could stand up to this incredibly powerful global
organization and make it listen to us," she says. "That sense of power - it
was like absolutely nothing in my life before."

Even so, Ms. Norr acknowledges that this current action is taking place in
a radically different context. "The tone of the organization has to be
really different," she says. "We want to be respectful of people who have
lost loved ones. We can't run down the street yelling, 'Hey, hey! Ho, ho!
War has got to go!' "

At the Massachusetts Institute of Technology in Cambridge, where about 200
students and faculty gathered "in solidarity" with other campuses on
Thursday, poetry reading and extemporaneous speaking focused on a peaceful
and just response.

To Brice Smith, a physics graduate student and longtime student organizer
at MIT, it was heartwarming: "I've been amazed by the number of people here
who, until Tuesday, had never thought of organizing, who just suddenly
realized that something had to be done."

Mr. Smith thinks more students are getting involved because "they start
hearing the reactions of the media and the administration, and it just
blends together into this undifferentiated voice that's just 'War, war,
war.' It's so shocking, they start looking for alternatives."

Indeed, some students are taking a hard line. "Our actions abroad have
created an environment in which people are willing to take these steps,"
says Alex Cheney, a Boston University student. "I don't think anything
justifies the attacks, but I would say that it is an equal response to our
actions abroad."

Other students are still figuring out where they stand. Samantha Fernandez,
a freshman at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, has seen
dozens of peace vigils on the liberal campus since Sept. 11. She had
planned to protest at the World Bank meetings - but she wasn't sure she'd
join the mass peace rally taking shape in its stead.

"I go to these vigils and hear everybody talking of peace, but then you're
getting the exact opposite reaction from the media and government," she
says, adding she is confused by a mix of patriotic feelings and a desire
for forbearance.


Supporting Muslim students

But even as those lines begin to be drawn, students have stayed largely
united in another cause: supporting Muslim peers.

Almost as soon as the attacks occurred, reports surfaced of assaults on
Muslims and those thought to be Muslim. "The things we're seeing now are
very scary," says Numan Waheed, a member of MIT's Muslim Student
Association. He cites threatening comments and actions as evidence of a
backlash.

Still, he says, after participating in a symposium held at the nearby
Fletcher School of Law and Diplomacy in support of Muslims, students have
contacted his group wanting to learn about Islam and to work on race
relations. The Asian Christian Fellowship, recalling Japanese-Americans'
treatment in World War II, has also reached out.

Many of the students at the Fletcher School gathering say they now have a
new sense of purpose about their study of international affairs. "Americans
are realizing we can't ignore the rest of the world anymore," says Peter
Neisuler, who is studying Islamic civilizations.

The attacks also reminded students of the need for open discussion. "The
public debate has been respectful," notes Assaf Moghadam, who grew up in
Germany and is of Iranian and Jewish heritage. Still, "much of the student
response has been to restrain military response. Those in security studies
are keeping a lower profile."

If nothing else, students agree their college experience has been
profoundly transformed. "It's a privilege to be in a university setting at
a time like this," says Dennis Markatos, who just graduated from UNC.
"Professors can talk about these issues, and you can [translate] concern
into action that ... can possibly change the world for the better."


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A new forum for news and debate links college activists

Even before the Sept. 11 attacks, a growing international network of
student activists had begun to organize. Rallying support over e-mail and
websites, they primarily focused on anti-globalization efforts. In 1999,
the first Independent Media Center (IMC) was founded to support independent
journalists and activists at the WTO demonstrations in Seattle. Since then,
IMCs and their websites have sprung up in more than 60 cities around the
world.

As a primary outlet for independent and student journalists and activists -
and particularly because they make use of the Web and other new-media
communications most accessible to students - IMCs are likely to play an
influential role among the wave of new demonstrators emerging after the
attacks on New York and Washington. Below are excerpts from the Seattle
IMC's Web discussion board, beginning Sept. 11:

Two Planes Crash into World Trade Center in New York
by ML 6:08 a.m. (Pacific time) Tues.

NPR is reporting that planes have crashed into both towers.

CALL LOCAL MEDIA NOW!!!
by A non e-mouse 6:24 a.m. Tues.

and demand that they stop re-playing the footage of the 2nd crash. DEMAND A
STOP TO SENSATIONALIST MEDIA!!!!


one building went down?
by rollerdexter 7:29 a.m. Tues.

I can see from here the NYC skyline, and everything downtown is filled with
smoke. I can only see one tower. One must have fallen!!!


Puh-lease
by Spider Jerusalem 7:39 a.m. Tues.

"Sensationalist media"? If that were footage of Carlo being shot in Genoa,
you'd be cheering for it getting so much air time. It's news. It's the 1st
Amendment. If you don't like it, change the channel.


No towers
by mike 7:39 a.m. Tues.

From seeing on TV news here, both have now fallen.


!!
by mrman 8:14 a.m. Tues.

shedloads of innocent people will be suffering, im only glad the towers
collapsed downwards, and didnt fall over.


This is not as horrible as Hiroshima
by guernica 9:39 a.m. Tues.

Yes, terrorism is a reality. U.S.A. and Israel do know it for they are
terrorists themselves. But this is the solution: stop protecting official
terrorists and you won't be the victim of organised terrorism.

america had 2 pay 4 its crimes
by David, France 10:28 a.m. Tues.

I hate terrorism and violence, but a country which supports dictatorships
worldwide can't do it endlessly.


We are not the terrorists...
by misternuvistor 6:40 p.m. Tues.

All the "violent" things that the US and Israel have done were small in
magnitude compared with the disasters today, and necessary for keeping
threat[s] at bay. I know you all don't want to hear this but YOU HAVE TO
FIGHT FIRE WITH FIRE.

Fire with Fire?
by wage slave 7:25 p.m. Tues.

you are so right! "Fire with Fire" is just why it happened. The fire that
the US and its allies have been breathing all over the world has itself
reaped fire from those who agree that fire must be fought with fire.


So much for Checks & Balances
by eyeswideopen 5:56 p.m. Thurs.

Did anybody else miss the national public debate as to whether or not we
should immediately engage ourselves in WWIII? As the Presi-dolt [has] been
careful to make clear, we will respond by "ending" any state who engages in
and/or supports terrorism.

Luckily, [we] haven't bothered to include our own republic in that list. .
yet.

Reported by staff writers Mary Wiltenburg, Stacy A. Teicher, Amelia
Newcomb, and Mark Clayton in Boston, and Marjorie Coeyman in New York, and
by contributors Patrik Jonsson in Raleigh, N.C., and Matthew MacLean in
Berkeley, Calif.

Written by Amelia Newcomb.