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Ongoing stories:
Reuters Cameraman Mazen Dana Killed in Iraq Dana's death brings to 17 the number of journalists or their assistants who have died in Iraq since war began on March 20. [MORE]
BUSH SAYS, "BRING'EM ON!" WE SAY BRING THEM HOME NOW! A movement calling for the immediate withdrawal of United States troops from Iraq has been started
by the families of US soldiers and army veterans. [MORE - Bring Them Home Now! Website]
Police cannot entrap people into committing crimes
they would not otherwise have committed...
What is a legal sting?
By RACHEL CLARKE
U.S. Government Sting Operation Criticized as Entrapment
By BRIAN ROSS
DISINFORMATION WARNING: CIA Posing as Al-Qaeda at Jihad Unspun?
30AUG2003
Why is this woman smiling?
Hillary Clinton is being urged to take on the troubled George W Bush in the 2004 Presidential race, says
Toby Harnden: "The darling of the Democratic Party, is under growing pressure to make
a late bid for the White House in 2004 from supporters who believe that only she can defeat Bush." [MORE]
Najif bombing condemned
The Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR) today condemned the car bomb attack Friday in the
city of Najaf, Iraq, that killed more than 100 people, including Ayatollah Mohammed Baqir al-Hakim.
In its statement, CAIR said: "This unspeakable crime could only have been perpetrated by those who
have no regard for moral or religious values. The bombing clearly demonstrates that Iraq is falling
into a state of chaos. Only a swift turnover of political power to a representative Iraqi government
has a chance of stemming the rising tide of violence and instability."
Pipes is the "wrong person for the job"
By SEN. EDWARD M. KENEDY
Your editorial criticizes my opposition to the Bush administration's appointment of Dr. Daniel Pipes
to the U.S. Institute of Peace ("Kennedy vendetta's price," Aug. 27). But a review of his record clearly
shows that he's the wrong person for the job.
The Institute of Peace was founded in order to find ways to bridge differences between nations,
cultures and religions to prevent armed conflicts. Its mission is more important today than ever,
and we should appoint to it only the best that America has to offer...
Regarding the Middle East conflict, he wrote, "The idea that a 'peace process' can take the place of
the dirty work of war is a conceit." The view that armed conflict is inevitable may be debated in
academic circles, but it has no place at the Institute of Peace.
Pipes also has made various offensive remarks over the years, and has called for racial and
religious profiling in law enforcement. He believes that mosques should be targets of police
surveillance. These controversial stands make him unsuited for a position that's about bringing
people together...
But surely, we can find someone better to serve at our Institute of Peace.
- Sen. Edward M. Kennedy
29AUG2003
Beyond hypocrisy, is nothing sacred?
Watching Fox writhe in having to reverse their editorial stand in order to give viewers what they
wants to see - now that the Bush White House war in Iraq is becoming so unpopular with the masses,
brings a kind of "let them eat crow" glee!
A reader wrote: "Doncha just love the idea of playing the final messages of those about to die
on 9/11? What timing! How cynical! - Most Americans know it was bin Laden, and NOT Saddam who was
behind 911..." Yes. But who was behind bin Laden - in the context of who was really behind Lockerbie?
Qddafi? I doubt it. Same with KAL007. Same with the assassinations.
TV anchors are asking (in these days of remembering the 40th Anniversary of Dr. King's "I Have a
Dream" speech), why are there no (black) leaders anymore; referring to and comparing Martin Luther
King, Malcolm X, and so on. Why did none take their places? They got killed! None wants to pay with their
lives to be in a position of leadership, black or white - the price is just too high to pay in a battle
that as we have seen thus far can't be won anyhow.
Racism and bigotry is a powerful tool that assures that the truly evil status quo continues. History
has shown that anyone who stands in the way of their agenda is a dead man. Because that "leadership"
vacuum was never filled, while no one gets shot these days, we are now a nation of dead men, and will
remain so until as a people we are encouraged to get some balls.
Catholic High School Bars Girl Wearing Muslim Scarf
By KAREN R. LONG
Amal Jamal is not welcome at Regina High School anymore.
"I was in shock; I didn't understand," Amal said. "All along, they gave me a room to pray in. They
asked me questions about Islam. They always accepted me for who I was. Now they have decided it is
against school policy to wear my hajib."
Amal, a soft-spoken 17-year-old, sat in her Euclid living room yesterday, too stunned to consider
what she might do next as her 270 schoolmates attended a second day of classes on the South Euclid
campus. Amal said she was stung that no administrator, teacher or student had called her or tried to
help.
"I feel very bad about this situation. [As she adjusted her own Catholic version of a hijab], Sister Maureen
Burke, Regina's principal for 12 years said, "I've agonized over it. Amal is a wonderful young woman. The
family is very fine ... But the uniform issue is very important to who we are as a Catholic school."
[MORE]
Orwell (George) or Hamas by any other name
Israel's public broadcasters are through with the Palestinian "intifada." The "hudna" is also dead and
gone.
With the Israeli-Palestinian conflict deteriorating on the ground, the managers of Israel's public
television and radio are launching a linguistic strike on the airwaves, trying to bar now-familiar
Arabic terms.
They have directed journalists to replace references to the Palestinian "intifada," or uprising that
broke out nearly three years ago, and the "hudna," or truce that collapsed last week, with their
Hebrew equivalents.
They also discussed changing the "radical Islamic movement Hamas" to the "terrorist organisation
Hamas" after the group claimed responsibility for last Tuesday's suicide bombing that killed 21
passengers on a Jerusalem bus. But no final decision has been taken, Israeli public television and
radio said.
Israeli media is under orders to brand Palestinian activists "terrorists," or "mehablim" in Hebrew,
whether they are accused of carrying out attacks on occupied Palestinian territory or in Israel itself.
They have also been told to call the occupied West Bank by its biblical name, Judea and Samaria.
Palestinian media have their own language guidelines, calling any Palestinian killed in the conflict
a "shahid," or martyr, regardless of whether the victim is a civilian, fighter or suicide
bomber. [MORE]
Insult to Intelligence
From tompaine.com
Sixty-four summers ago, when Hitler fabricated Polish provocations in his attempt to justify
Germanyıs invasion of Poland, there was not a peep out of senior German officials. Happily, in
todayıs Germany the imperative of truth-telling no longer takes a back seat to ingrained docility
and knee-jerk deference to the perceived dictates of homeland security. The most telling recent
sign of this comes in a recent edition of Die Zeit, Germany's highly respected weekly
newspaper (who also brought us the Mossad Art Students story).
The "homeland security" story, by Jochen Bittner, holds lessons for us all. [MORE]
Bowling for John Hinckley
By TOBY HARDIN
The loner who shot Ronald Reagan in 1981 is said by his doctors to have been cured of the
mental illness that led to his assassination attempt.
John Hinckley, 48, has been confined to secure wards in St Elizabeth's Hospital in Washington for more
than 20 years after being found not guilty of attempted murder by reason of insanity could soon be
released to the streets and a bowling alley near you. [MORE]
More insult: Iraq Effort to Cost Tens of Billions
By PETER SLEVEN and VERNON LOEB
According to U.S. occupation coordinator L. Paul Bremer, Iraqi revenue would not be enough to cover
the bill for economic needs described
as "almost impossible to exaggerate" (but easy enough to hide in the "tens of billions" phrase).
So waitaminute! If Iraq can't pay for the war damages with their oil revenues, who pays? You
pays, American taxpayer! [MORE]
The Enronization of the Bush Administration
By STEVEN C. CLEMONS
Ashcroft's Dirty Little Secret
By LISA DANETZ
As the top law enforcement officer of the federal government, the Attorney General of the United
States has a moral duty to act with honesty and integrity, and to guard his reputation as a
law-abiding citizen. This means the Attorney General must - at the very minimum - make sure the
political committees connected to him follow the nation's campaign finance rules. Respect for the
law demands no less.
If Mr. Ashcroft is truly loyal to the rule of law, he will direct his "Spirit of America" to come clean.
Unless, of course, he has something to hide. [MORE]
Bush's Dirty Secrets
From tompaine.com
"In the early 1980s, you didn't need to be a member of EarthFirst! to know that Ronald Reagan was bad
for the environment. You didn't even have to be especially politically aware. Here was a man who had,
after all, publicly stated that most air pollution was caused by plants. And then there was Reagan's
secretary of the Interior, James Watt, who saw no need to protect the environment because Jesus was
returning any day, and who, in a pique of reactionary feng shui, suggested that the buffalo on
Interior's seal be flipped to face right instead of left."
That's the humorous start to an article by Osha Gray Davidson in the September issue of Mother
Jones magazine.
But there's nothing funny about the story that follows: George W. Bush is waging a crusade to
destroy our environmental laws. Unlike Reagan, however, Bush tries to obscure his agenda from
the American people, who strongly favor environmental protection. [MORE]
Regulated Gasoline in California Recall Mix
By TOM CHORNEAU
In what started out as a circus in California, after shedding Ahnuld Schwarzenegger, Gary Coleman
and Larry Flynt, the recall is turning into a kind of revolution headed up by Cruz Bustamante, who by
adding one word and one comma to the Gray Davis Recall campaign and the state's Constitution, "gasoline"
will be considered a utility - right alongside electrical and telephone services, and commodities. [MORE]
Bustamante urges constitutional amendment to rein in oil companies
By TOM CHORNEAU
What's Fueling Price Increases
By TOM ICANTALUPO
Schwarzenegger Slammed by Hispanic Group
By BRIAN SKOLOFF
State Party endorsement could help Davis Survive Recall
By LAURA KUTRZMAN and HOWARD MINTZ
 The Hillary You Say!
"What the hell is she raising money for?"
By RICHARD REEVES
Hillary inner circle set for pow-wow on bid for presidency
By JOSEPH FARAH
Hillary Mulls Run If Bush Looks Beatable
By RUSH LIMBAUGH
The CIA Infiltration of the Left
What next? THE INTERNATIONAL CRIMINAL COURT BEGINS - MoveOn.org
Also see 29AUG2002 Draft Hillary 2004 Update
The Military records of George Walker Bush
 
28AUG2003
Oregon sues Worldcom
Oregon officials sued WorldCom's top officers and underwriters of the battered company's bonds,
charging three state investment funds lost $24 million on fraudulent debt issues.
The lawsuit accuses Salomon Smith Barney and other underwriters of failing to ensure that WorldCom's
prospectuses and registration statements were true and accurate. It also targets WorldCom top officers
because the company, which filed for bankruptcy in July 2002, cannot be named as a defendant.
"A U.S. company cheated public investors, and underwriters we relied on for independent information
helped them do it," Oregon Treasurer Randall Edwards said in a statement. "We need to right this wrong." [MORE]
Ground Zero Nation
I hope you regular readers read
Ground Zero Nation in the tomdispatch version delivered to your e-mailbox
yesterday or "Subscribe already!" For the benefit of new readers,
meet
Tom Engelhardt with his quote of the week from the holodeck of the spaceship Pentagon:
"Pentagon
sources report one hopeful
sign that the military is thinking creatively and unconventionally about Iraq. The Pentagon's special
operations chiefs have scheduled a showing tomorrow in the Army auditorium of 'The Battle of Algiers,'
a classic film that examines how the French, despite overwhelming military superiority, were defeated
by Algerian resistance fighters.
"A Pentagon flier announcing the film puts it in eerie perspective: 'How to win a battle against
terrorism and lose the war of ideas... Children shoot soldiers at point blank range. Women
plant bombs in cafes. Soon the entire Arab population builds to a mad fervor. Sound familiar?
The French have a plan. It succeeds tactically, but fails strategically. To understand why,
come to a rare showing of this film.'" (see Think Strategy, Not Numbers
By David Ignatius).
Tom writes, "A World Behind Bars: For those who don't remember, managed to miss, or weren't old
enough to see Gillo Pontecorvo's remarkable 1965 film The Battle of Algiers, I should fill you in on
what Ignatius in his column doesn't bother to say. (He's intent on arguing about overmilitarizing the
Iraqi conflict and trying to solve occupation problems by sending in more troops.) The French had a
plan indeed, carefully laid out, to destroy the national independence movement in the city of Algiers,
which was divided into small linked cells. The plan was to capture cell members, torture them
immediately and mercilessly, so that they would break quickly and the French could get to the next
cell members before anyone knew the cell's secrecy was broken, and so on, right up the ladder to the
leadership. It was unbearably brutal and, according to the film, tactically successful in breaking
the urban resistance, but it did not in the end stop the movement to free Algeria of French control.
(Of course we all know what the Algerian revolution finally degenerated into, itself a commentary on
where such cycles of brutality lead, no matter who officially wins what.)
"But the men who are running our post-9/11 war on terror don't necessarily need tips from Pontecorvo's
old film. We seem to have made it there on our own." [MORE]
Ed. note: Included are links (below) to Battle of Algiers, Z, and Godfather II. All three are
telling the same story about Algiers, Greece and Cuba; whoever is willing to die for his country
ultimately wins. For the Bush White House to ask American soldiers to die for Iraq, is socially and
morally irresponsible if not flat-out insane. Doesn't anyone inside the Beltway remember Vietnam anymore?
  
Battle of Algiers (1967) - English subtitles * Z (1969) - English subtitles * The Godfather, Part II (1974)
Z - DVD
The Godfather VHS - (Widescreen Edition) * VHS - Spanish subtitles * The Godfather DVD Collection (2001)
The Battle of the Casbah: Terrorism and Counter-Terrorism in Algeria 1955-1957
by Paul Aussaressess and Robert L. Miller
Also see:
Journal, 1955 - 1962 : Reflections on the French-Algerian War by Mouloud Feraoun
A savage war of peace : Algeria, 1954-1962 by Alistair Horne
The Algerian Civil War by Luis Martinez and John Entelis
The Battlefield: Algeria 1988-2002, Studies in a Broken Polity by Hugh Roberts
Lessons in how to lie about Iraq
By BRIAN ENO
The problem is not propaganda but the relentless control of the kind of things we think about...
When I first visited Russia, in 1986, I made friends with a musician whose father had been Brezhnev's
personal doctor. One day we were talking about life during 'the period of stagnation' -- the Brezhnev
era. 'It must have been strange being so completely immersed in propaganda,' I said.
'Ah, but there is the difference. We knew it was propaganda,' replied Sacha.
That is the difference. Russian propaganda was so obvious that most Russians were able to ignore it.
They took it for granted that the government operated in its own interests and any message coming from
it was probably slanted -- and they discounted it.
In the West the calculated manipulation of public opinion to serve political and ideological interests
is much more covert and therefore much more effective. Its greatest triumph is that we generally don't
notice it -- or we laugh at the notion it even exists. We watch the democratic process taking place --
heated debates in which we feel we could have a voice -- and think that, because we have 'free' media,
it would be hard for the government to get away with anything very devious without someone calling them
on it.
It takes something as dramatic as the invasion of Iraq to make us look a bit more closely and ask: 'How
did we get here?' How exactly did it come about that, in a world of AIDS, global warming, 30-plus active
wars, several famines, cloning, genetic engineering, and two billion people in poverty, practically the
only thing we all talked about for a year was Iraq and Saddam Hussein? Was it really that big a problem?
Or were we somehow manipulated into believing the Iraq issue was important and had to be fixed right
now -- even though a few months before few had mentioned it, and nothing had changed in the interim.
In the wake of the events of 9/11, it now seems clear that the shock of the attacks was exploited in
America. According to Sheldon Rampton and John Stauber in their new
book Weapons of Mass Deception*, it
was used to engineer a state of emergency that would justify an invasion of Iraq. Rampton and Stauber
expose how news was fabricated and made to seem real. But they also demonstrate how a coalition of the
willing -- far-Right officials, neo-con think-tanks, insanely pugilistic media commentators and of
course well-paid PR companies -- worked together to pull off a sensational piece of intellectual
dishonesty. Theirs is a study of modern propaganda.
What occurs to me in reading their book is that the new American approach to social control is so much
more sophisticated and pervasive that it really deserves a new name. It isn't just propaganda any more,
it's 'prop-agenda.' It's not so much the control of what we think, but the control of what we think
about. When our governments want to sell us a course of action, they do it by making sure it's the
only thing on the agenda, the only thing everyone's talking about. And they pre-load the ensuing
discussion with highly selected images, devious and prejudicial language, dubious linkages, weak or
false 'intelligence' and selected 'leaks'. (What else can the spat between the BBC and Alastair Campbell
be but a prime example of this?)
With the ground thus prepared, governments are happy if you then 'use the democratic process' to agree
or disagree -- for, after all, their intention is to mobilize enough headlines and conversation to make
the whole thing seem real and urgent. The more emotional the debate, the better. Emotion creates
reality, reality demands action.
An example of this process is one highlighted by Rampton and Stauber which, more than any other,
consolidated public and congressional approval for the 1991 Gulf War. We recall the horrifying stories,
incessantly repeated, of babies in Kuwaiti hospitals ripped out of their incubators and left to die
while the Iraqis shipped the incubators back to Baghdad -- 312 babies, we were told.
The story was brought to public attention by Nayirah, a 15-year-old 'nurse' who, it turned out later,
was the daughter of the Kuwaiti ambassador to the United States and a member of the Kuwaiti royal
family. Nayirah had been tutored and rehearsed by the Hill & Knowlton PR agency (which in turn
received $14 million from the American government for their work in promoting the war). Her story
was entirely discredited within weeks but by then its purpose had been served: it had created an
outraged and emotional mindset within America which overwhelmed rational discussion.
As we are seeing now, the most recent Gulf war entailed many similar deceits: false linkages made
between Saddam, Al Qaeda and 9/11, stories of ready-to-launch weapons that didn't exist, of nuclear
programs never embarked upon. As Rampton and Stauber show, many of these allegations were discredited
as they were being made, but nevertheless were retold.
Throughout all this, the hired-gun PR companies were busy, preconditioning the emotional landscape.
Their marketing talents were particularly useful in the large-scale manipulation of language that the
campaign entailed. The Bushites realized, as all ideologues do, that words create realities, and that
the right words can over whelm any chance of balanced discussion. Guided by the overtly imperial vision
of the Project for a New American Century (whose members now form the core of the American
administration), the PR companies helped finesse the language to create an atmosphere of simmering
panic where American imperialism would come to seem not only acceptable but right, obvious,
inevitable and even somehow kind.
Aside from the incessant 'weapons of mass destruction', there were 'regime change' (military
invasion), 'pre-emptive defense' (attacking a country that is not attacking you), 'critical
regions' (countries we want to control), the 'axis of evil' (countries we want to attack), 'shock
and awe' (massive obliteration) and 'the war on terror' (a hold-all excuse for projecting American
military force anywhere).
Meanwhile, U.S. federal employees and military personnel were told to refer to the invasion as 'a war
of liberation' and to the Iraqi paramilitaries as 'death squads', while the reliably sycophantic
American TV networks spoke of 'Operation Iraqi Freedom' -- just as the Pentagon asked them to -- thus
consolidating the supposition that Iraqi freedom was the point of the war. Anybody questioning the
invasion was 'soft on terror' (liberal) or, in the case of the United Nations, 'in danger of losing its
relevance'.
When I was young, an eccentric uncle decided to teach me how to lie. Not, he explained, because he
wanted me to lie, but because he thought I should know how it's done so I would recognize when I was
being lied to. I hope writers such as Rampton and Stauber and others may have the same effect and help
to emasculate the culture of spin and dissembling that is overtaking our political establishments.
Ed. note: Brian Eno is a musician who believes that regime change begins at home.
This commentary originally appeared in The Guardian, and is reprinted
without permission. A longer version will appear in the new literary magazine, Zembla. *Weapons of Mass
Deception by Sheldon Rampton and John Stauber is published by J. P. Tarcher (July 2003).
Bush White House lying about being lied to by Saddam defector/double-agents
By BOB DROGIN - L.A. Times
U.S. Suspects It Received False Iraq Arms Tips - Intelligence officials are reexamining data used in
justifying the war. They say Hussein's regime may have sent bogus defectors.
WASHINGTON - Frustrated at the failure to find Saddam Hussein's suspected stockpiles of chemical and
biological weapons, U.S. and allied intelligence agencies have launched a major effort to determine if
they were victims of bogus Iraqi defectors who planted disinformation to mislead the West before the
war. [MORE]
Big Dick Cheney's Halliburton in the news, again
By MICHAEL DOBBS - Washington Post
Halliburton, the company formerly headed by Vice President Cheney, has won contracts worth more
than $1.7 billion under Operation Iraqi Freedom and stands to make hundreds of millions more dollars
under a no-bid contract awarded by the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, according to newly available
documents.
The size and scope of the government contracts awarded to Halliburton in connection with the war in
Iraq are significantly greater than was previously disclosed. [MORE]
Bremer: Iraq Effort to Cost Tens of Billions
By PETER SLEVEN and VERNON LOEB - Washington Post
Iraqi revenue would not be enough to cover the bill for economic needs described
as "almost impossible to exaggerate" but easy enough to hide in the "tens of billions" phrase.
So waitaminute! If Iraq can't pay for the war damages with their oil revenues, who pays? You
pays, American taxpayer! [MORE]
War Profiteering - The Nation
Even before US troops arrived in Baghdad, looting broke out--in Washington. While Republicans in
Congress and their allies in the media yammered about the need to silence dissent and "support the
troops," corporations with close ties to the Bush Administration were quietly arranging to ink
lucrative contracts that would put them in charge of reconstructing Iraq. Bechtel's contract,
worth up to $680 million, to rebuild Iraqi roads, schools, sewers and hospitals drew a lot of media
attention, but it was chump change compared with the deal greased through by Vice President Cheney's
old oil-services firm, Halliburton. The Army Corps of Engineers told Representative Henry Waxman that
a Pentagon contract awarded without competition to Halliburton subsidiary Kellogg Brown & Root (KBR)
to fight oilwell fires is worth as much as $7 billion over two years. The Halliburton subsidiary has
been authorized to take profits of up to $490 million.
Congress dozes while the treasury is raided. [MORE]
Mars
Our ex-resident ex-psychic who moonlighted as an astrologer informs us that Mars, the war planet and
the havoc it's caused by getting so close to earth has completed it's course and is now on it's way
back to it's outer orbit, and won't cause us this degree of problems again for another 60,000 years.
Mars generally causes people to go a little bit nuts anyhow. For psychotics and war mongers, well,
they tend to go stone crazy - as we have seen since the Bush White House has rampaged out onto the world
stage making pre-emptive strikes wherever there is anything having to do with oil - from Afghanistan,
the land of future pipelines, to Iraq, the Alaskan wilderness, and the California and Texas-Louisania
Gulf coastlines.
According to the psychic, humanity (or whatever is here 60,000 years from now) can look forward to
blowjobs in the White House, stolen elections in Florida, attacks from enemies, and retaliatory wars. In
other words, over the next few years we can expect to see more of what we've seen in these recent times
but in a reverse order. The Iraq war should be over within a year. We are in danger of another stolen
election. There
could be some hankie-pankie in the Oral office... It kinda makes you wonder, particularly if Hillary is
President by then.
The CIA Infiltration of the Left
What next? THE INTERNATIONAL CRIMINAL COURT BEGINS - MoveOn.org
Also see 31JUL2002 Draft Hillary 2004 Update
27AUG2003
Come the Revolution!
In trying to stay focused on bringing our troops home,
Tom Engelhardt brings some hopeful signs
of what could be ahead for us - that the Bush White House is losing it's grip - in more ways than one,
and the consequences are great! [MORE - tomdispatch]
Two ways out of our energy crisis; 1. War as usual, or 2. Conservation and utilization of alternative
energy sources and resources.
The latter makes more sense. The only obvious downside in abandoning the status quo is that friends of
the Bush White House will not prosper.
Seriously, abandoning war in favor of a WPA or CCC for the environment and resolving our energy needs
problem is just what this country needs - providing we don't buy the alternative energy gadgetry
offshore.
Something along these lines is what I hope Hillary will promise: Jobs, jobs, jobs!
Hillary Seeks Inquiry Into E.P.A. Response to 911
By WINNIE HU
Senator Hillary Rodham Clinton and Representative Jerrold L. Nadler called yesterday for a
Congressional inquiry into the Environmental Protection Agency's response to the World Trade Center
attack, saying that the agency and the White House had not told the truth about potential health
hazards. [MORE]
Details on 9/11 Air Quality Questioned
By MARC KAUFMAN
In a sharply worded letter to President Bush, Democratic Sens. Hillary Rodham Clinton (N.Y.) and
Joseph I. Lieberman (Conn.) yesterday demanded to know why New Yorkers were given incomplete
information about the potential dangers from the polluted air caused by the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks
on the World Trade Center. [MORE]
SUV ATTACK BY ELF
Hummers Fight Back
By RUSH LIMBAUGH
MINK ATTACK BY ALF
Farmers on edge after mink releases; damage estimated at $500,000
By CHRISTOPHER SCHWARZEN
911 ATTACK BY CIA
Because of possible MOSSAD involvement in 911, as participants or as having intelligence that was or
wasn't passed along to who needed to know, and because some of the 911 suspects lived in Germany,
the anti-Semitism card is conveniently played to discredit anyone who mentions MOSSAD and 911 in the
same breath.
Getting the 911 story moved along from the goofball-type "hobby publicists, borderline journalists and
investigative reporter" realm to the alternative reporting realm is a step toward eventually getting
some coverage of this story from the straight media. The vast majority of voters won't believe it until
Dan Rather says it.
"Mohammed Atta and his key accomplice, Marwan al-Shehi. Both lived in Hamburg before they settled in
Hollywood, Florida. A Mossad team was also operating in the same town. The leader, Hanan Serfati, had
rented several dwellings. "One of Serfati's apartments was located on the corner of 701st St. and 21st
Ave., right near the apartment of Atta and al-Shehi." See
Waitaminute! Who is Hanan Serfati?
From the alternative reporting realm, Danny Schechter was asked to ask his readers, "How do you view
the 'anti-Semite' accusation in the German context?
While we await some answers, here's our editorial $0.02's worth: In any context, German or not,
criticism of nearly any individual if he happens to be a Jew, by nearly any Jew or non-Jew, is
considered by the psychotics to be a kind of anti-Semitism that says the one who criticizes would
push the Jews into the sea or into ovens, or would look the other way if someone else did it.
Criticism of Jews who en masse give a blind eye to the IDF treatment of the Palestinians (even before
the first Intifada and the suicide bombings) is considered an act of anti-Semitism, as defined above.
Same goes for criticism of Israel and Israelis, Zionists and Mossad.
The psychotics bristle when Zionist Israel is compared to Apartheid South Africa. There is no
difference for a Palestinian worker under Zionist controlled Israel than there was for black
or "colored" workers during the Apartheid South Africa era. Second-class citizenship status
imagined or imposed is a drag. Where does "reconciliation" fit in as a piece of the World Peace puzzle?
One of the German investigators openly doubts that planes were used in two of the 911 attacks.
If planes didn't fly into the Pennsylvania cabbage patch or into the Pentagon, what happened
to the hijacked planes and the hijackers and passengers?
Also, in terms of San Diego and Florida Flight School loose ends, there is a goofball-type German
link to 911, but there was also a German link to the Nazis and the ovens and the meaning of
anti-Semiticism that now tends to cloud the issues. For some clarification,
see MadCowProd.org.
Is '9/11 skepticism' widespread (among journalists) in the US?
Only goofball-types seem to be picking up on it OR is it that in order to not be considered a
goofball-type, the psychotic will distance himself from the 911 story so's to not be considered a
goofball-type in the eyes of his peers?
Where does it come from?
For people who are not psychotic, as the 911 story unfolded through the straight media, bits and
pieces of who what when where and why fell into place, and the logical dots that were connected by
the mind told a 911 story that seems to have a beginning, middle and end. The "story" needs to be
confirmed or disputed by way of some who what when where and why facts - that are presently held by
the Warren Commission, uh, the Bush White House as trade secrets. So, where does the skepticism come
from? The same place babies come from - from being fucked over.
Is it a result of the increased secrecy since the Bush administration took the White House?
Absolutely! From the Iran/Contra to the Big Dick Cheney energy crisis, to the Presidential papers,
and all the way to the 911; using daisy-cutter bombs for excavation purposes in Afghanistan (leveling
a mountain here and there, and filling in a valley here and there - for an easy oil pipeline lay), and
the same secret oil field CIA broker is in on the Iraq war op.
Is a deliberate intelligence failure a possible version of the events leading to 9/11... or should it
be treated as such?
If it was an "intelligence" op, it wasn't a failure at all - in other words, I don't know how to
answer that question without questioning whose "intelligence failure" caused or allowed the op to
reach a pre-determined stage of completion. The problem is that the FBI/CIA/MOSSAD had an inside
track AND the op as an op no matter whose, was obviously well managed and met with a modicum of
success.
How is the term 'conspiracy theorist' being used in this context?
If it walks like a duck is the working number. The Oklahoma bombing and 911 both quack. While the
principal players thought they were doing something, whoever was managing the op was there to make
sure it moved along ok and/or "they" were there to run interference as needed. Oswald thinks he's
doing something. The Grassy Knoll crowd is actually doing something. Oswald is put out of business.
Story dies.
In more recent news, Qadafi is willing to settle because it was his guys, but unbeknownst to his
guys, they were being set up; thinking they were doing one thing while something completely else was
being opt at the (very exact) same time. Same with KAL007.
The Art Students being deported to Israel "story" is my first favorite; the chaps seen chuckling and
taking pictures as the NYC op was under way is my second favorite, and the one about a couple of guys
trucking through Washington and being deported to Israel is my third favorite 911 story.
Another one I like is the one that while all planes in the U.S. were grounded, the bin Laden family
was gathered together and safely flown out of the U.S. Well, that story turned out not to be entirely
true. They were gathered together while all U.S. traffic was grounded, but they didn't get safely
flown out of here until normal air traffic in the U.S. was resumed.
The month-long pre-911 Crawford vacation is bothersome. Condoleeza Rice 911 and WMD same-diff "stories"
are also bothersome.
The CIA and ITT assassinated Salvador Allende. The CIA is still around. Think ITT ain't? Woodsteen!!
The CIA Infiltration of the Left
What next? THE INTERNATIONAL CRIMINAL COURT BEGINS - MoveOn.org
Also see 31JUL2002 Draft Hillary 2004 Update
26AUG2003
Hero: Ritter was right! - By Carl F. Worden
So we've got this one gutsy guy named Scott Ritter facing another virtual firing squad, and standing up
to them with complete confidence that heıll walk away unscathed. He pulled it off just like he always
has before - only this time he had a lot more backing his position than he ever did before the war
commenced: Now he has the hard proof.
Ritter made it clear from the onset that he emphatically supported the troops, and that they had done
an excellent job as ordered. He also stated our troops should be brought home immediately.
Ritter correctly stated that this was a war "elected" by President Bush (read without a congressional
declaration) on the basis that there was an imminent threat by Saddam to use weapons of mass destruction
against America and her allies. He pointed out that in lieu of such a threat, the war had been
unnecessary - just as he'd warned all along - and that the United States should pull out of Iraq
immediately and let the people of Iraq have their nation back. Ritter also pointed out quite succinctly
that because no imminent threat from Iraq actually existed, then by default, our attack on Iraq was an
act of naked aggression. [MORE]
Carl F. Worden
Liaison & Intelligence Officer
Southern Oregon Militia
A Weapons Cache We'll Never See
By SCOTT RITTER
Free Download: "This Is The Moment" - From Dennis Kucinich
KUCINICH SPEAKS OUT TODAY ON IRAQ:
Continuing his leadership in Congress, Kucinich issued a strong statement today calling for the U.S.
to withdraw from Iraq and for the U.N. to take over peacekeeping operations. [MORE]
WILLIE USES THE "F" WORD: At a news conference with Dennis Saturday in
Dubuque, Iowa, Willie Nelson offered more praise for the candidate.
One of his points didn't get quoted in the press: "I'm supporting
Dennis Kucinich because of the fucking farmers!" [MORE]
Leave No Millionaire Behind
By ARTHUR I. BLAUSTEIN - MotherJones
Driven by hollow political priorities, disastrous economic policies from the Bush White House are
undermining our national ideals. [MORE]
A tally of US taxpayers' tab for Iraq
By DAVID R. FRANCIS - Christian Science Monitor
In dollars and lives the costs of the Iraq war are escalating for the United States.
They are enlarging an already serious federal-budget deficit. The October-through-July deficit hit a
record $324 billion, the Treasury reported last week. The Congressional Budget Office projects the red
ink will reach $401 billion by the end of September.
Looking at Iraq alone, one congressional expert puts the cost for this fiscal year (ending next month)
at $80 billion, of which $62 million is charged to the Defense Department.
That works out to $281 per man, woman, and child in this country. This sum doesn't include the extra
gasoline and other fuel costs, nor Afghanistan.
Most experts expect the occupation costs to continue indefinitely. [MORE]
U.S. to Send Iraqis to Site in Hungary for Police Course
By DEXTER FILKINS
Eager to have more Iraqis take responsibility for their country's security, American officials here are
planning to ferry as many as 28,000 Iraqis to Eastern Europe for an intensive police training course.
Bernard B. Kerik, a former New York City Police commissioner in charge of the Iraqi Interior Ministry,
said in an interview that American officials had secured permission from the government of Hungary to
set up a large police academy inside an old Soviet military base there. [MORE]
Ed. note: Does anyone remember the Shah's dreaded SAVAK?
Censored director's warning for Britain
By FIACHRA GIBBONS - The Guardian
The film director Oliver Stone has warned that the independence of British news media would be
destroyed if US conglomerates were allowed to buy into them.
The maker of such films as Platoon and JFK, whose documentary on Fidel Castro, Commandante,
was pulled "indefinitely" from the cable station HBO's schedules as America went to war with Iraq,
said British politicians were naively courting disaster.
The communications bill enables foreign companies to buy terrestrial channels such as ITV and Channel
Five for the first time. Stone, who screened Commandante at the Edinburgh Film Festival, said he feared
the change would undermine standards. "I was shocked at how superficial and sentimental the American
coverage of the Iraq war was - all Private Jessica Ryan, and no coverage of civilian casualties. In
Britain, you have a wider view, and people are more independent.
"Goebbels said the bigger the lie, the more people will believe it, and I am afraid that is the American
case. [MORE]
Fighting erupts in Kurdish city - BBC
Violence has broken out in and around the northern Iraqi city of Kirkuk between ethnic Kurds and
Turkmen tribesmen with at least nine deaths reported. [MORE]
Ed. note: Also see
Iraqi oil to go to Israel by Amiram Cohen and Akiva Eldar - Haaretz. The United States has asked
Israel to prepare a plan to renew the transport of oil from the Iraqi city of Kirkuk to the Haifa
port. [MORE]
How the Israeli junta conspired to kill the Road Map
Ed. note: According to
Uri Avnery, an Israeli journalist, writer and peace activist, the Israeli
army's propaganda machine is already preparing the public for the expulsion of
Arafat. Expulsion is a euphemism. The intention is not to expel the leader from Ramallah, nor from
Palestine, but from this world. [MORE]
ZIONISTS DO NOT REPRESENT JEWS
From the inception of the Zionist State and particularly in recent times, the impression has been
created in the World that there is some connection between the State, which falsely calls itself
Israel, and the Jewish people as a whole. [MORE]
Christian Zionism: Dispensationalism and the Roots of Sectarian Theology
By JOHN SCOTT
Ed. note: Besides the verging on Voodoo "exorcism" story where an autistic 8-year-old and the "spirit" both got
got, the hooz-hoo bit on Christian Zionism was wierdest goddam article we'd seen all week!
The CIA Infiltration of the Left
What next? THE INTERNATIONAL CRIMINAL COURT BEGINS - MoveOn.org
Also see 31JUL2002 Draft Hillary 2004 Update
25AUG2003
"It's (still) the economy, Stupid!"
The phrase became famous in the early nineties when United States president George Bush Sr., the
victorious commander of the allied troops that liberated Kuwait from Saddam Hussein's occupation was
running for a second term.
An unknown governor from a poor southern state, Bill Clinton, emphasizing on the state of the US
economy and the feeble pockets of US consumers, finally frustrated Mr. Bush's ambitions.
Now a similar scenario seems to be building up even when current president George W. Bush Jr. hasn't
been so victorious in his defeat of Saddamn Hussein's regime and occupation of Iraq. [MORE]
Shooting and racist note with swastika precede 'suspicious' fire
(ISLAM-INFONET WASHINGTON, D.C.) - An overnight fire destroyed an Islamic center in Georgia. That
fire, which arson investigators have termed "suspicious," came after two recent incidents at or near
the same center that point to the possibility of a bias motive.
Local police and officials with the Islamic Center of Savannah in Savannah, Ga., teld CAIR the
fire was reported around three in the morning. The blaze spread quickly and engulfed the house that
was being used as a temporary center until a larger facility could be built.
Center officials say two recent incidents lead them to suspect arson. On August 3, five bullet holes
were discovered in the door to a prayer area in the center. On August 18, the apartment of a Muslim who
lives near and frequently prays at the center was broken into and a racist anti-Muslim note with a Nazi
swastika was left at the scene. The note threatened the lives of local Muslims, demanded that they leave
Savannah and claimed the Islamic community was being watched "24-7."
"Given the fact that there were two other suspicious incidents involving this community, it is
imperative that the FBI aid local law enforcement authorities in the investigation," said
Council on American Islamic Relations (CAIR)
Communications Director Ibrahim Hooper. He added that the FBI is looking into a number of anti-Muslim
hate crimes nationwide.
Hooper cited an attack on a Sikh family in New York during which anti-Muslim statements were made,
a cross burning at a Maryland Islamic school and the kidnapping and beating of a Massachusetts pizza
delivery man whose attackers thought he was Muslim. He noted that a Sikh man who may have been mistaken
for an Arab was shot recently in Phoenix, Ariz.
Since the beginning of this year, CAIR has received reports of physical assaults against Muslims or
those perceived to be Muslim in California, Georgia, New Jersey, South Carolina and other states. One
incident in Yorba Linda, Calif., left a Muslim teenager badly beaten by a mob that allegedly included
white supremacists. In Illinois, an explosive device destroyed a Muslim family's van. In Florida, a man
was recently sentenced to 12 1/2 years in federal prison for plotting to attack some 50 Islamic
institutions in that state.
Incidents targeting mosques and Islamic centers have occurred across America and in Canada,
particularly since the 9/11 terror attacks.
As early as 1994, a nearly completed mosque in Yuba City, Calif., burned to the ground in what was
ruled an arson attack. In 1995, arson destroyed a Springfield, Ill., Islamic center. In 1996, a suspect
was charged for involvement in an arson attack on a Greenville, S.C., mosque. In 1999, a would-be
terrorist was arrested after fleeing from the area of a mosque near Denver, Colo. The suspect's car
was found to contain loaded weapons and bomb-making materials. Also that year, an arson attack severely
damaged a Minneapolis, Minn., mosque. In 2002, a pick-up truck was driven into the front of the
Islamic Center of Tallahassee, Fla. Police said the attacker was motivated by "hatred of Muslims."
Similar incidents have occurred in a number of other states.
Victims of hate crimes are urged to fill out report forms, which are available for
download at: http://www.cair-net.org/ireport/Incident_Report.doc, or by
calling 202-488-8787. [MORE]
Judge Rejects Fox News' Request for Injunction on Franken Book
A federal judge on Friday denied the Fox News request for an injunction to block
humorist Al Franken's new book, whose title mocks the Fox slogan "fair and balanced."
U.S. District Judge Denny Chin said the book - "Lies and the Lying Liars Who Tell Them: A Fair and
Balanced Look at the Right" - is a parody protected by the First Amendment.
"There are hard cases and there are easy cases," the judge said. "This is an easy case. This case
is wholly without merit, both factually and legally."
The network had argued the subtitle to Franken's book could trick some consumers into believing
the book is associated with Fox. Fox, which trademarked "Fair and Balanced" as a slogan in 1998,
was seeking an injunction barring publisher Penguin Group from using the cover or any other promotion
including those words.
Franken called the ruling a victory for the First Amendment and satirists everywhere - "even bad
satirists."
"In addition to thanking my own lawyers," Franken said, "I'd like to thank Fox's lawyers for
filing one of the stupidest briefs I've ever seen in my life."
The ruling opened the door for lawyers for Penguin and Franken to file a motion to dismiss the suit
altogether. In addition to denying the injunction, the judge took direct aim at Fox for bringing the
case.
Judge Chin said, "It is ironic that a media company, which should be protecting the First
Amendment, is seeking to undermine it." [MORE]
Editorial cartoonist fired at the New Zealand Herald
Rod Emmerson is to be the permanent replacement for Malcolm
Evans at the New Zealand Herald.
"I happen to believe that our society and civilization owes a debt of gratitude to
centuries of Jewish initiative in every field of human endeavour. Out of all proportion to their number
among us, we have been blessed with the efforts, both singly and as communities, of Jewish scholars,
artists, authors, composers, craftsmen, social scientists , philanthropists you name it - the list goes
on.
"But Zionism is something else!
"I also believe that the Holocaust is without doubt the greatest crime in recorded history and together
with all the pogroms and persecutions of Jews that preceeded it, is Europe's greatest shame. But if it's
Europe's greatest crime, how can it be fair that it be used to justify the establishment of a safe
haven, for which Palestinian peasants must pay the price." -- Malcolm Evans
Click
here to see an archive of Malcolm's work. Malcolm won the Qantas Award as "Best Cartoonist of the
Year" in New Zealand last year and has drawn for the New Zealand Herald for seven years. He is a regular
contributor to the CagleCartoons site.
Ed. note: The difference between what happened to Malcolm Evans (above), and nothing happening
with Sandy Huffaker (below) is that Evans got fired for his maturity and understanding of the issues,
while Huffaker is allowed to express his ignorance so freely - but then at taxpayer expense, the
CIA or satanically-subsidized Dan Pipes, a propagandist and admittedly pro-Zionist says whatever's
on his mind and gets a Presidential (
recess) appointment to boot. Including our having to watch the gruesome and blatant injustices
appear above the fold that seem to favor the bad guys, that is only the down payment on the high price
we pay for a Free Press.
Without missing a beat, Danny Schechter's
News Dissector
blog came back online this morning, and outa
the chute he shares some thoughts on the way propaganda seeps into the press...
British musician Brian Eno sez: "Its greatest triumph is that we generally don't notice it - or laugh at the notion it
even exists. We watch the democratic process taking place - heated debates in which we feel we could
have a voice - and think that, because we have 'free' media, it would be hard for the Government to
get away with anything very devious without someone calling them on it. It takes something as dramatic
as the invasion of Iraq to make us look a bit more closely and ask: 'How did we get here? ... The new
American approach to social control is so much more sophisticated and pervasive that it really deserves
a new name. It isn't just propaganda any more, it's 'prop-agenda '. It's not so much the control of what
we think, but the control of what we think about."
Since we taxpayers are footing the bill, I think our government owes to us some disclosure when the
intelligence agencies subsidize various online, hardcopy and broadcast news media. Nah, maybe that's
asking too much.
The editorial "we" are still trying to find out what's what on
the
US tried and failed to plant WMDs story, that has floated onto the Internet like an urban legend
but didn't appear on the JihadSpun site.
24AUG2003
The Target is Microsoft
Ed. note: The target is Microsoft because it is such an easy target and not
because Bill Gates is considered a jerk by the worm writers. Gates & Company have consistently
written and brought to market a wholly inferior product - that's why it is the "easy" target so full
of holes patches can't be written fast enough.
Through Microsoft marketing and
merchandising tactics, those same inferior products have been forced down the world's throat, so now
the whole world gets to share in the misery.
When Gates affected the near total saturation of PCs marketplace with "Windows" (his software emulation
of an Apple or Macintosh computer) and the "Internet Explorer" (after the theft and copy of the Netscape
browser), he invited retaliation.
The New York Times said, "Microsoft, whose Windows operating systems were the target of the worms,
can be faulted for failing to design and test its software adequately..." and "security must be
improved before a more destructive attack drags this computerized society to a standstill..."
Quality systems and quality software in the first place will go a long way toward resolving
the bug-related "security" problems. [MORE
Pipes says Muslim war might be needed
By THOMAS GINSBERG
Daniel Pipes, a controversial scholar of Islam appointed yesterday to a tax-funded
peace institute, says war may be necessary for peace with some Muslim nations.
"Conditions of peace have, by and large, been created through military victory," he said last week on
condition his comments not be published until President Bush named him to the U.S. Institute of Peace. [MORE]
Bush Appoints Anti-Muslim to Peace Role
By SUZANNE GOLDENBERG
A Middle East expert who has written dismissively of diplomacy and holds views to the right of the
Israeli prime minister, Ariel Sharon, was yesterday named to the board of the US Institute of Peace.
The largely honorary appointment of Daniel Pipes, a gift of President George Bush, has outraged
Democratic senators, American Muslims and Arabs, liberal Jews and a large portion of the academic
community, who say his opinions are not conducive to peace. [MORE]
Don't appoint hatemonger
By SHABBIR MOTORWALA
In response to Charles Krauthammer's Aug. 18 Viewpoints column:
Understand the dangers of Islamic Radicalism - Oklahoma City bomber Timothy McVeigh was not taught in a mosque or raised in a Muslim
environment. Eric Rudolph, who hates Jews and immigrants, learned to kill doctors and others who didn't
follow his radical right-wing Christianity. Baruch Goldstein, who killed innocent Muslim worshipers in
Israel, was raised in Orthodox Jewish tradition. The radical Rabbi Meir Kahane was not trained in a
Wahhabi mosque.
Radicalism is not unique to Islam. Preachers who use religion for their own causes radicalize people.
Pat Robertson, Franklin Graham and Jerry Falwell have also abused their power and radicalized
Christianity.
President Bush will again blunder in his dealings with the Muslim world if he appoints Daniel Pipes,
the worst of Islam-phobic scholars, to the U.S. Institute of Peace. Only neocons would like to see
another hatemonger appointed to the peace institute. If Bush wants to win the hearts and minds of the
Muslim world, especially U.S. Muslims, he will withdraw Daniel Pipes' nomination. [Miami Herald]
Conscientious Muslims may be offended by the cartooning of Sandy Huffaker, and particularly
his "gratitude" piece. Without judgment, and mere observation, Muslims might see into the Huffaker
as a typically western mind and how they experience life, the universe and everything (see Hitch Hiker's Guide to the Galaxy). Real narrow (see Moon Over Morocco).
One may see Huffaker's writings as a kind of barometer of the re-created (recreational) world,
as filtered through that "real narrow" mind-set of who he thinks his readers really are, and who he's
writing to. Realize this guy is only a messenger. A free press is worth something. Don't shoot the
messenger!
A Koran for Dummies? What a concept! How about if the company who writes
the "For dummies" books were actually tasked with explaining to their admittedly "dumb (or ill-informed)"
readers (and cartoonists who venture into areas they know nothing about) what's really what with
Islam? Frigging novel!
They could explain that (authentic) Islam translates as a "commitment to peace", and Muslims (who
are authentic Muslims) are committed to peace. There are a billion Muslims practicing their
religion peacefully, and to hear it from the corporate media, there are 365 not-so-peaceful Muslims,
each committing a terrorist act a day...
If the same book publishers wrote a King James Version of the "Bible for Dummies", they could explain
that unlike the TV evangelists-types including Pat Robertson, Franklin Graham and Jerry Falwell,
authentic Christians actually practice "Do unto others" as "The Golden Rule", and are a truly loving and
forgiving kind of people; kind to neighbors, strangers and even their "enemies" - in that kind of
experiential love that Jesus, peace be upon him, is said to have spoken about and taught his followers.
In the Huffaker cartoon we see bookmarks for jihad, revenge, suicide bombings and fatwas...
In a Koran for Dummies, it could be explained that none except the Caliph has the authority to issue a
fatwa, and there hasn't been a Caliph in Islam (the organized "religion" or the return to God or Allah)
for centuries. Imam Khomeini was an Islamic figure of authority in the days of his Islamic Revolution;
in the first Islamic Republic in centuries, in Iran, and he issued a fatwa against that disgusting
Salman Rushdie who unnecessarily made the Prophet of Islam, peace be upon him, into a cartoon character.
If Huffaker would have done it, well, it would be water off a duck's back because Huffaker is an obvious
dummy when it comes to understanding Islam. Maybe he's a Jew. Maybe he's a Zionist. Maybe he drinks
beer and eats bacon and tomato sandwiches. Maybe he's an atheist. Maybe he believes
in nothing (see John LeCarre's
The Little Drummer Girl). No matter, Huffaker would have been wiser to write about what he knows
about. In Islam there are admonitions against taking drastic measures against the mentally retarded, so
it's not even likely that
someone in authority would issue a fatwa against the likes of the Huffakers of this world, although his
work would be banned these days in the Iranian press.
Salman Rushdie was a Muslim, and knew better than to do what he did just for the sake of selling a
few books - mainly to his western, English language readers who didn't have a clue about
Islam in the first place. Rushdie didn't help his readers gain a better understanding of Islam through
those writings. On the contrary, the only lesson learned by westerners from The Satanic Verses is that
a guy could get himself killed for making a mockery of the Holy Prophet (SAWA). Particularly if the guy
making such mischief was a Muslim. No one ever killed Rushdie so up until this
writing, the Imam's fatwa and the particulars behind it's issuance are still a mute point.
The CIA-trained Usama bin Laden had no more authority to issue fatwas than George W Bush had the
authority to wage war in Iraq based on his "sixteen words" or Tony Blair's "sexed up" documents that
were delivered to the American people as the State of the Union address, that supposedly justified a war
on Iraq.
Although wrong as hell, suicide bombers are the only effective weapon the occupied have against their
well armed occupiers, as we have seen in Israel, and now most recently in Iraq. Children killing
themselves and killing other children is also wrong as hell, but we're not talking here about Sunday
school. We're talking about a full-tilt war between the Israeli and Palestinians, or Americans and the
Iraqi people who think their respective lands are being occupied by the enemy so they fight back with
all the future they can muster - that includes the lives of their children, and their children's
children. What do they have to lose against powers that promise the demise of those same generations
sooner or later anyhow? I condone nothing. I acknowledge a hopeless situation that short of a Miracle
will always be a hopeless situation for everyone except comic book writers and arms merchants.
In or outside cartoon features, revenge is not unique to Muslims no matter what Huffaker attempted to
imply with a bookmark. The self-proclaimed "Christian" George W Bush attacked Afghanistan after 911,
and killing three times as many thousands as Usama's bunch killed at the World Trade Center? That was
an act of revenge!
The great mystery in dropping 20 thousand bombs on Afghanistan is that 15 of the 19 hijackers were
Sa'udi citizens - as was Usama. The 911 op was directly and indirectly bought and paid for by factions
within Sa'udi Arabia - the Wahabbi, the Sa'udi sanctioned religious arm and military protectorate arm
of the Sa'udi "Royal" Family, and individual family members paid at least four of the hijackers right
out of their own personal bank accounts - so the Bush White House took "revenge" on Afghanistan?
Go figure.
Closer to revenge being a deadly game of tit-for-tattery, when the Palestinians kill a bunch of
Israelis with suicide bombs, the Israelis take revenge by killing a bunch of Palestinians with tanks
and rockets. Then, for revenge, the Palestinians launch another suicide attack, and then the Israeli
send in bulldozers and missiles in a never-ending process of making war on one another. The same
was happening in Northern Ireland where both of the parties at war were Christians; Catholics and
Protestants - even the Queen's (official) Church of England flock were doing some killing up in Belfast.
The same will be happening in Iraq; for every strike against western interests, the U.S. will
retaliate, and the Iraqis will counter the retaliation with another suicide bomb or RPG strike, or
they'll blow up another oil pipeline - "revenge" by any other "getting even" name is the name of the
deadly game they play.
Archived on this very website are links to endless discussions about what dummies don't know about
jihad, so there is no point in doing any great re-hash here. See
A little
jihad with your morning qawa - Three articles:
Jihad: how a word became a weapon By
ED HAYES (A non-Muslim "student of Islam").
Jihad: the true
belief By STEPHEN SCHWARTZ (A Muslim). Also see,
in-context and by contrast Preventive War:
The Supreme Crime By Noam Chomsky.
The Truth About Charlie Krauthanger and Dan Pipes, and
Repeating Mistakes of the Cold War, then see Huffaker's "gratitude" question...
Neither from an Iraqi point of view, nor from anyone else's point of view did the Bush White House
do the Iraqis or the U.S. taxpayer any favor by making war on Iraq. None except the arms manufacturers
have anything to be grateful for where war is concerned. Israeli security has not been enhanced in any
way. Perhaps the instability brought to the mideast at the hands of the U.S. makes Israel a more
dangerous place than before; bringing an end to Israel (the real estate) sooner than might have
otherwise been expected. Will the last Israeli out explode a nuclear device rendering the whole place
too hot for anyone to live in for the next 10,000 years? If they do, they won't be welcome in California,
or Central Africa or anywhere else.
From a Muslim point of view, as might be explained in a Koran for Dummies, gratitude (and intent)
are two of the most important dynamics in Islam. Each have a mystical power, like the love and
forgiveness dynamics as might be explained in a King James Version of the Bible for Dummies, or the
ethics, philosophy or theology of non-violence as taught in a Bhagavatam for Dummies.
Very simply, those who are not grateful; i.e., who can't, don't or won't acknowledge
the Creation as differentiated from the "re-creation" might just as well forget about God. In so
doing there are consequences for believers and non-believers alike - for Muslims, Christians and Jews
who talk the Abrahamic talk but who don't walk Abrahamic walk - there are consequences as is also
explained in al-Qur'an presently or in a yet to be written Koran for Dummies.
In looking seriously at Huffaker's work, I find his particular brand of genius or dementia to
be universally offensive and irreverent, and nearly equally so towards all religions, politicians,
the professions, terrorists, freedom-fighters, all nationalities, and all races including the 5th at
Hollywood Park when he finds out that Sirhan Sirhan hot-walked horses and might not have been the
trigger man at all in the RFK assassination... Huffaker appears to live in a white-guy kind of dream
world with some privilege to match. It ain't a race thing. Jayson Blair played the same card and he
was black. Sorta black... like Chevron's Condoleeza Rice, Mi Lai's Colin Powell, and the Supreme
Court's Clarence Thomas.
Besides, for the Muslims who were most offended, take heart - Huffaker isn't a Muslim! For a Muslim or
anyone who knows the kind of gratitude Huffaker isn't writing about, better one should feel sorry than
give him a second thought - although I must admit, he certainly got our editorial attention, and the
time it took to write this up. [MORE - see August 22 entry]
Ed. note - File this one under the Bush White House with one less Bush: Carolyn Washburn,
Executive Editor of Idaho Statesman, after her newspaper printed "Koran for Dummies" on Aug. 18 wrote:
"We apologize for an editorial cartoon on the Commentary page... Our standard is to publish cartoons of
all points of view, even if the editorial board disagrees, because cartoons express the opinion of the
cartoonist. But our standard is to not run cartoons that do little more than reinforce stereotypes
about religion, race or other things of a personal nature. We apologize."
While the Idaho Statesman wasn't wrong to have published Sandy Huffaker's editorial cartoon, because it
was indeed the opinion of the cartoonist who you never know what they'll say next - so as long as
they don't say something like "fuck" in their free speech family newspaper, you takes your chances.
In this instance, and in the tradition of Uncle Bernie Ward, Carolyn Washburn was perfectly right to
have apologized after the fact rather than to have asked permission from the readers if the cartoonist
might be allowed express his ignorance and immaturity. It is obvious that the Cartoonist Guild never
initiated their fellow into manhood before turning him loose on the Free Press. The Engineer Guild for
example won't let just anyone hang out a shingle or we'd have bridges falling down all over the place. I
don't wish to belabour this one any further except to say that if the psychiatric community hasn't deemed
prejudice, racism and bigotry to be forms of mental illness, they should - and those who practice
prejudice, racism and bigotry, when they become a danger to themselves or others, they should be taken
off the streets. Imagine a world without the genius of old Ezra Pound locked away somewhere in a straight
jacket.
The CIA Infiltration of the Left
What next? THE INTERNATIONAL CRIMINAL COURT BEGINS - MoveOn.org
Also see 31JUL2002 Draft Hillary 2004 Update
23AUG2003
Ahnold Doesn't Get It - Yet - Carl Worden
I believe Arnold Schwarzenegger is a capable, nice, sincere guy with the very best of intentions for
running California as governor. I also believe Arnold is being misled and manipulated by some very
clever players behind the curtain - and I will herewith prove my case.
Nobody knows how to manipulate national and international finance better than Warren Buffet, the man
Schwarzenegger appointed as his financial guru for returning California's economy to the black. No one
is more fiscally astute than Warren Buffet.
So why isn't Warren buffet telling Arnold the truth about the disaster the North American Free Trade
Agreement (NAFTA) has wreaked on the American economy, and hence, California's economy? Why hasn't
Warren Buffet told Arnold that it is the economic devastation resulting from the General Agreement On
Trades And Tariffs (GATT) that forced California manufacturers to move their operations to mainland
China and elsewhere?
The other day, Arnold gave a great news conference, where he complained about California's taxes and
loss of manufacturing jobs. When asked what he would do to return manufacturing to California,
Schwarzenegger replied something like, "I'm going to make California more business friendly". That
told me right then and there that Arnold doesn't get it - yet.
I was hanging on Schwarzenegger's every word, listening in vain for his mention, if not his outright
condemnation, of NAFTA and GATT, but it never came. That leaves only two possibilities: Either Arnold
knows and isn't saying, or he doesn't know. If Arnold doesn't know, it's because Buffet isn't telling
him, and nobody but nobody knows what NAFTA and GATT have done to destroy this nation's manufacturing
and employment picture more than Warren Buffet.
Let's say Arnold gets elected Governor of California and suspends all corporate and small business
taxes in the state - including commercial property taxes. Let's say he relaxes all state Worker's
Compensation requirements to the bare minimum, as well as state environmental regulations and
other "unfriendly" regulations the whacko liberals and environmental freaks have heaped on California's
business environment over the past 30 years. Let's say he did all that, and you know what? It wouldn't
make a bit of difference.
Look, I'm American citizen and California resident Joe Entrepreneur, who's come up with a design for a
better Widget - the best Widget ever designed, and it will be high in demand all over the world for
years to come.
I need to manufacture this Widget, and Arnold wants me to build my manufacturing plant in the
new "business-friendly" California. Why should I if I don't have to?
If I build my manufacturing plant in China, I will enjoy low construction costs, low labor costs and
comparatively no government restrictions or taxes at all - which just happens to mirror the reason
America's manufacturing juggernaut got going so well in our early years.
Before NAFTA/GATT, I would have to consider not only the additional cost of shipping my Widgets from
China to America, but also the tariff and trade restrictions I'd face when trying to compete with
Widgets made in America. If those tariff and trade restrictions made my Widget sell for the same or
more at the retail level, I might as well manufacture them in America - and that is exactly what kept
our American manufacturers onshore at the time. That's not the case anymore.
With the passage of NAFTA/GATT, all American trade restrictions and tariffs were lifted. That
leaves only the consideration of shipping costs, and I want to remind everyone that we don't live in
the horse & buggy days anymore: The cost of worldwide shipping per unit today is so low as to be
negligible in the consideration of where to place your manufacturing plant -- so guess where I'm
going to manufacture my Widgets?
Sorry, Arnold.
As Governor of California, Arnold Schwarzenegger would be powerless to reverse the federal
government's love affair with NAFTA/GATT, and because Arnold wasn't born in America, he can never
be president.
What I'm curious to know is how long it takes Schwarzenegger to figure out his plan for making
California "business-friendly" won't work and never will as long as NAFTA/GATT remain in place.
Will it take four years or eight? With financial advisors like Warren Buffet perched on his
shoulder and whispering in his ear, will Arnold ever get it?
To tell you the truth, I think Schwarzenegger will eventually get it, and he's going to be feeling
pretty angry and personally betrayed when he does.
Carl F. Worden
Ed. note: Thanks to
Orrin Hatch, Arnold Schwarzenegger may have a better shot at a U.S. President slot than
anyone in their right mind could have otherwise imagined. Hatch is introducing an amendment the
Constitution so non-American born citizens of the United States may indeed become President. [MORE]
Controversial Dan Pipes Will Be Recess Appointment
Alan Cooperman
President Bush will sidestep congressional opposition by making a recess appointment today of a
controversial Middle East scholar, Daniel Pipes, to the board of directors of the U.S. Institute of
Peace, an administration official said.
Although the position is largely honorary, Muslim organizations and some Jewish groups have
campaigned vigorously since April against Pipes's nomination to the federally funded foreign policy
think tank, which has 70 staff and 15 board members.
The Council on American-Islamic Relations, a Washington-based civil rights group, said Pipes
is "known for his hostility to Muslims," and called the appointment "a backdoor move"
that is "an affront to all those who seek peace."
A Harvard-trained author and lecturer, Pipes, 53, heads the Middle East Forum, an independent think
tank in Philadelphia. He also founded Campus Watch, a group dedicated to combating what it sees as
pro-Palestinian, anti-Israeli bias on university campuses...
At a July 23 meeting on the nomination, Democrats on the Senate Health, Education, Labor and
Pensions Committee questioned what signal Pipes's appointment would send. Sen. Edward M.
Kennedy (D-Mass.) said Pipes's record did not "reflect a commitment to bridging differences and
preventing conflict," and Sen. Tom Harkin (D-Iowa) said the controversy could "overshadow" the
institute's work.
By making the appointment while Congress is in recess, Bush avoids a confirmation vote. But instead
of serving the usual four years, Pipes will serve the remaining 18 months of an unexpired term.
MUSLIMS DECLARE 'MORAL VICTORY' IN PIPES APPOINTMENT
Move shows lack of support for nominee, led to formation of coalitions
The Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR), an Islamic civil rights and advocacy group is
declaring a "moral victory" in the fight to prevent Daniel Pipes from being appointed to the
board of the United States Institute of Peace (USIP). According to media reports, President Bush
will today bypass the Senate confirmation process and issue a recess appointment for Pipes, who is
regarded by many Muslims as the nation's leading Islamophobe.
In a statement released this morning, CAIR said, "While a defeat for democracy, the president's
backdoor appointment of Daniel Pipes is a moral victory for the tens of thousands of American
Muslims, Arab-Americans, Christians, Jews, and civil rights activists who contacted the White House
and the Senate since the nomination was announced in April.
"By issuing this recess appointment, the president acknowledges that Pipes' nomination would have been
turned down by the Senate, despite that body's Republican majority. Without being approved by the
Senate, Pipes will serve just 18 months of what would have been a four-year term.
"The campaign to defeat Pipes' nomination and to expose his bigoted views also showed the Muslim and
Arab-American communities that there are those in Congress who will stand up for what is right,
despite tremendous political pressure to remain silent. At a July 23 Senate committee meeting on
Pipes' nomination, Sens. Edward Kennedy (D-MA), Christopher Dodd (D-CT) and Tom Harkin (D-IA) all
opposed the appointment. Sen. Harkin, who was involved in the formation of the USIP, spoke at length
about Pipes' statements warning of the 'dangers' posed by the enfranchisement of American Muslims and
his 'dossiers' on academic critics of Israeli policies.
"Perhaps the most positive by-product of the campaign was the creation of a broad coalition of
religious, ethnic, and civil liberties groups that will last long after Pipes takes his seat on the
USIP board."
ON/OFF SUBJECT: The enemy of my enemy is not necessarily my friend if you are anti-war, and
someone, in the name of "supporting the troops" like a possible challenger to George W in the Republican
primary season suggests more troops be sent. That may be supportive to the troops, but it ain't
anti-war. Anti-war is bringing the troops home now!
Senator John McCain says more troops needed
By MARGARET NEIGHBOUR
One of our e-mail friends in responding to what we wrote in introducing the
Lugnuts, flypaper and bourbier article, "I only hope in the fall a (peace) movement starts up again
out where we can actually see it."
War on Tourism - from The Scotsman
Tourists told to Beatle off
By JOHN INNES
SIX Brazilians were turned away from Britain by immigration officials after failing a quiz about
The Beatles.
The six were among a group of 72 on a tour from Rio de Janeiro and claimed to be travelling to
Liverpoolıs Mathew Street Festival, which celebrates the Fab Fourıs lives.
But officials at Heathrow barred their entry to the country when they failed to correctly answer
basic questions about the band.
Bill Heckle, from Cavern City Tours, said: "Immigration officials asked them simple questions, such
as how many Beatles are still alive, and what songs they could name."
The new arrivals had not heard of Yoko Ono and thought Ringo Starr was dead, but their spokesman
said: "The way we have been treated is terrible."
The CIA Infiltration of the Left
What next? THE INTERNATIONAL CRIMINAL COURT BEGINS - MoveOn.org
Also see 31JUL2002 Draft Hillary 2004 Update
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