Four more US soldiers have died in Iraq. For what? These young men and women are dying, in a Mega-Mogdishu, for a neo-con wet dream and a Three Stooges Reich...How could this nightmare happen to America? It's the Media, Stupid.
Gene Lyons, Arkansas Democrat-Gazette: Now and then, something happens that causes our esteemed Washington press corps to exhibit its collective posterior to a wondering nation...
Every news article and TV feature I saw regarding
Clinton’s book featured the quote from Michiko
Kakutani’s frontpage New York Times review, "sloppy,
self-indulgent and often eye-crossingly dull."
Positive reviews by "Lonesome Dove" author Larry
McMurtry and Ben Franklin biographer Walter Isaacson
got little play...
Interestingly, the Times ’ review neglected to mention
that Clinton spent many pages deconstructing its own
dreadfully bad Whitewater reporting. Reading it, he
wrote, "felt like an outof-body experience." Regarding
the Times’ ? The Washington Post’s and everybody
else’s failure to disclose the contents of the
Pillsbury Report, the eight-volume study by a
Republican law firm that exonerated the Clintons of
Whitewater wrongdoing in December 1995—years before
independent counsel Kenneth Starr—Clinton quoted my
friend Lars-Erik Nelson, the late New York Daily News
columnist. Nelson spent years in Moscow covering the
Soviet Union. "The secret verdict is in," he wrote.
"There was nothing for the Clintons to hide.... [I] n
a bizarre reversal of those Stalin-era trials in which
innocent people were convicted in secret, the
President and the First Lady have been publicly
charged and secretly found innocent."
Break the Bush Cabal Stranglehold on the "US
Mainstream News Media," Show Up for Democracy in 2004:
Defeat Bush (again!)
http://www.nwanews.com/adg/story_Editorial.php?storyid=69194
Here’s the beef
Gene Lyons
Posted on Wednesday, June 30, 2004
Now and then, something happens that causes our
esteemed Washington press corps to exhibit its
collective posterior to a wondering nation. Such an
event was the publication of Bill Clinton’s
biographical memoir, "My Life." Following the extended
funeral rites for former President Ronald Reagan,
Clinton’s humongous Bildungsroman left pundits
scrambling madly to master a new collective script.
"Bildungsroman" is professor-speak for "10 pounds of
ego in a 5-pound sack." Nobody writes an autobiography
without a big ego. Not even St. Augustine. But what
was Clinton’s real motive? Speaking on "NBC Nightly
News," Andrea Mitchell (Mrs. Alan Greenspan) thought
she knew. "All Clinton may want to do," she opined,
"is outsell his wife’s book, which sold almost three
million copies worldwide." Time’s Margaret Carlson
echoed her on CNN’s "Capital Gang." Where do they find
them? Write a 972-page book to show up your wife? In
my experience, when people pontificate about the
motives of people they scarcely know, it’s their own
motives they display.
Apart from horses and high school guidance counselors,
it’d be hard to find an equivalent group as consumed
with status anxiety as the Washington punditocracy.
Every news article and TV feature I saw regarding
Clinton’s book featured the quote from Michiko
Kakutani’s frontpage New York Times review, "sloppy,
self-indulgent and often eye-crossingly dull."
Positive reviews by "Lonesome Dove" author Larry
McMurtry and Ben Franklin biographer Walter Isaacson
got little play.
Interestingly, the Times ’ review neglected to mention
that Clinton spent many pages deconstructing its own
dreadfully bad Whitewater reporting. Reading it, he
wrote, "felt like an outof-body experience." Regarding
the Times’ ? The Washington Post’s and everybody
else’s failure to disclose the contents of the
Pillsbury Report, the eight-volume study by a
Republican law firm that exonerated the Clintons of
Whitewater wrongdoing in December 1995—years before
independent counsel Kenneth Starr—Clinton quoted my
friend Lars-Erik Nelson, the late New York Daily News
columnist. Nelson spent years in Moscow covering the
Soviet Union. "The secret verdict is in," he wrote.
"There was nothing for the Clintons to hide.... [I] n
a bizarre reversal of those Stalin-era trials in which
innocent people were convicted in secret, the
President and the First Lady have been publicly
charged and secretly found innocent."
Yet Kakutani charges Clinton with "lies" about "real
estate." Challenged by Salon’s Eric Boehlert to
stipulate any, he says she never called back. Times
editor Bill Keller alibied that the independent
counsel’s Whitewater report mentioned "inaccurate
statements."
But if inaccurate statements are lies, the
Timesprinted even more lies about Whitewater than
"weapons of mass destruction." Indeed, had editors
heeded problems with its "investigative" reporting
during Clinton’s first term when some of us started
calling attention to them, they might have spared
themselves a lot of trouble. Judith Miller’s bad
reporting about Iraq and Jeff Gerth’s about Arkansas
had certain basic similarities: Both reporters went to
places they knew little about, put themselves into the
hands of con men with axes to grind and suppressed
dissenting voices eventually proved correct.
As George Seldes observed, however, "the most sacred
cow of the press is the press itself." Hence, The
Washington Post, too, editorialized that Clinton’s
memoir "veers from the nonfiction category" regarding
Whitewater, adding: "The tangled real estate
investments... merited investigation, and the inquiry
produced numerous convictions."
But in fact the Clintons made exactly one real estate
investment involving roughly $200,000, repaid the
loans in full and lost about $50,000. None of the
convictions Starr obtained involved transactions to
which they were a party.
Most had no relationship to their investment
whatsoever.
Starr himself, apparently one of the unreliable
sources from whom reporters took dictation, blandly
assured a PBS interviewer that "very few individuals
who are caught up in the process of criminal
justice... walk out saying how much I love the
prosecutor." Cute, but Clinton’s beef is more pointed.
He produces a list of persons, such as Kathleen
Willey, whom he says Starr rewarded for lying, and a
list of others like Susan Mc-Dougal who he says got
indicted for refusing to lie.
Self-serving? Maybe. But a Little Rock jury acquitted
McDougal, and a Virginia jury failed to convict Julie
Hiatt Steele on Willey’s say-so. Unfortunately,
Clinton’s book overlooks one of Starr’s most stunning
transgressions: convicting Arkansas Gov. Jim Guy
Tucker on the basis of a repealed statute. Yes, you
read correctly. Starr destroyed the career of Tucker
(a Clinton rival, incidentally, to whom he says he
apologized for not having pardoned him) by using an
expired tax law. It took Tucker five years of costly
appeals to prove it, and it opens to further appeal a
second conviction of Tucker that Starr obtained
through the testimony of convicted embezzler David
Hale. But the courtiers of the Washington press have
no time for such trivialities. Speculating about the
Clintons’ marriage makes better entertainment.
• Free-lance columnist Gene Lyons is a Little Rock
author and recipient of the National Magazine Award.
850 + US soldiers have died in Iraq. For what? Meanwhile...Sea change.
Will Hutton, Guardian: For my entire journalistic life, the most salient political and cultural fact has been the rise of the American right. It is not just that America has been governed by Republican presidents or by Bill Clinton within the penumbra of the conservative intellectual and cultural ascendancy; it's that the conservative victory in the battle of ideas in the US has had a spill-over affect on the rest of the West.
It is no accident, for example, that the election of Ronald Reagan launched a fivefold increase in the numbers held in American prisons or that the profound growth of inequality also began with him. Whether it's criminal justice or tax policy, Britain and the industrialised West have been profoundly affected by the retreat of American liberalism...
Which is why this year's presidential election is so important, not just for the result but for the way the underlying argument is developing. Bush's strategists thought it would all be sewn up by now; they would have defined Democrat challenger John Kerry as a flip-flop, ultra liberal senator who was unsound on the war against terrorism...
In short, Iraq is emerging as a crucial turning-point in the 25-year-long conservative ascendancy. In his important book, After the Empire, French intellectual Emmanuel Todd argues that what has betrayed the US's attempt to sustain a global hegemonic position and win the battle against terrorism is its partisanship and retreat from universalist principles...
Events are giving the Democrats the ammunition to make the case that America needs friends anfd that to win them means adhering to international law. But the US is not going to undergo a Damascene conversion. Only cumulative evidence will change minds.
But opinion is moving. My bet remains that it will carry John Kerry to the White House - just. Of equal importance is the fact that neo-conservatism is on the defensive and that American liberalism has its best chance to regain ground for the first time in a generation.
Restore the Timeline, Show Up for Democracy in 2004: Defeat Bush (again!)
http://politics.guardian.co.uk/columnist/story/0,9321,1248400,00.html
Your time is up, George: No wonder Bush is running scared - 25 years of neo-conservative ascendancy in the US is under grave threat
Will Hutton
Sunday June 27, 2004
The Observer
For my entire journalistic life, the most salient political and cultural fact has been the rise of the American right. It is not just that America has been governed by Republican presidents or by Bill Clinton within the penumbra of the conservative intellectual and cultural ascendancy; it's that the conservative victory in the battle of ideas in the US has had a spill-over affect on the rest of the West.
It is no accident, for example, that the election of Ronald Reagan launched a fivefold increase in the numbers held in American prisons or that the profound growth of inequality also began with him. Whether it's criminal justice or tax policy, Britain and the industrialised West have been profoundly affected by the retreat of American liberalism.
Would Britain, for example, have so readily retreated from its long-held view that prison is essentially a last resort and rehabilitation of offenders must be the centrepiece of any penal policy if it had not been engulfed by the American conservative view that both propositions were wrong?
Equally, would our readiness to stand by progressive taxation have been so weakened without the view from the US that high rates of income tax on the rich are morally and economically wrong?
We had Mrs Thatcher, but arguably her dominance in British politics would have been less secure had it not been for the succour she took from American policies and conservative ideas. Britain is not a slave to American influences, but it cannot ignore the international common sense which the US more than any other nation shapes.
Britain may have elected two Labour governments in succession, but the extraordinary caution of New Labour in championing even a modest social democratic programme is itself tribute to how difficult it is to declare independence from the international consensus. Progressive politics in Britain will gather no momentum until that begins to change - and that requires change in the US.
Which is why this year's presidential election is so important, not just for the result but for the way the underlying argument is developing. Bush's strategists thought it would all be sewn up by now; they would have defined Democrat challenger John Kerry as a flip-flop, ultra liberal senator who was unsound on the war against terrorism.
Two-term American presidents have habitually established an unassailable lead over the summer before the November election; the Bush team had hoped to achieve that by now with Kerry. Instead, they are involved in a pitched battle with a growing possibility that they might lose. The Democrats are daring to hope and the Republicans are testy and on edge. On trust, on economic competence, on approval ratings and on whether the President is best for America, Bush's poll ratings are poor and falling. In the majority of so-called 'swing' states across the Midwest that Kerry must win, he is registering small but consistent leads; and despite spending a record $80 million on attack adverts, Bush is trailing Kerry nationally, albeit by a small and fluctuating margin.
Bush is enduring the most wretched months of his presidency. The furore over the maltreatment of prisoners in Abu Ghraib; the continuing loss of American lives in Iraq and the sense, despite the handover this week, that the US has lost control of events; the charge by the National Commission on Terrorist Attacks upon the US that there was no evidence of a collaborative relationship between al-Qaeda and Saddam have all badly wounded him.
There was never unanimity within Republican ranks, let alone within the wider US, that fighting a pre-emptive war of choice without hard justification and international legitimacy, where victory would confer the victors the impossible task of building a nation, was smart politics or even feasible. Now the debate is out in the open.
The risk for Bush is that none of this is going to get any better. Already the neocons are more on the defensive than at any time in the past 10 years. One small sign was the extravagant praise Bush felt he needed to heap on their hate figure, Bill Clinton, at the unveiling of his portrait in the White House.
More substantively, the concessions made to win UN endorsement for the handover and last week's cave-in on the US's attempt to get a further two-year extension on US troop immunity from International Criminal Court prosecution both highlight neocon weakness. The US is having to accept that it cannot make the international weather as it chooses.
In short, Iraq is emerging as a crucial turning-point in the 25-year-long conservative ascendancy. In his important book, After the Empire, French intellectual Emmanuel Todd argues that what has betrayed the US's attempt to sustain a global hegemonic position and win the battle against terrorism is its partisanship and retreat from universalist principles.
Palestinian deaths are not equal to Israeli deaths; terrorist suspects have no right to a fair trial or fair treatment in prison; countries not for the war on terror on American terms are necessarily against the US.
It is these attitudes that undermine its moral claims, the 'soft power' that hitherto has underpinned its international leadership. Todd believes that this decline of universalism abroad could not have happened without the decline of universalism within the US; that indifference to colossal inequality and differential rights of US citizens, now expressing itself as rising black infant mortality rates, creates the culture that pursues nakedly unfair policies abroad. America's failures abroad and at home are umbilically linked - and the root of both is neo-conservatism.
Few in the US would diagnose the situation in those terms, whatever the underlying truth, but there are signs in Bush's poll ratings that an emerging American majority do see that the philosophy underpinning his policies is a dead-end and that change is needed.
Kerry is criticised for not being more tactically aggressive, but his caution is justified.
A 25-year ascendancy does not dissolve overnight; the close network of funders, think-tanks, media supporters, corporate beneficiaries and the cultural coalition of anti-gun control, anti-gay and pro-evangelical groups is not going to run up the white flag without sustained resistance.
Events are giving the Democrats the ammunition to make the case that America needs friends and that to win them means adhering to international law. But the US is not going to undergo a Damascene conversion. Only cumulative evidence will change minds.
But opinion is moving. My bet remains that it will carry John Kerry to the White House - just. Of equal importance is the fact that neo-conservatism is on the defensive and that American liberalism has its best chance to regain ground for the first time in a generation.
It is not just American politics that could be transformed by Iraq, but our own. To believe in universal rights and fair societies might become respectable again.
Be vigilant, be vocal, be vociferous. They will try to steal it. Whether or not they have another Trifecta ticket to cash in...
Andrew Gumbel, LA City Beat: Late Monday, word came that Mischelle Townsend, Riverside County’s Registrar of Voters, had abruptly quit her job mid-term. She said she wanted to spend more time with her family, and nurse her father-in-law through his impending knee surgery. Worthy sentiments, for sure. But she didn’t mention anything about a controversial March 2 election for county supervisor that was still being contested, and the recount that had become entangled in problems attributable, in part, to the county’s electronic voting machines. Nor did she mention anything about potentially explosive new details regarding the possible manipulation of those machines. Likewise, no mention of the big list of questions to this effect from Los Angeles CityBeat sitting on her desk since last Saturday.
Instead, the state’s most outspoken champion of e-voting machines, who was leading a lawsuit against Secretary of State Kevin Shelley to try to revoke a list of 23 improved voting security measures imposed last month, is stepping down and vanishing. Townsend leaves not only a mass of unresolved questions about the contested supervisor seat, but also about the fate of e-voting in this state.
Thwart the Theft of a Second Presidential Election, Show Up for Democracy in 2004: Defeat Bush (again!)
http://www.lacitybeat.com/article.php?id=1013&IssueNum=55
DOWN FOR THE COUNT
by Andrew Gumbel
Riverside County’s outspoken registrar was a national poster child for touchscreen voting, but problems with the machines may have just ended her career
RIVERSIDE – Late Monday, word came that Mischelle Townsend, Riverside County’s Registrar of Voters, had abruptly quit her job mid-term. She said she wanted to spend more time with her family, and nurse her father-in-law through his impending knee surgery. Worthy sentiments, for sure. But she didn’t mention anything about a controversial March 2 election for county supervisor that was still being contested, and the recount that had become entangled in problems attributable, in part, to the county’s electronic voting machines. Nor did she mention anything about potentially explosive new details regarding the possible manipulation of those machines. Likewise, no mention of the big list of questions to this effect from Los Angeles CityBeat sitting on her desk since last Saturday.
Instead, the state’s most outspoken champion of e-voting machines, who was leading a lawsuit against Secretary of State Kevin Shelley to try to revoke a list of 23 improved voting security measures imposed last month, is stepping down and vanishing. Townsend leaves not only a mass of unresolved questions about the contested supervisor seat, but also about the fate of e-voting in this state.
The Power of Incumbency
Elections can be brutal things, but shortly after the polls closed on the night of March 2, supporters of Linda Soubirous, an underdog candidate for the Riverside County Board of Supervisors, had reason to feel happy with her performance. She had gone up against three-time incumbent Bob Buster, in a county where incumbents rarely face serious competition. And she had given him a real run for his money, thanks largely to the support of law enforcement groups sympathetic to her nationally recognized campaigns on behalf of the families of police officers killed in the line of duty.
As the first official results came in, it looked as if the Soubirous campaign had forced Buster into a runoff, which was as much as she had hoped for. With 46 of the county’s 157 precincts counted, Buster was running at about 47 per cent – three points below the 50 percent plus one he needed to win outright – with Soubirous at 37 percent and a third candidate, Kevin Pape, at 15. But then some very strange things started to happen.
The expectation was that the rest of the results would come in very quickly. Speed, after all, was one of the big attractions of Riverside’s pioneering touchscreen computer voting system – with its instant precinct-by-precinct vote tallies and ostensibly easy-to-operate system for centralized results tabulation. But the anticipated rapid-fire updates simply failed to materialize. After the initial results posting at 8:13 p.m., there followed a long period of silence.
At around 8:50, Soubirous’s campaign manager, Brian Floyd, received a call from an election observer in Temecula informing him that the vote count had been stopped – apparently by Registrar Mischelle Townsend herself. The reason was not made clear. So Floyd and another Soubirous campaigner named Art Cassel jumped into a car and drove to Townsend’s office to investigate. Sure enough, the counting area appeared to be near-deserted. But then they noticed two men huddled at one of the vote tabulation computers.
One, according to their account, was typing away on the computer keyboard, while the other was standing just next to him.
The two men turned out to be employees of Sequoia Voting Systems, the private company which manufactures Riverside County’s AVC Edge touchscreen machinery. Their presence was unusual, to say the least, and even the possibility that they might be making changes to the vote tabulation software in the middle of an election was alarming to Cassel and Floyd. Sequoia insists the two men’s activities were entirely benign – merely generating lists of data to send to the Secretary of State’s office in Sacramento that had nothing to do with the tabulation software. Soubirous’s campaign staff has made no direct accusations, although it has strongly criticized the registrar’s office for allowing at least an appearance of impropriety at a time when the sanctity of the electoral process should have been paramount. Cassel and Floyd said the man at the keyboard, a Sequoia vice president called Mike Frontera, was wearing a county employees’ ID badge – something that has not been adequately explained by anyone. “What they were doing there we’ll never know,” Cassel said.
When Floyd confronted Registrar Townsend directly, she denied that the vote count had been halted. But at 9:10, according to Cassel’s account, something seemed to have changed because county employees piled back into the counting area, and results from the outstanding precincts began to be posted shortly afterward. As the night went on, Buster’s lead over Soubirous steadily lengthened until he finished up a slender 92 votes over the 50 percent threshold he needed to avoid a runoff.
Over the next few days, as the totals from absentee and mail-in ballots were added, the margin shrunk down to a tantalizing 45 votes. And that part of the count remains highly contentious, too. On March 4, Floyd and Cassel saw the second Sequoia employee, Eddie Campbell, return to the registrar’s office and watched him pop into his pocket what looked like a PCMCIA card similar to those used to store votes on individual touchscreen machines. The Sequoia AVC Edge machines do not make a paper record of individual votes, and any record of total votes for a potential recount – vital in a race ‹ separated only by 45 votes – would only be stored on that kind of card.
Floyd shouted out: “Where are you going with that?” But he received no answer.
Accompanied by different county employees, Campbell walked all the way to the vote tabulation terminals where, according to Cassel, he sat down at the same computer he and Frontera had used on election night. Cassel says he saw the head of the registrar’s information technology department, Brian Foss, log Campbell on to the computer – presumably with his own password – and then leave the room. Campbell, now on his own, called up a screen that Cassel said he recognized as the WinEds tabulation software used on the Sequoia system.
What happened next is less than clear. According to Cassel, Campbell began moving from terminal to terminal – as though he was having difficulty being accepted by whatever system he was trying to enter. Floyd, meanwhile, was anxious for an explanation and tried to track down Mischelle Townsend. It took him all day to find her, and when he did she at first said that Eddie Campbell was not authorized to be in the system and then, in the presence of Brian Foss, changed her tune and said he was.
For the moment, we have only Cassel and Floyd’s version of these events. CityBeat gave Townsend a long list of written questions outlining their account and inviting her to rebut it with her own. At first she said she would be glad to answer, but she missed a mutually agreed deadline, and failed to respond to messages left at her office. Eventually reached on her cell phone, she said she had been advised by her lawyers not to contribute to an article that “obviously was not going to be factual.” Pressed on what she meant by this, she ended up answering some questions, but would not be drawn in on the specifics of Cassel and Floyd’s allegations.
She also failed to mention that she had just quit her job. The next morning, as this article was going to press, the Riverside Press-Enterprise reported that she was retiring early. Perhaps she really is concerned about her father-in-law’s upcoming knee surgery, but her detractors in Riverside County have their doubts. Indeed, the fallout from the Buster-Soubirous race suggests it is a textbook case of how not to conduct an election in just about every respect.
Recount Follies
Given the closeness of the supervisor’s race, the Soubirous campaign requested a recount in early April. Because of the alarm bells raised by the initial count, Linda Soubirous also hired a lawyer, who drafted a closely worded formal request for 44 separate items that would cast maximum light on the workings of the Sequoia voting machines, and cross-check the voting totals on the individual touchscreen machines with the tallies tabulated at the registrar’s headquarters. As pointed out by the growing chorus of critics of touchscreen machines, none of these safeguards constitutes a full recount exactly, because there is still no independent paper record of ballots confirming each voter’s intentions. If the machines drop or alter data – either because of a software glitch or some kind of malicious intervention – there is no way of knowing because they can print out only the information stored inside them, not the information as originally entered.
Touchscreen advocates like Townsend, however, argue that there is plenty of backup in the event of a vote-counting dispute. Townsend’s own website boasts of “an extraordinary number of safeguards,” including redundant storage of votes in two different places and a paper “audit trail.” It was this kind of information that Soubirous’s lawyer requested, based on his interpretation of his client’s rights under the California election code. But in almost every instance, Soubirous got neither answers nor materials.
Of the 44 items requested, only five were provided. Others were offered at different times, but in the end the recount went ahead without any examination of redundant data, audit logs, error reports, or any information documenting the chain of custody for data passed around on cartridges or over Intranet systems. The county is legally obliged, for example, to print out “zero tapes” proving that each touchscreen machine and cartridge or card is completely clear of votes before the polls open. Those zero tapes, in turn, are supposed to be made available to the public at a reasonable cost if anyone should ask for them. But they have not materialized.
Gregory Luke, the Santa Monica-based lawyer representing Soubirous, called the recount “a process that only Katherine Harris could love.”
“We were subjected to a reprint, not a recount,” he said, calling it “an empty formality suitable only for banana republics or dictatorships.”
After he wrote to Townsend expressing his dismay at her refusal “to provide information which has already been generated, and should have been retained by you in the ordinary course of your official business,” her lawyers wrote back that the materials requested were “not relevant to the counting of ballots” and, in many cases, did not exist – for reasons they did not elaborate. The materials, the lawyers argued, would become relevant only if it could be shown that they had been subject to fraud or error – an argument that turns the issue on its head because, of course, the only way to find out if anything is wrong is to inspect the materials first.
Still, the recount was not without hiccups. Almost 300 paper ballots that had not been counted the first time suddenly turned up – Townsend said the marks on them had been too faint to be picked up by the counting machines – shaving Bob Buster’s share of the vote down to 50.07 percent, or just 35 votes above the runoff threshold. The Soubirous campaign continued to demand its 44 items, but Townsend then threw in some Catch-22 logic of her own. Having conducted and completed the recount her own way, she decreed that Soubirous could no longer ask for any materials because that would be tantamount to holding a second recount, which she wasn’t about to grant.
Riverside was the first California county to embrace touchscreen, or Direct Recording Electronic (DRE) voting. The experiment began in 1999, at the height of the dot-com boom, and came to look little short of a coup de génie by the time the 2000 presidential election rolled around, exposing the country’s aging punchcard technology to international ridicule. Townsend was held up as an example to be followed everywhere, and won high praise from Wired magazine, the Bible of the digital age, as some kind of visionary for the new century.
In truth, though, the system was beset with problems from the outset. Although little reported at the time, election night in November 2000 was a near-disaster, as the tabulation software overloaded and started deleting votes from the tallying system. The system was righted, at least according to Sequoia, but Riverside’s results were not published until two hours after San Bernardino County, then still using punchcards. The man who headed Sequoia’s resuscitation team in Riverside, southern sales manager Phil Foster, was subsequently indicted in Louisiana for “conspiracy to commit money laundering and malfeasance” – charges later dropped in exchange for his testimony against Louisiana’s state commissioner of elections.
Long before the current controversy over the safety and reliability of touchscreens, Riverside ran into difficulty over the legal requirements for providing paper audit trails of the ballots inside each individual voting machine. The issue was discussed at length when California considered the Proposition 41 bond measure that overhauled the state’s voting systems and rewrote the state elections code. Because of concerns about Riverside and other emerging e-voting counties, Section 19234 (e) of the new Elections Code specifically called for a paper version of every ballot cast – something that Riverside has always been reluctant to provide. (Evidence from the original purchase orders suggests a large number of Riverside’s 4,250 Sequoia Edge machines do not have printing capabilities, although Mischelle Townsend denies this.) Riverside’s difficulties were swept away, however, thanks to then-Secretary of State Bill Jones, who in late 2001 declared that printers on touchscreen machines were now “an optional item” and opted for an extremely loose interpretation of Section 19234 (e). After he left office in 2002, Jones went on to become a paid consultant to Sequoia – following two former staff members who also hold senior positions in the company.
As the tide of public opinion turned against DRE machines, Townsend found herself increasingly in the spotlight because she, more than any other California county registrar, had grown almost messianic in her advocacy of touchscreen technology. In 2002, she and the county were taken to court by a Palm Desert resident, Susan Marie Weber, who had grown suspicious after a local ballot measure which had failed twice using the old voting technology passed the first time with Sequoia’s machines. Weber sued for the introduction of a voter-verified paper trail, arguing that it was the only way to guarantee the integrity of the system. Her suit was thrown out by the federal appeals court last year, largely on the grounds that Sequoia’s AVC Edge system contains adequate safeguards – the very same redundant data, multiple storage points and ballot images that the registrar’s office has now refused to show to Linda Soubirous and her lawyers.
That court victory was a fortuitous piece of timing for Townsend, because barely a month later the new Secretary of State, Kevin Shelley, ordered the introduction of the very voter-verified paper trail Weber had been after by January 2006. That, in turn, led to a virtual state of war between Townsend and her ostensible masters in Sacramento, culminating in a lawsuit in which she is seeking to have a number of Shelley’s rulings struck down. The fate of that lawsuit is far from clear in light of her resignation.
Her credibility was not exactly helped by the Soubirous controversy. And she was further rocked by a string of damaging revelations on conflict-of-interest issues, raising troubling questions about the good-old-boy nature of Riverside County politics and the way loose-knit political allies choose to interpret the rules of public office.
Revelation number one was her failure to file a statement of her personal economic interests, as required by state law, for four of the past six years. She hastily submitted the relevant forms to the county clerk’s office as soon as the news hit the papers at the end of March. Copies obtained by CityBeat (complete with stamped date of receipt) show that parts of the forms – particularly regarding her husband’s employment with a private government contractor called Maximus, Inc., which has done business in Riverside County – are left blank. Next to her signature she put the date the forms should have been filed, as opposed to dates corresponding to when they actually were filed.
Revelation number two came in her 2003 filing, which showed that she had accepted more than $1,000 worth of travel ‹ and hotel expenses from Sequoia to appear in a promotional video in Florida. Not only did the amount exceed Riverside’s $340 gift limit for public officials, it also triggered demands from a former Banning councilman, Joe Lucsko, for Townsend to be suspended from her job pending an investigation by the state Fair Political Practices Commission.
Revelation number three concerned the hiring of the Sacramento law firm Bell, McAndrews & Hiltachk, which is now representing her in the Soubirous recount controversy. County documents show that the request to retain outside counsel was submitted to the Board of Supervisors on April 8 and approved on April 13. However, the contract establishing the terms of the law firm’s activities on Townsend’s behalf – obtained by CityBeat – is dated April 7. In other words, the lawyers appear to have been hired first and approved only later (at a cost to the taxpayer of $2,000 a day for work in Riverside County, and at least $350 an hour for everything else).
Townsend has denounced much of the above as “groundless and politically motivated innuendo.” At one point in April, she went to the Riverside District Attorney, Grover Trask, and asked him to open an investigation into the allegations against her regarding the Soubirous-Buster election. But here, too, was a possible conflict of interest. Trask had openly endorsed Bob Buster in his election campaign. Both men had ties to the same political consulting group, O’Reilly Public Relations. One of O’Reilly’s other clients also happens to be Sequoia Voting Systems. To the surprise of nobody in the county, the district attorney came back after a few days and announced that the election had been in perfect accordance with state and federal law. Art Cassel and Brian Floyd said the district attorney’s office reached its conclusion without talking to either of them.
The Myth of Proprietary Software
Much of the opprobrium thrown at the makers of touchscreen voting machines has focussed on Sequoia’s rival, Diebold Election Systems. In fact, when Diebold’s source code was left lying around on the Internet and found sorely wanting by a team of computer scientists who analyzed it last year, Sequoia gloated that “while Diebold relies on a Microsoft operating system that is well known and understood by computer hackers, Sequoia’s AVC Edge runs on a proprietary operating system that is designed solely for the conduct of elections.” Mischelle Townsend offers her own testimonial in similar terms on the Sequoia company website. “Sequoia’s software is proprietary,” she writes, “not sold off-the-shelf and available to anyone, making it much more secure.”
However, these claims are at best misleading and, at worst, entirely bogus. Sequoia’s statement omits the fact that its WinEds vote-tallying software – as opposed to the vote-gathering part of the operation – runs on a Microsoft operating system and uses a Microsoft database. At least in the version in use until late last year, WinEds was written in a computer language called Visual Basic, which is notorious for its popularity with virus writers. VB is banned under the Federal Electoral Commission’s 2002 voting systems standards; WinEds, like much of the software in use in computer voting machines in this country, is certified under the pre-Internet age 1990 FEC standards.
It is not true, either, to say that the software used to run the touchscreen machines is “proprietary” and “not sold off-the-shelf.” According to a 2001 report by Wyle, an independent testing lab that analyzes voting software as part of the federal certification process, the AVC Edge machine has, “at its core,” a commercially available operating system called pSOS.
We are learning much more about the architecture of Sequoia’s computer codes because they, too, showed up on an unguarded File Transfer Protocol site on the Internet last year and are now being studied in earnest. Jeremiah Akin, a Riverside County computer scientist and anti-touchscreen campaigner, has discovered a way of writing modifications into the WinEds ballot management software in such a way that all trace of outside intervention vanishes automatically. (Sequoia did not respond to messages seeking comment.) “You can change the code, run it, save it and then, when you close down the system and you bring the system back up, all the modifications you made will be rewritten,” Akin said. “The system will set it back to the original code.”
Sounds like a handy way of rigging elections. A similar flaw was noticed in a Technical Security Assessment Report commissioned by the state of Ohio last year, which noted: “There is a risk that an unauthorized person with access to the administrator account … might use any Operating Database Connectivity compliant product to access the Sequoia server and access or modify the database.” The Ohio report didn’t consider this very likely because it assumed some basic security procedures would be in place at county registrars’ offices. Ask Linda Soubirous’s friends whether it could happen in Riverside County, though, and they might not be so skeptical.
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It's the Media, Stupid. And that truth cuts both ways.
Editors and Publishers: They like Mike. While the country as a whole appears split, along political lines, over the controversial Michael Moore documentary, "Fahrenheit 9/11," movie reviewers at U.S. daily newspapers are not.
An E & P survey of 63 daily papers that ran reviews, in "red" and "blue" states alike, finds that 56 gave the film a positive nod, with only 7 abstaining, an almost 90% favorable rating...
Among the few negatives, Phoebe Flowers in the South Florida Sun-Sentinel called the film "hyperbolic hysteria," and Lawrence Toppmann in the Charlotte Observer observed that Moore "rakes muck like nobody else, but almost as much of it sticks to him as to his subject."
But they were drowned out by praise, not only from some of the expected big city papers but from smaller towns. Boo Allen of the Denton Record Chronicle in Texas referred to "Maestro Moore." Philip Martin in the Arkansas Democrat-Gazette called the film "tough and true," while James Sanford in the Kalamazoo Gazette found it to be a "skillfully" directed "two-hour indictment."
Break the Bush Cabal Stranglehold on the "US Mainstream News Media," Show Up for Democracy in 2004: Defeat Bush (again!)
http://www.editorandpublisher.com/eandp/news/article_display.jsp?vnu_content_id=1000553027
One Group That's Not Polarized: 9 out of 10 Film Reviewers for Daily Papers Back 'Fahrenheit'
By E & P Staff
Published: June 27, 2004
NEW YORK They like Mike. While the country as a whole appears split, along political lines, over the controversial Michael Moore documentary, "Fahrenheit 9/11," movie reviewers at U.S. daily newspapers are not.
An E & P survey of 63 daily papers that ran reviews, in "red" and "blue" states alike, finds that 56 gave the film a positive nod, with only 7 abstaining, an almost 90% favorable rating.
The seven in the "anti" camp were: Detroit Free Press, Denver Rocky Mountain News, San Jose Mercury-News, New York Post, South Florida Sun-Sentinel, Philadelphia Daily News and the Charlotte Observer.
Among the "pro" crowd were reviewers from moderate to conservative papers such as the Boston Herald, Los Angeles Daily News, San Diego Union-Tribune and Las Vegas Review-Journal.
Many of the positive reviews expressed reservations but overall weighed in on the plus side.
Among the few negatives, Phoebe Flowers in the South Florida Sun-Sentinel called the film "hyperbolic hysteria," and Lawrence Toppmann in the Charlotte Observer observed that Moore "rakes muck like nobody else, but almost as much of it sticks to him as to his subject."
But they were drowned out by praise, not only from some of the expected big city papers but from smaller towns. Boo Allen of the Denton Record Chronicle in Texas referred to "Maestro Moore." Philip Martin in the Arkansas Democrat-Gazette called the film "tough and true," while James Sanford in the Kalamazoo Gazette found it to be a "skillfully" directed "two-hour indictment."
Mary Pols in the Contra Costa(Ca.) Times pretty much covered the waterfront in calling the film "passionate, clever, scathing, funny, snarky, brutal, sad, glib and at times superficial."
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
E & P Staff (letters@editorandpublisher.com)
The botched, bungled so-called "war on terrorism" is NOT the strength of the Bush abomination, it is the SHAME of the Bush abomination.
Los Angeles Times Editorial: The missteps have been many: listening to Iraqi exiles like Ahmad Chalabi who insisted that their countrymen would welcome invaders; using too few troops, which led to a continuing crime wave and later to kidnappings and full-blown terror attacks. Disbanding the Iraqi army worsened the nation's unemployment problem and left millions of former soldiers unhappy — men with weapons. Keeping the United Nations at arm's length made it harder to regain assistance when the need was dire.
It will take years for widely felt hostility to ebb, in Iraq and other countries. The consequences of arrogance, accompanied by certitude that the world's most powerful military can cure all ills, should be burned into Americans' memory banks.
Preemption is a failed doctrine. Forcibly changing the regime of an enemy that posed no imminent threat has led to disaster. The U.S. needs better intelligence before it acts in the future. It needs to listen to friendly nations. It needs humility.
Cleanse the White House of the Chicken Hawk Coup and Their War-Profiteering Cronies, Show Up for Democracy in 2004: Defeat Bush (again!)
June 27, 2004 E-mail story Print
EDITORIAL
The Disaster of Failed Policy
In its scale and intent, President Bush's war against Iraq was something new and radical: a premeditated decision to invade, occupy and topple the government of a country that was no imminent threat to the United States. This was not a handful of GIs sent to overthrow Panamanian thug Manuel Noriega or to oust a new Marxist government in tiny Grenada. It was the dispatch of more than 100,000 U.S. troops to implement Bush's post-Sept. 11 doctrine of preemption, one whose dangers President John Quincy Adams understood when he said the United States "goes not abroad, in search of monsters to destroy."
In the case of Vietnam, the U.S. began by assisting a friendly government resisting communist takeover in a civil war, though the conflict disintegrated into a failure that still haunts this country. The 1991 Persian Gulf War, under Bush's father, was a successful response to Iraq's invasion and occupation of Kuwait — and Bush's father deliberately stopped short of toppling Saddam Hussein and occupying Iraq.
The current president outlined a far more aggressive policy in a speech to the West Point graduating class in 2002, declaring that in the war on terror "we must take the battle to the enemy" and confront threats before they emerge. The Iraq war was intended as a monument to his new Bush Doctrine, which also posited that the U.S. would take what help was available from allies but would not be held back by them. It now stands as a monument to folly.
The planned transfer Wednesday of limited sovereignty from the U.S.-led Coalition Provisional Authority to an interim Iraqi government occurs with U.S. influence around the world at a low point and insurgent violence in Iraq reaching new heights of deadliness and coordination. Important Arab leaders this month rejected a U.S. invitation to attend a summit with leaders of industrialized nations. The enmity between Israelis and Palestinians is fiercer than ever, their hope for peace dimmer. Residents of the Middle East see the U.S. not as a friend but as an imperial power bent on securing a guaranteed oil supply and a base for U.S. forces. Much of the rest of the world sees a bully.
The War's False Premises
All the main justifications for the invasion offered beforehand by the Bush administration and its supporters — weapons of mass destruction, close ties between Al Qaeda and Iraq, a chance to make Baghdad a fountain of democracy that would spread through the region — turned out to be baseless.
Weeks of suicide car bombings, assassinations of political leaders and attacks on oil pipelines vital to the country's economy have preceded the handover.
On Thursday alone, car bombs and street fighting in five cities claimed more than 100 lives. Iraqis no longer fear torture or death at the hands of Hussein's brutal thugs, but many fear leaving their homes because of the violence.
The U.S. is also poorer after the war, in lives lost, billions spent and terrorists given new fuel for their rage. The initial fighting was easy; the occupation has been a disaster, with Pentagon civilians arrogantly ignoring expert advice on the difficulty of the task and necessary steps for success.
Two iconic pictures from Iraq balance the good and the dreadful — the toppling of Hussein's statue and a prisoner crawling on the floor at Abu Ghraib prison with a leash around his neck. Bush landed on the aircraft carrier Abraham Lincoln in May 2003 to a hero's welcome and a banner declaring "Mission Accomplished."
A year later, more than 90% of Iraqis want the U.S. to leave their country. The president boasted in July that if Iraqi resistance fighters thought they could attack U.S. forces, "bring them on." Since then, more than 400 personnel have been killed by hostile fire.
Iraqis hope, with little evidence, that the transfer of limited sovereignty to an interim government will slow attacks on police, soldiers and civilians. Another goal, democracy, is fading. The first concern remains what it should have been after the rout of Hussein's army: security. The new Iraqi leaders are considering martial law, an understandable response with suicide bombings recently averaging about one a day but a move they could hardly enforce with an army far from rebuilt.
The new government also faces the difficulty of keeping the country together. In the north, the Kurds, an ethnically separate minority community that had been persecuted by Hussein, want at least to maintain the autonomy they've had for a decade. The Sunnis and Shiites distrust each other. Within the Shiite community, to which the majority of Iraqis belong, Grand Ayatollah Ali Sistani and the violent Muqtada Sadr are opponents. Sadr was a relatively minor figure until occupation officials shut his party's newspaper in March and arrested one of his aides, setting off large protests and attacks on U.S. troops.
The U.S. carries its own unwelcome legacies from the occupation:
• Troops are spending more time in Iraq than planned because about one-quarter of the Army is there at any one time. National Guard and Army Reserve forces are being kept on active duty longer than expected, creating problems at home, where the soldiers' jobs go unfilled and families go without parents in the home.
• The Abu Ghraib prison scandal has raised questions about the administration's willingness to ignore Geneva Convention requirements on treatment of prisoners. Investigations of prisons in Iraq, Afghanistan and Guantanamo Bay must aim at finding out which high-ranking officers approved of the abuse or should have known of it. The U.S. also must decide what to do with prisoners of war. The Geneva Convention requires they be released when the occupation ends unless they have been formally charged with a crime. The International Committee of the Red Cross says fewer than 50 prisoners have been granted POW status. Thousands more detained as possible security threats also should be released or charged.
• The use of private contractors for military jobs once done by soldiers also demands closer examination. Civilians have long been employed to feed troops and wash uniforms, but the prevalence of ex-GIs interrogating prisoners at Abu Ghraib prison raises harsh new questions. For instance, what, if any, charges could be brought against them if they were found complicit in mistreatment?
Investigate the Contracts
The administration also put private U.S. contractors in charge of rebuilding Iraq. Congress needs to take a much closer look at what they do and how they bill the government.
Halliburton is the best-known case, having won secret no-bid contracts to rebuild the country. A Pentagon audit found "significant" overcharges by the company, formerly headed by Vice President Dick Cheney; Halliburton denies the allegations.
Iraqis say they want the Americans out, but most understand they will need the foreign forces for many more months. A U.S. troop presence in Iraq should not be indefinite, even if the Iraqis request it. By the end of 2005, Iraq should have enough trained police, soldiers, border guards and other forces to be able to defend the country and put down insurgencies but not threaten neighboring countries.
The Bush administration should push NATO nations to help with the training. Once the Iraqis have a new constitution, an elected government and sufficient security forces, the U.S. should withdraw its troops. That does not mean setting a definite date, because the U.S. cannot walk away from what it created. But it should set realistic goals for Iraq to reach on its own, at which time the U.S. Embassy in Baghdad becomes just another diplomatic outpost. It also means living up to promises to let Iraq choose its own government, even well short of democracy.
France, Germany and others that opposed the war seem to understand that letting Iraq become a failed state, an Afghanistan writ large, threatens them as well as the U.S. and the Middle East. But other nations will do little to help with reconstruction if Iraq remains a thinly disguised fiefdom where U.S. companies get billion-dollar contracts and other countries are shut out.
A Litany of Costly Errors
The missteps have been many: listening to Iraqi exiles like Ahmad Chalabi who insisted that their countrymen would welcome invaders; using too few troops, which led to a continuing crime wave and later to kidnappings and full-blown terror attacks. Disbanding the Iraqi army worsened the nation's unemployment problem and left millions of former soldiers unhappy — men with weapons. Keeping the United Nations at arm's length made it harder to regain assistance when the need was dire.
It will take years for widely felt hostility to ebb, in Iraq and other countries. The consequences of arrogance, accompanied by certitude that the world's most powerful military can cure all ills, should be burned into Americans' memory banks.
Preemption is a failed doctrine. Forcibly changing the regime of an enemy that posed no imminent threat has led to disaster. The U.S. needs better intelligence before it acts in the future. It needs to listen to friendly nations. It needs humility.
If you want other stories on this topic, search the Archives at latimes.com/archives.
Article licensing and reprint options
What the US electorate could not get from the "US mainstream news media," (i.e., the Truth about Fraudida, 9/11, Iraq, the Bush cabal itselt, etc.) has been delivered by the Internet-based Information Rebellion, which has now spread from cyber space into bookstores (and best-seller lists), movie theatres and DVD distribution...
Cameron McWhirter, Atlantic Journal-Constitution: "Fahrenheit 9/11," Michael Moore's polemical film blasting the Bush administration, is on course to be the top-grossing documentary film of all time. It also appears likely to be the top-grossing film of any genre for the weekend...
"This blows away any conceivable record for box office of a documentary," said Paul Dergarabedian, president of box office tracker Exhibitor Relations.
Break the Bush Cabal Stranglehold on the "US
Mainstream News Media," Show Up for Democracy in 2004:
Defeat Bush (again!)
http://www.ajc.com/news/content/news/0604/27fahrenheit.html
Moore's jab at Bush a success: 'Fahrenheit 9/11' a box office hit
By CAMERON McWHIRTER
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Published on: 06/26/04
"Fahrenheit 9/11," Michael Moore's polemical film
blasting the Bush administration, is on course to be
the top-grossing documentary film of all time. It also
appears likely to be the top-grossing film of any
genre for the weekend.
On Friday, its first day of national release, the film
earned about $8.2 million, already making it the
fourth-most profitable documentary in terms of
domestic gross receipts, according to the Web site Box
Office Mojo.
"This blows away any conceivable record for box office
of a documentary," said Paul Dergarabedian, president
of box office tracker Exhibitor Relations.
Movie theaters nationwide reported sold-out shows.
>From New York to Michigan to California, theater
owners said they added shows to accommodate crowds. In
metro Atlanta, 12 theaters showed the film this
weekend.
Shawn Young, 35, of Atlanta bought his tickets
Saturday at Landmark's Midtown Art theater in Atlanta,
a Democratic stronghold. Young said he wanted to see
the movie on its opening weekend because he admired
Moore's Oscar-winning documentary "Bowling for
Columbine."
Also, he said, "I'm not a big fan of Bush.
"It's definitely a political statement," he said about
attending the film.
Gideon Carson Kennedy, first assistant manager at
Midtown Art, said the theater sold out most showings
of the film. The theater is showing the movie in rooms
that seat 350 and 150. "Even the midnight show was
sold out," he said.
Sales were somewhat slower at AMC Theatres at Discover
Mills in Gwinnett County, a traditional Republican
stronghold. A manager said sales were good, but not
overwhelming.
"Fahrenheit 9/11" opened in 868 theaters nationwide,
far more than most previous documentaries. "Bowling
for Columbine" — which earned about $21.5 million to
become the largest grossing documentary in history —
was shown in only 248 theaters.
"Fahrenheit 9/11" presents Bush as a feckless leader
whose administration cynically used the Sept. 11,
2001, attacks to convince the public that the country
needed to attack Iraq. In May, the Cannes Film
Festival awarded the movie its top honor.
Just before Cannes, Disney, which funded production of
the film through its subsidiary Miramax, announced it
would not release the movie because of its overtly
political content. Miramax bosses Harvey and Bob
Weinstein bought back the film and hooked up with
Lions Gate Films and IFC to distribute it.
If the movie does become the top-grossing documentary,
it still would bring in only a fraction of what a
Hollywood blockbuster does. To date, Moore's gross for
all his films is $37.5 million, according to Box
Office Mojo. "Titanic," the top-grossing film of all
time, has earned $1.8 billion.
The Associated Press contributed to this article.
The DVD version of "Fahrenheit 911" will be available in...September 2004. Yes, there is an Electoral Uprising coming...
David Germain, Associated Press: "Fahrenheit 9/11," Michael Moore's assault on President Bush, took in $8.2 million to $8.4 million in its first day, positioning it as the weekend's No. 1 film, its distributors said Saturday.
Based on Friday's numbers, "Fahrenheit 9/11" was on
track for an opening weekend that would surpass the
$21.6 million total gross of Moore's "Bowling for
Columbine," his 2002 film that earned him an Academy
Award for best documentary.
Break the Bush Cabal Stranglehold on the "US
Mainstream News Media," Show Up for Democracy in 2004:
Defeat Bush (again!)
http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&cid=502&e=4&u=/ap/20040627/ap_on_en_mo/fahrenheit_911
Fahrenheit 9/11' Tops $8M in First Day
1 minute ago
By DAVID GERMAIN, AP Movie Writer
LOS ANGELES - "Fahrenheit 9/11," Michael Moore's
assault on President Bush (news - web sites), took in
$8.2 million to $8.4 million in its first day,
positioning it as the weekend's No. 1 film, its
distributors said Saturday.
Based on Friday's numbers, "Fahrenheit 9/11" was on
track for an opening weekend that would surpass the
$21.6 million total gross of Moore's "Bowling for
Columbine," his 2002 film that earned him an Academy
Award for best documentary.
"Bowling for Columbine" holds the record for highest
domestic gross among documentaries, excluding concert
films and movies made for huge-screen IMAX theaters.
Friday grosses for "Fahrenheit 9/11" ran about $1.5
million ahead of its closest competitor, the Wayans
brothers comedy "White Chicks." The performance of
"Fahrenheit 9/11" was even more remarkable considering
it played in just 868 theaters, fewer than a third the
number for "White Chicks."
"Fahrenheit 9/11" benefited from a flurry of praise
and condemnation. Supporters mobilized liberal-minded
audiences to see it over opening weekend to counter
efforts by some right-wing groups to discredit the
film.
"It always helps when there's a group out there that
says, 'Don't go see this movie. It's bad for you,'"
said Jonathan Sehring, president of IFC Films, one of
the film's distributors.
"Fahrenheit 9/11" paints Bush as a neglectful
president who ignored terrorism warnings before Sept.
11, then stirred up fear of more attacks to win public
support for the Iraq (news - web sites) war. The movie
won the top honor at the Cannes Film Festival (news -
web sites) in May.
The film has ridden a wave of publicity since just
before Cannes, when Moore began assailing Disney for
refusing to let subsidiary Miramax release "Fahrenheit
9/11" because of its political content.
Miramax bosses Harvey and Bob Weinstein bought back
the film and hooked up with Lions Gate (news - web
sites) Films and IFC to distribute it.
The fury over "Fahrenheit 9/11" resembled the
firestorm created by Mel Gibson (news)'s "The Passion
of the Christ," which rose to blockbuster status amid
debate over whether it was anti-Semitic.
"It's like how 'The Passion of the Christ' redefined
what a certain genre of movie could do at the box
office, 'Fahrenheit 9/11' is doing the same thing,"
said Paul Dergarabedian, president of box-office
tracker Exhibitor Relations. "This blows away any
conceivable record for box office of a documentary."
It's the Media, Stupid.
The name of RTE (Irish State Broadcasting) journalist Carole Coleman will be scrawled on the John O'Neill Wall of Heroes.
Miriam Lord, The Irish Independent: THE White House has lodged a complaint with the Irish Embassy in Washington over RTE journalist Carole Coleman's interview with US President George Bush...The Irish
Independent learned last night that the White House
told Ms Coleman that she interrupted the president
unnecessarily and was disrespectful.
She also received a call from the White House in which
she was admonished for her tone.
And it emerged last night that presidential staff
suggested to Ms Coleman as she went into the interview
that she ask him a question on the outfit that
Taoiseach Bertie Ahern wore to the G8 summit.
Break the Bush Cabal Stranglehold on the "US
mainstream news media," Show Up for Democracy in 2004:
Defeat Bush (again!)
http://www.unison.ie/irish_independent/stories.php3?ca=9&si=1205871&issue_id=11063
Angry White House pulls RTE interview
ADVERTISEMENT
THE White House has lodged a complaint with the Irish
Embassy in Washington over RTE journalist Carole
Coleman's interview with US President George Bush.
And it is believed the President's staff have now
withdrawn from an exclusive interview which was to
have been given to RTE this morning by First Lady
Laura Bush.
It is understood that both RTE and the Department of
Foreign Affairs were aware of the exclusive
arrangement, scheduled for 11am today. However, when
RTE put Ms Coleman's name forward as interviewer, they
were told Mrs Bush would no longer be available.
The Irish Independent learned last night that the
White House told Ms Coleman that she interrupted the
president unnecessarily and was disrespectful.
She also received a call from the White House in which
she was admonished for her tone.
And it emerged last night that presidential staff
suggested to Ms Coleman as she went into the interview
that she ask him a question on the outfit that
Taoiseach Bertie Ahern wore to the G8 summit.
Miriam Lord
Two more US marines died in Iraq over night. For what? Meanwhile, both Bill Clinton's book and Michael Moore's movie are breaking records and breaking chains all over America...There is an Electoral Uprising coming in November 2004...The poltical end is near for the Bush cabal, the "vast reich wing conspiracy" and the shell-of-a-man-formerly-known-as-Ralph-Nader...
Joe Conason interviews Bill Clinton: Have the fiscal
policies of the Bush administration destroyed your
legacy?
No, but they've destroyed the surplus! [Laughs]. I
think that he returned to trickle-down economics
because that's what they believe in. They don't
believe it's important to keep the deficit down, keep
debt down, keep interest rates down. They spend money
on what they want to spend money on and cut taxes,
especially for upper income people. Though he has
reversed our policy, he can't destroy our legacy. Our
legacy is how many people got jobs, how many people
got homes, how many people got college aid -- how many
people were helped.
Nothing is permanent in politics, but they can't
change whether people were better off when you left
than when you started. The country needs to return to
an economic policy that's an updated version of the
one I followed ... with even more emphasis on a new
energy policy to create jobs and free us from foreign
oil and do our part to deal with the environmental
challenges we face ... What they've done is
undisciplined and shortsighted and wrong on the
economic front.
Restore the Timeline, Show Up for Democracy in 2004:
Defeat Bush (again!)
http://www.salon.com/news/feature/2004/06/25/clinton/index.html
The Salon Interview: Bill Clinton
The former president blasts the Bush-Cheney rush to war, explains why Gore lost in 2000 and tells how Kerry can win in 2004.
- - - - - - - - - - - -
By Joe Conason
June 25, 2004 | At several points in "My Life," Bill
Clinton chastises himself appropriately for the
reckless selfishness and dishonesty of his affair with
Monica Lewinsky. He writes that he was disgusted by
his own misconduct and appalled by the consequences to
his family, friends, his country and his reputation.
None of this should come as news to the media, which
has devoted ample attention to that episode and its
aftermath for the past six years.
Yet publication of his exhaustive memoir has been
treated as the occasion to renew that same old
obsession while matters of substance are neglected or
ignored. "Everything has changed" since Sept. 11, or
so the portentous slogan goes, but some things haven't
changed at all.
As might be expected, Clinton is less preoccupied with
the subject of sex than Oprah, Larry King, and Michiko
Kakutani. He is perfectly willing to address other
questions, including those for which he has no glib
reply.
On Thursday afternoon, he spoke with Salon about his
administration's "inexcusable" failure to intervene
militarily against the 1994 genocide, which cost
hundreds of thousands of lives, and about his own
responsibility for the rise of a "dangerous"
Republican hegemony in Washington. But he also had
remarkably harsh words for the Bush administration's
dubious claims about Iraq, the "broken pottery" left
by its unilateral foreign policy and the president's
curious nonchalance about the exposure of CIA agent
Valerie Plame. He was frank about why he thinks Al
Gore won but lost the 2000 campaign ("The NRA ... hurt
us bad") and what John Kerry has to do to win in
November.
For a man often accused of worrying too much and too
publicly about his legacy, the former president sounds
relaxed and confident. While he confesses to lapses of
wisdom and courage, he cannot quite conceal the sense
that almost every day, the extremism and incompetence
of the Bush administration make his controversial
tenure look better by contrast. After years of mostly
refraining from overt criticism of his successor,
Clinton evidently feels free to be more candid from
now on. If his book tour offers his political
adversaries a fresh opportunity to attack him, it also
provides him a national platform to speak his mind
about them.
"We were in better shape when I left office than we
are now," he said. He was talking about the number of
Americans who lack health insurance -- but the
unavoidable inference went much further.
Al Gore gave a speech in Washington Thursday about the
Bush administration's attempts to link Iraq and
al-Qaida. Do you agree with him that the
administration misled the country about those alleged
links?
The whole time I was there [in the White House], I
knew of no links. Now, I don't think you can say for
sure that there was never an al-Qaida member that was
inside Iraq, but in terms of them being operational
partners, I didn't know anything about that. I also
never had any doubt that Iraq was not behind 9/11,
because they didn't have the terrorist capacity to do
it.
I supported -- as the whole world did -- resuming the
weapons inspections inside Iraq, for a simple reason.
When any kind of tyranny is running out of steam -- as
Iraq seemed to be -- I was afraid if they still did
have any of those chemical or biological agents,
somebody might sell them or give them away, or they
might be stolen. But in terms of [Iraq and al-Qaida]
working together, I never saw any evidence of it. And
I have not seen any evidence since -- from what's been
in the press -- that supports that contention. And
apparently the 9/11 commission doesn't agree [with the
allegation that Iraq worked with al-Qaida] either.
Now I hear Vice President Cheney continuing to assert
that there is a connection, but there's a difference
between assertion and evidence. If they have some kind
of evidence, they can come forward with it, but I
haven't seen any yet.
The administration and its supporters have often cited
statements from you and your administration about
Saddam Hussein's regime to justify the decision to go
to war in Iraq. I have heard you say recently that the
invasion was too precipitous -- and that the president
should have waited until the inspections were
completed, at least. Do you believe the war was
justified?
Well, I believed at the time that it was far more
important to win a complete victory in Afghanistan, do
everything we could to try to find Osama bin Laden and
al-Qaida's leadership, and help Hamid Karzai be the
president of the whole country and not just Kabul. Now
it seems to be moving in the right direction anyway
because Karzai has proved to be a very able man and
because we beefed up our support a little bit and the
rest of the world came in a little bit. I thought at
the time that we should take care of our Afghan
obligations first. I thought it was curious -- given
who did 9/11 and what the big terrorist threat was --
that we were sending 150,000 troops to Iraq and had
only between 12,000 and 15,000 in Afghanistan.
But Paul Wolfowitz always had a theory that if they
got rid of Saddam Hussein they could build a democracy
in the Middle East that would shake up the other
authoritarian Arab regimes, and that would give them
greater leverage in making peace between the
Palestinians and the Israelis. The only legal
justification they had for going to war was Saddam
Hussein's failure to comply with the U.N. resolutions
[requiring his regime to destroy its illicit arsenal].
And I didn't see how we had triggered that by
substituting our judgment for that of [chief U.N.
weapons inspector] Hans Blix. If Blix had said this
guy won't cooperate, he's bad, and we ought to take
him out, then I would have favored military action.
But had that happened, then whether the Security
Council voted for it or not, we would have had many
more allies and far fewer enemies, and no one would
have thought we had a different agenda.
You've said that Prime Minister Tony Blair was caught
in a dilemma between our government's position on Iraq
and the European viewpoint, and that he understandably
tried to maximize his leverage with his decision to go
forward with President Bush ...
Remember that Blair first tried to pass another
[Security Council] resolution that the Bush
administration didn't want. He tried to get a
resolution through that would have extended the
inspection time by another four to six weeks. The
Chileans and the Mexicans in the end decided not to
vote for it because they thought the Russians would
veto it anyway ...
But did Blair make the right decision in the end?
I think he made the decision he thought was right. You
know, I'm not the British prime minister. He believed,
as I did, that there was at least a strong chance that
there were some chemical and biological stocks still
there. We didn't know how much we had destroyed in the
1998 bombing. He believed that having gone as far as
he did, to turn around and go back to the continental
European position would have undermined his ability
over the long run to maintain the transatlantic
alliance. I think that's what he was thinking -- and I
think it was a defensible position given the fact that
the Bush administration played such a hard hand and he
couldn't get anybody to vote for his U.N. resolution.
He had two bad alternatives ...
What I thought the evidence showed was apparently
different from what they thought, too. To me, the
evidence was more limited than what Vice President
Cheney said. There were unaccounted-for stocks of
chemical and biological agents; a few unaccounted-for
missiles that could be loaded with chemical and
biological agents; and some quite limited laboratory
capacity to do very preliminary work toward nuclear
weapons. That's what we knew. I never knew of any
yellowcake from Niger or any of that stuff.
My view was that it would be good if we could account
for all that. And if we had a corollary benefit of
installing a more representative, less tyrannical
government in Iraq, that would be a good thing. But I
thought we didn't want to start the doctrine of
preventive war there, because we had a lot of fish to
fry with bin Laden and al-Qaida and Afghanistan.
My view was somewhere, I guess, between where Al
Gore's was and where Bush and Blair were. I never
liked Saddam Hussein and I wasn't sure he didn't have
some of that chemical and biological weaponry left. So
I was left without a home for my policy when Hans Blix
wasn't allowed to finish his job. Blix was plainly an
honest and competent man who wasn't rolling over for
Saddam Hussein. He was tough on the Iraqis when they
didn't help him. He tried to totally play it straight.
Speaking of yellowcake, how would you have handled the
"outing" of a CIA agent such as Valerie Plame Wilson
by officials in your administration? Do you think that
Bush's response was adequate?
Well, I'm not sure what he did. I would have done my
best to find out who did it, fire them, and make sure
they had to live with the consequences ... I know Joe
Wilson. He was a career diplomat, a straight-up
professional guy who did a lot of valuable work for me
and for America in Africa. What happened to his wife
was unforgivable as well as illegal -- and potentially
dangerous, and damaging to our intelligence networks.
And it plainly came from someone who didn't like the
fact that Joe didn't give the accepted line [on Iraq].
So it's hard for me to believe they can't find out who
outed her. And I would have gone to extraordinary
lengths to find that out, and then taken the
appropriate steps.
In your book, you describe the American and allied
failure to intervene in Rwanda in 1994 as one of your
worst errors. How did you reach that decision to do
nothing while the genocide was going on there?
That's one of the most regrettable things about it.
It's not like we had a decision. I don't know that we
ever had a high-level meeting on it. At that time I
think the whole foreign policy apparatus, including
me, was geared to getting into Bosnia as quickly as
possible. We knew we were going to have a problem in
Haiti. We were still reeling from what had happened in
Somalia. And I think even though there were a lot of
indications that Rwanda was going to be quite bad, I'm
not sure anybody focused on the fact that 10 percent
of a country, 700,000 or 800,000 people, could be
killed in 90 days with machetes ...
If we'd moved right away, we might have been able to
save a couple of hundred thousand people. They still
could have killed a lot of people before we could have
deployed in acceptable numbers there. [Later] we went
into the camps and we kept a lot of people alive, both
safe from violence and also rehydrating kids ... We
saved tens of thousands of lives, but we could have
saved a couple of hundred thousand more if we'd moved
more quickly. We hadn't really developed a clear
doctrine of when we would go in and when we wouldn't.
There was a lot of sentiment against such intervention
in the Congress. And the worst thing about it was that
we didn't have a meeting with an options paper where
we said yes, no, or maybe. We didn't even do that. And
before we knew it, they were lying dead.
It was inexcusable. We didn't even seriously consider
it, and I feel terrible about it. It's very
interesting though: the only people who have never
excoriated me for it are the Rwandans. When I went
there and apologized to them, their response was,
"You're the only person that ever even said you were
sorry. There were other people who could have helped
us, too."
The Bush administration has sharply criticized the
deal you made with North Korea as a failure, because
it was revealed that they have begun to clandestinely
reprocess uranium and built at least a couple of
nuclear weapons. What is your response to that
criticism? How should the United States deal with
North Korea?
I disagree with that, and if you look at the press
reports from the past few days it seems that the Bush
administration is coming back to our policy again.
Let's get the facts out first. When I became
president, it became obvious that North Korea was
moving toward the capacity to build several nuclear
weapons a year ... I was determined not to let that
happen. We had a very tense set of negotiations with
North Korea, which got quite tense when they kicked
the U.N. inspectors out ... Eventually, we made a deal
after we told them that under no circumstances would
we allow them the capacity to make several nuclear
weapons a year. So the deal we made was that we, along
with the Japanese, South Koreans, and other interested
parties, would provide them with food and [energy aid]
if they would put all the nuclear fuel rods in a place
where they could be inspected. That agreement worked
and on its own terms was not violated. In 1998 we
reached an agreement where they agreed to stop testing
their long-range missiles. In 2000, we nearly reached
an agreement where they nearly agreed to stop
producing and selling those missiles.
After I left office, the Bush administration
discovered, and briefed me about it, that in 1998 the
North Koreans had started a much smaller program in a
lab with highly enriched uranium -- enough to produce
perhaps a weapon or two. Does that mean my policy was
a failure? No, because if we hadn't stopped their
reactor program [in 1994], they could have been
producing not one or two nuclear weapons but maybe six
to 10 a year. Colin Powell said they would have had
dozens of weapons by this time, and the State
Department in the Bush administration has supported
our Korea policy.
What should be done now? North Korea wants three
things. They don't want to disappear. They want to eat
and stay warm, and they can't grow food or afford
power. And they want to be treated as an important
country that deals with the U.S. and other countries
in their region. They want some sort of official
recognition from us.
They're not going to bomb South Korea or Japan. The
danger is that a country that builds world-class bombs
but can't feed itself or stay warm will sell them ...
What we need to try to do is to get an agreement, with
the Chinese, the Russians, the Japanese and the South
Koreans, where they finally end all those nuclear and
missile programs, and we arrange for them to get food
and energy. And we continue to support the
rapprochement between North and South Korea. Now it
looks to me as if the Bush administration is in the
right place and moving in the right direction.
There could hardly be a greater contrast between your
view of how to deal with the world and our allies, and
the much more unilateral approach of this White House.
As you travel around the world, how do you assess the
reaction to this change? Do you feel the Bush
administration has undone the goodwill and prestige
that grew from a more open, multilateral policy?
There's no question that we have suffered some loss,
if not of prestige then at least of support in the
world by following a more unilateral course. But
that's not very important to [the Bush White House],
because they saw 9/11 as an opportunity to move the
country to the right and mold the world the way they
thought it ought to be molded.
That's why they morphed the attack by al-Qaida into
the war on Iraq, which is something they wanted to do
beforehand. Paul Wolfowitz tried to get me to depose
Saddam ... They see the world very differently. I
believe we ought to be trying to build more and more
institutional cooperation in the world, while
reserving the right to act alone when we have to. They
have believed, at least for the first three and a half
years, that they should act alone whenever they can,
using the springboard of what happened on 9/11 -- and
cooperate when they have to. In the end it may bring
us to the same place. In Iraq they've gone to the U.N.
to get a resolution. But in the meanwhile we're
leaving a lot of broken pottery along the way ...
That's one of the things that ought to be debated
thoroughly in this election.
Senator Kerry got in trouble earlier this year for
suggesting that leaders around the world are hoping he
will be elected in November. Have you picked up that
sense abroad?
I think that a lot of countries would like to see us
go back to a more cooperative, multilateral approach
like I followed, even though there were times when
they didn't agree with me. Now, I signed every
international agreement except the landmines treaty,
because I thought that had two parts that were
malicious and would put our soldiers at risk. And I
was doing more to destroy landmines than anybody who
signed the treaty.
There will always be times when we are at odds with
the rest of the world. But what they want to know is
that we basically favor cooperation and that we care
what happens to them. When they don't feel that way,
they hope for a change in policy. So I think that
[what Kerry said] is accurate. John got in trouble
partly because nobody can be "outed" admitting that.
He would have been better off not saying it, and
letting other people say it. None of these people
could afford to admit that and make their relations
with America even more tenuous.
Iraq was the last straw. They also didn't support the
International Criminal Court, although today I see
they've changed their policy on that ... They got out
of the climate-change agreement, which hurt America's
prestige enormously. They got out of the Comprehensive
Test Ban Treaty. They don't want to strengthen the
Biological Weapons Convention. So Iraq has to be seen
in the larger context.
Many critics, including some Democrats, believe that
your presidency damaged the Democratic Party by
bringing the party to its present diminished state,
where the Republicans control the White House, both
houses of Congress, many state houses and the Supreme
Court. How do you respond?
I talk about this a lot in my book. I did play a role
in losing the Congress in '94. Part of it was
inevitable. We had to clean up their fiscal mess and
we lost some votes because we did it. The Republicans
portrayed our budget as nothing but a tax increase and
we didn't effectively counter that ... We should never
have lost the White House and we didn't -- we just
didn't win by enough to stay out of the Supreme Court.
When I left office, about 65 percent of the American
people approved of what the administration had done,
and we should have won the White House on that.
I feel terrible about that, because I think it's very
dangerous for the country to have a party as far right
as the Washington Republican Party is, in control of
the White House and the Congress, packing the courts
with all of these ultraconservative people. It came
out today that one of the people who wrote these
questionable legal opinions about the treatment of
people in Iraq is now a Court of Appeals judge.
Whatever they find out about what he did, he's now got
a lifetime job.
Did Al Gore make an error in 2000 by seeking to put
some distance between himself and his campaign for the
presidency, and you and your administration?
In the beginning, I supported his going out on his own
with Joe Lieberman, because every vice president has
the same problem in running directly for the
presidency. People don't give the vice president
credit for the good things that happen in the
administration, as much as they should. I tried to
solve that by giving Al lots of credit all through the
eight years, but [voters] don't absorb that ... I
thought Gore ought to be independent ...
But I thought it was not a good idea to not embrace
the record more explicitly and say we ought to keep
the change going in the right direction. Remember in
Los Angeles, he said the issue was the people versus
the powerful, which it certainly was. Every powerful
right-wing interest group in the country was behind
Bush. But that didn't send a clear signal that it was
necessary to vote for Gore to keep the prosperity
going. At the end of the election, when Gore came back
to that theme, about eight days before Election Day,
he made up points in a hurry and actually won the
election by about 500,000 votes ... He probably would
have won by enough to stay out of the Supreme Court if
that had been the theme from August straight through
November ... I campaigned in California and Arkansas,
and those were the states where we beat the three
incumbent Republicans that lost in the House.
I believe Al lost Arkansas because of the National
Rifle Association ... and maybe Missouri, and maybe
Tennessee, and maybe New Hampshire (in addition to the
Nader vote) ... I don't think the NRA got near as much
credit as they deserve for Bush's election. They hurt
us bad.
If you were John Kerry, what would you do to close the
deal with voters this year? They seem to be wavering
in their support of President Bush, to say the least,
but not yet fully embracing Senator Kerry.
They don't know Kerry yet. That's why Bush is running
all these ads, trying to fill in the blanks in a
negative way, saying Kerry is not a positive figure,
he's focused on the past, and all that. What he needs
to do is keep doing what has been doing, saying what
he thinks and what he would do. To win he needs to
have a very good convention in Boston, and then acquit
himself well in the debates, and then maximize the
time he has following the convention.
Right now he's got a real problem because he got
nominated, in effect, so early that even the Democrats
in states that weren't involved in the nominating
process didn't know him all that well. The
independents and the Republicans who would like to
vote for somebody other than Bush didn't have much
information about him. It's just the downside of the
early nomination, although we got more out of that
than we lost because we're united and raising lots of
money for him on the Internet and doing a lot of good
things. He just has to keep doing what he believes is
right and keep carrying on. I think he's doing it very
well ... The chances are more than 50-50 that he's
going to win this election.
Have the fiscal policies of the Bush administration
destroyed your legacy?
No, but they've destroyed the surplus! [Laughs]. I
think that he returned to trickle-down economics
because that's what they believe in. They don't
believe it's important to keep the deficit down, keep
debt down, keep interest rates down. They spend money
on what they want to spend money on and cut taxes,
especially for upper income people. Though he has
reversed our policy, he can't destroy our legacy. Our
legacy is how many people got jobs, how many people
got homes, how many people got college aid -- how many
people were helped.
Nothing is permanent in politics, but they can't
change whether people were better off when you left
than when you started. The country needs to return to
an economic policy that's an updated version of the
one I followed ... with even more emphasis on a new
energy policy to create jobs and free us from foreign
oil and do our part to deal with the environmental
challenges we face ... What they've done is
undisciplined and shortsighted and wrong on the
economic front.
If you had another chance, how would you change your
approach to achieving universal healthcare? Although
some incremental changes were made, we're still a long
way from the goal you set in 1992.
Well, we were in better shape when I left office than
we are now. We had a decline in the number of people
without insurance. We passed the Children's Health
Insurance Program, which covered about 5 million kids
and was the biggest expansion in healthcare since
Medicare. We needed a simpler plan ... When Senator
Dole decided to filibuster any healthcare plan we
should have stopped and moved on to welfare reform,
and then come back after the [1994] election ... .If
you're not going to have an employer mandate, then
probably the only way to do it is some version of what
Rep. Rahm Emanuel [D-Ill.] is now suggesting -- which
is to allow all the uninsured people to buy into the
Federal Employee Health Benefit Program. That's a
private plan with a lot of different options and
costs. And then subsidize the purchases for small
businesses and those who can't afford it. That's the
simplest way to do it, with low administrative costs.
You promoted regional and global trade agreements --
some would say at the expense of labor and
environmental standards. Is there a way that
globalization can enhance rather than diminish those
standards in both the developing and the developed
world?
Sure. We don't have enough votes in Congress to do it
right now. When they had the World Trade Organization
meetings in Seattle, I went out there and said the
demonstrators in the street are wrong in saying that
trade is making the world poorer but they're right in
saying that you can't have a trade-only policy and
build the kind of world you want. I went to the World
Economic Forum in Davos and said the same thing to the
WTO and the International Labor Organization ...
They're going to have to open the process of the WTO
up, involve the nongovernmental organizations more,
and integrate the labor and environmental concerns
into their multilateral deliberations ...
We need to do more to make sure that the global
economy doesn't just make the rich richer and the poor
poorer. The problem is that without labor and
environmental agreements, and without significant new
investments in health, education and development, you
can lift a lot of people out of poverty with trade --
but all the population growth is occurring in the
poorest countries, so there will still be more poor
people every year. You cannot have a global economy
without some sort of global social compact.
People sometimes mention possible future jobs for you,
such as head of the World Bank or secretary-general of
the U.N. when Kofi Annan leaves. What do you plan to
do next?
I can't imagine that [those jobs] would ever be a
serious option. I haven't thought about it. What I
plan to do now is complete the book tour, do whatever
I can to help Senator Kerry, and then as quickly as
possible get back to work on my foundation.
- - - - - - - - - - - -
About the writer
Joe Conason writes a twice weekly column for Salon. He
also writes a weekly column for the New York Observer.
His new book, "Big Lies: The Right-Wing Propaganda
Machine and How It Distorts the Truth," is now
available. Join Joe Conason along with Ann Richards,
David Talbot and others on the Salon Cruise
Sound Off
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Here is one of the most compelling pieces of evidence you could offer against the shameful betrayal of everything good being perpetrated by the shell-of-a-man-formerly-known-as-Ralph-Nader...Appointments to the federal judiciary, especially likely Supreme Court appointments within the next few years, is, as it was in 2000, reason enough to reject the candidacy of the shell-of-a-man-formerly-known-as-Ralph-Nader and to call it what it is...yes...a shameful betrayal of all that is good...
John Nichols, The Nation: In one of the most
significant setbacks for the Bush Administration's
campaign to rewrite regulations to favor big business,
the US Court of Appeals for the Third Circuit in
Philadelphia rejected the rationale the FCC used to
ease media ownership limits and ordered the commission
to revisit the issue with an eye toward protecting,
rather than undermining, the public interest in
diverse ownership or local and national media.
Break the Bush Cabal Stranglehold on the "US
Mainstream News Media," Show Up for Democracy in 2004:
Defeat Bush (again!)
http://www.commondreams.org/views04/0625-05.htm
Published on Friday, June 25, 2004 by The Nation
Big Blow to Big Media
by John Nichols
More than a year after the Federal Communications
Commission narrowly endorsed a radical rewrite of
media ownership laws in a manner that would have
strengthened the hand of media conglomerates, a US
appeals court has determined that the FCC went too
far.
In one of the most significant setbacks for the Bush
Administration's campaign to rewrite regulations to
favor big business, the US Court of Appeals for the
Third Circuit in Philadelphia rejected the rationale
the FCC used to ease media ownership limits and
ordered the commission to revisit the issue with an
eye toward protecting, rather than undermining, the
public interest in diverse ownership or local and
national media.
The appeals court panel, which last year stayed
implementation of the rule changes, complained that
the FCC had relied on flawed reasoning and reached
contradictory conclusions to justify rule changes that
would have allowed the consolidation of media
ownership in local markets across the country. One of
the FCC approved rule changes would have allowed a
single corporation to own the daily newspaper, as many
as eight radio stations and as many as three
television stations in the same community.
"The court ruling affirmed what many of us have been
saying for a long time," explained US Representative
Maurice Hinchey, D-New York, one of the most ardent
Congressional critics of the rule changes. "Chairman
Powell's gift to media conglomerates was made without
basis in legitimate research. He cannot show that the
commission's decision was made in the public's best
interest. On the contrary, it threatens the ability of
the public to have its voice heard and to have access
to other diverse voices."
The court's 2-1 ruling requires the FCC to come up
with a research-based argument that some public good
will be served by allowing the development of a
one-size-fits-all media. That's going to be hard to
do, as the court rejected the industry-friendly
methodology the commission had used to justify the
rule changes. At the least, a new push to relax the
rules would take months, and perhaps years, to
complete.
And time may not be on the side of Powell or his
big-media allies.
With the presidential election approaching, the
appeals court decision would seem to assure that media
ownership regulations will not be loosened before this
fall's presidential vote. That raises the prospect
that big media's long campaign to relax the regulation
of ownership limits on the television, radio and
newspaper industries could be thwarted for years to
come. If President Bush, a prime proponent of the rule
changes, is defeated, Democrat John Kerry would be in
a position to create an FCC majority that supports
diversity in media ownership.
The commission is currently split 3-2, with three
Republicans supporting special-interest demands for
relaxation of ownership rules and two Democrats siding
with public-interest groups that oppose the lifting of
limits on media monopoly. If elected, Kerry could
select a Democrat to replace Powell as chairman and,
while past Democratic Presidents have often made bad
appointments to the FCC, unions that are close to
Kerry have been pressuring him to pick a new member
who would side with Democrats Michael Copps and
Jonathan Adelstein.
"This is a major victory in preventing a handful of
huge corporations from controlling what the American
people see, hear and read," declared US Representative
Bernie Sanders, I-Vermont, a leading Congressional
advocate for media reform. "It also vindicates the
millions of Americans from across the political
spectrum who spoke out and contacted the FCC on this
issue. The law unequivocally stands with the public
values of localism, diversity and competition in the
media, and that's what the court maintained."
Before the FCC voted by a 3-2 margin on June 2, 2003,
to endorse the rule changes, groups ranging from
Common Cause and MoveOn.org to the National Rifle
Association and the Traditional Values Coalition
raised concerns about the determination of FCC chair
Michael Powell and his two Republican allies on the
commission to implement rule changes that would make
it dramatically easier for a handful of large media
corporations to control the vast majority of print and
broadcast communications at the local and national
levels. Groups representing print and broadcast
journalists, including the Newspaper Guild, the
National Association of Black Journalists and the
National Association of Hispanic Journalists, were
also outspoken in their criticism of the proposed rule
changes.
After the commission voted for them, public outcry led
to votes in the US House and Senate for different
measures to override some or all of the FCC decisions
regarding the rules. But pressure from the Bush
Administration, and moves by House Majority Leader Tom
DeLay (R-Texas) to block necessary votes, have so far
prevented the reconciliation of the House and Senate
stances.
By blocking Congressional action that could resolve
the issue, Bush and DeLay have placed themselves in
direct opposition to clearly expressed public
sentiments.
More than two million Americans have contacted the FCC
and members of Congress demanding retention of limits
on media monopoly at the local level and controls on
consolidation of broadcast media ownership nationally.
And they now have the courts on their side.
The court challenge to the FCC ruling, which was
brought by the Prometheus Radio Project in
Philadelphia, was considered a long shot initially, as
the courts have historically been slow to intervene in
such matters. But with strong support from the Media
Access Project, lawyers for the Prometheus Radio
Project and allied media-reform groups were able to
convince the judges in Philadelphia that the FCC had
endorsed rule changes that posed a genuine threat to
localism, diversity and competition--which the FCC is
supposed to protect.
"This outstanding decision comes at a time when
unprecedented debate on the role of media outlets in
Americans' lives is taking place," said Prometheus
Program Director Hannah Sassaman. "Thousands of
Americans are telling the Commission and everyone who
will listen that consolidation is bad for their
communities and families. It is of paramount
importance that the FCC use that testimony to inform
new ownership rules that will preserve and protect
America's diverse, local voices."
Will that happen? Congressional critics of the FCC
aren't placing much faith in the commission--at least
as it is currently composed.
That's why Sanders, Hinchey, US Senator Byron Dorgan
(D-North Dakota) and a bipartisan coalition of
media-reformers in both houses of Congress continue to
promote legislation that would permanently prevent the
FCC from writing rules that favor big media. "The
court decision is step one," says Sanders. "The
American people, however, will not be satisfied until
Congress has totally ended the very dangerous idea of
allowing more media consolidation. Now, it is time to
become proactive and to fight for legislation which
will allow for more localism, more diversity of
opinion and more competition in the media."
John Nichols, The Nation's Washington correspondent,
has covered progressive politics and activism in the
United States and abroad for more than a decade. He is
currently the editor of the editorial page of Madison,
Wisconsin's Capital Times. Nichols is the author of
two books: It's the Media, Stupid and Jews for
Buchanan.
Copyright © 2004 The Nation
###
The Nazis burned books, the Bush Cabal burns treaties, perhaps most notably the Kyoto Accords and the ABM Treaty...The central issue of the national referendum on the increasingly unhinged and incredibly shrinking _resident is SECURITY: National Security, Economic Security *and* Environmental Security...Are you safer today than you were four years ago? Personally? Economically? Environmentally? NOTE to Sen. John F. Kerry (D-Mekong Delta): Run on Iraq AND 9/11, run on job loss, Medifraud AND the Deficit, and yes, run on the prostitution of the EPA AND global warming. Don't worry, John, just do it. The US Electorate is way out front on these issues.
U.S. Newswire: Eighty-one percent of Americans polled said that they support the targets of the legislation, commonly known as the McCain-Lieberman legislation or the Climate Stewardship Act, which calls for large companies to reduce their emissions to year 2000 levels by 2010 and to 1990 levels by 2020. When told it has been estimated that this would increase costs to the average American household by about $15 a month, 67 percent still said they would support it. If a candidate would support the legislation, 52 percent said this would increase their likelihood of voting for him or her, while just 14 percent said that it would decrease the likelihood (no effect: 32 percent)...
Eighty-two percent favored requiring car manufacturers to meet higher fuel efficiency standards. When asked next What if that meant it would cost more to own or lease a car? 63 percent still said they would favor higher fuel efficiency standards. Seventy-one percent favored that by 2010, half of all new cars produced are hybrid-electric or some other type that is very fuel-efficient.
Save the Environment, Show Up for Democracy in 2004: Defeat Bush (again!)
http://releases.usnewswire.com/GetRelease.asp?id=119-06252004
Eight in 10 Support McCain-Lieberman Climate Change Legislation; Majority Willing to Accept Increased Costs of $15 a month
6/25/2004 12:19:00 PM
To: National Desk
Contact: Steven Kull of the Program on International Policy Attitudes, 202-232-7500 WASHINGTON, June 25 /U.S. Newswire/ -- Eighty-one percent of Americans polled said that they support the targets of the legislation, commonly known as the McCain-Lieberman legislation or the Climate Stewardship Act, which calls for large companies to reduce their emissions to year 2000 levels by 2010 and to 1990 levels by 2020. When told it has been estimated that this would increase costs to the average American household by about $15 a month, 67 percent still said they would support it. If a candidate would support the legislation, 52 percent said this would increase their likelihood of voting for him or her, while just 14 percent said that it would decrease the likelihood (no effect: 32 percent). These are some of the findings of a new PIPA-Knowledge Networks poll of 753 Americans nationwide conducted June 8-14 (margin of error plus or minus 3.6 percent). Other highlights include:
A 62 percent majority opposes the idea, included in the McCain-Lieberman legislation, of permitting companies to trade greenhouse gas emission allowances (known as cap and trade). But a modest majority did find the arguments in support of the idea convincing, suggesting opposition is not deep-seated.
Seventy-five percent supported providing tax incentives to utility companies to encourage them to sell environmentally clean energy, and 80 percent favored giving cash incentives like tax credits and rebates to individual households that upgrade to more energy-efficient appliances.
Eighty-two percent favored requiring car manufacturers to meet higher fuel efficiency standards. When asked next What if that meant it would cost more to own or lease a car? 63 percent still said they would favor higher fuel efficiency standards. Seventy-one percent favored that by 2010, half of all new cars produced are hybrid-electric or some other type that is very fuel-efficient.
Americans overestimate how much their elected representatives support the Kyoto Treaty. Two-thirds (64 percent) said they would want their member of Congress to support the Kyoto Treaty. Fifty-eight percent assume that their member of Congress would vote for Kyoto, 46 percent assume that the majority of Congress would vote for it, and only 48 percent are aware President Bush does not favor it.
To view the full analysis/press release and questionnaire, see http://www.pipa.org
http://www.usnewswire.com/
-0-
/© 2004 U.S. Newswire 202-347-2770/
The logical conclusion of the complaint filed against Michael Moore's Fahrenheit 911, of course, is that Faux News should also be shut down after July 30th...Yes, it's the Media, Stupid...
Alexander Bolton, The Hill: Michael Moore may be prevented from advertising his controversial new movie, “Fahrenheit 9/11,” on television or radio after July 30 if the Federal Election Commission (FEC) today accepts the legal advice of its general counsel.
At the same time, a Republican-allied 527 soft-money group is preparing to file a complaint against Moore’s film with the FEC for violating campaign-finance law.
In a draft advisory opinion placed on the FEC’s agenda for today’s meeting, the agency’s general counsel states that political documentary filmmakers may not air television or radio ads referring to federal candidates within 30 days of a primary election or 60 days of a general election.
Break the Bush Cabal Stranglehold on the "US Mainstream News Media," Show Up for Democracy in 2004: Defeat Bush (again!)
http://www.thehill.com/news/062404/moore.aspx
Fahrenheit 9/11’ ban? Ads for Moore’s movie could be stopped on July 30
By Alexander Bolton
Michael Moore may be prevented from advertising his controversial new movie, “Fahrenheit 9/11,” on television or radio after July 30 if the Federal Election Commission (FEC) today accepts the legal advice of its general counsel.
At the same time, a Republican-allied 527 soft-money group is preparing to file a complaint against Moore’s film with the FEC for violating campaign-finance law.
In a draft advisory opinion placed on the FEC’s agenda for today’s meeting, the agency’s general counsel states that political documentary filmmakers may not air television or radio ads referring to federal candidates within 30 days of a primary election or 60 days of a general election.
steve finn/Getty images
Michael Moore
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The opinion is generated under the new McCain-Feingold campaign-finance law, which prohibits corporate-funded ads that identify a federal candidate before a primary or general election.
The proscription is broadly defined. Section 100.29 of the federal election regulations defines restricted corporate-funded ads as those that identify a candidate by his “name, nickname, photograph or drawing” or make it “otherwise apparent through an unambiguous reference.”
Should the six members of the FEC vote to approve the counsel’s opinion, it could put a serious crimp on Moore’s promotion efforts. The flavor of the movie was encapsulated by a recent review in The Boston Globe as “the case against George W. Bush, a fat compendium of previously reported crimes, errors, sins, and grievances delivered in the director’s patented tone of vaudevillian social outrage.”
The FEC ruling may also affect promotion of a slew of other upcoming political documentaries and films, such as “Uncovered: The Whole Truth About the Iraq War,” which opens in August, “The Corporation,” about democratic institutions being subsumed by the corporate agenda, or “Silver City,” a recently finished film by John Sayles that criticizes the Bush administration.
Another film, “The Hunting of the President,” which investigates whether Bill Clinton was the victim of a vast conspiracy, could be subject to regulations if it mentions Bush or members of Congress in its ads.
Since the FEC considers the Republican presidential convention scheduled to begin Aug. 30 a national political primary in which Bush is a candidate, Moore and other politically oriented filmmakers could not air any ad mentioning Bush after July 30.
That could make advertising for the film after July difficult since it is all about the Bush administration and what Moore regards as its mishandling of the war on terrorism and the decision to invade Iraq.
After the convention, ads for political films that mention Bush or any other federal candidate would be subject to the restrictions on all corporate communications within 60 days of the Nov. 2 general election.
“Fahrenheit 9/11” opens nationally tomorrow.
The film’s distributor, Lions Gate Films, an incorporated organization, would almost certainly pay for its broadcast promotions.
David Bossie, the president of Citizens United, plans to allege that “Fahrenheit 9/11” violates federal election law, arguing that “Moore has publicly indicated his goal is to impact this election season.”
Bossie had planned to file a complaint with the FEC yesterday but postponed action because his lawyers want to review it at the last minute, said Summer Stitz, a spokeswoman for Bossie’s group.
“I don’t think much of Michael Moore or his two-hour political advertisement — that’s all it is,” Bossie said. “He uses all of these words to make it look like he makes documentaries, but it’s the furthest thing from the truth. Documentaries tend to be fact-based.”
Sarah Greenberg, a spokeswoman for Lions Gate Films who is serving as Moore’s spokeswoman, did not return a call for comment.
The FEC counsel’s draft advisory opinion responded to a request for guidance from David Hardy, a documentary film producer with the Bill of Rights Educational Foundation. Hardy asked whether he could air broadcast ads that refer to congressional officeholders who appear in his documentary.
At issue in the FEC’s opinion is whether documentary films qualify for a “media exemption,” which allows members of the press to discuss political candidates freely in the days before an election.
In its opinion, the general counsel wrote, “In McConnell vs. FEC … (2003) the [Supreme] Court described the media exemption as ‘narrow’ and drew a distinction between ‘corporations that are part of the media industry’ as opposed to ‘other corporations that are not involved in the regular business of imparting news to the public.’”
“The radio and television commercials that you describe in your request would be electioneering communications,” the counsel concluded. “The proposed commercials would refer to at least one presidential candidate. … They would also be publicly distributed because you intend to pay a radio station and perhaps a television station to air or broadcast your commercials. … Finally, they would reach 50,000 people within 30 days of a national nominating convention and or the general election.”
However, one commissioner, Michael Toner, has a different view of what restrictions may be placed on political films.
“I think there’s evidence that when Congress created the press exemption they intended for it to cover media in all its forms,” said Toner. “If a documentary produced by an independent company would be subject to restriction or, equally important, if efforts to promote the documentary would be subject to restriction, I think that is very problematic.”
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There is an Electoral Uprising coming in November 2004.
William Rivers Pitt, www.truthout.org: The other dagger Moore put into me came during his montage of the media coverage of the war. Journalist after journalist is shown rhapsodizing Bush, his administration and the war. Each and every one of them carried forth that which we now know to be bald-faced lies: That Iraq had WMDs, that Iraq was a threat, that we had to go, and that everything is fine. It was a slideshow of the nonsense Americans have been spoon-fed for far too long.
If you doubt this, Sidney Blumenthal's aggressive and effective actual journalism, as found in his most recent report titled 'Reality is Unraveling for Bush,' should help you along. "Most of the media was on the bandwagon or intimidated," writes Blumenthal. "Cheney himself called the president of the corporation that owned one of the networks to complain about an errant commentator. Political aides directed by Karl Rove ceaselessly called editors and producers with veiled threats about access that was not granted in any case. The press would not bite the hand that would not feed it."
With a single stroke, Michael Moore has undone three years of poor, slanted, biased, factually bereft, compromised television journalism. This, in the end, is the final greatness of 'Fahrenheit 9/11.' Not only will Americans get a sense of the depth of the deception they have endured, but 'journalists' all across the country will be forced to endure the humiliation they so richly deserve.
I was privileged to see this film in the company of three groups - Military Families Speak Out, September 11 Families for Peaceful Tomorrows and Veterans for Peace - which have stood against this disastrous war from day one. Many in the theater had family in Iraq, or had lost family in Iraq, or had lost family on 9/11 and seen their beloved dead used as an excuse for unwarranted war, and there was not a dry eye in the house.
Break the Bush Cabal Stranglehold on the "US Mainstream News Media," Show Up for Democracy in 2004: Defeat Bush (again!)
http://www.truthout.org/docs_04/0625041.shtml
Thank You, Michael Moore
By William Rivers Pitt
t r u t h o u t | Perspective
Friday 25 June 2004
"The light at the end of the tunnel could be the bulb in a film projector."
- Jeanette Castillo
Screens in Bartlett, Chattanooga, Jackson, Knoxville and Memphis, Tennessee will be showing it. Screens in Layton and West Jordan, Utah will be showing it. If you find yourself in Leawood, Merriam, Shawnee or Wichita, Kansas, you can see it. The same goes for Centerville, Fairfax and Abington, Virginia. If you happen to be in Akron, Bexley, Dublin or Elyria, Ohio, you're all set. Hoover, Montgomery and Mobile, Alabama will not be left out.
Laramie, Wyoming? It's there. Bozeman, Montana? Indeed. Should you call home Grand Island, Lincoln or Omaha, Nebraska, you have not been forgotten. The largest mall in the country, the Mall of America in Bloomington, Minnesota, will have it in its theater. If you are a soldier at Camp Lejune or Fort Bragg, about to be shipped to Iraq, you can see it in nearby Fayetteville, North Carolina.
These towns, large and small, along with towns large and small from sea to shining sea and straight through the American heartland, will begin screening Michael Moore's documentary, 'Fahrenheit 9/11,' beginning at 12:01a.m. Friday morning, the 25th of June, 2004. For the majority of people who will see this movie, in those towns large and small, the experience will be nothing short of a mind-bomb.
The Who once sang about how the hypnotized never lie, but as we have seen, people hypnotized by television and deliberately enforced fear can certainly support a war, and a President, which are fundamentally at odds with basic American decency. In fact, people hypnotized by television and deliberately enforced fear will feed themselves into the meat grinder with "God Bless America" on their lips.
Michael Moore's film will snap that hypnosis, but good. Those Americans who believed what their President told them because they saw it on the TV will, after less than two hours in their local theater, look at both their television and their President with doubt and loathing when they walk from the darkness into the bright light of day. There are millions of Americans who believed what they were told - about 9/11, about Iraq, about George W. Bush himself - who will come into that bright light with the realization that they have been lied to.
Speaking personally, none of the data in this film surprised me. Having spent every day of the last three years working to expose as many Americans as possible to the truth of the man they call President, Mr. Moore was unlikely to explode any shells across my bow. The connections between Bush, the Saudis, the Carlyle Group and the 9/11 attacks were there. The connections between Cheney and Halliburton were there. The connections between Enron, Unocal, natural gas pipelines, the war in Afghanistan and a little-known country called Turkmenistan were there. I enjoyed the fact that Moore showed off unredacted copies of Bush's military service record, allowing us to see the parts of those documents which had been blacked out. I found no fact, no assertion in this film to question or doubt. I have done my homework, and as was made painfully clear, Michael Moore did his.
Most Americans don't know about this stuff, and seeing it fully documented and meticulously researched on the big screen will be, to say the least, revelatory. Yes, Virginia, there are billions of dollars to be made off this Iraq war for Bush's friends. The second door on the left is the recruiting office. Sign on the line that is dotted, and be the first kid on your block to die for the benefit of Carlyle's stock options. Be sure to save your pennies beforehand, however, because the Army will dock your pay for the days you are dead. It's policy, you see.
Mr. Moore put two daggers into me with this film, the first of which had to do with American soldiers. Trooper after trooper spoke frankly for Moore's camera, condemning both the war and the people who thrust them into it. Several scenes graphically explained what happens to a soldier's body when it is caught in an explosion. The result is ruinous, and the cries of the wounded and the dying will ring in my ears forever.
The most wrenching scenes in the film center around a woman named Lila, who loves her country, loves her flag, and above all loves her children whom she actively persuaded to join the armed services. We learn that Lila has a son in Iraq, and because of that, she despises those protesting the invasion. We find out later that her son was killed in Karbala on April 2nd, when his Blackhawk helicopter was shot down. We watch her read her son's last letter home, in which he rages against Bush and the war. We last see Lila standing at the gates of the White House, tears boiling from her eyes, as she discovers her true enemy, the one who took her baby from her.
The other dagger Moore put into me came during his montage of the media coverage of the war. Journalist after journalist is shown rhapsodizing Bush, his administration and the war. Each and every one of them carried forth that which we now know to be bald-faced lies: That Iraq had WMDs, that Iraq was a threat, that we had to go, and that everything is fine. It was a slideshow of the nonsense Americans have been spoon-fed for far too long.
If you doubt this, Sidney Blumenthal's aggressive and effective actual journalism, as found in his most recent report titled 'Reality is Unraveling for Bush,' should help you along. "Most of the media was on the bandwagon or intimidated," writes Blumenthal. "Cheney himself called the president of the corporation that owned one of the networks to complain about an errant commentator. Political aides directed by Karl Rove ceaselessly called editors and producers with veiled threats about access that was not granted in any case. The press would not bite the hand that would not feed it."
With a single stroke, Michael Moore has undone three years of poor, slanted, biased, factually bereft, compromised television journalism. This, in the end, is the final greatness of 'Fahrenheit 9/11.' Not only will Americans get a sense of the depth of the deception they have endured, but 'journalists' all across the country will be forced to endure the humiliation they so richly deserve.
I was privileged to see this film in the company of three groups - Military Families Speak Out, September 11 Families for Peaceful Tomorrows and Veterans for Peace - which have stood against this disastrous war from day one. Many in the theater had family in Iraq, or had lost family in Iraq, or had lost family on 9/11 and seen their beloved dead used as an excuse for unwarranted war, and there was not a dry eye in the house.
'Fahrenheit 9/11' is not a victory for anyone. We the People should have known better, We the People should have been given the facts before sending 851 of our children to die. We the People have been betrayed, by our leaders and by a media that profited, and profits still, from the daily sale of lies. This film drove that horrid fact home with a mallet, and it hurt.
I was reminded, as I filed out with this company of heroes, of a portion of Shakespeare's rendition of Henry's speech before Agincourt:
He that outlives this day and comes safe home,
Will stand a tip-toe when this day is named,
And rouse him at the name of Crispian.
He that shall live this day, and see old age,
Will yearly on the vigil feast his neighbours,
And say, 'To-morrow is Saint Crispian:'
Then will he strip his sleeve and show his scars,
And say, 'These wounds I had on Crispin's day.'
Many of us were not hypnotized. Millions of us took to the streets in this country and around the world, to try and stop this madness before it was unleashed. The people in that theater with me had done this, had never stopped doing this, though their President and their media named them traitor. They were right. They were right. They were right.
Michael Moore has unleashed a wolf within Mr. Bush's fences. There is no getting around it. Perhaps, now that it is far too late, we as a nation will wake up. On the day of that awakening, those of us who never stopped standing, never stopped marching, learned to live without sleep, learned to live in a nation that scorned truth for televised fantasy, those patriots I was with tonight in that theater can pause for breath. We can sit upon the grass on a bright day, strip our sleeves, and show our scars.
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William Rivers Pitt is a New York Times and international bestseller of two books - 'War on Iraq: What Team Bush Doesn't Want You To Know' and 'The Greatest Sedition is Silence.'
It's the Media, Stupid.
Michael Moore, Craig Unger, www.michealmoore.com: In the June 28, 2004 issue of Newsweek Magazine, Newsweek writer Michael Isikoff makes completely false and misleading statements about facts and issues contained in Fahrenheit 9/11. Isikoff has also gone on television shows repeating the charges...
It would be one thing if Isikoff had simply made an honest error; but that clearly is not the case. When he called me, I specifically told Isikoff that the evacuation process involved brief interviews of the bin Ladens which fell far short of the kind of intense criminal investigation that should have gotten underway after the murder of nearly 3,000 people. The worst crime in American history had just taken place two days earlier, and the FBI did not even bother to check the terror watch lists. Isikoff omitted all that. Instead, he put words in my mouth that are simply not in the movie. <
Break the Bush Cabal Stranglehold on the "US mainstream news media," Show Up for Democracy in 2004: Defeat Bush (again!)
http://www.michaelmoore.com/mustread/f911facts/isikoff.php
June 23rd, 2004
Michael Isikoff and Newsweek Magazine Deceive the Public About Fahrenheit 9/11
In the June 28, 2004 issue of Newsweek Magazine, Newsweek writer Michael Isikoff makes completely false and misleading statements about facts and issues contained in Fahrenheit 9/11. Isikoff has also gone on television shows repeating the charges.
Here are some of the falsehoods he is telling, and the truth:
Saudi Flights: Isikoff writes that "The movie claims that in the days after 9/11, when airspace was shut down, the White House approved special charter flights so that prominent Saudis - including members of the bin Laden family - could leave the country. Author Craig Unger appears, claiming that bin Laden family members were never interviewed by the FBI. Not true, according to a recent report from the 9/11 panel."
Isikoff's account of the movie is flatly untrue.
What the movie says is this: "It turns out that the White House approved planes to pick up the bin Ladens and numerous other Saudis. At least six private jets and nearly two dozen commercial planes carried the Saudis and the bin Ladens out of the U.S. after September 13th. In all, 142 Saudis, including 24 members of the bin Laden family, were allowed to leave the country."
These facts are based entirely on the findings contained in the 9/11 commission draft report, which states, "After the airspace reopened, six chartered flights with 142 people, mostly Saudi Arabian nationals, departed from the United States between September 14 and 24. One flight, the so-called Bin Ladin flight, departed the United States on September 20 with 26 passengers, most of them relatives of Usama Bin Ladin." National Commission on Terrorist Attacks Upon the United States, Threats and Responses in 2001, Staff Statement No. 10, The Saudi Flights, p. 12;
Isikoff claims that Fahrenheit 9/11 says that these flights out of the country took place when commercial airplanes were still grounded. The film does not say this anywhere. The film states clearly that these flights left after September 13 (the day the FAA began to slowly lift the ban on air traffic).
Moreover, in an interview with author Craig Unger, the film makes reference to the fact that these individuals were briefly interviewed before they were allowed to leave. Here is how Unger put it in a Letter to the Editor to Newsweek today (June 22, 2004):
To the Editors:
In "Under the Hot Lights," Michael Isikoff attacks Fahrenheit 9/11 by asserting that "Craig Unger appears, claiming that bin Laden family members were never interviewed by the FBI." The article then goes on to say that this assertion is false.
Unfortunately for Isikoff, I make no such statement in the movie. I do argue -- accurately -- that the bin Ladens and other Saudis were whisked out of the country without being subjected to a serious investigation. But the sequence to which Isikoff refers ends with director Michael Moore summing up my account of the bin Laden evacuation by saying, "So a little interview, check the passport, what else?" "Nothing," I respond.
It would be one thing if Isikoff had simply made an honest error; but that clearly is not the case. When he called me, I specifically told Isikoff that the evacuation process involved brief interviews of the bin Ladens which fell far short of the kind of intense criminal investigation that should have gotten underway after the murder of nearly 3,000 people. The worst crime in American history had just taken place two days earlier, and the FBI did not even bother to check the terror watch lists. Isikoff omitted all that. Instead, he put words in my mouth that are simply not in the movie.
Isikoff also wrongly asserts that the Saudi "flights didn't begin until September 14 -- after airspace reopened." In fact, as I reported in House of Bush, House of Saud, the first flight took place on September 13, when restrictions on private planes were still in place. According to the St. Petersburg Times, that flight has since been corroborated by authorities at Tampa International Airport. Isikoff knew all this. I told him. I even gave him the names of two men who were on that flight and told him how to get in touch with them. But Isikoff left all that out as well -- as he did other information that did not suit his agenda. In dismissing the Bush-Saudi ties, Isikoff even omits the fact that more than $1.4 billion in investments and contracts went from the House of Saud to companies in which the Bushes and Cheney have been key figures -- all of which is itemized in my book. Isikoff begins his article by asking, "Can Michael Moore be believed?" The real question should be whether Michael Isikoff can be believed. Clearly, the answer is no.
Craig Unger
New York City, NY
(Note: The St. Petersberg Times article to which Unger refers also states, "The 9/11 Commission, which has said the flights out of the United States were handled appropriately by the FBI, appears concerned with the handling of the Tampa flight... Most of the aircraft allowed to fly in U.S. airspace on Sept. 13 were empty airliners being ferried from the airports where they made quick landings on Sept. 11. The reopening of the airspace included paid charter flights, but not private, nonrevenue flights." Jean Heller, TIA now verifies flight of Saudis; The government has long denied that two days after the 9/11 attacks, the three were allowed to fly.
St. Petersburg Times, June 9, 2004.)
2. Carlyle and United Defense. Isikoff writes, "The movie quotes author Dan Briody claiming that the Carlyle Group 'gained' from September 11 because it owned United Defense, a military contractor. Carlyle Group spokesman Chris Ullman notes that United Defense holds a special distinction among U.S. defense contractors that is not mentioned in Moore's movie: the firm's $11 billion Crusader artillery rocket system developed for the U.S. Army is one of the only weapons systems canceled by the Bush administration."
This is completely misleading. The Crusader contract was canceled AFTER UNITED DEFENSE WENT PUBLIC, which is the entire point of the movie.
Here is what the film says: "September 11th guaranteed that United Defense was going to have a very good year. Just 6 weeks after 9-11 Carlyle filed to take United Defense public and in December made a one day profit of $237 million dollars."
This is exactly what happened, to wit:
"On a single day last month, Carlyle earned $237 million selling shares in United Defense Industries, the Army's fifth-largest contractor. The stock offering was well timed: Carlyle officials say they decided to take the company public only after the Sept. 11 attacks... On Sept. 26, [2001], the Army signed a $665-million modified contract with United Defense through April 2003 to complete the Crusader's development phase. In October, the company listed the Crusader, and the attacks themselves, as selling points for its stock offering. Mark Fineman, "Arms buildup is a boon to firm run by big guns," Los Angeles Times, January 10, 2002.
"Or its 1997 purchase of United Defense for $ 180 million. Four years later -- just before Rumsfeld canceled its Crusader howitzer program -- Carlyle took United Defense public and sold about half the stock for $ 588 million." Greg Schneider, "Connections and then some," The Washington Post, March 16, 2001
In "Crusader a Boon to Carlyle Group Even if Pentagon Scraps Project," Washington Post's Walter Pincus wrote (May 14, 2002):
Carlyle's financial success with United - and the success of others associated with the Crusader - shows how major Pentagon weapon systems can turn into cash cows. In turn, United's lobbying expenditures and campaign contributions show why they can be so difficult to kill, as Secretary of Defense Donald H. Rumsfeld announced he would try to do with the Crusader last week.
'Carlyle's aggressive approach ...is one reason why the Crusader lived this long,' said Lawrence J. Korb, an assistant secretary in the Reagan Pentagon and now director of studies at the Council on Foreign Relations. Even if Rumsfeld's decision stands, Korb said, United still will have received $ 2 billion from the Crusader program and will receive substantially more to close it down.
Still, in its annual report for 2001, United announced that it had been awarded a three-year, $ 697 million contract to complete full upgrading of 389 Bradley units and had added a $ 655 million contract modification to complete the Crusader's "definition and risk-reduction phase contract," which would be worth $ 1.7 billion through 2003. Together, the Crusader and Bradley programs contributed 41 percent of United sales in 2001, the report said.
With Crusader and the Bradley upgrade in hand, a decision was made to sell United stock to the public in late 2001. In preparation, United refinanced the roughly $ 180 million it owed on the original purchase loan, securing a new $ 600 million loan and $ 200 million in revolving credit.
...
After the debt restructuring came the stock offering. The United offering filed with the Securities and Exchange Commission included this boilerplate caveat to potential investors: 'The Carlyle group, our other stockholders and our executive officers will realize substantial benefits from the offering.'
When it took place, in December 2001, Carlyle sold 11 million shares of the 20 million offered at $ 19 a share, receiving a total of about $ 225 million. Even so, Carlyle still owns more than 47 percent of the outstanding United shares and controls United's board of directors.
Also in late 2001, according to SEC filings, Peay and Shalikashvili were paid 'performance' bonuses, though their separate employment contracts filed with the SEC state they only are to serve as directors and receive $ 25,000 annual retainers plus stock options and reimbursed expenses. Peay received $ 160,000, and Shalikashvili $ 102,586, according to a filing with the SEC.
A United spokesman said the generals did no lobbying and that their bonuses were similar to ones given company officers based on "the performance of the company." Neither retired general responded to requests for comment. Korb, who served as a vice president at Northrup, said he had never heard of company directors receiving bonuses based on the performance of the company.
The Emperor has no uniform...
Joe Strupp, Editors and Publishers: The Associated Press has sued the Pentagon and Air Force, seeking access to all records of President George W. Bush's military service, but the news agency wonders why it has come to this.
"It seems a little curious because the president made a pretty forceful presentation that he had nothing to hide," said AP General Counsel Dave Tomlin, when asked for his reaction to what the AP considers government stonewalling. "But we are not surprised."
Tomlin told E&P the lawsuit is needed to get access to a portion of Bush's record that may offer more information than the paper files previously released. "The paper file may not be everything," he said. "It has been there a long while, it could conceivably be tampered with."
Support Our Troops, Show Up for Democracy in 2004: Defeat Bush (again!)
http://www.editorandpublisher.com/eandp/news/article_display.jsp?vnu_content_id=1000550641
AP Lawyer: It's 'Curious' We've Had to Sue for Bush Records
By Joe Strupp
Published: June 24, 2004 12:01 AM EST
NEW YORK The Associated Press has sued the Pentagon and Air Force, seeking access to all records of President George W. Bush's military service, but the news agency wonders why it has come to this.
"It seems a little curious because the president made a pretty forceful presentation that he had nothing to hide," said AP General Counsel Dave Tomlin, when asked for his reaction to what the AP considers government stonewalling. "But we are not surprised."
Tomlin told E&P the lawsuit is needed to get access to a portion of Bush's record that may offer more information than the paper files previously released. "The paper file may not be everything," he said. "It has been there a long while, it could conceivably be tampered with."
Because the microfilm record has been in storage and "it can't be altered, that access to the microfilm would settle the matter," Tomlin added.
When asked why a lawsuit was needed, he said, "the administrative efforts we've made just aren't getting traction."
Tomlin said he did not expect White House officials to "rush right over with the information," after the lawsuit was filed, but expected a proper response. "It is important to get this; we'd like to see priority handling on it."
The suit, filed in federal court in New York on Tuesday, seeks access to a copy of Bush's microfilmed personnel file from the Texas State Library and Archives Commission in Austin. The White House has said it has already released all records of Bush's military service.
The Air National Guard has control of the microfilm, which should be disclosed under the Freedom of Information Act, the lawsuit claims. AP says the records "are being unlawfully withheld from the public." The lawsuit adds that no one has looked at any of the Bush military records at the state archives since 1996.
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Joe Strupp (jstrupp@editorandpublisher.com) is senior editor for E&P.
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Copyright 2004 Editor & Publisher
It's the Media, Stupid.
Reuters: Director Michael Moore's controversial documentary "Fahrenheit 9/11" turned on the box office heat in its first day in theaters breaking single-day records at the two New York City theaters where it played.
The movie, which aims a critical eye at President Bush and his prosecution of the war in Iraq, sold $49,000 worth of tickets at the Loew's Village 7 theater, beating the venue's single-day record of $43,435 held by 1997's "Men in Black," according to distributors Lions Gate Films and IFC Films.
At the Lincoln Plaza theater, "Fahrenheit 9/11" took in more than $30,000 to top the $24,013 set by "Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon" in 2000.
Break the Bush Stranglehold on the "US Mainstream News Media," Show Up for Democracy in 2004: Defeat Bush (again!)
http://money.cnn.com/2004/06/24/news/midcaps/fahrenheit.reut/
'Fahrenheit' turns on box office heat
Michael Moore's anti-Bush film breaks the single-day records at the two New York theaters.
June 24, 2004: 2:45 PM EDT
LOS ANGELES (Reuters) - Director Michael Moore's controversial documentary "Fahrenheit 9/11" turned on the box office heat in its first day in theaters breaking single-day records at the two New York City theaters where it played.
The controversial film opens nationwide on Friday, but as CNN's Jason Carroll reports, 'Fahrenheit 9/11' has already started people talking.
The movie, which aims a critical eye at President Bush and his prosecution of the war in Iraq, sold $49,000 worth of tickets at the Loew's Village 7 theater, beating the venue's single-day record of $43,435 held by 1997's "Men in Black," according to distributors Lions Gate Films and IFC Films.
At the Lincoln Plaza theater, "Fahrenheit 9/11" took in more than $30,000 to top the $24,013 set by "Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon" in 2000.
A spokesman for Lions Gate Films said the company debuted the movie in the two theaters to help build good word-of-mouth -- friend telling friend -- publicity ahead of the wide debut Friday when it plays in 868 theaters in all 50 states.
The film has caused a storm of controversy because director Moore, whose past work includes Oscar-winning documentary "Bowling for Columbine," makes a case that the Bush administration was determined to invade Iraq following the Sept. 11 attacks.
The movie links Bush family members and business associates with wealthy Saudi Arabian families, including that of Osama bin Laden, and Moore clearly wants to see the president fail to win re-election in this fall's presidential campaign.
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Groups have organized support for and against the movie, and audiences appear to be keen to see it.
Online ticket service Fandango.com reported Wednesday that "Fahrenheit 9/11" was making up 48 percent of advance ticket sales for the weekend ahead, compared to 11 percent for "Dodgeball" and 9 percent for next week's "Spider-Man 2."
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It's the Media, Stupid.
Rex Reed, New York Observer: Michael Moore leaves no turn unstoned. There are multitudes of shattering, seminal moments in his brilliant Bush-whacking documentary, Fahrenheit 9/11, that reveal more about the cynicism, greed and ineptitude in the U.S. government than you will ever learn from any sound bite on the right-wing late-night cable-channel blabfests, but one will stay with me forever. Forget about the "official" reports from the White House about the activities of George W. Bush on the fateful morning of Sept. 11, insisting he learned about the Al Qaeda attacks while meeting with Florida pre-schoolers and quickly dashed from the room to save the country. The truth, it is now revealed, is that he was informed of the first attack on the World Trade Center before he even entered the schoolroom, and he decided to continue with his photo-op anyway. There he is on camera when Andrew Card informs him of the second plane and utters the fatal words, "We’re under attack!"—but he continues to read My Pet Goat for another seven minutes, his eyes sliding sideways in his puzzled face, like a moron looking for a bathroom, until his staff insists that he leave. (He stayed for another half hour.) If nothing else, that defining moment says volumes about what we can expect from the President of the U.S. in the center of a supreme, history-altering crisis: He’s just clueless.
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http://www.observer.com/pages/onthetown.asp
Moore’s Magic: 9/11 Electrifies
by Rex Reed
Michael Moore leaves no turn unstoned. There are multitudes of shattering, seminal moments in his brilliant Bush-whacking documentary, Fahrenheit 9/11, that reveal more about the cynicism, greed and ineptitude in the U.S. government than you will ever learn from any sound bite on the right-wing late-night cable-channel blabfests, but one will stay with me forever. Forget about the "official" reports from the White House about the activities of George W. Bush on the fateful morning of Sept. 11, insisting he learned about the Al Qaeda attacks while meeting with Florida pre-schoolers and quickly dashed from the room to save the country. The truth, it is now revealed, is that he was informed of the first attack on the World Trade Center before he even entered the schoolroom, and he decided to continue with his photo-op anyway. There he is on camera when Andrew Card informs him of the second plane and utters the fatal words, "We’re under attack!"—but he continues to read My Pet Goat for another seven minutes, his eyes sliding sideways in his puzzled face, like a moron looking for a bathroom, until his staff insists that he leave. (He stayed for another half hour.) If nothing else, that defining moment says volumes about what we can expect from the President of the U.S. in the center of a supreme, history-altering crisis: He’s just clueless.
There are other moments that will impact some viewers and polarize others. So many, in fact, that you watch Fahrenheit 9/11 with disbelief, and leave shaking with rage. Sometimes sarcastic, always funny, Mr. Moore is armed with facts, and he presents them accurately and succinctly. The controversial filmmaker stated on the Today show that White House mouthpieces have denounced the film as "outrageously false" without seeing it, and right-wing Republicans have charged Mr. Moore with staging a "left-wing conspiracy" to influence the forthcoming election. Well, duh. For years, reactionary conservatives have been famous for staging right-wing conspiracies of their own to disgrace and discredit elected Democratic public officials. Maybe this is payback time. Whatever it is, everyone should see Fahrenheit 9/11 first—before debating the issues. The purpose of any documentary is to influence opinion. But instead of the customarily droning voice that comments on the action and tells you what to think, this one asks tough, logical questions, gets rational answers, and never loses its entertainment value.
Mr. Moore, who has tackled corporate greed (Roger & Me) and gun control (Bowling for Columbine), now feels driven and obligated to strip the façade from a swaggering, bow-legged, grammatically challenged bully and a cabinet that is beginning to look more like the Third Reich every day. He accuses them of lying about their motivations for declaring war against Iraq, a country that never threatened America in the first place, killing thousands of innocent civilians in retaliation for the acts of 9/11 aggression, although not one of the terrorists was from Iraq, and killing more than 800 of our own American kids (all from ethnic or working-class families). Nobody denies that Saddam Hussein was a monster, but not the Iraqi women and children who have been "saved" from one villain only to be burned and shot and maimed for life without arms and legs by villains in a different uniform. At the same time, Mr. Moore shows Mr. Bush justifying American atrocities against Saddam Hussein by actually saying to the camera, "He tried to kill my daddy." Like his daddy, he knows he might also get kicked out of the White House after serving only one term. Still, he pursues a war that is losing the "hearts and minds" of even the boys who fight it (the interviews with our soldiers on the front lines will make you weep) while earning the U.S. unprecedented heights of global hatred and distrust, even from long-standing allies. And he does it on the golf course, ignoring the pressing domestic issues of health care, education, Social Security, unemployment and the economy while instructing frustrated reporters to watch his next drive. (In his first eight months in office, he was on vacation 42 percent of the time.) Meanwhile the current occupants of the White House, bolstered by an irresponsible press that has never bothered to ask the right questions, have courted public support by hammering home the kind of fear and born-again religious ideology that keep people subservient and paralyzed. Mr. Moore is saying that in the lineup of fear factors, terrorists and sinners may have replaced Communists and beatniks, but if you keep the people frightened enough, the bully always wins.
The movie begins with the awesome night in 2000 when the U. S. Supreme Court decided the election, not the American voters, then unveils footage that was never reported on TV of the Bush inauguration limousine being pelted with raw eggs. Instead of the traditional walk to 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue, he was so afraid to leave the car that he became the first President in history who was forced to sneak into the White House through a back door.
It was downhill from there, and Mr. Moore has obtained amazing film to illustrate the graphic two-hour slam-dunk that follows. In the wimpy reportage that has dominated the media for four years, very few journalists have bothered to investigate the shroud of secrecy surrounding the Bush Presidency that keeps the people ignorant, to write about it, to explain it. Mr. Moore does it with wit and cleverness. There’s no doubt that he would do anything to prevent a Bush re-election, but there is no conjecture here. No embellishment. He doesn’t need any. Dubya & Co. are easy targets: Mr. Moore simply turns on his cameras and lets them hang themselves. He proves the $1.5 billion in profits the Bush clan has made from oil interests of the family of Osama bin Laden, the real perpetrator of the 9/11 disaster, then asks why, when all aircraft were grounded after 9/11, the White House allowed several planes to fly around the country picking up the bin Laden family and protectively escorting 142 Saudis out of the country without interrogation, overruling the protests of the F.B.I. You can say, "Yes, but his family has denounced Osama, so what’s the problem?" The problem is that the Bushes, père et fils, were in business with his family at the same time that Osama was under surveillance as a suspected Al Qaeda terrorist and neglected to make a full disclosure.
Mr. Moore also reveals Dubya’s military records, blotting out the name of a fellow pilot whose flight status was suspended for refusing to take a physical exam. The friend Bush was trying to protect turns out to be James R. Bath, who both managed the U.S. financial investments of the bin Laden regime and bankrolled the various oil interests of the Bush brigade. Cut to Dubya, arrogantly stating: "Access is power." Then, when he was investigated by the S.E.C., the man who got Bush out of hot water, Robert W. Jordan, was later appointed ambassador to—you guessed it—Saudi Arabia. The ironies pile up like body bags.
Now that the merde has hit the oscillator, so to speak, Mr. Moore charges that the Bush administration is still trying to hide evidence of its own stupidity by censoring 28 pages of the independent report by the 9/11 commission. If you don’t gasp at the sight of Mr. Bush dining with the Saudi ambassador with part of the Pentagon in flames in the background, this movie is not for you. No need to talk about the President welcoming the Taliban to the State Department, knowing they were harboring the man who bombed the U.S.S. Cole. No need to go into the plans to build an underground pipeline through Afghanistan pumping money into a company owned by Vice President Dick Cheney. Alarmingly, it’s all gone unreported by an irresponsible press corps. With $860 billion currently invested by the Saudis in American business, no wonder our tax money pays for a six-man detail to protect the Saudi ambassador in Washington. But why does it take Michael Moore to tell us? This is all very dispiriting. But unless you’ve lost your sense of humor completely, you’ve just gotta laugh when Mr. Moore intercuts Mr. Bush’s tough talk from cowboy movies with actual footage of the corny cowboys in those movies saying exactly the same things.
I’ve hardly scratched the surface of this electrifying documentary. Mr. Moore even cruises through Washington reading from a loudspeaker the idiotic USA PATRIOT Act—hastily passed by Congress without ever reading it—and chronicling the lunacy it has inspired: groups and individuals harassed by cops for holding private club meetings, a woman who was refused admittance to an airplane because she was carrying breast milk. All diversionary tactics, says Mr. Moore, to distract the American people from viewing the corpses sent home from Iraq for funerals that have never once been attended by President George W. Bush, or debunking the myth of "weapons of mass destruction." People of all ages are shown voicing doubts about the kids who have died in a questionable war with no end in sight, and for what? Bush says, "Defending freedom." This movie says, "Making money." And talk about imbalance. Fact: Out of 535 members of Congress, only one has a child serving in Iraq. One of the most telling scenes in Fahrenheit 9/11 is Michael Moore, standing outside the U.S. Senate with a microphone, trying to convince members of Congress to enlist their own children for the war. Not a single Senator or Representative is willing to send his own children into harm’s way. This is one of the few scenes in which the director appears at length. One of the things that makes this movie better and more convincing than his previous films is the way Mr. Moore stays mostly in the background, compiling facts and letting the evidence speak for itself.
The Cannes cognoscenti and the limousine liberals have already declared Fahrenheit 9/11 the blockbuster documentary of the year. Who knows how it will play in Punkin Crick? I think it should be required viewing for every American, but as usual, I fear the people who could learn the most from the issues it raises will avoid it like a fund-raiser for free abortions. Mr. Moore’s opponents will label it ideologically fueled partisan agitprop, which it is, but any visionary who tries to cultivate change is destined to harvest adversaries. With his usual fury channeled and under control, Mr. Moore sets out to prick, probe and sound a wake-up call in an emotionally charged election year where the truth has been buried six feet under, and succeeds with humor and bite. The result is undeniably galvanizing, immensely watchable and damned good filmmaking. If it convinces one nonvoter to think, it will serve a purpose. The saddest and most infuriating thing I learned from Fahrenheit 9/11 is not the political hackwork, but the reality of what a lightweight the President is in the context of American history. George W. Bush may be the first President of the U.S. who has brainwashed himself.
You may reach Rex Reed via email at: rreed@observer.com.
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This column ran on page 22 in the 6/28/2004 edition of The New York Observer.
Another prominent Republican and business leader deserts the increasingly unhinged and incredibly shrinking _resident and joins the ranks of the UNPRECEDENTED, broad-based and truly bi-partisan resistance to the Bush abomination. His name will be scrawled on the John O'Neill Wall of Heroes...There is an Electoral Uprising coming in November 2004...
US Newswire: Chairman of the Chrysler Corporation Lee Iacocca today endorsed Democratic Presidential candidate John Kerry for President. Having backed George W. Bush in 2000, Iacocca is switching his support in 2004 after over three years of jobs failure by the Bush administration...
In 2000, Iacocca backed Bush, citing jobs, particularly in the Michigan automobile industry, as one of his chief concerns. Iacocca was an active campaigner who appeared in television ads and GOTV calls focused on the need to protect jobs in Michigan.
However after three and a half years, the Bush administration's jobs record has been characterized by failure -- losing 134,900 manufacturing jobs in Michigan alone.
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Lee Iacocca Endorses Kerry for President; 2000 Bush Backer Swings Support to Kerry in 2004
Thu Jun 24, 1:17 PM ET
To: National Desk and Political Reporter
Contact: Allison Dobson of John Kerry (news - web sites) for President, 202-464-2800, Web: http://www.johnkerry.com
SAN JOSE, Calif., June 24 /U.S. Newswire/ -- Former Chairman of the Chrysler Corporation Lee Iacocca today endorsed Democratic Presidential candidate John Kerry for President. Having backed George W. Bush in 2000, Iacocca is switching his support in 2004 after over three years of jobs failure by the Bush administration
Iacocca announced his support for Kerry in San Jose Calif., at an event focused on Kerry's plan to create high-tech, high-paying jobs and strengthen America through a greater commitment to technology and innovation.
"I want to thank Lee Iacocca for his powerful endorsement of our plans to build a stronger America," Kerry said. "He knows the test of leadership is not whether it's Republican or Democratic, but whether it will move this country forward. I'm proud to have his counsel and his support. There are few men more respected not just in corporate America, but in all of America, than Lee Iacocca."
In 2000, Iacocca backed Bush, citing jobs, particularly in the Michigan automobile industry, as one of his chief concerns. Iacocca was an active campaigner who appeared in television ads and GOTV calls focused on the need to protect jobs in Michigan.
However after three and a half years, the Bush administration's jobs record has been characterized by failure -- losing 134,900 manufacturing jobs in Michigan alone.
George Bush faces the worst jobs record of any President who has run for reelection in nearly sixty years. From January 2001 when Bush first took office until May 2004, the economy has lost 1.9 million private sector jobs. While American jobs have been shipped to countries overseas, the Bush administration has stood by, even praising the benefits of outsourcing. Jobs that are being created pay significantly less than the jobs we have lost.
John Kerry knows America can do better and that we can have an economy that lifts families up with new, high-paying jobs. As President, Kerry will end tax breaks that encourage companies to ship jobs overseas and create 10 million new and better jobs in America, including 342,000 in Michigan. He will cut taxes for 99 percent of businesses and invest in technology and worker training, so that American workers are prepared for the jobs of the future.
http://www.usnewswire.com/
"He BETRAYED this country...Truth shall rise again!"
Al Gore: I am convinced that our founders would counsel us today that the greatest challenge facing our republic is not terrorism but how we react to terrorism, and not war, but how we manage our fears and achieve security without losing our freedom. I am also convinced that they would warn us that democracy itself is in grave danger if we allow any president to use his role as commander in chief to rupture the careful balance between the executive, the legislative and the judicial branches of government. Our current president has gone to war and has come back into "the city" and declared that our nation is now in a permanent state of war, which he says justifies his reinterpretation of the Constitution in ways that increase his personal power at the expense of Congress, the courts, and every individual citizen.
Save the US Constitution, Show Up for Democracy in 2004: Defeat Bush (again!)
http://www.algoredemocrats.com/news/gnn/EpllEpAluZQjrdFGci.shtml
Democracy Itself is in Grave Danger
1:44 PM PST
by Al Gore
American Constitution Society
Georgetown University Law Center
Remarks as prepared
When we Americans first began, our biggest danger was clearly in view: we knew from the bitter experience with King George III that the most serious threat to democracy is usually the accumulation of too much power in the hands of an executive, whether he be a king or a president. Our ingrained American distrust of concentrated power has very little to do with the character or persona of the individual who wields that power. It is the power itself that must be constrained, checked, dispersed and carefully balanced, in order to ensure the survival of freedom. In addition, our founders taught us that public fear is the most dangerous enemy of democracy because under the right circumstances it can trigger the temptation of those who govern themselves to surrender that power to someone who promises strength and offers safety, security and freedom from fear.
It is an extraordinary blessing to live in a nation so carefully designed to protect individual liberty and safeguard self-governance and free communication. But if George Washington could see the current state of his generation's handiwork and assess the quality of our generation's stewardship at the beginning of this 21st century, what do you suppose he would think about the proposition that our current president claims the unilateral right to arrest and imprison American citizens indefinitely without giving them the right to see a lawyer or inform their families of their whereabouts, and without the necessity of even charging them with any crime. All that is necessary, according to our new president is that he -- the president -- label any citizen an "unlawful enemy combatant," and that will be sufficient to justify taking away that citizen's liberty -- even for the rest of his life, if the president so chooses. And there is no appeal.
What would Thomas Jefferson think of the curious and discredited argument from our Justice Department that the president may authorize what plainly amounts to the torture of prisoners -- and that any law or treaty which attempts to constrain his treatment of prisoners in time of war is itself a violation of the constitution our founders put together.
What would Benjamin Franklin think of President Bush's assertion that he has the inherent power -- even without a declaration of war by the Congress -- to launch an invasion of any nation on Earth, at any time he chooses, for any reason he wishes, even if that nation poses no imminent threat to the United States.
How long would it take James Madison to dispose of our current president's recent claim, in Department of Justice legal opinions, that he is no longer subject to the rule of law so long as he is acting in his role as commander in chief.
I think it is safe to say that our founders would be genuinely concerned about these recent developments in American democracy and that they would feel that we are now facing a clear and present danger that has the potential to threaten the future of the American experiment.
Shouldn't we be equally concerned? And shouldn't we ask ourselves how we have come to this point?
Even though we are now attuned to orange alerts and the potential for terrorist attacks, our founders would almost certainly caution us that the biggest threat to the future of the America we love is still the endemic challenge that democracies have always faced whenever they have appeared in history -- a challenge rooted in the inherent difficulty of self-governance and the vulnerability to fear that is part of human nature. Again, specifically, the biggest threat to America is that we Americans will acquiesce in the slow and steady accumulation of too much power in the hands of one person.
Having painstakingly created the intricate design of America, our founders knew intimately both its strengths and weaknesses, and during their debates they not only identified the accumulation of power in the hands of the executive as the long-term threat which they considered to be the most serious, but they also worried aloud about one specific scenario in which this threat might become particularly potent -- that is, when war transformed America's president into our commander in chief, they worried that his suddenly increased power might somehow spill over its normal constitutional boundaries and upset the delicate checks and balances they deemed so crucial to the maintenance of liberty.
That is precisely why they took extra care to parse the war powers in the Constitution, assigning the conduct of war and command of the troops to the president, but retaining for the Congress the crucial power of deciding whether or not, and when, our nation might decide to go war.
Indeed, this limitation on the power of the executive to make war was seen as crucially important. James Madison wrote in a letter to Thomas Jefferson, "The Constitution supposes, what the history of all governments demonstrates, that the Executive is the branch of power most interested in war, and most prone to it. It has accordingly with studied care, vested the question of war in the legislature."
In more recent decades, the emergence of new weapons that virtually eliminate the period of time between the decision to go to war and the waging of war have naturally led to a reconsideration of the exact nature of the executive's war-making power. But the practicalities of modern warfare which necessarily increase the war powers of the president at the expense of Congress do not render moot the concerns our founders had so long ago that the making of war by the president -- when added to his other powers -- carries with it the potential for unbalancing the careful design of our Constitution, and in the process, threatening our liberty.
They were greatly influenced -- far more than we can imagine -- by a careful reading of the history and human dramas surrounding the democracies of ancient Greece and the Roman republic. They knew, for example, that democracy disappeared in Rome when Caesar crossed the Rubicon in violation of the Senate's long prohibition against a returning general entering the city while still in command of military forces. Though the Senate lingered in form and was humored for decades, when Caesar impoliticly combined his military commander role with his chief executive role, the Senate -- and with it the Republic -- withered away. And then for all intents and purposes, the great dream of democracy disappeared from the face of the Earth for 17 centuries, until its rebirth in our land.
Symbolically, President Bush has been attempting to conflate his commander in chief role and his head of government role to maximize the power people are eager to give those who promise to defend them against active threats. But as he does so, we are witnessing some serious erosion of the checks and balances that have always maintained a healthy democracy in America.
In Justice Jackson's famous concurring opinion in the Youngstown Steel case in the 1950s, the single most important Supreme Court case on the subject of what powers are inherent to the commander in chief in a time of war, he wrote, "The example of such unlimited executive power that must have most impressed the forefathers was the prerogative exercised by George III, and the description of its evils in the declaration of independence leads me to doubt that they created their new Executive in their image ... and if we seek instruction from our own times, we can match it only from the Executive governments we disparagingly describe as totalitarian."
I am convinced that our founders would counsel us today that the greatest challenge facing our republic is not terrorism but how we react to terrorism, and not war, but how we manage our fears and achieve security without losing our freedom. I am also convinced that they would warn us that democracy itself is in grave danger if we allow any president to use his role as commander in chief to rupture the careful balance between the executive, the legislative and the judicial branches of government. Our current president has gone to war and has come back into "the city" and declared that our nation is now in a permanent state of war, which he says justifies his reinterpretation of the Constitution in ways that increase his personal power at the expense of Congress, the courts, and every individual citizen.
We must surrender some of our traditional American freedoms, he tells us, so that he may have sufficient power to protect us against those who would do us harm. Public fear remains at an unusually high level almost three years after we were attacked on Sept. 11, 2001. In response to those devastating attacks, the president properly assumed his role as commander in chief and directed a military invasion of the land in which our attackers built their training camps, were harbored and planned their assault. But just as the tide of battle was shifting decisively in our favor, the commander in chief made a controversial decision to divert a major portion of our army to invade another country that, according to the best evidence compiled in a new, exhaustive, bipartisan study, posed no imminent threat to us and had nothing to do with the attack against us.
As the main body of our troops were redeployed for the new invasion, those who organized the attacks against us escaped and many of them are still at large. Indeed, their overall numbers seem to have grown considerably because our invasion of the country that did not pose any imminent threat to us was perceived in their part of the world as a gross injustice, and the way in which we have conducted that war further fueled a sense of rage against the United States in those lands and, according to several studies, has stimulated a wave of new recruits for the terrorist group that attacked us and still wishes us harm.
A little over a year ago, when we launched the war against this second country, Iraq, President Bush repeatedly gave our people the clear impression that Iraq was an ally and partner to the terrorist group that attacked us, al-Qaida, and not only provided a geographic base for them but was also close to providing them weapons of mass destruction, including nuclear bombs. But now the extensive independent investigation by the bipartisan commission formed to study the 9/11 attacks has just reported that there was no meaningful relationship between Iraq and al-Qaida of any kind. And, of course, over the course of this past year we had previously found out that there were no weapons of mass destruction in Iraq. So now, the president and the vice president are arguing with this commission, and they are insisting that the commission is wrong and they are right, and that there actually was a working cooperation between Iraq and al-Qaida.
The problem for the president is that he doesn't have any credible evidence to support his claim, and yet, in spite of that, he persists in making that claim vigorously. So I would like to pause for a moment to address the curious question of why President Bush continues to make this claim that most people know is wrong. And I think it's particularly important because it is closely connected to the questions of constitutional power with which I began this speech, and will profoundly affect how that power is distributed among our three branches of government.
To begin with, our founders wouldn't be the least bit surprised at what the modern public opinion polls all tell us about why it's so important particularly for President Bush to keep the American people from discovering that what he told them about the linkage between Iraq and al-Qaida isn't true. Among these Americans who still believe there is a linkage, there remains very strong support for the president's decision to invade Iraq. But among those who accept the commission's detailed finding that there is no connection, support for the war in Iraq dries up pretty quickly.
And that's understandable, because if Iraq had nothing to do with the attack or the organization that attacked us, then that means the president took us to war when he didn't have to. Almost 900 of our soldiers have been killed, and almost 5,000 have been wounded.
Thus, for all these reasons, President Bush and Vice President Cheney have decided to fight to the rhetorical death over whether or not there's a meaningful connection between Iraq and al-Qaida. They think that if they lose that argument and people see the truth, then they'll not only lose support for the controversial decision to go to war, but also lose some of the new power they've picked up from the Congress and the courts, and face harsh political consequences at the hands of the American people. As a result, President Bush is now intentionally misleading the American people by continuing to aggressively and brazenly assert a linkage between al-Qaida and Saddam Hussein.
If he is not lying, if they genuinely believe that, that makes them unfit in battle with al-Qaida. If they believe these flimsy scraps, then who would want them in charge? Are they too dishonest or too gullible? Take your pick.
But the truth is gradually emerging in spite of the president's determined dissembling. Listen, for example, to this editorial from the Financial Times: "There was nothing intrinsically absurd about the WMD fears, or ignoble about the opposition to Saddam's tyranny -- however late Washington developed this. The purported link between Baghdad and al-Qaida, by contrast, was never believed by anyone who knows Iraq and the region. It was and is nonsense."
Of course the first rationale presented for the war was to destroy Iraq's weapons of mass destruction, which turned out not to exist. Then the rationale was to liberate Iraqis and the Middle East from tyranny, but our troops were not greeted with the promised flowers and are now viewed as an occupying force by 92 percent of Iraqis, while only 2 percent see them as liberators.
But right from the start, beginning very soon after the attacks of 9/11, President Bush made a decision to start mentioning Osama bin Laden and Saddam Hussein in the same breath in a cynical mantra designed to fuse them together as one in the public's mind. He repeatedly used this device in a highly disciplined manner to create a false impression in the minds of the American people that Saddam Hussein was responsible for 9/11. Usually he was pretty tricky in his exact wording. Indeed, Bush's consistent and careful artifice is itself evidence that he knew full well that he was telling an artful and important lie -- visibly circumnavigating the truth over and over again as if he had practiced how to avoid encountering the truth. But as I will document in a few moments, he and Vice President Cheney also sometimes departed from their tricky wording and resorted to statements were clearly outright falsehoods. In any case, by the time he was done, public opinion polls showed that fully 70 percent of the American people had gotten the message he wanted them to get, and had been convinced that Saddam Hussein was responsible for the 9/11 attacks.
The myth that Iraq and al-Qaida were working together was no accident -- the president and vice president deliberately ignored warnings before the war from international intelligence services, the CIA, and their own Pentagon that the claim was false. Europe's top terrorism investigator said in 2002, "We have found no evidence of links between Iraq and al-Qaida. If there were such links, we would have found them. But we have found no serious connections whatsoever." A classified October 2002 CIA report given to the White House directly undercut the Iraq-al-Qaida claim. Top officials in the Pentagon told reporters in 2002 that the rhetoric being used by President Bush and Vice President Cheney was "an exaggeration."
And at least some honest voices within the president's own party admitted as such. Sen. Chuck Hagel, a decorated war hero who sits on the Foreign Relations Committee, said point blank, "Saddam is not in league with al-Qaida ... I have not seen any intelligence that would lead me to connect Saddam Hussein with al-Qaida."
But those voices did not stop the deliberate campaign to mislead America. Over the course of a year, the president and vice president used carefully crafted language to scare Americans into believing there was an imminent threat from an Iraq-armed al-Qaida.
In the fall of 2002, the President told the country "You can't distinguish between al-Qaida and Saddam" and that the "true threat facing our country is an al-Qaida-type network trained and armed by Saddam." At the same time, Vice President Cheney was repeating his claim that "there is overwhelming evidence there was a connection between al-Qaida and the Iraqi government."
By the Spring, Secretary of State Powell was in front of the United Nations claiming a "sinister nexus between Iraq and the al-Qaida terrorist network."
But after the invasion, no ties were found. In June of 2003, the United Nations Security Council's al-Qaida monitoring agency told reporters his extensive investigation had found no evidence linking the Iraqi regime to al-Qaida. By August, three former Bush administration national security and intelligence officials admitted that the evidence used to make the Iraq-al-Qaida claim was "tenuous, exaggerated and often at odds with the conclusion of key intelligence agencies." And earlier this year, Knight-Ridder newspapers reported "Senior U.S. officials now say there never was any evidence" of a connection.
So when the bipartisan 9/11 commission issued its report finding "no credible evidence" of an Iraq-al-Qaida connection, it should not have caught the White House off guard. Yet instead of the candor Americans need and deserve from their leaders, there have been more denials and more insistence without evidence. Vice President Cheney insisted even this week that "there clearly was a relationship" and that there is "overwhelming evidence." Even more shocking, Cheney offered this disgraceful question: "Was Iraq involved with al-Qaida in the attack on 9/11? We don't know." He then claimed that he "probably" had more information than the commission, but has so far refused to provide anything to the commission other than more insults.
The President was even more brazen. He dismissed all questions about his statements by saying "The reason I keep insisting that there was a relationship between Iraq and Saddam and al-Qaida, because there was a relationship between Iraq and al-Qaida." He provided no evidence.
Friends of the administration tried mightily to rehabilitate their cherished but shattered linkage. John Lehman, one of the Republicans on the commission, offered what sounded like new evidence that a Saddam henchman had attended an al-Qaida meeting. But within hours, the commissions files yielded definitive evidence that it was another man with a similar name -- ironically capturing the near-miss quality of Bush's entire symbolic argument.
They have such an overwhelming political interest in sustaining the belief in the minds of the American people that Hussein was in partnership with bin Laden that they dare not admit the truth lest they look like complete fools for launching our country into a reckless, discretionary war against a nation that posed no immediate threat to us whatsoever. But the damage they have done to our country is not limited to misallocation of military economic political resources. Whenever a chief executive spends prodigious amounts of energy convincing people of lies, he damages the fabric of democracy, and the belief in the fundamental integrity of our self-government.
That creates a need for control over the flood of bad news, bad policies and bad decisions also explains their striking attempts to control news coverage.
To take the most recent example, Vice President Cheney was clearly ready to do battle with the news media when he went on CNBC earlier this week to attack news coverage of the 9/11 commission's conclusion that Iraq did not work with al-Qaida. He lashed out at the New York Times for having the nerve to print a headline saying the 9/11 commission "finds no Qaeda-Iraq Tie" -- a clear statement of the obvious -- and said there is no "fundamental split here now between what the president said and what the commission said." He tried to deny that he had personally been responsible for helping to create the false impression of linkage between al-Qaida and Iraq.
Ironically, his interview ended up being fodder for "The Daily Show With Jon Stewart." Stewart played Cheney's outright denial that he had ever said that representatives of al-Qaida and Iraqi intelligence met in Prague. Then Stewart froze Cheney's image and played the exact video clip in which Cheney had indeed directly claimed linkage between the two, catching him on videotape in a lie. At that point Stewart said, addressing himself to Cheney's frozen image on the television screen, "It's my duty to inform you that your pants are on fire."
Dan Rather says that post-9/11 patriotism has stifled journalists from asking government officials "the toughest of the tough questions." Rather went so far as to compare administration efforts to intimidate the press to "necklacing" in apartheid South Africa, while acknowledging it as "an obscene comparison." "The fear is that you will be necklaced here (in the U.S.), you will have a flaming tire of lack of patriotism put around your neck," Rather explained. It was CBS, remember, that withheld the Abu Ghraib photographs from the American people for two weeks at the request of the Bush administration.
Donald Rumsfeld has said that criticism of the administration's policy "makes it complicated and more difficult" to fight the war. CNN's Christiane Amanpour said on CNBC last September, "I think the press was muzzled and I think the press self-muzzled. I'm sorry to say but certainly television, and perhaps to a certain extent my station, was intimidated by the Administration."
The administration works closely with a network of "rapid response" digital Brown Shirts who work to pressure reporters and their editors for "undermining support for our troops." Paul Krugman, the New York Times columnist, was one of the first journalists to regularly expose the president's consistent distortions of the facts. Krugman writes, "Let's not overlook the role of intimidation. After 9/11, if you were thinking of saying anything negative of the President ... you had to expect right-wing pundits and publications to do all they could to ruin your reputation.
Bush and Cheney are spreading purposeful confusion while punishing reporters who stand in the way. It is understandably difficult for reporters and journalistic institutions to resist this pressure, which, in the case of individual journalists, threatens their livelihoods, and in the case of the broadcasters can lead to other forms of economic retribution. But resist they must, because without a press able to report "without fear or favor" our democracy will disappear.
Recently, the media has engaged in some healthy self-criticism of the way it allowed the White House to mislead the public into war under false pretenses. We are dependent on the media, especially the broadcast media, to never let this happen again. We must help them resist this pressure for everyone's sake, or we risk other wrong-headed decisions based upon false and misleading impressions.
We are left with an unprecedented, high-intensity conflict every single day between the ideological illusions upon which this administration's policies have been based and the reality of the world in which the American people live their lives.
When you boil it all down to precisely what went wrong with the Bush Iraq policy, it is actually fairly simple: he adopted an ideologically driven view of Iraq that was tragically at odds with reality. Everything that has gone wrong is in one way or another the result of a spectacular and violent clash between the bundle of misconceptions that he gullibly consumed and the all-too-painful reality that our troops and contractors and diplomats and taxpayers have encountered. Of course, there have been several other collisions between President Bush's ideology and America's reality. To take the most prominent example, the transformation of a $5 trillion surplus into a $4 trillion deficit is in its own way just as spectacular a miscalculation as the Iraq war.
But there has been no more bizarre or troubling manifestation of how seriously off track this President's policies have taken America than the two profound shocks to our nation's conscience during the last month. First came the extremely disturbing pictures that document strange forms of physical and sexual abuse -- and even torture and murder -- by some of our soldiers against people they captured as prisoners in Iraq. And then, the second shock came just last week, with strange and perverted legal memoranda from inside the administration, which actually sought to justify torture and to somehow provide a legal rationale for bizarre and sadistic activities conducted in the name of the American people, which, according to any reasonable person, would be recognized as war crimes. In making their analysis, the administration lawyers concluded that the President, whenever he is acting in his role as commander in chief, is above and immune from the "rule of law." At least we don't have to guess what our founders would have to say about this bizarre and un-American theory.
By the middle of this week, the uproar caused by the disclosure of this legal analysis had forced the administration to claim they were throwing the memo out and it was, "irrelevant and overbroad." But no one in the administration has said that the reasoning was wrong. And in fact, a DOJ spokesman says they stand by the tortured definition of torture. In addition the broad analysis regarding the commander-in-chief powers has not been disavowed. And the view of the memo -- that it was within commander-in-chief's power to order any interrogation techniques necessary to extract information -- most certainly contributed to the atmosphere that led to the atrocities committed against the Iraqis at Abu Ghraib. We also know that President Bush rewarded the principle author of this legal monstrosity with a seat on the U.S. Court of Appeals. President Bush, meanwhile, continues to place the blame for the horrific consequences of his morally obtuse policies on the young privates and corporals and sergeants who may well be culpable as individuals for their actions, but who were certainly not responsible for the policies which set up the Bush Gulag and led to America's strategic catastrophe in Iraq.
I call on the administration to disclose all its interrogation policies, including those used by the military in Iraq and Afghanistan and those employed by the CIA at its secret detention centers outside the U.S., as well as all the analyses related to the adoption of those policies.
The Bush administration's objective of establishing U.S. domination over any potential adversary led to the hubristic, tragic miscalculation of the Iraq war, a painful adventure marked by one disaster after another based on one mistaken assumption after another. But the people who paid the price have been the U.S. soldiers trapped over there and the Iraqis in prison. The top-heavy focus on dominance as a goal for the U.S. role in the world is exactly paralleled in their aspiration for the role of the president to be completely dominant in the constitutional system. Our founders understood even better than Lord Acton the inner meaning of his aphorism that power corrupts and absolutely power corrupts absolutely. The goal of dominance necessitates a focus on power. Ironically, all of their didactic messages about how democracies don't invade other nations fell on their own deaf ears. The pursuit of dominance in foreign and strategic policy led the bush administration to ignore the United nations, do serious damage to our alliances in the world, violate international law and risk the hatred of the rest of the world. The seductive exercise of unilateral power has led this president to interpret his powers under the constitution in a way that would have been the worst nightmare of our framers.
And the kind of unilateral power he imagines is fool's gold in any case. Just as its pursuit in Mesopotamia has led to tragic consequences for our soldiers, the Iraqi people, our alliances, everything we think is important, in the same way the pursuit of a new interpretation of the presidency that weakens the Congress, courts and civil society is not good for either the presidency or the rest of the nation.
If the Congress becomes an enfeebled enabler to the executive, and the courts become known for political calculations in their decisions, then the country suffers. The kinds of unnatural, undemocratic activities in which this administration has engaged, in order to aggrandize power, have included censorship of scientific reports, manipulation of budgetary statistics, silencing dissent, and ignoring intelligence. Although there have been other efforts by other presidents to encroach on the legitimate prerogatives of Congress and courts, there has never been this kind of systematic abuse of the truth and institutionalization of dishonesty as a routine part of the policy process.
Two hundred and twenty years ago, John Adams wrote, in describing one of America's most basic founding principles, "The executive shall never exercise the legislative and judicial powers, or either of them ... to the end it may be a government of laws and not of men."
The last time we had a president who had the idea that he was above the law was when Richard Nixon told an interviewer, "When the president does it, that means that it is not illegal ... If the president, for example, approves something, approves an action because of national security, or, in this case, because of a threat to internal peace and order, of significant order, then the president's decision in this instance is one that enables those who carry it out to carry it out without violating the law."
Fortunately for our country, Nixon was forced to resign as president before he could implement his outlandish interpretation of the Constitution, but not before his defiance of the Congress and the courts created a serious constitutional crisis.
The two top Justice Department officials under President Nixon, Elliot Richardson and William Ruckelshaus, turned out to be men of great integrity, and even though they were loyal Republicans, they were more loyal to the Constitution and resigned on principle rather than implement what they saw as abuses of power by Nixon. Then Congress, also on a bipartisan basis, bravely resisted Nixon's abuse of power and launched impeachment proceedings.
In some ways, our current president is actually claiming significantly more extra-constitutional power, vis-à-vis Congress and the courts, than Nixon did. For example, Nixon never claimed that he could imprison American citizens indefinitely without charging them with a crime and without letting them see a lawyer or notify their families. And this time, the attorney general, John Ashcroft, is hardly the kind of man who would resign on principle to impede an abuse of power. In fact, whenever there is an opportunity to abuse power in this administration, Ashcroft seems to be leading the charge. And it is Ashcroft who picked the staff lawyers at Justice responsible for the embarrassing memos justifying and enabling torture.
Moreover, in sharp contrast to the courageous 93rd Congress that saved the country from Richard Nixon's sinister abuses, the current Congress has virtually abdicated its constitutional role to serve as an independent and coequal branch of government.
Instead, this Republican-led Congress is content, for the most part, to take orders from the president on what they vote for and what they don't vote for. The Republican leaders of the House and Senate have even started blocking Democrats from attending conference committee meetings, where legislation takes its final form, and instead, they let the president's staff come to the meetings and write key parts of the laws for them. (Come to think of it, the decline and lack of independence shown by this Congress would shock our founders more than anything else, because they believed that the power of the Congress was the most important check and balance against the unhealthy exercise of too much power by the Executive branch.)
This administration has not been content just to reduce the Congress to subservience. It has also engaged in unprecedented secrecy, denying the American people access to crucial information with which they might hold government officials accountable for their actions, and a systematic effort to manipulate and intimidate the media into presenting a more favorable image of the administration to the American people.
Listen to what U.S. News and World Report has to say about their secrecy: "The Bush administration has quietly but efficiently dropped a shroud of secrecy across many critical operations of the federal government -- cloaking its own affairs from scrutiny and removing from the public domain important information on health, safety, and environmental matters."
Here are just a few examples, and for each one, you have to ask, what are they hiding, and why are they hiding it?
More than 6,000 documents have been removed by the Bush administration from governmental Web sites. To cite only one example, a document on the EPA Web site giving citizens crucial information on how to identify chemical hazards to their families. Some have speculated that the principle threat to the Bush administration is a threat by the chemical hazards if the information remains available to American citizens.
To head off complaints from our nation's governors over how much they receive under federal programs, the Bush administration simply stopped printing the primary state budget report.
To muddy the clear consensus of the scientific community on global warming, the White House directed major changes and deletions to an EPA report that were so egregious that the agency said it was too embarrassed to use the language.
They've kept hidden from view Cheney's ultra-secret energy task force. They have fought a pitched battle in the courts for more than three years to continue denying the American people the ability to know which special interests and lobbyists advised with Vice President Cheney on the design of the new laws.
And when mass layoffs became too embarrassing they simply stopped publishing the regular layoff report that economists and others have been receiving for decades. For this administration, the truth hurts, when the truth is available to the American people. They find bliss in the ignorance of the people. What are they hiding, and why are they hiding it?
In the end, for this administration, it is all about power. This lie about the invented connection between al-Qaida and Iraq was and is the key to justifying the current ongoing constitutional power grab by the president. So long as their big flamboyant lie remains an established fact in the public's mind, President Bush will be seen as justified in taking for himself the power to make war on his whim. He will be seen as justified in acting to selectively suspend civil liberties -- again on his personal discretion -- and he will continue to intimidate the press and thereby distort the political reality experienced by the American people during his bid for re-election.
War is lawful violence, but even in its midst we acknowledge the need for rules. We know that in our wars there have been descents from these standards, often the result of spontaneous anger arising out of the passion of battle. But we have never before, to my knowledge, had a situation in which the framework for this kind of violence has been created by the president, nor have we had a situation where these things were mandated by directives signed by the secretary of defense, as it is alleged, and supported by the national security advisor.
Always before, we could look to the chief executive as the point from which redress would come and law be upheld. That was one of the great prides of our country: humane leadership, faithful to the law. What we have now, however, is the result of decisions taken by a president and an administration for whom the best law is NO law, so long as law threatens to constrain their political will. And where the constraints of law cannot be prevented or eliminated, then they maneuver it to be weakened by evasion, by delay, by hair-splitting, by obstruction, and by failure to enforce on the part of those sworn to uphold the law.
In these circumstances, we need investigation of the facts under oath, and in the face of penalties for evasion and perjury. We need investigation by an aroused Congress whose bipartisan members know they stand before the judgment of history. We cannot depend upon a debased Department of Justice given over to the hands of zealots. "Congressional oversight" and "special prosecution" are words that should hang in the air. If our honor as a nation is to be restored, it is not by allowing the mighty to shield themselves by bringing the law to bear against their pawns: it is by bringing the law to bear against the mighty themselves. Our dignity and honor as a nation never came from our perfection as a society or as a people: it came from the belief that in the end, this was a country which would pursue justice as the compass pursues the pole: that although we might deviate, we would return and find our path. This is what we must now do.
Al Gore is truly offering his "life, fortune and sacred honor." Al Gore is the Voice crying out in the Wilderness of the Republic, and the campaign of Sen. John Kerry (D-Meking Delta) promises to be the Redemption of the Republic...
There is an Electoral Uprising coming in November 2004...
Al Gore, Associated Press: Al Gore on Thursday accused President Bush of lying about a link between al-Qaida and Saddam Hussein and said the president refuses to back down from that position to avoid political fallout.
"They dare not admit the truth lest they look like complete fools for launching our country into a reckless, discretionary war against a nation that posed no immediate threat to us whatsoever," Gore, the former vice president who lost the presidency to Bush in 2000, said during a speech at Georgetown University Law Center...
Gore accused Bush and Vice President Dick Cheney of deliberately ignoring warnings from international intelligence services, the CIA and the Pentagon before the Iraq war that their claim of a link between al-Qaida and Saddam was false.
With a smirk, Gore then added: "So when the bipartisan 9/11 commission issued its report finding 'no credible evidence' of an Iraq-al-Qaida connection, it should not have come as a surprise. It should not have caught the White House off guard."
Repudiate the 9/11 Cover-Up and the Iraq War Lies, Show Up for Democracy in 2004: Defeat Bush (again!)
http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/news/archive/2004/06/24/politics1653EDT0703.DTL
www.sfgate.com Return to regular view
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Gore accuses Bush, Cheney of lying about link between al-Qaida and Iraq
- LIZ SIDOTI, Associated Press Writer
Thursday, June 24, 2004
(06-24) 14:59 PDT WASHINGTON (AP) --
Al Gore on Thursday accused President Bush of lying about a link between al-Qaida and Saddam Hussein and said the president refuses to back down from that position to avoid political fallout.
"They dare not admit the truth lest they look like complete fools for launching our country into a reckless, discretionary war against a nation that posed no immediate threat to us whatsoever," Gore, the former vice president who lost the presidency to Bush in 2000, said during a speech at Georgetown University Law Center.
Republicans responded that the Democrat's assertions were false and out of touch.
Ken Mehlman, Bush's re-election campaign chairman, admonished Gore for delivering "another gravely false attack" and the Republican National Committee contended he was out of touch.
"Al Gore's history of denial of the threat of terrorism is no less dangerous today in his role as John Kerry's surrogate than it was in the 1990s in his role as vice president, a time when Osama bin Laden was declaring war on the United States five different times," RNC spokesman Jim Dyke said in a statement.
Mostly sidelined from the presidential race, Gore emerges every few months with another stinging review of the Bush administration. The former vice president, who has grown irate and bellowed in previous appearances, took a more tempered but highly sarcastic tone on Thursday.
Gore accused Bush and Vice President Dick Cheney of deliberately ignoring warnings from international intelligence services, the CIA and the Pentagon before the Iraq war that their claim of a link between al-Qaida and Saddam was false.
With a smirk, Gore then added: "So when the bipartisan 9/11 commission issued its report finding 'no credible evidence' of an Iraq-al-Qaida connection, it should not have come as a surprise. It should not have caught the White House off guard."
The independent, bipartisan commission looking into the terrorist attacks found "no credible evidence" of a link between the events of Sept. 11, 2001, and Iraq. As to an Iraq-al-Qaida connection, the commission found there was no apparent "collaborative relationship."
Gore said Bush and Cheney won't acknowledge what he called their fabrication because of the "harsh political consequences" of admitting there's no evidence of a link. "If they believe these flimsy scraps, then who would want them in charge? Are they too dishonest or too gullible? Take your pick," Gore said.
Gore also accused Bush of abusing his presidential powers by invading Iraq without a war declaration from Congress, allowing Americans deemed "unlawful enemy combatants" to be held without being charges, and authorizing "what plainly amounts to the torture of prisoners."
He also called on the administration to disclose all of its interrogation policies -- including those used in Iraq and Afghanistan, and by the CIA -- and analyses about them.
"We deserve to know what and why it's being done in our name," Gore said to applause.
Still popular among Democrats, Gore is an important ally for Kerry because he can criticize Bush in harsher terms than Kerry, this year's Democratic presidential candidate. Aides said Kerry must temper his critiques of Bush to avoid alienating the independent and swing voters who will influence the outcome on Nov. 2.
Gore's staff, in a typical heads-up, told Kerry's campaign a few days ago that he would be giving a speech on Iraq. The campaign did not know the details until Gore's staff released its media advisory this week.
The former vice president does not clear his speeches or schedule through Kerry's staff, but Kerry's aides welcome his attacks on Bush. They say Gore's red-meat rhetoric helps fire up the Democratic base and underscores criticisms Kerry makes in a more muted fashion.
Gore's speech was sponsored by the American Constitution Society, a liberal group of lawyers, law students, law professors and others.
URL: http://sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?file=/news/archive/2004/06/24/politics1653EDT0703.DTL
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©2004 Associated Press
The LNS has often spoken about the utter lack of CONTEXT and
CONTINUITY that the "US mainstream news media" provides in
regard to the Bush abomination. We know it is disarming for you to see the major network news organizations covering individual aspects of the Bush
abomination, for example, Abu Ghraib or Plame or Chalabi (hey, what happened to this outrageous story of Chalabi's betrayal of US intel secrets to the Iranians and who was it that spilled those secrets to him after too many drinks?) or Niger cake and the otherWMD lies. BUT it is the overall CONTEXT itself and the CONTINUITY over four years that tell the real story of the Bush abomination. The major network news organizations (e.g., SeeNotNews, SeeBS, NotBeSeen, AnythingButSee and PrettyBlandStuff) and the major
city newspapers (e.g., WASHPS and NYTwits) have been slapping themselves on the back for "independent reporting" lately on Abu Ghraib in particular, BUT
they wholly disregard the CONTEXT and CONTINUITY demanded in this current state of national emergency...Forced by an event-driven unraveling, the
"US mainstream news media" is still trying to avoid the real story, and along with it the most vital responsibility of a free press in a democratic
society...Abu Ghraib, Plame, Chalabi, the WMD lies, Hallburton, Enron and California's phoney energy crisis, Fraudida itself, Medifraud, the prostitution of the EPA, the missing pages of the increasingly unhinged and incredibly shrinking _resident's "service records" for the Alabama National Guard, the Bush cabal's pre-9/11 negligence and especially the post-9/11 blunders articulated by Richard Clarke, etc., taken together bring the real story into focus -- i.e., the CREDIBILITY, COMPETENCE and CHRACTER of the
increasingly unhinged and incredibly shrinking _resident and the Bush abomination in particular his "national security team." Furthermore, the "US
mainstream news media" has failed to provide CONTEXT
and CONTINUITY by aggregating the UNPRECENDENTED
opposition of the Bush abomination, led by Republicans
and former officials of both his father's
administration and his own's abomination (i.e. Paul
O'Neill, Richard Clarke, Joe Wilson) as well as
numerous others, Roger Cressy and Greg Thielman
notably, and in the military, including Zinni, Crowe,
Shinseki and others, as well as "Diplomats and
Military Commanders for Change," as well as 450 law
professors and 48 Noble prize winning scientists, as
well as the families of the 9/11 victims, well as Pope
John Paul and radio shock jocks Don Imus and Howard
Stern. This UNPRECEDENTED, BROAD-BASED, BI-PARTISAN
opposition constitues a resounding REBUKE of an
utterly failed regime...
Sydney Blumenthal, Guardian: The urgency of Bush's
credibility crisis surfaced in the latest Washington
Post-ABC News poll showing the collapse of Bush's
standing on terrorism, losing 13 points since April,
putting Kerry even on the issue and one point ahead in
the contest. But even more worrying was Bush's rating
on trust. By a margin of 52% to 39%, Kerry is seen as
more honest and trustworthy.
Restore the Timeline, Show Up for Democracy in 2004:
Defeat Bush (again!)
http://www.guardian.co.uk/comment/story/0,3604,1245877,00.html
Reality is unravelling for Bush
Even negative attacks on Kerry no longer seem to be
working
Sidney Blumenthal
Thursday June 24, 2004
The Guardian
At the Pentagon, on June 10, while business in
Washington had officially halted as the body of Ronald
Reagan lay in state, defence secretary Donald Rumsfeld
convened an emergency meeting on the Abu Ghraib
scandal, according to a reliable source privy to its
proceedings. Rumsfeld began the extraordinary session
by saying that certain documents needed to "get out"
that would show that there was no policy approving of
torture and that what had happened in Iraq and
Afghanistan was aberrant.
The Senate armed services committee had been
conducting hearings whose corrosive impact needed to
be countered. Rumsfeld complained about "serial
requests" for information from Congress. Yet he was
even more upset by subpoenas of defence officials
issued by the special prosecutor in the case of
Valerie Plame. The Pentagon, Rumsfeld said, was nearly
"at a stop" because of them. Rumsfeld admitted he was
startled by the uproar over Abu Ghraib: "There are so
many international organisations."
On June 22, the White House released documents on
policy on torture, including a directive signed on
February 7 2002 by Bush stating that he has "the
authority under the constitution" to abrogate the
Geneva conventions, that the Taliban and al-Qaida as
non-signatories were not covered by them, and that
consequently Bush "declines to exercise that authority
at this time". Rumsfeld's damage control was simply
one front in the expanding Bush administration war for
credibility.
Vice-president Dick Cheney staged a preemptive strike
last week by reiterating that Saddam Hussein and
al-Qaida had a relationship and insinuating that they
were in league. His intended target was the 9/11
commission, which is dangerously independent. Its
Republican co-chairman, Thomas Kean, replied that
there was "no credible evidence" that Saddam and
al-Qaida had collaborated. Bush entered the battle,
repeating that there was indeed a "relationship". Then
the Democratic co-chairman of the commission, Lee
Hamilton, explained that al-Qaida had in fact
approached Saddam seeking his help, but that it had
been rebuffed. The rejection was the relationship. But
Bush and Cheney's affirmative assertions made it seem
that the "relationship" was affirmative.
The urgency of Bush's credibility crisis surfaced in
the latest Washington Post-ABC News poll showing the
collapse of Bush's standing on terrorism, losing 13
points since April, putting Kerry even on the issue
and one point ahead in the contest. But even more
worrying was Bush's rating on trust. By a margin of
52% to 39%, Kerry is seen as more honest and
trustworthy.
Since March 3, the Bush-Cheney campaign has spent an
estimated $80m on mostly negative advertising, to
eliminate Kerry at the starting gate. The strategy was
the acceleration of the lesson of Bush's father's
victorious effort in the 1988 campaign when, 17 points
behind in mid-summer, he shattered Michael Dukakis
with a withering negative attack.
Now, Bush's opponent is not only moving ahead, but the
failed assault may insulate Kerry against future
offensives. Bush had every reason to believe that his
attack on Kerry's image would succeed. After September
11, he was able to impose his explanations on the
public almost without resistance and to taint anyone
who contradicted them as somehow unpatriotic.
With Congress in Republican hands, checks and balances
were effectively removed. Most of the media was on the
bandwagon or intimidated. Cheney himself called the
president of the corporation that owned one of the
networks to complain about an errant commentator.
Political aides directed by Karl Rove ceaselessly
called editors and producers with veiled threats about
access that was not granted in any case. The press
would not bite the hand that would not feed it.
But Bush's projection of images can only faintly be
seen on the screen, which is overwhelmed with Bush's
past images of triumph unreeling in reverse. The
majority of the people had supported the war in Iraq
because they believed that Saddam was involved in the
terrorist attacks of September 11. Bush envisioned the
Iraqi war unfolding into a new world order: the
liberation of Iraq resembling the liberation of
France, democracy flowering throughout the Middle
East, and the Palestinians submitting quietly to
Sharon's fait accompli .
But the neoconservative prophesies had been advanced
by suppressing the scepticism of the US intelligence
agencies, the military and the state department.
Without deranging and dismissing the professionalism
of the basic institutions of national security, Bush
would not have been able to sustain his reasons.
Bush's battle is not with image, but with the
unravelling of his reality.
· Sidney Blumenthal is former senior adviser to
President Clinton and Washington bureau chief of
salon.com
sidney _ blumenthal @yahoo.com
The Emperor has no uniform...
Associated Press: The Associated Press sued the Pentagon and the Air Force on Tuesday, seeking access to all records of George W. Bush's military service during the Vietnam War.
Filed in federal court in New York, where The AP
is headquartered, the lawsuit seeks access to a copy
of Bush's microfilmed personnel file from the Texas
State Library and Archives Commission in Austin...
Controversy surrounds Bush's time in the Texas Air
National Guard because it is unclear from the record
what duties he performed for the military when he was
working on the political campaign of a U.S. Senate
candidate in Alabama.
There are questions as to whether the file
provided to the news media earlier this year is
complete, says the lawsuit, adding that these
questions could possibly be answered by reviewing a
copy of the microfilm of Bush's personnel file in the
Texas archives.
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Defeat Bush (again!)
AP Sues for Access to Bush Guard Records
By The Associated Press
Tuesday 22 June 2004
Washington - The Associated Press sued the
Pentagon and the Air Force on Tuesday, seeking access
to all records of George W. Bush's military service
during the Vietnam War.
Filed in federal court in New York, where The AP
is headquartered, the lawsuit seeks access to a copy
of Bush's microfilmed personnel file from the Texas
State Library and Archives Commission in Austin.
The White House says the government has already
released all the records of Bush's military service.
Controversy surrounds Bush's time in the Texas Air
National Guard because it is unclear from the record
what duties he performed for the military when he was
working on the political campaign of a U.S. Senate
candidate in Alabama.
There are questions as to whether the file
provided to the news media earlier this year is
complete, says the lawsuit, adding that these
questions could possibly be answered by reviewing a
copy of the microfilm of Bush's personnel file in the
Texas archives.
The Air National Guard of the United States, a
federal entity, has control of the microfilm, which
should be disclosed in its entirety under the Freedom
of Information Act, the lawsuit says.
The White House has yet to respond to a request by
the AP in April asking the president to sign a written
waiver of his right to keep records of his military
service confidential. Bush gave an oral waiver in a TV
appearance that preceded the White House's release
this year of materials concerning his National Guard
service.
The government "did not expedite their response
... they did not produce the file within the time
required by law, and they will not now estimate when
the file might be produced or even confirm that an
effort has been initiated to retrieve a copy from the
microfilm at the Texas archives," the lawsuit says.
In the absence of any privacy objection by the
president and in light of the importance of the file's
release in advance of the November election, says the
lawsuit, AP seeks a court order to compel the release
of records "that are being unlawfully withheld from
the public."
The released records were from the Texas Air
National Guard at Camp Mabry and the Defense Financing
Accounting Service in Denver.
Under Texas law, a copy of military personnel
files of those serving in the Texas Air National Guard
must be retained on microfilm at the Texas archives.
The lawsuit says that no one has looked at any of
the Texas Air National Guard records maintained at the
state archives since 1996.
Responding to AP's request, the Texas Air National
Guard concluded that Bush's file was a federal record
under control of the U.S. Air National Guard.
When the government did not produce the documents,
AP appealed to the Pentagon, saying that by law, the
microfilm copy should have been produced within 20
days. The Pentagon said it could not respond within
the legally required period.
-------
Yes, but tell it with CONTEXT and CONTINUITY...The LNS
pointed out at the time of the testimony of Pickard
and Ashcroft that somebody had just committed
perjury...CONTEXT and CONTINUITY...Remember Richard
Clarke's CONDEMNATION of the Bush abomination's
approach to the "war on terrorism." His view, sworn to
under oath, is being proven over and over, day after
day. When did the "US mainstream news media" last
mention his name or his testimony? Remember, the Bush
abomination fought the creation of the 9/11 Commission
and has resisted its reasonable requests every step of
the way. Remember, these are the people who wanted to
exploit 9/11 for the 2004 campaign. Remember John
O'Neill and "Forebidden Truth." Remember the 28 pages
of the Congressional 9/11 report that they refuse to
release...Remember the struggle of the 9/11
families...Remember Ashcroft's outrageous, sliming
attacks on 9/11 Commissioner Jamie Gorelick...
Lisa Myers, NBC: The 9/11 commission is busy writing
its final report, but is still investigating critical
facts, including the conduct of U.S. Attorney General
John Ashcroft. NBC News has learned that the
commission has interviewed two FBI officials who
contradict sworn testimony by Ashcroft, about whether
he brushed off terrorism warnings in the summer of
2001.
Repudiate the 9/11 Cover-Up and the Iraq War Lies,
Show Up for Democracy in 2004: Defeat Bush (again!)
http://msnbc.msn.com/id/5271234/
Did Ashcroft brush off terror warnings? NBC exclusive: 9/11 commission interviews FBI officials who contradict Ashcroft testimony
By Lisa Myers
Senior investigative correspondent
NBC News
Updated: 7:32 p.m. ET June 22, 2004WASHINGTON - The
9/11 commission is busy writing its final report, but
is still investigating critical facts, including the
conduct of U.S. Attorney General John Ashcroft. NBC
News has learned that the commission has interviewed
two FBI officials who contradict sworn testimony by
Ashcroft, about whether he brushed off terrorism
warnings in the summer of 2001.
In the critical months before Sept. 11, did Ashcroft
dismiss threats of an al-Qaida attack in this country?
At issue is a July 5, 2001, meeting between Ashcroft
and acting FBI Director Tom Pickard. That month, the
threat of an al-Qaida attack was so high, the White
House summoned the FBI and domestic agencies, and
warned them to be on alert.
Yet, Pickard testified to the 9/11 commission that
when he tried to brief Ashcroft just a week later, on
July 12, about the terror threat inside the United
States, he got the brush-off.
"Mr. Ashcroft told you that he did not want to hear
about this anymore," Democratic commission member
Richard Ben-Veniste asked on April 13. "Is that
correct?"
"That is correct," Pickard replied.
Testifying under oath the same day, Ashcroft
categorically denied the allegation, saying, "I did
never speak to him saying that I didn't want to hear
about terrorism."
However, another senior FBI official tells NBC News he
vividly recalls Pickard returning from the meeting
that day furious that Ashcroft had cut short the
terrorism briefing. This official, now retired, has
talked to the 9/11 commission.
Full coverage
9/11 commission
The National Commission on Terrorist Attacks Upon the
United States wrapped up its public hearings with a
two-day session on June 16 and 17.
• No Iraq-al-Qaida link: Story | Statement
• Al-Qaida's plan: Story | Statement
• Day of attack: Story | Statement
• Commission Web site
NBC News has learned that commission investigators
also tracked down another FBI witness at the meeting
that day, Ruben Garcia, head of the Criminal Division
at that time. Several sources familiar with the
investigation say Garcia confirmed to the commission
that Ashcroft did indeed dismiss Pickard's warnings
about al-Qaida.
"When you get two people coming forth and basically
challenging a sworn statement by the attorney general
regarding a critical meeting in the history of the
9/11 event, you raise serious questions about the
Attorney General's truthfulness," says Paul Light, a
government reform expert and New York University
professor.
Ashcroft's version of events is supported by his top
aide, who attended the meeting. But another Justice
official also there — who Ashcroft's office claimed
would dispute Pickard's account — says he doesn't
remember.
"I do not recall the conversation that interim
director Pickard referred to," says former Deputy
Attorney General Larry Thompson.
Experts say that in the context of Sept. 11, the issue
is not trivial.
"Was there a communications breakdown between the FBI
and the Department of Justice, at the highest levels
of each agency?" asks former Justice Department
Inspector General Michael Bromwich.
Ashcroft's spokesman dismissed the allegations
Tuesday, saying, "The suggestion that the attorney
general wasn't concerned about terrorism is absurd."
He says if Ashcroft was ever short with FBI officials,
it was because "he was unhappy with the quality of
information he was getting."
Pickard did brief Ashcroft on terrorism four more
times that summer, but sources say the acting FBI
director never mentioned the word al-Qaida again in
Ashcroft's presence — until after Sept. 11.
© 2004 MSNBC Interactive
Another US soldier has died in Iraq. For what? Oh yes, SECURITY is the central issue of this national referendum on the CREDIBILITY, COMPETENCE and CHARACTER of the increasingly unhinged and incredibly shrinking _resident: National Security, Economic Security and Environmental Security. Are you safer than you were four years ago? The botched, bungled "war on terrorism" is NOT the strength of the Bush Abomination, it is the SHAME of the Bush abomination.
Tom Regan, Christian Science Monitor: Anonymous, who published an analysis of Al Qaeda last year, called Through Our Enemies' Eyes, thinks it quite possible that another devastating strike against the US could come during the election campaign, not with the intention of changing the administration, as was the case in the Madrid bombing, but of keeping the same one in place. "I'm very sure they can't have a better administration for them than the one they have now," he said. "One way to keep the Republicans in power is to mount an attack that would rally the country around the president."
Repudiate the 9/11 Cover-Up and the Iraq War Lies, Show Up for Democracy in 2004: Defeat Bush (again!)
http://www.csmonitor.com/2004/0621/dailyUpdate.html
World > Terrorism & Security
posted June 21, 2004, updated 11:21 a.m.
Senior intel officer: Al Qaeda will attack US to ensure Bush win
His new book, others, also highlight intelligence, administration failures in war on terror.
by Tom Regan | csmonitor.com
In the past few months several books have been published that attack the US intelligence community, and the White House, for their alleged mistakes and misstatements about Iraq and the war on terror. Most of these books, the Guardian reports, have been written by "embittered" former officials.
But now, the newspaper reports, a senior US intelligence official is "about to publish a bitter condemnation of America's counter-terrorism policy, arguing that the West is losing the war against Al Qaeda and that an 'avaricious, premeditated, unprovoked' war in Iraq has played into Osama bin Laden's hands." This senior intelligence official, who writes as "Anonymous," also says that "Osama bin Laden may attack the US before the November election to ensure the re-election of President George Bush."
Anonymous, who published an analysis of Al Qaeda last year, called Through Our Enemies' Eyes, thinks it quite possible that another devastating strike against the US could come during the election campaign, not with the intention of changing the administration, as was the case in the Madrid bombing, but of keeping the same one in place. "I'm very sure they can't have a better administration for them than the one they have now," he said. "One way to keep the Republicans in power is to mount an attack that would rally the country around the president."
"Imperial Hubris: Why the West is Losing the War on Terror" will be released in July. The Guardian notes that the fact that this author has been allowed to publish this work, and yet still remain a senior member of the US intelligence community, may "reflect the increasing frustration of senior intelligence officials at the course the administration has taken."
Find out more.
"Anonymous" is not the only writer to put the intelligence community and the administration under a microsope. The New York Times reports that James Bamford, the author of two respected books on American intelligence (The Puzzle Palace and Body of Secrets, both about the National Security Agency), has written a new book called "Pretext for War." (The San Jose Mercury News calls him "one of the most talented but unsung investigative reporters of the past 25 years.")
His book is a "damning portrait" of the intelligence community (which he alleges was not ready to deal with the end of the cold war), as well as a "scathing picture" of neoconservatives in the Bush administration, according to the Times. Mr. Bamford also has harsh words for both President Bill Clinton and President Bush. He alleges that neither man did a very good job at dealing with terrorism before 9/11.
In addition Bamford suggests that the CIA caved to pressure from administration hard-liners. He quotes a CIA case officer who says that in January of 2003, one of the agency's higher-ups called a meeting and said, "You know what – if Bush wants to go to war, it's your job to give him a reason to do so."
Last week, in an oped article for the New York Times, Bamford wrote about the practice of "rent-a-spy," which costs the American taxpayers millions of dollars.
Desperate to fill their contracts, the [private] companies frequently offer to double a federal employee's salary. Because the recruiters have security clearances, they often make their recruiting pitches at the CIA's headquarters in Langley, Virginia. And many of those who do sign on end up going right back to their old office – only now working for a private company. Thus, after spending millions of dollars training people to be clandestine officers, taxpayers are having to pay them twice as much to return as rent-a-spies.
But Bamford's most controversial charges in his new book, according to a review in The Houston Chronicle, involve certain individuals in the US administration, and an idea they once pitched to the government of Israel.
According to Bamford, the basic blueprint for the administration's Middle East policy had been drawn up in the mid-1990s by Richard Perle, Douglas Feith, and David Wurmser, three neoconservatives who would be named to influential positions in the Bush administration. Described as a kind of "American privy council" to former Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, the three proposed what they called a "Clean Break" plan, which involved getting the United States to pull out of the peace negotiations in order to let "Israel take care of the Palestinians as it saw fit." Under the "Clean Break" plan, Israel would launch preemptive attacks against its major Arab enemies and replace Saddam Hussein with a puppet leader friendly to Israel. Bamford records that Netanyahu wisely rejected the plan but that the Perle group found a more receptive audience for their recommendations inside the Bush administration. The fact that several of the key players most aggressively pushing the Iraqi war had originally outlined it for the benefit of another country raises "the most troubling conflict of interest questions," he writes.
Bamford, however, has also come in for criticism about his decision to divulge the "secret location" used by Vice President Dick Cheney in his new book.
The Los Angeles Times reported last Thursday on more alleged intelligence failures. The paper cites current and former US intelligence officials as saying that two British-recruited Iraqi spies who had tales-to-tell about Saddam Hussein's alleged weapons of mass destruction (their reports were rushed to the White House just before the war) were "never interviewed by the CIA and are now viewed as unreliable."
The Times also says that US intelligence erred in its analysis of high-altitude satellite photos before the war, often mistaking chicken coops for Scud missle silos. The UN team then in Iraq grew so tired of running down these false reports, according to one former UN inspector, that they started to wear T-shirts that read "Ballistic Chicken Farm Inspection Team."
The 9/11 commission is preparing to release a report that many experts say will be a severe indictment of the US intelligence community and the way it operated under the Clinton and Bush administrations before 9/11. The New York Times reports that John F. Lehman, a Republican commission member, said the intelligence community was "dysfunctional" and that the commission would make recommendations for improvements. "They could not distinguish between a bicycle crash and a train wreck," he said.
The name of another brave American is scrawled on the John O'Neill Wall of Heroes...
Josh Gerstein, New York Sun: A prominent federal judge has told a conference of liberal lawyers that President Bush’s rise to power was similar to the accession of dictators such as Mussolini and Hitler.
“In a way that occurred before but is rare in the United States…somebody came to power as a result of the illegitimate acts of a legitimate institution that had the right to put somebody in power.That is what the Supreme Court did in Bush versus Gore. It put somebody in power,” said Guido Calabresi, a judge on the 2nd Circuit Court of Appeals, which sits in Manhattan.
“The reason I emphasize that is because that is exactly what happened when Mussolini was put in by the king of Italy,” Judge Calabresi continued, as the allusion drew audible gasps from some in the luncheon crowd Saturday at the annual convention of the American Constitution Society.
“The king of Italy had the right to put Mussolini in, though he had not won an election, and make him prime minister. That is what happened when Hindenburg put Hitler in. I am not suggesting for a moment that Bush is Hitler. I want to be clear on that, but it is a situation which is extremely unusual,” the judge said.
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Go To The New York Sun Home Page
Publication:The New York Sun; Date:Jun 21, 2004; Section:Front page; Page:1
AUDIENCE GASPS AS JUDGE LIKENS ELECTION OF BUSH TO RISE OF IL DUCE
2nd Circuit’s Calabresi Also Compares Bush’s Rise to That of Hitler
By JOSH GERSTEIN Staff Reporter of the Sun
WASHINGTON — A prominent federal judge has told a conference of liberal lawyers that President Bush’s rise to power was similar to the accession of dictators such as Mussolini and Hitler.
“In a way that occurred before but is rare in the United States…somebody came to power as a result of the illegitimate acts of a legitimate institution that had the right to put somebody in power.That is what the Supreme Court did in Bush versus Gore. It put somebody in power,” said Guido Calabresi, a judge on the 2nd Circuit Court of Appeals, which sits in Manhattan.
“The reason I emphasize that is because that is exactly what happened when Mussolini was put in by the king of Italy,” Judge Calabresi continued, as the allusion drew audible gasps from some in the luncheon crowd Saturday at the annual convention of the American Constitution Society.
“The king of Italy had the right to put Mussolini in, though he had not won an election, and make him prime minister. That is what happened when Hindenburg put Hitler in. I am not suggesting for a moment that Bush is Hitler. I want to be clear on that, but it is a situation which is extremely unusual,” the judge said.
Judge Calabresi, a former dean of Yale Law School, said Mr. Bush has asserted the full prerogatives of his office, despite his lack of a compelling electoral mandate from the public.
“When somebody has come in that way, they sometimes have tried not to exercise much power. In this case, like Mussolini, he has exercised extraordinary power. He has exercised power, claimed power for himself; that has not occurred since Franklin Roosevelt who, after all, was elected big and who did some of the same things with respect to assertions of power in times of crisis that this president is doing,” he said.
The 71-year-old judge declared that members of the public should, without regard to their political views, expel Mr. Bush from office in order to cleanse the democratic system.
“That’s got nothing to do with the politics of it.It’s got to do with the structural reassertion of democracy,” Judge Calabresi said.
His remarks were met with rousing applause from the hundreds of lawyers and law students in attendance.
Judge Calabresi was born in Milan. His family fled Mussolini in 1939 and settled in America. In 1994, President Clinton appointed the law professor to the federal appeals court that hears cases from the states of New York, Connecticut, and Vermont.
An opinion written by Judge Calabresi in 2000 rebuked Mayor Giuliani’s administration for failing to respect First Amendment rights.
“We would be ostriches if we failed to take judicial notice of the heavy stream of First Amendment litigation generated by New York in recent years,” the judge wrote. Allies of the mayor denounced the opinion as a thinly veiled political attack on Mr. Giuliani, who was then a candidate for the Senate.
Judge Calabresi made his comments from the floor during a question-andanswer period that was part of a panel discussion on the impact of the upcoming election on law and policy.
“I’m a judge and so I’m not allowed to talk politics. So I’m not going to talk about some of the issues that were mentioned or what some have said is the extraordinary record of incompetence of this administration,” he said.
Two Republicans on the panel politely rejected Judge Calabresi’s contention that Mr. Bush has overstepped his bounds.
A White House counsel under President George H.W. Bush said Judge Calabresi suggested the war in Iraq was a bold and inappropriate use of power without noting that the president’s policy initially enjoyed broad bipartisan support.
“It was approved with a pretty solid vote from Congress,” C. Boyden Gray said. Mr. Gray said conservatives believe Mr. Bush has been too cautious on issues like Medicare reform.
“If anything, he’s been too shy of doing things,” the attorney said.
A top Supreme Court litigator, Jay Sekulow,said it would be unwise to place limits on Mr. Bush’s authority simply because he did not win the popular vote.
“To say that a person who comes in under an Electoral College vote but not a majority of the popular vote and they’re somehow relegated to president-minus,I think is a very dangerous precedent,” said Mr.Sekulow,who is chief counsel for a conservative legal group,the American Center for Law and Justice.
One of the Democrats on stage endorsed Judge Calabresi’s comments.
“I absolutely obviously agree with what Judge Calabresi was trying to get at,” said a former chief of staff to Vice President Gore, Ronald Klain.
On Friday evening, Justice Breyer addressed the group. His presentation was more restrained. He detailed his thinking on the affirmative action cases the court recently decided. However, most of his remarks consisted of a celebration of the respect that most Americans show for the high court’s rulings.
“Ignoring the court isn’t done in this family,” the justice said.
During a session on corporate crime, a prominent class-action lawyer, Melvyn Weiss of Manhattan, warned that tort reform and similar measures could wipe out the plaintiffs’ bar.
Brandishing a copy of a Manhattan Institute report on trial lawyers, Mr. Weiss said, “This is what we’re up against, ladies and gentlemen, and if we don’t fight it, we’re dead meat.”
Another panelist said stockholders who said little about corporate governance in the 1990s share some of the blame for the recent corporate scandals.
“We were all making money. We weren’t out there saying, ‘Get ‘em Mel. Go get ‘em, Mel,” said a former attorney general of Massachusetts and a former president of Common Cause, Scott Harshbarger. He praised New York’s attorney general for his investigations.
“Elliott Spitzer has not drilled a dry hole yet,” Mr. Harshbarger said.
At another discussion, liberal lawyers said it was hypocritical for Republicans to push federal caps on damages in state tort cases while maintaining that they favor limited federal government.
There is an Electoral Uprising coming in November 2004.
Reuters: A New York concert promoter has mounted an online campaign to "draft" Bruce Springsteen to headline a rock 'n roll show to upstage the Republican National Convention on the night it nominates President Bush to run for another term.
The "Concert for Change," would be held Sept. 1 at Giants Stadium, across the Hudson River from the Republicans' meeting at Madison Square Garden, said promoter and Democratic activist Andrew Rasiej, who has reserved the date at Springsteen's New Jersey home venue that he routinely sells out when he tours...The New Jersey rocker has typically stayed out of politics, but in May posted the text of an anti-war speech by former Vice President Al Gore on his official Web site, calling it "one of the most important speeches I've heard in a long time."
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http://www.commondreams.org/headlines04/0622-04.htm
Published on Tuesday, June 22, 2004 by Reuters
NY Promoter Wants Springsteen to Upstage Bush
NEW YORK - A New York concert promoter has mounted an online campaign to "draft" Bruce Springsteen to headline a rock 'n roll show to upstage the Republican National Convention on the night it nominates President Bush to run for another term.
The "Concert for Change," would be held Sept. 1 at Giants Stadium, across the Hudson River from the Republicans' meeting at Madison Square Garden, said promoter and Democratic activist Andrew Rasiej, who has reserved the date at Springsteen's New Jersey home venue that he routinely sells out when he tours.
"This is a simple idea that captures the imagination of Americans opposed to George Bush," Rasiej told Reuters.
An online petition at www.draftbruce.com has been signed by about 50,000 people in 10 days since it was launched, Rasiej said, adding he had also reached out to acts such as REM, The Dave Matthews Band, Bob Dylan and Carlos Santana.
"When it gets to half a million or so I would formally try to deliver the petition to Bruce's people directly," he said.
"I've spoken to the manager of REM, to Bon Jovi's people and the rest of the names I've mentioned and they all said, 'if you build it, we will be there."'
Rasiej said he envisions drawing a big TV audience, but only if he can get a star of the magnitude of Springsteen to get on board and encourage other big acts to take part.
Springsteen's publicist was not available for comment.
Republicans and Democrats both asked to use his 1984 hit "Born in the U.S.A." -- a song about how unwelcoming America was to returning Vietnam veterans but often mistaken for a patriotic anthem -- for use in political campaigns. Springsteen declined the requests.
The New Jersey rocker has typically stayed out of politics, but in May posted the text of an anti-war speech by former Vice President Al Gore on his official Web site, calling it "one of the most important speeches I've heard in a long time."
Rasiej, founder of popular New York rock club Irving Plaza, said a "VoteAid" show could win a large TV audience, raise money to support voter registration and deliver a message that could affect the November presidential election.
© Copyright 2004 Reuters Ltd
###
Five more US soldiers have died in Iraq. For what? How
many more will die as a result of the Bush cabal's
neo-con wet dream? There is a profound revulsion and
revolt in the US military, the US intelligence
community, the US foreign policy establishment, and
across the entire political spectrum (center, left AND
right)...There is one simple way to guarantee that the
Bush abomination ends in DEFEAT this November. BUT
will the 9/11 Commissioners wimp out? Their
questioning, at least in public hearings, has been too
often painfully chummy, facile, non-confrontational
and off-the-mark? And if, by some miracle of American
spirit, the 9/11 Commission's final report does tell
the truth about the Bush abomination, will the "US
mainstream news media" provide appropriate CONTEXT and
CONTINUITY? Or will they just blurt out some ugly
truths in half-truth packings and then run and hide?
Or will perhaps the 9/11 Commission itself explode --
with some staff member and even one or two
commissioners resigning and speaking out publicly? IF
the 9/11 Commission, or a sufficient number of
individuals associated with it as staffers or
commissioners, decides to speak the truth about pre-9/11
criminal negligence, they will succeed in
finishing off the Bush cabal -- politically...The
future of this Republic is very bleak for many years
to come if we fail...
Ray McGovern, www.tompaine.com: Will the Sept. 11
Commission follow the example set by Congress and the
Intelligence Community and let itself be intimidated
by Vice President Dick Cheney?
Now that the commission’s staff report has pulled the
rug out from under the notion so successfully fostered
by the administration that Iraq played a role in the
attacks of 9/11, no one should be surprised if the
commissioners pull the rug out from under the staff.
There are disquieting signs that this has already
begun to happen.
Repudiate the 9/11 Cover-Up and the Iraq War Lies,
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http://www.tompaine.com/print/will_the_commissioners_cave.php
Will The Commissioners Cave?
by Ray McGovern
June 21, 2004
Amid the feeding frenzy over last week’s staff report
of the 9/11 commission, the press downplayed an
important fact: the report was produced by the staff
and not the commissioners themselves. This matters
greatly as we approach the July 26 deadline for the
commission’s final report. The Democratic
commissioners are saying the staff report reflects the
commission’s findings, while the Republican
commissioners disagree. McGovern, a former CIA
analyst, explains the partisan wrangling we can expect
during the next month.
Ray McGovern, a CIA analyst for 27 years, is
co-founder of Veteran Intelligence Professionals for
Sanity.
Will the Sept. 11 Commission follow the example set by
Congress and the Intelligence Community and let itself
be intimidated by Vice President Dick Cheney?
Now that the commission’s staff report has pulled the
rug out from under the notion so successfully fostered
by the administration that Iraq played a role in the
attacks of 9/11, no one should be surprised if the
commissioners pull the rug out from under the staff.
There are disquieting signs that this has already
begun to happen.
The stakes could not be higher for the president and
vice president. Arguably, the commission is in
position to play in 2004 a role analogous to that
played by the Supreme Court in 2000 in ensuring the
election of George W. Bush and Cheney. This, I
believe, accounts for the dyspeptic reaction of the
two to the staff report and the press play accorded it
last week.
New York Times pundit William Safire is also outraged.
In his column today he lashes out at the commission
chairman, Republican Tom Kean, and the vice chairman,
Democrat Lee Hamilton, for letting themselves be
“jerked around by a manipulative staff.” Safire
drives home the point that the staff conclusion
concerning Iraq and 9/11 was “not a judgment of the
panel of commissioners,” but rather “an interim report
of the commission’s runaway staff.”
Republican Commissioners Fall Into Line
Appearing Sunday on ABC’s This Week, Sept. 11
commission chairman Kean fell in line, saying
repeatedly that the staff report is only an “interim
report.” Not only did he note it is “not finished,”
the commissioners themselves have not been involved in
it so far and the final report will include whatever
“new information” becomes available.
It is not hard to see what is coming. On Thursday
Cheney told the press that he “probably” had more
intelligence information than had been made available
to the commission. Commissioner John Lehman, another
Republican stalwart, told Meet the Press Sunday “the
vice president was right when he said that he may have
things that we don’t have. And we are now in the
process of getting the latest intelligence.”
Flash back, if you dare, to other “intelligence”
promoted by Cheney: the aluminum tubes that turned
out not to be suitable for fashioning nuclear
materials after all; the mobile “biological warfare
labs” that produced nothing more lethal than hydrogen
for weather balloons; the infamous report, based on
forged documents, alleging that Iraq was seeking
uranium in Africa.
The Perils Of Partisanship
What is clear is that Washington is in for a month of
partisan wrangling among the commissioners and staff
before the July 26 deadline for the
report—partisanship of the kind demonstrated at the
grilling of former counter-terrorism chief Richard
Clark. This time it will all take place behind closed
doors. Lehman conceded on Meet the Press, “We’re
under tremendous political pressure…in this election
year.”
Indeed, the commission was highly politicized from the
get-go, with its work carefully choreographed.
Subpoena power, for example, requires a majority vote
among the five Republican and five Democrat
commissioners. And, as the public hearings have
already shown, the White House can count on seasoned
protection from heavy hitters like Fred Fielding,
legal counsel to Presidents Nixon and Reagan, as well
as from Lehman and the other Republican commissioners.
Once again, “intelligence” will be front and center,
with Cheney in the background as super-analyst. CIA
Director George Tenet is packing his bags for his July
11 departure, and there is zero chance his
well-mannered deputy, John McLaughlin, will depart
from what has become customary practice—at the CIA and
elsewhere— and stand up to the vice president.
The Neuralgic Point
When Meet the Press’ Tim Russert quoted The New York
Times’ contention that the commission staff report
“directly contradicts public statements by Bush and
Cheney regarding Iraq and 9/11,” Lehman, borrowing
from Cheney’s lexicon, branded the Times report
“outrageously irresponsible journalism.” Echoing
Kean’s remarks, Lehman added parenthetically, “And,
again, this is a staff statement; the commissioners
have not yet addressed this issue.”
Democrat Commissioner Richard Ben-Veniste had just
told Russert, “There was no Iraqi involvement in 9/11.
That’s what our commission found. That’s what our
staff, which included former high-ranking CIA
officials, who know what to look for (found).”
Interesting. Ben-Veniste saying it is what the
commission found; Kean and Lehman saying the
commissioners have not yet addressed the issue. A
harbinger of the wrangling to come.
That Troublesome Constitution Again
Most observers are familiar with the rhetorical
landscape with which Bush and Cheney persuaded a large
majority of Americans that Iraq played a role in the
attacks of 9/11, and many shrug this off as familiar
spin by politicians inclined to take liberties with
the facts. So far little attention has been given to
the fact that a constitutional issue is involved.
On March 19, 2002, the day the war began, President
Bush sent a letter to Congress in which he said that
the war was permitted under legislation authorizing
force against those who “planned, authorized,
committed, or aided the terrorist attacks that
occurred on September 11, 2001.” If the staff’s
finding that there is “no credible evidence that Iraq
and Al Qaeda cooperated on attacks against the United
States” is allowed to stand, the Bush administration
will be shown to have gone afoul of the Constitution
yet again.
Watch For New “Intelligence”
So expect new “intelligence” (and hope against hope
that there is time to give it the smell test).
Lehman’s assurance that the commission report will be
updated with new intelligence “right up until we go to
press” is by no means reassuring. If it is the truth
that is sought, there should by now be widespread
awareness of the pitfalls of cherry-picking
unevaluated, uncorroborated, “this-just-in” pieces of
intelligence.
Also watch for administration attempts to change the
final draft report, if the Republican commissioners do
not succeed in neutralizing offending passages.
Tim Russert called attention Sunday to reports that
the White House had been allowed to review the staff
reports just made public, and asked if that was
appropriate. Ben-Veniste indicated that the purpose
of reviewing the reports is supposed to be to find and
eliminate any classified information. He also said,
though, that the White House “went somewhat beyond
that and took issue with some of what the staff had
concluded.”
Indeed, an early draft of one draft report was
changed, according to Newsweek. A passage expressing
skepticism about the account of Cheney getting Bush’s
approval for the shoot-down order was reportedly
removed after the White House objected.
Ben-Veniste told Russert that the White House will
review the final report before it is made public.
Thus, there will be considerable opportunity for the
manufacture of “insurmountable” classification
problems, for delay and for other mischief—given the
potential political explosiveness of the commission’s
final report.
It will not be surprising if the final report is not
made public until well after the target date of July
26 (the same day the Democratic Convention opens in
Boston). If the report does meet that target, it is
likely that it will appear in significantly truncated
form.
There is an Electoral Uprising is coming in November
to re-affirm the reality that 2+2=4, not only in
science but in government and media.
Associated Press: Democrat John Kerry, touting the endorsement of 48 Nobel Prize-winning scientists, has criticized President Bush for relying on ideology rather than fact in the pursuit of science and
repeated his pledge to overturn the ban on federal
funding of research on new stem cell lines.
Restore the Timeline, Show Up for Democracy in 2004:
Defeat Bush (again!)
http://www.cnn.com/2004/ALLPOLITICS/06/21/kerry.science.ap/index.html
Kerry: Bush puts ideology ahead of research
Bush camp says president is commited to the sciences
Monday, June 21, 2004 Posted: 1:43 PM EDT (1743 GMT)
NANTUCKET, Massachusetts (AP) -- Democrat John Kerry,
touting the endorsement of 48 Nobel Prize-winning
scientists, has criticized President Bush for relying
on ideology rather than fact in the pursuit of science
and repeated his pledge to overturn the ban on federal
funding of research on new stem cell lines..
"We need a president who will once again embrace our
tradition of looking toward the future and new
discoveries with hope based on scientific facts, not
fear," the presidential candidate said in a speech
prepared for a Monday afternoon appearance in Denver.
Kerry is making his first public campaign trip to
Colorado, a traditionally Republican-leaning state.
It has voted Democratic before, choosing Bill Clinton
in 1992, and Kerry's advisers say it could do so again
this year because of the growing Hispanic population
and jobs losses under Bush.
The Massachusetts senator also hopes to have special
appeal because he was born at Fitzsimmons Army
Hospital near Denver and can relate with his military
background to the many veterans who live there.
Kerry has visited Colorado for private fund-raisers
and planned to fly from a weekend on this vacation
island to the ski haven of Aspen to raise money at a
private home before his speech in Denver.
In those remarks, Kerry said Bush's anti-science
initiatives included limiting stem cell research;
removing information about the global warming threat
from a 2003 Environmental Protection Agency report;
ordering changes to a report that described damage
that would be caused by oil-drilling in the Arctic
National Wildlife Refuge and deleting information
about condoms from government Web sites.
A Kerry campaign statement said Bush's proposed budget
cuts in the National Science Foundation, the EPA and
Veterans Affairs Department would "stymie important
scientific discoveries."
Kerry also pointed to a report by the Union of
Concerned Scientists that the administration distorts
scientific findings and tries to manipulate experts'
advice to avoid information that runs counter to its
political beliefs.
Bush's top science adviser said the report was
inaccurate and flawed in its methodology.
Kerry pledged to listen to the country's scientists
and make decisions based on their advice.
He also repeated his pledge to fund new stem cell
lines. Aides said he would announce proposed increases
in federal spending on science Tuesday.
Bush campaign spokesman Steve Schmidt said the
president has made an unprecedented commitment to the
sciences and funding levels are at record highs.
"President Bush has an enormous investment in the
National Institutes of Health and other areas of
scientific research," he said.
Harold Varmus, a former head of the NIH and a Kerry
supporter, said Bush continued President Clinton's
plan to double the agency's budget over five years.
But, he said, White House documents show the
administration is prepared to cut the NIH budget by
2.1 percent in 2006.
Other scientific budgets have increased, but under the
rate of inflation, Varmus said.
"I, like many scientists, feel like the country needs
stronger leadership on scientific research," said
Varmus, one of the Nobel Prize-winning scientists who
announced their endorsement of Kerry in an open letter
Monday.
The other signers include winners from 1957-2003 in
chemistry, physics and medicine.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Copyright 2004 The Associated Press. All rights
reserved.This material may not be published,
broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.
Find this article at:
http://www.cnn.com/2004/ALLPOLITICS/06/21/kerry.science.ap/index.html
There is a national sense of REVULSION, and it is
growing, it will result in an Electoral Uprising in
November 2004...Drip, drip, drip...Chalabi, Plame, the
WMD lies, the pre-9/11 negligence, Halliburton, Enron
and the phoney "California energy crisis," the
prostitution of the EPA, Abu Ghraib...
Harvard University Law School: A group of more than 450 professors of law, international relations, and public policy--led by Harvard Law School faculty members--today sent a letter calling on Congress to hold accountable, through impeachment and removal if appropriate, civilian officials from the top of the Executive Branch on down for policies developed at high levels that have facilitated the recent abuses at Abu Ghraib. The letter also calls on Congress to take primary responsibility for any policy on coercive
interrogation employed by the United States.
In asking Congress to assess Executive Branch
accountability, the letter says: "a growing body of
evidence indicates that the abuses practiced on
detainees under American control are the consequence
of policies developed at the highest levels in the
months and years immediately preceding the scandal."
It argues that prosecution of lower level personnel
"while necessary, is clearly insufficient."
Support Our Troops, Show Up for Democracy in 2004:
Defeat Bush (again!)
http://www.law.harvard.edu/news/2004/06/16_congressletter.php
Harvard Law Professors Urge Congress to Review
Interrogation Policy and Hold Executive Branch
Accountable
Post Date: June 16, 2004
A group of more than 450 professors of law,
international relations, and public policy--led by
Harvard Law School faculty members--today sent a
letter calling on Congress to hold accountable,
through impeachment and removal if appropriate,
civilian officials from the top of the Executive
Branch on down for policies developed at high levels
that have facilitated the recent abuses at Abu Ghraib.
The letter also calls on Congress to take primary
responsibility for any policy on coercive
interrogation employed by the United States.
In asking Congress to assess Executive Branch
accountability, the letter says: "a growing body of
evidence indicates that the abuses practiced on
detainees under American control are the consequence
of policies developed at the highest levels in the
months and years immediately preceding the scandal."
It argues that prosecution of lower level personnel
"while necessary, is clearly insufficient."
In asking Congress to take responsibility for
reviewing coercive interrogation policies and
practices, the letter notes that "official U.S. policy
now involves use of coercive methods that are morally
questionable and that may violate international and
domestic law." It further states: "....any decision to
adopt a coercive interrogation policy and the
definition of any such policy, if adopted, should be
made within the strict confines of a democratic
process.... [B]asic principles and policies regarding
human rights must be defined by a representative and
accountable body acting in transparent and
deliberative fashion."
Elizabeth Bartholet, one of the Harvard Law professors
organizing the letter effort, stated: "The letter
arose out of our concern that some of the most
fundamental issues raised by these abuses were getting
lost in the debate. The use of torture and related
extreme coercive techniques goes to the heart of our
understanding of our nation, its culture and values.
If we take seriously our democratic system, any
decision to use such techniques must be made by
Congress as the representative body, rather than by
Executive Branch officials working in secrecy."
Christine Desan, another organizer, stated: "As the
letter emphasizes, there can be no doubt that the acts
of abuse in Abu Ghraib prison constitute violations of
both the domestic and international legal obligations
of the U.S. and its agents. Executive Branch officials
have admitted as much."
Henry Steiner, director of Harvard Law School's Human
Rights Program, said: "The policies adopted and the
abuses to which they led have hurt not only the
immediate victims in terrible ways but also the
credibility and effectiveness of our country's efforts
in Iraq and elsewhere."
U.S. Senator Edward M. Kennedy will hold a press
conference in Washington, D.C. today to demonstrate
his support for its demands.
"The soldiers responsible for these atrocities need to
be held accountable. But they were not responsible for
setting the policy," said Kennedy. "We need to know
what orders and guidelines they were given, and where
those policies originated. No one should be immune to
questions, including the President."
The letter has been signed by 56 law teachers at
Harvard Law School, including former Dean Robert C.
Clark, and Professors Laurence Tribe, Alan Dershowitz,
Lani Guinier, Detlev Vagts and Frank Michelman. It has
also been signed by leading experts on international
relations, public policy and constitutional law across
the nation, including Yale University Professor Bruce
Ackerman; Professor Philip Alston, director of NYU's
Center for Human Rights and Global Justice; Jose
Alvarez, director of the Center on Global Legal
Problems at Columbia Law School; Duke Law School
Professor Paul Carrington; Georgetown Law School
Professor David Cole; Princeton Professor Richard
Falk; Columbia Law School Professor Jack Greenberg;
Kennedy School of Government Professor Christopher
Jencks; UCLA Law School Professor Kenneth Karst;
Juliette Kayyem of the Kennedy School of Government;
University of Texas Law School Professor Sanford
Levinson; David Scheffer, former U.S. ambassador at
large for war crimes issues; and Harvard University
Professor William Julius Wilson.
The letter has also been signed by members of the
Faculty of the Tufts University Fletcher School. It
has been signed by a total of 481 members of
university faculties across the nation, from more than
110 schools in 40 different states. It has been sent
to all members of Congress and of the relevant
Congressional committees.
The letter and the list of signers as of June 14 is
available at www.iraq-letter.com.
For additional information please contact Harvard Law
School Professors Christine Desan (617-495-4613 or
desan@law.harvard.edu), Henry Steiner (617-495-3107 or
hsteiner@law.harvard.edu), Martha Minow
(minow@law.harvard.edu) or Elizabeth Bartholet
(617-495-3128 or ebarthol@law.harvard.edu). Please
note: Professor Bartholet will be unavailable from
June 15-20.
The signifigance of this story is not that a NYTwits
reporter found Fahrenheit 911 accurate. Who are they to arbitrate accuracy?
The NYTwits have not gotten many facts straight, including simple arithmetic in regard to who "won" in Fraudida, for a painfully long time...No, the signifigance of this story is that a NYTwits reporter DIDN'T twist facts to imply inaccuracies in Fahrenheit 911, as they did to Al Gore and are doing to Sen. John F. Kerry (D - Mekong Delta)...
Greg Mitchell, Editors and Publishers: The author of
the piece, reporter Philip Shenon (who has covered the
federal 9/11 commission for the past year) predicts
that Moore “may face an onslaught of fact-checking”
unlike any a documentary film-maker has faced before.
Shenon’s verdict: “It seems safe to say that central
assertions of fact in ‘Fahrenherit 9/11’ are supported
by the public record….”
He also quotes Moore telling him, “without an ounce of
humor,” that attempts to libel him “will be met by
force.” He reveals that Moore has readied a “war room”
to offer instant rebuttal to conservative critics;
hired Democratic activist Chris Lehane; and has a team
of lawyers ready to bring defamation suits.
Shenon says Moore “is on firm ground” in arguing that
the Bushes have profited handsomely from their
relationships with the Saudis, including the bin Laden
family and the Saudi rulers. He also notes that Moore
is safe in charging that Bush paid too little
attention to terrorism before 9/11, and suggests he is
accurate when he claims that during Bush’s first eight
months in office he spent 42% of his time on vacation
(the source being The Washington Post.
And he predicts that perhaps more “damaging to the
White House” than any statistics in the film is its
unedited replaying of the seven minutes Bush spent
reading the book “My Pet Goat” to schoolchildren in
Florida after hearing the news of the second attack on
the World Trade Center.
Break the Bush Cabal Stranglehold on the "US
Mainstream News Media," Show Up for Democracy in 2004:
Defeat Bush (again!)
http://www.editorandpublisher.com/eandp/news/article_display.jsp?vnu_content_id=1000536074
'NY Times' 9/11 Reporter Reviews Facts in Michael Moore Film
By Greg Mitchell
Published: June 19, 2004
NEW YORK We had Ronald Reagan Week in the press, and
Bill Clinton Week will pass in a few days, and then
Michael Moore Week will surely arrive. The New York
Times gets a jump on it in tomorrow’s Arts & Leisure
section with a lengthy appraisal of the facts and
opinions in Moore’s controversial film “Fahrenheit
9/11” which will be released on Friday.
The author of the piece, reporter Philip Shenon (who
has covered the federal 9/11 commission for the past
year) predicts that Moore “may face an onslaught of
fact-checking” unlike any a documentary film-maker has
faced before. Shenon’s verdict: “It seems safe to say
that central assertions of fact in ‘Fahrenherit 9/11’
are supported by the public record….”
He also quotes Moore telling him, “without an ounce of
humor,” that attempts to libel him “will be met by
force.” He reveals that Moore has readied a “war room”
to offer instant rebuttal to conservative critics;
hired Democratic activist Chris Lehane; and has a team
of lawyers ready to bring defamation suits.
Shenon says Moore “is on firm ground” in arguing that
the Bushes have profited handsomely from their
relationships with the Saudis, including the bin Laden
family and the Saudi rulers. He also notes that Moore
is safe in charging that Bush paid too little
attention to terrorism before 9/11, and suggests he is
accurate when he claims that during Bush’s first eight
months in office he spent 42% of his time on vacation
(the source being The Washington Post.
And he predicts that perhaps more “damaging to the
White House” than any statistics in the film is its
unedited replaying of the seven minutes Bush spent
reading the book “My Pet Goat” to schoolchildren in
Florida after hearing the news of the second attack on
the World Trade Center.
But Shenon adds: “The most valid criticism of the film
are likely to involve the artful way that Mr. Moore
connects the facts, and whether has had left out
others that might undermine his scalding attack.”
Shenon cites one unproven assertion that Saudis own 6
to 7 percent of the United States. Despite criticism,
he reveals, Moore has left in the film dark claims
that the bin Laden family was allowed to fly out of
the U.S. before air space was open to anyone else.
Shenon also reveals, however, that Moore has deleted
his claims that Attorney General Ashcroft did not take
any commercial flights in the summer before 9/11,
after finding that he had done so “at least twice.”
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Greg Mitchell (gmitchell@editorandpublisher.com) is
editor of E & P
Drip, drip, drip...Abu Ghraib, Chalabi, the WMD lies,
Halliburton, Enron and the phoney "Calfornia energy
crisis," Medifraud, Plame...drip, drip, drip...
Associated Press: White House counsel Alberto Gonzales
underwent questioning at the federal courthouse. He
was the latest in a string of administration officials
to be asked about the unauthorized disclosure of the
name of CIA operative Valerie Plame, wife of former
Ambassador Joseph Wilson, to the news media...Vice
President Dick Cheney was recently questioned by
investigators, and President Bush has indicated that
he, too, expects to be questioned. Bush has consulted
with a private attorney about the case, since the
White House counsel can represent him only on official
matters.
Repudiate the 9/11 Cover-Up and the Iraq War Lies,
Show Up for Democracy in 2004: Defeat Bush (again!)
http://www.truthout.org/docs_04/062104B.shtml
White House Counsel Questioned in Leak Probe
Associated Press
Saturday 19 June 2004
Grand jury investigates outing of covert CIA operative: The White House’s top lawyer was questioned by a federal grand jury Friday in the criminal investigation of who in the Bush administration leaked the name of a covert CIA operative last year.
White House counsel Alberto Gonzales underwent
questioning at the federal courthouse. He was the
latest in a string of administration officials to be
asked about the unauthorized disclosure of the name of
CIA operative Valerie Plame, wife of former Ambassador
Joseph Wilson, to the news media.
"The president directed the White House to
cooperate fully, and Judge Gonzales was just doing his
part to cooperate," said White House press secretary
Scott McClellan, who also has gone before the grand
jury.
Vice President Dick Cheney was recently questioned
by investigators, and President Bush has indicated
that he, too, expects to be questioned. Bush has
consulted with a private attorney about the case,
since the White House counsel can represent him only
on official matters.
Disclosure of an undercover officer’s identity can
be a federal crime.
Syndicated columnist Robert Novak revealed Plame’s
work for the CIA a week after Wilson publicly
criticized Bush’s claim that Iraq had tried to obtain
uranium from the African nation of Niger.
Wilson had earlier been sent to Niger by the CIA
to check out the allegation and concluded it was
unfounded. Bush stated subsequently in his State of
the Union address that Iraq had sought to buy uranium
in Africa.
Wilson has said that revealing his wife’s name was
an attempt to discredit him. In printing Plame’s name,
Novak wrote that two administration officials said
Wilson’s wife suggested sending him on the Niger trip.
Wilson has suggested in a book that the leaker was
Lewis "Scooter" Libby, Cheney’s chief of staff.
The White House denies the claim and accuses
Wilson of seeking to bolster the campaign of Democrat
John Kerry, for whom he has acted as a foreign policy
adviser.
-------
Drip, drip, drip...Abu Ghraib, Chalabi, the WMD lies,
Halliburton, Medifraud, Plame, the prostitution of the
EPA, Enron and the phoney "Calfornia energy crisis,"
and Enron itself (i.e. "Kenny Boy" Lay -- confidant
and financier of the increasingly unhinged and
incredibly shrinking _resident)...drip, drip, drip...
Mary Flood, Houston Chronicle: Federal prosecutors
plan to ask a grand jury to indict Ken Lay on charges
relating to the last few months he was at the helm of
Enron as the company spiraled into its stunning 2001
collapse.
The indictments are expected within two weeks,
according to lawyers close to the case...
Free Martha Stewart, Prosecute the Real Corporate
Criminals, Show Up for Democracy in 2004: Defeat Bush
(again!)
http://www.truthout.org/docs_04/062104F.shtml
Prosecutors Seeking Lay Indictment
By Mary Flood
Houston Chronicle
Saturday 19 June 2004
Federal prosecutors plan to ask a grand jury to
indict Ken Lay on charges relating to the last few
months he was at the helm of Enron as the company
spiraled into its stunning 2001 collapse.
The indictments are expected within two weeks,
according to lawyers close to the case.
For the past 2 1/2 years, the Justice Department's
Enron Task Force has been investigating Lay - the
company's former chairman - and recently the probe has
picked up steam.
Over the past few weeks, witnesses about Lay have
appeared before the Enron grand jury in increasing
numbers. At the same time, prosecutors have been
separately interviewing other witnesses and shoring up
details about Lay.
Government lawyers have been playing their cards
close to their vests, and lawyers for witnesses
acknowledge that prosecutors could postpone the final
presentation of the case.
Prosecutors are barred from speaking publicly
about grand jury business, and Enron Task Force
Director Andrew Weissmann would not comment for this
story.
But the Houston-based grand jury has already heard
five days of testimony this month, all focused on Lay.
Enron Task Force prosecutors John Hemann and John
Hueston, who are investigating Lay, have taken in
witness after witness, including Lay's Chief of Staff
Steven Kean and ex-Enron General Counsel Jim Derrick.
Topics that prosecutors have been quizzing
witnesses about include:
Lay's receipt of three memos or e-mails warning of
financial trouble and fraud at the company within
weeks of Jeff Skilling's abrupt August 2001 departure
as CEO.
His public statements to investors and analysts.
Lay's attempt to find an alternative to having to
substantially write down the "goodwill" or excess
price paid for assets.
His trades of company stock for millions of dollars in
company cash in those last months.
Lay's Houston-based lawyer, Mike Ramsey, said
Friday that while he knows there is an active
investigation into his client, he will be surprised if
there's an indictment.
"Indict him for what?" Ramsey said Friday. "I
don't know what they could charge him with."
Lay's lawyers have noted Lay has a good defense to
insider trading charges because he held on to much of
his Enron stock even as the company went bankrupt. And
they said most of the millions in cash he borrowed
from the company and paid back with stock was used to
pay off other debt created by the fall of the price of
Enron stock.
In classic prosecutorial fashion, the Enron Task
Force has charged underlings and worked their way up
the employee food chain. Twenty-one former Enron
employees have been charged along with eight other
people from banks, financial firms or accounting firms
that did business with Enron.
The most recent indictment was against Lay's
second in command - ex-CEO Jeff Skilling, who pleaded
not guilty to 35 felony charges in February.
Though it's possible the government has no
"smoking gun" witness against Lay, prosecutors will
likely use a plethora of witnesses to accuse the
62-year-old.
Among the witnesses the government might use
against Lay are the company's ex-Chief Financial
Officer Andrew Fastow, who pleaded guilty to two
charges and agreed to cooperate with prosecutors; the
company's former treasurer Ben Glisan, serving a
five-year prison term but who testified before the
grand jury in February and March; and Paula Rieker, a
former executive in investor relations who has pleaded
guilty. She traveled to New York with Lay in October
2001, a trip when the Enron entourage is alleged to
have made false statements to analysts about Enron's
troubles.
Prosecutors now have the cooperation of 10 people
who have pleaded guilty, some of whom have been
re-interviewed in recent weeks, focusing on Lay and
others, including ex-Chief Accounting Officer Rick
Causey.
Lay is likely to be charged with some type of
fraud, possibly similar to the charges against
Skilling and Causey. They are charged with insider
trading, securities fraud, wire fraud, conspiracy and
lying on Enron financial statements.
Several of the lawyers representing witnesses in
the case speculate that rather than indict Lay
separately, prosecutors will add Lay to the case
against Skilling and Causey, meaning the three would
be tried together.
This could be done for two main reasons: The
government likes the efficiency of U.S. District Judge
Sim Lake, who is overseeing the existing case, and it
might pressure Causey to consider a plea bargain. But
Causey has pleaded not guilty to 31 charges and has
shown no signs of interest in a plea bargain.
Prosecutors seem to be focusing on Lay's behavior
from August 2001 to the company's bankruptcy in
December 2001 and seem to be especially interested in
what Lay saw, heard or said regarding events
including:
Aug. 13, 2001 - Lay's internal credit line, where
he could trade Enron stock for company cash, was
expanded from a $4 million cap to a $7.5 million cap.
The evidence of this largesse is a handwritten note on
meeting minutes saying : "$7.5 million per Dr.
LeMaistre." In January 2003, Dr. Charles LeMaistre,
the retired head of University of Texas M.D. Anderson
Cancer Center who ran the board's compensation
committee, appeared before the Enron grand jury.
In August, September and October of 2001, Lay
borrowed more than $15 million through this revolving
credit line, paying it back with stock and leaving a
debt of some $7 million when the company declared
bankruptcy.
Aug. 14 - Skilling abruptly resigned, leaving Lay
as both CEO and board chairman and unable to claim he
was letting someone else run the company. Lay told
people Skilling left for personal reasons but if he
knew otherwise, even those representations might work
against him.
Aug. 15 - Vice President Sherron Watkins sent her
now-famous memo to Lay warning of impending accounting
scandal and citing several problematic deals including
the four accounting partnerships, called the Raptors;
and Fastow's involvement in side deals.
Lay had the Vinson & Elkins law firm do a review,
though Watkins suggested that firm has a conflict and
outside accountants should take a look.
Aug. 17 - Lay's Chief of Staff Steven Kean
e-mailed Lay warning about problems with accounting,
overhyping of stock and a mercenary culture at Enron.
E-mail was almost schizophrenic, simultaneously
lauding the company while listing severe problems.
Last week of August - Recently laid-off employee
Margaret Ceconi sent e-mail addressed to Lay and the
board secretary warning of fraud in hiding Enron
Energy Services losses of at least $500 million by
moving them to another sector of Enron to make EES
appear profitable.
In this last quarter, Lay sought to find ways
around new accounting rules that would require the
company to acknowledge debt from the "goodwill"
payments for assets over their market value
Prosecutors are interested in whether Lay
specifically sought to improperly lessen the financial
hit from Enron's Azurix asset purchases, including its
overpriced acquisition of Wessex Water in the United
Kingdom.
Prosecutors will also want evidence of the
positive statements Lay made to employees, analysts,
and investors from August until the bankruptcy.
In September 2001, for example, Lay told Enron
employees that the stock is "incredibly cheap" and
said "talk up the stock and talk positively about
Enron to your family and friends. ... There have been
all kinds of reckless and unfounded rumors about Enron
and the financial condition of Enron.
-------
CREDIBILITY? COMPETENCY? CHARACTER? The action of the
"Diplomats and Military Commanders for Change" is
UNPRECEDENTED, and provides compelling bi-partisan and
expert testimony to the failures of the Bush
abomination...At least one wire service is providing
worthy CONTEXT and continuity for this story...
Bloomberg News: The statement by 27 former diplomats
and military officers on Wednesday calling for the
defeat of U.S. President George W. Bush may be
unprecedented.
``Their prominence and seniority and influence when in
their diplomatic or military posts, and their number,
is really remarkable,'' said Richard Kohn, the
Pentagon's chief Air Force historian from 1981-1991
and chairman of the University of North Carolina's
peace, war and defense curriculum in Chapel Hill.
Repudiate the 9/11 Cover-Up and the Iraq War Lies,
Show Up for Democracy in 2004: Defeat Bush (again!)
http://quote.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=10000103&sid=alMjDzShgJkQ&refer=us
U.S.
Bush Censure by Envoys May Be a First, Historians Say
(Update2)
June 18 (Bloomberg) -- The statement by 27 former
diplomats and military officers on Wednesday calling
for the defeat of U.S. President George W. Bush may be
unprecedented.
``Their prominence and seniority and influence when in
their diplomatic or military posts, and their number,
is really remarkable,'' said Richard Kohn, the
Pentagon's chief Air Force historian from 1981-1991
and chairman of the University of North Carolina's
peace, war and defense curriculum in Chapel Hill.
The group, which includes Democrats and Republicans,
said Bush's foreign policy and the war in Iraq have
damaged U.S. security. Its statement may sway voters
already concerned by reports of abuse of Iraqi
prisoners by U.S. soldiers and the conclusion by a
bipartisan commission that Saddam Hussein had no
connection to the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks.
The investigative commission, appointed by the
president, found no evidence that Hussein's regime
worked with the al-Qaeda terrorist organization to
plan the attacks on the World Trade Center in New York
and the Pentagon in Washington. Bush, 57, responded
that Hussein and al-Qaeda had ``numerous contacts''
outside of the attacks that justified the U.S. war in
Iraq.
``Bush's credibility has been damaged by Iraq,'' said
Greg Valliere, chief political strategist at Schwab
Soundview Capital Markets in Washington. Democratic
presidential candidate and Massachusetts Senator John
Kerry ``has greater potential to get traction on
issues like this,'' Valliere said.
Group's Statement
``From the outset, George W. Bush adopted an
overbearing approach to America's role in the world,
relying upon military might and righteousness,
insensitive to the concerns of traditional friends and
allies, and disdainful of the United Nations,'' said
the group, Diplomats and Military Commanders for
Change, in a statement Wednesday. They said Bush
should be defeated, without explicitly endorsing
Kerry, 60.
The group included Jack Matlock Jr., President Ronald
Reagan's ambassador to the Soviet Union; retired
Admiral William Crowe, Joint Chiefs of Staff chairman
under Reagan; Charles Freeman, President George H.W.
Bush's ambassador to Saudi Arabia; and retired Air
Force Chief of Staff Merrill McPeak, who is advising
Kerry's campaign.
``I can't remember anything comparable to that,'' said
historian Arthur Schlesinger Jr., 86, who was an
adviser to President John F. Kennedy, a Democrat. ``I
can't remember a precedent.'' Schlesinger won the
Pulitzer Prize for his 1965 book, ``A Thousand Days:
John F. Kennedy in the White House.''
`Questionable Entries'
The Bush campaign said at least 20 of the signatories
have been active politically before and at least 13
have contributed to Democrats, making the group a
partisan one.
``There are some questionable entries'' who can't
claim to be neutral, said Larry Sabato, director of
the University of Virginia's Center for Politics.
Crowe, for example, endorsed Democrat Bill Clinton for
president in 1992, he said.
``There's always some naysayers that get rounded up by
the opposition,'' said Edwin Meese, 72, who served as
attorney general under Reagan. ``I don't think it'll
have much effect at all in the election, in as much as
their statements seem inconsistent with their past
positions.''
Bush's approval rating among adults in the U.S.
climbed in the last month as more Americans said the
military effort in Iraq was going well, a poll from
the Pew Research Center found.
Bush Gains
The survey, conducted June 3-13, found the president's
overall approval rating rose to 48 percent, from 44
percent in May. He also gained in the presidential
race against Kerry, pulling into a statistical tie
after trailing by 5 percentage points, according to
the Washington-based Pew Center.
Professors such as Michael Munger, chairman of the
political science department at Duke University, as
well as former diplomats and military officials said
the group's charges won't resonate with most voters.
The people paying the most attention are the so-called
swing voters, who may go either way, they said.
``These are people who don't get their crank turned by
the main issues,'' Munger said. ``Iraq bears no
resemblance to Vietnam militarily, but it may start to
resemble Vietnam politically. What is the mission?
When will it end?''
In the latest Los Angeles Times poll, Kerry led Bush
by a margin of 51 percent to 44 percent. Fifty-five
percent of voters said they disapproved of Bush's
handling of the war in Iraq, up from 46 percent in
March. The June 5-8 poll of 1,230 registered voters
nationwide had a margin of error of 3 percentage
points.
Open Season?
Crowe laid the groundwork for such a group when he
endorsed Clinton, said Thomas Keaney, executive
director of the foreign policy institute at Johns
Hopkins University's School of Advanced International
Studies in Washington. At the time, it was rare even
for a retired military officer to speak out, he said.
``Today that is more and more prevalent,'' said
Keaney, a retired Air Force Colonel who has also been
a professor at the National War College. For diplomats
and ex-military officials, political acts ``ought to
remain extraordinary,'' Keaney said. ``It will hurt if
the code changes, if it becomes open season.''
In the Vietnam War era, the types of people speaking
out were lower-ranked officers or soldiers without
commissions, said Phyllis Bennis, a fellow with the
Institute for Policy Studies, a Washington research
group that promotes democracy and human rights. Kerry,
a Navy lieutenant in Vietnam who earned three Purple
Hearts for injuries, a Silver Star for gallantry in
action and a Bronze Star for valor, was one of those
protesters.
The War Issue
``I don't remember a group of this stature before this
war,'' Bennis said. ``The war is a crucial issue for
every voting bloc -- those that are uncertain where
they stand will take this as a very serious
consideration.''
In the late 1950s, high-ranking retired military
officials publicly denounced President Dwight
Eisenhower's military strategy against the Soviet
Union, said Christopher Preble, director of foreign
policy studies at the Cato Institute, a Washington
public policy group that advocates limited government
and libertarian issues. They acted as individuals, he
said.
``We have seen this on specific issues at times,
expressing some unhappiness, but not a broad blast at
the administration like this,'' said Casimir Yost,
director of the Institute for the Study of Diplomacy
at Georgetown University.
The U.S. group may have been following counterparts in
the U.K. In an open letter released April 26, 52
former U.K. ambassadors and international officials
criticized Prime Minister Tony Blair for his support
of the U.S. administration's policies in Iraq and in
the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.
Powell Response
U.S. Secretary of State Colin Powell on Wednesday said
the U.S. group's statement was politically motivated.
``I disagree with their point of view,'' Powell, 67,
said in an interview with the Arab television channel
Al-Jazeera. ``They wish to see President Bush not
reelected. I do not believe that will be the judgment
of the American people.''
The Bush campaign has more than 80,000 veteran and
military volunteers and 49 Medal of Honor recipients
who support the president, spokesman Scott Stanzel
said. There are just 130 living recipients of the
highest U.S. military award, according to the Web site
http://www.medalofhonor.com .
``We are not surprised that John Kerry has the support
of people who share his belief that the threat of
terror is exaggerated,'' Stanzel said. ``This is a
group of partisan individuals who have been previously
active in politics. They certainly have a right to
express their Democratic views, but we're not
concerned with their activity.''
Veterans' Role
Military issues have gained more attention in the 2004
election because of Iraq and Kerry's efforts to
organize 1 million veterans to help him.
``To be involved in an act that will be seen by many
as political if not partisan is for many of us a new
experience,'' said Phyllis Oakley, a career diplomat
who served as assistant secretary of state for
intelligence and research under Clinton and signed the
statement. ``As career government officials, we have
served loyally both Republican and Democratic
administrations.''
Bush, commenting yesterday on the Sept. 11 commission
report, said ``there was a relationship'' with
al-Qaeda. ``This administration never said that the
9/11 attacks were orchestrated between Saddam and
al-Qaeda. We did say there were numerous contacts
between Saddam Hussein and al-Qaeda,'' he said.
That nuance may be lost on voters, said Ted Carpenter,
an analyst at the Cato Institute. ``The Bush message
that Iraq was in league with terrorists is fairly
simple to understand, but he will not get the
distinction between his message and the commission's
message,'' Carpenter said. ``The commission report
will have an impact; it will resonate with undecided
voters.''
Vice President Dick Cheney, 63, reiterated the
administration's position in a CNBC television
interview last night, calling the evidence of a
connection between the terrorists and Iraq
``overwhelming.''
To contact the reporter on this story:
Kristin Jensen in Washington at
or kjensen@Bloomberg.net.
To contact the editor responsible for this story:
Joe Winski in Washington at
or jwinski@bloomberg.net.
Last Updated: June 18, 2004 10:23 EDT
Drip, drip, drip...Plame, Chalabi, Abu Ghraib,
Halliburton...drip, drip, drip...
Antony Barnett and Martin Bright, Guardian: A British
lawyer is emerging as a key witness in a $180 million
bribery investigation that could lead to the
indictment of US vice president Dick Cheney.
Last week, US oil corporation Halliburton cut all ties
with a former senior executive, Albert Stanley, after
it emerged he had received as much as $5m in 'improper
personal benefits' as part of a $4bn gas project in
Nigeria. Halliburton also sacked a second
'consultant', William Chaudan in connection with the
bribery allegations. At the time of these alleged
payments, Cheney was chief executive of the
corporation.
French investigating magistrate Renaud van Ruymbeke is
examining a stream of payments surrounding the
controversial project which was built during the
regime of the late dictator Sani Abacha. The judge has
uncovered a $180m web of payments channeled through
offshore companies and bank accounts.
Cleanse the White House of the Chickenhawk Coup and
Its War-Profiteering Cronies, Show Up for Democracy in
2004: Defeat Bush (again!)
http://www.commondreams.org/headlines04/0620-01.htm
Published on Sunday, June 20, 2004 by the Observer/UK
Cheney in Firing Line over Nigerian Bribery Claims
by Antony Barnett and Martin Bright
A British lawyer is emerging as a key witness in a
$180 million bribery investigation that could lead to
the indictment of US vice president Dick Cheney.
Last week, US oil corporation Halliburton cut all ties
with a former senior executive, Albert Stanley, after
it emerged he had received as much as $5m in 'improper
personal benefits' as part of a $4bn gas project in
Nigeria. Halliburton also sacked a second
'consultant', William Chaudan in connection with the
bribery allegations. At the time of these alleged
payments, Cheney was chief executive of the
corporation.
French investigating magistrate Renaud van Ruymbeke is
examining a stream of payments surrounding the
controversial project which was built during the
regime of the late dictator Sani Abacha. The judge has
uncovered a $180m web of payments channeled through
offshore companies and bank accounts.
The Nigerian project to build a huge gas plant was
signed with an international consortium that included
Halliburton subsidiary Kellogg Brown & Root. Cheney
retired from the chief executive post in 2000.
The French judge is considering summoning Cheney to
give evidence in his probe to ascertain whether the US
vice president knew about the alleged commission
payments.
Van Ruymbeke has been investigating why the
consortium, which built the gas plant, paid up to
$180m to a Gibraltan company set up by British
solicitor Jeffrey Tesler, a partner in law firm Kaye
Tesler & Co, based in Tottenham, north London. Van
Ruymbeke wants to know whether the Gibraltar firm,
TriStar Investments, was used to distribute bribes to
win the contracts. Tesler has declined to answer media
questions about his role in the project.
The Nigerian deal to build a $4bn liquefied natural
gas plant is already subject to a formal investigation
by both the US department of justice and the
Securities and Exchange Commission.
Halliburton's decision to sever ties with Stanley and
Chaudan recognizes the firm's difficulty with the
corruption allegations. When the claims initially
arose in France the firm denied any improper
activities. A spokesman for Halliburton said the two
executives were dismissed because they had broken the
firm's 'code of business conduct'.
A statement added: 'While we do not know all of the
facts related to the issue we are taking these actions
in response to the facts that we do have and to
protect our investors, employees, customers and
vendors as several investigations proceed.'
The acknowledgement that Stanley was receiving
payments as part of the Nigeria deal brings the
allegations uncomfortably close to Cheney. Stanley was
chairman of Kellogg Brown & Root - one of
Halliburton's most important subsidiaries. The company
denied that Stanley - who retired as chairman in
December but remained a consultant - would have
reported directly to Cheney.
Neither Stanley, Chaudan or their lawyers have made
any comments on the allegations and the two US
directors do not currently face any legal action.
© Guardian Newspapers Limited 2004
Yes, as the LNS has stated over and over again, Bin Laden could not have hoped for better from the increasingly unhinged and incredibly shrinking _resident if he had written the script himself...The botched, bungled "war on terrorism" is NOT the strength of the Bush abomination, it is the SHAME of the Bush abomination...
Julain Borger, Guardian: A senior US intelligence official is about to publish a bitter condemnation of America's counter-terrorism policy, arguing that the west is losing the war against al-Qaida and that an "avaricious, premeditated, unprovoked" war in Iraq has played into Osama bin Laden's hands.
Imperial Hubris: Why the West is Losing the War on Terror, due out next month, dismisses two of the most frequent boasts of the Bush administration: that Bin Laden and al-Qaida are "on the run" and that the Iraq invasion has made America safer.
In an interview with the Guardian the official, who writes as "Anonymous", described al-Qaida as a much more proficient and focused organisation than it was in 2001, and predicted that it would "inevitably" acquire weapons of mass destruction and try to use them...
Imperial Hubris is the latest in a relentless stream of books attacking the administration in election year. Most of the earlier ones, however, were written by embittered former officials. This one is unprecedented in being the work of a serving official with nearly 20 years experience in counter-terrorism who is still part of the intelligence establishment.
Repudiate the 9/11 Cover-Up and the Iraq War Lies, Show Up for Democracy in 2004: Defeat Bush (again!)
http://www.guardian.co.uk/alqaida/story/0,12469,1242638,00.html
Bush told he is playing into Bin Laden's hands: Al-Qaida may 'reward' American president with strike aimed at keeping him in office, senior intelligence man says
Julian Borger in Washington
Saturday June 19, 2004
The Guardian
A senior US intelligence official is about to publish a bitter condemnation of America's counter-terrorism policy, arguing that the west is losing the war against al-Qaida and that an "avaricious, premeditated, unprovoked" war in Iraq has played into Osama bin Laden's hands.
Imperial Hubris: Why the West is Losing the War on Terror, due out next month, dismisses two of the most frequent boasts of the Bush administration: that Bin Laden and al-Qaida are "on the run" and that the Iraq invasion has made America safer.
In an interview with the Guardian the official, who writes as "Anonymous", described al-Qaida as a much more proficient and focused organisation than it was in 2001, and predicted that it would "inevitably" acquire weapons of mass destruction and try to use them.
He said Bin Laden was probably "comfortable" commanding his organisation from the mountainous tribal lands along the border between Pakistan and Afghanistan.
The Pakistani army claimed a big success in the "war against terror" yesterday with the killing of a tribal leader, Nek Mohammed, who was one of al-Qaida's protectors in Waziristan.
But Anonymous, who has been centrally involved in the hunt for Bin Laden, said: "Nek Mohammed is one guy in one small area. We sometimes forget how big the tribal areas are." He believes President Pervez Musharraf cannot advance much further into the tribal areas without endangering his rule by provoking a Pashtun revolt. "He walks a very fine line," he said yesterday.
Imperial Hubris is the latest in a relentless stream of books attacking the administration in election year. Most of the earlier ones, however, were written by embittered former officials. This one is unprecedented in being the work of a serving official with nearly 20 years experience in counter-terrorism who is still part of the intelligence establishment.
The fact that he has been allowed to publish, albeit anonymously and without naming which agency he works for, may reflect the increasing frustration of senior intelligence officials at the course the administration has taken.
Peter Bergen, the author of two books on Bin Laden and al-Qaida, said: "His views represent an amped-up version of what is emerging as a consensus among intelligence counter-terrorist professionals."
Anonymous does not try to veil his contempt for the Bush White House and its policies. His book describes the Iraq invasion as "an avaricious, premeditated, unprovoked war against a foe who posed no immediate threat but whose defeat did offer economic advantage.
"Our choice of timing, moreover, shows an abject, even wilful failure to recognise the ideological power, lethality and growth potential of the threat personified by Bin Laden, as well as the impetus that threat has been given by the US-led invasion and occupation of Muslim Iraq."
In his view, the US missed its biggest chance to capture the al-Qaida leader at Tora Bora in the Afghan mountains in December 2001. Instead of sending large numbers of his own troops, General Tommy Franks relied on surrogates who proved to be unreliable.
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"For my money, the game was over at Tora Bora," Anonymous said.
Yesterday President Bush repeated his assertion that Bin Laden was cornered and that there was "no hole or cave deep enough to hide from American justice".
Anonymous said: "I think we overestimate significantly the stress [Bin Laden's] under. Our media and sometimes our policymakers suggest he's hiding from rock to rock and hill to hill and cave to cave. My own hunch is that he's fairly comfortable where he is."
The death and arrest of experienced operatives might have set back Bin Laden's plans to some degree but when it came to his long-term capacity to threaten the US, he said, "I don't think we've laid a glove on him".
"What I think we're seeing in al-Qaida is a change of generation," he said."The people who are leading al-Qaida now seem a lot more professional group.
"They are more bureaucratic, more management competent, certainly more literate. Certainly, this generation is more computer literate, more comfortable with the tools of modernity. I also think they're much less prone to being the Errol Flynns of al-Qaida. They're just much more careful across the board in the way they operate."
As for weapons of mass destruction, he thinks that if al-Qaida does not have them already, it will inevitably acquire them.
The most likely source of a nuclear device would be the former Soviet Union, he believes. Dirty bombs, chemical and biological weapons, could be home-made by al-Qaida's own experts, many of them trained in the US and Britain.
Anonymous, who published an analysis of al-Qaida last year called Through Our Enemies' Eyes, thinks it quite possible that another devastating strike against the US could come during the election campaign, not with the intention of changing the administration, as was the case in the Madrid bombing, but of keeping the same one in place.
"I'm very sure they can't have a better administration for them than the one they have now," he said.
"One way to keep the Republicans in power is to mount an attack that would rally the country around the president."
The White House has yet to comment publicly on Imperial Hubris, which is due to be published on July 4, but intelligence experts say it may try to portray him as a professionally embittered maverick.
The tone of Imperial Hubris is certainly angry and urgent, and the stridency of his warnings about al-Qaida led him to be moved from a highly sensitive job in the late 90s.
But Vincent Cannistraro, a former chief of operations at the CIA counter-terrorism centre, said he had been vindicated by events. "He is very well respected, and looked on as a serious student of the subject."
Anonymous believes Mr Bush is taking the US in exactly the direction Bin Laden wants, towards all-out confrontation with Islam under the banner of spreading democracy.
He said: "It's going to take 10,000-15,000 dead Americans before we say to ourselves: 'What is going on'?"
Drip, drip, drip...Chalabi, Plame, WMD lies, pre-9/11, post-9/11, the 28 pages, the Bush-Bath-Bin Laden-Saud family business ties, the Alabama National Guard, Medifraud, Enron and the phoney "California energy crisis," Halliburton...drip, drip, drip...Vive le France!
Doug Ireland, The Nation: The Securities and Exchange Commission has finally opened a formal investigation into allegations that Halliburton (in partnership with French petro-engineering company Technip) funneled $180 million into a slush fund to pay bribes in the construction of a $6 billion Nigerian gas refinery--a scandal that French authorities have been probing for a year (for background, see Doug Ireland, "Will the French Indict Cheney?" December 29, 2003)...Although the US media have shown little interest in the story, the investigation of the Halliburton Nigeria scandal by France's most celebrated investigating magistrate, Judge Renaud Van Ruymbeke, has continued making headlines in Paris--where the latest revelations bring the scandal right to the front door of Halliburton's Houston headquarters.
Cleanse the White House of the Chickenhaw Coup and their War-Profiteering Cronies, Show Up for Democracy in 2004: Defeat Bush (again!)
http://www.thenation.com/doc.mhtml?i=20040705&s=ireland
Click here to return to the browser-optimized version of this page.
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--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Dick Cheney and the $5 Million Man
by DOUG IRELAND
[posted online on June 18, 2004]
The Securities and Exchange Commission has finally opened a formal investigation into allegations that Halliburton (in partnership with French petro-engineering company Technip) funneled $180 million into a slush fund to pay bribes in the construction of a $6 billion Nigerian gas refinery--a scandal that French authorities have been probing for a year (for background, see Doug Ireland, "Will the French Indict Cheney?" December 29, 2003).
The energy conglomerate formerly headed by Dick Cheney disclosed the SEC probe (as it was required to do by law for any legal action potentially affecting the company's stock) on June 11. The timing of the disclosure was no accident--it was a Friday, the last day of the interminable Reagan funeral ceremonies, and Wall Street was thus closed. The national press corps focused on little else but the burial, so the SEC investigation got scant attention in the weekend papers (even the New York Times ran only a brief AP dispatch on its website).
Although the US media have shown little interest in the story, the investigation of the Halliburton Nigeria scandal by France's most celebrated investigating magistrate, Judge Renaud Van Ruymbeke, has continued making headlines in Paris--where the latest revelations bring the scandal right to the front door of Halliburton's Houston headquarters.
The Journal du Dimanche (JDD, a large Sunday paper) revealed on June 13 that Judge Van Ruymbeke's investigation has uncovered how Albert "Jack" Stanley, the president of huge Halliburton subsidiary Kellogg Brown & Root (KBR) at the time of the alleged bribery, received so-called "commissions" of 3 percent of the deal from the slush fund. The total amount Stanley received is some $5 million, according to reports in the International Herald Tribune and elsewhere. The Nigerian oil minister at the time, Dan Entete, got $2.5 million, reported the JDD. The slush fund was set up with Halliburton money by a London lawyer, Jeffrey Tesler--who worked for Halliburton at the same time he was financial adviser to the notoriously corrupt late Nigerian dictator Gen. Sani Abacha--as a shell-company front called TriStar, which Tesler established in the British tax haven of Gibraltar. Stanley, the 5 Million Dollar Man, is a close friend and associate of Dick Cheney.
In mid-May, after Judge Van Ruymbeke threatened to issue an international warrant to bring Tesler to France to testify, Tesler "voluntarily" came to Paris for two days of testimony under oath. Confronted by Van Ruymbeke with documents obtained through international search warrants targeting banks in Switzerland, Monaco, Madeira and elsewhere, Tesler admitted having made the highly unusual payments from the slush fund to then-KBR president Stanley, which Stanley had sent to a numbered bank account in Zurich baptized "Amal" (according to the French weekly Le Canard Enchaîné). Another huge payment of $350,000 was made to a top KBR executive, William Chaudran, which Chaudran had routed to an anonymous bank account in the island fiscal paradise of Jersey, Tesler testified. (Stanley, who is retired from KBR but maintains an office and secretary in Halliburton-KBR's Houston headquarters, did not return calls requesting comment, and neither did Halliburton-KBR's flack, Wendy Hall.)
The obvious question is: If the payments to the KBR execs were legitimate, why route them through secret foreign bank accounts? And where did the rest of the $180 million go? To the dictator Abacha, whose money adviser Tesler was, and other Abacha cronies?
Statements given by Halliburton to Le Figaro and other French papers covering the scandal claim the conglomerate had no knowledge of the payments to the KBR execs--and appear to be setting up Stanley as the fall guy. Is this to keep the scandal from touching Cheney?
The final contract for construction of the Nigeria refinery, one of the world's largest, was signed in 1999, on Cheney's watch (Cheney was CEO of Halliburton from 1995 to 2000). Bribes of the sort under investigation by the SEC and the French are illegal under statutes of the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development, of whose international conventions both the United States and France are signatories-members; and under the US Foreign Corrupt Practices Act. In disclosing the SEC investigation, Halliburton said it did not believe it had violated the FCPA, while adding, "There can be no assurance that government authorities would not conclude otherwise."
Indeed.
Vladimir Putin and Russian intelligence? Well, Putin
is a very *intelligent* man. He is much wilier than
either the increasingly unhinged and incredibly
shrinking _resident or the VICE _resident that punches
his trifecta tickets for him. But, of course, as
Dunston Woods, LNS foreign correspondent observes,
even Chalabi and Iranian intelligence outsmarted the
Three Stooges Reich...Yes, I think they both have us
right where they want us...bleeding and squandering
treasure in the desolation of Iraq...Do not be
distracted. Do not be dismayed. Do not allow the
weak-minded around you to be misled. There is an
Electoral Uprising coming in November 2004...
Patrick Sabatier, Liberation: In France, George W. Bush's calamitous policy produces three reactions with regard to America against which we must be on guard...Despair, the third common reaction, makes Bush the craftsman of a slide from democracy to a form of "fascism". That viewpoint
ignores Congressional hearings and reports that one
after the other demonstrate the administration's
pre-war lies: after weapons of mass destruction, links
between Saddam and bin Laden have been acknowledged to
be non-existent. That also eclipses the success of the
uncompromising and devastating best-sellers by men who
have left power, as well as the fact that Michael
Moore's anti-Bush conflagration, far from being
censured, is being distributed in hundreds of theaters
in the United States. These are so many proofs that
the American people are not idiots, that opposing
forces function, and that American democracy is far
from being moribund. "The times they are a-changin,"
Dylan sang. There is no impunity for Bush, even if his
defeat in November is not assured.
Repudiate the 9/11 Cover-Up and the Iraq War Lies,
Show Up for Democracy in 2004: Defeat Bush (again!)
http://www.truthout.org/docs_04/061904H.shtml
Opposing Force
By Patrick Sabatier
Libération
Friday 18 June 2004
In France, George W. Bush's calamitous policy produces three reactions with regard to America against which we must be on guard.
First of all, demonization: anti-Americanism
contests with Islamophobia and anti-Semitism for the
top spot on the Internet's Hatred Hit-parade. Some of
Bush's critics easily give in to a paranoid vision of
history that explains American policy through
conspiracies hatched in Jerusalem or Riyadh between
the CIA and plutocrats.
Then, idealization, which often extends
demonization by making believe that the 43rd United
States president does not personify the American
people and that "Bushism" boils down to the
maneuverings of a clique that came to power almost by
accident. In fact, "W." was well and truly elected
(however badly) and his policy has responded to the
trauma of a country at war since September 11. It is
anchored in recurrent aspects of the American psyche
and history: imperial arrogance, religiosity, and
authoritarian temptations.
Despair, the third common reaction, makes Bush the
craftsman of a slide from democracy to a form of
"fascism". That viewpoint ignores Congressional
hearings and reports that one after the other
demonstrate the administration's pre-war lies: after
weapons of mass destruction, links between Saddam and
bin Laden have been acknowledged to be non-existent.
That also eclipses the success of the uncompromising
and devastating best-sellers by men who have left
power, as well as the fact that Michael Moore's
anti-Bush conflagration, far from being censured, is
being distributed in hundreds of theaters in the
United States. These are so many proofs that the
American people are not idiots, that opposing forces
function, and that American democracy is far from
being moribund. "The times they are a-changin," Dylan
sang. There is no impunity for Bush, even if his
defeat in November is not assured.
What Putin, Chalabi, et al are really up to...I do not
think these people would mind another four years of
the Bush abomination shooting itself in the foot,
draining America's resources, sapping the elan of its
military and fracturing its alliances...The Bin Laden
family is not the only bad influence at work...
Sergei Blagov, Asia Times: While refraining from
overt criticism of the United States, an emerging
organization that embraces Russia, China, and Central
Asian states has indicated its concern over American
unilateralism in the region.
When the presidents of the Shanghai Cooperation
Organization (SCO) - a six-member group that comprises
Russia, China, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan and
Uzbekistan - met in Tashkent on Thursday, they pledged
to address regional security concerns. The SCO also
vowed to become a full-fledged international
organization. In fact, its efforts can be seen as
aimed at countering US clout in the region.
Restore the Timeline, Show Up for Democracy in 2004:
Defeat Bush (again!)
http://www.atimes.com/atimes/Central_Asia/FF19Ag01.html
Russian President Vladimir Putin made no secret of the fact that Moscow has been keen to use a variety of groups to exert its influence across the region. "The voice of Russia will be heard here," Putin told reporters after the summit.
Central Asia
Shanghai group aims to keep US in check
By Sergei Blagov
MOSCOW - While refraining from overt criticism of the
United States, an emerging organization that embraces
Russia, China, and Central Asian states has indicated
its concern over American unilateralism in the region.
When the presidents of the Shanghai Cooperation
Organization (SCO) - a six-member group that comprises
Russia, China, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan and
Uzbekistan - met in Tashkent on Thursday, they pledged
to address regional security concerns. The SCO also
vowed to become a full-fledged international
organization. In fact, its efforts can be seen as
aimed at countering US clout in the region.
Russian President Vladimir Putin made no secret of the
fact that Moscow has been keen to use a variety of
groups to exert its influence across the region. "The
voice of Russia will be heard here," Putin told
reporters after the summit.
To ensure its voice is heard, Moscow relies on
economic incentives. Russia is to continue providing
economic aid, including low cost energy supplies, to
the former Soviet states, notably members of the SCO,
Putin said in Tashkent.
Before the SCO summit, Putin and Uzbek President Islam
Karimov signed a partnership agreement and a US$1
billion 35-year production-sharing agreement (PSA) to
develop Uzbek natural gas deposits. Under the PSA, top
Russian oil producer LUKoil is to develop the Kandym,
Khauzak and Shady gas fields in the south of the
country, which have 280 billion cubic meters of proven
reserves. LUKoil will have a 90% share in the project,
with Uzbekistan's Uzbekneftegaz holding the remaining
10%.
Russia's natural gas monopoly Gazprom is also to
invest $1 billion in Uzbekistan, Putin announced.
Gazprom's investment will boost Russian involvement in
Uzbekistan to $2.5 billion, Karimov said.
China came up with its own economic carrot . President
Hu Jintao reportedly offered nearly $1 billion in
credit to the SCO Central Asian states to boost
economic cooperation.
The SCO leaders were joined by Afghan President Hamid
Karzai. Karzai attended the talks as a guest, while
the SCO granted Mongolia observer status. However, the
SCO approved creation of the SCO-Afghanistan contact
group.
Putin said the SCO was open to other states, but it
was too early to discuss Afghanistan's membership. "We
are all interested in normalization in Afghanistan,
but any state should fit certain parameters to become
a member of the SCO," Putin said without elaborating
further.
"We should not rush with accepting new SCO members,"
Uzbek President Islam Karimov said, adding that he
expressed Russia's and China's opinion as well.
It was not said in public, of course, but Russian
commentators explained the SCO's reservations over
Afghanistan's membership as being due to Karzai's
largely pro-American stance. Russia's Kommersant daily
commented that an ultimate goal of the "certain
parameters" argument was to limit growing US influence
in the region.
The presidents signed the Tashkent Declaration, which
calls for enhanced cooperation with Asia-Pacific
forums, as well as urging the creation of a
"cooperative system of regional security" in the
Asia-Pacific. In the declaration, the leaders also
called for close cooperation with the United Nations,
yet another implicit criticism of American
unilateralism.
The leaders also launched the SCO anti-terror center
in Tashkent, a think tank and information exchange
center for member states.
China has been seen as increasing its security ties in
Central Asia through the SCO. Notably, China has
committed itself for the first time to a regional
collective security agreement. The SCO anti-terrorist
rapid deployment forces could be used to help enforce
border security along with other members of the
Shanghai group.
Nonetheless, the SCO still seeks to be a geopolitical
player in Central Asian security developments, a trend
also reflected in bilateral defense ties between
Russia and China. Last December, Moscow and Beijing
clinched a deal under which China would procure $2
billion worth of Russian military hardware and
technologies in 2004.
When in June 2001 the informal Shanghai Five group of
states became the SCO, member states envisioned the
organization as a counterweight to growing US economic
and political influence. In June 2002, the leaders of
the five states plus Uzbekistan agreed to base the SCO
secretariat in Beijing and to establish the joint
anti-terrorism center.
Russia and China have reluctantly tolerated the US
strategic presence in Central Asia. They are concerned
that permanent American bases in the region would be
primarily designed to limit Beijing and Moscow's
influence in Central Asia.
Meanwhile, the US has made moves toward establishing a
long-term presence in Central Asia, in Uzbekistan,
Tajikistan and Kyrgyzstan. During a visit to
Uzbekistan last February, US Defense Secretary Donald
Rumsfeld indicated that the US wanted to establish
operating facilities and not permanent bases. In
pledging that a potential US presence does not mean a
large-scale military deployment, US officials hope to
limit Russian and Chinese opposition to these plans
for Central Asia.
Moscow has been insisting that the US military
presence in the region is temporary and should be
ended after anti-terrorism action in Afghanistan.
Russia would accept US bases in Central Asia no longer
than the anti-terrorism operation in Afghanistan,
Moscow has repeatedly reiterated. It is understood
that Karimov has drifted towards Russia after being
targeted by Western criticism over human rights
violations.
In the meantime, Russia has been keen to rely on any
post-Soviet grouping in order to push its agenda in
Central Eurasia. Last month, Russia moved to join a
purely Central Asian grouping, the Central Asian
Cooperation Organization, which includes Kazakhstan,
Kyrgyzstan, Uzbekistan and Tajikistan.
Moreover, on June 18-19, two Russia-dominated
post-Soviet groupings, the Eurasian Economic
Commonwealth (EEC) and Collective Security
Organization Treaty (CSTO), hold their summits in the
Kazakhstan capital, Astana. The EEC summit is to
discuss multilateral economic integration, while the
CSTO is to address regional security concerns.
Russia's - and presumably China's - perceived
strategic purpose remains to counterweigh American and
Western influence in Central Eurasia. However, the SCO
and other groupings are yet to prove their viability
as vehicles to check US unilateralism in the region.
(Copyright 2004 Asia Times Online Ltd. All rights
reserved. Please contact content@atimes.com for
information on our sales and syndication policies.)
Three more US soldiers have died in Iraq. For what? Drip, drip, drip...Abu Ghraib, Plame, the WMDs lies, the Iraq-Al Qaeda lie, Halliburton, pre-9/11, post-9/11..,drip, drip, drip...
CBS/AP: In a sworn statement to Army investigators
obtained by USA Today, Army Lt. Col. Steven Jordan, the top military intelligence officer at Abu Ghraib when abuses occurred, said he was under intense pressure from the White House, Pentagon and CIA last
fall to get better information from
detainees...Jordan's statement said he was reminded of
the need to improve intelligence "many, many, many
times" and the pressure included a visit to the prison
by an aide to White House national security adviser
Condoleezza Rice, the paper reported.
Support Our Troops, Show Up for Democracy in 2004:
Defeat Bush (again!)
http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2004/04/30/iraq/main614905.shtml
Prison Officer Says He Felt Heat
WASHINGTON, June 18, 2004
(CBS/AP) An Army intelligence officer claims the
abuses at Abu Ghraib took place after interrogators
came under pressure from Bush administration
officials.
In a sworn statement to Army investigators obtained by
USA Today, Army Lt. Col. Steven Jordan, the top
military intelligence officer at Abu Ghraib when
abuses occurred, said he was under intense pressure
from the White House, Pentagon and CIA last fall to
get better information from detainees.
He also said he had worked out a procedure with CIA
interrogators to hide five or six inmates from Red
Cross inspectors in October, the newspaper reported in
Friday editions.
Jordan's statement said he was reminded of the need to
improve intelligence "many, many, many times" and the
pressure included a visit to the prison by an aide to
White House national security adviser Condoleezza
Rice, the paper reported.
To rebut Jordan's account, the White House arranged an
interview with White House homeland security adviser
Fran Townsend before, but in anticipation of, the
newspaper's publication.
Townsend, who last fall was Rice's deputy for
combating terrorism, told The Associated Press she
visited Abu Ghraib and even walked through a cellblock
but "we never discussed interrogation. We never
discussed interrogation techniques. That wasn't the
focus."
"I did not go there to pressure them to do anything
they weren't doing," Townsend added. "I really wanted
to understand how they were taking the information
they had and what they were doing with it so that I
could ^=… think through how we could make that
dissemination of information most effective."
In other developments:
Jack Goldsmith, the Assistant Attorney General for the
Office of Legal Counsel, announced on Thursday that he
was resigning at the end of July. The Office of Legal
Counsel is embroiled in a dispute over Bush
administration memos that contend neither the
president, nor anyone acting on his orders as a
wartime commander-in-chief, can be held liable under
anti-torture laws. Goldsmith was a Pentagon adviser
when a similar memo was drafted there. Goldsmith said
he was resigning to return to academia.
A former Army ranger hired by the CIA to conduct
interrogations was charged Thursday with assaulting an
Afghan detainee who died after two days of beatings,
the first time civilian charges have been brought in
the investigation of prisoner abuse in Iraq and
Afghanistan.
Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld told reporters he
ordered an alleged member of an Iraqi militant group
held without notifying international authorities in a
timely fashion, as required under the Geneva
Conventions. He did so at the request of CIA Director
George Tenet. The defense secretary said such a
decision would be made to prevent the prisoner's
interrogation from being interrupted.
The Bush administration has been stung by harsh
criticism at home and abroad over mistreatment of
prisoners, most notably at the Abu Ghraib prison in
Iraq. The Defense Department and other agencies are
investigating abuse allegations.
No civilians have been charged in connection with Abu
Ghraib, though Ashcroft said the Defense Department
had referred one case to the Justice Department for
investigation. Seven soldiers were charged by the
military.
A four-count grand jury indictment was handed up in
Raleigh, N.C., against David A. Passaro, 38, for the
June 21, 2003, death of Abdul Wali. Attorney General
John Ashcroft said Passaro was accused of "brutally
assaulting" Wali at a U.S. base in Asadabad,
Afghanistan.
Wali, the prisoner who died last year in Afghanistan,
was described as having participated in rocket attacks
against a U.S. base in mountainous northeast
Afghanistan about five miles (eight kilometers) from
the border with Pakistan. Al Qaeda and Taliban
fighters are active in the region, Ashcroft said.
U.S. officials wanted to talk to Wali, and on June 18,
2003, he came to the base gate to surrender, according
to court documents. Wali died in a cell at the base
after two days of beatings by Passaro, who used "his
hands and feet and a large flashlight," the indictment
alleged.
Passaro is charged with two counts each of assault and
assault with a dangerous weapon — the flashlight. He
faces a total of up to 40 years in prison, if
convicted, and up to a $1 million fine. Federal law
allows civilian charges to be brought against U.S.
citizens for crimes overseas.
Passaro was arrested Thursday and ordered held without
bond after a brief initial appearance before a federal
magistrate in Raleigh. Passaro, who was shackled
around his wrists and legs in the courtroom, will have
a detention hearing Tuesday.
"We were stunned today when he was picked up," said
Passaro's attorney, Gerald Beaver. "We've been in
consultation with the government since March and it
was my understanding that he would be allowed to
surrender if there were any indictments."
Wali's case initially was referred to the Justice
Department by the CIA in November.
Ashcroft said the indictment sends a message that "the
United States will not tolerate criminal acts of
brutality" against detainees.
U.S. officials said Passaro's contract with the CIA
began in December 2002 and that he arrived at the
Afghan base in mid-May 2003, only a few weeks before
the alleged abuse occurred.
In a statement, the U.S. Army Special Operations
Command at Fort Bragg said Passaro was arrested at the
post Thursday morning. Passaro, a former Special
Forces medic, was on leave from a civilian Army
medical job at Fort Bragg while doing the contract
work for the CIA, it said.
Wali's is among three detainee deaths being
investigated by the Justice Department and CIA's
inspector general in Iraq and Afghanistan. The Justice
Department declined to bring charges in a fourth
death.
CIA spokesman Mark Mansfield noted that the
allegations were promptly reported after the death
occurred. Ashcroft said Passaro was returned to the
United States shortly after Wali died.
©MMIV CBS Broadcasting Inc. All Rights Reserved. This
material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten,
or redistributed. The Associated Press contributed to
this report.
The November 2004 election is a national referendum on the CREDIBILITY, COMPETENCE and CHARACTER of the increasingly unhinged and incredibly shrinking _resident. The central issue is SECURITY: National Security, Economic Security AND *Environmental Security*
David Adam, Guardian (UK): The head of one of the world's biggest oil companies has admitted that the threat of climate change makes him "really very worried for the planet".
In an interview in today's Guardian Life section, Ron Oxburgh, chairman of Shell, says we urgently need to capture emissions of the greenhouse gas carbon dioxide, which scientists think contribute to global warming, and store them underground - a technique called carbon sequestration.
"Sequestration is difficult, but if we don't have sequestration then I see very little hope for the world," said Lord Oxburgh. "No one can be comfortable at the prospect of continuing to pump out the amounts of carbon dioxide that we are pumping out at present ... with consequences that we really can't predict but are probably not good."
His comments will enrage many in the oil industry, which is targeted by climate change campaigners because the use of its products spews out huge quantities of carbon dioxide, most visibly from vehicle exhausts.
Save the Environment, Show Up for Democracy in 2004: Defeat Bush (again!)
http://www.commondreams.org/headlines04/0617-01.htm
Published on Thursday, June 17, 2004 by the Guardian/UK
Oil Chief: My Fears for Planet, Shell Boss's 'Confession' Shocks Industry
by David Adam
The head of one of the world's biggest oil companies has admitted that the threat of climate change makes him "really very worried for the planet".
In an interview in today's Guardian Life section, Ron Oxburgh, chairman of Shell, says we urgently need to capture emissions of the greenhouse gas carbon dioxide, which scientists think contribute to global warming, and store them underground - a technique called carbon sequestration.
"Sequestration is difficult, but if we don't have sequestration then I see very little hope for the world," said Lord Oxburgh. "No one can be comfortable at the prospect of continuing to pump out the amounts of carbon dioxide that we are pumping out at present ... with consequences that we really can't predict but are probably not good."
His comments will enrage many in the oil industry, which is targeted by climate change campaigners because the use of its products spews out huge quantities of carbon dioxide, most visibly from vehicle exhausts.
His words follow those of the government's chief science adviser, David King, who said in January that climate change posed a bigger threat to the world than terrorism.
"You can't slip a piece of paper between David King and me on this position," said Lord Oxburgh, a respected geologist who replaced the disgraced Philip Watts as chairman of the British arm of the oil giant in March.
Companies including Shell and BP have previously acknowledged the problem of climate change and pledged to reduce their own emissions, but the issue remains sensitive, and carefully worded public statements often emphasize uncertainties over risks.
Robin Oakley, a climate campaigner with Greenpeace, said: "This is an important statement to make but it does have to come with a commitment to follow through, and that means making the case to his peers in the oil industry who are still skeptical of climate change."
Mr Oakley said a gulf was opening between more progressive oil companies such as Shell, which invests in alternative energy sources including wind and solar power, and ExxonMobil, the biggest and most influential producer, particularly in the US.
In June 2002 ExxonMobil's chairman, Lee Raymond, said: "We in ExxonMobil do not believe that the science required to establish this linkage between fossil fuels and warming has been demonstrated."
Lord Oxburgh's words will also fuel arguments over sequestration. Supporters say it will allow a smoother transition to reduced emissions by allowing us to burn coal, oil and gas for longer. Critics argue that the idea is an expensive and probably unworkable smokescreen for continued reliance on fossil fuels.
Last year the Guardian revealed that ministers were considering plans for a national network of pipelines to carry millions of tonnes of carbon dioxide from power stations to be buried under the North sea.
"You probably have to put it under the sea but there are other possibilities. You may be able to trap it in solids or something like that," said Lord Oxburgh, who claimed even vehicle emissions could be trapped and disposed of. "The timescale might be impossible, in which case I'm really very worried for the planet because I don't see any other approach."
According to a 3,000m (about 10,000ft) ice core from Antarctica revealing the Earth's climate history, carbon dioxide levels are the highest for at least 440,000 years.
Lord Oxburgh said the situation is particularly urgent because many developing countries, including India and China, are sitting on huge untapped stocks of coal, probably the most polluting fossil fuel.
"If they choose to burn their coal, we in the west are not in a very good position to tell them not to, because it's exactly what we did in our industrial revolution."
Bryony Worthington, a climate campaigner with Friends of the Earth, said: "It isn't a responsible attitude to say we're going to pledge to do sequestration but if the plans don't work out then the world's messed up. He's done quite a clever job by making it clear he's concerned but at the same time not pledging to do anything about it."
She called for tougher emission standards for new vehicles, as well as greater investment in energy efficiency measures and renewable sources.
A former non-executive director with Shell, Lord Oxburgh was catapulted into the chairman's role after the company was forced to reveal it had overstated the extent of its reserves. He was widely viewed as a safe pair of hands.
He followed his long-standing academic career with spells as chief science adviser to the Ministry of Defense and rector of Imperial College, London. A crossbench life peer, he still chairs the Lords science and technology select committee, although he must retire from Shell next year.
© Guardian Newspapers Limited 2004
###
It's the Media, Stupid.
Jonathan E. Kaplan, The Hill: Stern’s vast audience includes 17 percent of likely voters, and they back Kerry 53 to 43 percent over Bush according to the poll. In so-called “battleground” states, Kerry beats Bush by 59 to 37 percent. The New Democrat Network (NDN), a centrist Democratic fundraising organization, commissioned Penn, Schoen and Berland Associates, a Democratic firm, to conduct the poll.
On his website, Stern says that he is more influential than conservative radio hosts Sean Hannity or Rush Limbaugh because he claims his listeners are undecided voters and Hannity and Limbaugh’s listeners are Republicans.
Don Imus, a New York-based political talk show host, has said on his program that he also supports Kerry.
Nevertheless, the poll shows that voters whose main source of news is radio support Bush 52 to 46 percent, perhaps reflecting the dominance of conservative talk radio.
Break the Bush Caba Stranglehold on the "US Mainstream News Media," Defeat BUSH (again!)
http://www.thehill.com/news/061504/stern.aspx
Howard Stern says he can deliver swing votes to Kerry
New poll: Stern’s listeners favor Kerry over Bush by a 10-point margin
By Jonathan E. Kaplan
Radio shock jock Howard Stern is predicting that he will help deliver the heavily sought-after swing voters to presumptive Democratic presidential nominee Sen. John Kerry this November.
On air yesterday, Stern told The Hill: “I’m both pro-Kerry and anti-Bush. More anti-Bush. I encourage people on the air and personally [to vote for him]. Here’s the deal, dude. It turns out the show has a lot of influence among swing voters, voters who are not Republican or Democrat, but intelligent enough to vote for the good candidate.”
Stern said he has never met Kerry but considers him a “good guy.”
Stern’s listeners support Kerry over President Bush by a 10-point margin, according to a poll released last week.
In recent months, Stern has repeatedly lambasted the Bush administration for its crackdown on “indecent material” and called on his listeners to vote the president out of office.
Stern himself is a swing voter. Besides a brief run for governor as a Libertarian, Stern used his position to back two Republican gubernatorial candidates in New York and New Jersey. Both George Pataki and Christie Todd Whitman beat Democratic incumbents. Whitman even promised to name a highway oasis after Stern, and put a plaque with his name in a bathroom along the New Jersey turnpike.
Stern’s vast audience includes 17 percent of likely voters, and they back Kerry 53 to 43 percent over Bush according to the poll. In so-called “battleground” states, Kerry beats Bush by 59 to 37 percent. The New Democrat Network (NDN), a centrist Democratic fundraising organization, commissioned Penn, Schoen and Berland Associates, a Democratic firm, to conduct the poll.
On his website, Stern says that he is more influential than conservative radio hosts Sean Hannity or Rush Limbaugh because he claims his listeners are undecided voters and Hannity and Limbaugh’s listeners are Republicans.
Don Imus, a New York-based political talk show host, has said on his program that he also supports Kerry.
Nevertheless, the poll shows that voters whose main source of news is radio support Bush 52 to 46 percent, perhaps reflecting the dominance of conservative talk radio.
Scott Stanzel, a Bush-Cheney campaign spokesman, dismissed the poll’s results. “It’s a partisan Democratic poll from a partisan group that’s just one of the shadowy soft-money groups assisting the Kerry campaign,” he said.
Simon Rosenberg, the NDN’s executive director, responded, “Every poll they don’t like they trash.”
Allison Dobson, a Kerry spokeswoman, said: “I think the bottom line is that George Bush has disappointed a lot of people and his policies are taking the country in the wrong direction.”
The NDN poll also reports that Stern’s likely voters are overwhelmingly male and 40 percent are Democrats, 26 percent are Republicans and 34 percent are independents. His listeners are more liberal and younger than the average voter – 40 percent are under 35 years old. They are more diverse and more driven by economic issues than other voters as well.
Stern is best known for testing the limits of the Federal Communications Commission’s (FCC) decency standards; strippers and dirty jokes are staples of his morning drive-time radio program.
When pop star Janet Jackson experienced a “wardrobe malfunction” in which she exposed her breast on national television during this year’s Super Bowl halftime show, lawmakers clamored to score political advantage by making indecency on television and radio an issue.
Executives from CBS and MTV’s parent company, Viacom, were hauled before the House Energy and Commerce Committee. In March, Congress passed legislation that raised fines for indecency over the public airwaves, and Clear Channel Communications, which aired Stern’s show on six of its stations, banned the show in April. Last week, Clear Channel agreed to pay $1.7 million in fines to the FCC to settle charges of indecency.
Since then, Stern has been lampooning the FCC, the Bush administration and Clear Channel.
Stern continues to antagonize Clear Channel and the FCC. While on air yesterday, he promoted an anti-Bush book, “Banana Republicans,” and complained that it is commonplace for Republicans to use intimidation tactics against their opponents.
In 1996, Stern hosted a debate between ex-Rep. Richard Zimmer (R-N.J.) and Sen. Robert Torricelli (D-N.J.).
Yes, one day soon in America, we're going to have a "Boston TV Party." Here's Jim Hightower on what the LNS calls the "Information Rebellion."
Jim Hightower, www.commondreams.org: A handful of self-serving corporate fiefdoms now controls practically all of America's mass-market sources of news and information. GE now owns NBC, Disney owns ABC, Viacom owns CBS, News Corp. owns Fox, and Time Warner owns CNN; these five have a lock on TV news. Of the 1,500 daily newspapers, only 281 are independently owned - three companies control 25 percent of the daily news circulated in the entire world.
These aloof giants openly assert that meeting their own profit needs is the media's reason for existence - as opposed to meeting the larger public's need for a vigorous, democratic discourse. Lowry Mays, honcho of Clear Channel Inc. (which owns more than 1,200 radio stations - a third of all the stations in America), opines that: "We're not in the business of providing news and information We're simply in the business of selling our customers' products."
The web gives us the means to bypass the corporate media, creating our own low-cost, decentralized network of news that, say, The New York Times does not consider "fit to print."
In addition to hundreds of specialized news sites, there are "aggregators" that amount to news services for progressive content - credible outfits like Alternet.org, TomPaine.com, Buzzflash.com, and CommonDreams.org.
This single-minded mercenary focus combines with general corporate arrogance to bloat the egos of media chieftains, leading them to think that they really are the infallible gods of our daily newsfeed, with no need to be accountable to the public: "We paid $3 billion for these television stations," said an executive with a Fox affiliate in Tampa; "We decide what the news is. The news is what we tell you it is."
Crude, corporate censorship of our news by these boardroom types is less common than the subtle, internal self-censorship done by general managers, top editors, and some reporters who avoid topics and dilute stories that the corporate hierarchy might find offensive or simply not comprehend. A 2000 survey by the Pew Research Center for the People and the Press found that a third of local reporters admit softening a news story on behalf of the interests of their media organizations. A fourth say they have been told by superiors to ignore a story because it was dull, but the reporters suspected that the real motivation was that the story could harm the media company's financial interests. And that's only the reporters who confess!
If you detect a corporate bias in your news, don't feel lonely. Two-thirds of Americans told pollsters last September that they believe special interests or a self-serving corporate-political agenda infect news coverage. We can all wring our hands and wail about this corporate, monopolistic grasp on our news sources, but here's a better idea: Let's do something about it. A grassroots flowering
Break the Bush Cabal Stranglehold on the "US Mainstream News Media," Show Up for Democracy in 2004: Defeat Bush (again!)
http://www.commondreams.org/views04/0615-14.htm
Published on Tuesday, June 15, 2004 by CommonDreams.org
The People's Media Reaches More People Than FOX Does
by Jim Hightower
While Big Media is "simply in the business of selling products, the people's media reaches more people than FOX does.
Democratic reformer Henry Adams, who decried the decline in democracy as the robber barons rose to power in the nineteenth century, did not mince words about the failure of the news media of his day: "The press is the hired agent of a monied system," he wrote, "and set up for no other purpose than to tell lies where the interests are involved."
Imagine the verbal scorching Henry would give to today's media barons, who are not merely hired agents of monied interests‹they have become the interests, fully corporatized, conglomerated and well-practiced in the art of journalistic lying to perpetuate the power and profits of the elites.
A handful of self-serving corporate fiefdoms now controls practically all of America's mass-market sources of news and information. GE now owns NBC, Disney owns ABC, Viacom owns CBS, News Corp. owns Fox, and Time Warner owns CNN; these five have a lock on TV news. Of the 1,500 daily newspapers, only 281 are independently owned - three companies control 25 percent of the daily news circulated in the entire world.
These aloof giants openly assert that meeting their own profit needs is the media's reason for existence - as opposed to meeting the larger public's need for a vigorous, democratic discourse. Lowry Mays, honcho of Clear Channel Inc. (which owns more than 1,200 radio stations - a third of all the stations in America), opines that: "We're not in the business of providing news and information We're simply in the business of selling our customers' products."
The web gives us the means to bypass the corporate media, creating our own low-cost, decentralized network of news that, say, The New York Times does not consider "fit to print."
In addition to hundreds of specialized news sites, there are "aggregators" that amount to news services for progressive content - credible outfits like Alternet.org, TomPaine.com, Buzzflash.com, and CommonDreams.org.
This single-minded mercenary focus combines with general corporate arrogance to bloat the egos of media chieftains, leading them to think that they really are the infallible gods of our daily newsfeed, with no need to be accountable to the public: "We paid $3 billion for these television stations," said an executive with a Fox affiliate in Tampa; "We decide what the news is. The news is what we tell you it is."
Crude, corporate censorship of our news by these boardroom types is less common than the subtle, internal self-censorship done by general managers, top editors, and some reporters who avoid topics and dilute stories that the corporate hierarchy might find offensive or simply not comprehend. A 2000 survey by the Pew Research Center for the People and the Press found that a third of local reporters admit softening a news story on behalf of the interests of their media organizations. A fourth say they have been told by superiors to ignore a story because it was dull, but the reporters suspected that the real motivation was that the story could harm the media company's financial interests. And that's only the reporters who confess!
If you detect a corporate bias in your news, don't feel lonely. Two-thirds of Americans told pollsters last September that they believe special interests or a self-serving corporate-political agenda infect news coverage. We can all wring our hands and wail about this corporate, monopolistic grasp on our news sources, but here's a better idea: Let's do something about it. A grassroots flowering
A grassroots flowering
The Austin Motel is a refurbished, New Deal-era business on South Congress Avenue near my home. It has an old brightly-lit marquee out front that proudly boasts the credo of the current owners: "No additives, No preservatives, Corporate-free since 1938."
Wouldn't that make a fine slogan for a new democratic media for America?
Oh, you say, Hightower, don't toy with us. It would take billions and billions of dollars to build a broad-based media network outside the established TV, radio, and newspaper conglomerates, so that's just a pipe dream. Well, yes, it would take those impossible billions if we set out merely to duplicate the media Goliaths. But what if we wanted to develop a David a sprightly, nimble network of media outlets that are not capital-intensive and not burdened with either multimillion-dollar salaries or voracious conglomerate bureaucracies?
I have good news for you: This is already happening! Thousands of hardy, grassroots people have been working steadily and creatively over the years in every area of media, and the result of their combined efforts is that a new media force is now flowering coast to coast a force of hundreds of media outlets that is unabashedly progressive, fiercely independent, diverse, dispersed, and democratic. Some of these outlets are nationally known, others only locally known; some are brand new, others have been plugging away for decades. But the significant thing is that, collectively, they are a force to be reckoned with, celebrated, strategically deployed and deliberately expanded.
I've known and worked closely with many of these varied outlets my entire political life, but it was only last year that I realized what can happen if we learn to connect the various components and tap into the full power that they offer.
The occasion was a most modest one: The launch of my book, Thieves in High Places. In addition to being about the monied kleptocracy that has seized our people's democratic power, the heart of this book is about the deeply-encouraging rise of you grassroots Americans out there who're battling the thieves - and often beating them. These are inspiring stories of democratic activism that the media establishment largely ignores, and I wanted as many people as possible to know about the stories, so that others might take heart and battle on.
Call me cynical, but I knew from experience that the barons of media power were not likely to rush forward to embrace and disseminate my antiestablishment message. I was right none of the morning TV shows ("Today," "Good Morning America," etc.) allowed me to talk about it; no evening newsmagazine show ("20/20," "Dateline," etc.) would touch it; there were no reviews in the mass-market newspapers and magazines (New York Times, Newsweek, etc.) and even NPR and public television gave it the cold shoulder. It was a case of libra non grata. Yet, a funny (and fun) thing happened: Thieves rose into the top 10 of nearly every best-seller list across the country, including the New York Times list. You could almost hear the incredulous compilers of sales data asking: "How the hell did this thing get on our list?"
It got there, quickly reaching a mass-market audience, by way of your and my very own rag-tag, patchwork media network, which most of us don't even know we have. I stumbled on the breadth and depth of this network because Sean Doles and Laura Ehrlich in my office had organized a guerrilla campaign to get the word out about the book. Working with community-radio stations, alternative newsweeklies, independent bookstores, web-active organizations, progressive (and aggressive) magazines, websites and publications of grassroots organizations, local organizing groups, some upstart television rebels - and, of course, you scrappy Lowdowners - we found that progressives are not voiceless in a corporate-media wasteland after all if only we recognize that we have powerful media assets of our own.
My book doesn't matter, but the concept of connecting this patchwork of assets does matter greatly. Any particular piece of this progressive media patchwork is small (and too often scoffed at by progressives themselves as "insignificant"). But add the pieces together and we have a far-flung network of outlets that - each and every day - is reaching tens of millions of people.
Also, the people who are tuning in to our progressive outlets are not just cumulative numbers to be sold to advertisers; mostly they're readers, listeners, online clickers, and viewers who give a damn and are looking for action. We saw an example last year of what can happen when even some of these components connect. The FCC, led by laissez-faire nutball Michael Powell, was ramming through a rules change that effectively would allow one or two media conglomerates to control the TV, radio, and newspaper outlets in every U.S. city.
Essentially, this unregulation of media ownership would lead to the full-scale monopolization of our news sources. Corporate lobbyists and government lawyers had holed up in a dark back room to whisper sweet legalese to each other, and we Joe and Joline Schmoes would have known nothing about it until after the fact, when we would've heard that wet, smoooooooching sound coming from Washington that tells us - uh-oh - another dirty deed has been done to us.
This time, though, was different. Several public-interest organizations picked up on the FCC's back-room move and alerted such grassroots groups as Common Cause, which sent up red flares to engage its 200,000 members. Then, like the pamphleteers of old, dozens of community- radio stations plastered on-air broadsheets all across the country, translating the FCC's regulatory gobbledygook into straightforward rallying cries. They pounded the issue day after day. Next came the Web-active group MoveOn.org, which gave this growing grassroots opposition the mechanism it needed for a targeted response - and some 170,000 emails poured into Washington.
The result was that, last July, the U.S. House of Representatives voted 400 to 21 in favor of an amendment by Rep. David Obey to stop the FCC's media-monopolization rule. The decisive 400 House votes were from Congress critters (Democrats as well as Republicans) who had taken buckets full of campaign cash from the very media barons they suddenly decided they had to vote against.
The battle is not over, but the fact that this arcane issue of media-ownership regulations could, in such a short time, ignite a prairie fire of popular rebellion is a testament to the power at our disposal.
Radio
As I've learned from the past dozen years of on-air experience, radio can be a very democratic little box‹in part because it's ubiquitous (in our bedrooms, cars, showers, etc.), and also because people tend to hear what's said on radio, as opposed to TV, where they get an image but don't much follow the story being told. The bad news is that the radio dial is fast being bought up by Clear Channel and a couple of other conglomerates. The good news, however, is that we still have hundreds of extremely important stations in our hands, beaming out a steady progressive message to millions every day.
Since 1993, my own two-minute radio commentaries ("little pops of populism," we call them) have aired every weekday, now being heard on a mix of 130 commercial and community stations coast to coast, plus Alaska, Hawaii, and - get this - Armed Forces Radio, as well as on the web (www.jimhightower.com). But I'm the least of it. From Amy Goodman's sassy Democracy Now to Working Assets Radio with Laura Flanders, from New Dimensions to Latino USA, from Counterspin to RadioNation, from ACORN Radio to Alternative Radio with David Barsamian, from Media Matters with Bob McChesney to The World - there's a wealth of national and local broadcasters putting forth progressive issues and insights every day.
Because of the corporate bias of its owners, commercial radio is the hardest nut to crack, but we have such voices as Enid Goldstein at KNRC in Denver, Sly Sylvester on WTDY in Madison, and Mitch Albom on WJR in Detroit. And now, Air America is making a bold play to bring 17 hours a day of progressive talk radio through its burgeoning network, broadcasting such live-wire hosts as Al Franken, Janeane Garofalo, Randi Rhodes, Chuck D, and Rachel Maddow. This brand-new upstart is already in 15 cities, and is drawing millions more listeners each day on the web (www.airamericaradio.com).
Then there are our community owned stations. Many people assume that these are little one-watt nothings, but that's nonsense. Indeed, some are powerhouse blasters in big cities, such as the Pacifica Network's five flagship stations in Berkeley, New York City, Los Angeles, Washington, DC, and Houston. Pacifica's KPFK in LA, for example, is 110,000 watts, reaching from San Diego to Santa Barbara and stretching inland to San Bernardino. Likewise, the independent community station WMNF in Tampa is a 70,000- watt treasure that reaches from Sarasota on the Gulf Coast almost to Orlando in the middle of the state.
Even the small-town community broadcasters pack a punch. WERU in Blue Hill, Maine (pop. 700), for example, reaches clear to the state capital in Augusta and is a beloved rallying point for the whole Penobscot Bay area ("We-are-you" is how the station pronounces its call letters). The same with KAOS in Olympia, KBOO in Portland, KGNU in Boulder, and so many more‹people don't just tune in, they count on these stations, trust them in a way no one would trust Clear Channel, and are willing to act on the information they receive.
The web
A democratic tool that Jefferson, Madison, and the other Bill of Righters could not have imagined, but would gleefully embrace today, is the world wide web. This computerized architecture of interconnected hubs and spokes allows us to link our thoughts and actions instantly in virtual space and produce tangible political results that would have taken months before.
Every progressive group (even Luddites like me) now has lively, interactive web sites through which we can share a gold mine of information, forge coalitions, hold "meetings," and mobilize mass actions (from local to global).
The growth of the net is explosive - 68 billion emails per day, for example, and 10 million daily blogs by everyone from the kid next-door to famous pundits to me! MoveOn.org, TrueMajority.org, and the Howard Dean campaign have shown the phenomenal potential of the web, not only for fund-raising and blitzing Congress with citizen opinion, but especially for organizing people for action (a breakthrough that you'll hear more about as the Lowdown itself develops a web-active program to link all of us Lowdowners into more grassroots civil action).
The web gives us the means to bypass the corporate media, creating our own low-cost, decentralized network of news that, say, The New York Times does not consider "fit to print."
In addition to hundreds of specialized news sites, there are "aggregators" that amount to news services for progressive content - credible outfits like Alternet.org, TomPaine.com, Buzzflash.com, and CommonDreams.org
Some are creating their own virtual newspapers. Check out iBrattleboro.com. For more than a year now, this Vermont website lets the readers be the reporters on what's really going on in town. Anyone can contribute, and anyone can comment on the contributions. In a town of 12,000, the virtual pages of iBrattleboro are getting 260,000 viewers a year.
Alternatives galore
If reading the daily press depresses you, get a lift by going beyond your "Daily Blather" newspaper to such spunky journals as The Nation, Mother Jones, The Progressive, In These Times, American Prospect, Ms., Harper's, and The Progressive Populist. Also, Utne rounds up articles every month from more than 2,000 alternative media sources. And two groups, the Independent Press Association (indypress.org) and the Alternative Press Center (altpress.org), give you access to magazines, newsletters, and 'zines that cover every political and cultural issue imaginable.
Chances are your own town has one or more independent weekly newspapers offering detailed coverage of progressive issues and events that the monopoly dailies miss or avoid. The Association of Alternative Weeklies (aan.org) plugs you into 120 of these local voices that, collectively, reach 17 million readers a week. Even television, the feeblest member of our democracy's media mob, is perking up a bit. PBS's Now with Bill Moyers has been a blast of fresh air (though its direction is uncertain now that he has announced his retirement), and C-SPAN continues to do a great public service by simply clicking on its cameras and letting us see events without edits or editorializing. And you can forget the network news and go directly to The Daily Show for Jon Stewart's irreverent, on-target satires, broadcast on Comedy Central.
Especially encouraging in TV-land are the insurgents of the air, including Free Speech TV and WorldLink TV, reaching a combined 20 million homes. Grassroots rebels are also making their own TV, thanks to Cable Access Television, available on some 600 public-access channels, as well as a feisty group of Independent Media Centers (indymedia.org) that are particularly good at streaming raw footage of protests and other actions, with their media activists taking their web-driven videocams right into the center of things, bringing you news as it happens.
Finally, don't discount the power of face-to-face networks. On any given day, thousands of people are gathered in various-sized groupings to listen, learn, discuss, interact, strategize, and organize. These forums include the nation's 2,200 independent bookstores, which are not merely book peddlers, but also community meeting places and informal bulletin boards (go to booksense.com to find ones near you). Public libraries, progressive speakers' series, pot-luck suppers, conversation cafes and progressive festivals (Greenfest, Bioneers, Rolling Thunder, etc.) are also part of this vibrant, high-touch outreach that goes on daily in practically every city and neighborhood.
Years ago, my momma taught me that two wrongs don't make a right - but I soon figured out that three left turns do. We must apply that same kind of street savvy if we're ever to find our way around the media blockages that the corporate interests have put in place to shut out our voices.
###
It's the Media, Stupid.
Center for American Progress: Speaking at the Take Back America conference on June 3, American Progress CEO John Podesta said, "I think when you get so distant from the facts as -- as guys like Limbaugh and Sean Hannity do, yeah, I think that tends to -- it kind of -- it tends to corrupt the dialogue." Apparently he struck a nerve with Fox News' Sean Hannity. Hannity challenged Podesta to "defend and explain one example where I -- where I said something that was so false." Since choosing just one of Hannity's distortions is too difficult, here are fifteen examples...
Break the Bush Cabal Stranglehold on the "US Mainstream News Media," Show Up for Democracy in 2004: Defeat Bush (again!)
http://www.americanprogress.org/site/pp.asp?c=biJRJ8OVF&b=91585
The Document Sean Hannity Doesn't Want You To Read
June 16, 2004
Speaking at the Take Back America conference on June 3, American Progress CEO John Podesta said, "I think when you get so distant from the facts as -- as guys like Limbaugh and Sean Hannity do, yeah, I think that tends to -- it kind of -- it tends to corrupt the dialogue." Apparently he struck a nerve with Fox News' Sean Hannity. Hannity challenged Podesta to "defend and explain one example where I -- where I said something that was so false." Since choosing just one of Hannity's distortions is too difficult, here are fifteen examples:
All Hannity quotes from Hannity and Colmes unless otherwise noted.
1. WMD
HANNITY: "You're not listening, Susan. You've got to learn something. He had weapons of mass destruction. He promised to disclose them. And he didn't do it. You would have let him go free; we decided to hold him accountable." (4/13/04)
FACT: Hannity's assertion comes more than six months after Bush Administration weapons inspector David Kay testified his inspection team had "not uncovered evidence that Iraq undertook significant post-1998 steps to actually build nuclear weapons or produce fissile material" and had not discovered any chemical or biological weapons. (Bush Administration Weapons Inspector David Kay, 10/2/03)
2. Colin Powell on Iraq
HANNITY: "Colin Powell just had a great piece that he had in the paper today. He was there [in Iraq]. He said things couldn't have been better." (9/19/03)
FACT: "Iraq has come very far, but serious problems remain, starting with security. American commanders and troops told me of the many threats they face--from leftover loyalists who want to return Iraq to the dark days of Saddam, from criminals who were set loose on Iraqi society when Saddam emptied the jails and, increasingly, from outside terrorists who have come to Iraq to open a new front in their campaign against the civilized world." (Colin Powell, 9/19/03)
3. Saddam/Al-Qaeda Connection
HANNITY: "And in northern Iraq today, this very day, al Qaeda is operating camps there, and they are attacking the Kurds in the north, and this has been well-documented and well chronicled. Now, if you're going to go after al Qaeda in every aspect, and obviously they have the support of Saddam, or we're not." (12/9/02)
FACT: David Kay was on the ground for months investigating the activities of Hussein's regime. He concluded "But we simply did not find any evidence of extensive links with Al Qaeda, or for that matter any real links at all." He called a speech where Cheney made the claim there was a link "evidence free." (Boston Globe, 6/16/04)
4. 9/11 Investigation
HANNITY: "[After 9-11], liberal Democrats at first showed little interest in the investigation of the roots of this massive intelligence failure...[Bush and his team] made it clear that determining the causes of America's security failures and finding and remedying its weak points would be central to their mission." (Let Freedom Ring, by Sean Hannity)
TRUTH: Bush Opposed the creation of a special commission to probe the causes of 9/11 for over a year. On 5/23/02 CBS New Reported "President Bush took a few minutes during his trip to Europe Thursday to voice his opposition to establishing a special commission to probe how the government dealt with terror warnings before Sept. 11." Bush didn't relent to pressure to create a commission, mostly from those Hannity would consider "liberal" until September 2002. (CBS News, 5/23/02; ABC News, 9/20/02)
5. The Recession
HANNITY: "First of all, this president -- you know and I know and everybody knows -- inherited a recession...it was by every definition a recession" (11/6/02)
HANNITY: "Now here's where we are. The inherited Clinton/Gore recession. That's a fact." (5/6/03)
HANNITY: "The president inherited a recession." (7/10/03)
HANNITY: "He got us out of the Clinton-Gore recession." (10/23/03)
HANNITY: "They did inherit the recession. They did inherit the recession. We got out of the recession." (12/12/03)
HANNITY: "And this is the whole point behind this ad, because the president did inherit a recession." (1/6/04)
HANNITY: "Historically in every recovery, because the president rightly did inherit a recession. But historically, the lagging indicator always deals with employment." (1/15/04)
HANNITY: "Congressman Deutsch, maybe you forgot but I'll be glad to remind you, the president did inherit that recession." (1/20/04)
HANNITY: "He did inherit a recession, and we're out of the recession." (2/2/04)
HANNITY: "The president inherited a recession." (2/23/04)
HANNITY: "The president inherited a recession." (3/3/04)
HANNITY: "Well, you know, we're going to show ads, as a matter of fact, in the next segment, Congressman. Thanks for promoting our next segment. What I like about them is everything I've been saying the president ought to do: is focusing in on his positions, on keeping the nation secure in very difficult times, what he's been able to do to the economy after inheriting a very difficult recession, and of course, the economic impact of 9/11." (3/3/04)
HANNITY: "All right. So this is where I view the economic scenario as we head into this election. The president inherited a recession." (3/16/04)
HANNITY: "First of all, we've got to put it into perspective, is that the president inherited a recession." (3/26/04)
HANNITY: "Clearly, we're out of the recession that President Bush inherited." (4/2/04)
HANNITY: "Stop me where I'm wrong. The president inherited a recession, the economic impact of 9/11 was tremendous on the economy, correct?" (4/6/04)
HANNITY: "[President George W. Bush] did inherit a recession." (5/3/04)
HANNITY: "[W]e got [the weak U.S. economy] out of the Clinton-Gore recession." (5/18/04)
HANNITY: "We got out of the Clinton-Gore recession." (5/27/04)
HANNITY: "We got out of the Clinton-Gore recession." (6/4/04)
FACT: "The recession officially began in March of 2001 -- two months after Bush was sworn in -- according to the universally acknowledged arbiter of such things, the National Bureau of Economic Research. And the president, at other times, has said so himself." (Washington Post, 7/1/03)
6. The Hispanic Vote
HANNITY: "The Hispanic community got to know him in Texas. They went almost overwhelming for him. He more than quadrupled the Hispanic vote that he got in that state." (9/16/03)
FACT: Exit polls varied in 1998 governors race, but under best scenario he increased his Hispanic vote from 24 to 49 percent – a doubling not a quadrupling. He lost Texas Hispanics to Gore in 2000, 54-43 percent. (Source: NCLR , NHCSL)
7. White House Vandalism
HANNITY: "Look, we've had these reports, very disturbing reports -- and I have actually spoken to people that have confirmed a lot of the reports -- about the trashing of the White House. Pornographic materials left in the printers. They cut the phone lines. Lewd and crude messages on phone machines. Stripping of anything that was not bolted down on Air Force One. $200,000 in furniture taken out." (1/26/01)
TRUTH: According to statements from the General Services Administration that were reported on May 17, little if anything out of the ordinary occurred during the transition, and "the condition of the real property was consistent with what we would expect to encounter when tenants vacate office space after an extended occupancy." (FAIR)
8. Patriotism
HANNITY: "I never questioned anyone's patriotism." (9/18/03)
FACT:
HANNITY: (to attorney Stanley Cohen) "Is it you hate this president or that you hate America?" (4/30/03)
HANNITY: "Governor, why wouldn't anyone want to say the Pledge of Allegiance, unless they detested their own country or were ignorant of its greatness?" (6/12/03)
HANNITY: "You could explain something about your magazine, [the Nation]. Lisa Featherstone writing about the hate America march, the [anti-war] march that took place over the weekend..." (1/22/03)
HANNITY: "'I hate America.' This is the extreme left. There is a portion of the left -- not everybody who's left -- that does hate this country and blame this country for the ills of the world..." (1/23/02)
HANNITY: (speaking to Sara Flounders co-director of the International Action Center) "You don't like this country, do you? You don't -- you think this is an evil country. By your description of it right here, you think it's a bad country." (9/25/01)
9. Separation of Church and State
HANNITY: "It doesn't say anywhere in the Constitution this idea of the separation of church and state." (8/25/03)
FACT: "Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof." (1st Amendment)
"The Senators and Representatives before mentioned, and the Members of the several State Legislatures, and all executive and judicial Officers, both of the United States and of the several States, shall be bound by Oath or Affirmation, to support this Constitution; but no religious Test shall ever be required as a Qualification to any Office or public Trust under the United States." (Article VI)
10. James Madison
HANNITY: "You want to refer to some liberal activist judge..., that's fine, but I'm going to go directly to the source. The author of the Bill of Rights [James Madison] hired the first chaplain in 1789, and I gotta' tell ya' somethin', I think the author of the Bill of Rights knows more about the original intent--no offense to you and your liberal atheist activism--knows more about it than you do." (9/4/02)
TRUTH: The first congressional chaplains weren't hired by James Madison--they were appointed by a committee of the Senate and House in, respectively, April and May, 1789, before the First Amendment even existed. James Madison's view: "Is the appointment of Chaplains to the two Houses of Congress consistent with the Constitution, and with the pure principle of religious freedom? In strictness the answer on both points must be in the negative." (James Madison)
11. Alabama Constitution
HANNITY: "But the Alabama Constitution, which Chief Justice Roy Moore is sworn to uphold, clearly it says, as a matter of fact that the recognition of God is the foundation of that state's Constitution." (8/21/03)
FACT: While the preamble of the Alabama Constitution does reference "the Almighty," section three provides: "That no religion shall be established by law; that no preference shall be given by law to any religious sect, society, denomination, or mode of worship; that no one shall be compelled by law to attend any place of worship; nor to pay any tithes, taxes, or other rate for building or repairing any place of worship, or for maintaining any minister or ministry; that no religious test shall be required as a qualification to any office or public trust under this state; and that the civil rights, privileges, and capacities of any citizen shall not be in any manner affected by his religious principles." (Alabama Constitution, Section 3)
12. Rent for Public Housing
HANNITY: Betsy, they're not going to lose it [public housing], because if you work less than 30 hours a week -- if you work more than 30 hours a week, you don't have to do it. If you're between the ages of 18 and 62 and you're not legally disabled and you have free housing -- in other words...
BETSY MCCAUGHEY: No. Wait a second, Sean. Let me correct you. Most people in public housing are not receiving free housing. Many of them are paying almost market rates.
HANNITY: Betsy, that is so ridiculous and so false, it's hardly even worth spending the time. (10/23/03)
FACT: Residents of public housing pay rent scaled to their household's anticipated gross annual income, less deductions for dependents and disabilities. The basic formula for rent is 30 percent of this monthly adjusted income. There are exceptions for extremely low incomes, but the minimum rent is $25 per month. No one lives in public housing for free. (Department of Housing and Urban Development)
13. Kerry Tax Plan
HANNITY: "The Kerry campaign wants to cut taxes on people who make two hundred thousand dollars. She [Teresa Heinz Kerry] only paid 14.7 percent of her income in taxes, because their plan doesn't go to dividends, only income. So they don't want to tax themselves." (5/12/04)
FACT: Kerry's plan would "Restore the capital gains and dividend rates for families making over $200,000 on income earned above $200,000 to their levels under President Clinton. (Kerry Press Release, 4/7/04)
14. Kerry and Weapons Systems
HANNITY: "He's [Kerry's] flip-flopped all over the place... on the issue of Iraq. All the munitions that we have built up, most of them wouldn't be there." (1/30/04)
HANNITY: "But he wanted to cancel…every major weapons system. Specific votes that he would have canceled the weapons systems we now use." (2/26/04)
FACT: "In 1991, Kerry opposed an amendment to impose an arbitrary 2 percent cut in the military budget. In 1992, he opposed an amendment to cut Pentagon intelligence programs by $1 billion. In 1994, he voted against a motion to cut $30.5 billion from the defense budget over the next five years and to redistribute the money to programs for education and the disabled. That same year, he opposed an amendment to postpone construction of a new aircraft carrier. In 1996, he opposed a motion to cut six F-18 jet fighters from the budget. In 1999, he voted against a motion to terminate the Trident II missile." (Slate, 2/25/04)
15. Kerry and the CIA
HANNITY: "If he (Kerry) had his way and the CIA would almost be nonexistent." (1/30/04)
FACT: John Kerry has supported $200 billion in intelligence funding over the past seven years - a 50 percent increase since 1996.
Kerry votes supporting intelligence funding:
FY03 Intel Authorization $39.3-$41.3 Billion
[2002, Unanimous Senate Voice Vote 9/25/02]
FY02 Intel Authorization $33 Billion
[2001, Unanimous Senate Voice Vote 12/13/01]
FY01 Intel Authorization $29.5-$31.5 Billion
[2000, Unanimous Senate Voice Vote 12/6/00]
FY00 Intel Authorization $29-$30 Billion
[1999, Unanimous Senate Voice Vote 11/19/1999]
FY99 Intel Authorization $29.0 Billion
[1998, Unanimous Senate Voice Vote 10/8/98]
FY98 Intel Authorization $26.7 Billion
[1997, Senate Roll Call Vote #109]
FY97 Intel Authorization $26.6 Billion
[1996, Unanimous Senate Voice Vote 9/25/96]
(Source: CDI)
It's the Media, Stupid.
Mimir, Daily Kos: Scarborough did not appreciate Moore's explanation to an NBC reporter as to why he would not appear on Scarborough's show. Moore rehashed the facts concerning Lori Klausutis, a young intern found dead in Scarborough's Florida office, around the time Scarborough announced he would not seek reelection. Scarborough says Moore accused him of being a murderer:
SCARBOROUGH: You going to talk to Michael?
GOLDBERG: When he has time for me.
SCARBOROUGH: When he has time for you, just tell him to stop going around calling me a murderer or I`m going to have to call my lawyers. Will you do that for me?
Break the Bush Cabal Stranglehold on the "US Mainstream News Media," Show Up for Democracy in 2004: Defeat Bush (again!)
http://www.dailykos.com/story/2004/6/15/203432/052
Joe Scarborough threatens to sue Michael Moore
by Mimir
Tue Jun 15th, 2004 at 20:34:32 EDT
Scarborough did not appreciate Moore's explanation to an NBC reporter as to why he would not appear on Scarborough's show. Moore rehashed the facts concerning Lori Klausutis, a young intern found dead in Scarborough's Florida office, around the time Scarborough announced he would not seek reelection. Scarborough says Moore accused him of being a murderer:
SCARBOROUGH: You going to talk to Michael?
GOLDBERG: When he has time for me.
SCARBOROUGH: When he has time for you, just tell him to stop going around calling me a murderer or I`m going to have to call my lawyers. Will you do that for me?
GOLDBERG: Well, I`m sure you can get to him yourself, Joe, but I appreciate you having me on. I really do.
Once again, Moore is casually commenting on facts that he reasonably assumes the media already knew about. Scarborough will come out with egg on his face, as Peter Jennings did for challenging Moore's apt description of Bush as a deserter. If Scarborough is serious about his threat, then he will suffer a worse defeat than Bill O'Reilly (in going after Franken).
These guys never learn. I hope Scarborough makes Moore's day!
The botched, bungled, so-called "war on terrorism" is NOT the strength of the Bush White House, it is the SHAME of the Bush White House...
Independent (UK): Mr Clarke believes Mr Bush's decision to invade Iraq undoubtedly damaged the hunt for al-Qa'ida. He also believes it has diverted much-needed resources from Homeland Security, leaving the country unnecessarily vulnerable. "[Iraq] is a fiasco," he said. "We can only hope there is a way of minimising the losses and getting out in a way that allows us to leave behind some sort of stable government. If [it stays as it is] now there is a high risk that what we leave behind will be worse than what was there before ... Iraq could easily be much more of a problem for us than it would have been if Saddam Hussein had stayed in power."
The whistleblower highlights three ways in which the invasion of Iraq diverted resources from the real "war on terror". Money is not available for the Department of Homeland Security to protect potential targets such as trains and chemical plants adequately, funds are not available to help countries such as Pakistan and Yemen, which could do more to counter terrorism.
Finally, the war was a great propaganda coup for the jihadist movement. "It probably greatly increased its recruitment," he said. "There was a period of time as well ... where resources in the hunt for Bin Laden were pulled away, satellite resources, special forces, Predator [drones] were sent to Iraq, rather than sent to Afghanistan. That has been somewhat rectified but not entirely. If Bin Laden had written the scenario it would have been identical to what happened."
Repudiate the 9/11 Cover-Up and the Iraq War Lies, Show Up for Democracy in 2004: Defeat Bush (again!)
http://news.independent.co.uk/people/profiles/story.jsp?story=531365
Richard Clarke: 'Iraq could be much more of a problem for America than if Saddam had stayed in power'
The Monday Interview: Former White House security chief
By Andrew Buncombe, in Washington
14 June 2004
Richard Clarke is the man who put the cat among the pigeons. This year, in the same week as the former counter-terrorism chief was giving evidence to an independent commission investigating the attacks of 11 September, Mr Clarke's scathing account of the failure to deal with al-Qa'ida was published.
In his tell-all memoir, Against all Enemies, and in his public testimony, Mr Clarke could barely have been more provocative. Much of the blame for failing to stop the attacks of 11 September, he said, could be laid at the feet of the Bush administration. They ignored his warnings about the threat posed by Osama bin Laden and - after al-Qa'ida had wreaked havoc and death in New York and Washington - President George Bush was distracted from taking on the terror network by his groundless wish to invade Iraq.
"Your government failed you," Mr Clarke told the hearing, turning to the relatives of those who died and who had come to Washington to hear his testimony. "Those entrusted with protecting you failed you. And I failed you. We tried hard, but that doesn't matter, because we failed."
Not surprisingly, the administration hit back immediately. Mr Clarke was wrong, said officials. He was out of the loop, said Vice-President Dick Cheney. The White House now considered Mr Clarke an outcast.
He is a blunt, plain-spoken man, accused by some former colleagues of arrogance and even rudeness. But does he regret speaking out. "No, not at all," he said. "I always thought, particularly in a White House job if you placed a high value on being liked by the bureaucracy, if that was one of your primary goals, then you probably should not be in that job.
"The job of a White House NSC [National Security Council] staff person is to be an enforcer of presidential policy. The bureaucracy does not naturally do what the President tells it to do."
But Mr Clarke's complaint is that the President and his senior staff, in the spring and summer of 2001, failed to listen to what he advised them about the dangers posed by al-Qa'ida "when maybe we could have done something to stop 9/11". The day after the attacks, Mr Bush was already focusing on Iraq. "Look into Iraq, Saddam," Mr Clarke says he was told angrily as his officials briefed him on al-Qa'ida being almost certainly responsible for the attacks.
Mr Clarke, who now has a consultancy firm in Arlington, Virginia, remains uncertain whether al-Qa'ida could have been stopped. "I don't think we know. It's very facile to say it could have been or could not have been. There is absolutely no way of knowing. What I do believe is that had we known about the two al-Qa'ida individuals who were among the hijackers ... Had we known they were in the country, which the FBI at some level knew and which the CIA at some level knew, had my counterparts at the FBI and CIA known, had I known, then I firmly believe we could have caught those two.
"Now, you can draw all sorts of conclusions from that. One, is that, simply, there would have been 17 hijackers. Another conclusion is that we might have been able to pull strings on those two and find more of the 19. But even if we had rounded up all 19 there would have been another 19. There would have been another major attack. The point is that al-Qa'ida was on a march to have a major terrorist attack ... They would not stop until they succeeded in having one. So yes, we might have been able to stop a particular attack."
Apart from the missed opportunities he highlights, what might be of potentially greater concern is Mr Clarke's belief that al-Qa'ida could easily attack again, and America and Britain remain exceedingly vulnerable. Another attack is not inevitable ("I think almost nothing is inevitable," he said) but possible.
He added: "I think it is harder but I can think of ways of them doing it and I'm sure they can imagine ways of doing it. It's entirely possible there will be another major attack." A dirty bomb, he believes, is probably in the "too hard" category. It is more likely terrorists would use suicide-bombs to attack softer targets, such as casinos or shopping malls. "Those are the two scenarios I use all the time when discussing it," he said. "If you do eight guys in eight shopping malls you have an enormous effect on the economy ... so much of the US economy is tied up with retail sales.
"If you did four casinos with four guys you could destroy the economy of Las Vegas. There are lots of low-end ways of doing things. And the reason they have not done some of the low-end threats, I think, is because they set the barrier for themselves very high with the 9-11 attacks. They may want another major attack; they may feel that if they do less than a major attack [they] will look like a lesser force."
Richard Clarke has made a career out of telling uncomfortable truths. He was born in Boston, his mother a nurse and his father a worker in a chocolate factory. In 1961, aged 12, he won a chance to attend the prestigious Boston Latin School, whose famous former pupils include Benjamin Franklin and Samuel Adams. From there, Mr Clarke - an active opponent of the Vietnam War - went to the University of Pennsylvania to study for a career in national security. "I wanted to get involved in national security in 1973 as a career to make sure that Vietnam did not happen again." He spent five years in the Pentagon and then moved to the State Department. In 1992, he was taken on by the White House as a national security staffer. One of the first things he did there was to exert greater influence on the Counter-terrorism Security Group. Though his career stretched over four presidencies - Ronald Reagan, George Bush Sr, Bill Clinton and George Bush Jr - it is the last for whom he reserves his most outspoken criticism. The American people were duped, he believes, by Mr Bush who came to office with a plan to invade Iraq but hid it during the election campaign. "It was very clear on 9/11, on the days immediately following when we had been attacked, that attention turned to Iraq, even as the smoke was still coming out of the World Trade Centre."
Mr Clarke believes Mr Bush's decision to invade Iraq undoubtedly damaged the hunt for al-Qa'ida. He also believes it has diverted much-needed resources from Homeland Security, leaving the country unnecessarily vulnerable. "[Iraq] is a fiasco," he said. "We can only hope there is a way of minimising the losses and getting out in a way that allows us to leave behind some sort of stable government. If [it stays as it is] now there is a high risk that what we leave behind will be worse than what was there before ... Iraq could easily be much more of a problem for us than it would have been if Saddam Hussein had stayed in power."
The whistleblower highlights three ways in which the invasion of Iraq diverted resources from the real "war on terror". Money is not available for the Department of Homeland Security to protect potential targets such as trains and chemical plants adequately, funds are not available to help countries such as Pakistan and Yemen, which could do more to counter terrorism.
Finally, the war was a great propaganda coup for the jihadist movement. "It probably greatly increased its recruitment," he said. "There was a period of time as well ... where resources in the hunt for Bin Laden were pulled away, satellite resources, special forces, Predator [drones] were sent to Iraq, rather than sent to Afghanistan. That has been somewhat rectified but not entirely. If Bin Laden had written the scenario it would have been identical to what happened."
One of Mr Clarke's friends from the national security council, is foreign policy adviser to the Democrat presidential nominee John Kerry. Mr Clarke has refused to endorse Mr Kerry in his bid for the presidency. "I do not want to be seen simply as a politically partisan commentator," he said. "I was a career civil servant. We don't have as much a tradition of career civil servants as you do [in Britain] but we have senior executive service and I was a member of that for a long time. I have a lot of Republican friends and they agree with me on most of what I say.
"So I don't want to lose the support of large numbers of Americans by my choosing sides, by choosing parties. I think this issue should be non-partisan. A large number of Republicans agree with me and I want them to speak out."
THE CV
Age: 53
Education: Boston Latin School and University of Pennsylvania
Career: 1985-88: Deputy assistant secretary of state for intelligence
1985-92: State Department
1989-92: Assistant secretary for politico-military affairs
1998-2000: National co-ordinator for security, infrastructure protection, and counter-terrorism
1992-03: Chair of the counter-terrorism group, National Security Council
March 2004: Testified to national commission on terrorist attacks
Author of 'Against All Enemies: Inside America's War on Terror - What Really Happened'
The botched, bungled, so-called "war on terrorism" is NOT the strength of the Bush White House, it is the SHAME of the Bush White House...
Hope Yen, Associated Press: Bluntly contradicting the Bush administration, the commission investigating the Sept. 11 attacks reported Wednesday there was ``no credible evidence'' that Saddam Hussein helped al-Qaida target the United States.
Repudiate the 9/11 Cover-Up and the Iraq War ies, Show Up for Democracy in 2004: Defeat Bush (again!)
http://www.commondreams.org/headlines04/0616-01.htm
Published on Wednesday, June 16, 2004 by the Associated Press
9/11 Commission: No Link Between Al-Qaida and Saddam
by Hope Yen
WASHINGTON - Bluntly contradicting the Bush administration, the commission investigating the Sept. 11 attacks reported Wednesday there was ``no credible evidence'' that Saddam Hussein helped al-Qaida target the United States.
In a chilling report that sketched the history of Osama bin Laden's network, the commission said his far-flung training camps were ``apparently quite good.'' Terrorists-to-be were encouraged to ``think creatively about ways to commit mass murder,'' it added.
Bin Laden made overtures to Saddam for assistance, the commission said in the staff report, as he did with leaders in Sudan, Iran, Afghanistan and elsewhere as he sought to build an Islamic army.
Chairman of the National Commission on Terrorists Attacks Upon the United States (9-11 Commission) Gov. Thomas Kean looks on at the beginning of their final two-day hearing at the National Transportation Security Board conference center in Washington, June 16, 2004. The commission investigating the Sept. 11 attacks began its final hearings on Wednesday before delivering its findings at the end of next month. REUTERS/Larry Downing
While Saddam dispatched a senior Iraqi intelligence official to Sudan to meet with bin Laden in 1994, the commission said it had not turned up evidence of a ``collaborative relationship.''
The Bush administration has long claimed links between Saddam Hussein and al-Qaida, and cited them as one reason for last year's invasion of Iraq.
On Monday, Vice President Dick Cheney said in a speech that the Iraqi dictator ``had long established ties with al-Qaida.''
The bipartisan commission issued its findings as it embarked on two days of public hearings into the worst terrorist attacks in American history.
The panel intends to issue a final report in July on the hijackings on Sept. 11, 2001 that killed nearly 3,000, destroyed the World Trade Centers in New York and damaged the Pentagon outside Washington. A fourth plane commandeered by terrorists crashed in the countryside in Pennsylvania.
The staff report pieced together information on the development of bin Laden's network, from the far-flung training camps in Afghanistan and elsewhere, to funding from ``well-placed financial facilitators and diversions of funds from Islamic charities.''
Reports that bin Laden had a huge personal fortune to finance acts of terror are overstated, the report said.
The description of the training camp operations contained elements of faint, grudging praise.
``A worldwide jihad needed terrorists who could bomb embassies or hijack airliners, but it also needed foot soldiers for the Taliban in its war against the Northern Alliance, and guerrillas who could shoot down Russian helicopters in Chechnya or ambush Indian units in Kashmir,'' it said.
According to one unnamed senior al-Qaida associate, various ideas were floated by mujahadeen in Afghanistan, the commission said. The options included taking over a launcher and forcing Russian scientists to fire a nuclear missile at the United States, mounting mustard gas or cyanide attacks against Jewish areas in Iraq or releasing poison gas into the air conditioning system of a targeted building.
``Last but not least, hijacking an aircraft and crashing it into an airport or nearby city,'' it said.
The Iraq connection long suggested by administration officials gained no currency in the report.
``Bin Laden is said to have requested space to establish training camps, as well as assistance in procuring weapons, but Iraq apparently never responded,'' the report said. ``There have been reports that contacts between Iraq and al-Qaida also occurred'' after bin Laden moved his operations to Afghanistan in 1996, ``but they do not appear to have resulted in a collaborative relationship,'' it said.
``Two senior bin Laden associates have adamantly denied that any ties existed between al-Qaida and Iraq,'' the report said.
In a separate report, the commission staff said that senior al-Qaida planner Khalid Shaihk Mohammed initially proposed a Sept. 11 attack involving 10 planes. An expanded target list included the CIA and FBI headquarters, unidentified nuclear plants and tall buildings in California and Washington state.
That ambitious plan was rejected by bin Laden, who ultimately approved a scaled-back mission involving four planes, the report said. Mohammed wanted more hijackers for those planes - 25 or 26, instead of 19.
The commission has identified at least 10 al-Qaida operatives who were to participate but could not take part for reasons including visa problems and suspicion by officials at airports in the United States and overseas.
From a seamless operation, the report portrays a plot riven by internal dissent, including disagreement over whether to target the White House or the Capitol that was apparently never resolved prior to the attacks. Bin Laden also had to overcome opposition to attacking the United States from Mullah Omar, leader of the former Taliban regime, who was under pressure from Pakistan to keep al-Qaida confined.
The United States toppled the regime in the wake of the Sept. 11 attacks, but Omar has eluded capture, as has al-Qaida.
© Copyright 2004 Associated Press
###
As the LNS has chronicled for the long, painful years since 9/11, there is "something rotten in the state of..." and significant elements of the intelligence establishment, the military establishment, and the foreign policy establishment (and hopefully, the law enforcement establishment) are struggling against the Bush abomination. This struggle -- from John O'Neill to Richard Clarke and Joseph Wilson, and beyond -- has been recorded here, and elsewhere, thanks to the Internet-based Information Rebellion (and the free press of our European allies)...Yes, the Halliburton scandals (there are several) are heating`up. Even the WASHPS and the NYTwits have noticed. Although if you want the truth of it stick to the Financial Times and the press releases of Rep. Henry Waxman (D-CA.) And yes, the LNS's suspicions about the increasingly unhinged and incredibly shrinking _resident's father distancing himself from Junior on the war in Iraq has been corrborated in Capitol Hill Blue, but we are going to stay focused and disciplined...So many "high crimes and misdemeanors," so little time...
Mark Follman, Salon, interviews Thomas Powers: Author
Thomas Powers says the White House's corruption of
intelligence has caused the greatest foreign policy
catastrophe in modern U.S. history - and sparked a
civil war with the nation's intel agencies.
The U.S. is now waging three wars, says
intelligence expert Thomas Powers. One is in Iraq. The
second is in Afghanistan. And the third is in
Washington - an all-out war between the White House
and the nation's own intelligence agencies.
Powers, the author of "Intelligence Wars: American
Secret History From Hitler to Al Qaeda," charges that
the Bush administration is responsible for what is
perhaps the greatest disaster in the history of U.S.
intelligence. From failing to anticipate 9/11 to
pressuring the CIA to produce bogus justifications for
war, from abusing Iraqi prisoners to misrepresenting
the nature of Iraqi insurgents, the Bush White House,
the Pentagon and the intelligence agencies they
corrupted, coerced or ignored have made
extraordinarily grave errors which could threaten our
national security for years. By manipulating
intelligence and punishing dissent while pursuing an
extreme foreign-policy agenda, Bush leaders have set
spy against U.S. spy and deeply damaged America's
intelligence capabilities.
"It's a catastrophe beyond belief. Going into
Afghanistan was inevitable, and in my opinion the
right thing to do. But everything since then has been
a horrible mistake," Powers says. "The CIA is
politicized to an extreme. It's under the control of
the White House. Tenet is leaving in the middle of an
unresolved political crisis - what really amounts to a
constitutional crisis."
Repudiate the 9/11 Cover-Up and the Iraq War Lies,
Show Up for Democracy in 2004: Defeat Bush (again!)
http://www.truthout.org/docs_04/061504E.shtml
A Temporary Coup
By Mark Follman
Salon.com
Monday 14 June 2004
Author Thomas Powers says the White House's corruption
of intelligence has caused the greatest foreign policy
catastrophe in modern U.S. history - and sparked a
civil war with the nation's intel agencies.
The U.S. is now waging three wars, says
intelligence expert Thomas Powers. One is in Iraq. The
second is in Afghanistan. And the third is in
Washington - an all-out war between the White House
and the nation's own intelligence agencies.
Powers, the author of "Intelligence Wars: American
Secret History From Hitler to Al Qaeda," charges that
the Bush administration is responsible for what is
perhaps the greatest disaster in the history of U.S.
intelligence. From failing to anticipate 9/11 to
pressuring the CIA to produce bogus justifications for
war, from abusing Iraqi prisoners to misrepresenting
the nature of Iraqi insurgents, the Bush White House,
the Pentagon and the intelligence agencies they
corrupted, coerced or ignored have made
extraordinarily grave errors which could threaten our
national security for years. By manipulating
intelligence and punishing dissent while pursuing an
extreme foreign-policy agenda, Bush leaders have set
spy against U.S. spy and deeply damaged America's
intelligence capabilities.
"It's a catastrophe beyond belief. Going into
Afghanistan was inevitable, and in my opinion the
right thing to do. But everything since then has been
a horrible mistake," Powers says. "The CIA is
politicized to an extreme. It's under the control of
the White House. Tenet is leaving in the middle of an
unresolved political crisis - what really amounts to a
constitutional crisis."
The bitterest dispute, though not the only one, is
between the CIA and the Pentagon, whose own secret
intelligence unit, the Office of Special Plans,
aggressively promoted the war on Iraq. While departing
CIA Director George Tenet played along with the Bush
administration - a fact which Powers says reveals the
urgent need for a truly independent intelligence chief
- much of the agency is enraged at the Pentagon, which
put intense pressure on it to produce reports tailored
to the policy goals of the Bush White House. The
simmering tensions between the Pentagon, with its
troika of Rumsfeld, Wolfowitz and Feith, and rank and
file CIA personnel boiled over in July 2003, when the
White House trashed the career of veteran CIA
operative Valerie Plame by leaking her identity. The
move was a crude retaliation against Plame's husband,
former U.S. ambassador Joseph Wilson, who had exposed
the Bush administration's specious claim that Saddam
had sought "yellowcake" from Africa to build a nuclear
bomb.
The struggle between the CIA and the Defense
Department reached a bizarre climax a few weeks ago
when Ahmed Chalabi's office was very publicly
ransacked by officers working under the command of the
CIA; the Iraqi exile leader was later accused of
leaking vital information to Iran, among other
allegations. The abrupt fall from grace of the man
hand-picked by neoconservative policymakers to lead
post-Saddam Iraq, says Powers, lays bare the brutal
turf war between the two sides.
"It reveals an extraordinary level of bitter
combat between the CIA and the Pentagon. It's
astonishing that the CIA actually oversaw a team of
people who broke into Chalabi's headquarters - which
was paid for by the Pentagon - and ransacked the
place. The CIA single-handedly destroyed him."
The collapse of U.S. intelligence and the
arrogance and extremism at the top of the Bush
administration are also at the root of the torture
scandal at Abu Ghraib prison, Powers says. With U.S.
troops facing a mounting insurgency from an enemy they
couldn't find, Powers believes Bush officials signed
off on a systematic policy of hardcore interrogation
in a frantic attempt to deal with the problem. He says
that while it's unlikely Defense Secretary Rumsfeld
gave specific orders as to what type of abuse should
be meted out to the Iraqi prisoners, there is strong
reason to believe Rumsfeld "issued blanket permission
for them to turn up the heat."
In an explosive conjecture, Powers also speculates
that the Israelis, "who've had the most experience,"
cooperated with the U.S. on the techniques used to
humiliate and break Arabs, including sexual
degradation.
As for the dubiously timed Tenet resignation -
with its fairy-tale like cover story of "I'll be
spending more time with my family" - Powers thinks one
possibility is that the CIA director may have been
forced out after Pentagon officials, enraged by the
Chalabi debacle, pressured Bush to get rid of him.
But what troubles Powers the most, he says, is
that the Bush administration completely subverted
American democracy, browbeating Congress and the
national security agencies to launch a war. "They
correctly read how the various institutions of our
government could be used to stage a kind of temporary
coup on a single issue: Whether or not to go to war
with Iraq."
Salon reached Powers by phone at his office in
Vermont.
Let's start with the problems inside Iraq itself.
We know there was a dearth of intelligence assets on
the ground for years before the war. What's your
assessment of the situation now?
This is one of the most closely guarded secrets of
the agency, and I don't know anybody outside of it who
really has a sense of the assets they had inside the
country then, or what they have there now. But I don't
think that was the biggest problem.
The biggest problem has to do with the decision at
very high levels to look at things in a certain way.
There was no shortage of warnings in the U.S.
government from various branches and offices that the
postwar period was going to be complicated and
difficult. In that respect there was no failure of
intelligence. But for institutional reasons -
political reasons - the White House and the Defense
Department didn't want to hear it. The Defense
Department was very explicit that they weren't going
to pay attention to those studies, that they wouldn't
seriously consider increasing their estimate of how
much money and troops would be required - because once
that went down on a piece of paper Congress would want
to see it.
There is already ample evidence that the abusive
treatment of Iraqi prisoners proceeded from systematic
policy at some level. With U.S. forces facing a rising
insurgency and a severe lack of intelligence
infrastructure there, do you think Bush policymakers
decided that the situation required a kind of dragnet
interrogation system? That in order to deal with the
problem they had to round up anybody remotely
suspicious and "take the gloves off" - as Rumsfeld
ordered done with American Taliban John Walker Lindh -
in order to figure out who and where the enemy was?
Well, we know Gen. [Geoffrey D.] Miller went from
Guantanamo to Iraq [last August] in order to beef up
the whole intelligence gathering apparatus so that we
could try to begin to understand who we were fighting
there. For a long time the administration had been
claiming we were fighting Baathists and dead-enders,
or foreign terrorists pouring in across Iraq's
borders. Part of the reason for those claims was that
politically that's what was needed to explain the
continuing resistance. It was also clear that we
didn't really know who we were fighting.
Fallujah is a good example: The administration has
never given a clear answer as to who we've been
fighting there. Our behavior suggests that when we
finally decided to back off, we had concluded that
whoever it was didn't pose a direct threat to us. It
was a resistance to us - but we were perfectly
prepared to live with it. We turned it over to an
Iraqi officer and said, "Hey, you deal with this."
They didn't have to shoot all the Iraqi insurgents,
they reached an agreement and the fighting appeared
suddenly to just stop.
How would you connect that to the administration's
broader interrogation policy?
I think the attempts at Abu Ghraib - and in many
other places, I'm sure - to extract information about
what was happening on the ground were based on a real
need. But the military had at least one success that
suggested how they might do it correctly: tracking
down Saddam Hussein. As far as I understand it, that
was essentially a bookkeeping success. They really
paid attention to detail, kept very good files and
eventually identified and located everybody who was
connected to Saddam, to 10 degrees of separation. They
realized that somebody would tell somebody else in
that network where he was. So that kind of complete
encompassing of the subject appears to have been
effective.
But the notion that Abu Ghraib prison was chaotic
and out of control, that's what people say who don't
want to take responsibility for it. I don't believe
that for a second. Rumsfeld wouldn't sit down and say,
"The best way is to photograph these guys pretending
to masturbate," but I think he did create the
circumstances and the pressure for that kind of thing
- in effect issued blanket permission for them to turn
up the heat.
Then you have to ask who actually instructed U.S.
interrogators in Arab psychology and suggested this
would be a good way to get Arabs to feel powerless and
vulnerable and tell you what you want to know. My
guess is the people who've had the most experience in
that, namely the Israelis, who've been at war with
Arabs for decades, must've cooperated with us on a
method. Of course, that's pure speculation on my part.
Clearly this kind of treatment shatters the U.S.
relationship to the Geneva Accords, not to mention the
professed morality of our mission. What do you make of
the latest Pentagon memo to come to light, which said
the president could ignore the anti-torture laws?
The answer seems pretty clear to me. The U.S.
government has people who specialize in interrogation,
and they have a long list of things they can't do. But
when you're feeling desperate, you simply take some of
the things from list B, what you're not allowed to do,
and you move them over to list A, the things you are
allowed to do.
What do you make of the Byzantine twists of the
Ahmed Chalabi story? By the time photos of his
ransacked Baghdad compound filled the newspapers, the
tale of his rise and fall seemed almost unbelievable,
the stuff of a spy novel.
I think it reveals an extraordinary level of
bitter combat between the CIA and the Pentagon. It's
astonishing that things would get to such a level,
where the CIA actually oversaw a team of people who
broke into Chalabi's headquarters - which was paid for
by the Pentagon - and ransacked the place and carried
away his computers. Who do you think bought those
computers? Those are your American tax dollars at
work.
That level of internal animosity is amazing. Look
at the chronology: First you have a moment when the
Pentagon announces that it's cutting off the funds to
Chalabi's intelligence operation. A few days later
this raid takes place. Well, it looks pretty clear
that somebody warned the Pentagon this was going to
happen, so that they could at least cut off his
funding and not be caught with their pants down.
Chalabi was the Pentagon's candidate to run Iraq.
Richard Perle [the influential neoconservative advisor
to the Pentagon] still says that the single greatest
mistake we've made so far was not putting Chalabi in
power as soon we got there.
And who has actually gone into power now? The
CIA's man: Iyad Allawi [the interim Iraqi prime
minister]. That's a dramatic shift. As it was, Chalabi
didn't appear to be the candidate that [U.N. envoy]
Lakhdar Brahimi was going to choose, but that invasion
of Chalabi's office made it an impossibility. The CIA
single-handedly destroyed him by doing that.
Chalabi is clearly a shady figure, but given the
timing and chronology here, do you find the recent
charges that he could be working for the Iranians
believable? Or is it ultimately a smear campaign?
What's at the center of all this?
Who knows! [Laughs]. We can only try to follow the
logic of where the information about the leaked
Iranian code would've come from. The conversation
between Chalabi and the Iranian intelligence office
was likely collected by the National Security Agency,
which is normally in charge of that kind of data, who
would've then passed it on to counterintelligence in
the CIA. Or, the CIA might have actually sent a team
into Chalabi's office to plant bugs or broadcasting
devices, they might have conducted that type of
black-bag operation in order to get access to that
communication traffic. It's also conceivable the
[Pentagon's] Defense Intelligence Agency was involved.
The information about Chalabi could certainly be
real, but meanwhile, the CIA's guy Allawi apparently
benefits by the removal from the scene of a principle
rival - right before Brahimi gets to choose the new
government.
So this is ultimately the CIA fighting back
against the Pentagon?
I think so - can it really be a coincidence that
this happens right before Brahimi announces the new
government? U.S. intelligence knew about the
compromised Iranian code about six weeks before the
raid. So why wait till just before Brahimi's
announcement? And why the large team of people and the
very public display of trashing Chalabi headquarters
and carting everything away? Regardless of the truth,
when something like this happens, Brahimi is incapable
of sorting it out. He just has to step away. It's one
of those things you can't touch with a 10-foot pole.
I don't know exactly what it all represents, but
I'm certain that it involves bad blood between the CIA
and the Pentagon. It puzzled me at first why Tenet
would be resigning after this apparent CIA triumph. I
did wonder if the Pentagon had mustered enough
high-level fury to reach the president.
How else do you view Tenet's resignation? The
innocuous framing of it accompanies perhaps the
biggest series of intelligence disasters in U.S.
history.
There is no question that over the last couple of
years it's become clear that the various U.S.
intelligence agencies have numerous weaknesses and
institutional deficiencies. But the biggest problem is
really the politicization of intelligence under Bush.
It's happened in two ways. First, because of the
politics surrounding 9/11, the intelligence agencies
have not been able to speak about it honestly and
directly. Iraq is the other big issue: The
intelligence agencies have not been able to speak
about that honestly and directly either, because
they've been pressured by the White House, especially
before the war, to take a certain view.
That's where all this internal trouble with the
intelligence system comes from. It's not as if they're
all Keystone Kops who can't figure out where their
left shoes are. It's all about the politics of it.
And that's only further complicated by the long
history of turf wars between the agencies, between the
FBI and CIA, and now apparently between the State
Department and the Pentagon intelligence operations.
Exactly, and now they're all fighting over a
policy which represents perhaps the single most
aggressive and resolute endeavor in the history of
U.S. foreign relations. It's astonishing, not just
that President Bush got a bee in his bonnet that he
had to invade another country and establish a major
new American military presence in the Middle East, but
that he would do it in this way.
Do you think Tenet essentially was pushed out by
the White House?
Tenet was pushed out by the accumulating
circumstances, not because he failed to do what Bush
wanted him to do, which was essentially two things:
The first was to not speak too clearly about the
warnings that he'd given the White House before 9/11.
You can be certain that it was not easy for Tenet to
do that. Tenet has never spoken out clearly and said,
"I told the president everything he needed to know to
at least start responding to the threat."
Secondly, Tenet hasn't spoken clearly on the
reason why they got Iraqi WMD wrong. And it's not
because people in the bowels of the agency had it all
balled up, it's because in the process of writing
finished intelligence - which was required to extract
a vote for war from congress - it got turned on its
head at the upper levels of the CIA. They found
certainty where there wasn't any; the evidence for WMD
stockpiles and programs was extremely thin. Who else
could have created this situation besides the
policymakers themselves?
What about the timing of Tenet's departure? It
comes in tandem with more alerts about terrorist
attacks this summer, and right around the June 30
transition of power in Iraq. Do you think Tenet was
explicitly asked to leave?
I think he was definitely asked to leave. He
showed every sign of extreme distress.
And there's been plenty of speculation that has to
do with the forthcoming congressional reports on 9/11
and Iraq intelligence, which won't look good for him.
The obvious answer is probably the correct one.
Tenet would spend all his time defending himself
against the reports. Everybody knows that another guy
could run the agency just as well and could run it the
same way. Bush has even made sure it'll be run the
same way by keeping the same leadership, with [Deputy
Director] John McLaughlin taking over. Bush would end
up spending a lot of political capital fighting for
Tenet; it's much simpler just to get him off the stage
- just like they did with Gen. Ricardo Sanchez in
Iraq. Once somebody made clear that Sanchez knew about
Abu Ghraib, they didn't argue about it. They got rid
of him.
What does Tenet's departure say about the state of
the agency at a critical time for U.S. national
security operations?
The agency is politicized to an extreme. It is
under the control of the Bush White House. Tenet is
leaving in the middle of an unresolved political
crisis - what really amounts to a constitutional
crisis. It's somewhat like Iran-Contra, though on a
totally different scale. The president wanted to go to
war. He's supposed to have the support of the
Congress. How did he get it? Well, his administration
made up a scary story about imminent dangers.
Doesn't Tenet's departure make him the fall guy
implicitly, even if President Bush delivered him
cordially?
Of course the implicit blame is there, and that's
one of the reasons why he looked and sounded so
distressed. He had plenty reason to be; there was a
cumulative insistence that the CIA had to be at fault.
He could change that picture dramatically by standing
up and saying, "Look, you want to know what I really
told the president before 9/11? Here it is." Obviously
that would be quite a bombshell and you can be sure
the president would never speak to him again.
I think the truth about what happened at the
policy level will eventually come out. We know,
because it was on paper, that on Aug. 6, 2001 the CIA
gave the president a very explicit warning. When 9/11
actually occurred, you would expect to look back and
see, once the distress light was on, various U.S.
intelligence and police organizations scurrying around
frantically responding to the warning. But what do you
find? Nothing.
While Tenet appears to have equivocated about
Iraqi WMD in some instances, we also know that the CIA
expressed significant doubt about specific
intelligence on Iraq long before the war - the bogus
Niger-uranium report, for example - that the Bush
administration still used to make its case. How can
the administration possibly continue to promote the
idea that the CIA got it all wrong?
Well, who else is the administration going to
blame? If they don't say that, then they would have to
ask, "Why did the CIA write a report that went in
certitude beyond the evidence?" The answer is very
likely to be, "Because that's what the president
wanted, and he made sure that was understood."
Is the war inside the U.S. intelligence system
completely off the charts historically? Is there any
precedent for this?
I can't think of any. It's not uncommon for the
various secret branches of the U.S. government to be
at odds with each other. The CIA quarreled with the
Defense Department for years over Soviet missiles, but
I don't remember anything like this. The CIA was
present when that team of Iraqi police went in and
ransacked Chalabi's compound. I mean, that's amazing.
The only thing that would've made it more amazing was
if it had happened in Washington.
In a way it reminds me of the "Night of the long
knives" in 1934, the night when Hitler got rid of the
Brown Shirts, the street fighting organization that
had helped the Nazi Party come to power. It was a
highly organized institution bitterly hated by the
army. It was run by a bunch of people who were
politically ambitious and were direct rivals of the
group that came into power with Hitler. Literally in
one night the offices and headquarters of this group
were raided and many of them were killed in their
beds. Immediately all kinds of propaganda came out
about their low behavior and betrayal. It was an
internal government bloodletting where one faction
just simply swept the other off the scene.
What the CIA did to Chalabi isn't exactly the
same, but it makes me worry even more about the level
of covert fighting inside our own government.
Just last week the New York Times reported that
the CIA is still struggling with a "major flaw" in its
operations. A senior agency official, Jami Miscik,
described conditions still ripe for the distortion of
information, and similar problems reportedly plague
the Defense Intelligence Agency. What's your view of
the rising chorus within Congress to overhaul the
intelligence system?
I think it's a good idea, and I never thought that
before. It ought to be set up with a devoted Cabinet
post, a secretary of intelligence who would have a
wide range of powers and authority to oversee the
whole system. But that person can't run everything;
each of the agencies is distinct for good reasons, and
each one has to be run by its own chief.
Separating intelligence and police operations is
absolutely essential. If you put it all under a single
authority it would represent the greatest threat by
far to American democracy. Other countries have proven
that. A single intelligence organization will abuse
the power of secrecy to protect itself - all
intelligence organizations routinely abuse the power
of secrecy to protect themselves.
Just look back at the way we got into this war:
There was nobody in the public who had the capacity to
seriously question the CIA's evidence and arguments.
We just had to take it on trust.
And that's a dangerous prospect when you have a
White House with an inflexible agenda that's in
control of the system.
I think so. I don't know how else to explain
getting it completely wrong. If you go back and look
at Powell's speech at the U.N., he makes dozens of
claims and not one of them was ever robustly confirmed
- in fact, almost all of them were completely false. I
mean, how could he get it that wrong?
The most important thing to do now is to alter the
chain of command. I think it makes sense to have the
secretary of intelligence serve for a four-year term
that overlaps presidential terms, an appointment that
begins at the end of the first year of every
presidential term. In other words, each president
coming into office inherits the previous intelligence
leader for at least a year. That provides continuity
and avoids election year politics.
How do you view the Bush administration in terms
of dealing with this whole series of intelligence
problems that have come to light?
It's a catastrophe beyond belief. Going into
Afghanistan was inevitable, and in my opinion the
right thing to do. But everything since then has been
a horrible mistake, one that has made it more
difficult to fight the war on terror, has driven away
allies and diminished the degree of cooperation from a
number of intelligence services and governments in the
Arab world. And it promises to get worse. This was a
completely unnecessary, distracting, expensive war
that has isolated the United States.
It seems like there has almost never been direct
acknowledgement by the White House of any policy
problems.
Yes, but they've done something else which
troubles me more than anything. They correctly read
how the various institutions of our government could
be used to stage a kind of temporary coup on a single
issue: Whether or not to go to war with Iraq.
President Bush used the intelligence system as a
blunt instrument, and they forced Congress to go along
- the Congress was in an almost impossible position.
When the president uses the maximum power of his own
office and says, "I am soberly telling you that this
is necessary for the safety of the country," you gotta
listen to the guy. At least once.
-------
The Lynndie Englands and Jessica Lynchs of this
country are going to lead the sacking of the Bush
abomination...There is an Electoral Uprising coming in
November 2004...
Cindi Lash and Michael A. Fuoco, Pittsburgh
Post-Gazette: By putting top government officials like
Vice President Dick Cheney on their witness list,
England's attorneys are serving notice that in
defending their client, they will attempt to put on
trial the Bush administration's policies on
intelligence gathering from detainees. Like most other
military police reservists charged in the abuse
scandal, England has claimed military intelligence
officers ordered the MPs to "soften up" the detainees
prior to interrogations.
Support Our Troops, Show Up for Democracy in 2004:
Defeat Bush (again!)
http://www.post-gazette.com/pg/04165/331166.stm
Soldier's defense team wants 100 witnesses from Cheney on down for Abu Ghraib case
Sunday, June 13, 2004
By Cindi Lash and Michael A. Fuoco, Pittsburgh
Post-Gazette
Defense attorneys preparing for Pfc. Lynndie England's
upcoming hearing on charges she abused detainees at
Abu Ghraib prison have compiled a list of 100
potential witnesses stretching from the halls of power
in Washington, D.C., to the sand-swept vistas of Iraq.
KCNC-TV via AP
Army Pfc. Lynndie England during an interview with
KCNC-TV on May 11.
By putting top government officials like Vice
President Dick Cheney on their witness list, England's
attorneys are serving notice that in defending their
client, they will attempt to put on trial the Bush
administration's policies on intelligence gathering
from detainees. Like most other military police
reservists charged in the abuse scandal, England has
claimed military intelligence officers ordered the MPs
to "soften up" the detainees prior to interrogations.
However, just because her attorneys want those
witnesses doesn't mean that many of them will be on
the stand later this month at England's Article 32
hearing in Fort Bragg, N.C. That's because a military
investigating officer, the presiding authority at the
Article 32 hearing, will decide which witnesses are
most relevant.
The goal at this stage of the military justice system
is to determine whether there is sufficient probable
cause to believe a crime was committed and whether
England committed it. If the investigating officer
determines there is enough evidence to proceed to a
court-martial, he will make that recommendation to a
higher-ranking officer, who will make the final
determination.
Given that, it would seem highly unlikely that the
most prominent names listed will be asked to take the
witness stand at England's hearing, tentatively
scheduled for June 22.
Related article
Top general approved tough grilling tactics
The wished-for witness list, obtained by the
Pittsburgh Post-Gazette, includes, in addition to
Cheney, other high-ranking officials such as Defense
Secretary Donald Rumsfeld, Deputy Defense Secretary
Paul Wolfowitz and Defense Undersecretary for
Intelligence Stephen Cambone; Lt. Gen. Ricardo
Sanchez, commander of U.S. forces in Iraq, and other
high-ranking Army officers; White House General
Counsel Alberto Gonzales; and Justice Department
officials.
An Army spokeswoman said last week that any military
personnel chosen as witnesses by the investigating
officer will be ordered to appear. Spokesmen for
Cheney and the Defense Department did not return calls
seeking comment.
England, 21, of Fort Ashby, W.Va., has become perhaps
the most recognized of the seven soldiers from the
372nd MP Company who were charged in the prison abuse
scandal. She provoked international ire for her
exuberant smile and thumbs-up sign while posing with
naked, hooded prisoners in widely published
photographs. In one, she holds a leash attached to the
neck of a naked Iraqi who is on the ground.
The witness list includes 16 members of the 372nd,
headquartered in Cresaptown, Md., many of whose names
will be familiar to those who have followed the abuse
scandal.
Among the group are Spc. Joseph M. Darby, the Somerset
County native who turned in the others and is not
facing charges, and Spc. Jeremy Sivits of Hyndman,
Bedford County, who pleaded guilty May 19 at a special
court-martial in a plea bargain with prosecutors in
which he promised to testify against England and the
six other MPs charged thus far.
The five other charged MPs -- Staff Sgt. Ivan "Chip"
Frederick II, Sgt. Javal S. Davis, Spc. Charles Graner
Jr., Spc. Sabrina Harman and Spc. Megan Ambuhl --
remain in Iraq where they are performing tasks other
than jail guard duty. They are not expected to be
ordered to testify because they almost certainly would
invoke their Fifth Amendment right against
self-incrimination if ordered to do so.
Frederick, Davis and Graner have already had their
Article 32 hearings and have had charges referred to
general court-martial. A military judge set June 21
for pre-trial hearings in their cases, where pleas and
motions must be entered.
Ambuhl has had her Article 32 hearing, at which two of
four charges lodged against her were dropped. A
decision is expected by early summer on whether she
should face a court-martial.
Harman's Article 32 hearing is scheduled for June 24.
An Army spokesman in Iraq said the hearing is
tentatively set to be held at the Victory Base
Courthouse outside of Baghdad but it may be moved to
the Green Zone, the heavily guarded area in central
Baghdad, to provide for additional seating.
Unlike the other charged MPs, England was transferred
to the United States because she is pregnant. She told
investigators that Graner is the father.
At this stage, prosecutors are likely to draw much of
their case against England from her own words, found
in the signed, sworn statement she gave agents from
the Army's Criminal Investigation Division at Fort
Bragg on May 5. Her attorneys, who did not return
calls last week, have in the past argued that England
was pressured into giving that statement and they will
try to have it suppressed.
In that statement, obtained by the Post-Gazette,
England implicates herself and five other members of
the 372nd in varying types of abuse at Abu Ghraib. She
maintains they committed no crimes because they were
following orders from superior officers and that what
occurred there was widely known and, in some cases,
"funny."
England acknowledged in her statement that the MPs
were not given specific orders on how to "break''
detainees for interrogation by military intelligence
officers or other government agents. But she said
those officers praised the MPs and told them to "keep
it up'' with their treatment of detainees.
England's witness list also includes White House
counsel Gonzales and Justice Department officials who
were involved in a controversial Bush administration
decision two years ago to deny Geneva Conventions
protections to captured Taliban and Al-Qaida
combatants detained in Afghanistan and at Guantanamo,
Cuba. That paved the way for U.S. agents to employ a
new, more aggressive set of interrogation rules that
included stress and duress while they attempted to
extract information from detainees at Guantanamo and
other sites.
Attorneys for England and other charged MPs, as well
as administration critics, contend that policy was
gradually expanded to also cover Iraqi detainees,
creating conditions where military and civilian
intelligence officers used MP guards at Abu Ghraib to
intimidate detainees before interrogations.
Also on the witness list are 12 Abu Ghraib detainees,
although what assistance they could provide in
England's defense is unclear, other than if they would
say she wasn't involved in any incidents involving
them.
One of them, Abdou Hussain Saad Faleh, is identified
in CID documents obtained by the Post-Gazette as the
inmate in the iconic photo of the abuse scandal --
hooded, standing on a box and with wires attached to
his fingers, toes and penis -- after MPs told him he
would be electrocuted if he stepped off.
Another detainee on the witness list, Abd Alwhab
Youss, told CID investigators that after he was
mistakenly identified as the owner of a broken
toothbrush that could be used as a weapon, he was
stripped and six unnamed guards poured cold water on
him and "forced me to put my head in someone's urine,"
beat him with a broom, stepped on his head, spit on
him and yelled at him with a loudspeaker for three
hours.
The witness list also includes:
Maj. Gen. Geoffrey D. Miller, who supervised
operations at the U.S. Detention Center in Guantanamo
before he was sent to Iraq to improve intelligence
gathering in summer 2003. In November, Sanchez
transferred control of Abu Ghraib to military
intelligence and other agencies.
Maj Gen. Antonio M. Taguba, who headed a military
investigation that produced a report detailing abuses
at Abu Ghraib. His report includes MPs' contentions
that their controversial treatment of prisoners was
directed by military intelligence and other government
officials.
Maj. Gen. George Fay, the Army's deputy chief of
staff for intelligence, who was appointed after
Taguba's report to investigate the conduct of military
intelligence officers at Abu Ghraib. Fay, however, may
be replaced by a higher-ranking general because, as a
two-star general, he lacks authority to question
officers of greater rank.
Brig. Gen. Janis L. Karpinski, who as commander of
the 800th Military Police Brigade oversaw military
prisons in Iraq, and other Army officials who worked
in the prison. Karpinski and other officers have been
reprimanded.
Col. Thomas M. Pappas, who as commander of the 205th
Military Intelligence Brigade oversaw interrogations
at Abu Ghraib.
Other soldiers who were witnesses to abuse, according
to CID documents obtained by the Post-Gazette.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
(Cindi Lash can be reached at clash@post-gazette.com
or 412-263-1973. Michael A. Fuoco can be reached at
mfuoco@post-gazette.com or 412-263-1968.)
Drip, drip, drip...The stench of Abu Ghraib is on the
Bush White House, and the stench of the Bush White
House is on Abu Ghraib...Note, of course, that Brig.
Gen. Karpinski was given a forum by the BBC, not by
SeeNotNews, or AnythingButSee, or NotBeSeen, or even
by SeeBS (yet)...
BBC: Brig Gen Janis Karpinski told the BBC she was
being made a "convenient scapegoat" for abuse ordered
by others.
Top US commander for Iraq, Gen Ricardo Sanchez, should
be asked what he knew about the abuse, she told BBC
Radio 4's On The Ropes programme...
Gen Karpinski said more damaging information was
likely to emerge at those trials...
Karpinski fears she has been made a scapegoat
A US general who has investigated the abuse has blamed
the soldiers - and found no evidence "of a policy or a
direct order given to these soldiers to conduct what
they did".
But Gen Karpinski believes the soldiers had not taken
the pictures of their own accord.
"I know that the MP [military police] unit that these
soldiers belonged to hadn't been in Abu Ghraib long
enough to be so confident that one night or early
morning they were going to take detainees out of their
cells, pile them up and photograph themselves in
various positions with these detainees."
"How it happened or why those photographs came to the
Criminal Investigation Division's attention in January
I think will probably come out very clearly at each
individual's court martial."
Support Our Troops, Show Up for Democracy in 2004:
Defeat Bush (again!)
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/americas/3806713.stm
Last Updated: Tuesday, 15 June, 2004, 11:10 GMT 12:10
UK
E-mail this to a friend Printable version
Iraq abuse 'ordered from the top'
Images of the abuse have shocked the world
The US commander at the centre of the Iraqi prisoner
scandal says she was told to treat detainees like
dogs.
Brig Gen Janis Karpinski told the BBC she was being
made a "convenient scapegoat" for abuse ordered by
others.
Top US commander for Iraq, Gen Ricardo Sanchez, should
be asked what he knew about the abuse, she told BBC
Radio 4's On The Ropes programme.
One soldier has been sentenced and six others are
awaiting courts martial for abuses committed at Abu
Ghraib jail.
Gen Karpinski said more damaging information was
likely to emerge at those trials.
Gen Karpinski was in charge of the military police
unit that ran Abu Ghraib and other prisons when the
abuses were committed. She has been suspended but not
charged.
More details awaited
Photographs showing naked Iraqi detainees being
humiliated and maltreated first started to surface in
April, sparking shock and anger across the world.
Gen Karpinski said military intelligence took over
part of the Abu Ghraib jail to "Gitmoize" their
interrogations - make them more like what was
happening in the US detention camp at Guantanamo Bay,
Cuba, which is nicknamed "Gitmo".
He said they are like dogs and if you allow them to
believe at any point that they are more than a dog
then you've lost control of them
General Karpinski
In pictures: Prisoner abuse
She said current Iraqi prisons chief Maj Gen Geoffrey
Miller - who was in charge at Guantanamo Bay - visited
her in Baghdad and said: "At Guantanamo Bay we learned
that the prisoners have to earn every single thing
that they have."
"He said they are like dogs and if you allow them to
believe at any point that they are more than a dog
then you've lost control of them."
Gen Karpinski repeated that she knew nothing of the
humiliation and torture of Iraq prisoners that was
going on inside Abu Ghraib - she was made a scapegoat.
Top commander Ricardo Sanchez must be asked serious
questions about what he knew about the abuse and when,
she said.
Gen Sanchez said in May that he took a personal
responsibility for the abuse by soldiers at Abu Ghraib
jail. But he denied authorising interrogation
techniques such as sleep deprivation, stress positions
or sensory deprivation.
Last week, he asked to be excused from any role in
reviewing the results of an investigation into the
abuses. He requested that a higher-ranking general
take on that task, Pentagon officials said.
Karpinski fears she has been made a scapegoat
A US general who has investigated the abuse has blamed
the soldiers - and found no evidence "of a policy or a
direct order given to these soldiers to conduct what
they did".
But Gen Karpinski believes the soldiers had not taken
the pictures of their own accord.
"I know that the MP [military police] unit that these
soldiers belonged to hadn't been in Abu Ghraib long
enough to be so confident that one night or early
morning they were going to take detainees out of their
cells, pile them up and photograph themselves in
various positions with these detainees."
"How it happened or why those photographs came to the
Criminal Investigation Division's attention in January
I think will probably come out very clearly at each
individual's court martial."
On The Ropes can be heard on BBC Radio 4 on Tuesday 15
June at 0900 and 2100 BST.
The November 2004 election is a national referendum on
the CREDIBILITY, COMPETENCE and CHARACTER of the
increasingly unhinged and incredibly shrinking
_resident. The issues of CREDIBILITY and COMPTENCE
have been brought to the public eye, and now, finally,
the issue of CHARACTER is being brought to the public
eye...
Capitol Hill Blue: Dr. Justin Frank, writing in Bush
on the Couch: Inside the Mind of the President, also
says the President has a ""lifelong streak of sadism,
ranging from childhood pranks (using firecrackers to
explode frogs) to insulting journalists, gloating over
state executions ... [and] pumping his fist gleefully
before the bombing of Baghdad."
Even worse, Dr. Frank concludes, the President's years
of heavy drinking ""may have affected his brain
function - and his decision to quit drinking without
the help of a 12-step program [puts] him at far higher
risk of relapse."
Dr. Frank's revelations comes on the heels of last
week's Capitol Hill Blue exclusive that revealed
increasing concern by White House aides over Bush's
emotional stability.
Restore the Timeline, Show Up for Democracy in 2004:
Defeat Bush (again!)
http://www.capitolhillblue.com/artman/publish/article_4687.shtml
From Capitol Hill Blue
Bush Leagues
Washington Shrink Calls Bush a Paranoid, Sadistic Meglomaniac
By Staff and Wire Reports
Jun 14, 2004, 00:22
A new book by a prominent Washington psychoanalyst
says President George W. Bush is a "paranoid
meglomaniac" as well as a sadist and "untreated
alcoholic." The doctor's analysis appears to confirm
earlier reports the President may be emotionally
unstable.
Dr. Justin Frank, writing in Bush on the Couch: Inside
the Mind of the President, also says the President has
a ""lifelong streak of sadism, ranging from childhood
pranks (using firecrackers to explode frogs) to
insulting journalists, gloating over state executions
... [and] pumping his fist gleefully before the
bombing of Baghdad."
Even worse, Dr. Frank concludes, the President's years
of heavy drinking ""may have affected his brain
function - and his decision to quit drinking without
the help of a 12-step program [puts] him at far higher
risk of relapse."
Dr. Frank's revelations comes on the heels of last
week's Capitol Hill Blue exclusive that revealed
increasing concern by White House aides over Bush's
emotional stability.
Aides, who spoke only on condition that their names be
withheld, told stories of wide mood swings by the
President who would go from quoting the Bible one
minute to obscenity-filled outbursts the next.
Bush shows an inability to grieve - dating back to age
7, when his sister died. "The family's reaction - no
funeral and no mourning - set in motion his life-long
pattern of turning away from pain [and hiding] behind
antic behavior," says Frank, who says Bush may suffer
from Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder.
Other findings by Dr. Frank:
His mother, Barbara Bush - tabbed by some family
friends as "the one who instills fear" - had trouble
connecting emotionally with her son, Frank argues.
George H.W. Bush's "emotional and physical absence
during his son's youth triggered feelings of both
adoration and revenge in George W."
The President suffers from "character pathology,"
including "grandiosity" and "megalomania" -- viewing
himself, America and God as interchangeable.
Dr. Frank has been a psychiatrist for 35 years and is
director of psychiatry at George Washington
University. A Democrat, he once headed the Washington
Chapter of Physicians for Social Responsibility.
In an interview with The Washington Post's Richard
Leiby, Dr. Frank said he began to be concerned about
Bush's behavior in 2002.
"I was really very unsettled by him and I started
watching everything he did and reading what he wrote,
and watching him on videotape. I felt he was
disturbed," Dr. Frank told Leiby. Bush, he said, "fits
the profile of a former drinker whose alcoholism has
been arrested but not treated."
Dr. Frank's expert recommendation? ""Our sole
treatment option -- for his benefit and for ours -- is
to remove President Bush from office . . . before it
is too late."
White House spokesman Scott McClellan refused to
comment on the specifics of Dr. Frank's book or the
earlier story by Capitol Hill Blue.
"I don't do book reviews," McClellan said, even though
he last week recommended the latest book by the
Washington Post's Bob Woodward to reporters at the
daily press briefing.
© Copyright 2004 Capitol Hill Blue
The November 2004 election is a national referendum on
the CREDIBILITY, COMPETENCE and CHARACTER of the
increasingly unhinged and incredibly shrinking
_resident. The issues of CREDIBILITY and COMPTENCE
have been brought to the public eye, and now, finaly,
the issue of CHARACTER is being brought to the public
eye...
Richard Leiby, Washington Post: In the book, to be released Tuesday, Justin A. Frank, a clinical professor at George Washington University Medical Center, claims President Bush exhibits "sadistic tendencies" and suffers from "character pathology," including "grandiosity" and "megalomania" -- viewing himself, America and God as interchangeable.
Restore the Timeline, Show Up for Democracy in 2004:
Defeat Bush (again!)
http://www.washingtonpost.com/ac2/wp-dyn/A30085-2004Jun10?language=printer
Rx for W: Electoral Surgery
By Richard Leiby
Thursday, June 10, 2004; Page C03
We can assure you nobody will be caught perusing this
book in the White House. "Bush on the Couch," authored
by a longtime Washington psychiatrist who has never
met or treated the president, offers "an exploration
of Bush's psyche" that delves into such touchy topics
as his baby sister's death, his relationship with his
mother and father and his drinking history.
In the book, to be released Tuesday, Justin A. Frank,
a clinical professor at George Washington University
Medical Center, claims President Bush exhibits
"sadistic tendencies" and suffers from "character
pathology," including "grandiosity" and "megalomania"
-- viewing himself, America and God as
interchangeable. Frank told us yesterday that his
opinions are based on publicly available materials,
adding, "I've never met the president or any members
of his family."
A Democrat who once headed the Washington chapter of
Physicians for Social Responsibility, Frank concludes
in the book: "Our sole treatment option -- for his
benefit and for ours -- is to remove President Bush
from office . . . before it is too late."
Frank, who has practiced for 35 years, told us he
began noting Bush's mannerisms in the fall of 2002. "I
was really very unsettled by him and I started
watching everything he did and reading what he wrote,
and watching him on videotape. I felt he was
disturbed." In the book, he writes that Bush "fits the
profile of a former drinker whose alcoholism has been
arrested but not treated."
A White House spokeswoman would not comment yesterday
on "Bush on the Couch," reiterating a statement from
communications director Scott McClellan: "I don't do
book reviews." (Although the White House has
recommended Bob Woodward's "Plan of Attack.")
Hard to believe this straight, unskewed, unstilted
news story was printed in the Union Leader...There is
an Electoral Uprising coming in November 2004...
Riley Yates, Union Leader: In a fiery 40 minute
speech, the former vice president knocked the Bush
administration for using wrong information to justify
the invasion, in particular for relying on Iraqi
dissident Ahmed Chalabi, who has since been reportedly
linked to Iran.
“Which means that for 3½ years, he’s been doping the
President of the United States,” Gore said. “Does that
inspire confidence?”
Gore also accused Bush and his administration of
breaking with rules governing the treatment of
prisoners of war, implicating them in the prisoner
abuse scandals.
“The paper trail shows very clearly that these privates and corporals weren’t the ones who suggested pulling out of the Geneva Convention,” Gore said.
Later in the speech, he added: “The President of the
United States ordered the withdrawal from the Geneva
Convention and the secretary of defense said take off
the gloves, get tough with them.”
Restore the Timeline, Show Up for Democracy in 2004: Defeat Bush (again!)
http://www.theunionleader.com/articles_showfast.html?article=39180
Gore tells NH Democrats Bush
changed meaning of America
By RILEY YATES
Union Leader Staff
Former Vice President Al Gore is greeted by guests at
the Manchester City Democrats annual Flag Day Dinner
at the Chateau in Manchester last night. (TOM
THIBEAULT/UNION LEADER)
MANCHESTER — Al Gore last night charged President Bush
has endangered America’s position in the world with a
mistaken invasion of Iraq and by flaunting
international convention.
“This was done in our name. This changes for many in
the world the meaning of America, the image of
America,” Gore told 300 Democrat powerbrokers at a
fundraiser for the city party.
In a fiery 40 minute speech, the former vice president
knocked the Bush administration for using wrong
information to justify the invasion, in particular for
relying on Iraqi dissident Ahmed Chalabi, who has
since been reportedly linked to Iran.
“Which means that for 3½ years, he’s been doping the
President of the United States,” Gore said. “Does that
inspire confidence?”
Gore also accused Bush and his administration of
breaking with rules governing the treatment of
prisoners of war, implicating them in the prisoner
abuse scandals.
“The paper trail shows very clearly that these
privates and corporals weren’t the ones who suggested
pulling out of the Geneva Convention,” Gore said.
Later in the speech, he added: “The President of the
United States ordered the withdrawal from the Geneva
Convention and the secretary of defense said take off
the gloves, get tough with them.”
The annual Flag Day dinner featured a roast of Kathy
Sullivan, the state party chairman. Held at the
Chateau Restaurant on Hanover Street, it included four
hours of speeches from candidates for governor, the
U.S. House and the Executive Council.
Gore’s criticism of Bush spanned to the environment,
the Patriot Act and Attorney General John Ashcroft,
and the federal budget deficit. He stuck mostly to
Iraq and foreign affairs, however, as he stumped in
what’s considered a swing state for prospective
Democratic Presidential nominee John Kerry of
Massachusetts.
“Now in so many places in the world so many people
holding out the American flag of freedom will be met
with catcalls and cynicism,” Gore said.
Gore also said the war has led to a “backdoor draft”
with people in the service “being ordered to stay in
the military even though they don’t want to.” He said
the Bush administration overruled its own military
estimates in invading Iraq without enough forces.
The speech was in direct contrast to Gore’s opening
remarks, which saw light humor, as the former vice
president poked fun at getting used to being just a
citizen and the closeness of the 2000 Presidential
election.
“I am Al Gore. I used to be the next President of the
United States,” Gore introduced himself to laughter,
quipping: “I don’t believe that’s particularly funny.”
Compelling evidence to be offered in the upcoming national referendum on the CREDIBILITY, COMPETENCE and CHARACTER of the increasingly unhinged and incredibly shrinking _resident. A powerful, significant, UNPRECEDENTED move from the military and foreign policy establishment. Will you hear about it on the Sunday morning propapunditgandist shows? At least, the LA Times understands its signifigance (or unafraid to acknowledged it with suitable gravitas)...
LA Times: A group of 26 former senior diplomats and
military officials, several appointed to key positions
by Republican Presidents Ronald Reagan and George H.W.
Bush, plans to issue a joint statement this week
arguing that President George W. Bush has damaged
America's national security and should be defeated in
November.
The group, which calls itself Diplomats and Military
Commanders for Change, will explicitly condemn Bush's
foreign policy, according to several of those who
signed the document.
"It is clear that the statement calls for the defeat
of the administration," said William C. Harrop, the
ambassador to Israel under President Bush's father and
one of the group's principal organizers.
Those signing the document, which will be released in
Washington on Wednesday, include 20 former U.S.
ambassadors, appointed by presidents of both parties,
to countries including Israel, the former Soviet Union
and Saudi Arabia.
Others are senior State Department officials from the
Carter, Reagan and Clinton administrations and former
military leaders, including retired Marine Gen. Joseph
P. Hoar, the former commander of U.S. forces in the
Middle East under President Bush's father. Hoar is a
prominent critic of the war in Iraq...
It is unusual for so many former high-level military
officials and career diplomats to issue such an
overtly political message during a presidential
campaign.
Restore the Timeline, Show Up for Democracy in 2004:
Defeat Bush (again!)
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
http://www.latimes.com/news/politics/2004/la-na-diplo13jun13,1,1142936.story?coll=la-home-headlines
THE RACE TO THE WHITE HOUSE
Retired Officials Say Bush Must Go: The 26 ex-diplomats and military leaders say his foreign policy has harmed national security. Several served under Republicans.
By Ronald Brownstein
Times Staff Writer
June 13, 2004
WASHINGTON — A group of 26 former senior diplomats and
military officials, several appointed to key positions
by Republican Presidents Ronald Reagan and George H.W.
Bush, plans to issue a joint statement this week
arguing that President George W. Bush has damaged
America's national security and should be defeated in
November.
The group, which calls itself Diplomats and Military
Commanders for Change, will explicitly condemn Bush's
foreign policy, according to several of those who
signed the document.
"It is clear that the statement calls for the defeat
of the administration," said William C. Harrop, the
ambassador to Israel under President Bush's father and
one of the group's principal organizers.
Those signing the document, which will be released in
Washington on Wednesday, include 20 former U.S.
ambassadors, appointed by presidents of both parties,
to countries including Israel, the former Soviet Union
and Saudi Arabia.
Others are senior State Department officials from the
Carter, Reagan and Clinton administrations and former
military leaders, including retired Marine Gen. Joseph
P. Hoar, the former commander of U.S. forces in the
Middle East under President Bush's father. Hoar is a
prominent critic of the war in Iraq.
Some of those signing the document — such as Hoar and
former Air Force Chief of Staff Merrill A. McPeak —
have identified themselves as supporters of Sen. John
F. Kerry, the presumptive Democratic presidential
nominee. But most have not endorsed any candidate,
members of the group said.
It is unusual for so many former high-level military
officials and career diplomats to issue such an
overtly political message during a presidential
campaign.
A senior official at the Bush reelection campaign said
he did not wish to comment on the statement until it
was released.
But in the past, administration officials have
rejected charges that Bush has isolated America in the
world, pointing to countries contributing troops to
the coalition in Iraq and the unanimous passage last
week of the U.N. resolution authorizing the interim
Iraqi government.
One senior Republican strategist familiar with White
House thinking said he did not think the group was
sufficiently well-known to create significant
political problems for the president.
The strategist, who spoke on the condition of
anonymity, also said the signatories were making an
argument growing increasingly obsolete as Bush leans
more on the international community for help in Iraq.
"Their timing is a little off, particularly in the
aftermath of the most recent U.N. resolution," the
strategist said. "It seems to me this is a collection
of resentments that have built up, but it would have
been much more powerful months ago than now when even
the president's most disinterested critics would say
we have taken a much more multilateral approach" in
Iraq.
But those signing the document say the recent signs of
cooperation do not reverse a basic trend toward
increasing isolation for the U.S.
"We just felt things were so serious, that America's
leadership role in the world has been attenuated to
such a terrible degree by both the style and the
substance of the administration's approach," said
Harrop, who served as ambassador to four African
countries under Carter and Reagan.
"A lot of people felt the work they had done over
their lifetime in trying to build a situation in which
the United States was respected and could lead the
rest of the world was now undermined by this
administration — by the arrogance, by the refusal to
listen to others, the scorn for multilateral
organizations," Harrop said.
Jack F. Matlock Jr., who was appointed by Reagan as
ambassador to the Soviet Union and retained in the
post by President Bush's father during the final years
of the Cold War, expressed similar views.
"Ever since Franklin Roosevelt, the U.S. has built up
alliances in order to amplify its own power," he said.
"But now we have alienated many of our closest allies,
we have alienated their populations. We've all been
increasingly appalled at how the relationships that we
worked so hard to build up have simply been shattered
by the current administration in the method it has
gone about things."
The GOP strategist noted that many of those involved
in the document claimed their primary expertise in the
Middle East and suggested a principal motivation for
the statement might be frustration over Bush's effort
to fundamentally reorient policy toward the region.
"For 60 years we believed in quote-unquote stability
at the price of liberty, and what we got is neither
liberty nor stability," the strategist said. "So we
are taking a fundamentally different approach toward
the Middle East. That is a huge doctrinal shift, and
the people who have given their lives, careers to
building the previous foreign policy consensus, see
this as a direct intellectual assault on what they
have devoted their lives to. And it is. We think what
a lot of people came up with was a failure — or at
least, in the present world in which we live, it is no
longer sustainable."
Sponsors of the effort counter that several in the
group have been involved in developing policy
affecting almost all regions of the globe.
The document will echo a statement released in April
by a group of high-level former British diplomats
condemning Prime Minister Tony Blair for being too
closely aligned to U.S. policy in Iraq and Israel.
Those involved with the new group said their effort
was already underway when the British statement was
released.
The signatories said Kerry's campaign played no role
in the formation of their group. Phyllis E. Oakley,
the deputy State Department spokesman during Reagan's
second term and an assistant secretary of state under
Clinton, said she suspected "some of them [in the
Kerry campaign] may have been aware of it," but that
"the campaign had no role" in organizing the group.
Stephanie Cutter, Kerry's communications director,
also said that the Kerry campaign had not been
involved in devising the group's statement.
The document does not explicitly endorse Kerry,
according to those familiar with it. But some
individual signers plan to back the Democrat, and
others acknowledge that by calling for Bush's removal,
the group effectively is urging Americans to elect
Kerry.
"The core of the message is that we are so deeply
concerned about the current direction of American
foreign policy … that we think it is essential for the
future security of the United States that a new
foreign policy team come in," said Oakley.
Much of the debate over the document in the days ahead
may pivot on the extent to which it is seen as a
partisan document.
A Bush administration ally said that the group failed
to recognize how the Sept. 11 attacks required
significant changes in American foreign policy.
"There's no question those who were responsible for
policies pre-9/11 are denying what seems as the
obvious — that those policies were inadequate," said
Cliff May, president of the conservative advocacy
group Foundation for the Defense of Democracies.
"This seems like a statement from 9/10 people [who
don't see] the importance of 9/11 and the way that
should have changed our thinking."
Along with Hoar and McPeak, others who have signed it
are identified with the Democratic Party.
Adm. William J. Crowe Jr., though named chairman of
the Joint Chiefs of Staff under Reagan, supported
Clinton in 1992. Crowe has endorsed Kerry. Retired
Adm. Stansfield Turner served as Carter's director of
central intelligence and has also endorsed Kerry.
Matlock said he was a registered Democrat during most
of his foreign service career, though he voted for
Reagan in 1984 and the elder Bush twice and now is
registered as an independent.
Several on the group's list were appointed to their
most important posts under Reagan and the elder Bush.
These include Matlock and Harrop, as well as Arthur A.
Hartman, who served as Reagan's ambassador to the
Soviet Union from 1981 through 1987; H. Allen Holmes,
an assistant secretary of state under Reagan; and
Charles Freeman, ambassador to Saudi Arabia under the
elder Bush.
Many on the list have not been previously identified
with any political cause or party. Several "are the
kind who have never spoken out before," said James
Daniel Phillips, former ambassador to Burundi and the
Congo.
Oakley, Harrop and Matlock said the effort began this
year. Matlock said it was sparked by conversations
among "colleagues who had served in senior positions
around the same time, most of them for the Reagan
administration and for the first Bush administration."
Oakley said frustration over the Iraq war was "a large
part" of the impetus for the statement, but the
criticism of President Bush "goes much deeper."
The group's complaint about Bush's approach largely
tracks Kerry's contention that the administration has
weakened American security by straining traditional
alliances and shifting resources from the war against
Al Qaeda to the invasion of Iraq.
Oakley said the statement would argue that,
"Unfortunately the tough stands [Bush] has taken have
made us less secure. He has neglected the war on
terrorism for the war in Iraq. And while we agree that
we are in unprecedented times and we face challenges
we didn't even know about before, these challenges
require the cooperation of other countries. We cannot
do it by ourselves."
If you want other stories on this topic, search the
Archives at latimes.com/archives.
Article licensing and reprint options
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Copyright 2004 Los Angeles Times
Sen. John F. Kerry (D-Mekong Delta) is ahead in
Fraudida. Be vigilant, be vocal, be vociferous. This
election is perhaps our last hope, for a long time, to
save the Republic...
Associated Press: Touchscreen voting machines in 11
counties have a software flaw that could make manual
recounts impossible in November's presidential
election, state officials said. A spokeswoman for the
secretary of state called the problems "minor
technical hiccups" that can be resolved, but critics
allege voting officials wrongly certified a voting
system they knew had a bug.
Thwart the Theft of a Second Presidential Election,
Show Up for Democracy in 2004: Defeat Bush (again!)
http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&u=/ap/20040612/ap_on_el_pr/florida_voting_machines_1
Fla. Voting Machines Have Recount Flaw
1 hour, 54 minutes ago
TALLAHASSEE, Fla. - Touchscreen voting machines in 11 counties have a software flaw that could make manual recounts impossible in November's presidential election, state officials said.
A spokeswoman for the secretary of state called the
problems "minor technical hiccups" that can be
resolved, but critics allege voting officials wrongly
certified a voting system they knew had a bug.
The electronic voting machines are a response to
Florida's 2000 presidential election fiasco, where
thousands of punchcard ballots were improperly marked.
But the new machines have brought concerns that errors
could go unchecked without paper records of the
electronic voting.
The machines, made by Election Systems & Software of
Omaha, Neb., fail to provide a consistent electronic
"event log" of voting activity when asked to reproduce
what happened during the election, state officials
said.
Officials with the company and the state Division of
Elections said they believe they can fix the problem
by linking the voting equipment with laptop computers.
Florida's two largest counties — Miami-Dade and
Broward — are among those affected by the flaws.
Rep. Robert Wexler, D-Fla., has asked state Attorney
General Charlie Crist to investigate whether the head
of the state elections division lied under oath when
he denied knowing of the computer problem before
reading about it in the media. A spokeswoman for Crist
said he was reviewing the request.
The elections chief, Ed Kast, abruptly resigned
Monday, saying he wanted a change of pace.
During a May 17 deposition for a lawsuit Wexler filed
seeking to require a paper trail for state voting
machines, Kast said he had recently heard of the
problem only days earlier. But in a letter to Crist,
Wexler said the Miami-Dade Election Reform Coalition,
a citizens' group, notified Kast and Secretary of
State Glenda Hood of the glitch in March.
Hood blamed Miami-Dade Supervisor of Elections
Constance Kaplan for the delay, telling Kaplan in a
May 13 letter she should have notified state officials
when she learned of the problem in June 2003.
Nonetheless, state and county election officials
insist the problem can be resolved in the five months
before the November election.
"These are minor technical hiccups that happen," said
Hood spokeswoman Nicole DeLara. "No votes are lost, or
could be lost."
Wexler and coalition members said they want to know
how the state can be sure that glitches will not
prevent elections officials from even detecting
computer malfunctions.
"How do you know that any votes were lost if your
audit is wrong?" asked Lida Rodriguez-Taseff,
chairwoman of the Miami-Dade coalition.
State officials say there is no need for recounts, or
an audit trail, with the touchscreen system because it
was designed to prevent people from voting in the same
race more than once — an overvote — and provide
multiple alerts to voters to warn them when they are
skipping a race — an undervote.
They emphasize that the "glitch" in the touchscreen
machines occurs when the audit is done after the
election, not when the tally sheet is printed in each
precinct when polls close.
The central issue is SECURITY: National Security, *Economic Security* and Environmental Security. The central question is "Are you safer today than you were four years ago, or even the day after 9/11? Is America safer today than four years? Geopolitically? Economically? Environmentally?" Appalachia would be a wonderful place to begin asking that question...
Jesse Jackson, Chicago Sun Times: In Washington, George W. Bush hails the economy as strong. ''My plan is working,'' he says. In McClellentown, Pa., people know better. Good jobs are going abroad; unemployment is up. Pennsylvania has lost about 159,000 manufacturing jobs since Bush took office. Nearly 70,000 workers in Pennsylvania have exhausted their unemployment benefits while looking for a job that can pay the rent or mortgage....It is time to change course. We need a plan to reinvest in America. Make Appalachia the center of investment in renewable energy. Build schools and make college affordable for all who earn it. Repeal the perverse tax breaks and incentives that reward companies for moving jobs abroad.
Appalachia holds a mirror to America. What kind of country are we? When we call on the sons and daughters of Appalachia to fight, what commitment do we make to them in return? Surely it cannot be that we will spend $200 billion on defeating and rebuilding Iraq, even as we starve investment in schools and good jobs in southern Ohio. Appalachia is too often ignored, but it tells a stark truth. It is time for America to listen.
Restore the Timeline, Show Up for Democracy in 2004: Defeat Bush (again!)
http://www.suntimes.com/output/jesse/cst-edt-jesse08.html
What Appalachia says about U.S.
June 8, 2004
BY JESSE JACKSON
The hills of Appalachia have a hard truth about them. This is God's country -- stark, untamed, rich in coal, scarred by man. In Appalachia, reality hits you in the face like a hard fist and exposes the rhetoric of Washington for what it is.
In Washington, George W. Bush hails the economy as strong. ''My plan is working,'' he says. In McClellentown, Pa., people know better. Good jobs are going abroad; unemployment is up. Pennsylvania has lost about 159,000 manufacturing jobs since Bush took office. Nearly 70,000 workers in Pennsylvania have exhausted their unemployment benefits while looking for a job that can pay the rent or mortgage.
In Washington, George W. Bush celebrates his education reforms and pushes to put public money in private school vouchers. In Appalachia, kids travel two hours on the bus one way to get to school. Those schools need resources to attract good teachers and update textbooks and technology. Soaring college costs make it harder for children of Appalachia to get the college educations that they need.
The people of Appalachia understand it. They know that the children raised in the affluent suburbs have a separate and unequal opportunity to succeed. Those children get the good teachers, the modern schools and the advanced courses. Their children are left behind not for lack of intelligence or hard work but for lack of opportunity.
But when this nation goes to war, the young men and women of Appalachia are among the first to respond. These are proud people who volunteer to defend their country. When their children are photographed humiliating and torturing Iraqi prisoners, they are stunned. They support their commander in chief. But they aren't about to believe that their kids did this on their own without pressure or orders from above. And they are right about that.
Black lung disease still kills in Appalachia. Life is shorter; many are crippled from the mines that still dot these hills. But fewer people have health care, and ever more are underinsured, a serious illness away from bankruptcy. Companies are cutting health care benefits for retirees and hiking prices on workers.
This week, I am joining with union leaders -- Cecil Roberts of the United Mine Workers, Gerald McEntee of the American Federation of State, County and Municipal Workers, Leo Gerard of the United Steelworkers -- on a bus trip through the hills and valleys of southeastern Ohio, West Virginia and western Pennsylvania.
Our purpose is to expose the reality of poverty in America. Most poor people are not on welfare; they work every day. They are not African American. They tend to be white, young, female and single. They take the work they can get. They do the hard jobs.
They make up beds in fancy resorts. They clean the rooms. They bathe the sick in hospitals, but when they get sick, they cannot lie down in the beds they make up every day.
Washington calls on them to defend the nation. They pay the price in blood for the hubris and miscalculations of our leaders. Yet when they come home, Washington turns its back. The Bush White House insists that we cut taxes on the wealthy rather than invest in the poor. Ship jobs abroad, outsource hope in these hills, and call it prosperity.
It is time to change course. We need a plan to reinvest in America. Make Appalachia the center of investment in renewable energy. Build schools and make college affordable for all who earn it. Repeal the perverse tax breaks and incentives that reward companies for moving jobs abroad.
Appalachia holds a mirror to America. What kind of country are we? When we call on the sons and daughters of Appalachia to fight, what commitment do we make to them in return? Surely it cannot be that we will spend $200 billion on defeating and rebuilding Iraq, even as we starve investment in schools and good jobs in southern Ohio. Appalachia is too often ignored, but it tells a stark truth. It is time for America to listen.
Drip...drip...drip...
Patrick Jarreau, Le Monde: A British journalist observed that the whole point of the Justice Department memo and the Pentagon's from March 2003 had been precisely to explore the legal arguments that would allow officials to torture prisoners without constituting a statutory offense. Under these circumstances, Mr. Bush's response: that he had given instructions to comply with the law, wasn't "very reassuring". The American president, verging on exasperation, replied: "Listen, I'll say it one more time. (...) The instructions that were given were to comply with the law. That should reassure you. We are a nation of laws. We follow the law. We have laws on our books. You could go look at those laws and that should reassure you."
Repudiate the 9/11 Cover-Up and the Iraq War Lies, Show Up for Democracy in 2004: Defeat Bush (again!)
http://www.truthout.org/docs_04/061204E.shtml
Torture Scandal Grows and Threatens to Reach George Bush
By Patrick Jarreau
Le Monde
Friday 11 June 2004
The American president appeared to be in trouble Thursday. Several official reports have attempted to provide a legal foundation for the practice of torture. How did the White House follow up on these texts? "We stayed within the framework of the law," dodged Mr. Bush.
American attention has been monopolized in recent days by tributes to Ronald Reagan and, to a lesser extent, by the G-8 meeting, an index of George Bush's ability to rally the most powerful countries in the world to his policies in Iraq and the Middle East.
However another subject has slipped into the news, to the point of disrupting the White House leader's press conference Thursday June 10 in Savannah Georgia at the conclusion of the G-8 meeting: had soldiers and CIA agents been authorized to torture prisoners in the "war against terror" in Afghanistan, at Guantánamo Bay or elsewhere?
A week ago, the American press revealed the existence of several documents generated by the Justice and Defense Departments which offer legal justification for the practice of torture. According to the jurists who drew these reports up, torture could be justified in law in the framework of executive orders given by the President of the United States in his role as commander in chief, the ultimate person responsible for Americans' security.
In this case, the documents assert, civilian or military officials who would act in compliance with such orders would not be liable to prosecution, whether on the basis of the American Constitution, which forbids "cruel punishments", or on the basis of American law forbidding torture. In other words, the United States could dispense with compliance with the International Convention Against Torture, even though it ratified it in 1994.
One of the documents is a memo addressed to the White House by the Justice Department in August 2002. No one knows how Mr. Bush acted on these opinions. He was asked that question a first time on Thursday. "The authorization I gave (...) was that all we did should be in accordance with American law and consistent with our international treaty obligations. That's the message I gave our people," the president responded. Had he seen the Justice Department memo at the time? "I don't remember," he said.
A second question on the same subject provoked a grimace of annoyance followed by an even shorter answer than before. "What I authorized was that we stay within the framework of American law," asserted Mr. Bush, who had avoided saying whether torture is acceptable under certain circumstances or never.
A British journalist observed that the whole point of the Justice Department memo and the Pentagon's from March 2003 had been precisely to explore the legal arguments that would allow officials to torture prisoners without constituting a statutory offense. Under these circumstances, Mr. Bush's response: that he had given instructions to comply with the law, wasn't "very reassuring". The American president, verging on exasperation, replied: "Listen, I'll say it one more time. (...) The instructions that were given were to comply with the law. That should reassure you. We are a nation of laws. We follow the law. We have laws on our books. You could go look at those laws and that should reassure you."
The question of respect for the laws and international engagements was posed very soon after American military operations in Afghanistan began. Methods based on physical pain and psychological damage were used very early on, since John Walker Lindh, the young American who had joined the Taliban and was captured in November 2001 at Kunduz, had been stripped and held in stress positions during his interrogations by CIA agents.
In January 2002, after the opening of the first prisoner detention camp on the American naval base at Guantánamo Bay on the island of Cuba, a Justice Department memo drawn up by John Yoo, today a law professor at Berkeley, concluded that the detainees at Guantánamo do not enjoy Geneva Convention protections. Mr. Bush adopted this opinion, contested by Secretary of State Colin Powell.
The August 2002 memo was drawn up by the Justice Department following CIA demands. It appears that the agency had worried its about legal sanctions that might be incurred by its agents who were being pressured by the political power to extract usable intelligence from the al-Qaeda leaders and militants captured in Afghanistan or in Pakistan.
The principal American intelligence agency had not forgotten the problems it had run into following the denunciations in the 1970s of the methods it had used in the fight against communism. Consequently, the agency sought to "cover" itself when it was asked to hunt down and make talk known terrorists or persons suspected of ties to Osama bin Laden's network.
The 50 page long Justice Department memo is signed by Jay Bybee, one of the Attorney General's assistants. Mr. Bybee directed the Office of Legal Counsel, which is the government's authority on legal matters.
In March 2003, it appears that it was a request from officials responsible for interrogations at Guantánamo Bay that brought the Defense Secretary to have the torture question studied by his own jurists. They came to conclusions analogous to those of their Justice Department colleagues. In both cases, the Cabinet members involved, John Ashcroft and Donald Rumsfeld, have refused to provide the relevant documents to Congress.
In a press conference following Mr. Bush's, Jacques Chirac, without using the word "torture", declared that the struggle against terrorism must not "disregard the principles on which our civilization is based, such as human rights."
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Translation: t r u t h o u t French language correspondent Leslie Thatcher.
It's the Media, Stupid.
Michael Finnegan, L.A. Times: The scramble to bring the dark, often satirical film to U.S. movie screens is blending Hollywood and presidential politics in ways never seen in a race for the White House. While the filmmakers deny any overt effort to promote the candidacy of the presumed Democratic presidential nominee, Sen. John F. Kerry of Massachusetts, their efforts fall clearly in sync with the campaign to unseat Bush.
To anticipate and fend off the criticism that already is brewing, Moore has set up a "war room" populated by former Clinton White House operatives plotting swift counterattacks on Bush supporters who question the film's credibility.
To lead the effort, Moore has hired Chris Lehane and Mark Fabiani, former political advisors to Bill Clinton and Al Gore. "Employing the Clinton strategy of '92, we will allow no attack on this film to go without a response immediately," Moore said Thursday. "And we will go after anyone who slanders me or my work, and we will do it without mercy. And when you think 'without mercy,' you think Chris Lehane."
Moore also said he planned to use the film to register thousands of voters, and will stage screenings to benefit antiwar groups set up by families of U.S. troops in Iraq and victims of the Sept. 11 attacks.
Break the Bush Cabal Stranglehold on the "US Mainstream News Media," Show Up for Democracy in 2004: Defeat Bush (again!)
http://www.latimes.com/news/printedition/front/la-et-moore11jun11,1,20992.story
THE NATION
Film and Election Politics Cross in 'Fahrenheit 9/11'
The marketing of a scathing movie about Bush resembles a race for the White House.
By Michael Finnegan, Times Staff Writer
There are movie campaigns and there are presidential campaigns, and usually you can tell the difference. One features a red carpet, the other a war room.
But "Fahrenheit 9/11," Michael Moore's scathing new documentary about President Bush, has both.
Its release later this month appears to mark the first time that a film slamming a major presidential candidate has opened on screens across the nation in the final months of a campaign. At the same time, the movie is producing a global publicity extravaganza for Moore and Miramax Film founders Harvey and Bob Weinstein, who bought the film after Walt Disney Co. refused to let Miramax release it.
The scramble to bring the dark, often satirical film to U.S. movie screens is blending Hollywood and presidential politics in ways never seen in a race for the White House. While the filmmakers deny any overt effort to promote the candidacy of the presumed Democratic presidential nominee, Sen. John F. Kerry of Massachusetts, their efforts fall clearly in sync with the campaign to unseat Bush.
To anticipate and fend off the criticism that already is brewing, Moore has set up a "war room" populated by former Clinton White House operatives plotting swift counterattacks on Bush supporters who question the film's credibility.
To lead the effort, Moore has hired Chris Lehane and Mark Fabiani, former political advisors to Bill Clinton and Al Gore. "Employing the Clinton strategy of '92, we will allow no attack on this film to go without a response immediately," Moore said Thursday. "And we will go after anyone who slanders me or my work, and we will do it without mercy. And when you think 'without mercy,' you think Chris Lehane."
Moore also said he planned to use the film to register thousands of voters, and will stage screenings to benefit antiwar groups set up by families of U.S. troops in Iraq and victims of the Sept. 11 attacks.
So far, the Bush reelection campaign has played down concerns about the film's effect.
"Voters know fact from fiction coming from Hollywood," said Bush campaign spokesman Scott Stanzel. "It's designed to entertain. American voters want fact, not fiction, when determining their vote. And everyone knows where Michael Moore is coming from."
Others have been more aggressive in trying to discredit Moore, who attacked Bush from the Oscar podium when he won the feature documentary prize for his "Bowling for Columbine."
Former President George H.W. Bush called Moore a "slimeball" last month, dismissing the upcoming film as "a vicious attack on our son," according to the New York Daily News.
Joining Moore as chief promoter of the film is Harvey Weinstein, a top Democratic donor widely seen as the foremost strategist in Hollywood's annual campaigns — for Academy Awards. Over the last decade, Weinstein and Miramax have transformed the Oscar balloting into a bare-knuckle brawl resembling a political campaign, with costly ads and accusations of negative attacks dominating the race.
In the case of "Fahrenheit 9/11," the mounting publicity has followed a dream script. It grabbed the media spotlight last month with a New York Times story revealing that Disney was blocking its Miramax division from distributing Moore's film. Moore's agent, Ari Emanuel (whose brother, an Illinois congressman, is another former Clinton White House operative), charged in that story that Disney was concerned that releasing the movie would imperil tax breaks for the company's ventures in Florida, where Bush's brother is governor. Disney denied it, and said it had informed Miramax a year ago that it would be barred from releasing the film because of its partisan nature.
The story broke just before the Cannes Film Festival, where the documentary was a media and critical darling. It went on to win the festival's top prize, the Palme d'Or, and several weeks later, the Weinsteins purchased the movie themselves and lined up new distributors.
The film's high profile has been rising ever since. To promote "Fahrenheit 9/11," the producers are screening it in New York and Washington next week for opinion makers in media and politics. Television advertising begins this weekend on national cable, along with posters and trailers before such big-studio releases as "The Stepford Wives," starring Nicole Kidman, and "The Chronicles of Riddick," with Vin Diesel.
Larry Noble, former chief counsel of the Federal Election Commission, said the film's ads, which are apt to paint Bush unfavorably, risked drawing complaints that campaign spending restrictions should apply to the movie's promotion. But unless the ads run in the final 60 days of the campaign and specifically call for Bush's defeat or the election of Kerry, he said, the commission is apt to reject the complaints.
"We're not campaigning for or against any political candidates; we're marketing a movie," said Tom Ortenberg, president of Lions Gate Releasing, which is distributing the movie with IFC Films.
Because the Weinstein brothers own the movie, they stand to make a windfall if the film is a commercial success. The film's distributors will collect a fee based on its performance, but all profits will ultimately flow to the Weinsteins and Moore. The brothers purchased the film for about $6 million — roughly what the documentary cost to make.
For Harvey Weinstein, the film offers a chance to profit while enhancing both his Hollywood standing and political clout. But he denies any overt political agenda.
"This is not about electing a candidate," he said.
Praising the film's artistic value, Weinstein said he had "shown the movie to people diametrically opposed to its politics who walked away questioning things."
"I think it will have a huge influence on people's minds," said Weinstein, who also is a producer of upcoming Los Angeles and New York concerts to raise money for Kerry.
"Fahrenheit 9/11" casts a deeply unfavorable light on Bush's handling of the Sept. 11 attacks and the Iraq war, ridiculing him and his top advisors with footage that catches them in embarrassing moments clearly not intended for public viewing. Deputy Defense Secretary Paul D. Wolfowitz uses spit to comb his hair; Bush jovially asks news crews to watch him swing a golf club seconds after sternly calling on the world's nations "to do everything they can to stop terrorist killers."
Moore, who closes the film with the message "Do Something," is unabashed about his hope that the film will help dislodge Bush as president.
"I hope this country will be back in our hands in a very short period of time," he told hundreds of invited guests at a celebrity-jammed Beverly Hills screening of the film on Tuesday. The screening was part of an ambitious and unusually fast rollout to get the movie into at least 650 theaters on June 25—and possibly several hundred more.
"Are we conducting this like a campaign? Yes, we are," Moore said Thursday. "But it's not a campaign for Kerry."
How much influence the film might have is a matter of dispute. Bill Carrick, a Democratic campaign consultant, said its effect would be negligible. He likened it to the talk radio shows of Rush Limbaugh and other hosts whose listeners hold firm, unyielding opinions on Bush.
"I don't think it's a place where you're going to persuade anybody — a Michael Moore movie," Carrick said. "The audience is too small. It's a self-selecting group of people."
But in an election where turning out core constituencies could be crucial to both Kerry and Bush, others see the film as a potent tool for motivating Democrats — especially since Republicans are typically more reliable for showing up at the polls.
"Feeling motivated, to the extent you make that extra effort to vote on your way home from work — that matters," said Thomas Hollihan, a communications professor at USC's Annenberg School for Communication.
That potential is not lost on Moore, who plans to offer ticket discounts and prizes to newly registered voters who see the film or visit his Web site. "If it can encourage the people who belong to the largest political party in America, the non-voter party, to leave that party behind and do the very minimum of what every citizen should do on Nov. 2, then I hope that will be seen as a significant contribution to this country," he said.
A main target of the film is younger voters, who tend to turn out in low numbers. Studies have shown that younger voters increasingly get election information from non-traditional campaign media, such as late-night television comedy shows and the Internet.
"For younger people, who may or may not be all that interested in politics, these entertainment formats are a key way to bring them into the political discussion," said Stephen Farnsworth, a political scientist at Mary Washington College in Virginia.
Staff writer John Horn contributed to this report.
The central issue is SECURITY: National Security, *Economic Security* and Environmental Security. Are you safer -- personally, economically, environmentally -- than you were four years ago? Is America safer geopolitically, economically or environmentally? The US Electorate is going to answer that question with a resounding "NO!" in November 2004.
Reuters: Former U.S. Treasury Secretary Robert Rubin has warned that spiraling budget deficits have created a "fiscal morass" that might threaten the U.S. economy's longer-term health as baby boomers approach retirement.
Rubin, now member of the Office of the Chairman at Citigroup Inc. (C: Research, Estimates), said the budget has swung from a projected 10-year surplus of $5.6 trillion in 2001 to a projected 10-year deficit that might reach $5.5 trillion...He said he would have done some things differently after the Sept. 11 attacks had he still been in the Cabinet.
"I would have said, Mr. President, ... it's appropriate to have short-term fiscal stimulus, but I would put in place temporary measures, not long-term measures," he said. Long-term measures are going to have exactly the effects we're now having, unfortunately."
Restore Fiscal Responsibility in the White House, Show Up for Democracy in 2004: Defeat Bush (again!)
http://money.cnn.com/2004/06/11/news/economy/rubin_warning.reut/index.htmRubin warns of spiraling deficits
Former Treasury Secretary says widening gap might threaten the economy in the long run.
June 11, 2004: 7:52 AM EDT
NEW YORK (Reuters) - Former U.S. Treasury Secretary Robert Rubin has warned that spiraling budget deficits have created a "fiscal morass" that might threaten the U.S. economy's longer-term health as baby boomers approach retirement.
Rubin, now member of the Office of the Chairman at Citigroup Inc. (C: Research, Estimates), said the budget has swung from a projected 10-year surplus of $5.6 trillion in 2001 to a projected 10-year deficit that might reach $5.5 trillion.
After methodology changes, he said that amounts to a $9 trillion swing, with 2001 and 2003 tax cuts expected to cost $4 trillion over the next 10 years.
"The deficits of the magnitude we're now talking about would have a substantial adverse impact on interest rates, productivity and our economy," he said in a speech Thursday.
"The fiscal morass that we have today is a more serious problem than the unsound fiscal conditions of the 1980s," he added. This is in part because of higher deficits, lower personal savings, high consumer debt, and higher expected entitlement payouts as Americans age, he said.
At some point, Rubin said, markets might fear that deficits will cause "fiscal disarray" or that the government won't show fiscal discipline, leading to "sharply higher" interest rates.
Rubin was Treasury Secretary from 1995 to 1999 under the administration of Bill Clinton, a Democrat, and is widely credited with helping to stem financial crises in Mexico, Asia and Russia. He spoke at the New York Society of Security Analysts' annual dinner.
Risks
Though U.S. policies are criticized in many parts of the world, Rubin said "the global community will almost certainly not move on major (economic) issues" without U.S. leadership.
Still, he said the United States cannot provide that leadership "unless it works in true cooperative partnership" with other countries. Europe and Japan, he said, are not strong enough "to provide independent energy to the global economy."
Meanwhile, he said investors focus too much on short-term events such as quarterly corporate earnings, and too little on unquantifiable risk. He said this includes such geopolitical risks as political situations in Iraq, North Korea and Pakistan, terrorism and nuclear proliferation.
"We are far, far from having knowledge of the uncertainty and the complexity of these issues," he said.
Other worrisome issues, he said, include rising health care costs and oil prices, the environment and global poverty.
Rubin's investments
Rubin, who has lived during 12 presidencies starting with Franklin Roosevelt's, said the 2004 Presidential election "is in some respects the most important in my own lifetime."
He said he would have done some things differently after the Sept. 11 attacks had he still been in the Cabinet.
"I would have said, Mr. President, ... it's appropriate to have short-term fiscal stimulus, but I would put in place temporary measures, not long-term measures," he said. Long-term measures are going to have exactly the effects we're now having, unfortunately."
Rubin said he has put some of his own money in "long-short" investments that involve buying some securities and selling others, some in private equity, some in "plain old equities," and "enough ... in some place that is really safe. I'm talking about short-term something-or-others."
"For all I know," he said to laughter, "none of these (bad) things will ever happen, and all of the bad people in the world will become good, and maybe (Federal Reserve Chairman Alan) Greenspan is wrong and there is a free lunch."
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Copyright 2004 Reuters All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.
There is an Electoral Uprising coming in November 2004.
Ruy Teixeira, www.americanprogress.org:Whether the overall economy is doing well or not, many Americans are experiencing a severe wage-price squeeze. As a result, it is not surprising that they are much less optimistic about the economy and the investment climate than many of their financially better-off counterparts. While Iraq may continue to dominate the headlines in the months ahead, it could be this wage-price squeeze that turns out to be the most important story as the presidential election approaches later this year...
Conclusion: the economic clouds over the Bush administration are not likely to lift anytime soon. And we're getting very close to the "lock-in" point in the election year where voters' views of the economy and the incumbent administration's handling of it become hard to change in time for election day, no matter how good the economic trends become.
That suggests that, as far as the economy and the Bush administration go, the latest jobs report can reasonably be described as "too little too late," rather than as a harbinger of rebounding voter confidence...
So Bush has independents fired up. Trouble for him is, it's the wrong way: they're fired up against him. Maybe that's part of the reason why the Bush campaign seems to be concentrating on mobilizing their base; they're hoping they can bring out those voters in droves and swamp the negative trend among independents...
As Bush's 30 percent approval rating on Iraq suggests, these voters are very negative indeed on the Iraq situation and whether it's accomplishing anything positive. By an overwhelming 69 percent to 20 percent margin, they don't believe that Bush has a clear plan to bring the Iraq situation to a successful conclusion. By a similar margin (67 percent to 19 percent), they don't believe that the war in Iraq has reduced the risk of terrorist attacks against the United States. They also don't believe, by 53 percent to 40 percent, that the situation in Iraq was worth going to war over...
As the campaign unfolds, therefore, an overly cautious approach on Kerry's part could miss an opportunity to turn the swing voters in swing states into a Kerry constituency. And note these voters' sentiment about keeping troops in Iraq. Even if he doesn't want to specify an exit date, he may need to convey to these voters that he has a plan for successfully concluding the Iraq war and getting those troops back home.
Restore the Timeline, Show Up for Democracy in 2004: Defeat Bush (again!)
http://www.americanprogress.org/site/pp.asp?c=biJRJ8OVF&b=87567
Public Opinion Watch - June 9, 2004
by Ruy Teixeira
June 9, 2004
(covering polls and related articles from the week of May 31–June 6)
In this edition of Public Opinion Watch:
• Will the Economy Save Bush? (June Edition)
• Independent Voters and the Bush Presidency
• Swing Voters in Swing States Very Negative on Bush
Will the Economy Save Bush? (June Edition)
Dennis Jacobe, "Are Troubles in Iraq Hurting the U.S. Investment Climate?" Gallup News Service, May 24
American Research Group (ARG) poll of 1,100 adults, released June 4 (conducted June 1–3)
Well, it's that time of month again: the new jobs report is out and the usual spate of news stories have ensued, making the pretty good job numbers (248,000 jobs created in May) sound way better than they really are and, of course, speculating that this allegedly torrid pace of job creation will wind up taking the economy issue away from the Democrats.
As I said in the May edition of this analysis: not likely. And for basically the same reasons that were well-summarized in Paul Krugman's May 25 New York Times column on Republicans' "Delusions of Triumph" on the economy. I reproduce key parts of Krugman's column here, merely updating the numbers to take account of the new jobs report. Everything Krugman said in his column remains dead-on, even with this extra month of job growth taken into account:
Let's start with the [1.2 million new jobs] created in the last [five] months. Is that exceptional? Well, during the first [five] months of 2000, the last presidential election year, the economy created [1.4] million new jobs . . . [1.4] million jobs [have been] created since last August (when job growth finally turned positive). But in [May] 2000, payroll employment was [2.6] million higher than in August 1999.
And that was after seven years of sustained employment growth; rapid job growth is hard to achieve when the economy is already close to full employment. To find a year comparable to 2004, we need to look back to 1994, when the economy was still recovering from the first Bush recession. In the first [five] months of that year, the economy added almost [1.6] million jobs.
The experience of 1994 also gives us some indication of how likely job growth is to "redefine" an election. Between December 1993 and November 1994 the economy gained 3.6 million jobs, a number beyond the Bush administration's fondest dreams. Yet voters, convinced that Bill Clinton was leading the country astray, gave his party a severe defeat in that year's midterm elections. So it's interesting that a new CBS News poll finds that 65 percent of Americans believe that the country is headed in the wrong direction—a level not seen since 1994.
He concluded:
And employment is chasing a moving target: it must rise by about 140,000 a month just to keep up with a growing population. In [May], the economy added [248,000] jobs. If you do the math, you discover that President Bush needs about four years of job growth at last month's rate to reach what his own economists consider full employment.
The bottom line, then, is that Mr. Bush's supporters have no right to complain about the public's failure to appreciate his economic leadership. Three years of lousy performance, followed by [three] months of good but not great job growth, is not a record to be proud of.
Well said, Mr. Krugman. And for further explanation of voters' stubbornly non-elated response to these modest economic improvements, let's turn to a May 24 Gallup report on persistent economic pessimism, as indicated by their polling data, and its possible relationship to the Iraq war.
A more plausible explanation [for economic pessimism], however, might simply lie in the unusual nature of the current economic expansion. Although job growth seems to have improved during the past couple of months, we are still experiencing one of the slowest job-growth expansions in history. This has combined with the outsourcing of jobs to foreign countries to produce a great deal of job insecurity for the average working family. In turn, this overall insecurity in the labor market has led to a compression of middle-class wages.
Now, we have an externally generated surge in energy prices and inflation that is creating significant financial hardship for many Americans. For example, 43 percent of investors say that the surge in gasoline prices has created financial hardship for their households. And, three in four of those experiencing such financial hardship say it is either moderate or severe.
Whether the overall economy is doing well or not, many Americans are experiencing a severe wage-price squeeze. As a result, it is not surprising that they are much less optimistic about the economy and the investment climate than many of their financially better-off counterparts. While Iraq may continue to dominate the headlines in the months ahead, it could be this wage-price squeeze that turns out to be the most important story as the presidential election approaches later this year.
These analyses are consistent with results of an ARG poll, conducted June 1–3, right after this allegedly spectacular month of job creation. The results show no lifting of the economic pessimism that is bedeviling the Bush administration.
Bush receives an economic approval rating of just 42 percent, with 53 percent disapproval, very close to his 43 percent/50 percent overall approval rating. (Note to horse race fans: the poll also shows Kerry leading Bush by two points, 48 percent to 46 percent). Moreover, just 19 percent say that the national economy is getting better, actually less than the 27 percent who said that it was getting better at the beginning of May. And only 27 percent say that the economy will be better a year from now, a substantial drop from the 45 percent who were optimistic about the economy at the beginning of May.
Conclusion: the economic clouds over the Bush administration are not likely to lift anytime soon. And we're getting very close to the "lock-in" point in the election year where voters' views of the economy and the incumbent administration's handling of it become hard to change in time for election day, no matter how good the economic trends become.
That suggests that, as far as the economy and the Bush administration go, the latest jobs report can reasonably be described as "too little too late," rather than as a harbinger of rebounding voter confidence.
Independent Voters and the Bush Presidency
William Schneider, "Super-Charged Electorate," National Journal, June 3
Jeffrey M. Jones, "Bush Ratings Show Historical Levels of Polarization," Gallup Organization, June 4
Gallup has put out an interesting new analysis discussing the high levels of partisan polarization in views of Bush. In the most recent Gallup poll, 89 percent of Republicans approve of the job Bush is doing as president, compared to just 12 percent of Democrats who approve. That 77 point gap is the highest of Bush's presidency.
Moreover, the strength of partisan approval and disapproval is striking. Among Republicans, 64 percent strongly approve of Bush's performance and, among Democrats, 66 percent strongly disapprove.
These are impressive figures, but for my money the most interesting data in the Gallup analysis are actually about independents. The analysis includes a chart of Bush approval by Democrats, Republicans, and independents that shows that, starting in early May, Bush's approval rating among independents dropped to 40 percent and stayed there.
That drop, if not reversed, may well prove to be the death knell of Bush's presidency. I just don't see how Bush can pull it out if he's running at only 40 percent approval among independents; the close relationship between approval and voting support would imply a healthy Bush deficit among independents on election day which, in turn, would make it highly unlikely that Bush could win (keep in mind that Bush actually carried independents by two points in 2000 and still lost the popular vote).
Note also the structure of Bush's approval rating among independents. His 40 percent approval rating only includes 16 percent who strongly approve of his performance. But, among the 55 percent who disapprove of his performance, 41 percent strongly disapprove.
So Bush has independents fired up. Trouble for him is, it's the wrong way: they're fired up against him. Maybe that's part of the reason why the Bush campaign seems to be concentrating on mobilizing their base; they're hoping they can bring out those voters in droves and swamp the negative trend among independents.
But that's probably not going to work either. According to figures cited by William Schneider in the National Journal, independents are following this year's campaign with unusual intensity—not far removed, in fact, from the intensity with which Democratic and Republican partisans are following the race, which is, in turn, unusually high by historical standards.
Alas for Bush, this may turn out to be the election where everyone shows up. And, if that's the case, it is likely to be the Republican base that gets swamped, not the other way around.
Swing Voters in Swing States Very Negative on Bush
Annenberg Election Survey poll of 8,314 adults, including 832 persuadable respondents in twenty battleground states, by Schulman, Ronca, Bucuvalas, released June 4 (conducted May 1–31)
The Annenberg Election Survey has just released some new data on "persuadable voters" in the battleground states (about 11 percent of the nation's public) and it is very interesting data indeed. (Annenberg defines persuadable voters as those that say they are undecided or who have a preference but say there's a "good chance" they could change their minds; for Annenberg's definition of battleground states, see last week's Public Opinion Watch) Probably the most striking thing about the data is how little these voters like George Bush and where he's led the country.
Consider these findings. Swing voters in swing states give Bush an overall approval rating of just 44 percent. But that's good compared to how they feel about Bush's handling of the economy and Iraq. In both cases, Bush's approval rating is a stunningly low 30 percent, with 60 percent disapproval. Wow. Sounds like these voters are ready for a change.
That's confirmed by their responses to the right direction/wrong track question: they chose wrong track over right direction by over two to one (59 percent to 25 percent). In addition, 85 percent of these voters believe that the current state of the economy is only fair or poor and only 14 percent believe that Bush's economic policies have made the economy better.
As Bush's 30 percent approval rating on Iraq suggests, these voters are very negative indeed on the Iraq situation and whether it's accomplishing anything positive. By an overwhelming 69 percent to 20 percent margin, they don't believe that Bush has a clear plan to bring the Iraq situation to a successful conclusion. By a similar margin (67 percent to 19 percent), they don't believe that the war in Iraq has reduced the risk of terrorist attacks against the United States. They also don't believe, by 53 percent to 40 percent, that the situation in Iraq was worth going to war over.
And they're interested in getting U.S. troops out of Iraq as soon as possible. By 52 percent to 41 percent, they say we should bring our troops home as soon as possible, rather than keep troops in Iraq until a stable government is formed (the public as a whole narrowly favors keeping troops in Iraq by 49 percent to 46 percent).
Note also that Bush's approval rating on handling the war on terrorism among these voters is net negative (44 percent approval/50 percent disapproval).
Besides their decidedly negative views on Bush, other characteristics of these voters suggest their accessibility to Kerry's campaign. Compared to the general public, either nationwide or just in the battleground states, these voters are less likely to describe themselves as conservative, less likely to be Republican, less likely to attend church frequently and less likely to own a gun.
Is it a done deal for John Kerry among these voters? No. He still has to close the sale. At this point, his net favorability rating among these voters (+3) is no higher than Bush's. These voters also are paying less attention to the campaign than other voters, so Kerry will need to catch their attention to turn them decisively in his direction.
As the campaign unfolds, therefore, an overly cautious approach on Kerry's part could miss an opportunity to turn the swing voters in swing states into a Kerry constituency. And note these voters' sentiment about keeping troops in Iraq. Even if he doesn't want to specify an exit date, he may need to convey to these voters that he has a plan for successfully concluding the Iraq war and getting those troops back home.
Ruy Teixeira is a joint fellow at the Center for American Progress and The Century Foundation.
Remember, 2+2=4.
Norman Solomon, www.commondreams.org: If journalism is history's first draft, the death of Ronald Reagan has caused a step-up in the mass production of falsified history. The main technique is omission. People who suffered from the Reagan presidency have no media standing today. It's not cool to mention victims of his policies in, for example, Central America...Since he passed away, American media outlets have drowned the country in nonstop veneration for Reagan as a symbol of devotion to principle. There's precious little U.S. media space for the kind of reporting that Agence France Presse provided a few days after he died: "Reagan, determined to check arch-foe Iran, opened a back door to Iraq through which flowed U.S. intelligence and hundreds of millions of dollars in loan guarantees even as Washington professed neutrality in Baghdad's war with Tehran. ... Sales of UH-1H helicopters and Hughes MD-500 Defender helicopters were approved by Washington. Though sold as civilian aircraft, nobody objected when they were quickly converted for military use."
...President Reagan was in the habit of telling whoppers. His tales ranged far and wide: to deny environmental degradation, or blithely pretend that widespread human rights violations by U.S.-backed regimes didn't exist, or denigrate low-income people in the United States. Yet now, more than ever, he's being hailed as the Great Communicator...The mourning in America is overwhelming. But the country is starved for honesty.
Break the Bush Cabal Stranglehold on the "US Mainstream News Media," Show Up for Democracy in 2004: Defeat Bush (again!)
http://www.commondreams.org/views04/0611-02.htm
Published on Friday, June 11, 2004 by CommonDreams.org
Media: Mourning in America
by Norman Solomon
If journalism is history's first draft, the death of Ronald Reagan has caused a step-up in the mass production of falsified history.
It's mourning in America.
The main technique is omission. People who suffered from the Reagan presidency have no media standing today. It's not cool to mention victims of his policies in, for example, Central America.
President Reagan lauded and subsidized the contra guerrillas -- extolling them as "freedom fighters" while they terrorized the population in Nicaragua, killing thousands of civilians. And he proudly funneled large-scale support to governments aligned with death squads murdering thousands more in Guatemala and El Salvador.
With all the media-fueled mourning in America, there's been none left for the victims of Reaganite policies in Angola, either. His tireless support for the guerrilla forces of Unita "freedom fighter" Jonas Savimbi deserves much of the credit for making Angola the artificial limb capital of the world. Reagan saw to it that Uncle Sam walked in the bloody footsteps of colonial Portugal and apartheid South Africa to sustain Savimbi's monstrous warfare.
"Every year since the mid-1980s, I have interviewed dozens of displaced peasants who described attacks on their villages by Unita, kidnaping of young men and boys, looting, beatings, and killings, while in hospital beds the rows of mutilated women bore witness to the mining of their fields," journalist Victoria Brittain wrote in the New Statesman magazine a decade ago. "Defectors from Unita told more chilling stories of mass rallies at the headquarters in Jamba where women were burned alive as witches. These were not stories the outside world wanted to hear about Unita, whose leader was regularly received at the White House." Very warmly. By Ronald Reagan.
Mainstream news outlets encourage us to mourn his passing but not to grieve a whit for his victims.
Reagan lavished big money from the U.S. Treasury on anti-Soviet mujahadeen -- "freedom fighters" in Afghanistan who evolved into groupings like Al Qaeda and the Taliban. Yet his supposed idealism rarely gets a critical look through the obit-omit media lens.
Since he passed away, American media outlets have drowned the country in nonstop veneration for Reagan as a symbol of devotion to principle. There's precious little U.S. media space for the kind of reporting that Agence France Presse provided a few days after he died: "Reagan, determined to check arch-foe Iran, opened a back door to Iraq through which flowed U.S. intelligence and hundreds of millions of dollars in loan guarantees even as Washington professed neutrality in Baghdad's war with Tehran. ... Sales of UH-1H helicopters and Hughes MD-500 Defender helicopters were approved by Washington. Though sold as civilian aircraft, nobody objected when they were quickly converted for military use."
President Reagan was in the habit of telling whoppers. His tales ranged far and wide: to deny environmental degradation, or blithely pretend that widespread human rights violations by U.S.-backed regimes didn't exist, or denigrate low-income people in the United States. Yet now, more than ever, he's being hailed as the Great Communicator.
Promoting huge tax breaks for multimillionaires and large corporations, he presided over an unprecedented transfer of wealth to the already rich at the expense of everyone else. But today's dominant media images present him as a beloved populist hero.
That's media mourning in America.
He's being hailed as a champion of "small government" -- yet he vastly increased the size of Defense Department budgets and methodically appointed federal judges who enlarged the intrusive powers of government.
President Reagan spoke out for labor rights in Poland while spearheading anti-union measures in the United States and avidly supporting regimes on several continents that repressed workers and oversaw systematic murders of labor activists. Now, rewritten media history is touting him as a friend to working people.
It's media mourning in America.
He was a president so immersed in anti-gay bigotry and so bereft of non-Hallmark-style compassion that from the time the Centers for Disease Control announced the discovery of AIDS in mid-1981, until 1987, he couldn't bring himself to publicly utter the name of the deadly disease -- part of a policy approach that surely cost many thousands of lives. Yet he is being lauded by countless pundits for his sunny disposition.
Reagan thumbed his nose at basic civil rights legislation, including efforts to protect voting rights. In words and deeds, he conveyed disinterest in helping to move the country beyond the curse of racism.
But his media persona endures as a man with a big smile and an even bigger heart.
The mourning in America is overwhelming. But the country is starved for honesty.
Norman Solomon is co-author, with Reese Erlich, of "Target Iraq: What the News Media Didn't Tell You."
Jesse Jackson (one of the first named carved on the John O'Neill Wall of Heroes) was the last leader standing, except for the Congressional Black Caucus itself, after the Fraudida 2000 debacle ended in Supreme InJustice. Of course, shortly afterwards, the "vast reich-wing" conspiracy tried to destroy him. They did not succeed. He fights on, and now Al Gore, having learned the painful lesson that in struggle against such the Bush cabal, gentle men cannot afford to be too "gentlemanly," has also taken to the highway, speaking TRUTH to Power. If treachery and treason await us again in the aftermath of November 2004, Sen. John F. Kerry (D-Mekong) will not make the mistake Al Gore made in 2000, he will not tell Jesse to get off the street or tell the CBC to sit down.
Jesse Jackson: In 2000, they robbed the bank, and wrecked the truck in the getaway. Now, they've compounded the damage with shame, secrecy and scandal. We must win on our strength, not on their weaknesses...In his four years in office, Bush has never met with civil rights leadership. Never met with the NAACP, who has met with every president since Warren Harding. He has never met with John Sweeney and the AFL-CIO. He has never met with NOW or NARAL. He has closed the door to the Oval Office along ideological lines, locking out those who disagree with his politics...Bush abused his authority. He chose Chalabi over Hans Blix, Kofi Annan, the UN, Germany, France and Russia. He chose Wolfowitz and Perle over Colin Powell and his misgivings. Bush loosed Rumsfeld to berate our European allies with his "our way or the highway" arrogance. The burden is on this administration. The United States found no evidence of imminent threat, Al Qaeda connections or WMDs. We have lost over 800 American lives and many times more Iraqi lives, spent billions, and now lost our national honor. The United States is in disgrace and isolation in Iraq...There needs to be a clear gap between Sen. Kerry and the Bush position—and the bigger the gap on the war, the bigger the margin of victory in November...The formula is straightforward:
Register new African American and Latino voters;
Strengthen alliances with labor, and with workers who would be in unions if the rules were fair;
Talk directly to working men and women about common ground economic interests—jobs, living wages, health care and economic security;
Reach out specifically to single women, who always get the short end of the economic stick;
Use social issues to win over suburban women;
Take young people seriously; every graduating senior should have a voting card along with their diploma; colleges need to have voting precincts on campus;
Spend money on organizers, not just TV ads; and,
Increase voter turnout.
And one more thing: count every vote—make every vote count. We can hope for a landslide—we need one, to take back the Senate and House—but we should work every day as if every state, every neighborhood, were Florida.
Remember Florida. Every vote counts
Remember Florida. Minority votes are discounted.
Remember Florida. The right takes what they can, not what they won.
Remember Florida. Every vote counts. Count every vote.
If we remember these rules, and work on them every single day for the next 150 days, we will win.
Restore the Timeline, Show Up for Democracy in 2004: Defeat Bush (again!)
http://www.tompaine.com/articles/jesse_jacksons_formula.php
Jesse Jackson's Formula
Rev. Jesse Jackson
June 11, 2004
Rev. Jackson is a pioneer in uniting people across divisions of race and class. This summer he's on a Reinvest in America tour to spread his vision. In this speech to grassroots activists, Jackson lays out the agenda for bringing voters of every class, race and place over to the Democratic Party in November. Yes, says Jackson, progressives want John Kerry to win. But they also want the Democratic vision of a "One Big Tent" America to win.
Editor's Note: This speech was delivered at the Take Back America Conference on Friday, June 4, 2004.
Beware the rich young ruler who becomes an evangelist. He is now conducting pre-emptive wars for God.
In 2000, they robbed the bank, and wrecked the truck in the getaway. Now, they've compounded the damage with shame, secrecy and scandal. We must win on our strength, not on their weaknesses.
George W. Bush campaigned as a "compassionate conservative, implying that he was less dismissive of the labor and civil rights community than Ronald Reagan was, and more open than his father. However, he has been a "closed-door conservative." Beware of wolves in sheep's clothing.
In his four years in office, Bush has never met with civil rights leadership. Never met with the NAACP, who has met with every president since Warren Harding. He has never met with John Sweeney and the AFL-CIO. He has never met with NOW or NARAL. He has closed the door to the Oval Office along ideological lines, locking out those who disagree with his politics.
Our votes can open the White House up again. We deserve access to our White House and the Department of Justice!
As progressives—civil rights, labor, environmental, peace and gender equity activists—we want John Kerry to win. But we also want the time-honored legacy of the Democratic vision of a one-big-tent America to win. We are clear that inclusion and expansion lead to growth, lifting the boats mired at the bottom. It is morally right and value-added for our society.
We want a new president, and a new direction, and new priorities. You really cannot have one without the others. We want them all! We want a no-carb plan: no Cheney, no Ashcroft, no Rumsfeld, no Bush, and very little Rice.
Let's look at the first issue to address: reaching across the racial divide, to register and mobilize the huge number of pro-democratic, pro-labor unregistered people of color. We will win or lose by the margin of their involvement and inspiration, or their despair.
We can afford for them to miss conferences, but we cannot afford for them to miss Election Day. Often conservatives oppress them and push them out; and too often top democrats do distancing dances. Both parties assume the fight is for the present voting pool. But the 30/40/30 equation is faulty. It assumes a static 30 percent of voters are on the left, 30 percent on the right: 40 percent in the middle. This static theory misses the fact that there are so many unregistered voters who can change the balance if they are brought into the picture.
We need to expand the pool, to expand the role of the poor. Many top democrats have mixed emotions or write them off. They want the votes of this great group, but ignore their issues. But we need to get them in, and grow our base vote. We must address the issues of their lives. We need to reach them on the ground. They cannot be reached by an air war of TV ads.
In reality, their issues are America's issues – and they are key to a coalition for victory. For example, in South Carolina, trade policies, union policies, education policies and criminal justice policies come together. The population of South Carolina is 35 percent black, but the prison population is 80 percent black. 110,000 blacks are arrested there every year. That means 110,000 calls to lawyers, calls to bail bondsmen, court appearances. There are 32 state prisons in the state, but only one state college. There is an entire jail industry being supported by African Americans. Of more than 140 judges, only nine are people of color.
There has been a net loss of 75,000 jobs in each southern state. There are more young black men in jail than in college in every state.
If the voters in South Carolina and neighboring states are enfranchised and empowered, and vote their interests, their numbers will be key to victory for Democrats and for labor.
Here is a summary of data on unregistered blacks in several states:
New York: 800,000 +
New Jersey: 400,000 +
Maryland: 400,000 +
Alabama : 300,000 +
Florida: 600,000 +
Georgia: 600,000 +
North Carolina: 500,000 +
South Carolina: 300,000 +
In addition, there are almost 6 million unregistered Latino citizens nationally.
Labor unions were born when slavery ended. Labor can be born again when racial oppression and worker marginalization end in the south.
In 1986, based on vigorous Rainbow-led voter registration and Southern black motivation, we regained the Senate even at the height of Reagan's popularity. This success was not widely attributed to the 1984 campaign, and the motivation of over two million new base voters who were pro-labor, pro-Democrat and anti-states'-rights.
They also helped elect Clinton in 1992 and 1996. Bush and Dole received more white votes than Clinton, but Clinton received more Rainbow votes.
They were the key to Gore winning the most votes in 2000. And his election was stolen by the margin of discounted, uncounted and disenfranchised black voters—for example, voter scrubbing by Ms. Harris in Florida.
Progressives often have right ideas, but their fuel to drive the engine must be connected to the base power. I hope that the cultural disconnect between progressive whites and blacks and Latinos will not leave us limping at less than full strength.
Secondly, the war in Iraq—a war of choice, not of necessity; a vain journey rooted in deception and greed. The ultimate shame is not that Kerry and those who voted for war out of misinformation and fear of consequences after 9/11. Colin Powell said we went to war on flawed information. Rumsfeld called it a miscalculation. Bush said "bring them on."
Bush abused his authority. He chose Chalabi over Hans Blix, Kofi Annan, the UN, Germany, France and Russia. He chose Wolfowitz and Perle over Colin Powell and his misgivings. Bush loosed Rumsfeld to berate our European allies with his "our way or the highway" arrogance. The burden is on this administration. The United States found no evidence of imminent threat, Al Qaeda connections or WMDs. We have lost over 800 American lives and many times more Iraqi lives, spent billions, and now lost our national honor. The United States is in disgrace and isolation in Iraq.
We have gone from pre-emptive strike—ignoring international law— to invasion, occupation, and now we seek to conquer, and put a CIA-selected steering committee—a handpicked veneer of democracy—over the Iraqi people.
America must be given a choice—away from this vain and failed war policy and a weakened America. To go further down this road is to be blinded by a foolish pride that precedes the fall. The United States went in along with private security guards and a few Brits—but we need the international community to come to our rescue.
There needs to be a clear gap between Sen. Kerry and the Bush position—and the bigger the gap on the war, the bigger the margin of victory in November.
One reason to end this war based on lies is that it is blue-collar boys and girls that are doing the dying. No child of a member of Congress is serving in Iraq. Another reason is the one that Dr. King raised during Vietnam—we can't afford both guns and butter. An expensive war of empire will drain our programs of social uplift.
This war has already cost more than the combined costs of the revolutionary war, the War of 1812, the Mexican War, the Civil War, the Spanish American War, and the Persian Gulf War combined—and now it has exceeded the cost of World War One. And they just admitted that they will be slashing social programs next year. The war is ruining our economy.
Despite all the fear of terror attacks, the Bush administration is allowing the ban on assault weapons to expire in September. 7,500 AK-47 guns were recently intercepted in Vermont. If 9/11 was a tragedy, imagine those weapons falling into the hands of terrorists. We must extend the ban of assault weapons.
Thirdly: Economic issues and war priorities are inextricably bound together. We need to find economic common ground in the battlegrounds, so we can reach higher ground.
Bush is wiping out the resources for reinvesting in America. We have already heard about the Halliburton no-bid contracts and overcharging for fuel in Iraq. Now we know that Arthur Andersen, the infamous accounting and consulting firm, has a $10 billion contract for border surveillance and identification, under the name Accenture, based in Bermuda. The combination of tax gifts and off-shore tax avoidance schemes for wealthy Americans, $200 billion for Iraq destruction and reconstruction with no-bid contracts and the subsequent record deficit is putting our future in jeopardy.
Our infrastructure needs rebuilding. Our schools need rebuilding. Health care needs to be expanded. We have our priorities.
In economics, there is a school of thought that favors tax cuts and trickle down. There is another school that says invest in infrastructure, attract private capital and develop up.
It is not reasonable in a tightly bound world community to globalize capital without globalizing human rights, workers' rights, women's rights, children's rights and environmental rights. To export jobs and capital and import cheap products and guest workers leads toward a day of reckoning on the economic scale. As the gap expands between north and south, the richest and the poorest, the walls being erected cannot be defended by cannons and missiles. We must build bridges.
Our present policies stimulate reactions of terror and pain. We must have a broader view of our mission. We can lead the world by our values—freedom of speech, checks and balances, equal justice and fairness, transparency. We cannot dominate the world with our guns.
Finally: Back to basics. Reinvest in America : Put America back to work.
Next week—June 6 to 9—we go to Appalachia. Mine workers, chemical workers, steel workers, AFSCME, AFGE and electrical workers are going to the hills.
Starting in Pittsburgh, to western Pennsylvania, West Virginia, southern Kentucky, eastern Ohio—we will again raise the issues of the working poor. Coal miners die of "black lung." Children riding two and a half hours each way to school—and no one is discussing vouchers or charter schools for these children! Plants closing and jobs leaving.
Why Appalachia? It is a region of abounding poverty and patriotic working poor people. We want to take away the race card from the right wing. To whiten the face of poverty. To deracialize the debate about rebuilding America.
When John Kennedy campaigned in Harlem, he held up a black baby—but he was dismissed. But Bobby Kennedy, holding up a white baby in Appalachia, poor, hungry, bloated stomach—that whitened the face of poverty. That little white baby drove the public agenda. Most poor people are not black or brown—they're white, female, and young—two-thirds are children. The nation had to face the white face of poverty.
We will challenge whites to choose economic common ground over racial fear and cultural wedges. We will challenge blacks to choose hope over despair.
We must break the policies and dwarf visions that will not work.
We need to protect our vote. Congressman Jackson is right: we need a constitutional right to vote for the president, so states-rights forces will not remain in power to steal federal elections. We need the constitutionally protections, not states-rights schemes. Bush wants to manipulate and divide, and amend the Constitution to break gay rights.
We need to amend the Constitution to guarantee rights for everyone.
We need to guarantee equal, high-quality public education for all; and the right of workers to organize.
We need to guarantee equal, high-quality public health care for all, and a secure, healthy environment.
We need a new president! We need a new direction!
We need a new Supreme Court with moral authority.
We need a long-term view of national interest, not limited by short-term politics. We need workers to have their rightful place at the table in trade negotiations. We need civil rights protected for all—not privileges for an exalted few.
All of this and more is within our reach—unlike past years when
There was no Internet
Women did not have the right to vote
Workers did not have the right to organize at all
Races did not have the right to associate
People of color did not have the right to vote, and
Rural blacks were intimidated and whites hampered by poll taxes.
Today we have the power to change our objective conditions.
The right wing is not that popular. It is sustained by money, and by our side's failure to exercise our full political power, by our failure to register and vote our whole team. Hundreds of thousands of African Americans in every state in the South—not registered or not voting.
More than five million unregistered citizen Latinos in the United States today. We should be growing our base.
We win with African Americans. We win with Latinos. We win with single women. We win with new voters, especially the young.
Whites need to vote their economic interests over racial fears. Blacks and Latinos need to vote hope over despair.
As we pursue the presidency, we need common ground economic messages for the Midwest.
As we seek to win back the Senate, and even the House, we have to try a new southern strategy. We have to enter boldly the southern red zone, where the going is toughest.
If we want to win the future, we have to forge a black and brown and labor coalition to register and mobilize millions of new Latinos.
The formula is straightforward:
Register new African American and Latino voters;
Strengthen alliances with labor, and with workers who would be in unions if the rules were fair;
Talk directly to working men and women about common ground economic interests—jobs, living wages, health care and economic security;
Reach out specifically to single women, who always get the short end of the economic stick;
Use social issues to win over suburban women;
Take young people seriously; every graduating senior should have a voting card along with their diploma; colleges need to have voting precincts on campus;
Spend money on organizers, not just TV ads; and,
Increase voter turnout.
And one more thing: count every vote—make every vote count. We can hope for a landslide—we need one, to take back the Senate and House—but we should work every day as if every state, every neighborhood, were Florida.
Remember Florida. Every vote counts
Remember Florida. Minority votes are discounted.
Remember Florida. The right takes what they can, not what they won.
Remember Florida. Every vote counts. Count every vote.
If we remember these rules, and work on them every single day for the next 150 days, we will win.
Our destiny is in our hands! We have the power to vote for a new direction.
Together, on common ground, we win. Together, keeping hope alive, we win. Together, mobilizing for November second, and then re-mobilizing for November third, we will win—we will deserve to win—and we will change the direction of our nation.
"If my people, who are called by my name…"
Keep hope alive! And thank you.
Another outrage being downplayed by the "US Mainstream News Media." Remember, and remind everyone you know, over and over again, the November 2004 election is a national referendum on the CREDIBILITY, COMPETENCE and CHARACTER of the increasingly unhinged and incredibly shrinking _resident and whole of his abomination, and in particular, his "national insecurity team." The central issue is SECURITY: not just National Security, but also Economic Security and Environmental Security? Are you safer than you were four years ago? Or even immediately after 9/11? NO.
NOTE: Rep. Henry Waxman (D-CA.), of course, another name scrawled on the John O'Neill Wall of Heroes at its unveiling, forced the issue and made this outrageous admission necessary.
Arshad Mohammed, Reuters: The State Department said on Thursday its April 29 report that the number of international "terrorist" attacks and resulting deaths fell last year was wrong and both figures had in fact risen.
The admission dented the claim by some U.S. officials that the report provided evidence that Washington was winning the "war on terrorism," whose success is critical to President Bush's reelection strategy.
Repudiate the 9/11 Cover-Up and the Iraq War Lies, Show Up for Democracy in 2004: Defeat Bush (again!)
http://www.reuters.com/newsArticle.jhtml?type=domesticNews&storyID=5396771
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US Corrects Terrorism Report, Says Attacks Went Up
Thu Jun 10, 2004 05:20 PM ET
By Arshad Mohammed
WASHINGTON (Reuters) - The State Department said on Thursday its April 29 report that the number of international "terrorist" attacks and resulting deaths fell last year was wrong and both figures had in fact risen.
The admission dented the claim by some U.S. officials that the report provided evidence that Washington was winning the "war on terrorism," whose success is critical to President Bush's reelection strategy.
The department's "Patterns of Global Terrorism Report" said "terrorist" attacks fell to 190 last year, their lowest since 1969, from 198 in 2002. It also said those killed dropped to 307, including 35 U.S. citizens, from 725 in 2002, including 27 Americans.
State Department spokesman Richard Boucher said both totals were understated because of errors in compiling the data by the Terrorist Threat Integration Center. The interagency group was set up last year to address the failure of U.S. intelligence agencies to uncover the Sept. 11, 2001 attacks in advance.
Boucher told reporters the terrorism experts appeared to have made a series of mistakes, failing to count attacks for the full year and possibly misinterpreting the definition of such attacks to exclude incidents included in the past.
"The data in the report are incomplete and in some cases incorrect," he said, admitting his department failed to catch the mistakes. "We got the wrong data and we didn't check it enough ... That's the simplest explanation for what happened."
Secretary of State Colin Powell said he was "very disturbed" that errors had made it into the report but denied the numbers were manipulated for political benefit.
When the report was released, Deputy Secretary of State Richard Armitage said it provided "clear evidence that we are prevailing in the fight" while State Department coordinator for counterterrorism Cofer Black hailed its "good news."
Boucher said the department learned of the report's errors in the first week of May and began an investigation. He said a May 17 letter from Rep. Henry Waxman, a California Democrat and frequent critic of the administration, spurred its efforts.
He said the State Department asked the Terrorist Threat Integration Center to review the numbers. Preliminary indications were that it would show a sharp increase over the previous year in incidents and resulting deaths.
A senior State Department official later played down his remarks, saying although the number of deaths would be above 2002's level it may not be a sharp increase.
One U.S. official who asked not to be named said the report's errors included a failure to count "international terrorist attacks" that occurred after Nov. 11, 2003.
"I am very disturbed that there were errors in the report," Powell told reporters. "We're going to correct it."
"It was a combination of errors both at the new Terrorist Threat (Integration) Center as they were transitioning into the job and building their organization and errors crept into the report that frankly we didn't catch over here," he added.
Asked if the numbers were manipulated to make the administration look good, Powell said: "Of course not."
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It's the Media, Stupid.
Ed Garvey, Madison Capital Times: Auletta's article, which details the Republican takeover scheming, is a must read...Unfortunately, PBS will lose Moyers to retirement after the elections this fall, but even before he leaves, we will be treated to a Friday night magazine hosted by, you guessed it, Tucker Carlson. So President Bush and Cheney are getting their way.
But the Bush folks aren't satisfied, and the PBS brass is not finished caving in to them. In addition to adding the Carlson program, PBS may add another conservative program, hosted by the Wall Street Journal's editorial page editor, Paul Gigot. If you are keeping score, it is Bush/Cheney 3, liberals 0. Tell me again the difference between Fox and PBS?
Auletta quotes Bill Moyers: "This is the first time in my 32 years of public broadcasting that (the Corporation for Public Broadcasting) has ordered up programs for ideological instead of journalistic reasons." Strong words.
Break the Bush Cabal Stranglehold on the "US Mainstream News Media," Show Up for Democracy in 2004: Defeat Bush (again!)
http://www.commondreams.org/views04/0609-14.htm
Published on Wednesday, June 9, 2004 by the Madison Capital Times (Wisconsin)
Right Wing Now Hijacking PBS by Moving to Control Content
by Ed Garvey
"It's not easy being green," or so Kermit the Frog sang on public television for many years.
And today "it's not easy being liberal" on PBS, as Ken Auletta explains in the most recent issue of the New Yorker magazine.
Ah, the channel of choice in our family forever, or so it seems, is now the target of those who control or own virtually all commercial radio, television and print outlets. Yup! Not Barney or the Muppets or Kermit anymore. Now it is former Congressman Newt Gingrich, Vice President Dick Cheney and the Wall Street Journal's Paul Gigot.
Not satisfied to have "unfair and unbalanced" Fox News on TV; talk radio dominated by Rush Limbaugh, Charlie Sykes and Mark Belling; and newspaper chains that are more interested in packaging advertising supplements than reporting the news, the right wing is taking over PBS. They have decided that they cannot eliminate public television and radio - despite years of trying - so now they are dead set on controlling the programming.
Auletta's article, which details the Republican takeover scheming, is a must read.
But Auletta is not alone in explaining the pressures on PBS. We reported part of the story in FightingBob.com in March, namely that Republican congressional leaders tried to pressure PBS to get rid of Bill Moyers' Friday night must-see program "NOW" or force him to accept Newt Gingrich as a co-host.
I'm not making this up. As an alternative to Newt, conservatives in the Bush administration promoted the supercilious CNN commentator "on the right," Tucker Carlson, as a co-host. Predictably, Moyers refused.
Unfortunately, PBS will lose Moyers to retirement after the elections this fall, but even before he leaves, we will be treated to a Friday night magazine hosted by, you guessed it, Tucker Carlson. So President Bush and Cheney are getting their way.
But the Bush folks aren't satisfied, and the PBS brass is not finished caving in to them. In addition to adding the Carlson program, PBS may add another conservative program, hosted by the Wall Street Journal's editorial page editor, Paul Gigot. If you are keeping score, it is Bush/Cheney 3, liberals 0. Tell me again the difference between Fox and PBS?
Auletta quotes Bill Moyers: "This is the first time in my 32 years of public broadcasting that (the Corporation for Public Broadcasting) has ordered up programs for ideological instead of journalistic reasons." Strong words.
It gets worse. The most recent Bush appointment to the Corporation for Public Broadcasting board is a former chair of GOPAC, the Gingrich political action committee. Remember the "Contract With America"? Well, get ready for Gingrich aide Gay Hart Gaines' "contract on PBS."
So what do we do? We can protest all we want to the Corporation for Public Broadcasting or PBS but that won't change the Friday night lineup. But we can start asking Wisconsin Public Television to take up the slack and to report on this disaster. Silence from Wisconsin Public Radio and Television is not helpful.
Here is an opportunity for Wisconsin Public Television to jump into the void by presenting programming that will offset Tucker Carlson and Paul Gigot. We should ask, even though it is unlikely that the powers that be at Wisconsin Public Television will respond. After all, they still show the corporate dominated "We the People" series before every election. The "partners" who control on-air talent for that series, as well as the questions and format, are conservative Channel 3 in Madison, conservative Wood Communications and the conservative Wisconsin State Journal.
Isn't it time for Wisconsin Public Television to reflect the ideological diversity of the state? Why not ask the League of Women Voters to produce "We the People" this year?
Why not present a Wisconsin Public Television that is as concerned about progressive politics as PBS is about the right wing?
Bob McChesney and John Nichols will speak at Fighting Bob Fest Sept. 18 in Baraboo. The title of the fest this year is "Rights at Risk." Naturally, we will have speakers on public education at risk, civil liberties at risk under John Ashcroft and political rights at risk. But McChesney and Nichols will speak on our First Amendment rights at risk.
This could provide an opportunity for development of a plan to offset the hijacking of PBS. I don't know about you but I haven't worried too much about Fox News because I never watch it. Why would I when we have public television, community television with Free Speech TV, and Lou Dobbs on CNN?
But now they are messing with my channel of choice. I'm going to fight back. Are you with me?
Ed Garvey, the Democratic nominee for governor in 1998, is a Madison lawyer and the editor of the fightingbob.com Web site. E-mail: comments@fightingbob.com
© 2004 The Capital Times
Sen. John F. Kerry (D-Mekong Delta) is ahead of the
increasingly unhinged and incredibly shrinking
_resident in most polls, including relatively accurate
polls like Zogby and the LA Times, and even suspect
polls like Gallup. Al Gore is barnstorming around the
country, speaking the naked, blazing truth about the
Bush abomination. George Soros is still alive. Air America is still broadcasting...The drip, drip, drip of the pre-9/11 White House failures, the WMD lies, the Plame betrayal, the Chalabi national security breach, the Abu Ghraib war crimes, the Halliburton contracts, etc. continues to seep through, albeit painfully and slowly, even into the "US mainstream news media." Americans Coming Together (ACT), the Media Fund, the Center for American Progress and other new organizations are gaining traction. Bill Clinton's autobiography (yes, he wrote it himself), including a blistering critique of the Bush abomination in the last chapter, will be released later this month. Clinton's book tour will provide him with a powerful bully pulpit...AND Michael Moore's Fahrenheit 911 will debut in US theatres on June 25th...Yes, there is trouble coming...
BBC: Fahrenheit 9/11, the controversial film by
Michael Moore, has been given a standing ovation by at
the headquarters of the Academy Awards. The anti-Iraq
war film was shown at the Academy of Motion Picture
Arts and Sciences in Los Angeles on Tuesday.
The 600-strong audience cheered and clapped throughout
the film and got to their feet as Moore took to the
stage.
Fahrenheit 9/11, which won the top prize at the 2004
Cannes Film Festival, will open in US cinemas on 25
June.
Moore, whose film criticises President Bush's response
to the 11 September attacks and alleges links between
the Bush family and Osama bin Laden's, told the
audience it was time for change. He said: "There has
been a shift in this country. ... The average American
is finally beginning to figure it out. We were duped
[into invading Iraq]."
Break the Bush Cabal Stranglehold on the "US
Mainstream News Media," Show Up for Democracy in 2004:
Defeat Bush (again!)
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/entertainment/3791275.stm
Academy ovation for Moore's 9/11
Fahrenheit 9/11, the controversial film by Michael
Moore, has been given a standing ovation by at the
headquarters of the Academy Awards. The anti-Iraq war
film was shown at the Academy of Motion Picture Arts
and Sciences in Los Angeles on Tuesday.
The 600-strong audience cheered and clapped throughout
the film and got to their feet as Moore took to the
stage.
Fahrenheit 9/11, which won the top prize at the 2004
Cannes Film Festival, will open in US cinemas on 25
June.
Political bias
Moore, whose film criticises President Bush's response
to the 11 September attacks and alleges links between
the Bush family and Osama bin Laden's, told the
audience it was time for change.
He said: "There has been a shift in this country. ...
The average American is finally beginning to figure it
out. We were duped [into invading Iraq]."
"I hope this country will be back in our hands in a
short period of time," he added.
Fahrenheit 9/11 was refused distribution by the film's
original backers, Disney - whose Miramax film unit
produced the movie - citing concerns over its apparent
political bias.
But brothers Harvey and Bob Weinstein, the founders of
Miramax, personally bought back the rights from parent
company Disney.
Moore won an Oscar in 2002 documentary Bowling for
Columbine.
He said he expected Fahrenheit 9/11 to do three times
as well as Columbine, which earned a record $21.5m
(£11.75m) for a documentary.
The Information Rebellion reaches the air waves via cyberspace...It's the Media, Stupid...
Peter Kafka, Forbes: AirAmerica, the newly launched radio network aimed at liberal listeners who prefer Al Franken's smirk to Rush Limbaugh's snarl, had a rough start this spring. In its first month of operation, the network saw top executives leave, had trouble meeting payroll and struggled to make its signal heard from a mere six radio stations.
But in cyberspace, AirAmerica has been a hit. In its heavily hyped first week of broadcast, the network sent 2 million streams out to listeners who dialed in via computer--either because they were away from a nearby radio or, in most cases, because no local radio station carried the programming.
For AirAmerica, the Internet has been a fundamental part of the fledgling network's launch strategy. Since the terrestrial radio stations controlled by the likes of Viacom (nyse: VIA.B - news - people ) and Clear Channel Communications (nyse: CCU - news - people ) would be hard to come by, "we thought it was very important from day one to be live on the Internet," says AirAmerica Chief Executive Doug Kreeger.
Break the Bush Cabal Stranglehold on the "US Mainstream News Media," Show Up for Democracy in 2004: Defeat Bush (again!)
http://www.forbes.com/services/2004/06/03/cz_pk_0603radio.html
Media
Buy My Internet Radio, Please
Peter Kafka, 06.03.04, 3:00 PM ET
NEW YORK - AirAmerica, the newly launched radio network aimed at liberal listeners who prefer Al Franken's smirk to Rush Limbaugh's snarl, had a rough start this spring. In its first month of operation, the network saw top executives leave, had trouble meeting payroll and struggled to make its signal heard from a mere six radio stations.
But in cyberspace, AirAmerica has been a hit. In its heavily hyped first week of broadcast, the network sent 2 million streams out to listeners who dialed in via computer--either because they were away from a nearby radio or, in most cases, because no local radio station carried the programming.
For AirAmerica, the Internet has been a fundamental part of the fledgling network's launch strategy. Since the terrestrial radio stations controlled by the likes of Viacom (nyse: VIA.B - news - people ) and Clear Channel Communications (nyse: CCU - news - people ) would be hard to come by, "we thought it was very important from day one to be live on the Internet," says AirAmerica Chief Executive Doug Kreeger.
But AirAmerica's relationship with Internet radio could also be symbiotic. Though more and more listeners are dabbling with streaming broadcasts through their desktop PCs--Arbitron/Edison Media Resarch says 40% of Americans have tried tuning in to Internet radio, and 38 million do so at least once a month--if the medium is going to become mainstream, it will need content that's hard to find in other places.
AirAmerica fits that bill, says Michael Harrison, publisher of Talkers, a radio trade magazine. "All of a sudden you had Mr. Mainstream America, who isn't advanced technologically, trying out radio on their computers," he says. "Suddenly AM/FM stations seem very old-fashioned."
Right now, old-fashioned AM/FM stations are where advertisers prefer to spend their dollars--some $20 billion each year. The Internet radio advertising market, by contrast, is so small that there are no reliable estimates. But think single-digit millions. Still, Net radio backers argue that they are already primed to start competing for at least a sliver of the terrestrial market.
"The audience is there," says David Goldberg, vice president of music at Yahoo! (nasdaq: YHOO - news - people ), which offers Internet radio through its Launch service. "The consumer demand is tremendous. Now it's really kind of figuring out how to make it work from the advertisers' perspective."
Part of the task, says Goldberg, is finding evangelizers who can work with ad buyers to convince them that Internet radio is a worthwhile buy. To that end, Yahoo!--along with Microsoft (nasdaq: MSFT - news - people ), Time Warner's (nyse: TWX - news - people ) AOL and Live 365, a company that aggregates thousands of do-it-yourself Net radio stations--has hired radio veterans Eric Ronning and Andy Lipset to sell U.S.-wide ad spots across its Internet radio properties.
"We've had to educate the market," says Ronning. He believes his clients--whose listeners are generally more educated and affluent than the average terrestrial radio listener--should be able to command the same kind of rates that conventional stations generate: between $5 and $20 per thousand listeners. Ronning and Lipset think Net radio can generate $100 million in annual advertising dollars in short order.
Arguably true, says Matt Feinberg, senior vice president at Zenith Media, a media buying and planning outfit. But he says the fragmented nature of Internet radio makes it a difficult sell. Individual stations have comparatively tiny audiences, and since the listenership is spread throughout the world, there's no point in buying local advertising. And even though the four networks Ronning and Lipset represent each reach 1 million to 2 million listeners per week, that's just the equivalent of a single reasonably successful terrestrial station. That makes it a tricky sell for a major advertiser that wants U.S.-wide exposure.
"Yes, it's viable, because it's real," says Feinberg. "But is it viable in terms of audience delivery? Though [Internet radio shows] do have an audience, they're small. And no one would tell you otherwise."
So how will Net radio grow? Like every other Net-based media business, Internet radio execs expect their growth curve to parallel that of broadband, currently at some 40% of American homes. And they argue that their advantages compared to terrestrial radio--a nearly infinite number of offerings, each geared toward different entertainment niches; limited advertising; and, in some cases, customizable stations--sway consumers who sample the services.
But they have to try it first.
Thus the importance of offerings like AirAmerica: highly publicized, can't-get-it-anywhere-else programming. Who knew Al Franken's interests dovetailed with those of Bill Gates?
"Out, out, damn spot!"
Jean Heller, St. Petersburg Times: For nearly three
years, White House, aviation and law enforcement
officials have insisted the flight never took place
and have denied published reports and widespread
Internet speculation about its purpose. But now, at
the request of the National Commission on Terrorist
Attacks, TIA officials have confirmed that the flight
did take place and have supplied details.
The odyssey of the small LearJet 35 is part of a
larger controversy over the hasty exodus from the
United States in the days immediately after 9/11 of
members of the Saudi royal family and relatives of
Osama bin Laden.
Repudiate the 9/11 Cover-Up and the Iraq War Lies,
Show Up for Democracy in 2004: Defeat Bush (again!)
http://sptimes.com/2004/06/09/Tampabay/TIA_now_verifies_flig.shtml
TIA now verifies flight of Saudis: The government has long denied that two days after the 9/11 attacks, the three were allowed to fly.
By JEAN HELLER, Times Staff Writer
Published June 9, 2004
The National Commission on Terrorist Attacks, better
known as the 9/11 Commission, sent a list of questions
to Tampa International Airport. It appears concerned
with the handling of the Tampa flight.
TAMPA - Two days after the Sept. 11 attacks, with most
of the nation's air traffic still grounded, a small
jet landed at Tampa International Airport, picked up
three young Saudi men and left.
The men, one of them thought to be a member of the
Saudi royal family, were accompanied by a former FBI
agent and a former Tampa police officer on the flight
to Lexington, Ky.
The Saudis then took another flight out of the
country. The two ex-officers returned to TIA a few
hours later on the same plane.
For nearly three years, White House, aviation and law
enforcement officials have insisted the flight never
took place and have denied published reports and
widespread Internet speculation about its purpose.
But now, at the request of the National Commission on
Terrorist Attacks, TIA officials have confirmed that
the flight did take place and have supplied details.
The odyssey of the small LearJet 35 is part of a
larger controversy over the hasty exodus from the
United States in the days immediately after 9/11 of
members of the Saudi royal family and relatives of
Osama bin Laden.
The terrorism panel, better known as the 9/11
Commission, said in April that it knew of six
chartered flights with 142 people aboard, mostly
Saudis, that left the United States between Sept. 14
and 24, 2001. But it has said nothing about the Tampa
flight.
The commission's general counsel, Daniel Marcus, asked
TIA in a letter dated May 25 for any information about
"a chartered flight with six people, including a Saudi
prince, that flew from Tampa, Florida on or about
Sept. 13, 2001." He asked for the information no later
than June 8.
TIA officials said they sent their reply on Monday.
The airport used aircraft tracking equipment normally
assigned to a noise abatement program to determine the
identity of all aircraft entering TIA airspace on
Sept. 13, and found four records for the LearJet 35.
The plane first entered the airspace from the south,
possibly from the Fort Lauderdale area, sometime after
3 p.m. and landed for the first time at 3:34 p.m. It
took off at 4:37 p.m., headed north. It returned to
Tampa at 8:23 p.m. and took off again at 8:48 p.m.,
headed south.
Author Craig Unger, who first disclosed the
possibility of a post-9/11 Saudi airlift in his book
House of Bush, House of Saud, said in an interview
that he believes the jet came to Tampa a second time
to drop off two former law enforcement agents from
Tampa who accompanied three young Saudis to Lexington
for security purposes.
The Saudis asked the Tampa Police Department to escort
the flight, but the department handed off the
assignment to Dan Grossi, a former member of the
force, Unger said. Grossi recruited Manuel Perez, a
retired FBI agent, to accompany him. Both described
the flight to Unger as somewhat surreal.
"They got the approval somewhere," Perez is quoted as
telling Unger. "It must have come from the highest
levels of government."
While there is no manifest for those aboard the Lear
flight to Kentucky, Unger says the foreign nationals
left Lexington for London aboard a Boeing 727. That
manifest lists eight Saudis, two Sudan nationals, one
Tunisian, one Philippine citizen, one Egyptian and two
British subjects.
Of those, three listed residences on Normandy Trace
Drive in Tampa, and all of them held Florida drivers'
licenses. They are Ahmad Al Hazmi, then 19, Fahad Al
Zeid, then 20, and Talal M. Al Mejrad, then 18, all
male Saudis.
It is not known which, if any, is a Saudi prince.
Perez, the former FBI agent on the flight, could not
be located this week, and Grossi declined to talk
about the experience.
"I'm over it," he said in a telephone interview. "The
White House, the FAA and the FBI all said the flight
didn't happen. Those are three agencies that are way
over my head, and that's why I'm done talking about
it."
Grossi did say that Unger's account of his
participation in the flight is accurate.
The FAA is still not talking about the flights,
referring all questions to the FBI, which isn't
answering anything, either. Nor is the 9/11
Commission.
Unger's book criticizes the Bush administration for
allowing so many Saudis, including the relatives of
bin Laden, to leave the country without being
questioned thoroughly about the terrorist attacks.
Fifteen of the 19 men who hijacked four airlines on
Sept. 11 were Saudi, as is bin Laden.
The 9/11 Commission, which has said the flights out of
the United States were handled appropriately by the
FBI, appears concerned with the handling of the Tampa
flight.
"What information, if any, do you have about the
screening by law enforcement personnel - including law
enforcement personnel affiliated with the airport
facility - of individuals on this flight?" the
commission asked TIA.
The TIA Police Department said a check of its records
indicated no member of its force screened the Lear's
passengers.
Despite evidence that the flight occurred, several new
questions have arisen.
Raytheon Aircraft is the only facility at TIA that
services general aviation, which includes charter
flights. When appropriate, Raytheon collects landing
fees from those aircraft for TIA and reports to TIA on
the flights.
According to airport records, Raytheon collected
landing fees from only two aircraft on Sept. 13, one
of them a Lear 35. But according to the record, the
registration on the Lear is 505RP, a tail number
which, according to the latest federal records, is
assigned to a Cessna Citation based in Kalamazoo,
Mich., and Oskar Rene Poch.
Poch confirmed Tuesday that he owns a Citation with
that tail number and did before the terrorist attacks.
"Somebody must have gotten the registration number
wrong in Tampa," he said.
TIA spokeswoman Brenda Geoghagan said it is believed
the Lear's Sept. 13 journey began in Fort Lauderdale,
possibly at a charter company called Hop-a-Jet Inc.
The fact that the four trips in and out of Tampa all
carried the flight designation "HPJ32" lends support
to that idea.
But an official of Hop-a-Jet who wouldn't identify
himself said the company does not own an aircraft with
the registration number 505RP. Furthermore, he said,
if that tail number is assigned to a Cessna Citation,
the company doesn't own any Citations, either.
Most of the aircraft allowed to fly in U.S. airspace
on Sept. 13 were empty airliners being ferried from
the airports where they made quick landings on Sept.
11. The reopening of the airspace included paid
charter flights, but not private, nonrevenue flights.
"Whether such a (LearJet) flight would have been legal
hinges on whether somebody paid for it," said FAA
spokesman William Shumann. "That's the key."
- Times researcher Kitty Bennett contributed to this
report.
[Last modified June 9, 2004, 01:00:39]
The Center for Constitutional Law has published the
"Working Group Report on Interrogation of Detainees in
the Global War on Terrorism..." CCL's posting of the
document on the Internet is a meritorious act. It is
unfortunate that you cannot read it in its entirety in
the major city newspapers, or from their web
sites...Nor are the major city newspaper providing CONTEXT and CONTINUTITY. Here are two examples of CONTEXT and CONTINUITY that the "US mainstream news media" and its propapunditgandists should be providing you: 1) Why are US soldiers being court-marshalled for following directives that flowed directly from the highest levels of the Bush abmonination unless those Bush abomination officials also face justice (a use for those military tribunals? just joking...) 2. At the very least, this document and other evidence reveals that Bush abomination officials told a big WHOPPING LIE to the US electorate and to the court of world opinion when it denounced and feigned no knowledge of techniques it had AUTHORIZED...Sadly, the stench of Abu Ghraib is on the Bush White House, and sadder still, the stench of the Bush White House is on Abu Ghraib...Here is the link to the actual document (yes, of course, it contains passages that are blacked out):
http://www.ccr-ny.org/v2/reports/docs/PentagonReportMarch.pdf
Center for Constitutional Law: CCR has posted the
controversial Pentagon “Working Group Report on
Detainee Interrogations in the Global War on
Terrorism: Assessment of Legal, Historical, Policy
and Operational Considerations” on its website. The
report is further proof of the Bush administration’s
disregard for the Constitution and civil liberties and
shows there was planning at high levels of government
to abuse and torture detainees.
CCR President Michael Ratner stated, “This memo and
others show there was planning far up the chain of
command to torture detainess; the atrocities at Abu
Ghraib and elsewhere cannot be swept under the rug by
going after low-level soldiers. Apparently highly
placed U.S. officials were willing to approve
interrogation methods that violate every convention on
torture the United States has ever signed. But they
needed to find cover for their actions and a defense
to possible criminal prosecution. Government lawyers
writing this report wildly distorted the law in an
effort to exempt officials from potential criminal
prosecution.”
Support Our Troops, Show Up for Democracy in 2004:
Defeat Bush (again!)
http://www.ccr-ny.org/v2/reports/report.asp?ObjID=0Shrzgi8q7&Content=385
CCR OBTAINS INTERNAL PENTAGON REPORT OUTLINING FRAMEWORK FOR USE OF TORTURE
Opinions and Documents
Pentagon Report March 2003 (PDF) 6.7MB
Synopsis
CCR has posted the controversial Pentagon “Working
Group Report on Detainee Interrogations in the Global
War on Terrorism: Assessment of Legal, Historical,
Policy and Operational Considerations” on its website.
The report is further proof of the Bush
administration’s disregard for the Constitution and
civil liberties and shows there was planning at high
levels of government to abuse and torture detainees.
CCR President Michael Ratner stated, “This memo and
others show there was planning far up the chain of
command to torture detainess; the atrocities at Abu
Ghraib and elsewhere cannot be swept under the rug by
going after low-level soldiers. Apparently highly
placed U.S. officials were willing to approve
interrogation methods that violate every convention on
torture the United States has ever signed. But they
needed to find cover for their actions and a defense
to possible criminal prosecution. Government lawyers
writing this report wildly distorted the law in an
effort to exempt officials from potential criminal
prosecution.”
For further information about the report and all CCR
cases, contact Jen Nessel 212.614.6449
For questions about the report as it relates to
international law, please consult Mary Ellen
O'Connell, Ohio State University Professor of Law at
oconnell.44@osu.edu .
When the network news organizations have finished
shooting their "All Reagan All the Time" wad and the
"Gipper Grease" is spent, the cesspool created in the
four years of this illegitimate, corrupt and
incompetent regime (i.e. the Bush abmonination) will
still be overflowing...drip, drip, drip...Job loss,
the Federal deficit, Enron and the phoney "California
energy crisis," Medifraud, the prostitution of the
EPA...drip, drip, drip...830+ dead US soldiers,
thousands of US soldiers maimed for life drip, drip,
drip...Niger cake and other WMD lies, Chalabi,
Halliburton, Plame, Abu Ghraib...drip, drip, drip...
Washington Post: This week, thanks again to an
independent press, we have begun to learn the deeply
disturbing truth about the legal opinions that the
Pentagon and the Justice Department seek to keep
secret. According to copies leaked to several newspapers, they lay out a shocking and immoral set of justifications for torture. In a paper prepared last
year under the direction of the Defense Department's
chief counsel, and first disclosed by the Wall Street
Journal, the president of the United States was
declared empowered to disregard U.S. and international
law and order the torture of foreign prisoners.
Moreover, interrogators following the president's
orders were declared immune from punishment. Torture
itself was narrowly redefined, so that techniques that
inflict pain and mental suffering could be deemed
legal. All this was done as a prelude to the
designation of 24 interrogation methods for foreign
prisoners -- the same techniques, now in use, that
President Bush says are humane but refuses to
disclose.
Support Our Troops, Show Up for Democracy in 2004: Defeat Bush (again!)
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A26602-2004Jun8.html
washingtonpost.com
Legalizing Torture
Wednesday, June 9, 2004; Page A20
THE BUSH administration assures the country, and the
world, that it is complying with U.S. and
international laws banning torture and maltreatment of
prisoners. But, breaking with a practice of openness
that had lasted for decades, it has classified as
secret and refused to disclose the techniques of
interrogation it is using on foreign detainees at U.S.
prisons at Guantanamo Bay and in Afghanistan and Iraq.
This is a matter of grave concern because the use of
some of the methods that have been reported in the
press is regarded by independent experts as well as
some of the Pentagon's legal professionals as illegal.
The administration has responded that its civilian
lawyers have certified its methods as proper -- but it
has refused to disclose, or even provide to Congress,
the justifying opinions and memos.
This week, thanks again to an independent press, we
have begun to learn the deeply disturbing truth about
the legal opinions that the Pentagon and the Justice
Department seek to keep secret. According to copies
leaked to several newspapers, they lay out a shocking
and immoral set of justifications for torture. In a
paper prepared last year under the direction of the
Defense Department's chief counsel, and first
disclosed by the Wall Street Journal, the president of
the United States was declared empowered to disregard
U.S. and international law and order the torture of
foreign prisoners. Moreover, interrogators following
the president's orders were declared immune from
punishment. Torture itself was narrowly redefined, so
that techniques that inflict pain and mental suffering
could be deemed legal. All this was done as a prelude
to the designation of 24 interrogation methods for
foreign prisoners -- the same techniques, now in use,
that President Bush says are humane but refuses to
disclose.
There is no justification, legal or moral, for the
judgments made by Mr. Bush's political appointees at
the Justice and Defense departments. Theirs is the
logic of criminal regimes, of dictatorships around the
world that sanction torture on grounds of "national
security." For decades the U.S. government has waged
diplomatic campaigns against such outlaw governments
-- from the military juntas in Argentina and Chile to
the current autocracies in Islamic countries such as
Algeria and Uzbekistan -- that claim torture is
justified when used to combat terrorism. The news that
serving U.S. officials have officially endorsed
principles once advanced by Augusto Pinochet brings
shame on American democracy -- even if it is true, as
the administration maintains, that its theories have
not been put into practice. Even on paper, the
administration's reasoning will provide a ready excuse
for dictators, especially those allied with the Bush
administration, to go on torturing and killing
detainees.
Perhaps the president's lawyers have no interest in
the global impact of their policies -- but they should
be concerned about the treatment of American
servicemen and civilians in foreign countries. Before
the Bush administration took office, the Army's
interrogation procedures -- which were unclassified --
established this simple and sensible test: No
technique should be used that, if used by an enemy on
an American, would be regarded as a violation of U.S.
or international law. Now, imagine that a hostile
government were to force an American to take drugs or
endure severe mental stress that fell just short of
producing irreversible damage; or pain a little milder
than that of "organ failure, impairment of bodily
function, or even death." What if the foreign
interrogator of an American "knows that severe pain
will result from his actions" but proceeds because
causing such pain is not his main objective? What if a
foreign leader were to decide that the torture of an
American was needed to protect his country's security?
Would Americans regard that as legal, or morally
acceptable? According to the Bush administration, they
should.
© 2004 The Washington Post Company
Be vigilant, be vocal, be vociferous...November 2004
is probably the last chance for the redemption of the
Republic...Are the "red states" really "red'?
Elaine Kitchel, Intervention Magazine: WISH TV, an
Indiana television station, did a recent in-depth
investigation of the election woes plaguing some
Indiana counties after some precincts ran out of
republican ballots shortly after the polls opened, and
after some counties reported thousands more votes than
registered voters...What the WISH-TV news team
uncovered was something far deeper even than a lack of
ballots. A look beyond the present failings toward the
fall election revealed possibilities for tampering
that would scare even the most complacent of voters.
Top state election officials tend to work closely with
the vendors of voting equipment. Republican Kathy
Richardson, an Indiana State Representative who was
Indiana's Hamilton County Clerk, purchased $1.3
million worth of electronic voting equipment from
MicroVote, and says she plans to purchase $700,000
more. She told WISH-TV, “When you work with a vendor,
you develop a relationship.” She works closely indeed.
MicroVote's president, James Ries Jr., has donated to
Richardson's campaign. Apparently, voting equipment
companies don't see that as a conflict.
Wendy Orange, who recently resigned her job as project
manager at ES&S (another voting equipment company),
was working with Indiana election officials, with her
office inside the election board's warehouse. She
stated that voting equipment companies say “trust us,”
and they have been trusted for years. But has that
trust been earned? Can voters really “trust” the
products and the companies who make them?
Thwart the Theft of a Second Presidential Election,
Show Up for Democracy in 2004: Defeat Bush (again!)
http://www.interventionmag.com/cms/modules.php?op=modload&name=News&file=article&sid=767
An investigation into electronic voting in Indiana has frightening implications for the presidential election in November.
By Elaine Kitchel
It's no secret that the new voting
technology--paperless, electronic voting machines--has
increased the risk of fraud and incorrect totals. You
have only to read the daily newspapers to see story
after story of possible tampering and elections gone
wrong.
Take Indiana, for instance. WISH TV, an Indiana
television station, did a recent in-depth
investigation of the election woes plaguing some
Indiana counties after some precincts ran out of
republican ballots shortly after the polls opened, and
after some counties reported thousands more votes than
registered voters: click here and click here.
What the WISH-TV news team uncovered was something far
deeper even than a lack of ballots. A look beyond the
present failings toward the fall election revealed
possibilities for tampering that would scare even the
most complacent of voters.
Top state election officials tend to work closely with
the vendors of voting equipment. Republican Kathy
Richardson, an Indiana State Representative who was
Indiana's Hamilton County Clerk, purchased $1.3
million worth of electronic voting equipment from
MicroVote, and says she plans to purchase $700,000
more. She told WISH-TV, “When you work with a vendor,
you develop a relationship.” She works closely indeed.
MicroVote's president, James Ries Jr., has donated to
Richardson's campaign. Apparently, voting equipment
companies don't see that as a conflict.
Wendy Orange, who recently resigned her job as project
manager at ES&S (another voting equipment company),
was working with Indiana election officials, with her
office inside the election board's warehouse. She
stated that voting equipment companies say “trust us,”
and they have been trusted for years. But has that
trust been earned? Can voters really “trust” the
products and the companies who make them?
When Ries, the MicroVote President, was asked how a
citizen could know if his/her voted counted, he
replied, “It's one of those areas of a leap of faith.
You really do have to have a faith in your local
jurisdiction, that they are conducting equitable
elections in the best faith of the voters. The
security for the voter, once again, is the acceptance
of good judgment by a local board. Quite frankly, it's
very difficult to convince somebody how do I know my
vote counted…. There is no way to link that individual
ballot back to that individual voter.”
Is it any wonder Orange resigned her position after
she blew the whistle on ES&S when the company asked
her to cover up a software problem it had? “I was
faced with a moral and ethical dilemma, and I felt the
only thing that I could do was come forward and tell
the Marion County Clerk what had happened,” Orange
continued in her interview with WISH-TV.
Now, Marion County Clerk Doris Anne Sadler,
responsible for the largest voting population in
Indiana, is in the unenviable position of questioning
the reliability and veracity of ES&S, with whom the
county has so heavily invested. The company disputes
Orange's claims, of course. But ES&S's corporate
certification claim says: “Under a statute that took
effect in July 2003, the State of Indiana now requires
equipment to be certified to the new 2002 federal
standards. While Version 7.4.5 has not been certified
to these new standards--as is the case, we believe,
for other vendors’ systems as well--it is very
important to note that Version 7.4.5 has been tested
by an independent testing authority, certified to the
federal government’s 1990 standards, certified by
numerous states around the country, and used very
effectively in many jurisdictions around the country.”
The glaring omission in this statement is that
Nebraska-based ES&S does not claim that its results
are accurate, only that they adhere to the OLD
standards of 1990 and are just as good as anyone
else's in the industry. Further, Nebraska's Senator
Chuck Hagel was once president of the company. And the
Senate ethics committee found that Senator Hagel still
has financial ties to ES&S’s parent company, the
McCarthy Group. The senator's campaign treasurer is
the chairman of that company.
An investigation by the Palm Beach Post revealed ES&S
had a secret agreement to kick back a percentage of
its profits to the Florida Association of Counties,
and that the lobbyist representing both ES&S and the
Florida Association of Counties was Sandra Mortham, a
former Florida secretary of state and former running
mate of Governor Jeb Bush.
So if, as they claim, ES&S and MicroVote are
comparable to the others, let's look at the last big
player, Diebold.
The man behind Diebold, an Ohio-based company, is
Walden O'Dell. Last summer O'Dell sent out invitations
to fellow Republicans to attend a fund-raising dinner.
In his invitation he stated he was “committed to
helping Ohio deliver its electoral votes to the
president.” And O'Dell means it. In the last election
the Republican National Committee received $100,000
from O'Dell. With Ohio being a pivotal state in the
upcoming election, one doesn't have to go very far to
envision how O'Dell and Diebold will actually
“deliver.” Twenty of Ohio's counties have already
adopted Diebold technology for the November election.
In fact, from its own website, Diebold has this to say
about its machines to be used in some California
precincts: “[Diebold Election Systems] anticipates
that its TSX system … will be the first touchscreen
voting system to be qualified under the new 2002
federal standards…. The company is not obligated to
report changes to its outlook.”
Diebold further states, “Readers are cautioned not to
place undue reliance on these forward-looking
statements, which speak only as of the date hereof.
The company's uncertainties could cause actual results
to differ materially from those anticipated in
forward-looking statements. These include, but are not
limited to:
* challenges raised about reliability and security of
the company's election systems products, including the
risk that such products will not be certified for use
or will be decertified;
* potential security violations to the company's
information technology systems.”
“Uncertainties?” “Faith?” Are they talking about
possible rain at a church picnic or an election?
Yes, Diebold is comparable to ES&S and MicroVote, all
right. And with the election in such good hands, it's
easy to have “faith,” isn't it?
If “faith” isn't enough for you, you might want to
write your Senators and Congresspeople to support the
Voter Confidence and Increased Accessibility Act
(H.R.2239) (S.1980): click here.
Elaine Kitchel lives in Indiana where she is a
research scientist. She closely watches the political
scene and writes about it, instead of jumping from her
4th floor office window in disgust. You can email
Elaine at Elaine@interventionmag.com
Posted Monday, June 7, 2004
Drip...drip...drip...Abu Ghraib, Halliburton, Challabi, Niger cake, Plame...Here's the truth...What would the political landscape be like in the USA right now IF the major city newspapers, like the NYTwits and the WASHPs, wrote leads like this one from Paul Harris on the Observer?
Paul Harris, Observer: The growing sense of crisis within the Bush administration over the aftermath of the Iraq conflict deepened yesterday after it emerged that Vice-President Dick Cheney has been questioned as part of the intelligence scandals engulfing American politics.
He has been interviewed as part of a probe into the leaking last year of the identity of undercover CIA agent Valerie Plame, wife of ex-diplomat Joe Wilson, a vocal critic of the administration in the build-up to the Iraq war, especially claims about Saddam Hussein's weapons of mass destruction.
News of Cheney's grilling follows the resignation of CIA chief George Tenet and will add to the pressure on a Republican party already sinking in the polls. George Bush's approval ratings are at an all-time low of 42 per cent, dangerously close to the 40 per cent level seen as the point beneath which victory is unlikely.
Repudiate the 9/11 Cover-Up and the Iraq War Lies, Show Up for Democracy in 2004: Defeat Bush (again!)
Cheney Faces Grilling Over Leak as Bush Election Hopes Slump
By Paul Harris
The Observer U.K.
Sunday 06 June 2004
Scandal of naming undercover CIA agent engulfs Vice-President and puts pressure on White House.
The growing sense of crisis within the Bush administration over the aftermath of the Iraq conflict deepened yesterday after it emerged that Vice-President Dick Cheney has been questioned as part of the intelligence scandals engulfing American politics.
He has been interviewed as part of a probe into the leaking last year of the identity of undercover CIA agent Valerie Plame, wife of ex-diplomat Joe Wilson, a vocal critic of the administration in the build-up to the Iraq war, especially claims about Saddam Hussein's weapons of mass destruction.
News of Cheney's grilling follows the resignation of CIA chief George Tenet and will add to the pressure on a Republican party already sinking in the polls. George Bush's approval ratings are at an all-time low of 42 per cent, dangerously close to the 40 per cent level seen as the point beneath which victory is unlikely.
Cheney, a hate figure for liberals due to his corporate contacts in the defence industry, was questioned about his knowledge of anyone on his staff who may have leaked Plame's name. It is not believed that Cheney himself is the suspect in the leak, a federal crime that carries the risk of a jail sentence.
However, intelligence sources have pinpointed the leak as coming from Cheney's office. His chief of staff, Lewis 'Scooter' Libby, has been named in several press reports as a possible suspect. It is also believed that the investigation has pulled phone records from Air Force One as part of their probe. Observers think that Plame's identity was deliberately leaked to conservative newspaper columnist Bob Novak as a way of punishing her husband. 'It came out of Cheney's office. These are a very serious group of people,' said Mel Goodman, a former top CIA officer.
The case is reaching high into the halls of power. Bush himself last week consulted a private lawyer, Jim Sharp, in case he is questioned. In a worrying echo of previous scandals, Sharp once worked as counsel in the Iran-Contra hearings during the 1980s scandal that almost wrecked Ronald Reagan's presidency. The probe is now the hot talk of Washington's corridors of power amid intense speculation that charges will be brought. 'If they can get the proof, someone will pay for it,' said Larry Johnson, a former CIA agent and senior counter-terrorism official at the State Department.
The case is just one of several intelligence scandals. The Pentagon is being probed over the activities of Ahmed Chalabi, who helped to provide much of the information used as a basis for invading Iraq. He is now thought to have passed secrets to Iran, including news that the US had broken Iranian intelligence codes. FBI investigators have used lie-detector tests on Pentagon officials to determine who passed secrets to Chalabi. Two other investigation reports, one from the 11 September Commission and another from the Senate, are also due in the next month and are expected to slam US intelligence-gathering in Iraq.
As negative news swamped the Bush campaign, his Democratic opponent, John Kerry, has kept a low profile. Democrat strategists believe news events alone are derailing Bush and recent poll numbers have added to the sense of Republican crisis. One survey showed almost 20 per cent of Republicans were considering not voting for Bush.
'That is a very serious problem,' said John Zogby, head of polling firm Zogby International. One of America's most respected pollsters, Zogby believes Bush's numbers are so bad that the election has become Kerry's to lose.
Last week Bush met religious groups to revive a stalled plan to encourage faith organisations to bid for government money to run charity projects. The move is controversial for blurring the lines between church and state, but is popular with conservative Christians.
Bush's lurch to the right has opened up chasms in the previously united Republican party. Moderates are becoming increasingly vocal in their criticism. Central to this group is Arizona Senator John McCain, a Vietnam war hero and rival to Bush for the 2000 presidential nomination.
Speculation is rife that McCain could be lured over to the Democrats as Kerry's running mate. McCain has dismissed the idea, but sources close to the senator said that he would probably consider any offer. 'He is a real rogue,' said one source.
-------
Niger cake, Plame, Halliburton, Abu Ghraib, Chalabi...drip, drip, drip...this cesspool will still be overflowing after the "Mouring in America" (i.e. the binge of Reagan revisionism) fades away...
Guardian: Baer said that before George Bush won the 2000 election he had told Douglas Feith and Richard Perle, two prominent INC backers, about Chalabi's unreliability and his ties to Iran.
"I told Feith and Perle this, but it did not make any difference," he said. "They're like Jesuits. They believed and they didn't check around."
Vincent Cannistraro, a former chief of operations at the CIA's counterterrorism unit, said George Tenet, the agency's chief who resigned on Thursday, had arranged for the Pentagon to be informed about Chalabi in 2002 but the CIA had been "blown off" by the Pentagon.
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http://www.truthout.org/docs_04/060804E.shtml
Pentagon Ignored its Info, CIA Says
The Guardian U.K.
Sunday 06 June 2004
"I told Feith and Perle this, but it did not make any difference. They're like Jesuits. They believed and they didn't check around."
Robert Baer, former CIA officer
Ahmad Chalabi, the leader of the Iraqi National Congress (INC), came under further pressure from Washington on Friday when it was reported the US intercepted an Iranian intelligence cable nine years ago which discussed a meeting with him in northern Iraq.
Chalabi, who was supported by the Pentagon during the Iraq invasion, has been accused by US intelligence officials of passing secrets to Tehran this year.
Former intelligence officials have pointed to the intercept as evidence the INC leader had longstanding ties to Iranian intelligence. They say the CIA informed the Pentagon of its suspicions but was ignored.
In the 1995 incident Chalabi is reported to have met Iranian agents in northern Iraq and let them see a forged document falsely suggesting the US was pursuing a plan to assassinate Saddam Hussein.
The story was first told by Robert Baer in his 2001 book, See No Evil: the True Story of a Ground Soldier in the CIA's War on Terrorism. Baer was the CIA case officer assigned to work with Chalabi in northern Iraq in the mid-1990s.
According to his account, Chalabi put the document, printed on US national security council stationery, on his desk during a meeting with Iranian intelligence agents and left it there when he left the room to take a telephone call, knowing the Iranians would read it.
But Baer did not explain in the book how US intelligence had found out about the forged document. On Friday the Washington Post said Iranian agents in Iraq had sent an encrypted message about the meeting to Tehran which was intercepted and decoded by the US. Baer said he could neither confirm nor deny that part of the story.
Chalabi fell from grace with his American backers last month, after being accused by US officials of passing secrets to Iranian intelligence six weeks ago, informing Tehran that its internal codes had been cracked by the US national security agency. He has rejected the charge as a CIA smear.
The assassination of foreign leaders in peacetime is prohibited by US law and presidential orders and the 1995 incident triggered an FBI investigation.
Baer and his team in northern Iraq were questioned about their role in forging the document but were eventually cleared of involvement. Baer said the document was forged by the INC, in the hope of attracting Iran's support for his fight against Saddam.
Baer said that before George Bush won the 2000 election he had told Douglas Feith and Richard Perle, two prominent INC backers, about Chalabi's unreliability and his ties to Iran.
"I told Feith and Perle this, but it did not make any difference," he said. "They're like Jesuits. They believed and they didn't check around."
Vincent Cannistraro, a former chief of operations at the CIA's counterterrorism unit, said George Tenet, the agency's chief who resigned on Thursday, had arranged for the Pentagon to be informed about Chalabi in 2002 but the CIA had been "blown off" by the Pentagon.
-------
Richard Clarke, the former National Security Council official, who has become legendary since his explosive testimony under oath to the 9/11 Commission has excused the Bush abmoniation of playing politics with terror threats, and his comments have been wholly ignored by the "US mainstream news media." Here is the story from a South African news organization...
www.news24.com: Clarke, who resigned last year, said the conflicting assessments of the risk of terror attacks presented by US Homeland Security Department Secretary Tom Ridge and US Attorney General John Ashcroft last week showed how some officials sought to inflate the threat for political gain.
"That was ass-covering, or perhaps, dare I say it, politics in an election year," said Clarke, who was in Berlin on a book tour to promote his unflattering account of US President George W Bush's anti-terrorism policies, entitled Against All Enemies
He had been asked at a panel discussion whether frequent terror warnings by the US administration were "just bureaucratic ass-covering".
Clarke said Ashcroft had offered a far more alarmist view compared with Ridge's remarks "saying 'We're going into the summer and we should have heightened security but we have no new intelligence about it.'"
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http://www.news24.com/News24/World/News/0,6119,2-10-1462_1538546,00.html
'Terror threat political game'
06/06/2004 17:18 - (SA)
Berlin - Former White House counter-terrorism adviser Richard Clarke on Sunday accused members of the US administration of using terror warnings to manipulate voters ahead of the presidential election in November.
Clarke, who resigned last year, said the conflicting assessments of the risk of terror attacks presented by US Homeland Security Department Secretary Tom Ridge and US Attorney General John Ashcroft last week showed how some officials sought to inflate the threat for political gain.
"That was ass-covering, or perhaps, dare I say it, politics in an election year," said Clarke, who was in Berlin on a book tour to promote his unflattering account of US President George W Bush's anti-terrorism policies, entitled Against All Enemies
He had been asked at a panel discussion whether frequent terror warnings by the US administration were "just bureaucratic ass-covering".
Clarke said Ashcroft had offered a far more alarmist view compared with Ridge's remarks "saying 'We're going into the summer and we should have heightened security but we have no new intelligence about it.'"
At the end of May, Ashcroft told reporters: "Credible intelligence from multiple sources indicates that al-Qaeda plans to attempt an attack on the United States in the next few months.
"This disturbing news shows a particular intention to hit the United States hard."
The Washington Post later reported that Ridge allies within the Bush administration and members of Congress criticised Ashcroft for failing to co-ordinate that threat information with the White House and Homeland Security.
Clarke has been an outspoken critic of Bush's anti-terrorism policies ahead of and after the attacks of September 11, 2001.
He has accused Bush of failing to pay enough attention to the al-Qaeda threat after he took office in January 2001 and undermining the struggle against terrorism with a "counterproductive" war in Iraq.
Hmmm....Curiouser and curiouser...Yesterday, the WSJ ran a *real news story* on a highly classified document related to the prisoner abuses at Abu Ghraib. Remember, the ones that the increasingly unhinged and incredibly shrinking _resident, et al denounced and for which US soldiers are being court-martialed? Well, if the WSJ is accurate (how could it not be?) than the increasingly unhinged and incredibly shrinking _resident, et al have LIED once again...Of coaurse, John Ashcroft is refusing to release or even discuss the document...Yes, very sadly, the stench of Abu Ghraib is on the White House, and sadder still, the stench of the Bush White House is on Abu Ghraib...
Bloomberg News: Democratic members of the Senate Judiciary Committee asked Ashcroft about reports in the Wall Street Journal, the Washington Post and the New York Times that the Justice Department advised the White House in 2002 and 2003 that it might not be bound by U.S. and international laws prohibiting torture. Ashcroft said he wouldn't reveal confidential advice he gave to President George W. Bush or discuss it with Congress...
Senator Joseph Biden, a Delaware Democrat, challenged Ashcroft to say whether he was invoking executive privilege in refusing to give Congress the Justice Department memos. Ashcroft said he wasn't invoking executive privilege.
``You might be in contempt of Congress, then,'' Biden replied. ``You have to have a reason. You better come up with a good rationale.''
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http://quote.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=10000103&sid=aynk7_r_cQik
U.S.'s Ashcroft Won't Release or Discuss Torture Memo (Update1)
June 8 (Bloomberg) -- U.S. Attorney General John Ashcroft, warned that he might be risking a contempt citation from Congress, told lawmakers he won't release or discuss memoranda that news reports say offered justification for torturing suspected terrorists.
Democratic members of the Senate Judiciary Committee asked Ashcroft about reports in the Wall Street Journal, the Washington Post and the New York Times that the Justice Department advised the White House in 2002 and 2003 that it might not be bound by U.S. and international laws prohibiting torture. Ashcroft said he wouldn't reveal confidential advice he gave to President George W. Bush or discuss it with Congress.
``This administration rejects torture,'' Ashcroft said as he refused to answer whether he personally believes torture can be justified under certain circumstances. Bush ``has not directed or ordered any conduct that would violate the Constitution of the United States,'' any U.S. laws or any international treaties, Ashcroft said.
The Washington Post, citing a Justice Department memo, said government lawyers told the White House in August 2002 that torturing captured al-Qaeda members abroad may be justified in the war on terrorism.
Senator Joseph Biden, a Delaware Democrat, challenged Ashcroft to say whether he was invoking executive privilege in refusing to give Congress the Justice Department memos. Ashcroft said he wasn't invoking executive privilege.
``You might be in contempt of Congress, then,'' Biden replied. ``You have to have a reason. You better come up with a good rationale.''
Prison Photographs
Senator Edward Kennedy, a Massachusetts Democrat, held up copies of some of the photographs that have been released that depict abuses against inmates at Abu Ghraib prison near Baghdad. Seven U.S. military police soldiers have been charged in the abuses.
``This is what directly results when you have that kind of memoranda out there,'' Kennedy said.
Ashcroft disagreed. ``The kind of atrocities'' depicted in the photographs ``are being prosecuted by this administration,'' he said. ``They are being investigated by this administration. They are rejected by this administration.''
He also challenged the lawmakers on whether their questions were appropriate. ``We are at war,'' Ashcroft said. ``And for us to begin to discuss all the legal ramifications of the war is not in our best interest, and it has never been in times of war.''
To contact the reporter on this story:
Laurence Arnold in Washington larnold4@bloomberg.net
To contact the editor responsible for this story:
Glenn Hall at ghall@bloomberg.net
Last Updated: June 8, 2004 12:13 EDT
Hmmm..Curiouser and curiouser...Yesterday, Al Gore denounced the "Democract" Mayor of Miami for betrayal during the Fraudida debacle of 2000, and today, the Director of Fraudida's Division of Elections resigns...Be vigilant, be vocal, be vociferous...
Gary Fineout, Miami Herald: Florida's elections chief, who just last month ignited controversy by pushing for a new purge of voters identified as felons ineligible to vote, abruptly resigned from his job Monday...
''When the key election official for the state resigns with just five months to go, it's a sign of serious disarray and instability,'' said Sharon Lettman, the group's Florida state director for its voter education and advocacy program. ``Just when county supervisors are looking for clear leadership, here comes another curve ball.''
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Posted on Tue, Jun. 08, 2004
CAMPAIGN 2004
State elections chief resigns
Ed Kast, the director of the state Division of Elections, abruptly resigned from his job Monday, just months before the 2004 presidential election.
BY GARY FINEOUT
gfineout@herald.com
Florida's elections chief, who just last month ignited controversy by pushing for a new purge of voters identified as felons ineligible to vote, abruptly resigned from his job Monday.
Ed Kast, 53, a veteran state employee, turned in a brief letter to Secretary of State Glenda Hood that said, ''I find it necessary to tender my resignation.'' The resignation is effective June 15.
A spokeswoman for Hood said that Kast was not asked to resign by the secretary, and that he was leaving to ``pursue other opportunities.''
In a statement, Hood said: ``We are grateful for Ed's leadership and dedicated service to the state. His departure is truly a loss for our department and he will be sorely missed.''
Kast, who has spent 14 years in state government, was earning $89,550. He had worked for the Department of State since 1994 and became director of the state Division of Elections nearly two years ago. He is being replaced by Dawn Roberts, a 41-year-old attorney who has been working as the general counsel for the department since last August. Roberts will be paid $91,404.
GROWING SCRUTINY
Kast's decision to step down comes in the midst of increasing scrutiny of the upcoming presidential election in Florida, which decided the presidency by 537 votes four years ago.
In early May, Kast alerted the state's 67 election supervisors that there were nearly 48,000 voters that the state had identified as possible felons ineligible to vote. Kast asked the supervisors to start notifying those on the list, in advance of purging the names, but many election supervisors have delayed so far, saying they remain concerned about the accuracy of the new felon list.
Lists of ineligible voters developed in 1999 and 2000 were riddled with errors and some supervisors ignored the list. Elections supervisors are meeting this week in Key West to discuss how much independent verification they should do before notifying voters that they may be ineligible.
One liberal group, People for the American Way Foundation, tried to use the news of Kast's resignation as a reason for putting the new purge list on hold. The group called on Hood to work more on restoring to the rolls those voters who may have improperly lost their eligibility in 1999 and 2000 -- and that she tell supervisors to delay processing the new felon list.
`CURVE BALL'
''When the key election official for the state resigns with just five months to go, it's a sign of serious disarray and instability,'' said Sharon Lettman, the group's Florida state director for its voter education and advocacy program. ``Just when county supervisors are looking for clear leadership, here comes another curve ball.''
Jenny Nash, a spokeswoman for Hood, called Lettman's comments ''misguided'' and said Hood has no legal authority to either restore voters or remove them from the rolls.
''The secretary doesn't tell the supervisors how to do their job,'' Nash said.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
© 2004 Herald.com and wire service sources. All Rights Reserved.
http://www.miami.com
Consider the source. The WSJ, a "US mainstream news media" institution, has published a story on a highly classified Pentagon document, that the WSJ itself has reviewed. The facts of the story contradict the public statements of the increasingly unhinged and incredibly shrinking _resident, as well as Rumsfeld and others, concerning what happened at Abu Ghraib and who is responsible...As the LNS has stated repeatedly, the stench of Abu Ghraib is on the Bush White House, and the stench of the Bush White House is on Abu Ghraib...
Jess Bravin, Wall Street Journal: Bush administration lawyers contended last year that the president wasn't bound by laws prohibiting torture and that government agents who might torture prisoners at his direction couldn't be prosecuted by the Justice Department...
The report outlined U.S. laws and international
treaties forbidding torture, and why those
restrictions might be overcome by national-security
considerations or legal technicalities. In a March 6,
2003, draft of the report reviewed by The Wall Street
Journal, passages were deleted as was an attachment
listing specific interrogation techniques and whether
Mr. Rumsfeld himself or other officials must grant
permission before they could be used. The complete
draft document was classified "secret" by Mr. Rumsfeld
and scheduled for declassification in 2013.
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http://www.commondreams.org/headlines04/0607-01.htm
Published on Monday, June 7, 2004 by the Wall Street
Journal
Pentagon Report Set Framework For Use of Torture
Security or Legal Factors Could Trump Restrictions,
Memo to Rumsfeld Argued
by Jess Bravin
Bush administration lawyers contended last year that
the president wasn't bound by laws prohibiting torture
and that government agents who might torture prisoners
at his direction couldn't be prosecuted by the Justice
Department.
The advice was part of a classified report on
interrogation methods prepared for Defense Secretary
Donald Rumsfeld after commanders at Guantanamo Bay,
Cuba, complained in late 2002 that with conventional
methods they weren't getting enough information from
prisoners.
The report outlined U.S. laws and international
treaties forbidding torture, and why those
restrictions might be overcome by national-security
considerations or legal technicalities. In a March 6,
2003, draft of the report reviewed by The Wall Street
Journal, passages were deleted as was an attachment
listing specific interrogation techniques and whether
Mr. Rumsfeld himself or other officials must grant
permission before they could be used. The complete
draft document was classified "secret" by Mr. Rumsfeld
and scheduled for declassification in 2013.
The draft report, which exceeds 100 pages, deals with
a range of legal issues related to interrogations,
offering definitions of the degree of pain or
psychological manipulation that could be considered
lawful. But at its core is an exceptional argument
that because nothing is more important than "obtaining
intelligence vital to the protection of untold
thousands of American citizens," normal strictures on
torture might not apply.
The president, despite domestic and international laws
constraining the use of torture, has the authority as
commander in chief to approve almost any physical or
psychological actions during interrogation, up to and
including torture, the report argued. Civilian or
military personnel accused of torture or other war
crimes have several potential defenses, including the
"necessity" of using such methods to extract
information to head off an attack, or "superior
orders," sometimes known as the Nuremberg defense:
namely that the accused was acting pursuant to an
order and, as the Nuremberg tribunal put it, no "moral
choice was in fact possible."
According to Bush administration officials, the report
was compiled by a working group appointed by the
Defense Department's general counsel, William J.
Haynes II. Air Force General Counsel Mary Walker
headed the group, which comprised top civilian and
uniformed lawyers from each military branch and
consulted with the Justice Department, the Joint
Chiefs of Staff, the Defense Intelligence Agency and
other intelligence agencies. It isn't known if
President Bush has ever seen the report.
A Pentagon official said some military lawyers
involved objected to some of the proposed
interrogation methods as "different than what our
people had been trained to do under the Geneva
Conventions," but those lawyers ultimately signed on
to the final report in April 2003, shortly after the
war in Iraq began. The Journal hasn't seen the full
final report, but people familiar with it say there
were few substantial changes in legal analysis between
the draft and final versions.
A military lawyer who helped prepare the report said
that political appointees heading the working group
sought to assign to the president virtually unlimited
authority on matters of torture -- to assert
"presidential power at its absolute apex," the lawyer
said. Although career military lawyers were
uncomfortable with that conclusion, the military
lawyer said they focused their efforts on reining in
the more extreme interrogation methods, rather than
challenging the constitutional powers that
administration lawyers were saying President Bush
could claim.
The Pentagon disclosed last month that the working
group had been assembled to review interrogation
policies after intelligence officials in Guantanamo
reported frustration in extracting information from
prisoners. At a news conference last week, Gen. James
T. Hill, who oversees the offshore prison at
Guantanamo as head of the U.S. Southern Command, said
the working group sought to identify "what is legal
and consistent with not only Geneva [but] ... what is
right for our soldiers." He said Guantanamo is "a
professional, humane detention and interrogation
operation ... bounded by law and guided by the
American spirit."
Gen. Hill said Mr. Rumsfeld gave him the final set of
approved interrogation techniques on April 16, 2003.
Four of the methods require the defense secretary's
approval, he said, and those methods had been used on
two prisoners. He said interrogators had stopped short
of using all the methods lawyers had approved. It
remains unclear what actions U.S. officials took as a
result of the legal advice.
Critics who have seen the draft report said it
undercuts the administration's claims that it
recognized a duty to treat prisoners humanely. The
"claim that the president's commander-in-chief power
includes the authority to use torture should be
unheard of in this day and age," said Michael Ratner,
president of the Center for Constitutional Rights, a
New York advocacy group that has filed lawsuits
against U.S. detention policies. "Can one imagine the
reaction if those on trial for atrocities in the
former Yugoslavia had tried this defense?"
Following scattered reports last year of harsh
interrogation techniques used by the U.S. overseas,
Sen. Patrick Leahy, a Vermont Democrat, wrote to
National Security Adviser Condoleezza Rice asking for
clarification. The response came in June 2003 from Mr.
Haynes, who wrote that the U.S. was obliged to conduct
interrogations "consistent with" the 1994
international Convention Against Torture and the
federal Torture Statute enacted to implement the
convention outside the U.S.
The U.S. "does not permit, tolerate or condone any
such torture by its employees under any
circumstances," Mr. Haynes wrote. The U.S. also
followed its legal duty, required by the torture
convention, "to prevent other acts of cruel, inhuman
or degrading treatment or punishment which do not
amount to torture," he wrote.
The U.S. position is that domestic criminal laws and
the Constitution's prohibition of cruel and unusual
punishments already met the Convention Against
Torture's requirements within U.S. territory.
The Convention Against Torture was proposed in 1984 by
the United Nations General Assembly and was ratified
by the U.S. in 1994. It states that "no exceptional
circumstances whatsoever, whether a state of war or a
threat of war, internal political instability or any
other public emergency, may be invoked as a
justification of torture," and that orders from
superiors "may not be invoked as a justification of
torture."
That prohibition was reaffirmed after the Sept. 11
attacks by the U.N. panel that oversees the treaty,
the Committee Against Torture, and the March 2003
report acknowledged that "other nations and
international bodies may take a more restrictive view"
of permissible interrogation methods than did the Bush
administration.
The report then offers a series of legal
justifications for limiting or disregarding
antitorture laws and proposed legal defenses that
government officials could use if they were accused of
torture.
A military official who helped prepare the report said
it came after frustrated Guantanamo interrogators had
begun trying unorthodox methods on recalcitrant
prisoners. "We'd been at this for a year-plus and got
nothing out of them" so officials concluded "we need
to have a less-cramped view of what torture is and is
not."
The official said, "People were trying like hell how
to ratchet up the pressure," and used techniques that
ranged from drawing on prisoners' bodies and placing
women's underwear on prisoners heads -- a practice
that later reappeared in the Abu Ghraib prison -- to
telling subjects, "I'm on the line with somebody in
Yemen and he's in a room with your family and a
grenade that's going to pop unless you talk."
Senior officers at Guantanamo requested a "rethinking
of the whole approach to defending your country when
you have an enemy that does not follow the rules," the
official said. Rather than license torture, this
official said that the report helped rein in more
"assertive" approaches.
Methods now used at Guantanamo include limiting
prisoners' food, denying them clothing, subjecting
them to body-cavity searches, depriving them of sleep
for as much as 96 hours and shackling them in
so-called stress positions, a military-intelligence
official said. Although the interrogators consider the
methods to be humiliating and unpleasant, they don't
view them as torture, the official said.
The working-group report elaborated the Bush
administration's view that the president has virtually
unlimited power to wage war as he sees fit, and
neither Congress, the courts nor international law can
interfere. It concluded that neither the president nor
anyone following his instructions was bound by the
federal Torture Statute, which makes it a crime for
Americans working for the government overseas to
commit or attempt torture, defined as any act intended
to "inflict severe physical or mental pain or
suffering." Punishment is up to 20 years imprisonment,
or a death sentence or life imprisonment if the victim
dies.
"In order to respect the president's inherent
constitutional authority to manage a military campaign
... (the prohibition against torture) must be
construed as inapplicable to interrogations undertaken
pursuant to his commander-in chief authority," the
report asserted. (The parenthetical comment is in the
original document.) The Justice Department "concluded
that it could not bring a criminal prosecution against
a defendant who had acted pursuant to an exercise of
the president's constitutional power," the report
said. Citing confidential Justice Department opinions
drafted after Sept. 11, 2001, the report advised that
the executive branch of the government had "sweeping"
powers to act as it sees fit because "national
security decisions require the unity in purpose and
energy in action that characterize the presidency
rather than Congress."
The lawyers concluded that the Torture Statute applied
to Afghanistan but not Guantanamo, because the latter
lies within the "special maritime and territorial
jurisdiction of the United States, and accordingly is
within the United States" when applying a law that
regulates only government conduct abroad.
Administration lawyers also concluded that the Alien
Tort Claims Act, a 1789 statute that allows
noncitizens to sue in U.S. courts for violations of
international law, couldn't be invoked against the
U.S. government unless it consents, and that the 1992
Torture Victims Protection Act allowed suits only
against foreign officials for torture or
"extrajudicial killing" and "does not apply to the
conduct of U.S. agents acting under the color of law."
The Bush administration has argued before the Supreme
Court that foreigners held at Guantanamo have no
constitutional rights and can't challenge their
detention in court. The Supreme Court is expected to
rule on that question by month's end.
For Afghanistan and other foreign locations where the
Torture Statute applies, the March 2003 report offers
a narrow definition of torture and then lays out
defenses that government officials could use should
they be charged with committing torture, such as
mistakenly relying in good faith on the advice of
lawyers or experts that their actions were
permissible. "Good faith may be a complete defense" to
a torture charge, the report advised.
"The infliction of pain or suffering per se, whether
it is physical or mental, is insufficient to amount to
torture," the report advises. Such suffering must be
"severe," the lawyers advise, and they rely on a
dictionary definition to suggest it "must be of such a
high level of intensity that the pain is difficult for
the subject to endure."
The law says torture can be caused by administering or
threatening to administer "mind-altering substances or
other procedures calculated to disrupt profoundly the
sense of personality." The Bush lawyers advised,
though, that it "does not preclude any and all use of
drugs" and "disruption of the senses or personality
alone is insufficient" to be illegal. For
involuntarily administered drugs or other
psychological methods, the "acts must penetrate to the
core of an individual's ability to perceive the world
around him," the lawyers found.
Gen. Hill said last week that the military didn't use
injections or chemicals on prisoners.
After defining torture and other prohibited acts, the
memo presents "legal doctrines ... that could render
specific conduct, otherwise criminal, not unlawful."
Foremost, the lawyers rely on the "commander-in-chief
authority," concluding that "without a clear statement
otherwise, criminal statutes are not read as
infringing on the president's ultimate authority" to
wage war. Moreover, "any effort by Congress to
regulate the interrogation of unlawful combatants
would violate the Constitution's sole vesting of the
commander-in-chief authority in the president," the
lawyers advised.
Likewise, the lawyers found that "constitutional
principles" make it impossible to "punish officials
for aiding the president in exercising his exclusive
constitutional authorities" and neither Congress nor
the courts could "require or implement the prosecution
of such an individual."
To protect subordinates should they be charged with
torture, the memo advised that Mr. Bush issue a
"presidential directive or other writing" that could
serve as evidence, since authority to set aside the
laws is "inherent in the president."
The report advised that government officials could
argue that "necessity" justified the use of torture.
"Sometimes the greater good for society will be
accomplished by violating the literal language of the
criminal law," the lawyers wrote, citing a standard
legal text, "Substantive Criminal Law" by Wayne LaFave
and Austin W. Scott. "In particular, the necessity
defense can justify the intentional killing of one
person ... so long as the harm avoided is greater."
In addition, the report advised that torture or
homicide could be justified as "self-defense," should
an official "honestly believe" it was necessary to
head off an imminent attack on the U.S. The
self-defense doctrine generally has been asserted by
individuals fending off assaults, and in 1890, the
Supreme Court upheld a U.S. deputy marshal's right to
shoot an assailant of Supreme Court Justice Stephen
Field as involving both self-defense and defense of
the nation. Citing Justice Department opinions, the
report concluded that "if a government defendant were
to harm an enemy combatant during an interrogation in
a manner that might arguably violate criminal
prohibition," he could be justified "in doing so in
order to prevent further attacks on the United States
by the al Qaeda terrorist network."
Mr. LaFave, a law professor at the University of
Illinois, said he was unaware that the Pentagon used
his textbook in preparing its legal analysis. He
agreed, however, that in some cases necessity could be
a defense to torture charges. "Here's a guy who knows
with certainty where there's a bomb that will blow New
York City to smithereens. Should we torture him? Seems
to me that's an easy one," Mr. LaFave said. But he
said necessity couldn't be a blanket justification for
torturing prisoners because of a general fear that
"the nation is in danger."
For members of the military, the report suggested that
officials could escape torture convictions by arguing
that they were following superior orders, since such
orders "may be inferred to be lawful" and are
"disobeyed at the peril of the subordinate." Examining
the "superior orders" defense at the Nuremberg trials
of Nazi war criminals, the Vietnam War prosecution of
U.S. Army Lt. William Calley for the My Lai massacre
and the current U.N. war-crimes tribunals for Rwanda
and the former Yugoslavia, the report concluded it
could be asserted by "U.S. armed forces personnel
engaged in exceptional interrogations except where the
conduct goes so far as to be patently unlawful."
The report seemed "designed to find the legal
loopholes that will permit the use of torture against
detainees," said Mary Ellen O'Connell, an
international-law professor at the Ohio State
University who has seen the report. "CIA operatives
will think they are covered because they are not going
to face liability."
Copyright © 2004 Dow Jones & Company, Inc
###
One of the most painful and frustrating sub-plots in
the fateful debacle of Fraudida 2000 was the
questionable behavior of several key "Democratic"
officials in Miami-Dade and Palm Beach. Fortunately,
for all of us, Al Gore has decided to help Fraudida
clean its house...More will be revealed as the
campaign advances..."Truth shall rise again!"
Beth Reinhard, Miami Herald: Former Vice President Al
Gore, who lost the 2000 presidential election by 537
votes in Florida, on Saturday called Miami-Dade County
Mayor Alex Penelas ``the single most treacherous and
dishonest person I dealt with during the campaign
anywhere in America.''
Gore, who rarely gives interviews, added in his
statement: ``As the campaign moves forward and when
appropriate, I will have more to say about this.''
Thwart the Theft of a Second Presidential Election,
Show Up for Democracy in 2004: Defeat Bush (again!)
http://www.miami.com/mld/miamiherald/8850672.htm
Posted on Sun, Jun. 06, 2004
Gore says Penelas betrayed Democrats: Former Democratic presidential candidate Al Goredelivered a harsh message to Miami-Dade County Mayor Alex Penelas, three months before he faces a U.S. Senate primary.
BY BETH REINHARD
breinhard@herald.com
Former Vice President Al Gore, who lost the 2000
presidential election by 537 votes in Florida, on
Saturday called Miami-Dade County Mayor Alex Penelas
``the single most treacherous and dishonest person I
dealt with during the campaign anywhere in America.''
The statement was e-mailed by a Gore spokesman in
response to a Herald inquiry about Penelas's role in
the 2000 campaign. Gore supporters say the vice
president had counted on Penelas for a late boost in
the Hispanic community, and the mayor did not come
through.
The harsh remarks come just three months before
Penelas faces a Democratic primary election for the
U.S. Senate. Gore's reproach could seriously damage
the mayor's bid to succeed Sen. Bob Graham, since
party loyalists tend to dominate turnout in a primary.
In a telephone interview Saturday evening, Penelas
defended himself, saying he was ``by Gore's side from
the very beginning.''
''Al Gore has a right to be upset about the election,
but had he won his home state of Tennessee or West
Virginia, we wouldn't be here,'' Penelas said. ``He
also owes an explanation as to why he waited until the
middle of October to engage in Florida.''
He said Gore has declined to return his phone calls to
discuss the 2000 campaign.
The mayor has been defending his loyalty to Gore for a
full year in response to attacks from his Democratic
rival, U.S. Rep. Peter Deutsch. The congressman went
so far as to boycott last June's Florida Democratic
Party dinner in his hometown of Hollywood because
Penelas was receiving an award.
Then, and at recent forums, Penelas has described
himself as a strong Gore supporter. But the vice
president's statement says: ``Not all who claim to
have been supportive and loyal truly were.''
Gore, who rarely gives interviews, added in his
statement: ``As the campaign moves forward and when
appropriate, I will have more to say about this.''
He went out of his way to praise Deutsch, who has
served in Congress since 1992, saying in the
statement, ``Peter Deutsch is a good and dear friend
who has been a stand-up leader for our party in
difficult times such as the 2000 election recount in
Florida.''
Penelas did help raise hundreds of thousands of
dollars for Al Gore when he ran with Bill Clinton in
1996 and when he headed the ticket in 2000.
During one fundraising trip to Miami, Gore and Penelas
toasted to victory with Cuban cafecitos. At the
reception, Penelas gushed to the crowd, ``We're so
looking forward to calling you President Gore.''
The mayor also touted Gore on Spanish-language radio,
a main source of political news for Hispanic voters.
There were rumors that he might become a running mate.
ELIAN FALLOUT
But relations between the two men frayed after
5-year-old Elián González was rescued at sea on
Thanksgiving Day, 1999. Many from Penelas's political
base, the heavily Republican, Cuban-American
community, took to the streets in rage when federal
agents seized Elián at gunpoint from his relatives'
home and sent him back to his father in Cuba.
Though President Clinton and Attorney General Janet
Reno were the most visible players during the crisis,
many Cuban exiles lumped Gore with the federal
government that returned the boy to an oppressive
regime.
Penelas kept his distance, too. Instead of joining
Gore when he clinched the Democratic nomination in
March in Tallahassee, Penelas attended his own
fundraisers there. In August, he skipped the
Democratic National Convention to focus on his eight
re-election opponents.
NOTABLE ABSENCE
On Oct. 18, one day after his swearing in, Penelas was
a no-show at a Hispanic get-out-the-vote rally in
Hialeah. Later that day, he and his wife headed to
Spain on a trip that was part vacation, part trade
mission. He did not return until Oct. 30, one week
before the election.
Mitchell Berger, a leading Gore fundraiser, said he
and others helped raise out-of-state money for Penelas
so he could avoid a runoff and spend more time
rallying Hispanic voters for the vice president.
''Alex Penelas did not help Al Gore during the most
crucial time,'' said Berger, who is supporting
Deutsch.
Deutsch, in contrast, was a constant presence at the
Broward County recount. He called for a federal
investigation of rowdy protests at the Miami-Dade
recount before it shut down. He hosted fundraisers for
Gore and donated $250,000 from his congressional
account, one of the largest contributions of its kind
to a national campaign.
Both supporters and critics of Deutsch thought his
assaults on Penelas might backfire. Gore's statement
gives Deutsch more ammunition than he could hope for.
''I would like to thank the vice president for his
gracious show of support and for saying what needed to
be said,'' Deutsch said through spokesman Roy Teicher.
Former Florida Education Commissioner Betty Castor and
Hollywood businessman Bernard Klein will also be on
the primary ballot.
FIRST PARTY RACE
Although Penelas has been in politics for 17 years,
this is the first time he has run as a Democrat. All
of his past campaigns -- for Hialeah City Council, the
Miami-Dade County Commission and Miami-Dade mayor --
have been nonpartisan.
Still, he has been one of the party's best
fundraisers. He has also embraced core Democratic
values, crusading for gun control, standing up for gay
rights and spearheading a constitutional amendment to
require public pre-kindergarten.
''If some people want to measure my Democratic
credentials by the 2000 election, that's fine,''
Penelas said. ``I've been a loyal and dedicated
Democrat for a long time.''
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
© 2004 Herald.com and wire service sources. All Rights
Reserved.
http://www.miami.com
Yes, as LNS Foreign Correspondent Dunston Woods, says,
"It's the Consensus vs. the Cabal." And, it is,
indeed, a very broad and deep "Consensus."
Patrick J. Buchanan, WorldNetDaily: The Night of the Long Knives has begun. The military and CIA are stabbing the neocons front, back and center, laying responsibility on them for the mess in Iraq. Meanwhile, the Balkan wars of the American Right have re-ignited, with even the normally quiescent Beltway conservatives scrambling to get clear of the neocon encampment before the tomahawking begins.
Support Our Troops, Show Up for Democracy in 2004:
Defeat Bush (again!)
http://wnd.com/news/article.asp?ARTICLE_ID=38815
This is a WorldNetDaily printer-friendly version of
the article which follows.
To view this item online, visit
http://www.worldnetdaily.com/news/article.asp?ARTICLE_ID=38815
Monday, June 7, 2004
The dog days of the War Party
Posted: June 7, 2004
1:00 a.m. Eastern
By Patrick J. Buchanan
© 2004 Creators Syndicate, Inc.
Fourteen months ago, after the 3rd Infantry Division
and Marines swept into Baghdad, Washington was at the
feet of the neoconservatives who had been plotting and
propagandizing for an invasion for years.
A celebratory breakfast was held at the American
Enterprise Institute think tank, where William
Kristol, Richard Perle and Michael Ledeen held forth
in a spirit of joyous anticipation of wars and
victories to come. At a dinner party at the vice
president's mansion, Kenneth ("Cakewalk") Adelman,
Lewis I. "Scooter" Libby, Cheney's chief of staff, and
Paul Wolfowitz toasted one another and the president.
As the '60s song went, "Those were the days, my
friend, we thought they'd never end."
Now, enmeshed in a guerrilla war, Americans are
demanding to know who told us we would be welcomed
with garlands of flowers. Who said our troops would
come home in a year? Who said democracy would flourish
across the Arab world? Who misled us about the weapons
of mass destruction? Who lied us into war?
But the neocons may be facing problems more serious
than entering the history books alongside the Whiz
Kids of the McNamara era who got it wrong in Vietnam
and left 58,000 behind. Some War Party leaders may see
careers cashiered and reputations ruined.
According to the New York Times, U.S. intelligence
officials claim that Ahmad Chalabi informed the top
Iranian agent in Baghdad that the Americans had broken
their top-secret code and were reading their messages
to Tehran. Chalabi reportedly told his Iranian contact
he got this intel from a high American official who
was drunk.
According to writer Sidney Blumenthal, the FBI is now
visiting AEI to interrogate scholars in residence – to
learn who leaked word we had broken the Iranian code
to Chalabi, who is emerging as the Alger Hiss of the
neoconservatives.
Another question is whether Chalabi was being used all
along by Tehran to goad the United States into
invading Iraq, thus opening the door to a Shiite
regime in Baghdad, which, with Shiite Iran, might
control the Persian Gulf and its oil treasures in
perpetuity.
If so, this Iranian coup would rank with Bismarck's
doctoring of the Ems telegram to goad Napoleon III
into a war that cost him his throne and
Alsace-Lorraine, and united Germany behind a Prussian
king whom Bismarck would have crowned Kaiser in the
Hall of Mirrors at Versailles.
The White House dumping of Chalabi represents a rout
for the neocons, who had all their chips on this pony.
For Chalabi had promised them that, once installed in
power, he would recognize Israel and resurrect the old
Mosul-to-Haifa pipeline.
Another scandal on the back burner that could explode
and spill over before November is the Justice
Department's investigation into the White House leak
of the CIA identity of the wife of former Ambassador
Joe Wilson. That leak was a retaliatory strike on
Wilson for an op-ed in the New York Times that
undermined Bush's claim in his 2003 State of the Union
Address that Iraq was seeking uranium for nuclear
weapons in the African nation of Niger.
Apparently, Justice is not only seeking to identify
the leakers, but looking at the possibility that FBI
investigators were misled or lied to. President Bush
has himself hired outside counsel. As ever, it is not
the offense, but the cover-up that ensnares them.
Then there is the Abu Ghraib prison scandal. This
appears to be working its way up the chain of command
toward the E-Ring of the Pentagon and even the West
Wing of the White House. If orders went out to ignore
the Geneva Convention, and prisoners who had nothing
to do with terrorism were abused or tortured, or died
in captivity, famous heads could roll.
Later this summer, the 9-11 Commission reports. It
seems certain to single out Wolfowitz and
administration neoconservatives along the line of
argument of Richard Clarke's "Against All Enemies" –
for an obsession with Iraq that blinded the White
House to the real and present danger of bin Laden and
al-Qaida.
Beyond this, the national press, cable television and
the Internet are still flush with stories of how, in a
secret Pentagon intel shop, neocons "cherry-picked"
the prewar intelligence and "stove-piped" it up to
Cheney's office, where it was inserted into the
addresses of President Bush.
The Night of the Long Knives has begun. The military
and CIA are stabbing the neocons front, back and
center, laying responsibility on them for the mess in
Iraq. Meanwhile, the Balkan wars of the American Right
have re-ignited, with even the normally quiescent
Beltway conservatives scrambling to get clear of the
neocon encampment before the tomahawking begins.
But a larger matter looms than the cashiering of
ideologues and apparatchiks whose time has come and
gone. If Bush's "world democratic revolution" and "Pax
Americana" are out, what is in?
What is our post-Iraq foreign policy to be? After we
come home from Iraq, how far does retrenchment go? If
the neocons are being stuffed into the Hefty bags of
history, who moves up next?
SPECIAL OFFER: Pat Buchanan's book, "The Death of the
West," an eye-opening exposé of how immigration
invasions are endangering America, is now available at
HALF-PRICE from WorldNetDaily's online store!
Autographed edition also available!
Patrick J. Buchanan was twice a candidate for the
Republican presidential nomination and the Reform
Party’s candidate in 2000. He is also a founder and
editor of the new magazine, The American Conservative.
Now a political analyst for MSNBC and a syndicated
columnist, he served three presidents in the White
House, was a founding panelist of three national
television shows, and is the author of seven books.
Mourning in America?
Greg Palast, www.gregpalast.com: Ronald Reagan was a
conman. Reagan was a coward. Reagan was a killer...
And when Hezbollah terrorists struck and murdered hundreds of American marines in their sleep in Lebanon, the TV warrior ran away like a whipped dog …
then turned around and invaded Grenada. That little
Club Med war was a murderous PR stunt so Ronnie could
hold parades for gunning down Cubans building an
airport...
The New York Times today, in its canned obit, wrote
that Reagan projected, "faith in small town America"
and "old-time values." "Values" my ass. It was union
busting and a declaration of war on the poor and
anyone who couldn't buy designer dresses. It was the
New Meanness, bringing starvation back to America so
that every millionaire could get another million.
Break the Bush Cabal Stranglehold on the "US
Mainstream News Media," Show Up for Democracy in 2004:
Defeat Bush (again!)
http://www.gregpalast.com/detail.cfm?artid=336&row=0
KILLER, COWARD, CON-MAN: GOOD RIDDANCE, GIPPER ...
MORE PROOF ONLY THE GOOD DIE YOUNG
Sunday, June 6, 2004
by Greg Palast
You're not going to like this. You shouldn't speak ill
of the dead. But in this case, someone's got to.
Ronald Reagan was a conman. Reagan was a coward.
Reagan was a killer.
In 1987, I found myself stuck in a crappy little town
in Nicaragua named Chaguitillo. The people were kind
enough, though hungry, except for one surly young man.
His wife had just died of tuberculosis.
People don't die of TB if they get some antibiotics.
But Ronald Reagan, big hearted guy that he was, had
put a lock-down embargo on medicine to Nicaragua
because he didn't like the government that the people
there had elected.
Ronnie grinned and cracked jokes while the young
woman's lungs filled up and she stopped breathing.
Reagan flashed that B-movie grin while they buried the
mother of three.
And when Hezbollah terrorists struck and murdered
hundreds of American marines in their sleep in
Lebanon, the TV warrior ran away like a whipped dog …
then turned around and invaded Grenada. That little
Club Med war was a murderous PR stunt so Ronnie could
hold parades for gunning down Cubans building an
airport.
I remember Nancy, a skull and crossbones prancing
around in designer dresses, some of the "gifts" that
flowed to the Reagans -- from hats to million-dollar
homes -- from cronies well compensated with government
loot. It used to be called bribery.
And all the while, Grandpa grinned, the grandfather
who bleated on about "family values" but didn't bother
to see his own grandchildren.
The New York Times today, in its canned obit, wrote
that Reagan projected, "faith in small town America"
and "old-time values." "Values" my ass. It was union
busting and a declaration of war on the poor and
anyone who couldn't buy designer dresses. It was the
New Meanness, bringing starvation back to America so
that every millionaire could get another million.
"Small town" values? From the movie star of the
Pacific Palisades, the Malibu mogul? I want to throw
up.
And all the while, in the White House basement, as his
brain boiled away, his last conscious act was to
condone a coup d'etat against our elected Congress.
Reagan's Defense Secretary Casper the Ghost Weinberger
with the crazed Colonel, Ollie North, plotted to give
guns to the Monster of the Mideast, Ayatolla Khomeini.
Reagan's boys called Jimmy Carter a weanie and a wuss
although Carter wouldn't give an inch to the Ayatolla.
Reagan, with that film-fantasy tough-guy con in front
of cameras, went begging like a coward cockroach to
Khomeini pleading on bended knee for the release of
our hostages.
Ollie North flew into Iran with a birthday cake for
the maniac mullah -- no kidding --in the shape of a
key. The key to Ronnie's heart.
Then the Reagan roaches mixed their cowardice with
crime: taking cash from the hostage-takers to buy guns
for the "contras" - the drug-runners of Nicaragua
posing as freedom fighters.
I remember as a student in Berkeley the words
screeching out of the bullhorn, "The Governor of the
State of California, Ronald Reagan, hereby orders this
demonstration to disperse" … and then came the teargas
and the truncheons. And all the while, that
fang-hiding grin from the Gipper.
In Chaguitillo, all night long, the farmers stayed
awake to guard their kids from attack from Reagan's
Contra terrorists. The farmers weren't even
Sandinistas, those 'Commies' that our cracked-brained
President told us were 'only a 48-hour drive from
Texas.' What the hell would they want with Texas,
anyway?
Nevertheless, the farmers, and their families, were
Ronnie's targets.
In the deserted darkness of Chaguitillo, a TV blared.
Weirdly, it was that third-rate gangster movie,
"Brother Rat." Starring Ronald Reagan.
Well, my friends, you can rest easier tonight: the Rat
is dead.
Killer, coward, conman. Ronald Reagan, good-bye and
good riddance.
Greg Palast is author of the New York Times
bestseller, The Best Democracy Money Can Buy.
www.GregPalast.com
Site Design by Creative Constructs -
www.CreativeConstructs.com
Two more US soldiers died today in Iraq. FOR WHAT? We have a failed administration (i.e. the Bush abomination). There are well over 800 US soliders dead in this foolish military adventure. Our military has been stretched beyond any reasonable expectation for wholly irrational reasons. We have squandered over $100 billion so far in Iraq. That money that could have been spent hardening homeland security inside the US, and crushing Al Qaeda-style terror organizations both inside and outside the US. Instead, it has been poured into Iraq, allowing Al-Qaeda to regroup around the world and swelling its ranks with new recruits from the Arab Street. Now Ronald Reagan has passed on. It is all Reagan all the time on the air waves. Indeed, the propapunditgandists will spin so that Sen. John F. Kerry (D-Mekong Delta) is running against the ghost of Ronald Reagan, instead of an increasingly unhinged and incredibly shrinking _resident...Well, the LNS provides CONTEXT and CONTINUITY...When Reagan lost hundreds of US Marines in a suicide bombing in Beirut, he got us the Hell out of there. The increasingly unhinged and incredibly shrinking _resident has lost many more US soldiers already, and has brought us a Mega-Mogadishu, predicated on LIES, with no end in sight. When Reagan was in power, he had a strong ally in Pope John Paul. There was mutual respect and a shared geopolitical view on the threat of that time (i.e. a crumbling, and therefore, very dangerous Soviet empire). But there were 501,000 protesters awaiting the increasingly unhinged and incredibly shrinking _resident in Rome last week: 500,000 protesters in the street, and one very powerful protester sitting alongside him. The increasingly unhinged and incredibly shrinking _resident made Pope John Paul wait for 15 minutes -- an unprecendent and appaling insult. But Pope John Paul, despite his fraility, his age and his infirmity, tongue-lashed the increasingly unhinged and incredibly shrinking _resident publicly and in blunt language for a failed "war on terror" in general and for the unnecessary war in Iraq and Abu Ghraib in particular. (BTW, use the LNS searchable database to reference a fascinating article about Vatican insiders confiding that the Pope is concerned that the increasingly unhinged and incredibly shrinking _resident might indeed by the Anti-Christ. Remember borne from the world of politics and presenting himself as a man of peace?) Nor will you hear any *truth* about what Reagan and the increasingly unhinged and incredibly shrinking _resident do have in common: e.g. "vodoo economics" for which the only cure is what Clinton did in the early 1990s and what JFK will do IF there is an election in November and a Constitutional transfer of power in 2005: i.e. RESTORE FISCAL RESPONSIBILITY and GET RID OF THE DEFICIT!!! Nor will you hear anything of course about the Reagan era crimes -- both Constitutional (Iran-Contra) and "against humanity (the Central America of John Negroponte, the "Ambassador" to Iraq, and Elliot Abrams, now assigned to the Middle East). Nor will you hear that Osama bin Laden, whose madness has shaped the Bush abomination, was launched into the business of killing people during Reagan's proxy war in Afghanistan. The myth of Ronald Reagan's *greatness* has two sources: 1) his genuine gift for communicating positive emotion on the overtone, almost viscerally or subliminally, despite the inannity of the rhetoric, and 2) the courage, skill, intelligence and vision of Mikhail Gorbachev. Oh, yes, something else that the increasingly unhinged and incredibly shrinking _resident does NOT share in common with Reagan: the blue-collar "Reagan Democrats," the LNS predicts that they are "coming home" to vote for JFK. A sheetmetal worker from Chicago told us so...No, of course, you won't hear any of this CONTEXT and CONTINUITY over the next few days in the propapunditgandists of the "US mainstream news media." Our only hope is Nancy Reagan. She has distinguished herself for integrity since President Reagan's sad descent into Alzeheimer's. She denounced Oliver North during his thankfully failed run for the US Senate in Virginia, and she rebuked the increasingly unhinged and incredibly shrinking _resident's American Taliban ban on expanded stem cell research. Keep your fingers crossed that Nancy does not allow them to spin her husband's death into another photo op for the failed Bush abomination. Otherwise, as LNS Correspondent Dunston Woods says, all we will get on the air waves is "Gipper Grease." Yes, indeed...It's the Media, Stupid
Eric Alterman, Center for American Progress: Last week, the Pew Center for Excellence in Journalism [PEJ] released a Survey of Journalists that included some significant findings. Among the most worrisome: The vast majority of journalists believe increased financial pressure is "seriously hurting" the quality of news coverage. Sixty-six percent of national news people and fifty-seven percent of local journalists see it this way. This percentage, moreover, is rising. In 1995, for example, forty-one percent of national and thirty-three percent of local journalists agreed with the statement. In a related finding, the poll found journalists who fear their stories are "increasingly full of factual and sloppy reporting" rose from thirty percent in 1995 to forty percent in 1999 to forty-five today."
Interestingly, management is considerably more sanguine about the current state of journalistic affairs. Most executives at national news organizations (fifty-seven percent) feel increased business pressures are "mostly just changing the way news organizations do things" rather than seriously undermining quality. What we have here is a perfect example of how conglomeration interferes with the public's reception of information. Now it is certainly possible the dismissal (in the past x years) of nearly sixty percent of radio news personnel, for instance, has improved that medium's ability to keep its audience informed. But it is far more likely management is shilling for the bosses while the journalists on the ground are in much better touch with the quality of the product they are now providing. And that product has been decimated by round-after-round of consolidation, budget-cuts and the integration of radio, television, and print products that do not naturally combine but really ought to compete.
Break the Bush Cabal Stranglehold on the "US Mainstream News Media," Show Up for Democracy in 2004: Defeat Bush (again!)
http://www.americanprogress.org/site/pp.asp?c=biJRJ8OVF&b=85317
Think Again: 'You Call this 'Liberal?''
by Eric Alterman
June 3, 2004
Last week, the Pew Center for Excellence in Journalism [PEJ] released a Survey of Journalists that included some significant findings. Among the most worrisome: The vast majority of journalists believe increased financial pressure is "seriously hurting" the quality of news coverage. Sixty-six percent of national news people and fifty-seven percent of local journalists see it this way. This percentage, moreover, is rising. In 1995, for example, forty-one percent of national and thirty-three percent of local journalists agreed with the statement. In a related finding, the poll found journalists who fear their stories are "increasingly full of factual and sloppy reporting" rose from thirty percent in 1995 to forty percent in 1999 to forty-five today."
Interestingly, management is considerably more sanguine about the current state of journalistic affairs. Most executives at national news organizations (fifty-seven percent) feel increased business pressures are "mostly just changing the way news organizations do things" rather than seriously undermining quality. What we have here is a perfect example of how conglomeration interferes with the public's reception of information. Now it is certainly possible the dismissal (in the past x years) of nearly sixty percent of radio news personnel, for instance, has improved that medium's ability to keep its audience informed. But it is far more likely management is shilling for the bosses while the journalists on the ground are in much better touch with the quality of the product they are now providing. And that product has been decimated by round-after-round of consolidation, budget-cuts and the integration of radio, television, and print products that do not naturally combine but really ought to compete.
The study has naturally not received much attention, save for its ideological findings. Among these are nearly sixty percent of journalists surveyed think the media has been far too easy on President Bush and just over a third of journalists identify themselves as "liberal." These two figures have driven the conservatives who control the cable TV and radio debates to distraction. This is surprising. True, thirty-four percent calling themselves "liberal" is a bit more than the national average, but if I'm not mistaken, these same right-wingers have been crowing endlessly that the entire media was controlled by liberals. If the number is only a third — with fifty-four percent calling themselves moderates, then just what's the problem? True, the number of liberals is rising — it was only twenty-two percent nine years ago — and the trend among local journalists is moving the same way — twenty-three percent say they are liberals, up from fourteen percent in 1995 — but this is largely a product of the ability of the far right to move the discourse into its home territory. A decade ago, someone who held the views espoused by George W. Bush would be considered a far right-extremist. Someone who held views to his left — say Senator McCain or perhaps George H.W. Bush — was considered a liberal. Today, top Republican leaders want to kick McCain out of the party and Bush himself refers to his father as "weak" and mocks his desire in 1991 to seek a UN mandate and genuine coalition before going to war. If more journalists are calling themselves "liberal" and fewer "conservative," well that's because the word conservative has been hijacked by radical reactionaries and neocons who are closer in temperament to revolutionaries than to historic conservatives like Edmund Burke or Alexander Hamilton.
Writing in US News, the conservative columnist John Leo mocks the journalists in the survey because while "some 82 percent of the journalists were able to list a news organization that was "especially conservative" (most named Fox News), an amazing 62 percent could not name any news organization that struck them as "especially liberal." Good grief. Even 60 percent of the Homer Simpson family could probably figure out that the New York Times or National Public Radio qualify as liberal. Leave aside the fact that Homer apart, the Simpsons are pretty damned smart (though it's hard to tell yet about Maggie) Leo picked a bad week to make his point. The New York Times is in uproar over the role played by its correspondent Judith Miller and others in passing along false information — much of it supplied by the neocons and their dangerous plaything, Ahmad Chalabi — to fool the country into going to war in Iraq. If that's "liberal," then the word has lost all meaning. Meanwhile, over at NPR, its own ombudsman has endorsed the findings of a study by Fairness and Accuracy In Reporting that demonstrates conservative, rather than liberal guests dominate the proceedings. The current issue of The New Yorker has a fine piece by Ken Auletta about the right-wing hijacking of that old conservative bugaboo — PBS. (Trading Bill Moyers for Tucker Carlson and Paul Gigot hardly seems like a winner for the liberal team, much less for American journalism.)
Finally, while journalists are a bit more liberal than the rest of this country on social issues, they are generally more conservative on economic issues, as befits their elite status. You can say the same about just about any group of well-educated urban professionals. So what? Is the news liberal? Combine the sensitivities of those in the executive suites who actually determine what is covered — with the constant pressure of the White House and its many right-wing allies in the foundation world, and journalists' alleged liberalism hardly counts for much when the media rubber hits the road. The fact that Mr. Bush was able to push his phony agenda for war through the New York Times, NPR and the rest — with a considerable assist from the far-right dominated cable talk world — to say nothing of talk radio — implies conservatives are either paranoid or dishonest when they complain about the evils of so-called "liberal media." Either way, it's time they hung it up.
Eric Alterman is a senior fellow of the Center for American Progress and the author of What Liberal Media? The Truth About Bias and the News, just published in paperback with a new chapter on the Iraq war and a study guide for students.
When Hillary Clinton, then First Lady, denounced the "vast reich-wing conspiracy" behind the ceaseless attempt at political assassination that US President Bill Clinton survived and in the end overcame during his two terms in the White House, the "US mainstream news media" ridiculed her mercilessly. It was an example of why elected officials and candidates for high office (or their spouses) rarely speak the naked truth in public in America. Of course, Hillary was right. (Al Gore is free of that constraint now.) The existence of the "vast reich-wing conspiracy" was documented by Joe Conason and Gene Lyons in The Hunting of the President, as well as Sidney Blumenthal in The Clinton Wars, and corroborated from the inside by David Block in his Blinded By The Right. Richard Scaife, a reich-wing billionaire industrialist, bankrolled much of the conspiracy's vile activities. Well, the Progressive movement has learned from the painful experiences of the 1990s and the disaster of 2000. George Soros, a billionaire with a very different world-view, has dedicated himself to removing the incredible shrinking _resident from power in the 2004 election. He has provided financing for many powerful voices (e.g. Amy Goodman's Democracy Now!) and many vital initiatives (e.g. Harold Ickes' Media Fund), and has spoken out personally and publicly on the danger that confronts the US, the UN and the world if the Bush cabal is allowed to widen and lengthen its road to Hell. Well, the "vast reich-wing conspiracy" is going after Soros. All of their lackeys, from O'Reilly to Blakely, are on message, and the message is twisted, sick, deceiftul, destructive, AND, of course, it is carried without caveat or qualification (e.g. using the opportunity to introduce Scaife to the US electorate by comparing his "good works" to those of Soros, equating the two and letting America decide which "philanthopist" it is most attuned with) by the SeeNotNews and the "US mainstream news media," which is of course to a great extent nothing more than, in a language of thuggery, a "bitch" "owned" by the "vast reich-wing conspiracy." David Brock's marvelous new web site, www.mediamatters.org is doing a great job at chronicling it all. (Brock is also waging a information operation against Rush Limbaugh on www.mediamatters.com, and when that Goebbels-like sicko is finally unplugged from the microphone, it will be in large part the work of David Brock.)
NOTE: If you want to know more about the real Soros, including a wonderful interview with Bill Moyers, use the LNS searchable database at www.mindspace.org\liberation-news-service\)
www.mediamatters.com: On Hannity & Colmes on June 3, Washington Times editorial page editor Tony Blankley joined the show's co-host Sean Hannity and other right-wing pundits in attacking financier, philanthropist, and political activist George Soros. Blankley's attacks on Soros included calling Soros a "left-wing crank," "a Jew who figured out a way to survive the Holocaust," "a robber baron," "a pirate capitalist," and "a reckless man." As Media Matters for America reported on June 4, attacking Soros as a means of discrediting Senator John Kerry has become a key strategy of the Republican National Committee.
Break the Bush Cabal Stranglehold on the "US Mainstream News Media," Show Up for Democracy in 2004: Defeat Bush (again!)
http://mediamatters.org/items/printable/200406040004
Back to this story | Home
On FOX, Tony Blankley called Soros "a Jew who figured out a way to survive the Holocaust"
On Hannity & Colmes on June 3, Washington Times editorial page editor Tony Blankley joined the show's co-host Sean Hannity and other right-wing pundits in attacking financier, philanthropist, and political activist George Soros. Blankley's attacks on Soros included calling Soros a "left-wing crank," "a Jew who figured out a way to survive the Holocaust," "a robber baron," "a pirate capitalist," and "a reckless man." As Media Matters for America reported on June 4, attacking Soros as a means of discrediting Senator John Kerry has become a key strategy of the Republican National Committee.
From the June 3 edition of FOX News Channel's Hannity & Colmes:
HANNITY: George Soros, who is described by some as "Daddy Warbucks" of the Democratic Party, was introduced by Senator Hillary Rodham Clinton at an event in Washington, and he compared the prison abuse pictures in Iraq to the attacks of 9/11.
[...]
BLANKLEY: Look, if he wasn't a multi-billionaire, he'd just be another ignored left-wing crank, but we all tend to pay more attention to people who have several billion dollars.
[...]
BLANKLEY: This is a man who has blamed the Jews for anti-Semitism. ... This is a man who, when he was plundering the world's currencies, in England in '92, he caused the Southeast Asian financial crisis in '97 --
[...]
BLANKLEY: He said that he has no moral responsibility for the consequences of his financial actions. He is a self-admitted atheist, he was a Jew who figured out a way to survive the Holocaust.
[...]
BLANKLEY: When a man is worth this kind of money, and he's spending it on trying to influence the American public in an election, trying to buy the election, he's not going to, we have a right to know what kind of an unscrupulous man he is.
[...]
BLANKLEY: He's buying influence all over the world. He's a robber baron, he's a pirate capitalist, and he's a reckless man.
[...]
BLANKLEY: He supported abortion in Eastern Europe, in a country that's losing population, he's a self-admitted atheist, I think he's a very bad influence in the world. He's entitled to spend his money, and the public is entitled to know what kind of a man he is.
[...]
HANNITY: Tony, I think you're right. He is trying to buy the election, we have a right to know who he is, and the Democrats who support him are only doing it for money.
— A.S.
Posted to the web on Friday June 4, 2004 at 4:06 PM EST
Copyright © 2004 Media Matters for America. All rights reserved.
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MEANWHILE...
OneWorld.net: The secretary of the UN's paramount environment accord warned that climate-altering pollution emitted by burning oil, gas and coal was now growing at "an alarmingly rapid" rate.
"Recent news about a disintegrating Arctic ice cap and the increased frequency of extreme weather events and associated damage have added to the sense of urgency" about climate change, Joke Waller-Hunter, executive secretary of the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC), said here.
"Also worrying are the latest measures of the alarmingly rapid growth in atmospheric CO2 (carbon dioxide) concentrations," she said.
The UNFCCC is the parent treaty of the Kyoto Protocol, which aims to trim output of fossil gases...
Kyoto, signed in 1997, remains in limbo however.
The United States, the biggest carbon polluter, has walked away from it and Russia is dragging its feet about ratifying the accord, a move that would push the deal over a legal threshold and make it an international treaty.
Save the Environment, Show Up for Democracy in 2004: Defeat Bush (again!)
http://www.commondreams.org/headlines04/0605-06.htm
Published on Saturday, June 5, 2004 by the OneWorld.net
Climate-Change Gases Now Increasing "Alarmingly": UN
BONN - The secretary of the UN's paramount environment accord warned that climate-altering pollution emitted by burning oil, gas and coal was now growing at "an alarmingly rapid" rate.
"Recent news about a disintegrating Arctic ice cap and the increased frequency of extreme weather events and associated damage have added to the sense of urgency" about climate change, Joke Waller-Hunter, executive secretary of the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC), said here.
"Also worrying are the latest measures of the alarmingly rapid growth in atmospheric CO2 (carbon dioxide) concentrations," she said.
Waller-Hunter referred to measurements made by US scientists at Mauna Loa, Hawaii.
She said CO2 was recorded there in March at 379 parts per million (ppm), "well above the 280 ppm of pre-industrial times and with a three ppm increase from the year before."
That three-ppm year-on-year increase compares with an average annual growth of 1.8 ppm over the past decade, Waller-Hunter said.
Climate expert Jennifer Morgan, with the environmentalist group WWF, said the recorded increase was extraordinary. "That's scary," she told AFP.
CO2 is by far the most important of the six "greenhouse" gases blamed for driving changes to the world's delicate climate system.
These gases hang like an invisible shroud in the atmosphere, trapping the Sun's heat and driving up the temperature of the Earth's land and sea, inflicting what scientists say are potentially catastrophic changes to icecaps, glaciers and rainfall patterns.
The UNFCCC is the parent treaty of the Kyoto Protocol, which aims to trim output of fossil gases.
Kyoto, signed in 1997, remains in limbo however.
The United States, the biggest carbon polluter, has walked away from it and Russia is dragging its feet about ratifying the accord, a move that would push the deal over a legal threshold and make it an international treaty.
Waller-Hunter made the remarks at the final day of a four-day international conference on solar, wind and other renewable energies in Bonn.
She said renewables could play a "central role" in combating climate change.
"On average, about 2.3 tonnes of CO2 are released per tonne of oil equivalent supplied. This means that the (share) of 14 percent in the world's energy supply help us avoid the emission of more than three billion tonnes of CO2 every year."
The 14 percent comprises wind, solar, hydro and geothermal energy, together with waste and "combustible renewables."
That category includes wood, which is widely used for heating and cooking in poor countries, and while fuel-inefficient is relatively low in CO2 emissions.
© Copyright 2004 AFP
###
Another US soldier has died in Iraq. For what? Many of
you now know that the answer to that painful question
is almost unspeakable. Because, increasingly, it is
hard to think of any reason for their death except for
the neo-con wet dream that captured the small-minded
imagination of the incredible shrinking _resident and
the political machinations of Rove, who thought he
could use a Mega-Grenada, but got a Mega-Mogadishu
instead. As LNS Foreign Correspondent says, "It is the
Consensus vs. the Cabal." The LNS has, for many
months, been chronicling the valiant struggle of our
military, intelligence, counterterrorism and foreign
policy professionals to ensure that A) the whole
sordid truth of the pre- and post-9/11 national
security failured of the Bush abomination (i.e., it
could have been prevented, and that the Bush
abomination devalued the threat from Al Qaeda, did not
heed the numerous warnings and indeed, undid good that
Clinton had done in the fight with Al Qaeda) is made
known to the US electorate, and that B) the whole
sordid truth about the incredible shrinking
_resident's unilateral, pre-emptive war in Iraq (i.e.,
that it was waged on false pretences, planned with
disregard and incompetence, incredibly damaging to our
position in the world, and worst of all, wholly
unnecessary) is made known to the US electorate.
Bryon Bender, Boston Globe: ''I have been a Republican
my entire adult life," said A. Martin Erim, the
group's chairman and president of Defense Holdings
Inc. in McLean, Va., which consults on mergers and
acquisitions in the defense industry. ''I voted for
George W. Bush in the last election, but I have
undergone a major transformation since 9/11 because of
how the administration has handled things."
Republican defense industry executives such as Erim
join the ranks of such former career civil servants as
Richard A. Clarke, Bush's former counterterrorism
czar; Rand Beers, another former National Security
Council official now advising Kerry; Greg Thielmann, a
former State Department intelligence chief; and others
who recently have expressed opposition to the
president to whom they once reported.
Kerry, invoking the ''special bond" he shares as a
Vietnam veteran, yesterday pledged to secure support
for his campaign from 1 million veterans.
Support Our Troops, Show Up for Democracy in 2004:
Defeat Bush (again!)
Bush backing seen eroding in defense professions
By Bryan Bender, Globe Staff | June 5, 2004
WASHINGTON -- An increasing number of current and
former military officials, defense industry
executives, and homeland security professionals have
grown disenchanted with the direction of President
Bush's national security policies, and some are
rallying around John F. Kerry, according to interviews
with military and industry officials.
Republican presidential candidates historically have
drawn strong support from Americans who make a career
out of protecting the nation's security, so escalating
dissent within that constituency offers an unusual
opportunity for Kerry, a decorated Vietnam veteran,
according to political analysts. A new group called
Americans for Strong National Security, whose
membership of about 50 people includes defense
executives, former senior Pentagon officials, and
diplomats, is raising money for Kerry and providing
policy advice to the Democrat's presidential campaign.
''I have been a Republican my entire adult life," said
A. Martin Erim, the group's chairman and president of
Defense Holdings Inc. in McLean, Va., which consults
on mergers and acquisitions in the defense industry.
''I voted for George W. Bush in the last election, but
I have undergone a major transformation since 9/11
because of how the administration has handled things."
Republican defense industry executives such as Erim
join the ranks of such former career civil servants as
Richard A. Clarke, Bush's former counterterrorism
czar; Rand Beers, another former National Security
Council official now advising Kerry; Greg Thielmann, a
former State Department intelligence chief; and others
who recently have expressed opposition to the
president to whom they once reported.
Kerry, invoking the ''special bond" he shares as a
Vietnam veteran, yesterday pledged to secure support
for his campaign from 1 million veterans.
In the past, most of the 26 million veterans in the
United States have supported the Republican ticket.
And a newly released CBS poll indicated that 54
percent of veterans surveyed said they would support
Bush, compared with 40 percent for Kerry. But Kerry's
campaign has organized volunteer coordinators in 50
states to recruit the support of current and former
military personnel.
In the last presidential campaign, Bush was able to
exploit what was perceived as the military's distrust
of the Clinton administration, promising the Pentagon
that ''help is on the way." Kerry has turned the
tables, asserting that the Bush administration
disregards the advice of professional military
officers and has ended the careers of officials whose
assessments contradicted the administration's position
on Iraq.
''That is not the way to make the most solemn
decisions of war and peace," Kerry said in a speech in
Seattle last week that kicked off an 11-day campaign
swing focusing on national security issues. ''As
president, I will listen to and respect the views of
our experienced military leaders and never let
ideology trump the truth."
Bush's handling of the Iraq war and the war on
terrorism has been criticized publicly by some retired
commanders, including two former chairmen of the Joint
Chiefs of Staff, Admiral William Crowe and Army
General John Shalikashvili; and two former heads of US
Central Command, Anthony Zinni and Joseph Hoar, both
Marine Corps generals.
Bush aides have dismissed the criticisms from military
brass no longer with the Pentagon, saying
administration officials base their policies on input
from ''commanders on the ground" in Iraq and
elsewhere.
When asked about Americans for Strong National
Security, the new pro-Kerry group, Bush-Cheney
campaign spokesman Kevin Madden said: ''The president
has significant support and credibility among those
who think he is making strong and clear choices in
making the country safer. The Kerry campaign has a
policy deficit on national security; they have to
manufacture support networks and think tanks where
they can generate ideas."
Bush retains the backing of many veterans and national
security professionals. Two veterans who have been
received by the public as heroes -- retired Army Chief
Warrant Officer Michael Durant, who was shot down and
held captive in Somalia in 1993, and retired Air Force
Captain Scott O'Grady, who was shot down over Bosnia
in 1995 -- are campaigning for Bush's reelection.
When asked about the contentions that Bush's standing
is ebbing among national security professionals,
retired Air Force Lieutenant General Thomas McInerney,
a Bush supporter, said there is some frustration but
not widespread opposition. ''I don't see any of that,"
he said. ''You have to be careful where these guys
come from. I don't hear any good alternatives from
them."
But disillusionment with Bush among traditional
Republican allies in the military-industrial sector is
mounting, according to other members of that
community. And they said much of it stems from the
problems in the Iraq war.
Top generals, including Eric Shinseki -- who in early
2003 was chastised by Defense Secretary Donald H.
Rumsfeld for saying the war would require at least
200,000 troops and who was later replaced as Army
chief of staff -- fault Pentagon leadership for not
heeding their advice to deploy more ground forces
before the invasion or to prepare adequately for the
aftermath. They say Rumsfeld and other top civilian
leaders ignored or belittled them at the expense of
the Army, which is straining under the weight of the
Iraq conflict.
''The Army is fighting this war and needs more money,"
said a longtime Army official who, like other Pentagon
officials interviewed for this article, declined to be
named, citing fear of reprisal. ''Morale in the
Pentagon is pretty poor. They still think they can do
more with less. It is one element of Bush's support
that is eroding."
He said that he is not enamored with Kerry but that
his reservations about the current administration are
growing.
It is people like him whom Kerry is seeking to enlist.
''There is no doubt in my mind that the problems the
president and his policy have encountered in Iraq are
giving Kerry an opening," said Stuart Rothenberg,
editor of The Rothenberg Political Report, a
nonpartisan newsletter published in Washington.
The most public criticism of Bush has come from
retired military officers who are able to speak more
freely than their active-duty counterparts. Primary
among them is Zinni, Bush's former envoy to
Arab-Israeli peace negotiations. In a recent book,
''Battle Ready," Zinni blasts Bush and his team for
launching what he calls an unjustified war with
insufficient forces. The book was written with
novelist Tom Clancy, a longtime Bush supporter who has
criticized the Iraq war because he says it had no
rationale.
Outspoken former officers such as Zinni, Hoar, Crowe,
and Shalikashvili ''are simply reflecting a widespread
view that can't be expressed by active-duty officers,"
said Loren Thompson, chief operating officer of the
Lexington Institute, a conservative think tank in
Arlington, Va. Thompson said he voted for Bush in 2000
but has not decided whom he will support in November.
''There is a huge reservoir of resentment about how
Rumsfeld has treated the military and conducted the
war in Iraq," Thompson said.
A former senior official with the Pentagon added: ''I
am amazed at how much anger there is. It's popped up
in the last month."
The frustration in military and intelligence circles
springs from what some perceive as a ''competency
gap," the belief that top administration officials are
not up to the job of protecting America in the
changing world.
Others in the national security community have
expressed concern that not enough is being done to
combat Islamic extremists and protect the United
States from more terrorist attacks.
''For first time since 1814, Americans are defining
their sense of security by defense of the homeland,"
said Tom McMillen, a former Democratic congressman
from Maryland who now runs a homeland security firm
and is a leader of Americans for Strong National
Security. ''In many respects, this is going to be the
first presidential election of that new paradigm. The
idea behind strong security is not Pentagon-centric
anymore. It is policeman-centric and fireman-centric
and emergency worker-centric."
Although a Democrat, McMillen represented a staunchly
prodefense district that included the headquarters of
the National Security Agency and the US Naval Academy.
© Copyright 2004 The New York Times Company
There has been much horror, insult and pain:
Mega-Mogadishu, Niger cake, Plame, Abu Ghraib,
Chalabi, Halliburton, Enron, the prosituting of the
EPA, the FALSE SCIENCE on global warming, the Federal
deficit, the nominations of reich-wing judges,
Medifraud, the pre-9/11 failures testified to by
Richard Clarke and others, the disturbing nature of
the business relationships between the House of Saud,
the House of Bin Laden and the House of Bush, etc. But
it is important to remember that this nightmare began
with the theft of a Presidential election that
commenced on the ground in Fraudida and was completed
in D.C. with Supreme InJustice...The LNS has written a
lot about Triple Lock (remember to use our searchable
database at
wwww.mindspace,org\liberation-news-service\), but just
for a refresher, the Triple Lock consists of #1:
Overwhelming advantage in campaign $$$, #2: Control
over the "US mainstream news media," #3: Black box
voting. The Triple Lock is still the crux of this
campaign. Unprecendented campaign $$$ have flown into
Sen. John F. Kerry (D-Mekong Delta) and to the
Democratic Party and its allies, but the Bush cabal
still has an incredible advantage. The consequences of
the Bush abomination's failed policies have been so
eggregious that the "US mainstream news media" has
been forced in an event-driven environment to report
*some* of the truth, but it still protects the Bush
abomination from the US electorate, whenever it can it
pulls its punches and it refuses to provide the
CONTINUITY and CONTEXT needed for grasping how utterly
the Bush abomination has failed and how dangerous they
have made the world for Americans...The battle over
black box voting is raging all over the country: Ohio,
Georgia and Fraudida itself are of particular concern,
JFK is ahead now in both Ohio and Fraudida. Be
vigilant, be vocal, be vociferous...
Marty Logan, Inter Press Service: Kozminski's
Citizens' Alliance for Secure Elections (CASE) is one
of many campaigns -- local and national -- created
specifically to push governments to ensure that if
they jump on the electronic voting bandwagon, they
must first guarantee that the new mechanism will
include a "paper trail" for every vote.
Many voting activists cite a letter from Wally O'Dell,
chairman and chief executive of Diebold, Inc., the
largest maker of electronic voting terminals in the
country, as proof of the direct link between elected
officials and manufacturers: ''I am committed to
helping Ohio deliver its electoral votes to the
president next year,'' O'Dell wrote in a fundraising
letter in 2003.
Thwart the Theft of a Second Presidential Election,
Show Up for Democracy in 2004: Defeat Bush (again!)
http://www.commondreams.org/headlines04/0605-02.htm
Published on Saturday, June 5, 2004 by the Inter Press
Service
US Citizens Revolting Against Paperless Voting
by Marty Logan
MONTREAL- Carroll County officials in the U.S. state
of Ohio opted this week not to buy an electronic
voting machine in time for November's presidential
election, and Dan Kozminski says his group should get
some of the credit for that decision.
Kozminski's Citizens' Alliance for Secure Elections
(CASE) is one of many campaigns -- local and national
-- created specifically to push governments to ensure
that if they jump on the electronic voting bandwagon,
they must first guarantee that the new mechanism will
include a "paper trail" for every vote.
"Many of our members have attended boards of election
meetings. We have faxed them, we have e-mailed them
many times, and sent out regular mail. We have been
working with VerifiedVoting.org and the Electronic
Frontier Foundation to encourage their members in Ohio
to call their boards of elections to ask them please
not to go forward," says the CASE activist from
Cleveland, Ohio.
Across the United States, "the land of the free" and
long a shining example of democracy to people
worldwide, groups and movements have sprung up in
recent months fighting to ensure that everyone who is
entitled is able to vote on Nov. 3 and that those
ballots are fairly counted.
And their demand for paper backups to
electronically-cast votes is an important part of that
effort.
So far, CASE has played a part in the decisions of 28
of 31 counties in the northern state of Ohio to not
take advantage of new federal funding to buy the
machines in 2004, said Kozminski in a telephone
interview with IPS Friday.
"Our position is that electronic voting is probably
going to be the wave of the future. I'm comfortable
with computers -- I used to be a computer programmer.
But they're rushing into this whole procedure without
really thinking through the issues, and (without)
putting forward a very secure, reliable verifiable
technology."
Echoes of that view can be found on numerous U.S.
websites, in Internet chat rooms and, increasingly, in
the mainstream media.
One of the most-quoted voices is that of Bev Harris,
author of "Black-Box Voting: Ballot Tampering in the
21st Century". She is a journalist who has made
uncovering hi-tech voting fraud her passion.
Harris is calling for volunteers to join an election
monitoring team -- what she refers to as the "Clean-Up
Crew" -- that would serve as poll workers, election
judges and poll watchers in November, when President
George W. Bush, of the Republican Party, is expected
to face Democrat challenger, Senator John Kerry.
"Some Clean-Up Crew members will act as communications
relays to get problems to the media instantly.
Additional... members will collect information needed
for prompt litigation (and) monitor results for
statistical anomalies," says an e-mail from Harris.
"Please submit your nomination for a county that needs
special attention. The Top 10 clean-up sites will each
be assigned 100 Clean-Up Crew members, blanketing
every polling place," adds the journalist, who writes
on her website that she has embarked on a 90-day road
trip to investigate who is profiting from the move to
electronic voting.
Many voting activists cite a letter from Wally O'Dell,
chairman and chief executive of Diebold, Inc., the
largest maker of electronic voting terminals in the
country, as proof of the direct link between elected
officials and manufacturers: ''I am committed to
helping Ohio deliver its electoral votes to the
president next year,'' O'Dell wrote in a fundraising
letter in 2003.
In May, O'Dell told the New York Times the letter was
a "huge mistake".
Paperless voting machines were one of many issues to
emerge from the infamous 2000 presidential election,
which ended with a Supreme Court decision that Bush
had triumphed by 537 votes in the key state of
Florida, governed by his brother Jeb Bush.
The furore that erupted over that debacle motivated
Congress to pass the Help America Vote Act (HAVA) in
2002. It provides money for states to replace
antiquated voting systems such as punch cards. But it
does not require that new systems provide a
voter-verified paper ballot, or any form of paper
trail.
Without that proof, says Kozminski, you have "no way
at all to audit the results, to have a meaningful
recount... the only way you can recount is to
regurgitate the same information out of these
machines, and that's not a recount".
He tells the story of an exercise in the northeast
state of Maryland, where officials hired a computer
expert to try to hack into a staged election. It took
the expert only five minutes, "using software an
eighth-grader could download off the Internet," says
Kozminski.
Other accounts of real and potential voting machine
fraud are numerous and growing daily.
Two counties in Florida, including Miami-Dade,
reported problems with voting machines during
elections in 2003. The malfunction was compounded by
the news that the state official who oversees voting
claimed she learned of the glitches only in May, when
her office had acknowledged the problems in a March
letter.
It is estimated that in November, about a third of
U.S. citizens registered to vote will do so
electronically, another one-third will use optical
scan machines, 20 percent will use punch cards, 13
percent will vote with lever machines and the
remainder will use other options, according to company
Election Data Services Inc.
On May 30 the New York Times wrote in an editorial
that so-called independent testing of voting machines
"is riddled with problems, including conflicts of
interest and a disturbing lack of transparency. Voters
should demand reform, and they should also keep
demanding, as a growing number of Americans are, a
voter-verified paper record of their vote."
Earlier this week, Moveon.org, an Internet-based
campaign devoted to unseating Bush in November,
launched its own paper-ballot campaign, centred on an
online petition citizens can e-mail to the president.
"I urge you to make sure all voters can verify their
votes. We shouldn't have to trust electronic voting
machines -- we should be able to verify our votes on
paper," says the petition.
"November is coming soon. Please protect my vote as if
it were your own," it adds.
Texas-based Diebold said last month that 20 of the 31
Ohio counties chosen to receive federal money under
HAVA had indicated they would purchase Diebold
machines if they went electronic in 2004.
That could generate revenues of up to 20 million
dollars, the company predicted in a statement.
But after Thursday's vote in Carroll County and an
announcement Friday that Ohio's Secretary of State
Kenneth Blackwell has banned another county from
buying machines because it took too long to make a
decision, only three counties have indicated they will
definitely go electronic, according to Kozminski.
Yet, to date no companies have had their machines
certified for use in Ohio this year.
"We've been told that Diebold is expecting their
approval by the end of June. We're kind of hoping that
would be too late" to use in November, says Kozminski.
The former salesman says he set aside a project to
develop an Internet business so he could work with
CASE full time. "This has become a passion (for me),
along with everybody else in our organisation, to
protect democracy."
"I was never involved in anything before this issue.
And the more I learn, the more I'm horrified about how
many votes are spoiled, how elections can be close...
how votes are lost, mail-in ballots are not counted.
It just absolutely blew my mind."
Citizens' Alliance for Secure Elections
MoveOn.org
Help America Vote Act
Black Box Voting
© Copyright 2004 IPS - Inter Press Service
No, it was not an anomaly or a mirage. Al Gore has,
indeed, thrown his "life, fortune and sacred honor"
(literally, on all three counts) into this battle for
the heart, mind and soul of America. Gore is doing the
Voice in the Wilderness, and Sen. John F. Kerry
(D-Mekong Delta) is offering REDEMPTION. But do not
indulge in weak thinking, i.e. "gee, if only Kerry
would talk like that," or "if only Gore had talked
like that in 2000," or "if only Gore had run this time and
talked like that." It doesn't work that way. The "US
mainstream news media" dominates the air waves and how
information is presented, and it does not like too
much truth-saying, and consequently, the Electoral
College must be played very carefully, not timidly,
but carefully...No, JFK is advancing relentlessly,
determinedly and swiftly in all states and all regions
with a campaign that Bill Clinton has termed "very
smart." But because Gore is not the candidate, he is
free to talk freely about what has happened here over
the last four years.
Associated Press:Former Vice President Al Gore stepped
up his slashing attack on President Bush on Friday
night, accusing the administration of ruining the
economy, destroying the nation's standing with its
allies and waging a war in Iraq based on lies and
deception...Those policies came out of the White House
and no matter the wrongdoing of individual troops,
they were ordered to wade into a moral cesspool and
given ambiguous, conflicting instructions and then
praised for doing things they shouldn't have been
doing," Gore said. "I believe the abuse of those
prisoners came directly from the abuse of the truth in
the run-up to the war."
"They decided to take advantage of 9-11 and exploit
the fears and exploit the anger and redirect it away
from the people who attacked us" and attack Iraq, he
said.
Bush has "looted" the economy and turned projected
multitrillion-dollar surpluses into deep deficits,
Gore said.
"In the last three and a half years, this
administration has tragically and recklessly
squandered our legacy, while the special interest
people were advising him behind closed doors," Gore
declared.
Restore the Timeline, Show Up for Democracy in 2004:
Defeat Bush (again!)
http://www.kgw.com/sharedcontent/APStories/stories/D830LES00.html
Gore blisters Bush on war, 'moral cesspool' at Iraqi prison
06/05/2004
By DAVID AMMONS / Associated Press
Former Vice President Al Gore stepped up his slashing
attack on President Bush on Friday night, accusing the
administration of ruining the economy, destroying the
nation's standing with its allies and waging a war in
Iraq based on lies and deception.
Continuing the verbal pounding he began in New York
last week, the Democrats' 2000 presidential nominee
told the Washington state Democratic Convention that
the Bush White House bears some culpability for the
abuse of Iraqi prisoners.
"Those policies came out of the White House and no
matter the wrongdoing of individual troops, they were
ordered to wade into a moral cesspool and given
ambiguous, conflicting instructions and then praised
for doing things they shouldn't have been doing," Gore
said. "I believe the abuse of those prisoners came
directly from the abuse of the truth in the run-up to
the war."
If the United States re-elects Bush, then American
citizens share the blame, Gore added.
Gore's 50-minute speech frequently brought the
audience to its feet, whooping and shouting.
Gore said he initially supported Bush's decision to
invade Afghanistan, but now realizes that the
administration was already secretly agitating to find
some way to launch a war in Iraq.
"They decided to take advantage of 9-11 and exploit
the fears and exploit the anger and redirect it away
from the people who attacked us" and attack Iraq, he
said.
Bush has "looted" the economy and turned projected
multitrillion-dollar surpluses into deep deficits,
Gore said.
"In the last three and a half years, this
administration has tragically and recklessly
squandered our legacy, while the special interest
people were advising him behind closed doors," Gore
declared.
The Bush administration's "single objective is to help
the wealthy and powerful," he said, adding that the
president likes to act tough but "whenever he is in
the presence of a wealthy contributor, he is a moral
coward."
Gore, who carried Washington's 11 electoral votes
three times as presidential or vice presidential
candidate, was a top draw for Friday night's banquet
honoring Rep. Norm Dicks, D-Wash.
The $65-a-plate dinner sold out on Monday, with 1,150
tickets sold. Some donors were paying up to $250 a
person, so the event was expected to raise about
$150,000 for the state party.
Anger over the Bush presidency has energized the
Democratic faithful to unusual heights, state
Democratic Chairman Paul Berendt said earlier Friday
as about 1,600 delegates arrived for a two-day
convention.
That could be the catalyst for a Democratic sweep in
the fall, he told The Associated Press.
"We've seen a surge ever since the caucuses on Feb. 7,
with this tremendous outpouring of people who want to
make change in the White House," he said. "People
desperately want to see a new president."
Even the convention theme is a slap at the president:
"Winning Back Our Future."
Last week, Gore electrified the party — and became the
butt of Republican barbs — when he told a New York
City audience that President Bush has made the threat
of terrorism worse with his "arrogance, willfulness
and bungling."
He called then for the resignations of top
administration officials and an end to what he called
"twisted values and atrocious policies."
Yier Shi, spokesman for the Republican National
Committee, told the AP Friday that "Al Gore and the
Democrats' angry and pessimistic rhetoric will not
resonate with Washington state voters.
"Gore's 'blame America first' agenda is indicative of
what we've heard from John Kerry's campaign and his
surrogates. Al Gore seems to forget that he was vice
president when Osama Bin Laden declared war on the
United State five separate times and when terrorists
killed Americans."
The main convention on Saturday will include speeches
from the party's major candidates and adoption of a
liberal-leaning platform.
With the party's longtime leader, Gov. Gary Locke,
retiring after 22 years in public life, King County
Executive Ron Sims and Attorney General Christine
Gregoire are battling for the Democratic nomination in
September.
___
On the Net:
Democrats: http://www.wa-democrats.org
Republicans: http://www.wsrp.org
What the "US mainstream news media" and its propapunditgandists are not reporting from inside of Beltwayistan...
Doug Thompson, Capitol Hill Blue: President George W. Bush’s increasingly erratic behavior and wide mood swings has the halls of the West Wing buzzing lately as aides privately express growing concern over their leader’s state of mind. In meetings with top aides and administration officials, the President goes from quoting the Bible in one breath to obscene tantrums against the media, Democrats and others that he classifies as “enemies of the state."
The President's abrupt dismissal of CIA Directory George Tenet Wednesday night is, aides say, an example of how he works.
"Tenet wanted to quit last year but the President got his back up and wouldn't hear of it," says an aide. "That would have been the opportune time to make a change, not in the middle of an election campaign but when the director challenged the President during the meeting Wednesday, the President cut him off by saying 'that's it George. I cannot abide disloyalty. I want your resignation and I want it now."
Tenet was allowed to resign "voluntarily" and Bush informed his shocked staff of the decision Thursday morning. One aide says the President actually described the decision as "God's will."
Repudiate the 9/11 Cover-Up and Iraq War Lies, Show Up for Democracy in 2004: Defeat Bush (again!)
http://www.capitolhillblue.com/artman/publish/article_4636.shtml
Bush Leagues
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Bush's Erratic Behavior Worries White House Aides
By DOUG THOMPSON
Publisher, Capitol Hill Blue
Jun 4, 2004, 06:15
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President George W. Bush’s increasingly erratic behavior and wide mood swings has the halls of the West Wing buzzing lately as aides privately express growing concern over their leader’s state of mind.
In meetings with top aides and administration officials, the President goes from quoting the Bible in one breath to obscene tantrums against the media, Democrats and others that he classifies as “enemies of the state.”
Worried White House aides paint a portrait of a man on the edge, increasingly wary of those who disagree with him and paranoid of a public that no longer trusts his policies in Iraq or at home.
“It reminds me of the Nixon days,” says a longtime GOP political consultant with contacts in the White House. “Everybody is an enemy; everybody is out to get him. That’s the mood over there.”
In interviews with a number of White House staffers who were willing to talk off the record, a picture of an administration under siege has emerged, led by a man who declares his decisions to be “God’s will” and then tells aides to “fuck over” anyone they consider to be an opponent of the administration.
“We’re at war, there’s no doubt about it. What I don’t know anymore is just who the enemy might be,” says one troubled White House aide. “We seem to spend more time trying to destroy John Kerry than al Qaeda and our enemies list just keeps growing and growing.”
Aides say the President gets “hung up on minor details,” micromanaging to the extreme while ignoring the bigger picture. He will spend hours personally reviewing and approving every attack ad against his Democratic opponent and then kiss off a meeting on economic issues.
“This is what is killing us on Iraq,” one aide says. “We lost focus. The President got hung up on the weapons of mass destruction and an unproven link to al Qaeda. We could have found other justifiable reasons for the war but the President insisted the focus stay on those two, tenuous items.”
Aides who raise questions quickly find themselves shut out of access to the President or other top advisors. Among top officials, Bush’s inner circle is shrinking. Secretary of State Colin Powell has fallen out of favor because of his growing doubts about the administration’s war against Iraq.
The President's abrupt dismissal of CIA Directory George Tenet Wednesday night is, aides say, an example of how he works.
"Tenet wanted to quit last year but the President got his back up and wouldn't hear of it," says an aide. "That would have been the opportune time to make a change, not in the middle of an election campaign but when the director challenged the President during the meeting Wednesday, the President cut him off by saying 'that's it George. I cannot abide disloyalty. I want your resignation and I want it now."
Tenet was allowed to resign "voluntarily" and Bush informed his shocked staff of the decision Thursday morning. One aide says the President actually described the decision as "God's will."
God may also be the reason Attorney General John Ashcroft, the administration’s lightning rod because of his questionable actions that critics argue threatens freedoms granted by the Constitution, remains part of the power elite. West Wing staffers call Bush and Ashcroft “the Blues Brothers” because “they’re on a mission from God.”
“The Attorney General is tight with the President because of religion,” says one aide. “They both believe any action is justifiable in the name of God.”
But the President who says he rules at the behest of God can also tongue-lash those he perceives as disloyal, calling them “fucking assholes” in front of other staff, berating one cabinet official in front of others and labeling anyone who disagrees with him “unpatriotic” or “anti-American.”
“The mood here is that we’re under siege, there’s no doubt about it,” says one troubled aide who admits he is looking for work elsewhere. “In this administration, you don’t have to wear a turban or speak Farsi to be an enemy of the United States. All you have to do is disagree with the President.”
The White House did not respond to requests for comment on the record.
© Copyright 2004 by Capitol Hill Blue
At least four more US soldiers died in Iraq today. For what? Meanwhile...Chalabi, Halliburton, Abu Ghraib, Niger cake, Plame, Fahrenheit 911, the Federal Deficit, job loss, Medifraud, Enron...drip, drip, drip...The incredible shrinking _resident has already lost in Iraq and in the Electoral College...These are very deep and dangerous waters...Is the incredible shrinking _resident rummaging in the VICE _resident's pockets for another "winning" Trifecta ticket?
Ray McGovern on Democracy Now! with Amy Goodman: Why do I say all this? I say all this because I am more frightened now than at any time over the last three and a half years, that this administration will resort to extra-legal methods to do something to ensure that there are four more years for George Bush. And Ashcroft’s statement last week, gratuitous statement, uncoordinated with the department of, CIA, with the Department of Homeland Security, his warning that there is bound to be a terrorist strike before the US elections. That can be viewed and this can be reasonably viewed as the opening salvo in the justification for doing, taking measures to ensure that whatever happens in November comes out so that four more years can be devoted to maybe changing that war crimes act or protecting at least these vulnerable people for four more years.
Save the US Consitution, Show Up for Democracy in 2004: Defeat Bush (again!)
http://www.democracynow.org/article.pl?sid=04/06/03/1626202
Thursday, June 3rd, 2004
Online Exclusive... 27-Year CIA Vet Ray McGovern On George Tenet's Surprise Resignation
President Bush announced this morning that he had accepted the resignation of CIA Director George Tenet. Tenet, who was the second longest serving director of Central Intelligence, resigned for "personal reasons," according to Bush. But many analysts say that Tenet is a fall guy for an administration plagued by accusations of misconduct. [Includes rush transcript]
In recent months, the Bush administration has attempted to lay much of the blame for its false claims about Iraqi WMDs, its handling of 9/11 and its justification for the war in Iraq on Tenet.
Minutes after the announcement, we spoke with 27-year veteran CIA analyst Ray McGovern.
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RAY MCGOVERN: George Tenet is clearly the first sacrificial lamb here. Things are going quite badly here in Washington. Somebody has to start being held accountable. And Tenet is sort of a tragic figure because he did all he could to help George Bush, much more than he should have as an objective intelligence professional. For example, the estimate that was prepared in September and October of 2002, which was used to persuade our Congress that Saddam Hussein was about to rain mushroom clouds upon us. That was George Tenet actually corrupting the Intelligence process to the policy that had already been decided. The decision for war antedated that estimate by six or seven months at least. And so we had the bizarre experience of a decision for war before there was any intelligence estimate, and the intelligence estimate sort of playing catch-up ball so that the Congress, that needed to approve this war, would be deceived. He played that game, and he defended it, and if you look at what that estimate said, it was wrong on virtually every count. It’s amazing that he hung around as long as he did.
JEREMY SCAHILL: And Ray McGovern, of course George Tenet, as you point out, really was put forward as sort of the one to blame for everything from the inclusion of the accusation by Bush at the State of the Union Address. Those sixteen words that Saddam Hussein was attempting to import uranium from an African nation. Colin Powell’s major address making the case for war in front of the U.N Security Council in February of 2003 as well as the investigation of the events leading up to 9/11 and directly following. Can you expand on this idea of Tenet being a fall guy now for an administration faced with really a political crisis because of the war in Iraq, the lack of finding any weapons of mass destruction, etcetera?
RAY MCGOVERN: Yeah, you see Tenet was playing a double game. He was trying to be all things to all people. Which is what a congressional staffer needs to do, and that is his sole professional background. So when he realized that all this hype about Iraq seeking Uranium from Niger, was based, was false on its face number one, it couldn’t happen, and number two it was based on a forgery, he succeeded in getting that out of the president’s speech on October the 7th, the key one that antedated the vote for war by three or four days. He succeeded in that, but at the very same time, he permitted to be put in this national estimate, N.I.E., we call it National Intelligence Estimate, he permitted sections in there, several paragraphs which repeated this charade, this crazy story that Iraq was getting Uranium. So he was indirectly responsible for that appearing in the president’s state of the union address. Why? Well because the White House simply called from the estimate. What the White House didn’t realize perhaps, is that the estimate had already been prostituted, had already been corrupted. It’s usually possible to take an estimate, which is the most authoritative view of the director of central intelligence and say, well this is the last word. Well it wasn’t Tenet’s last word. His last word was saying to the president, please don’t say that, it’s spurious. And yet the estimate prepared at precisely the same time and given to the president over George Tenet’s signature, said just the opposite. So he was playing the game that he learned in Congress. You know, when the president, according to Bob Woodward, at the end of the year, at the end of 2002 said, you know I’m not sure, is this all you’ve got in terms of intelligence on weapons of mass destruction? Is it a good case? Well George Tenet sprung up twice and said, Mr. President, it’s a slam-dunk. Now we know he did that because Ms. Condoleeza Rice has verified that. Now, this is just a startling example, of what’s not supposed to happen in intelligence. You don’t tell the president what he wants to know. You tell him the truth. And that seems to have been avoided here in Washington these days. What is truth, Pilate’s old question? People don’t seem to have any appreciation of the need to tell the truth. And there’s one place where that’s essential, and that is serving up an objective, unpartisan, unbiased, tell it like it is, intelligence to the president. The president doesn’t like that, but you got to do it anyway. And if he doesn’t like you, you got to quit, or permit yourself to be fired. That’s not what this firing is all about. This firing is simply the first sacrificial victim here. They don’t want to get rid of Rumsfeld or Wolfowitz yet. There’s lots of dirty stuff having to do with CIA interrogations in Iraq as well as military interrogations. So there’s a whole litany of things that George Tenet is very vulnerable on, and I think this is throwing one person in to the fray here and say, well at least we got rid of George Tenet. He’s a tragic figure. I feel sorry for him but I do not defend what he has done to the intelligence community because the folks there are thoroughly demoralized. The ethic that we all worked by, you shall know the truth and the truth shall set you free, you know that’s carved into the marble at the entrance to CIA headquarters. That seems to have been just completely rescinded from under the reign of George Tenet.
AMY GOODMAN: We, of course can’t forget how many times Dick Cheney went to the Central Intelligence Agency. Very unusual situation. Can you talk about that in relation to George Tenet?
RAY MCGOVERN: Yes Amy, that’s a very good question. People have asked me, is that unusual? Well, it’s not unusual for the vice president to go to CIA headquarters. It’s unprecedented. I worked there for twenty seven years, and never once did a serving vice president come on a working visit to CIA headquarters. That’s not the way you do things in Washington. We went down to see him. I saw the first George Bush every other morning over a period of more than two years. If they have questions, you bring down the experts. You get the answers. But you don’t need key policy makers looking over your shoulder to make sure you haven’t missed something, to make sure in effect that you get the answers right. And right, the description of right is what the policy makers want. You not only had Dick Cheney, you had people like Newt Gingrich for Pete’s sake. You had Colin Powell bragging about the fact that he spent four days and nights at CIA headquarters before his key speech on 5 February 2003. This is bizarre. If by that time the CIA did not have together a conclusive case to present to Colin Powell for him to present to the UN, it’s bizarre that he had to show up there and help along the analysts. This is not the way things are done.
AMY GOODMAN: This is happening at the same time, Ray McGovern, as George Bush is just getting his own private lawyer to deal with the Bush administration exposing of the CIA operative Valerie Plame. Now this both implicated Central Intelligence because Novak said the reporter who exposed the story said he was speaking with Bush administration officials said that he spoke with both people in the CIA as well as the White House. Can you talk about that?
RAY MCGOVERN: Yeah, I’m just fresh actually from writing an Op-Ed on the general question of the president seeking private counsel. I think he’s learned from one very large mistake. That is he’s learned by going to a private counsel to get advice on the Valerie Plame case. I think he’s probably by now read the memorandum of 25 January 2002 that Alberto Gonzalez, his chief White House counsel wrote to him. This is the one that says, well you know, Geneva Conventions, that’s kind of a nettle here. We have US law actually, dated 1996 which makes it a crime punishable by death to rescind from or to ignore or to exempt people from the Geneva Conventions on prisoners of war. But Ashcroft says it’s okay as far as the Al Qaeda people are concerned, and I think it’s probably okay to exempt the Taliban as well. And the only downside is that exempting people is a slippery slope and people might come up with some ambiguity with respect to which prisoners qualify for such protection and which do not. And so he finished up by saying, there’s a reasonable basis in law Mr. President, that you will not be prosecuted for war crimes under the US code, War Crimes Act of 1996. Now if I’m President Bush and I finally read that thing because Newsweek has it printed, and I say, my goodness, there’s a reasonable basis in law that I won’t be prosecuted? I’m going to have a couple of really second thoughts here. One is that next time I’m in a situation like this I’m certainly going to seek independent counsel. But another is, my God, four more years becomes even more important to me and to Ashcroft and to Rumsfeld. Gonzalez specifically warns that who knows, some future administration or some future group might sue you for violating the Geneva Conventions. And not only the Geneva Conventions but to the degree that they are embedded in this US law of 1996, and so you’re really, we have a strong basis in law but we can’t exclude the possibility. So four more years? Why do I say all this? I say all this because I am more frightened now than at any time over the last three and a half years, that this administration will resort to extra-legal methods to do something to ensure that there are four more years for George Bush. And Ashcroft’s statement last week, gratuitous statement, uncoordinated with the department of, CIA, with the Department of Homeland Security, his warning that there is bound to be a terrorist strike before the US elections. That can be viewed and this can be reasonably viewed as the opening salvo in the justification for doing, taking measures to ensure that whatever happens in November comes out so that four more years can be devoted to maybe changing that war crimes act or protecting at least these vulnerable people for four more years.
JEREMY SCAHILL: We’re talking to Ray McGovern, who is a veteran of the Central Intelligence Agency, more than a quarter century with the agency. As you talk about the issue of the leaking or exposing of the identity of Valerie Plame as CIA operative. Also, the FBI is examining whether Pentagon officials who had frequent contacts with Ahmed Chalabi may have leaked sensitive information that American intelligence have broken Iran’s secret communication codes. This morning Chalabi’s lawyers issued statements around the networks saying that they are calling for an investigation into who leaked these false allegations about Ahmed Chalabi. Do you see any connection with Tenet’s resignation and this current controversy about Ahmed Chalabi and his apparent fall from grace.
RAY MCGOVERN: Well as is well known, it has been the Pentagon that had sort of adopted Chalabi. The CIA and State department dismissed him as a swindler several years ago. I don’t see any direct connection there between George Tenet’s resignation and the Chalabi thing. But I must say that if it weren’t so sad, one could sort of, one could sort of focus and then say, well there’s poetic justice for you, you know? The folks that were running Chalabi or vice versa as the case may be that is, the folks that were being run by Chalabi, were the Neo-cons who are responsible for the fix that this country is in now in Iraq. They groomed him and they went out drinking with him, and I can easily believe the story that was printed in the press yesterday that one of them got a little too potted. Intelligence officers often, sometimes are guilty of the same fault, but you like to brag a little and somebody told Chalabi, you know those Iranians, we’ve got ‘em pegged, we’ve got their communications and we can read everything they’re saying. Chalabi goes and tells the Iranian in Baghdad and the fool puts that message on the same code as has been broken. And so the CIA and NSA now has no doubt is a transcript of Chalabi saying, this is what I learned from, and there’s a good chance that there might be a name in there. And one can guess about five people who may have told him that. And most of them, yeah most of them reside in the Pentagon. So what we have here is very very damaging proof that A), Chalabi was always to be distrusted, and B), that the people that were in association with him and brought him in with US aircraft right when the war was over so to speak, those people are really playing fast and loose with US intelligence, with US interests, all out of their very blind devotion to this fellow who is going to deliver their objectives to them by being a subservient head of Iraq and not incidentally, establishing ties with Israel.
AMY GOODMAN: What do you mean not incidentally?
RAY MCGOVERN: Well, I mean the twin aim of this neo-conservative so-called cabal was this. You can read it in their documents. First and foremost it was the strategic vision, the ideological vision, that the US is the sole remaining superpower in the world and this imposes some sort of obligation on the US to throw its weight around wherever it can, and particularly in strategic areas where there’s lots of oil. God knows we need the oil. Okay, that’s number one. Number two is that the only threat to Israel’s security that needed to be dealt with in Israeli eyes was the impossible threat that Saddam Hussein may have had one or two scuds left, scud missiles which could rain chemical weapons, chemical agents down on Tel Aviv or Jerusalem. Why did they believe that? Well there were thirty nine such missiles raining down on Israel and other countries during the first gulf war so it was a reasonable fear. Colin Powel said on the 5th of February 2003 that Iraq had twenty four of those. Well, he was off just by two dozen, he didn’t have any it turns out. But if you’re an Israeli, you can’t be sure of that. And so the only thing to do is eliminate that threat, occupy the country and make sure there are no scud missiles.
AMY GOODMAN: We’re talking with former CIA analyst Ray McGovern. We only have a minute to go and I have two last quick questions. What do you think really happened behind the scenes? What does it mean to say that he is the scapegoat, George Tenet, who has now just resigned, George Bush accepting his resignation and announcing it? And also George Bush’s lawyer being the former attorney for Richard Secord, the retired major general US air force who worked with Albert Hakim involved with Iran-Contra affair. If you could say who Secord was.
RAY MCGOVERN: Yeah, well Secord was one of those shadowy figures who was so deeply involved with Iran-Contra that he needed the best kind of lawyer to defend him. I’m glad you pointed that out Amy. This is exactly and precisely the same fellow. With respect to Tenet, you know, the Senate Intelligence Committee is just about to come out with a report that is going to bring him over the coals. It’s going to be very acerbic. Pat Roberts is no longer his defender. For the first time in George Tenet’s political existence he does not have support on the hill and that is the death knell for him. And the president will be able to point to this and say, well we did get rid of one of the malefactors, and maybe that will shield Rumsfeld and Wolfowitz for another month or two.
To purchase an audio or video copy of this entire program, click here for our new online ordering or call 1 (800) 881-2359.
Yes, indeed, the forest has arrived at the castle walls...Let's recap the week so far...TIME published US Army Corp. of Engineers e-mail indicating impropriety in VICE _resident Cheney's office re: Halliburton contracts in Iraq...The world press, and begrudgingly, the "US Mainstream News Media," has reported the Bush cabal pawn Ahmad Chalabi leaked highly classified US intelligence secrets to the Iranians...The source of Ashcroft's latest attempt to scare the US electorate into submission was revealed to be laughable in its lack of credibility...CBS News released audio tapes of foul-mouthed Enron traders clearly manipulating the energy market to create the phoney "California energy crisis" and boasting that once George W. Bush was in the White House, he would not allow any price caps to thwart them...The Abu Ghraib scandal continues to fester...At least 5 more US soldiers died in Iraq (FOR WHAT?)...Michael Moore's Fahrenheit 911 now has a release date in the US: June 25th (same week Bill Clinton's book, which savages the incredible shrinking _resident in its final pages, is released)...CIA Director George Tenet resigned for "personal reasons," which probably translates into a desire to perserve some honor and integrity along with the "well-being of his family"...AND...
Capitol Hill Blue: Witnesses told a federal grand jury President George W. Bush knew about, and took no action to stop, the release of a covert CIA operative's name to a journalist in an attempt to discredit her husband, a critic of administration policy in Iraq.
Their damning testimony has prompted Bush to contact an outside lawyer for legal advice because evidence increasingly points to his involvement in the leak of covert CIA operative Valerie Plame's name to syndicated columnist Robert Novak.
Repudiate the 9/11 Cover-Up and the Iraq War Lies, Show Up for Democracy in 2004: Defeat Bush (again!)
http://www.capitolhillblue.com/artman/publish/article_4629.shtml
From Capitol Hill Blue
Bush Leagues
Bush Knew About Leak of CIA Operative's Name
By Staff and Wire Reports
Jun 3, 2004, 05:28
Witnesses told a federal grand jury President George W. Bush knew about, and took no action to stop, the release of a covert CIA operative's name to a journalist in an attempt to discredit her husband, a critic of administration policy in Iraq.
Their damning testimony has prompted Bush to contact an outside lawyer for legal advice because evidence increasingly points to his involvement in the leak of covert CIA operative Valerie Plame's name to syndicated columnist Robert Novak.
The move suggests the president anticipates being questioned by prosecutors. Sources say grand jury witnesses have implicated the President and his top advisor, Karl Rove.
White House spokesmen, however, dismiss the hiring of outside counsel as a routine precaution.
"The president has made it very clear he wants everyone to cooperate fully with the investigation and that would include himself," White House press secretary Scott McClellan said Wednesday night.
He confirmed that Bush had contacted Washington attorney Jim Sharp. "In the event the president needs his advice, I expect he probably would retain him," McClellan said. There is no indication Bush has been questioned yet.
A federal grand jury has questioned numerous White House and administration officials to learn who leaked the name of CIA operative Plame, wife of former Ambassador Joseph Wilson, to the news media. Wilson has charged that officials made the disclosure in an effort to discredit him.
Bush has been an outspoken critics of leaks, saying they can be very damaging, but he has expressed doubts that the government's investigation will pinpoint who was responsible. While Bush has said he welcomed the leak investigation, it has been an awkward development for a president who promised to bring integrity and leadership to the White House after years of Republican criticism and investigations of the Clinton administration.
Even though he has a White House counsel, Bush is dependent on outside lawyers for private matters. A memo distributed to the staff last year reminded officials that the counsel's office works solely for the president in his official capacity and is not a private attorney for anyone.
Democrats seized on the news to criticize the president.
"It speaks for itself that the president initially claimed he wanted to get to the bottom of this, but now he's suddenly retained a lawyer," said Jano Cabrera, spokesman for the Democratic National Committee. "Bush shouldn't drag the country through grand juries and legal maneuvering. President Bush should come forward with what he knows and come clean with the American people."
Plame was first identified by syndicated columnist and TV commentator Novak in a column last July. Novak said his information came from administration sources.
Wilson has said he believes his wife's name was leaked because of his criticism of Bush administration claims that Iraq had tried to obtain uranium from Niger, which Wilson investigated for the CIA and found to be untrue.
Disclosure of an undercover officer's identity can be a federal crime. The grand jury has heard from witnesses and combed through thousands of pages of documents turned over by the White House, but returned no indictments.
The probe is being handled by Chicago U.S. Attorney Patrick Fitzgerald, appointed after Attorney General John Ashcroft stepped aside from case because of his political ties to the White House.
Wilson has suggested in a book that the leaker was Lewis "Scooter" Libby, chief of staff to Vice President Cheney. But Wilson's book, "The Politics of Truth," gave no conclusive evidence for the claim.
The White House denied the claim and accused Wilson of seeking to bolster the campaign of Democrat John Kerry, for whom he has acted as a foreign policy adviser.
Wilson also said it's possible the leak came from Elliott Abrams, a figure in the Reagan administration Iran-Contra affair and now a member of Bush's National Security Council. And Rove, Bush's chief political adviser, may have circulated information about Wilson and Plame "in administration and neoconservative circles" even if Rove was not himself the leaker, Wilson wrote.
Another possibility is that two lower-level officials in Cheney's office - John Hannah or David Wurmser - leaked Plame's identity at the behest of higher-ups "to keep their fingerprints off the crime," Wilson speculated.
Sources within the investigation say evidence points to Rove approving release of the leak. They add that their investigation suggests the President knew about Rove's actions but took no action to stop release of Plame's name.
© Copyright 2004 Capitol Hill Blue
The LNS applauds CBS but only with one hand clapping...Why wasn't it the lead story on the CBS evening news? Why did they eat out of Ashcroft's hand again after fighting him for THIS story? (Did the resignation of the President and CEO have anything to do with it?) Why didn't the White House daily press briefing grind to a screeching halt on this one issue today? Why is this STORY not RED HOT? What has happened to this country? Remember Enron? Remember what the grim political realities were for the incredible shrinking _resident prior to 9/11? Remember the real reason for the financial crisis that led to the lynching of Gray Davis (D-CA) and the Total Recall Putsch that installed Conan the Deceiver as the Bush Cabal's Viceroy of KaliFORneeAH? Remember why the incredible shrinking _resident began blathering about hitting the "Trifecta"? Well, we had to endure several years of propapunditgandists and radio talk show hosts telling us that the phoney "California energy crisis" wasn't phoney and wasn't driven by Enron with the encouragement and protection of the Bush cabal...Remember the mysterious pretzel attack on that Sunday morning? The news cycle was all Enron all the time at that point. That was when the incredible shrinking _resident was pretending as if he barely knew Kenny Boy Lay...Oh yes, and Mr. Ashcorft, where is Ken Lay?
CBS/AP: Before the 2000 election, Enron employees pondered the possibilities of a Bush win.
"It'd be great. I'd love to see Ken Lay Secretary of Energy," says one Enron worker.
That didn't happen, but they were sure President Bush would fight any limits on sky-high energy prices.
"When this election comes Bush will f------g whack this s--t, man. He won't play this price-cap b------t."
Crude, but true.
"We will not take any action that makes California's problems worse and that's why I oppose price caps," said Mr. Bush on May 29, 2001.
Both the Justice Department and Enron tried to prevent the release of these tapes. Enron's lawyers argued they merely prove "that people at Enron sometimes talked like Barnacle Bill the Sailor."
Free Martha Stewart, Jail the Real Corporate Criminals, Show Up for Democracy in 2004: Defeat Bush (again!)
http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2004/06/01/eveningnews/main620626.shtml
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Enron Traders Caught On Tape
LOS ANGELES, June 1, 2004
When a forest fire shut down a major transmission line into California, cutting power supplies and raising prices, Enron energy traders celebrated, CBS News Correspondent Vince Gonzales reports.
"Burn, baby, burn. That's a beautiful thing," a trader sang about the massive fire.
Four years after California's disastrous experiment with energy deregulation, Enron energy traders can be heard – on audiotapes obtained by CBS News – gloating and praising each other as they helped bring on, and cash-in on, the Western power crisis.
"He just f---s California," says one Enron employee. "He steals money from California to the tune of about a million."
"Will you rephrase that?" asks a second employee.
"OK, he, um, he arbitrages the California market to the tune of a million bucks or two a day," replies the first.
The tapes, from Enron's West Coast trading desk, also confirm what CBS reported years ago: that in secret deals with power producers, traders deliberately drove up prices by ordering power plants shut down.
"If you took down the steamer, how long would it take to get it back up?" an Enron worker is heard saying.
"Oh, it's not something you want to just be turning on and off every hour. Let's put it that way," another says.
"Well, why don't you just go ahead and shut her down."
Officials with the Snohomish Public Utility District near Seattle received the tapes from the Justice Department.
"This is the evidence we've all been waiting for. This proves they manipulated the market," said Eric Christensen, a spokesman for the utility.
That utility, like many others, is trying to get its money back from Enron.
"They're f------g taking all the money back from you guys?" complains an Enron employee on the tapes. "All the money you guys stole from those poor grandmothers in California?"
"Yeah, grandma Millie, man"
"Yeah, now she wants her f------g money back for all the power you've charged right up, jammed right up her a------ for f------g $250 a megawatt hour."
And the tapes appear to link top Enron officials Ken Lay and Jeffrey Skilling to schemes that fueled the crisis.
"Government Affairs has to prove how valuable it is to Ken Lay and Jeff Skilling," says one trader.
"Ok."
"Do you know when you started over-scheduling load and making buckets of money on that?
Before the 2000 election, Enron employees pondered the possibilities of a Bush win.
"It'd be great. I'd love to see Ken Lay Secretary of Energy," says one Enron worker.
That didn't happen, but they were sure President Bush would fight any limits on sky-high energy prices.
"When this election comes Bush will f------g whack this s--t, man. He won't play this price-cap b------t."
Crude, but true.
"We will not take any action that makes California's problems worse and that's why I oppose price caps," said Mr. Bush on May 29, 2001.
Both the Justice Department and Enron tried to prevent the release of these tapes. Enron's lawyers argued they merely prove "that people at Enron sometimes talked like Barnacle Bill the Sailor."
©MMIV, CBS Broadcasting Inc. All Rights Reserved.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
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The stench of Abu Ghraib is on the White House, the
stench of the White House is on Abu Ghraib. Al Gore
knows it, you know it, I know it, Sy Hirsch knows it.
Will the network news organizations and major city
newspapers stand up to the Bush cabal or will they let
soldiers take the rap for the demented policies of the
Bush abomination itself?
Michael Hirsh and John Barry, Newsweek: But numerous
critics—not just in the human-rights community, but in
Congress and the U.S. military as well—insist that the
current probes are still too limited to bring full
accountability. Some critics say Donald Rumsfeld's
Defense Department is doing its best to stop
potentially incriminating information from coming out,
that it's deflecting Congress's inquiries and
shielding higher-ups from investigation. Documents
obtained by NEWSWEEK also suggest that Rumsfeld's
aides are trying hard to contain the scandal, even
within the Pentagon. Defense Under Secretary Douglas
Feith, who is in charge of setting policy on prisoners
and detainees in occupied Iraq, has banned any
discussion of the still-classified report on Abu
Ghraib written by Maj. Gen. Antonio Taguba, which has
circulated around the world. Shortly after the Taguba
report leaked in early May, Feith subordinates sent an
"urgent" e-mail around the Pentagon warning officials
not to read the report, even though it was on Fox
News. In the e-mail, a copy of which was obtained by
NEWSWEEK, officials in Feith's office warn that the
leak is being investigated for "criminal prosecution"
and that no one should mention the Taguba report to
anybody, even to family members. Feith has turned his
office into a "ministry of fear," says one military
lawyer. A spokesman for Feith, Maj. Paul Swiergosz,
says the e-mail warning was intended to prevent
employees from downloading a classified report onto
unclassified computers.
Support Our Troops, Show Up for Democracy in 2004:
Defeat Bush (again!)
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/5092776/site/newsweek/
The Abu Ghraib Scandal Cover-Up?
Bush insists that 'a few American troops' dishonored
the country. But prisoner abuse was more widespread,
and some insiders believe that much remains hidden
Is Rumsfeld's Defense Department obstructing
investigations into abuses at Abu Ghraib (pictured
earlier this month)?
By Michael Hirsh and John Barry
NewsweekJune 7 issue - The meeting was small and
unpublicized. In a room on the third floor of the Old
Executive Office Building last week, Condoleezza Rice
grittily endured an hour's worth of pleading from
leading human-rights activists who want to see a
9/11-style commission created to investigate the abuse
of detainees in the war on terror. According to
participants, the president's national-security
adviser didn't repeat the line that George W. Bush had
delivered to the American people in a speech two days
before: that the scandal was the work of "a few
American troops who dishonored our country." Nor did
Rice try to make the case that by razing Iraq's Abu
Ghraib Prison—a Bush proposal that took even his
Defense secretary by surprise—administration officials
would put the scandal behind them. "I recognize we
have a very grave problem," Rice said, according to
Scott Horton, a New York lawyer at the meeting whose
account was corroborated by another participant.
"There are major investigations going on right now to
fully understand the scope and nature of it."
But numerous critics—not just in the human-rights
community, but in Congress and the U.S. military as
well—insist that the current probes are still too
limited to bring full accountability. Some critics say
Donald Rumsfeld's Defense Department is doing its best
to stop potentially incriminating information from
coming out, that it's deflecting Congress's inquiries
and shielding higher-ups from investigation. Documents
obtained by NEWSWEEK also suggest that Rumsfeld's
aides are trying hard to contain the scandal, even
within the Pentagon. Defense Under Secretary Douglas
Feith, who is in charge of setting policy on prisoners
and detainees in occupied Iraq, has banned any
discussion of the still-classified report on Abu
Ghraib written by Maj. Gen. Antonio Taguba, which has
circulated around the world. Shortly after the Taguba
report leaked in early May, Feith subordinates sent an
"urgent" e-mail around the Pentagon warning officials
not to read the report, even though it was on Fox
News. In the e-mail, a copy of which was obtained by
NEWSWEEK, officials in Feith's office warn that the
leak is being investigated for "criminal prosecution"
and that no one should mention the Taguba report to
anybody, even to family members. Feith has turned his
office into a "ministry of fear," says one military
lawyer. A spokesman for Feith, Maj. Paul Swiergosz,
says the e-mail warning was intended to prevent
employees from downloading a classified report onto
unclassified computers.
More worrisome, critics say, is that the Pentagon is
investigating itself. Maj. Gen. George Fay, the No. 2
in Army Military Intelligence, is in charge of the
probe into whether his own intel officers directed the
MPs to abuse prisoners. But so far Fay has questioned
no one above the rank of colonel, military and other
sources say. Among those critical of Fay is Sgt.
Samuel Provance, who was formerly in military
intelligence at Abu Ghraib and has told reporters in
recent weeks that the Army is engaged in a cover-up.
"I had to volunteer more information than was being
asked of me [by Fay]. It was like I was adding to his
burden," Provance told NEWSWEEK last week. "There are
so many soldiers directly involved who haven't been
talked to."
"Out, out damn spot!"
Gary Unger, NY Times: Unfortunately, though, we may never know the real story. The investigative panel has already concluded that there is "no credible evidence that any chartered flights of Saudi Arabian nationals departed the United States before the reopening of national airspace." But the real point is that there were still some restrictions on American airspace when the Saudi flights began.
In addition, new evidence shows that the evacuation involved more than the departure of 142 Saudis on six charter flights that the commission is investigating. According to newly released documents, 160 Saudis left the United States on 55 flights immediately after 9/11 — making a total of about 300 people who left with the apparent approval of the Bush administration, far more than has been reported before. The records were released by the Department of Homeland Security in response to a Freedom of Information Act request filed by Judicial Watch, a conservative, nonpartisan watchdog group in Washington...
The passengers should have been questioned about any links to Osama bin Laden, or his financing. We have long known that some faction of the Saudi elite has helped funnel money to Islamist terrorists —inadvertently at least. Prince Ahmed bin Salman, who has been accused of being an intermediary between Al Qaeda and the House of Saud, boarded one of the evacuation planes in Kentucky. Was he interrogated by the F.B.I. before he left?
If the commission dares to address these issues, it will undoubtedly be accused of politicizing one of the most important national security investigations in American history — in an election year, no less. But if it does not, it risks something far worse — the betrayal of the thousands of people who lost their lives that day, not to mention millions of others who want the truth.
Repudiate the 9/11 Cover-Up and the Iraq War Lies, Show Up for Democracy in 2004: Defeat Bush (again!)
http://www.commondreams.org/views04/0601-06.htm
Published on Tuesday, June 1, 2004 by the New York Times
The Great Escape
by Craig Unger
Americans who think the 9/11 commission is going to answer all the crucial questions about the terrorist attacks are likely to be sorely disappointed — especially if they're interested in the secret evacuation of Saudis by plane that began just after Sept. 11.
We knew that 15 out of 19 hijackers were Saudis. We knew that Osama bin Laden, a Saudi, was behind 9/11. Yet we did not conduct a police-style investigation of the departing Saudis, of whom two dozen were members. of the bin Laden family. That is not to say that they were complicit in the attacks.
Unfortunately, though, we may never know the real story. The investigative panel has already concluded that there is "no credible evidence that any chartered flights of Saudi Arabian nationals departed the United States before the reopening of national airspace." But the real point is that there were still some restrictions on American airspace when the Saudi flights began.
In addition, new evidence shows that the evacuation involved more than the departure of 142 Saudis on six charter flights that the commission is investigating. According to newly released documents, 160 Saudis left the United States on 55 flights immediately after 9/11 — making a total of about 300 people who left with the apparent approval of the Bush administration, far more than has been reported before. The records were released by the Department of Homeland Security in response to a Freedom of Information Act request filed by Judicial Watch, a conservative, nonpartisan watchdog group in Washington.
The vast majority of the newly disclosed flights were commercial airline flights, not charters, often carrying just two or three Saudi passengers. They originated from more than 20 cities, including Chicago, Dallas, Denver, Detroit and Houston. One Saudi Arabian Airlines flight left Kennedy Airport on Sept. 13 with 46 Saudis. The next day, another Saudi Arabian Airlines flight left with 13 Saudis.
The panel has indicated that it has yet to find any evidence that the F.B.I. checked the manifests of departing flights against its terror watch list. The departures of additional Saudis raise more questions for the panel. Richard Clarke, the former counterterrorism czar, told The Hill newspaper recently that he took full responsibility for approving some flights. But we don't know if other Bush administration officials participated in the decision.
The passengers should have been questioned about any links to Osama bin Laden, or his financing. We have long known that some faction of the Saudi elite has helped funnel money to Islamist terrorists —inadvertently at least. Prince Ahmed bin Salman, who has been accused of being an intermediary between Al Qaeda and the House of Saud, boarded one of the evacuation planes in Kentucky. Was he interrogated by the F.B.I. before he left?
If the commission dares to address these issues, it will undoubtedly be accused of politicizing one of the most important national security investigations in American history — in an election year, no less. But if it does not, it risks something far worse — the betrayal of the thousands of people who lost their lives that day, not to mention millions of others who want the truth.
Craig Unger is the author of "House of Bush, House of Saud: The Secret Relationship Between the World's Two Most Powerful Dynasties."
Copyright 2004 The New York Times Company
###
The "US mainstream news media" and its propapunditgandists are hiding...They do not want to go where the trail of blood and scandals leads...They are afraid...They are hoping that the US electorate decides for them...They are not going to risk being on the wrong side of the Bush abomination IF it stays on in power after November. MEANWHILE, they are on the wrong side of HISTORY itself..The Niger cake hoax? The outing of Valerie Plame? Abu Ghraib? Chalabi? The pre-9/11 blunders exposed by Richard Clark? The post-9/11 blunders exposed by Richard Clark? The VICE _resident and Hallburton? Any one of these revelations of scandal, incompetence and worse should be enough to dominate the air waves with DEEPLY DISTURBING debate about this failed _residency...But they are cowering in the corner...
William Rivers Pitt, www.truthout.org: No, this is the real deal. The White House has been forced to turn on one of their most important allies because his involvement with Iranian intelligence has been exposed. The American intelligence community despised Chalabi because Bush and his people cut them out of the loop in favor of Chalabi, and then turned around and blamed the intelligence community when Chalabi's data turned out to be bogus.
Last summer, I wrote that one scapegoats the CIA at their mortal peril. This, a year later, appears to be the final revenge of the intelligence community against an administration that insulted, suppressed and blamed them for the failures of the neoconservative hawks. The fact that the White House provided the hanging rope, in the guise of the badly compromised Ahmad Chalabi, only makes this dish all the colder.
Repudiate the 9/11 Cover-Up and the Iraq War Lies, Show Up for Democracy in 2004: Defeat Bush (again!)
http://www.truthout.org/docs_04/060104A.shtml
The Deep Game
By William Rivers Pitt
t r u t h o u t | Perspective
Tuesday 1 June 2004
My article from last week, 'The Iranian Spy in the House of Bush,' which took a close look at accusations leveled at the White House's favorite Iraqi Ahmad Chalabi, generated a number of interesting responses from truthout readers. Pointedly, many refused to believe that stories suggesting Chalabi was acting as an agent of Iran in the run-up to the Iraq invasion were anything more than another Bush administration plot, the purpose of which was to gin up national support for an attack against Iran.
The logic people offered to support the idea that we are merely getting jobbed by the Bush crew again is straightforward, and not easily cast aside. This administration has been, since day one of their White House occupation and even before, running the game plan created by the Project for the New American Century, or PNAC. A central component of their imperial designs is the need to attack, invade and overthrow many, if not all, Middle Eastern regimes, thus bringing 'democracy' to the region. Iran has been a central part of the plan; it is difficult to miss the intent behind the addition of that nation to the 'Axis of Evil.' What better way to create support for the next phase of the PNAC plan, goes the argument, than to devise a scenario by which America was under an intelligence attack from Iran by way of Chalabi?
Chalabi is accused of passing highly sensitive signal intelligence to the Iranian government. Specifically, he is accused of informing Iran that the United States had broken one of their most important codes, and was basically able to read their mail. Clearly, there is more going on here than immediately meets the eye. The argument that the White House has conjured these accusations against Chalabi for their own military ends, however, fails in the face of several facts.
First of all, it has been known for years in intelligence circles that Ahmad Chalabi had strong connections to Iran. He bragged to former U.N. weapons inspector Scott Ritter in 1997 that he had "tremendous connections with Iranian intelligence." Chalabi's aide, Aras Karim Habib, has also been a known associate of Iranian intelligence for years. The recent raid on Chalabi's residence in Iraq was aimed more at Habib than Chalabi. Habib escaped capture in the raid, and is believed to have fled to Terhan. Seized in that raid, however, was the personal Koran of Chalabi. The book carried an inscription from former Iranian ruler Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini himself. The inscription read, "To My Son, Ahmad."
Evidence to support allegations that Chalabi has been acting in the interests of Iran goes back some ten years. In 1994, Chalabi conjured an Iraqi defector named Khidir Hamza, who claimed to be a senior member of Hussein's nuclear weapons team. According to Hamza, Iraq was very close to completing the development of nuclear weapons. He was given to CIA agents, who subsequently decided he was utterly without credibility. Imad Khadduri, the Iraqi nuclear physicist who was in charge of documenting nuclear development stated flatly that Hamza, "Did not, even remotely, get involved in any scientific research, except for journalistic articles, dealing with the fission bomb, its components or its effects."
Hamza, in attempting to establish his credibility, coughed up a 20-page document which had apparently been developed by "Group 4," the Iraqi department responsible for designing nuclear weaponry. At first, the report appeared to be damning evidence that Hussein was developing nuclear weaponry in defiance of UN sanctions. After a further review by the International Atomic Energy Agency, however, it was determined that the report was "not authentic."
In fact, analysis suggests this purported Iraqi nuclear document was, in fact, a manufactured fraud created by Iranian intelligence. Several technical descriptions in the report used phrases that would only be used by an Iranian. The use of the term 'dome,' 'Qubba' in Iranian, instead of 'hemisphere,' which is 'Nisuf Kura' in Arabic, is particularly instructive. The usage of these words indicate the document was originally written in Farsi by an Iranian scientist and then translated into Arabic.
Iran, apparently, was creating and disbursing false information intended to demonstrate that Hussein was building nuclear weapons. This particular fraud, and Hamza himself, was used repeatedly to justify the invasion of Iraq. It appears to have been a masterful intelligence operation out of Terhan, one that came to the attention of American officials by way of Ahmad Chalabi. Thus, the new accusations that Chalabi is a tool of Iran have a basis in past activities.
Why would a man with such connections to the anti-American regime in Iran be tolerated in the highest circles of American government? The answer lies in the old Middle Eastern axiom, "The enemy of my enemy is my friend." Chalabi's Iranian contacts were tolerated for so long because he was working to the same end as many within the United States: the removal of Saddam Hussein from power in Iraq.
Over time, Chalabi developed deep connections with CIA, and more importantly, with many who are now power-brokers within the federal government. He became, most specifically, a prized ally of the cabal of neoconservative hawks which includes Donald Rumsfeld, Dick Cheney, Paul Wolfowitz, Richard Perle, Douglas Feith and William Luti. These men helped engineer legislation in Congress which eventually funneled some $100 million into Chalabi's organization, the Iraqi National Congress. In the run-up to the Iraq invasion, they created a special intelligence-manipulation bureau within the Defense Department called the Office of Special Plans. It was here that accusations of vast Iraqi stockpiles of WMDs, nuclear capabilities and al Qaeda connections were manufactured and disbursed. Chalabi was the main source for these now-debunked accusations.
Chalabi had been chosen by Don Rumsfeld to be the next leader of Iraq, a position which suited Chalabi's all-encompassing desire to come into possession of Iraq's vast oil revenues. He promised Rumsfeld and the hawks that he would create a secular Shia government that would immediately make peace with Israel. In other words, he told the PNAC crew exactly what they wanted to hear; a central aspect of the PNAC plan to enact 'regime change' across the Middle East was, in their minds, about the defense of Israel via the removal of threatening governments.
The wheels came off when none of Chalabi's information - about the weapons of mass destruction, about the nuclear capabilities, about the al Qaeda connections, about the ease with which America would occupy Iraq - turned out to be true. Chalabi felt the winds of his fortune changing and, still filled with the desire to rule Iraq in the manner Rumsfeld had promised long ago, turned on his former friends. He began fashioning himself as a martyr for the Iraqi people, began attacking America with the same rhetoric used by Moqtada al Sadr and other radical clerics, in order to develop a power base with the fundamentalist Shia community. Promises to make peace with Israel at some point were exposed as the lies they were.
Thus, the White House approved the move to send soldiers into Chalabi's compound, to cut off his fat monthly paychecks, and to distance him from the struggle for power in Iraq. According to Newsweek, the final straw for Chalabi came when Bush and Cheney, "were briefed several weeks ago about intelligence indicating that someone in Chalabi's Iraqi National Congress gave the Iranian government 'extremely sensitive' and 'highly classified' info which could jeopardize U.S. intelligence sources and even 'get people killed.' Intelligence sources say potential suspects for the leak include Chalabi himself and his intelligence chief, Aras Habib." The data given to Iran, sensitive signal intelligence that let Iran know we had broken some of their codes, is a damaging breach of national security.
Is this Chalabi story a calculated ruse by the Bush administration to get them off the hook for this Iraq disaster by scapegoating Chalabi? Given all the facts at hand, it seems highly unlikely.
It is difficult to imagine a worse situation for the Bush administration than what is currently unfolding. Chalabi is completely the creation of those running the White House and the Pentagon. This is widely known. If it is true that, as they were anointing Chalabi, he was funneling Iranian disinformation straight to the highest levels of our government, who subsequently gave him intelligence data which he handed over to Iran...if this is indeed true, it is a disaster of millennial proportions for the administration. It reveals this White House to be saps, played like violins by Iran in a masterful intelligence operation that removed a long-time enemy of Tehran while setting the stage for a fundamentalist Shia regime in Iraq that would become a boon ally. How any aspect of this helps George W. Bush and his crew is hard to see.
Is this Chalabi story a calculated ruse by the Bush administration to create an environment where war against Iran would be acceptable? Clearly, they would like this conflict to become a reality. But reality, in this matter, interferes. Consider a call for war in Iran. The immediate questions would be:
With whose army? Our troops in Iraq are badly stretched, and there aren't many Reserves left. The UN won't have anything to do with another invasion. It is difficult to believe that we would dare use Israel as a proxy force, because we'd lose every other country in the region overnight, including Pakistan, which actually has nuclear weapons.
With whose vote? Congresspeople have constituents, and the constituents are badly disturbed by Iraq already. The war is a mess, and Congress has more than enough political cover to say 'no' this time around. It isn't 2002 anymore.
With what money? Bush has spent hundreds of billions on Afghanistan and Iraq, and has failed (quietly on the first and spectacularly on the second). Because of Iraq, Congress can, and almost certainly will, say no to Iran spending.
With which Pentagon? If you believe Sid Blumenthal's report that the officer corps in the Pentagon is on the edge of revolt because of what has taken place already, it is difficult to imagine a scenario in which they would sit still for yet another military action.
No, this is the real deal. The White House has been forced to turn on one of their most important allies because his involvement with Iranian intelligence has been exposed. The American intelligence community despised Chalabi because Bush and his people cut them out of the loop in favor of Chalabi, and then turned around and blamed the intelligence community when Chalabi's data turned out to be bogus.
Last summer, I wrote that one scapegoats the CIA at their mortal peril. This, a year later, appears to be the final revenge of the intelligence community against an administration that insulted, suppressed and blamed them for the failures of the neoconservative hawks. The fact that the White House provided the hanging rope, in the guise of the badly compromised Ahmad Chalabi, only makes this dish all the colder.
At least five more US soldiers died in Iraq over the
last 24 hours. For what? The Emperor has no uniform...
Retired US Marine Corp. Major General William A.
Whitlow, Washington Post: Our service members are the
ultimate victims of this incomplete strategy,
misguided policy and false intelligence. It is inconceivable and derelict not to have a viable war termination strategy for an operation as complex as a major theater war. America's citizens and our service
members deserve far better for their sacrifices. This
combination of things -- misleading the president with
false intelligence and omitting a principal element
from our war strategy -- is reason enough to seek
change in the vice presidency and senior defense
leadership, civilian and military.
It is our patriotic duty to speak out when egregiously
flawed policies and strategies needlessly cost
American lives. It is time for the president to ask
those responsible for the flawed Iraqi policy --
civilian and military -- to resign from public
service. Absent such a change in the current
administration, many of us will be forced to choose a
presidential candidate whose domestic policies we may
not like but who understands firsthand the effects of
flawed policies and incompetent military strategies
and who fully comprehends the price.
Support Our Troops, Show Up for Democracy in 2004:
Defeat Bush (again!)
http://www.truthout.org/docs_04/053104B.shtml
The Price Of Giving Bad Advice
By William A. Whitlow
The Washington Post
Sunday 30 May 2004
As the war in Iraq drags on, conservative citizens,
mostly Republican, face a growing dilemma in the
November election.
In the face of growing evidence that the president
was deceived and misguided about the cause and urgency
for waging war on Saddam Hussein, it is time for those
responsible to stand forth and accept accountability.
True, the president is ultimately responsible for the
actions of his vice president, his Cabinet and the
executive departments. But it has become clear that
the counsel the president received from the vice
president, secretary of defense, deputy secretary of
defense and senior uniformed leadership was severely
flawed and uncorroborated. Whether the president was
intentionally misled by neoconservatives or whether
their advice was a result of pure incompetence remains
to be seen. The fact is that he was misled
sufficiently to require him to take bold action to
restore his diminished credibility.
The supposedly urgent need to attack Iraq was based
partly on inflated, creative intelligence information,
some of which originated with Ahmed Chalabi, an
associate of the vice president and deputy secretary
of defense. The information from Chalabi led the vice
president and defense secretary to believe that war
with Iraq would be a "cakewalk" and U.S. forces would
be received with open arms. This belief resulted in a
fatal flaw in developing a complete war strategy. A
principal tenet of forming a strategy -- have a "war
termination" phase -- was neglected. Although the
tactical and operational phases of the war were
conducted flawlessly by superior field commanders, the
absence of a complete strategy has needlessly cost
lives.
Our service members are the ultimate victims of this
incomplete strategy, misguided policy and false
intelligence. It is inconceivable and derelict not to
have a viable war termination strategy for an
operation as complex as a major theater war. America's
citizens and our service members deserve far better
for their sacrifices. This combination of things --
misleading the president with false intelligence and
omitting a principal element from our war strategy --
is reason enough to seek change in the vice presidency
and senior defense leadership, civilian and military.
It is our patriotic duty to speak out when
egregiously flawed policies and strategies needlessly
cost American lives. It is time for the president to
ask those responsible for the flawed Iraqi policy --
civilian and military -- to resign from public
service. Absent such a change in the current
administration, many of us will be forced to choose a
presidential candidate whose domestic policies we may
not like but who understands firsthand the effects of
flawed policies and incompetent military strategies
and who fully comprehends the price.
-------
The writer is a retired major general in the Marine
Corps. He served as director of the expeditionary
warfare division in the office of the deputy chief of
naval operations.
It's the Media, Stupid.
Buzzflash Editorial: It's been a long, long time since you could look at the front page of the New York Times and believe that you were being provided with a balanced political perspective on the news, let alone issues like Republican corruption and deceit. Despite
how many "liberals" love the "gray lady" for its
cultural coverage, a smattering of liberal columnists,
its extensive number of stories, and its traditionally
liberal editorial section, its news coverage has been
compromised again and again by a nod to the Republican
Party "Lee Atwater" propaganda team. If the NYT is the
epitome of the liberal media, as the right wing
claims, we are in big, big trouble. But we know that,
don't we?
Break the Bush Stranglehold on the "US Mainstream News
Media," Show Up for Democracy in 2004: Defeat Bush
(again!)
http://www.buzzflash.com/editorial/04/06/edi04039.html
June 1, 2004 SEND THIS PAGE TO A FRIEND
EDITORIAL ARCHIVES
It's Time for Regime Change at the New York Times
A BUZZFLASH EDITORIAL
While at least half of this nation is demanding regime
change for America in 2004, liberals who can't start a
Sunday until they hear the thud of the New York Times
hit the ground should wake up.
Regime change in the media should begin with the New
York Times.
Yes, the New York Times editorial board has maintained
its traditional liberal stances, for the most part.
We'll grant you that, particularly in comparison to
the generally pro-Bush Washington Post editorial board
(with some indignation finally starting to show up
there over the Iraqi war crimes issue).
But even the New York Times editorial board supported
the war in Iraq, and it has, until just a few weeks
ago, been generally devoid of a sense of outrage over
the dishonest, lying, treasonous, inept, and corrupt
Bush Administration. So, we're not about to let
America's "paper of record" off the hook.
Even so, if the New York Times editorial policies,
have been, in general, somewhat liberal, its news
section has often been an insidious vehicle for
Republican spin since, at least, the early 90s.
Make no mistake about it, the current NYT admission
[LINK] that it might have abandoned some basic
journalistic principles in its reporting of fiction as
fact in regards to the Iraq War -- most noticeably in
the blatantly uncorroborated confections of Judith
Miller [LINK] -- is as disingenuous as the articles
that they want us to believe they are admitting should
not have been posted in the first place.
First of all, the NYT posted an editor's note
acknowledging the highly flawed reporting only AFTER
the White House, for reason's still not fully clear,
decided to brand Chalabi, their erstwhile puppet, as a
man who betrayed them. Whether this charge is true or
not -- or whether it is just a way that the Bush
Cartel is setting Chalabi up to APPEAR not to be a
puppet of the White House or whether it is all just
Neo-Con/CIA infighting -- is irrelevant as far as the
NYT admission of "flawed" journalistic standards.
What is important to remember, for the moment, is that
the NYT was forced to acknowledge as fundamentally
flawed articles that the infamous Judith Miller and
other staff members wrote, because when the Bush
Cartel discredited Chalabi, the NYT, in essence, was
caught with its pants pulled down. On May 20, the Bush
Cartel (or the CIA in defiance of the Defense
Department Neo-Cons) had Chalabi's offices raided and
then started leaking like a sieve accusations of
possible Chalabi/Iranian cooperation [LINK]. So, six
days AFTER the Chalabi raid, the NYT ran an admission
of journalistic failings on May 26th. [LINK].
If the NYT, as it claims, found belated fault with the
Bush Cartel "spin" articles, why did it wait until
after the Chalabi "outing" to run a mea culpa? And why
did it bury the acknowledgement -- as its own public
editor observes -- on the inside pages, instead of on
the front page where it ran most of the breathlessly
reported ("It's Judith Miller time") Bush
administration pro-Iraq war propaganda stories? [LINK]
Good questions indeed. But it doesn't stop there. The
NYT served as an essential Bush administration tool in
persuading the American public that the Iraq war was
necessary. Judith Miller, for instance, would print a
"thinly" source Saddam WMD article and then Cheney and
others would refer to it. This implied that even the
NYT had documentation of WMDs, when it was actually
the Bush Cartel surrogate, Chalabi -- his cohorts, and
Bush administration officials -- who were feeding the
lies to Judith Miller and other NYT reporters in the
first place. And the NYT continued to run stories
supporting Bush Cartel claims about Saddam and WMDs
even after the war started.
Make no mistake about it; the NYT was to the Iraq War
what Matt Drudge was to the Clinton impeachment. It's
that simple.
As Editor & Publisher Magazine noted:
Strikingly absent from the [NYT] editors' note is any
flat-out admission that the Times as an institution
allowed the line to become indistinct between the Bush
Administration's claims and the newspaper's own
reporting. There is no admission that the nation's
leading print outlet bears some responsibility for the
march to war.
So this sentence does not exactly ring true: "It is
past time we turned the same light on ourselves." For
little light is provided on what actually happened.
The New York Times became a "player" in a three-way
echo chamber.
The public aside, Times reporting influenced the
executive and legislative branches of government, as
well as the Administration using the newspaper to get
its story out. Exile groups "gamed" both, with grave
consequence.
[LINK]
And, like the Bush Administration to whom the NYT news
section is so often tied at the hip, for the most
part, there are, as we have noted, no consequences to
the admission of responsibility. No one has been fired
or reprimanded at the NYT. No personnel changes appear
to be in the offing.
It would be easy to single out Judith Miller as the
chief culprit -- and she was the most visible
cheerleader for the Bush claims. But, as the NYT
public editor noted in his May 30th analysis of the
paper's Iraqi journalistic malfeasance, the problem
represents an institutional failure. Miller should
seek employment in the White House or Department of
Defense press secretary offices, but others should
also leave the NYT if its reputation is to be
restored.
In more ways than one, the NYT mimics the "hold the
team together whatever its incompetencies and
failures" philosophy of George W. Bush. Remember how
Bush visited the Pentagon, allegedly viewed photos of
torture and abuse of Iraqis by American military
personnel and contractors, and then emerged to
announce that Rumsfeld was doing a "superb" job?
Sounds a lot like the NYT dealing with journalistic
malpractice.
Make no mistake about it; the NYT tries to continue to
appear to be a liberal newspaper in its news coverage.
It tends to take a secular perspective on choice,
race, and gender issues, for instance. But being
"modern" and "urban" has not precluded the NYT from
being, in general, insidiously pro-Republican and
anti-Democratic Party in its presidential news
coverage, whatever specific exceptions it can offer to
the contrary.
The DailyHowler.com is the best chronicler of the
outrageously sneering and biased news coverage the NYT
(and Washington Post) have shown toward Democratic
presidential candidates and Bill Clinton. But you
don't need a daily scorecard. Just remember that it
was the New York Times that kept alive a Whitewater
story that was a non-story and blew on its embers
until Kenneth Starr was able to find a sexual act to
try and bring down Clinton. At that point, the NYT
passed the baton to the Washington Post, which became
a regular outlet for Starr's slimy leaks, although the
NYT still continued to give disproportionate coverage
to the trumped up impeachment efforts. It never fully
acknowledged its errors in being led by the nose down
the fruitless Whitewater and impeachment path by rabid
Republican leakers who pedaled Richard Mellon
Scaife-funded "research" to the NYT. If only the NYT
had and would apply such passion and resources to
exposing the REAL abuses of democracy undertaken daily
be the Bush administration.
And let's not forget that in one its few investigative
efforts over the past few years, the disastrous Wen Ho
Lee attack job on the Clinton administration blew up
in its face. Nor can we willingly accept how the NYT
acted as if Bush were legitimately elected, instead of
intensely investigating and analyzing the theft of a
presidential election.
And the NYT played a key role in propagating the
ridiculous caricature that Al Gore was a liar, while
it did little to expose the truth about George W.
Bush's disastrous and dissembling history as an
individual and as governor of Texas. As the "paper of
record," one of its most fundamental failures has been
allowing a gaggle of its political reporters to go
along with the Republican tactic of propagating
caricatures of Democratic presidential candidates.
When has a NYT political reporter written repeatedly
about the chronic lying of the Bush administration?
Where's the proportionality that marks good
journalistic news judgment?
It's been a long, long time since you could look at
the front page of the New York Times and believe that
you were being provided with a balanced political
perspective on the news, let alone issues like
Republican corruption and deceit. Despite how many
"liberals" love the "gray lady" for its cultural
coverage, a smattering of liberal columnists, its
extensive number of stories, and its traditionally
liberal editorial section, its news coverage has been
compromised again and again by a nod to the Republican
Party "Lee Atwater" propaganda team. If the NYT is the
epitome of the liberal media, as the right wing
claims, we are in big, big trouble. But we know that,
don't we?
Turning the NYT back into a "liberal" newspaper
requires more than a commitment to "fully intend to
continue aggressive reporting aimed at setting the
record straight."
Sloppy journalism that exceeds the error threshold of
cub reporters isn't an accident. You can be sure of
that.
Forced mea culpas are no longer sufficient from the
NYT.
What the New York Times needs is regime change.
It needs a publisher and news editor whose first
duties are to the democratic process in America -- and
to political coverage based on truth, policies and
competence, not on caricature and administration spin.
It needs regime change that will re-institute the
tradition of investigative reporting that uncovers the
wrongs done by political figures who violate the
public trust. It needs regime change to meet White
House pronouncements with skepticism, instead of
plastering them on the front page with several column
headlines. It needs regime change to send reporters to
the White House who can challenge WH babble that
doesn't pass the smell test, instead of passing on the
horse manure as news to the American public.
Why isn't there one reporter like Helen Thomas, a
courageous elderly journalist who is persona non grata
at the White House because she dares to challenge the
official spin, covering the White House for the New
York Times?
May the New York Times be reborn into a newspaper
that, to paraphrase a famous muckraking journalist,
afflicts the comfortable and comforts the afflicted.
May it return to its role, in its news section, as a
voice for democracy, the engagement of public policy
debate, uncoverer of corruption, investigative
journalism, and seeker after truth and justice.
But just as you can't clean up the stables of the
Defense Department with Donald Rumsfeld in place, only
regime change at the NYT will do the job.
Judith Miller should go, but so should all the
individuals responsible for a "corporate culture" at
the New York Times that has failed democracy.
A BUZZFLASH EDITORIAL