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02JUL2003
Anne Coulter - Not your average cunt
Ed. note: When Nancy Sinatra sang "These boots're made for walkin' / That's just what they'll
do / One of these days these boots are gonna walk all over you!", that was an afterthought.
Originally the song was to be sung by lyricist Lee Hazelwood, but it was too hard. In the 1960s,
Nancy Sinatra could make it just right, and right it was for the cocktail crowd.
Why mention it at all in the context of
Anne Coulter? Rush Limbaugh, Clear Channel and the right wing
talk show radio hosts have created a climate for assassination.
Indeed, Tom Daschle was targeted
for assassination by the anthrax killer right after 911. Forget Tom Brokaw, how about
Dan "The Treasonous" Rather? and
more recently they have encouraged the Dixie Chicks book (or CD) burnings.
Traitor is such an ugly word, right along with betrayal, and just yesterday I suggested that
Ralphie-boy Nader* is a "traitor" to the cause of socialism, but then
some might say I'm just saying that because I am a Trotskyite who still remembers that the traitor
Stalin betrayed socialism and killed Trotsky; that
the right wingers kill left wingers, but not the other way around - which is why ultimately the
right wing Fascists prevail as we have seen from the end of WWII until this day. While it is true
there was a temporary set-back for the Fascist cause with the demise of Adolf Hitler and Benito
Mussolini, the
backers of the Fascists went on to do great things - with the help of their German friends brought
in by William "Wild Bill" Donovan and Allen Dulles, as the
OSS (Office of Strategic Services) which
later became the CIA - Ex-nazi Wernher Von Braun and the likes put a man on the moon, after they
killed the President who suggested the idea, uh, of putting a man on the moon, not killing him...
Now to Anne Coulter, author of the New York Time best
seller
Slander: Liberal Lies About the American Right, and
Treason: Liberal Treachery -
From the Cold War to the War on Terrorism - Coulter is also known to some as
the whacked out bimbo with the political
morals of a ferret: What a bizzare and surreal character
she is. Religious Trotskyites
and atheists should pray that Coulter has her thing stitched up leaving a hole only big enough to pee
through but not open enough to procreate. She eats up our food, breathes up our air and she fronts for
the Limbaughs and the right wing media machine, who because she is a
woman of sorts can say "These boots're made for walkin'" and no one will take her seriously as
periodically democrats the likes of John Heinz, Mel Carnahan, Jerry Litton, John Kennedy, Jr. and Paul Wellstone die in plane crashes as Jayson Blair and David Manning interview mothers of
servicemen in Texas or tout upcoming Jessica Lynch movies.
All this to say, read Gerard Van der
Leun on traitors, free speech, and Ashcroftitus,
and
Jamie McCarthy on "treason" claims from the right and the left, and then take two aspirin and then
e-mail me in the morning. [MORE]
28NOV2003
The Nation's David Corn is Awarded The Woodstein!*
Ed. note: Davis Corn is recognized by The Geeze as 2003's Journalist of the Year - for breaking
the CIA agent outing story
A White House Smear, followed up with
CIA Leak Is Big Trouble For Bush, and for his Little-noticed cover-up: 9/11 story (below).
For those two stories alone David could have earned the Woodstein!
David is also recognized for his reporting of Ann Coulter outing herself on
the Chris Matthews Show - See Hard Ball Transcript.
Previous to the self-outing of Ann Coulter, David was in the write place at the write time
enough to have reported an otherwise disgusting Ann Coulter Religious War story.
The 9/11 cover-up and the Outing of
Valerie Plime stories also had an element of disgust, but in this business someone hasta
sort out the garbage.
As news stories go, it's rare that garbage piling up without proper
disposal ever has a happy ending - as we saw in the Lottery winners saved by garbage
strike story: "The Chicago area's garbage strike was a nuisance for many, but now it smells sweet
to two lottery winners who tossed their $10.5 million ticket prematurely." Realizing their
lottery ticket already thrown away might have been a winner, and because of the labor dispute
the garbage hadn't been picked up, a Chicago family was able to rescue their ticket before it wound
up in the land fill.
That's a good story, but it ain't the kind of work that merits a Woodstein!
Ann Coulter's Religious War
By DAVID CORN - The Nation
Republicans and conservatives say the darnest things.
First, Ann Coulter. Don't think I am obsessing over here just because this is my second mention of her
in two weeks. (See below). I don't recall having written about her madness before
these latest strikes. But it was hard to resist returning to the subject after reading an account of a
lecture she delivered to the impressionable minds of Northwestern University. She took the predictable
potshots at liberals. And then she proclaimed that the war on terror is a "religious war."
She explained, in a way:
"This is a religious war, not against Islam but for Christianity, for a Christian nation..."
MORE
Ann Coulter Goes to the Movies
By DAVID CORN - The Nation
Don't read this if you like Ann Coulter.
Don't read this if you want to believe Ann Coulter gets her facts straight.
MORE
16AUG2004
Is Kerry Losing Democratic Consensualism?
Reporters Ordered out of Najaf - for their own safety
The headline from Voice of America News reads, Journalists Ordered Out of Iraqi Holy City as
Battle Looms:
Iraqi police have forced journalists to leave the Iraqi holy city of Najaf, amid signs that a major U.S. and Iraqi military assault is imminent.
The Najaf police chief, Ghaleb al-Jazaeri, told reporters to leave by midday, and said he could not guarantee their safety if they stayed.
Earlier Sunday, U.S. troops massed at a nearby base moved to an area near a cemetery occupied by insurgents and U.S. tank fire boomed across the largely deserted central city.
A ceasefire Friday halted days of fierce fighting pitting supporters of firebrand Shi'ite cleric Moqtada al-Sadr against U.S. forces. Hundreds of insurgents are believed dead.
Iraq says its government made every effort to negotiate an end to the standoff. However, insurgents claim Baghdad ordered officials to scuttle the talks even though the two sides were making progress.
Freedom needs free press
The Telegraph UK
General Ghaleb al-Jazairi, police chief of Najaf, issued an instruction to journalists working in the Iraqi holy city yesterday that sounded remarkably like a threat.
"I have received orders from the interior minister, who demands that all local, Arab and foreign journalists leave the hotel and city within two hours," he said. "We have information that there is a 250kg car bomb targeting them. Therefore you should leave immediately for your own safety."
For their safety, or for the convenience of the Iraqi government? Just over a week ago, Iyad Allawi, the Iraqi prime minister, closed the Baghdad office of al-Jazeera, the Arab television station, on the grounds that it was circulating incitements to violence.
It was not clear how this action would "protect the people of Iraq", as Mr Allawi put it, since al-Jazeera would continue to broadcast throughout Iraq; but supporters of the government were prepared to give the new prime minister the benefit of the doubt.
Yesterday's events raise fresh doubts about the Iraqi government's concept of freedom. There is a fine
line between a willingness to act ruthlessly to restore order, and ruthlessness in the pursuit of
political expedience. MORE
Click
HERE for latest tomdispatch on Iraq and
the 9/11 Goat story - not necessarily in that order.
No Hard Data Yet from Venezuela
By Al Giordano - Posted on Mon Aug 16th, 2004 at 02:01:46 AM EST
CARACAS VENEZUELA; AUGUST 16, 2004, 2:00 A.M.: It was a day without
precedent: A record voter turnout
for the first-ever recall referendum on a president in the American hemisphere and an unprecedented
extension, twice moved, of the hour until which citizens could vote in response to unrivaled long lines
of voters going to the polls...
And at two o'clock the next morning, the country and the world await the results.
I'm still here in the Narco News informational war room, with various Venezuelan colleagues, waiting
for the National Electoral Council (CNE in its Spanish initials) to hold its press conference. So far
both sides - the supporters of the "yes" vote and supporters of the "no" vote - have refrained from
offering results in public, although both have spooned out discordant numbers, off the record, to us and
the rest of the press.
Click
HERE for latest NarcoNews from Venezuela.
INCITEMENT WATCH: 'OUR ENEMIES ARE ARABS/MUSLIMS'
Muslims must make a choice to stay in U.S.
With so many reports of possible terrorist plots, and with charges flying back and forth between the presidential candidates as to who can best protect us, I think we are losing sight of the constant: Our enemies are Arabs/Muslims.
They brought us 9/11, they have beheaded innocent civilians, and they are plotting against us, right here, right now. They, not George Bush or John Ashcroft, deserve your hatred and fear. Your local mosque, not Republican campaign headquarters, is where these plotters find support and funding. Their Dark Ages interpretation of Islam, not the Jews or Israel, is why they hate us.
Each time a Muslim cleric is arrested, the community insists that he is innocent. This has to stop. Muslim-Americans have to make a choice: You are Americans or you are Islamic barbarians. If you will not help law enforcement rout out the terrorists in your midst, sooner or later you will not be allowed to stay here.
America will not tolerate more 9/11s and the sight of Arabs/Muslims celebrating in the streets of American cities. As for law enforcement, it is time to take off the gloves in these communities. Arabs/Muslims know that their charitable contributions are being funneled to terrorist organizations. It is time to arrest these people as you close down their charities. Every imam should be wire-tapped; suspicious characters should be taken into custody and questioned.
But, you say, this is not the American way. Arabs/Muslims should be treated the same as everyone else. No way. They are the threat -- not Poles, or Italians, or Puerto Ricans.
If and when my people, Jews, fly planes into American buildings and threaten further attacks, we should receive the same harsh treatment.
Abe Krieger
HIGHLAND PARK
Ed. note: Jeez, don't get me started with this stuff! What? Is this guy living on Mars, or in Canada?
Is the "Abe Krieger" letter to the editor a hoax - to make Jews look like jerks or what? The enemy of
Muslims and Arab-Americans, and all other Americans in the United States is a CIA that would spy on
Americans on American soil. The enemies of America are those individuals and agencies that have so
politicized 9/11 that the United States of America is becoming 1984 - with an Orwellian news-peak, uh,
make that new-speak to match (See Karl Rove). The enemy of America is John Ashcroft and his so-called
Department of Justice, and the enforcers of the so-called Patriot Act. The enemy of the United States is
the FEMA on steroids and crack Department of Homeland Security - although Tom Ridge isn't long for
his cushy job anymore. He's going back to the private sector where he can make enough money to put
his kids through college.
Which reminds me, did you hear the one about "Go Duck!" and
Terrance Kelly, a De La Salle High School football star
who got the nod and a full scholarship from the University o' Arrrrrregon to play football here? Instead
he got killed in Richmond, California (see Oakland or the Bronx) - he didn't make it out in time. Just two
days before he was scheduled to arrive, he was gunned down in a shooting that the Richmond police have yet
to fully explain. See
DallasNewsRivals and
The (sports) Insider for some background. Channel 5 says
Suspect in Murder of East Bay HS Football Star is a Former Teammate, and the San Francisco Chronicle says,
Richmond police seek second suspect in killing of athlete.
Ducks attempt to move forward
By Bob Clark - The Register-Guard
All the anticipation, all the excitement of the approaching start to football practice at Oregon seemed
to drain away in one disheartening instant as word spread Friday that recruit Terrance Kelly had been
killed by an assailant in Richmond.
Now what, for the Ducks?
"It's going to be very difficult to begin a season," UO coach Mike Bellotti said. MORE
The University may never know greatness. We will never know if Terrance Kelly could have handed it to us for
four straight undefeated years, and trips to the Rose Bowl for four years straight. That would be great.
That woud be greatness! But we'll never now if it could have happened because Terrance Kelly didn't
make it out in time or his killer was allowed to stay too long. Yeah, "Go ducks!"
ON/OFF SUBJECT: The prophet 'Isa (Jesus), peace be upon him is said to have said some variation of, "The
Jews will always be with us." I have made this offer before, and I make it again. Both the Israelis and
Taiwanese are welcome here, and for the sake of peace in the world. The great state of Texas should be
divided into thirds and two of those thirds should be divided into lottery slots given over to people
who know peace and freedom is more important than real estate. The Wailing Wall could be moved to Texas,
stone by Holy stone, in exactly the way London Bridge was moved from London, and perfectly re-assembled
at Lake Havasu (City), Arizona.
Besides the Islamophobic
Abe Krieger letter, an interesting discussion is taking place on the
Home News Tribune site.
The following isn't from Nation of Islam/Black Muslim leader Louis Farrakhan, it is either from
Washington Post writer David Broder or it is a typographical error:
The restraint of America's Muslims
David S. Broder
LOS ANGELES - If I were an American Muslim, I might be getting a little angry.
Just listen to this: "Islam is like a virus, it affects the mind. It is a cancer that destroys the body it infects. The Koran is simply the 'software' for producing deviant cancer-cell political behavior and violence in human beings. No doctor would hesitate to eliminate cancer cells from the body."
Those are the considered views of one of the two authors of the anti-Kerry book: "Unfit for Command: Swift Boat Veterans Speak Out Against John Kerry."
Or how about this? In a Florida high school earlier this month, a 15-year-old Muslim girl, her account backed up in writing by at least four non-Muslim students in her history class, complained to authorities that the teacher made fun of her last name as sounding like Saddam Hussein's and said all Muslims were suicidal terrorists who must kill at least one American. (The Florida office of the Council on American-Islamic Relations has lodged a formal complaint that the school is investigating.)
And who can ever forget (answer: perhaps our commander-in-chief) the remarks of U.S. Army Lt. Gen. William Boykin, who publicly called the war on terrorism a battle with "Satan," claimed America had been targeted "because we're a Christian nation," and condemned Allah as "an idol," compared to the "real God," Christ.
If you were Islamic, mightn't you get a little hot under the collar?
What's therefore astonishing is the restraint of America's Muslims. There are more than 5 million of them, about two-thirds clustered in 10 states. But while Jewish-American groups have long had a profound impact on U.S. politics, Muslim Americans have not yet.
That may be changing. In the 2000 presidential election, many registered Muslim Americans voted for Republican George Bush. They responded warmly to his emphasis on conservative family values, and his outspoken opposition to detaining any American citizen, including Muslims, without proper safeguards. But with the widely publicized brutal treatment of detained Muslims in Iraq, the rise of the U.S. Patriot Act, Republican support for even tougher such legislation, and the failure to discipline Boykin, Muslims have begun to worry that the Christian Bush's praise for Islam as a "religion of peace" may be lip service at best.
One poll showed Bush's 83-percent 2001 favorable rating among Muslims to have been cut at least in half; another poll of Arab-American voters in four key electoral states (Florida, Michigan, Ohio and Pennsylvania) placed the president's approval rating at about 30 percent; a recent poll by the Council on American-Islamic Relations revealed Muslims much less inclined to vote for Bush than Kerry, about whom, however, they were so far anything but enthused.
Fortunately for Bush, these figures are in flux, and Muslim Americans, rather than being some sort of predictable monolithic voting bloc, are human beings like most of the rest of us who go into the voting booth with a variety of concerns. When we bluntly asked Matt Vray in the political office of the Washington-based Muslim American Society how U.S. Muslims will vote in November, he snapped back: "Every Muslim has a free will to vote as they'd like."
Quite so: Muslim Americans have the absolute right to expect to be regarded as human beings and not stereotyped as group suicide bombers.
In a recent speech, Malaysian Prime Minister Abdullah Ahmad Badawi, insisting that Muslims have only themselves to blame for the poor image of Islam today, told the world's 1 billion Muslims that they must modernize their faith, avoid mainstreaming extremists and spurn violence to resolve differences.
It was a brave and welcome speech, especially before an Islamic conference. But it is simply not true that Muslims are wholly to blame for their worldwide image problem. The West's many bigots who poison the political dialogue with ignorance or evil are responsible, too.
Such people are the new Ku Klux Klan in today's globalized world. Fanning the flames of intense religious and ethnic hatred, they comprise the new intellectual lynch mobs that bode to someday scorch the political Earth.
Neither President Bush, nor for that matter challenger John Kerry, appear to comprehend what is at stake. At a time when the world desperately needs a strong and clear voice to light the darkness and lead us out of the caves of ignorance and hatred, political pygmies, or religious bigots, stand in the way of progress. It's a tragedy in the making. And it's not the American way.
Maybe it is a Seattle-Times typo. UCLA professor Tom Plate, a member of the Pacific Council on
International Policy, is the founder of the
Asia Pacific Media Network.
Ed. note: Maybe I'm getting too old and sober to enjoy reading Christopher Hitchens anymore. In his feeble
attempt to
write around cheer-leading for Bush while getting real about Kerry; the latter he more or less
pulled off ok in
Taking the Measure of John Kerry, although throwing around "un homme serieux", and "peace time
president" didn't help.
How can Kerry lose? I mean, how can Kerry lose what he ain't got except in the mind of Cristopher
Hitchens who writes articles, gets published any day of the week even when he doesn't say anything - and
even in the New York Times? In those Times writings and not to dissapoint, Hitchins typically throws in
one good "penumbra" for good, uh,
measure, to boot.
Hitchens writes, "If Kerry is dogged and haunted by the accusation of wanting everything twice over, he
has come by the charge honestly. In Vietnam, he was either a member of a 'band of brothers' or of a
gang of war criminals, and has testified with great emotion to both convictions." Hitchens remembers
"Both Sides Now" by Joni Mitchell. Cute.
Carl Worden, a fellow-Oregonian e-pen pal friend since a year or two before 9/11 wrote, "Southern Oregon is solidly
conservative Republican Bush country,
which is why a recent visit by Democratic presidential candidate John Kerry raised so many eyebrows.
"When Vice President Dick Cheney visited the Rogue Valley about a week or so ago earlier, he drew a crowd of
around 3,000 people. When Kerry showed up, he drew a crowd of around 6,000 people, and some of
them carried 'Republicans for Kerry' signs.
"Based on my many travels to various regions of the nation, and my readership' responses, I am firmly
convinced George W. Bush is going to be defeated in November. I'm not happy to see Kerry as president,
but the evidence is simply too obvious to ignore any longer.
"There are a lot of people, some of them former Bush supporters, who would rather see a snake sitting in
the White House, than a man who has solidly betrayed Republican/conservative ideals so blatantly, but it's
the fact he's gotten so many of our kids in uniform killed that seems to be the unifying factor in ousting
Bush no matter who runs against him."
Carl is no peace-nik lefty. He's Republican, a Jew who converted to Christianity (not necessarly in that order), and
he's the Intelligence officer
for the Southern Oregon Militia - and not voting for Bush. Christopher Hitchens is afraid for Israel - and
he should be, and he lives so close to Washington, D.C., he's afraid about that too - and he should be, and
he's probably going to vote for Bush - at least that's how he writes it in discussing
"Democratic consensualism" and Kerry as "un homme serieux" and "the only Catholic Jew with
Mayflower-Winthrop roots to have sought the highest office..."
Goss Admits Being Unqualified to Head CIA
Zaman - Turkey's First Online Newspaper
Until Michael Moore came along, no one had seen a real live leper-con since Jesus chased
a bunch of pigs over a cliff in Bible times...
Michael Moore, director of several controversial films including 'Fahrenheit 9/11', produced an interview with Porter Goss that is set to send shockwaves through Washington political circles.
Congressman Porter Goss (R-Florida), who was recently tipped by Bush to head the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA), had to eat his own words as Moore brought forth an interview he had done with the Congressman during the filming of 'Fahrenheit 9/11'.
"I couldn't get a job with the CIA today. I am not qualified," Goss told the filmmaker.
"My language skills were Romance languages and stuff," continued Goss. "[The CIA] is looking for Arabists today. I don't have the cultural background, probably. And I certainly don't have the technical skills, as my children remind me every day, 'Dad, you got to get better on your computer.'"
Goss, who at one time had worked as a clandestine CIA agent in Latin America and Europe, did not comment
on the issue.
Click
HERE or on the Michael Moore pic (above) to see and hear Porter Goss in action. Also
check out the Michael
Moore website to see and hear the
George W Bush Declaration of War on America.
WMD: Weapons of Mass Deception
By Joe Baltake - Sacto Bee Movie Critic
When did journalists stop questioning the government and become self-appointed referees between the right
and the left? That's one of the questions asked with a healthy sense of righteous indignation by Danny
Schechter, an Emmy Award-winning TV journalist, network news veteran, author and media critic in this
searing documentary. In it, Schechter takes what was a footnote in Michael Moore's "Fahrenheit 9/11" -
namely, the mainstream media's willingness to become embedded with the military during its coverage of the
war in Iraq - and turned it into one angry feature-length film. He gamely attacks the idea of "one nation
under Television" - "a media war without end."
A self-described "network refugee" - Schechter is a former "20/20" producer - the filmmaker studied 720
hours of live war coverage and found the news misshaped and misreported. He takes us from the days of
Vietnam, when a reporter "did not get on the team" (Peter Arnett), to today's "handcuffed, managed news
reporting" (Christiane Amanpour). Patriotic fervor followed, notes Schechter, who adds, "The Bush
administration used 9/11 as a pretext to implement secret plans to invade Iraq. ... Patriotic correctness
swept through the news business. There was more debate in the streets than on TV, which relayed the
government's spin without much question. Without their cheerleading, there would have been no consensus
for war."
Schechter opens his powerful film with a quote from Marshall McLuhan: "If there were no coverage, there
would be no war."
Help us break through the economic interest of the news culture*
There two wars waged in Iraq. One fought will bombs artillery, and armies of soldiers. The other
war fought with cameras satellites and armies of journalists. In a hard hitting personal film, media
critic Danny Schechter, former network news producer, turns the cameras away from the shock and awe;
taking aim at the role media plays promoting the war and distorting the news. Confronting journalists,
anchors, news managers and Pentagon propagandists, news dissector Danny Schechter challenges a pro-war
narrative driven by jingoism not journalism. Finally, after these many months of TV militainment, a
film dissects the war we never saw. There may be no weapons of mass destruction but there still are
weapons of mass deception. "Truth does have a way of coming out. I believe the American people
deserve the truth."
See
WEAPONS OF MASS DECEPTION TRAILER narrated by Tim Robbins.
*To help with finishing and distribution chores,
contact Danny Schechter.
Muslim roots of the blues
The music of famous American blues
singers reaches back through the South
to the culture of West Africa
By Jonathan Curiel - San Francisco Chronicle Page E - 1
Ed. note: A click-to the
MPEG Audio page will reveal some astounding sounds and
revelations...
Sylviane Diouf knows her audience might be skeptical, so to demonstrate the connection between Islam and American blues music, she'll play two recordings: The Muslim call to prayer (the religious recitation that's heard from mosques around the world), and "Levee Camp Holler" an early type of blues song that first sprang up in the Mississippi Delta more than 100 years ago.
"Levee Camp Holler" is no ordinary song. It's the product of ex-slaves who worked moving earth all day in post-Civil War America. The version that Diouf uses in presentations has lyrics that, like the call to prayer, speak about a glorious God. ("Well, Lord, I woke up this mornin', man, I feelin' bad . . . Well, I was thinkin' 'bout the good times, Lord, I once have had.") But it's the song's melody and note changes that closely parallel one of Islam's best-known refrains. As in the call to prayer, "Levee Camp Holler" emphasizes words that seem to quiver and shake in the reciter's vocal chords. Dramatic changes in musical scales punctuate both "Levee Camp Holler" and the call to prayer. A nasal intonation is evident in both.
"I did a talk a few years ago at Harvard where I played those two things, and the room absolutely exploded in clapping, because (the connection) was obvious," says Diouf, an author and scholar who is also a researcher at New York's Schomburg Center for Research in Black Culture. "People were saying, 'Wow. That's really audible. It's really there.' "
It's really there because of all the Muslim slaves from West Africa who were taken by force to the United States for three centuries, from the 1600s to the mid-1800s. Upward of 30 percent of the African slaves in the United States were Muslim, and an untold number of them spoke and wrote Arabic, historians say now. Despite being pressured by slave owners to adopt Christianity and give up their old ways, many of these slaves continued to practice their religion and customs, or otherwise melded traditions from Africa into their new environment in the antebellum South. Forced to do menial, back-breaking work on plantations, for example, they still managed, throughout their days, to voice a belief in the God of the Quran. These slaves' practices eventually evolved -- decades and decades later, parallel with different singing traditions from Africa -- into the shouts and hollers that begat blues music, historians believe.
Another way that Muslim slaves had an indirect influence on blues music: the instruments they played. Drumming (which was common among slaves from the Congo and other non-Muslim regions of Africa) was banned by white slave owners, who felt threatened by its ability to let slaves communicate with each other and by the way it inspired large gatherings of slaves. Stringed instruments (which were favored by slaves from Muslim regions of Africa, where there's a long tradition of musical storytelling) were generally allowed because slave owners considered them akin to European instruments like the violin. So slaves who managed to cobble together a banjo or other instrument (the American banjo originated with African slaves) could play more widely in public. This solo- oriented slave music featured elements of an Arabic-Islamic song style that had been imprinted by centuries of Islam's presence in West Africa, says Gerhard Kubik, an ethnomusicology professor at the University of Mainz in Germany who has written the most comprehensive book on Africa's connection to blues music ("Africa and the Blues").
An influence on the blues
Kubik believes that many of today's blues singers unconsciously echo these Arabic-Islamic patterns in their music. Using academic language to describe this habit, Kubik writes in "Africa and the Blues" that "the vocal style of many blues singers using melisma, wavy intonation, and so forth is a heritage of that large region of West Africa that had been in contact with the Arabic-Islamic world of the Maghreb since the seventh and eighth centuries." (Melisma is the use of many notes in one syllable; so, instead of a note that produces, say, a single sound of "ah," you'd get a note that produces something like, "ah-ahhhh-ahhh-ah-ah." Wavy intonation refers to a series of notes that veer from major to minor scale and back again, something that's very common in both blues music and in the Muslim call to prayer. The Maghreb is the Arab-Muslim region of North Africa.)
Kubik summarizes his thesis this way: "Many traits that have been considered unusual, strange and difficult to interpret by earlier blues researchers can now be better understood as a thoroughly processed and transformed Arabic-Islamic stylistic component."
The extent of this link between Islam and American blues music is still being debated. Some scholars continue to insist there is no connection, and many of today's best-known blues musicians would say their music has little to do with a religion whose most extreme clerics regularly deride the evils of Western pop music. Yet a growing body of evidence -- gathered by academics like Kubik, and by others like Cornelia Walker Bailey, a Georgia author whose great-great-great-great-grandfather was a Georgia slave who prayed toward Mecca -- suggest a deep relationship between slaves of Islamic descent and U. S. culture. To be sure, Muslim slaves from West Africa were just one factor in the formation of American blues music, but they were a factor, says Barry Danielian, a trumpeter who's performed with Paul Simon, Natalie Cole and Tower of Power.
Call to prayer
Danielian, who is Muslim, says non-Muslims find this connection hard to believe because they don't know enough about Arabic or Islamic music. The call to prayer and other Muslim recitations that were practiced by American slaves had a musicality to them, just as these recitations still do, even if they aren't thought of as music by Westerners, Danielian says.
"I'm part of the Tijaniyya Sufi order, which is based in West and North Africa," says Danielian, who lives in Jersey City, N.J. "And I know that when we get together, especially when the cheikhs (leaders) come and everybody gets together and there are hundreds of people and we do the litanies, they're very musical. You hear what we as Americans would call soulfulness or blues. That's definitely in there."
What Americans now think of as blues music developed in the 1890s and early 1900s, in Southern states like Louisiana, Mississippi and Alabama. Blues music was an outgrowth of all the different music that was then being performed in the South, from minstrels to street shows. Early blues performers didn't recognize the music's African or Muslim roots because, by then, the songs had more fully merged with white, European music and had lost their obvious connections to a continent that was 4,000 miles away. Also, by the turn of the 20th century, the progeny of America's Muslim slaves had generally converted to Christianity, either by force or circumstance. Among Southern blacks in that period, there were few exponents of Islam. But as more scholars like Diouf and Kubik research that period in history, they see plenty of signs that weren't obvious 100 years ago.
Take the case of W.C. Handy, who earned the moniker "Father of the Blues" for the way he formalized the music over a 40-year career of writing songs and playing the cornet. In his autobiography, Handy (whose parents were slaves) writes about a life-changing moment that happened around 1903. Handy was sleeping at a train station in Tutwiler, Miss., when "a lean, loose-jointed Negro had commenced plucking a guitar beside me while I slept. His clothes were rags; his feet peeped out of his shoes. His face had on it some of the sadness of the ages. As he played, he pressed a knife on the strings of the guitar. ... The effect was unforgettable. His song, too, struck me instantly. . .. The singer repeated the line ("Goin' where the Southern cross' the Dog") three times, accompanying himself on the guitar with the weirdest music I had ever heard."
Singing about everything
The song was about a nearby train station where different trains intersected. As Handy noted in the autobiography (which was published in 1941), "Southern Negroes sang about everything. Trains. Steamboats, steam whistles, sledgehammers, fast women, mean bosses, stubborn mules -- all became subjects for their songs. They accompany themselves on anything from which they can extract a musical sound or rhythmical effect, anything from a harmonica to a washboard. In this way, and from these materials, they set the mood for what we now call the blues."
While washboards, in fact, became popular among later blues musicians such as Robert Brown (known as "Washboard Sam"), the technique that Handy witnessed -- that of pressing a knife on guitar strings -- can be traced to Central and West Africa, where, as Kubik points out in "Africa and the Blues," people play one-string zithers that way. Handy assumed the technique (which is now called "slide guitar") was borrowed from Hawaiian guitar playing, but it's more likely that the itinerant guitar player that Handy met in Tutwiler was manifesting his African roots. Kubik has traveled to Africa many times for his research and has lived there.
Bailey, who visited West Africa in 1989, says the African and Muslim roots of Southern U.S. traditions are often mistaken for something else.
Churches face east
Bailey lives on Georgia's Sapelo Island, where a small community of blacks can trace their ancestry to Bilali Mohammed, a Muslim slave who was born and raised in what is now the country of Guinea. Visitors to Sapelo Island are always struck by the fact that churches there face east. In fact, as a child, Bailey learned to say her prayers facing east -- the same direction that her great-great-great-great-grandfather faced when he prayed toward Mecca.
Bilali was an educated man. He spoke and wrote Arabic, carried a Quran and a prayer rug, and wore a fez that likely signified his religious devotion. (Bilali had been trained in Africa to be a Muslim leader; on Sapelo Island, he was appointed by his slave master to be an overseer of other slaves). Although Bilali's descendents adopted Christianity, they incorporated Muslim traditions that are still evident today.
The name Bailey, in fact, is a reworking of the name Bilali, which became a popular Muslim name in Africa because one of Islam's first converts -- and the religion's first muezzin -- was a former Abyssinian slave named Bilal. (Muezzins are those who recite the call to prayer from the minarets of mosques. ) One historian believes that abolitionist Frederick Douglass, who changed his name from Frederick Bailey, may have had Muslim roots.
"History changes things," says Bailey, 59, who chronicled the history of Sapelo Island in her memoir, "God, Dr. Buzzard, and the Bolito Man." "Things become something different from what they started out as."
A good example is the song "Little Sally Walker." It's been recorded by many blues artists, but it's also been recorded as "Little Sally Saucer" (the lyrics describe a girl "sittin' in a saucer"). Frankie Quimby, a relative of Bailey's who also traces her roots to Bilali Mohammed, says the song originated during slavery on the Georgia coast, written by songwriting slaves who took the last name (Walker) of their slave owners.
"I've seen (people) take the song and use different words," says Quimby, who sings slave songs with her husband in a group called the Georgia Sea Island Singers, which recently performed for President Bush and his Cabinet. "We're educating people about this."
Guitar derived from Arab oud
Because there is little documentation about these slave-time origins, it's easy to argue about what can be unequivocally linked to Africa and Islam. Islam and Arab culture have certainly been influences on other music around the world, including flamenco, which is rooted in seven centuries of Muslim rule in Spain.
The modern guitar is a direct descendant of the oud, an Arabic lute that was introduced to Europe during Spain's Muslim reign. In fact, there's a connection between Renaissance music and Arab-Islamic culture, a connection that academics have studied with more precision than the connection between black Muslim slaves in America and this country's blues music.
So far, knowledge of Islam's association with blues music seems limited to a select group of academics and musicians. Books like Kubik's "Africa and the Blues" (published in 1999 by the University Press of Mississippi) and Diouf's "Servants of Allah: African Muslims Enslaved in the Americas" (published in 1998 by New York University Press) are more geared toward university audiences. Kubik's book, for example, is weighed down with chapters of dense writing and obscure references.
In terms of popular culture, it's hard to find a single work -- whether it's a novel, movie, song or other art form -- that covers the topic of Islam, music and African slaves. "Daughters of the Dust," Julie Dash's 1991 film about life on the Sea Islands of Georgia, features a Muslim man who portrays Bilali Mohammed, but a scene that shows him in prayer lasts just a few moments, and the movie received limited release.
"Roots," Alex Haley's novel that was made into a historic TV series in the 1970s, featured a main character (Kunte Kinte) who is Muslim, although novelist James Michener and others doubted the authenticity of Haley's work.
As more people become aware of the connection between Islam and the blues, there will be an inevitable shift in perception of how the Muslim religion has spread across continents and influenced other cultures. The difference between Spain, which once was conquered by Muslims, and the United States is that African slaves were brought to this country in chains, against their will, to do hard labor. The slave trade led to a diaspora unlike any other in human history, with at least 10 million Africans bought and sold into bondage in the Americas. Those slaves' pain is evident in American blues music -- a music that's often about cruel treatment, sad times and a yearning to break free. Blues music is a unique American art form that went around the world and, in turn, influenced history. Without the blues, there wouldn't be jazz, wouldn't be the bluesy music of the Rolling Stones and the Beatles.
Bending of notes
In his book "Black Music of Two Worlds," author John Storm Roberts says he can hear patterns of Islamic African music in the songs of Billie Holiday. Roberts refers to the "bending of notes" that is evident in Holiday's sad, soulful ballads as well as the call to prayer. This same note-bending can be heard in the music of B.B. King and John Lee Hooker. Blues music, with its thriving tempos and many lyrical references to relationships, has often been described as "the devil's music" by those on the outside looking in. Even many devout Muslims think of blues music as decadent and indicative of permissive Western morals.
People like Diouf, Kubik and Moustafa Bayoumi, an associate professor of English at Brooklyn College, City University of New York, who has researched Islam's connection to American music, are trying to correct the public record. Bayoumi wrote a paper two years ago that examined African Muslim history in the United States in which he argues that John Coltrane's best-known album, "A Love Supreme," features Coltrane saying, "Allah Supreme" in addition to the many refrains of "A Love Supreme."
"It's about uncovering a hidden past," says Bayoumi, asked about the spate of new scholarship on the subject of Islam and African Americans. "You can hear (influences of Islam) in even the earliest days of American blues music. What you've gotten lately is an ethnomusicology that's trying to reconstruct that. These are deliberate attempts to rebuild a bridge, as it were."
E-mail Jonathan Curiel at jcuriel@sfchronicle.com.
The Sinking Value of the Wal-Mart Experience
By Stephen Crockett
I have been thinking about writing an editorial on Wal-Mart for several months. Rarely does a personal experience as a consumer get me to write so much as a complaint letter. This comentary is the exception. I just tried to exchange a defective pair of black leather tennis shoes to my local Wal-Mart and had the store manager (Mr. Patel at the Fayetteville, Tennessee store) try to blame the defect on me. He refused to make the exchange after telling me that they personally inspect every shoe. Somebody obviously missed the pair I bought. I got angry over his implication that I was conning Wal-Mart for a pair of shoes and the time I wasted. It was not the lost money.
I am only out about $30, tax and all, which is certainly no big deal. It was the first time I had ever tried to exchange anything I ever bought. Like most men, I have a garage full of purchases that should have been exchanged. However, for most men, admitting to a store clerk that we made a bad-purchasing decision is sort of like asking for directions when lost driving. It just almost never happens. If the shoes had not been blatantly defective, I would still own them. I bought 20 pairs of the same type of shoe from Wal-Mart over the past 6 or 7 years. Men are creatures of habit.
While wasting around an hour at the customer service counter, I started thinking about all those abused customers of Corporate chain stores all over America that are stuck with bad purchases of largely, imported, low quality merchandise in dollar amount to low to take to court. Most do not have talk radio shows or widely published newspaper columns to vent their frustrations. All they can do is boycott the store like I am doing to Wal-Mart from this day forward.
It takes the collective action of hundreds of thousands of consumers to really hurt Corporate giants like Wal-Mart. I never liked Wal-Martıs anti-union attitudes clear back to the good ole days of Sam Walton. Sam was nice to his customers but really hated unions. I limited my purchases somewhat as a result but still bought some things because of convenience.
I, also, limited my purchases there because Wal-Mart hurts many local businesses when it moves into a community. You can almost see the slow death of small town commercial centers, as one family-owned store after another goes out of business, once Wal-Mart moves into town. The boarded up stores in small towns all over the South are testimony to the commercial power of Wal-Mart. This experience is spreading nationally as Wal-Mart expands geographically and into the grocery business.
In the Sam Walton days, the damage of this retailing giantıs expansion was lessened by some company policies. Wal-Mart hired many local people and that partially offset the loss of jobs by local family-owned retailers. The jobs did not pay well and did not have the best of benefits, but they were still jobs. Now, Wal-Mart has started installing self-checkout counters instead of hiring enough employees to provide quick service. They are not alone in taking this approach to cost cutting.
I urge everyone to stop by the customer service of any giant Corporate retailer from Wal-Mart to Home Depot to file complaints about them using self-checkout counters instead of hiring enough workers. Threaten to take your business elsewhere. Ask the employees for complaint forms.
We have lost far to many jobs to Corporate purchasing decisions to stock cheap, poor quality imported merchandise instead of buying American made goods! Just in the less than 4 years of the George W. Bush's Administration, we have lost existing jobs and failed to create new jobs (in order to keep up with natural population growth) to the tune of a 7 million job shortfall! While the rich get richer, the rest of us struggle trying to get by. Millions of Americans have been forced out of the job market entirely (living on family or welfare). Millions of Americans are living at the very edges of our society and the number is growing. This is the result of Corporate decisions and government policy influenced or controlled by Corporate political and economic power.
The advertising hook that first made me become a Wal-Mart customer was their highly promoted "BUY AMERICAN" commitment. Finding American made merchandise in Wal-Mart and other Corporate retail chains has become a real challenge for customers.
I remember when Wal-Mart had a policy of opening more checkout counters when a certain specific number of customers were waiting in line. They do not seem to care how long the customer waits now if they can hire fewer workers based on my personal experience. Wal-Mart was once known for treating their customers well (if not exactly doing the same with their employees despite their advertising claims.)
In my opinion, the customers and employees both need to stage a little public revolt against the top Corporate management. The workers need to unionize. The customers need to complain loudly and vote with their wallets. There are other stores (especially locally owned, family businesses) where you can get quality goods and personal service. I intend on spending my money in those places.
If getting burnt on a $30 pair of shoes finally gets me to do the right thing as a customer and a writer, it was worth it. As I drop them in the trash, I am smiling. See ya later, Wal-Mart!!!!
Stephen Crockett is co-host of Democratic Talk Radio
Mail: 7A Planville Drive, Fayetteville, Tennessee 37334. Phone: 931-438-1500 or 443-421-0287.
More Weekday Morning News at The News Dissector blog
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More Weekday Morning News at The News Dissector blog
The Path to War
By Bryan Burroughs, Evgenia Peretz,
David Rose and David Wise
In the May 2004 edition of Vanity Fair is published The Path to War by Bryan Burroughs, Evgenia Peretz,
David Rose and David Wise. A mighty work. After the
Jim Lehrer blunder, who can be trusted no matter the
number of journalists who agree? I mostly already knew and agree with
The Path to War conclusion; what
happened and how (the "justifiable" means by which) the Bush White House (neocon) neo-Fascists drug us into that
war.
Also in the May 2004 edition of Vanity Fair is an excerpt from The Documents
That Reveal How Bush Sold Us a War, by John Prados.
As though
The Price of Loyalty by Paul O'Neill,
Against All Enemies by Richard Clarke, and the
Vanity Fair piece were not enough, Bob Woodward has a new book,
Plan of Attack on
the subject that got a lot of TV news attention from Friday night on, even Saturday, of course the Sunday talk
shows cover it cover to cover, and then there's the Mike Wallace interview of Woodward on 60 Minutes.
16-18APR2004
The Last Word on a Cause (Palestine) and Effect (9/11) World
Yesterday we recommended subcribing to Danny Schechter's
New Dissector blog, Tom Engelhardt at tomdispatch, and 20/20 Vision.
Today we are adding the Daily Mislead to the list of
subscription musts. Subscribe!
===============================
THE DAILY MIS-LEAD
daily.misleader.org
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BUSH CONTRADICTS SELF AT HIS OWN PRESS CONFERENCE
During his prime time press conference, President Bush once again
claimed that "there was nobody in our government, at least, and I don't
think the prior government that could envision flying airplanes into
buildings" (1). But just minutes later at the same press conference the
president proved he was not telling the truth.
Specifically, Bush said the reason he supposedly requested intelligence
briefings before 9/11 "had to do with the Genoa G-8 conference I was going
to attend" in 2001. Bush was referring to the fact that, prior to that
conference, he was warned that "Islamic terrorists might attempt to kill him
and other leaders by crashing an airliner into the summit" meetings (2).
His statement that "the prior government" had not taken precautions against
terrorists using planes as weapons is also contradicted by the facts. The
Wall Street Journal recently reported that under President Clinton, "the
federal government had on several earlier occasions taken elaborate, secret
measures to protect special events from just such an attack" (3) after
receiving intelligence warnings (4).
At the press conference, Bush also claimed to have no "inkling whatsoever"
(5) about an attack before 9/11. But the Washington Post today reports that
newly-declassified information shows that the president did not just receive
one intelligence briefing about an imminent Al Qaeda attack, but "a stream"
of repeated warnings (6). In April and May 2001, for example, the
intelligence community titled some of those reports "Bin Laden planning
multiple operations," "Bin Laden network's plans advancing" and "Bin Laden
threats are real." The CIA explicitly told the Administration that upcoming
attacks would "occur on a catastrophic level, indicating that they would
cause the world to be in turmoil."
Sources:
1.
President Addresses the Nation in Prime Time Press Conference - 04/13/2004
2.
Italy Tells of Threat at Genoa Summit Los Angeles Times - 09/27/2001
3. Wall Street Journal - 04/01/2004
4.
Report Warned Of Suicide Hijackings CBS News - 05/10/2002
5.
President Addresses the Nation in Prime Time Press Conference - 04/13/2004
6.
Panel Says Bush Saw Repeated Warnings Washington Post - 04/14/2004
Visit Misleader.org for more about Bush Administration distortion.
I believe the projective Bush White House nightmare is finally over. Iraq has blown up in their collective USUKI
face. As was pointed out in
Fallujanomics by Khalid Kishtainy, the whole world now knows that in retaliation for the brutal murder of four
bully-boy mercenaries (so-called "contractors") in Fullujah, U.S. forces went in and massacred 600
Iraqis; "combatants", old men, women and children.
Sandwiched in-between Fallujah and the Pvt. Maupin capture video, is the bin-Laden tape. It will still take the
media and the unsuspecting American people a few more days to find out; i.e., for the proverbial penny to drop.
Apparently Usama bin Laden will have the Last Word. While he didn't start it, he ended it substantively. "It" is
Palestine (as the cause) and 9/11 (as the effect), and it's aftermath - where pettiness and ugly-Americanism has
no part. With the unintended help of the George W Bush White House (neocon) Neo-Fascists and their War on
Terrorism via Iraq, we see the Middle East map being re-drawn. In his Holy War, bin Laden has wrestled the King
James (Version) of Armageddon away from descendants of the Crusaders. Usama looks (backwards) and has effectively
locked a fix onto the Golden Age of Islam. The rest, as they say, is history - in the making.
Generally speaking, we don't get substantive and objective journalism news from (English language) western media,
and U.S. media is even worse. There are exceptions, as we have noted (above), and add to that list, the BBC, the
Independent, and the Guardian. BuzzFlash
and Information Clearing House are both good at sorting out on-point articles from the domestic and world
press.
From any and all sources and resources, westerners could not "get" it because we did not get a true rendering of
what Usama had to say on the subject. There isn't enough sound-byte time in western-world for "terrorist" messages.
Try these...
Excerpts From Alleged Bin Laden Tape
Excerpts from an audiotape aired Thursday on Al-Jazeera television and attributed to Osama bin Laden. Translated
from Arabic by The Associated Press.
"I am offering a truce to European countries, and its core is our commitment to cease operations against any
country which does not carry out an onslaught against Muslims or interfere in their affairs as part of the big
American conspiracy against the Islamic world."
"The truce will begin when the last soldier leaves our countries. The door to a truce is open for three months
starting with the release of this statement. Whoever wants reconciliation and the right (way), then we are the
ones who initiated it, so stop spilling our blood so we can stop spilling your blood."
"What happened on September 11 and March 11 was your goods delivered back to you."
"Security is a need for all humans, and we could not let you have a monopoly on it for yourselves. People who are
aware would not let their politicians jeopardize their security."
"By describing us and our actions as terrorism, you are necessarily describing yourself and your actions. ... Our
actions are reactions to your actions that destroy and kill our people in Afghanistan, Iraq and Palestine."
"In which religion are your killed innocent and ours specks of dust? In which sect is your blood (real) blood,
and ours, water? It is justice to be treated in the same way, and he who initiates injustice is more unjust."
"This war brings billions of dollars to big companies, either to those that manufacture weapons or those who
reconstruct Iraq, like Halliburton and its sister companies. And from here it becomes clear who benefits from the
outbreak of wars and bloodshed: war traders and vampires who administer world politics from behind the curtain."
"I plead with the honest people, intellectuals, activists and traders to form a permanent committee to raise
people's awareness for the justice of our causes -- on top of which comes Palestine."
"If they (the United States) were seeking peace ... they wouldn't have to lie to people and claim that we kill
for the sake of killing. Reality shows that they lie. When we killed the Russians, it was after their invasion of
Afghanistan and Chechnya; the killing of Europeans was after the invasion of Iraq and Afghanistan; the killing of
Americans ... was after their support for Jews in Palestine and their invasion of the Arabian peninsula; killing
them (U.S. soldiers) in Somalia was after their invasion in a peacekeeping mission."
Osama Bin Laden's Offer For Peace
jihadunspun.com
Complete Statement Of Osama Bin Laden Address to the European Countries:
Praise be to Almighty God; Peace and prayers be upon our Prophet Muhammad, his family, and companions.
This is a message to our neighbours north of the Mediterranean, containing a reconciliation initiative as a response to their positive reactions.
Praise be to God; praise be to God; praise be to God who created heaven and earth with justice and who allowed the oppressed to punish the oppressor in the same way.
Peace upon those who followed the right path:
In my hands there is a message to remind you that justice is a duty towards those whom you love and those whom you do not. And people's rights will not be harmed if the opponent speaks out about them.
The greatest rule of safety is justice, and stopping injustice and aggression. It was said: Oppression kills the oppressors and the hotbed of injustice is evil. The situation in occupied Palestine is an example. What happened on 11 September [2001] and 11 March [the Madrid train bombings] is your commodity that was returned to you.
It is known that security is a pressing necessity for all mankind. We do not agree that you should monopolise it only for yourselves. Also, vigilant people do not allow their politicians to tamper with their security.
Having said this, we would like to inform you that labelling us and our acts as terrorism is also a description of you and of your acts. Reaction comes at the same level as the original action. Our acts are reaction to your own acts, which are represented by the destruction and killing of our kinfolk in Afghanistan, Iraq and Palestine.
The act that horrified the world; that is, the killing of the old, handicapped [Hamas spiritual leader] Sheikh Ahmed Yassin, may God have mercy on him, is sufficient evidence.
We pledge to God that we will punish America for him, God willing.
Which religion considers your killed ones innocent and our killed ones worthless? And which principle considers your blood real blood and our blood water? Reciprocal treatment is fair and the one who starts injustice bears greater blame.
As for your politicians and those who have followed their path, who insist on ignoring the real problem of occupying the entirety of Palestine and exaggerate lies and falsification regarding our right in defence and resistance, they do not respect themselves.
They also disdain the blood and minds of peoples. This is because their falsification increases the shedding of your blood instead of sparing it.
Moreover, the examining of the developments that have been taking place, in terms of killings in our countries and your countries, will make clear an important fact; namely, that injustice is inflicted on us and on you by your politicians, who send your sons - although you are opposed to this - to our countries to kill and be killed.
Therefore, it is in both sides' interest to curb the plans of those who shed the blood of peoples for their narrow personal interest and subservience to the White House gang.
We must take into consideration that this war brings billions of dollars in profit to the major companies, whether it be those that produce weapons or those that contribute to reconstruction, such as the Halliburton Company, its sisters and daughters.
Based on this, it is very clear who is the one benefiting from igniting this war and from the shedding of blood. It is the warlords, the bloodsuckers, who are steering the world policy from behind a curtain.
As for President Bush, the leaders who are revolving in his orbit, the leading media companies and the United Nations, which makes laws for relations between the masters of veto and the slaves of the General Assembly, these are only some of the tools used to deceive and exploit peoples.
All these pose a fatal threat to the whole world.
The Zionist lobby is one of the most dangerous and most difficult figures of this group. God willing, we are determined to fight them.
Based on the above, and in order to deny war merchants a chance and in response to the positive interaction shown by recent events and opinion polls, which indicate that most European peoples want peace, I ask honest people, especially ulema, preachers and merchants, to form a permanent committee to enlighten European peoples of the justice of our causes, above all Palestine. They can make use of the huge potential of the media.
I also offer a reconciliation initiative to them, whose essence is our commitment to stopping operations against every country that commits itself to not attacking Muslims or interfering in their affairs - including the US conspiracy on the greater Muslim world.
This reconciliation can be renewed once the period signed by the first government expires and a second government is formed with the consent of both parties.
The reconciliation will start with the departure of its last soldier from our country.
The door of reconciliation is open for three months of the date of announcing this statement.
For those who reject reconciliation and want war, we are ready.
As for those who want reconciliation, we have given them a chance. Stop shedding our blood so as to preserve your blood. It is in your hands to apply this easy, yet difficult, formula. You know that the situation will expand and increase if you delay things.
If this happens, do not blame us - blame yourselves.
A rational person does not relinquish his security, money and children to please the liar of the White House.
Had he been truthful about his claim for peace, he would not describe the person who ripped open pregnant women in Sabra and Shatila [reference to Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon] and the destroyer of the capitulation process [reference to the Palestinian-Israeli peace process] as a man of peace.
He also would not have lied to people and said that we hate freedom and kill for the sake of killing. Reality proves our truthfulness and his lie.
The killing of the Russians was after their invasion of Afghanistan and Chechnya; the killing of Europeans was after their invasion of Iraq and Afghanistan; and the killing of Americans on the day of New York [reference to 11 September] was after their support of the Jews in Palestine and their invasion of the Arabian Peninsula.
Also, killing them in Somalia was after their invasion of it in Operation Restore Hope. We made them leave without hope, praise be to God.
It is said that prevention is better than cure. A happy person is he who learns a lesson from the experience of others.
Heeding right is better than persisting in falsehood.
Peace be upon those who follow guidance.
GLOBAL JIHAD - 'White House gang ... fatal danger to the world'
WorldNetDaily.com
Calling President Bush a danger to the world, the taped message concludes:
"When you look at what happened and is happening, the killing in our countries and in yours, an important fact emerges, and that is that the oppression is forced on both us and you by your politicians who send your sons, against your will, to our country to kill and to be killed.
"Therefore, both sides have an interest in thwarting those who shed the blood of the peoples for their own narrow interests, out of vassalage to the White House gang ... .
"This war makes millions of dollars for big corporations, either weapons manufacturers or those working in the reconstruction [of Iraq], such as Halliburton and its sister companies...
"It is crystal clear who benefits from igniting the fire of this war and this bloodshed: They are the merchants of war, the bloodsuckers who run the policy of the world from behind the scenes.
"President Bush and his ilk, the media giants, and the U.N. ... all are a fatal danger to the world, and the Zionist lobby is their most dangerous member. Allah willing, we will persist in fighting them..."
"Therefore, in order to thwart opportunities for the merchants of war, and in response to the positive developments that were expressed in recent events and in the public opinion polls, which determined that most European peoples want peace, I urge ... the establishment of a permanent commission to nurture awareness among Europeans regarding the justness of our causes, particularly the cause of Palestine, and that use be made of the vast media resources to this end.
"I hereby offer them a peace treaty, the essence of which is our commitment to halt actions against any country that commits itself to refraining from attacking Muslims or intervening in their affairs, including the American conspiracy against the larger Islamic world.
"This peace treaty can be renewed at the end of the term of a government and the rise of another, with the agreement of both sides.
"The peace treaty will be in force upon the exit of the last soldier of any given [European] country from our land.
"The door of peace will remain open for three months from the broadcast of this statement. Whoever rejects the peace and wants war should know that we are the men [of war], and whoever wants a peace treaty and signs it, we hereby allow this peace treaty with him.
"Stop shedding our blood in order to protect your own blood. The solution to this easy - difficult equation is in your own hands. You should know that the longer you delay, the worse the situation will become, and when that happens, do not blame us, blame yourselves...
"As for those who lie to people and say that we hate freedom and kill for the sake of killing - reality proves that we are the speakers of truth and they lie, because the killing of the Russians took place only after their invasion of Afghanistan and Chechnya; the killing of the Europeans took place only after the invasion of Iraq and Afghanistan; the killing of the Americans in the Battle of New York took place only after their support for the Jews in Palestine and their invasion of the Arabian Peninsula; their killing in Somalia happened only after Operation Restore Hope. We restored [i.e. repelled] them without hope, by the grace of Allah."
bin Laden has clearly and decisively tonked on USUKI, leaving the U.S., Britain and Israel permanently out of
the game.
Tom Engelhardt wrote today (in
Dreaming of George), "Think Middle East, think Iraq. Consider how Sharon's whacking of Hamas's Sheik Yassin
blewback on the Bush administration in Iraq. The fact is that our men in Washington (and in Baghdad) are hard at
work creating the sort of extreme, religiously riven world that Osama bin Laden could only dream of. It's really a
miracle -- and not a godly one, either. In the Middle East, they seem headed not just for a failed empire, but
for a level of extreme sectarianism, a "clash of civilizations," that will make a mockery of anyone's dreams of
a better world, no less "democracy." It's as if they took all of Osama bin Laden's complaints and charges and
decided to make them come true. I think we may soon have to look on these taped messages from bin Laden
as "to do" lists for this administration. And the results can be seen in Iraq."
Usama isn't out of the woods yet. He still hasta to deal with the (old school) Shi'ah. This kinda stuff is way
over the heads of and none of the business of the practitioners of ugly-Americanism and pettiness. Shoot! That's
more than half of the U.S. population - living, or so they think, on the actualized, or so they think, side of The
Matrix (the movie). 99% of The Geeze readers don't know or care about this kind of stuff either.
The 9/11 story is just about over too. The commission will white-wash their report (9/11 was "allowed" to
happen) just as the Warren Commission white-washed the Kennedy Assassination starring Lee Harvey Oswald was
sanctioned. The Waco/Ruby Ridge (cause) with the resultant Timothy McVeigh Oklahoma bombing (effect) was yet
a re-run of the JFK assassination in execution and cover-up. CIA complicity is more obvious in 9/11 than in
the JFK assassination.
The al-Mihdhar Follow-Op
"The CIA knew that an al-Qaida operative linked to the al-Qaida lieutenant suspected of engineering the Cole
attack had possibly come to the United States, and it did nothing."
On 9/11, CIA Chief George Tenet Gets Off Easy
By David Corn - The Nation
The day after Tenet testified before the 9/11 commission, The New York Times declared on the front
page, "Sept. 11 Panel Cites CIA For Failures in Terror Case." The Washington Post blared, "Al Qaeda Unchecked
for Years, Panel Says: Tenet Concedes CIA Made Mistakes." The news stories focused on a damning staff
statement -- one in a series of interim reports -- issued by the commission that criticized Tenet's agency for
years of misjudgments and errors related to its perceptions and handling of the threat posed by al Qaeda. But
when Tenet sat before the ten commissioners, he was praised by the members and faced not a single round of truly
discomfiting questions. Though several of its members have referred to 9/11 as a massive intelligence failure, the
panel was rather tame when it had the chance to publicly query the fellow who was (and remains) in charge of the
system that failed. More importantly, the commissioners neglected to ask key questions. They were doing what the
CIA and the FBI have been accused of: failing to connect the dots.
Before examining the issues that Tenet did not have to confront, let's look at some of the alarming findings of
the commission's staff statement on the "performance of the Intelligence Community."
* The report notes, "While we know that al Qaeda was formed in 1988, at the end of the Soviet occupation of Afghanistan, the Intelligence Community did not describe this organization, at least in documents we have seen, until 1999. As late as 1997, the [Counterterrorism Center of the CIA] characterized Usama bin Ladin as a financier of terrorism." This is a brutal assessment. Al Qaeda had been involved in several attacks against U.S. targets years before 1999, and the CIA even had information prior to 1997 that showed that bin Laden was much more than a moneyman for Islamic terrorists. In 1996, according to the commission, a walk-in source told the CIA that bin Laden's organization had been involved in a 1992 attack in Yemen against U.S. military personnel, the 1993 shootdown of U.S. Army Blackhawk helicopters in Somalia, and possibly the 1995 bombing of an American training mission in Saudi Arabia.
* Although the intelligence community received several reports in the years before 9/11 noting that Islamic extremists were interested in hijacking airliners and turning them into weapons, the CIA did nothing in response. Its Counterterrorism Center (CTC) did not analyze how a hijacked airliner might be used as a weapon. It did not consider how to defend against such an attack. The CIA did not tell its spies and analysts--or those of other intelligence agencies--to look for signs that terrorists were pursuing such a scheme. (One indicator might be that a person linked to terrorist outfits was seeking flight training.) If it had, perhaps the hints that did come in--such as the August 2001 arrest of Zacarias Moussaoui, the suspicious flight school student, might have triggered action. In late August, Tenet and other CIA officials received a briefing on the Moussaoui arrest under the heading, "Islamic Extremist Learns To Fly." Imagine what response could have occurred, had the CIA been primed to pick up on clues that terrorists were interested in a 9/11-like scenario.
* German intelligence in 1999 handed the CIA a lead on a terrorist suspect named "Marwan." The CTC, which had a phone number for this person in the United Arab Emirates, pursued this lead for a "short time" but failed to develop any further information and dropped the matter, without asking any other intelligence agencies (say, the National Security Agency, which conducts electronic eavesdropping around the world) for help. This person was Marwan al Shehhi, who piloted United Airlines Flight 175 into the South Tower of the World Trade Center. And he had used that UAE telephone number in the period before September 11.
* The CIA put together a plan -- dubbed "The Plan" to improve its efforts to collect intelligence on al Qaeda using human sources and had developed what the commission calls "ingenious efforts" to bolster its collection using signals intercepts. But, the report notes, "there was no comprehensive collection strategy to pull together human sources, imagery, signals intelligence and open sources. Even 'The Plan' was essentially a CIA plan, not one for the Intelligence Community as a whole."
* On December 4, 1998, Tenet sent out a directive to several CIA officials that referred to Islamic terrorists and declared, "We are at war. I want no resources or people spared in this effort, either inside CIA or the [Intelligence] Community." The commission reports, "Unfortunately, we found the memorandum had little overall effect on mobilizing the CIA or the Intelligence Committee." The memo supposedly was faxed to the heads of all the intelligence agencies. But most of them told the commission they had never seen it. The NSA director at the time, Lieut. General Kenneth Minihan, said that he believed the memo only applied to the CIA.
* Though Tenet characterized counterterrorism efforts as a "war," the commission notes, he "did not develop a management strategy for a war against terrorism before 9/11." Tenet takes exception to this finding. But, according to the report, in 1998 he called for reforms that would lead to better sharing of counterterrorism data among the CIA, the NSA, the FBI and other agencies. But no plan to do so was developed prior to 9/11.
* Many of the problems the commission identified certainly loom larger after 9/11, but what might be its sharpest criticism concerned an overall institutional failure that stands out as serious and unacceptable without the benefit of hindsight: "we did not find an institution or culture that provided a safe outlet for admitting errors and improving procedures." While Tenet has defended himself and the CIA against most of the commission's criticisms by claiming the CIA was short on money and staff in the years before 9/11, such a defense does not work against this charge.
Another commission staff statement, released the day before Tenet testified, examined the CIA's handling of information on Khalid al Mihdhar and Nawaf al Hazmi, two of the nineteen 9/11 hijackers. The basics of this tale have been previously revealed. The CIA learned in early 2000 that these two suspected al Qaeda operatives, after attending something of an al Qaeda summit in Malaysia, were heading toward or in the United States. But the CIA did not place their names on any watchlist for people entering the United States, nor did it tell the FBI about the two. The pair rented homes in San Diego and obtained driver's licenses using their real names and were in regular contact with an FBI informant. If the FBI had been alerted to their possible presence in the United States, it may well have been able to track the two--who were in touch with at least two of the other hijackers--during the year and a half prior to 9/11. Who knows what that might have yielded? The CIA did not pass this lead to the FBI until late August 2001. At that point, the FBI went looking for the men and did not find them before September 11.
The commission's latest report on this episode -- the most significant screw-up of 9/11 -- makes the CIA look even worse. It notes that in January 2001, the CIA learned that the suspected leader of the October 2000 bombing of the U.S.S. Cole had been at the January 2000 Malaysia meeting. This meant that Mihdhar and Hazmi had attended a gathering with the possible mastermind of an attack that had killed 17 American troops. (There even had been speculation within the CIA that Mihdhar and the suspected leader were the same person.) Yet the report says, "we found no effort by the CIA to renew the long-abandoned search for Mihdhar." In other words, the CIA knew that an al Qaeda operative linked to the al Qaeda lieutenant suspected of engineering the Cole attack had possibly come to the United States, and it did nothing.
There's more. In May 2001, as threat reporting surged, a CIA official reviewed old cables from early January 2000 that included information that Mihdhar had received a U.S. visa and that Hazmi had come to Los Angeles on January 15, 2000. This officer took no action. Then in the summer of 2001, an FBI official detailed to the CIA was asked to review material about the Malaysia meeting--in her free time. As the report notes (in an understated way), "She grasped the significance of this information." She learned from the Immigration and Naturalization Service that Mihdhar had entered the United States with Hazmi on January 15, 2000, and again on July 4, 2001. In late August, she and an FBI analyst initiated a search for Mihdhar, but higher levels of CIA and FBI management were not told about it. The search was assigned, on a routine basis, to a single FBI agent. This was his very first counterterrorism lead. He was given 30 days to open the case. He started the process a week later. He was still looking for Mihdhar on September 11.
Did the commissioners grill Tenet about the biggest missed opportunity of 9/11? After all, what is his explanation for this series of foul-ups? Had anyone been held accountable? Demoted? Fired? Why did it take an FBI official on loan to the CIA to make the right call? Why had CIA and FBI officials in late August not reported the Mihdhar connection to higher-ups?
No such questions were asked. In fact, there were no queries about the entire matter. Tenet, in his opening statement, did say, "We made mistakes" and cited "our failure to watchlist al-Hazmi and al-Mihdhar." But this intelligence blunder--perhaps the worst single lapse in the CIA's history--deserved more than one sentence.
Other obvious areas were left untouched by the commissioners. Here is a sampling of questions that Tenet ought to have been asked.
* The recent release of the August 6, 2001 President's Daily Brief -- titled "Bin Ladin Determined To Strike in US" -- caused a media storm regarding whether Bush had been aware before 9/11 that al Qaeda was aiming to conduct attacks in the United States. But the document also raises questions about the performance of your CIA. Why did this short report not refer to other information the CIA possessed indicating al Qaeda's intentions to hit the United States, such as material that emerged during the recent trial of al Qaeda operatives who bombed the U.S. embassies in Africa on 1998? Some of this information--such as al Qaeda's efforts to acquire uranium--had been in the newspapers. But Bush has said he does not routinely read newspapers and relies upon his briefers. Also, the PDB reported that the FBI had 70 anti-al Qaeda "full field investigations" under way throughout the United States. That number, according to testimony before the 9/11 commission, was higher than the actual amount. It turns out that the 70 figure had referred to the number of targeted individuals, not investigations, and that some of the targets were involved only in financing activities. How many investigations were there? Why did the CIA get this wrong? Did the PDB present a false impression that the FBI's anti-al Qaeda efforts were more extensive than they were? Do you believe this short briefing fully conveyed the domestic threat al Qaeda presented?
* What were the nature of your conversations with President Bush about the threat from al Qaeda during 2001? Did he ever instruct you to take any specific steps regarding al Qaeda? Did you tell him there was a "war" going on? Did he agree with this view?
* Richard Clarke, the former White House counterterrorism coordinator, has said that in 2001 he asked you to brief national security adviser Condoleezza Rice on the threat from al Qaeda because he was concerned that Rice was not taking the threat seriously enough. What happened at this briefing? How did Rice respond?
* What did you do after you were told in late August that Moussaoui, a suspicious Islamic extremist, had been trying to learn how to fly a 747? Did you ask for any follow-up action or further reports? Did you make sure the FBI was on top of this (which it was not)?
* Why did the CIA in general fail to respond to the various reports it received over several years indicating that al Qaeda and other terrorists were interested in using airliners as weapons? In 1999, for instance, a public report prepared for the National Intelligence Council, an affiliate of the CIA, by the research division of the Library of Congress noted, "Suicide bomber(s) belonging to al-Qaida's Martyrdom Battalion could crash-land an aircraft ... into the Pentagon, the headquarters of the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA), or the White House." Whatever happened to this particular report? And after Bush said shortly after 9/11 that "no one could have conceivably imagined suicide bombers burrowing into our society and then emerging all in the same day to fly their aircraft -- fly U.S. aircraft into buildings full of innocent people," did you inform the president he had been mistaken? After Rice in May 2002 said, "I don't think anyone could have predicted that these people would take an airplane and slam it into the World Trade Center," did you tell her that she was wrong?
* When did the CIA conclude that bin Laden and al Qaeda was responsible for the Cole bombing? Did Bush ever want to talk about the Cole in order to consider possible reprisals? Was he interested in the case? Did he ask to be briefed on it?
* Why did your 1998 declaration of war against the terrorists go unheeded throughout most of the intelligence community you oversee?
* You told the commission that you believe that Bush White House officials grasped the urgency of the al Qaeda threat prior to September 11. But why did deputy CIA director John McLaughlin tell the commission that he felt "a great tension...between the new administration's need to understand these issues and his sense that this was a matter of great urgency"? And if the White House was granting the matter sufficient attention, why did two veteran Counterterrorism officials report to the commission that they "were so worried about an impending disaster that one of them...considered resigning and going public with their concerns"?
* Why did the CIA's internal culture, under your watch (and probably earlier), not provide, as the commission notes, "a safe outlet for admitting errors and improving procedures"?
* In February 2002, you testified before the Senate intelligence committee and said that 9/11 "was not the result of the failure of attention and discipline and focus and consistent attention" on the part of the CIA. In light of the al Mihdhar/al Hazmi episode, would you care to revise that remark?
To his credit, Tenet was attuned to the threat from al Qaeda years before 9/11. Still, the agency he directed and the community he oversaw failed. Misjudgments and specific errors of the CIA and the intelligence community made it easier for the mass murderers of 9/11 to succeed. The 9/11 commission staffers have produced stunning indictments of the CIA and the FBI in their interim reports. But during the public hearings the commissioners have gently questioned the government officials who were in charge -- such as Tenet -- and avoided some of the more disturbing and difficult topics. It's as if the commission is operating on two separate levels. The staff fires away at the agencies; the commissioners let the responsible people walk away unmussed. No doubt, Tenet, one of the savvier players in Washington, felt the sting of the commission's staff statement when he read the newspapers the next day. But he probably realized that it could have been a lot worse.
CIA Years Away From Needed Changes?
Lou Dobbs - CNN
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
LOU DOBBS, CNN ANCHOR (voice-over): Tonight, a dramatic admission by CIA Director George Tenet. Tenet says the CIA is years away from being fully ready to battle radical Islamist terrorists.
GEORGE TENET, CIA DIRECTOR: It will take us another five years to have the kind of clandestine service our country needs.
DOBBS: 9/11 Commission member Timothy Roamer is our guest.
[SNIP]
DOBBS: Good evening.
CIA Director George Tenet today said it will take five years to completely rebuild the CIA's clandestine service to fight radical Islamist terrorists. Tenet told the 9/11 Commission that the end of the Cold War led to a sharp reduction in CIA manpower and capital investment. FBI Director Robert Mueller also testified before the commission today. Mueller said he is in the midst of a restructuring of the FBI.
We have two reports tonight, national security correspondent David Ensor with a report on George Tenet's testimony, and justice correspondent Kelli Arena on Robert Mueller's testimony.
We begin with David Enso | 
