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This week on Uprising: A special look at Iraq and the elections

* Will the Democrats Take Back Congress? We’ll hear from Bob Benenson (CQPolitics.com), and pollster John Zogby.

* Black Agenda Report on “the melting pot”

* Iraqi American Activist Dahlia Wasfi on the medical consequences of the war in Iraq

* Empire Notes on exit strategies in Iraq

* Fernando Suarez del Solar on record troop deaths in Iraq

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Will the Democrats Take Back Congress?

GUEST: Bob Benenson, Editor of CQpolitics.com, John Zogby, President and CEO of the independent polling firm Zogby International

The mid-term elections are around the corner and today we spend the morning taking a look at various Congressional races across the country. Democrats are poised to win a slim majority in the House of Representatives but many races are still too close to call. In the Senate, Democrats are facing tough resistance from rural voters according to a series of polls by the LA Times and Bloomberg. If Democrats can’t break through on November 7th to win Senate races in at least two of three rural states — Missouri, Tennessee and Virginia — they are unlikely to control the chamber. Democrats are leading in hotly contested races for Republican-held seats in Virginia and Ohio. But Republicans lead in Missouri and Tennessee. In New Jersey, the Republicans are making their strongest bid to gain a Democratic seat but the incumbent is holding a slim majority. According to pollster John Zogby, if the election was held today, Democrats would likely gain between 25 and 30 seats in the House and four in the Senate. That would give them a majority in the House, but not in the Senate. Zogby also said that 15 to 20 percent of voters, many of whom identify themselves as Republicans, are still undecided.

For more information, visit www.zogby.com and www.cqpolitics.com.

Black Agenda Report on “the melting pot”

GUEST: Glen Ford is a writer and radio commentator and the Executive Editor of The Black Agenda Report

Visit www.blackagendareport.com. This week’s commentary is called: the Melting Pot

Medical Consequences of the War in Iraq

GUEST: Dahlia Wasfi, Iraqi American activist, medical student, and speaker for Global Exchange

A survey carried out by Iraqi physicians and overseen by American academics at Johns Hopkins University and MIT, estimated recently that 655,000 more people have died in Iraq since US-led forces invaded in March 2003. In the year ending June 2006, the team calculated Iraq’s mortality rate to be roughly four times what it was the year before the war with a steady increase in mortality since the invasion. Of the 655,000 dead, 54,000 were killed by disease and other causes relating to a health care system in dire condition. According to the Iraqi Health Ministry, as of October 2005 25% of Iraq’s 18,000 physicians had left the country since the 2003 US invasion. According to one Iraqi physician, Dr Majeed al-Naomi, “healthcare in Iraq since 2003 is worse than during the sanctions. At that time we had little equipment and medicine, but in the last three years we have lost almost all the specialists.” Additionally, doctors and other health workers are attacked, shot at, threatened, kidnapped, and told to “leave the country or die”. Doctors have also been targeted by government death squads and US military. Meanwhile, health workers in Iraq have been on strike for higher wages over the past month across several areas of the country.

Visit Dahlia Wasfi’s website at www.liberatethis.com.

Empire Notes on Exit Strategies in Iraq

GUEST: Rahul Mahajan, author of Full Spectrum Dominance and The New Crusade

Empire Notes are weekly commentaries filed by Rahul Mahajan, author of Full Spectrum Dominance and The New Crusade. Today’s commentary is about exit strategies in Iraq

Empire Notes is online at www.empirenotes.org.

Record Numbers of Troops Killed this Month

GUEST: Fernando Suarez del Solar, founder of Guerrero Azteca Peace Project, father of Jesus Suarez, one of the first American soldier to be killed in the Iraq war.

October has been the deadliest month this year for U.S. soldiers in Iraq. The U.S. military has said that 96 troops have died so far in the month of October including four Marines and a sailor killed just yesterday. The number of U.S. troop fatalities this month is also the highest since October 2005. For more information, visit the Guerrero Azteca Peace Project.

Sonali’s Subversive Thought for the Day

Arch bishop Oscar Romero once said —

“Peace is not the product of terror or fear.
Peace is not the silence of cemeteries.
Peace is not the silent result of violent repression.
Peace is the generous, tranquil contribution of all to the good of all.
Peace is dynamism. Peace is generosity.
It is right and it is duty.”