Water Makes US Troops in Iraq Sick
Dozens of U.S. troops in Iraq fell sick at bases using "unmonitored and potentially unsafe" water supplied by the military and a contractor once owned by Vice President Dick Cheney's former company, the Pentagon's internal watchdog says.

A report obtained by The Associated Press said soldiers experienced skin abscesses, cellulitis, skin infections, diarrhea and other illnesses after using discolored, smelly water for personal hygiene and laundry at five U.S. military sites in Iraq.

The Defense Department's inspector general's report, which could be released as early as Monday, found water quality problems between March 2004 and February 2006 at three sites run by contractor KBR Inc., and between January 2004 and December 2006 at two military-operated locations.
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"Therefore, water suppliers exposed U.S. forces to unmonitored and potentially unsafe water," at the military sites by late 2006, the report said.

The problems did not extend to troops' drinking water, but rather to water used for washing, bathing, shaving and cleaning. Water used for hygiene and laundry must meet minimum safety standards under military regulations because of the potential for harmful exposure through the eyes, nose, mouth, cuts and wounds.

According to the Washington Post: "D.C. police are now watching live images from dozens of surveillance cameras posted in high-crime parts of the city, hoping to respond faster to shootings, robberies and other offenses and catch suspects before they get away.

"Since August 2006, the city has installed 73 cameras across the city, mostly on utility poles, at a cost of about $4 million. But until recently, officers were using them mainly as an investigative tool -- checking the recordings after crimes were committed in hopes of turning up leads and evidence."

Now, however, under a new policy, police watch live feeds from a dozen or so cameras. And they want to greatly expand that.

Live police surveillance of citizens via camera is already standard policy in U.S. cities including Baltimore, Chicago, New York and Philadelphia.

U.S. cities are following the model of London, where 500,000 surveillance cameras allow government agents of Big Brother to peer at citizens around the clock. The average Londoner is caught on camera several hundred times a day.

Many U.S. politicians and enforcers are eager to follow London's example. New York mayor Michael Bloomberg toured London last year and virtually salivated at the widespread surveillance there. He dismissed critics of government surveillance as "ridiculous," and, observing that London has a camera in every bus and subway car, declared, "We are way behind and we really do have to catch up."

Similarly, D.C Police Chief Cathy L. Lanier told the Washington Post: "I'd love to have the whole city wired like London."

According to the Washington Post: "The District's cameras have quite a range ... Officers can rotate angles for different views. They can zoom in on faces of potential suspects and pick up license plate numbers from cars several blocks away."

Around-the-clock government surveillance of streets and public spaces fits in nicely with other developing government trends, like the REAL ID national ID scheme (discussed last issue), the continuing erosion of Fourth Amendment protections, plans for the creation of massive government databases on U.S. citizens, and reports of new levels of federal electronic eavesdropping.

Does anybody see a trend here?