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STOP THE MADNESS!!! ... Is this what the "pious" politicos mean by "religious values"???

07.31.04 (9:21 am) [edit]

[u]Bush/Cheney's "Compassionate Conservatism" & "Religious Values"[/u]: "[i]And one of the police, he put a part of his stick that he always carries inside my ass, and I felt it going inside me about two centimeters, approximately. And I started screaming, and he pulled it out and he washed it with water inside the room. And the two American girls that were there when they were beating me, they were hitting me with a ball made of sponge on my dick. And when I was tied up in my room, one of the girls, with blond hair, she is white, she was playing with my dick. I saw inside this facility a lot of punishment just like what they did to me and more. And they were taking pictures of me during all these instances[/i]." - http://www.tblog.com/template... ... [i]This isn't even the "worst" of it if that is imaginable ... Children being raped and sodomized ... People being fed crap to eat [/i]...

Read the horrifying account of murder, torture, rape and sodomy of human beings (including children) by the Bush/Cheney regime in [i][b]The Secret File of Abu Ghraib: New classified documents implicate U.S. forces in rape and sodomy of Iraqi prisoners [/b][/i] on http://www.tblog.com/template...

Take a good hard [i]look[/i] at what Bush/Cheney have done to our nation. Bush and Cheney are [i]despicable[/i]!!!

And we [i]haven't[/i] as yet seen the pictures of Bush/Cheney's thugs raping and sodomizing of little children because they are [i]covering-up [/i]their War Crimes!!!

Check-Out[/b]: "Abu Ghraib Cover-up Intensifies" on http://www.tblog.com/template...

[b]Torture and Abuse at Abu Ghraib Prison ... The Red Cross warned the Bush administration who knew over a year ago and did nothing to stop this ...[/b]

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[b]Its the "liberation" of the Iraqi people and it isnt pretty.[/b]

=http://img38.photobucket.com/...

[b]These are just some of the photos that led to an investigation into conditions at the Abu Ghraib prison, once Saddams torture palace, and now run by the occupation authorities, as revealed in a shocking report broadcast by CBS on[i] 60 Minutes II[/i][/b].

=http://img38.photobucket.com/...

[b]Brig. Gen. Janice Karpinski, in charge of the occupiers detention facilities throughout Iraq, has been dismissed from her post, and 6 U.S. soldiers face charges[/b].

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[b]"This is international standards," said Karpinski, in an earlier interview with CBS. "It's the best care available in a prison facility."[/b]

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[b]Anybody can see that.[/b]

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[b]Below, Brigadier-General Janis Karpinski, who was responsible for military jails in Iraq, and has now been suspended in the abuse probe, meets with Donald Rumsfeld.[/b]

=http://img38.photobucket.com/...

[b]And even more disturbing screen shots made available from Global Free Press http://globalfreepress.com/ via [i]TheMemoryHole[/i] http://www.thememoryhole.org/... [/b].

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[b]These images are from the [i]60 Minutes II [/i]broadcast. CBS says that it has twelve of these photographs, though there are dozens more. Among them:

The Army has photographs that show a detainee with wires attached to his genitals. Another shows a dog attacking an Iraqi prisoner[/b].

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Is THIS the so-called "Compassionate Conservativism" BULL-SHIT we're supposed to put up with???

07.31.04 (9:15 am) [edit]

[u]Bush/Cheney's "Compassionate Conservatism"[/u]: "[i]And one of the police, he put a part of his stick that he always carries inside my ass, and I felt it going inside me about two centimeters, approximately. And I started screaming, and he pulled it out and he washed it with water inside the room. And the two American girls that were there when they were beating me, they were hitting me with a ball made of sponge on my dick. And when I was tied up in my room, one of the girls, with blond hair, she is white, she was playing with my dick. I saw inside this facility a lot of punishment just like what they did to me and more. And they were taking pictures of me during all these instances[/i]." - http://www.tblog.com/template... ... [i]This isn't even the "worst" of it if that is imaginable ... Children being raped and sodomized ... People being fed crap to eat [/i]...

Read the horrifying account of murder, torture, rape and sodomy of human beings (including children) by the Bush/Cheney regime in [i][b]The Secret File of Abu Ghraib: New classified documents implicate U.S. forces in rape and sodomy of Iraqi prisoners [/b][/i] on http://www.tblog.com/template...

Take a good hard [i]look[/i] at what Bush/Cheney have done to our nation. Bush and Cheney are [i]despicable[/i]!!!

And we [i]haven't[/i] as yet seen the pictures of Bush/Cheney's thugs raping and sodomizing of little children because they are [i]covering-up [/i]their War Crimes!!!

Check-Out[/b]: "Abu Ghraib Cover-up Intensifies" on http://www.tblog.com/template...

[b]Torture and Abuse at Abu Ghraib Prison ... The Red Cross warned the Bush administration who knew over a year ago and did nothing to stop this ...[/b]

=http://img38.photobucket.com/...

=http://img38.photobucket.com/...

=http://img38.photobucket.com/...

=http://img38.photobucket.com/...

=http://img38.photobucket.com/...

[b]Its the "liberation" of the Iraqi people and it isnt pretty.[/b]

=http://img38.photobucket.com/...

[b]These are just some of the photos that led to an investigation into conditions at the Abu Ghraib prison, once Saddams torture palace, and now run by the occupation authorities, as revealed in a shocking report broadcast by CBS on[i] 60 Minutes II[/i][/b].

=http://img38.photobucket.com/...

[b]Brig. Gen. Janice Karpinski, in charge of the occupiers detention facilities throughout Iraq, has been dismissed from her post, and 6 U.S. soldiers face charges[/b].

=http://img38.photobucket.com/...

[b]"This is international standards," said Karpinski, in an earlier interview with CBS. "It's the best care available in a prison facility."[/b]

=http://img38.photobucket.com/...

[b]Anybody can see that.[/b]

=http://img38.photobucket.com/...

[b]Below, Brigadier-General Janis Karpinski, who was responsible for military jails in Iraq, and has now been suspended in the abuse probe, meets with Donald Rumsfeld.[/b]

=http://img38.photobucket.com/...

[b]And even more disturbing screen shots made available from Global Free Press http://globalfreepress.com/ via [i]TheMemoryHole[/i] http://www.thememoryhole.org/... [/b].

=http://img38.photobucket.com/...

=http://img38.photobucket.com/...

[b]These images are from the [i]60 Minutes II [/i]broadcast. CBS says that it has twelve of these photographs, though there are dozens more. Among them:

The Army has photographs that show a detainee with wires attached to his genitals. Another shows a dog attacking an Iraqi prisoner[/b].

=http://img38.photobucket.com/...

=http://img38.photobucket.com/...

=http://img38.photobucket.com/...

=http://img38.photobucket.com/...

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...... Some Republicans defect to Kerry's camp

07.31.04 (8:07 am) [edit]

(Reuters) - Ohio resident Bob Stewart says of President Bush: "He's been a world-class polarizer. I don't know if I can stomach four more years with him as president. He misled us into the war in Iraq and has mismanaged everything since."

A raging Democrat? No, Stewart is a Republican, one of an unknown number of such voters who plan to back John Kerry, out of despair over the war in Iraq and disappointment over budget deficits and social policies.

It remains to be seen whether they can tip the scales in hotly contested middle American states like Ohio as the Democratic nominee courts them and battles Bush in the final three-month dash to November's election. In past elections defections from both parties have sometimes canceled each other out.

Kerry and running mate John Edwards kicked off that fight on Friday, leaving Boston and the concluded party convention for a two-week campaign swing across 21 states.

Stewart, 44, an insurance agent from Anderson Township near Cincinnati, voted for Bush in 2000 and is a registered Republican.

"I just have a gut feeling that Kerry can be trusted to make the right courageous decisions and will make a good president. He showed that with his heroism in Vietnam," he says.

Bush is "supposed to be a conservative and yet he's run up the biggest federal deficit in history. One thing that really turned me (away from Bush) as a lifelong Catholic ... was to see Bush go to the Vatican and try to get the pope to come down hard on Kerry for his stand on abortion. That is absolutely appalling."

In Michigan, Dan Martin has run for local office as a Republican. He says his biggest disappointment is that Bush's reputation as a "compassionate, conservative" governor of Texas hasn't proven true in the White House.

"The foreign policy is a mess. The offensive in Iraq is reckless and built on bad decision making. On the domestic front I understand that terrorism has struck and he's occupied but any real progress on a domestic agenda has ground to a halt," added Martin, 32, a customer service manager at a health maintenance organization who lives in Rochester Hills.

In Tennessee, Brian Boland, a young music company manager shopping at a market near Nashville, said: "I've always voted Republican and my folks will just kill me if they find out I'm switching to Kerry this year ... but I am just frustrated with the way Bush has mishandled everything. All the untruths."

His wife said she too was switching. The Republicans carried Tennessee in 2000, even though it was the home state of Democratic nominee Al Gore.

At the same market Ron King, a black Vietnam Veteran, said: "I always voted Republican before but I'm against Bush ever since I found out that he doesn't love this country. His so-called military record is a sham. And the worst part is that he lies so much. He lied about weapons of mass destruction."

Lloyd Huff, 64, retired director of the Dayton Research Institute in Ohio, says he has "voted for a Republican in every presidential election I can remember" but it will be Kerry this time because "the Bush administration has been the most deceitful, duplicitous, secretive administration this country has ever had."

"Going to war in Iraq was a horrible, horrible mistake," he said. He accused Bush of "an arrogant, swaggering cowboy mentality ... he has done more than anyone to inflame the Muslim world by his words and actions,"

Kenneth Warren of St. Louis University, who has studied and taught about voter behavior for three decades, said turning a trickle into a trend will be a tough job for Kerry because historically Republicans tend to be faithful. Democrats are more diverse and divided, a "party of factions," and more easily hived off, as former President Ronald Reagan did with the "Reagan Democrats," he said.

Clay Richards, assistant director of the Polling Institute at Quinnipiac University in Connecticut, says Kerry is getting about 11 or 12 percent of the Republican vote in Pennsylvania and New Jersey while Bush is drawing 9 or 10 percent of his support from Democrats, not a statistically significant crossover.

Before any Kerry draw could be rated similar to the "Reagan Democrats" effect, he said "the gap would have to be a lot bigger." - http://www.smirkingchimp.com/...

Defections ... It's A Good Thing ...

07.31.04 (8:06 am) [edit]

[b]Some Republicans defect to Kerry's camp [/b]

(Reuters) - Ohio resident Bob Stewart says of President Bush: "He's been a world-class polarizer. I don't know if I can stomach four more years with him as president. He misled us into the war in Iraq and has mismanaged everything since."

A raging Democrat? No, Stewart is a Republican, one of an unknown number of such voters who plan to back John Kerry, out of despair over the war in Iraq and disappointment over budget deficits and social policies.

It remains to be seen whether they can tip the scales in hotly contested middle American states like Ohio as the Democratic nominee courts them and battles Bush in the final three-month dash to November's election. In past elections defections from both parties have sometimes canceled each other out.

Kerry and running mate John Edwards kicked off that fight on Friday, leaving Boston and the concluded party convention for a two-week campaign swing across 21 states.

Stewart, 44, an insurance agent from Anderson Township near Cincinnati, voted for Bush in 2000 and is a registered Republican.

"I just have a gut feeling that Kerry can be trusted to make the right courageous decisions and will make a good president. He showed that with his heroism in Vietnam," he says.

Bush is "supposed to be a conservative and yet he's run up the biggest federal deficit in history. One thing that really turned me (away from Bush) as a lifelong Catholic ... was to see Bush go to the Vatican and try to get the pope to come down hard on Kerry for his stand on abortion. That is absolutely appalling."

In Michigan, Dan Martin has run for local office as a Republican. He says his biggest disappointment is that Bush's reputation as a "compassionate, conservative" governor of Texas hasn't proven true in the White House.

"The foreign policy is a mess. The offensive in Iraq is reckless and built on bad decision making. On the domestic front I understand that terrorism has struck and he's occupied but any real progress on a domestic agenda has ground to a halt," added Martin, 32, a customer service manager at a health maintenance organization who lives in Rochester Hills.

In Tennessee, Brian Boland, a young music company manager shopping at a market near Nashville, said: "I've always voted Republican and my folks will just kill me if they find out I'm switching to Kerry this year ... but I am just frustrated with the way Bush has mishandled everything. All the untruths."

His wife said she too was switching. The Republicans carried Tennessee in 2000, even though it was the home state of Democratic nominee Al Gore.

At the same market Ron King, a black Vietnam Veteran, said: "I always voted Republican before but I'm against Bush ever since I found out that he doesn't love this country. His so-called military record is a sham. And the worst part is that he lies so much. He lied about weapons of mass destruction."

Lloyd Huff, 64, retired director of the Dayton Research Institute in Ohio, says he has "voted for a Republican in every presidential election I can remember" but it will be Kerry this time because "the Bush administration has been the most deceitful, duplicitous, secretive administration this country has ever had."

"Going to war in Iraq was a horrible, horrible mistake," he said. He accused Bush of "an arrogant, swaggering cowboy mentality ... he has done more than anyone to inflame the Muslim world by his words and actions,"

Kenneth Warren of St. Louis University, who has studied and taught about voter behavior for three decades, said turning a trickle into a trend will be a tough job for Kerry because historically Republicans tend to be faithful. Democrats are more diverse and divided, a "party of factions," and more easily hived off, as former President Ronald Reagan did with the "Reagan Democrats," he said.

Clay Richards, assistant director of the Polling Institute at Quinnipiac University in Connecticut, says Kerry is getting about 11 or 12 percent of the Republican vote in Pennsylvania and New Jersey while Bush is drawing 9 or 10 percent of his support from Democrats, not a statistically significant crossover.

Before any Kerry draw could be rated similar to the "Reagan Democrats" effect, he said "the gap would have to be a lot bigger." - http://www.smirkingchimp.com/...

.......................... Some Republicans defect to Kerry's camp ..........................

07.31.04 (8:04 am) [edit]

Bush is in deep trouble: An analysis of the post-convention Zogby poll

07.31.04 (8:02 am) [edit]

The most recent Zogby poll shows deeper trouble for President George W. Bush beyond just the horserace. Mr. Bush has fallen in key areas while Senator John Kerry has shored up numerous constituencies in his base. The Bush team's attempted outreach to base Democratic and swing constituency has shown to be a failure thus far, limiting his potential growth in the electorate.

The most important group in this election now is the undecideds and Mr. Bush's standing among them is weak. He is generally well liked among the undecideds, having a strong favorability (56%), but his job performance is another story. Only 32% approve of Bush's job in office and only 31% believe the country is headed in the right direction. The undecideds are not yet sold on Mr. Kerry, with only 49% having a favorable opinion of him. But Mr. Kerry can still sell his message to them: over a quarter (28%) are either not familiar enough or are not sure of their opinion yet. These undecided voters are generally dissatisfied with the President, but are still not acquainted enough with the Senator from Massachusetts to support him.

The Bush campaign's efforts to court voters in the Hispanic, Jewish, and Catholic communities seem to have fallen flat. Mr. Kerry is leading Mr. Bush by a similar margin to that which former Vice-President Al Gore won among Jewish voters in 2000. Mr. Bush is also running far behind his 2000 Hispanic total, with only 19% of the Hispanic voters supporting him, while Mr. Kerry is beating Mr. Gore's total with 69%. Mr. Kerry is also running very strong among Catholics, topping Mr. Bush, 52% to 37%, showing that not only has Bush's courting of them failed, but his use of wedge issues like gay marriage and partial birth abortion have failed to separate Catholic voters from Kerry.

The Senator's lead among Catholics is similar to the Clinton margins of the 1990s.

Mr. Bush has also shown weakness in what is considered to be his best region, the South. While Kerry's choice of Senator John Edwards gives him his biggest boost, his economic populism and courting of veterans are also key in his eroding of Mr. Bush's support. Not only has Kerry now come to a tie with Bush in favorability in the South (55% for both), the Kerry-Edwards ticket has pulled ahead, 48% to 46% in the South. President Bush's job performance is down to only 44% in the South, and only 43% of Southerners think the country is headed in the right direction.

Mr. Kerry is also performing well in Blue states, among Young voters and among Single voters. In the Blue states, Mr. Kerry is winning 50% to 38%, while in the Red States, Mr. Bush is only winning 48% to 46%. Among Single voters, Mr. Kerry is winning huge by a total of 69% to 19%. And among young voters - 18-29 year olds - a group Al Gore only won by 2 points in 2000, Kerry is winning in a landslide, 53% to 33%.

There are three factors contributing to Senator Kerry's lead in the electorate; first is President Bush's eroding base, second is his failure in outreach to swing groups and base Democratic constituencies, and third is Mr. Kerry's strengthening of his base. Mr. Kerry also has the potential to open a bigger lead in two areas. First, among the undecided voters, if Mr. Kerry can sell himself as a viable alternative to Mr. Bush, he stands to make large gains amongst the small, but significant chuck of undecideds. Second is in the turnout arena, Mr. Kerry's large leads amongst Hispanics - who will potentially make up a great portion of the electorate than they did in 2000 - and young voters - who numerous non-partisan groups like Rock the Vote and MTV are targeting - will stand to boost his total share of the vote with every point their turnout increases. Mr. Kerry is showing a 2-to-1 lead (50% to 25%) amongst voters who didn't vote in 2000, while winning three-quarters (75%) of Ralph Nader's voters and stealing twice as many (8% to 4%) of Mr. Bush voters in 2000 than Bush is stealing of Gore voters in 2000.

[i][b]John Zogby is President of Zogby International. Christopher Conroy is Political Research Associate at Zogby International[/b][/i]. - http://www.smirkingchimp.com/...

Bush is in deep trouble: An analysis of the post-convention Zogby poll

07.31.04 (8:00 am) [edit]

Bush/Cheney Should Reimbourse U.S. Taxpayers for Billions $$$ Embezzled, Stolen & "Lost"!!! ...

07.31.04 (7:58 am) [edit]

Shouldn't Bush/Cheney have their assets confiscated to pay-off the record level deficits for wars based upon lies-- [i]and what is outrageous[/i]: for the billions of US taxpayer dollars have "disappeared", "vanished" unaccounted for? In private enterprise, this is called malfeasance & incompetence [i]at best[/i], embezzlement and criminal negligence[i] in reality [/i]... Misappropriation that Bush/Cheney and the Republican Party should be obliged to pay-back to the American people ...

Read the following news stories that have been published in the last few days:

Bush/Cheney's Theft of U.S. Taxpayer $$$: NO RECORDS FOR IRAQ SPENDING!!! http://www.tblog.com/template...

Cheney's Halliburton "Lost" [nod, wink] $18.6 Million/6,975I in Military Gear for Our Soldiers!!! http://www.tblog.com/template...

Bush/Cheney Should Reimbourse U.S. Taxpayers for Billions $$$ Embezzled, Stolen & "Lost"!!! ...

07.31.04 (7:57 am) [edit]

BUSH & CHENEY'S WAR CRIMES: More News on Rape and Sodomy at Abu Ghraib ...

07.31.04 (7:55 am) [edit]

[b]The Secret File of Abu Ghraib

[i]New classified documents implicate U.S. forces in rape and sodomy of Iraqi prisoners [/i][/b]

It has been months since the now-infamous photographs from Abu Ghraib revealed that American soldiers tortured Iraqi prisoners -- yet the Bush administration has failed to get to the bottom of the abuses."There are some serious unanswered questions," says Sen. Susan Collins, a Republican on the Armed Services Committee. The Pentagon is stalling on several investigations, and congressional inquiries have ground to a halt. The foot-dragging is astonishing, given that Congress has access to classified documents detailing the abuses outlined by Maj. Gen. Antonio Taguba in his report on Abu Ghraib. Rolling Stone obtained those files in June and offers this report on their contents. -[i]The Editors [/i]

The new classified military documents offer a chilling picture of what happened at Abu Ghraib -- including detailed reports that U.S. troops and translators sodomized and raped Iraqi prisoners. The secret files -- 106 "annexes" that the Defense Department withheld from the Taguba report last spring -- include nearly 6,000 pages of internal Army memos and e-mails, reports on prison riots and escapes, and sworn statements by soldiers, officers, private contractors and detainees. The files depict a prison in complete chaos. Prisoners were fed bug-infested food and forced to live in squalid conditions; detainees and U.S. soldiers alike were killed and wounded in nightly mortar attacks; and loyalists of Saddam Hussein served as guards in the facility, apparently smuggling weapons to prisoners inside.

The files make clear that responsibility for what Taguba called "sadistic, blatant and wanton" abuses extends to several high-ranking officers still serving in command positions. Maj. Gen. Geoffrey Miller, who is now in charge of all military prisons in Iraq, was dispatched to Abu Ghraib by Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld last August. In a report marked secret, Miller recommended that military police at the prison be "actively engaged in setting the conditions for successful exploitation of the internees." After his plan was adopted, guards began depriving prisoners of sleep and food, subjecting them to painful "stress positions" and terrorizing them with dogs. A former Army intelligence officer tells Rolling Stone that the intent of Miller's report was clear to everyone involved: "It means treat the detainees like shit until they will sell their mother for a blanket, some food without bugs in it and some sleep." In the files, prisoner after prisoner at Abu Ghraib describes acts of torture that Taguba found "credible based on the clarity of their statements and supporting evidence provided by other witnesses." The abuses took place at the Hard Site, a two-story cinder-block unit at the sprawling prison that housed Iraqi criminals and insurgents, not members of Al Qaeda or other terrorist organizations. In one sworn statement, Kasim Mehaddi Hilas, detainee number 151108, said he witnessed a translator referred to only as Abu Hamid raping a teenage boy. "I saw Abu Hamid, who was wearing the military uniform, putting his dick in the little kid's ass," Hilas testified. "The kid was hurting very bad." A female soldier took pictures of the rape, Hilas said.

During the Muslim holy period of Ramadan, Hilas saw Spc. Charles Graner Jr. and an unnamed "helper" tie a detainee to a bed around midnight. "They . . . inserted the phosphoric light in his ass, and he was yelling for God's help," the prisoner testified. Again, the same female soldier photographed the torture.

Another prisoner, Abd Alwhab Youss, was punished after guards accused him of plotting to attack an MP with a broken toothbrush. Guards took Youss into a closed room, poured cold water on him, pushed his head into urine and beat him with a broom. Then the guards "pressed my ass with a broom and spit on it," Youss said.

Mohanded Juma, detainee number 152307, testified that on his first day at Tier 1A, the west wing of the Hard Site where prisoners were brought for interrogation, he was stripped and left naked in his cell for six days. Graner, the guard in charge of the tier, entered Juma's cell at 2 a.m., cuffed his hands and feet, and took him to the shower room, where a female interrogator questioned him. After she left, Graner and another man threw pepper in Juma's face, beat him with a chair until it broke and choked him until he thought he was going to die. The assault lasted for half an hour. "They got tired from beating me," Juma told investigators. "They took a little break, and then they started kicking me very hard with their feet until I passed out." In another instance, Graner and a fellow guard reportedly beat a detainee until his nose split open.

Torin Nelson, one of thirty-two private contractors who worked as interrogators at Abu Ghraib, told investigators that he spoke with an interpreter who witnessed an interrogator toss a handcuffed prisoner from a car. "The interrogator then yells at him for falling on the ground and starts dragging or pulling the detainee by the cuffs," Nelson testified. He believed the story, Nelson added, "based on the stuff that I have heard and seen."

The sworn statement of Amjed Isail Waleed, detainee number 151365, is especially graphic. On his first day at the Hard Site, he told investigators, guards "put me in a dark room and started hitting me in the head and stomach and legs." Then, one day in November, five soldiers took him into a room, put a bag over his head and started beating him. "I could see their feet, only, from under the bag. . . . Some of the things they did was make me sit down like a dog, and they would hold the string from the bag, and they made me bark like a dog, and they were laughing at me." A soldier slammed Waleed's head against the wall, causing the bag to fall off. "One of the police was telling me to crawl, in Arabic," he testified, "so I crawled on my stomach, and the police were spitting on me when I was crawling and hitting me on my back, my head and my feet. It kept going on until their shift ended at four o'clock in the morning. The same thing would happen in the following days."

Finally, after several beatings so severe that he lost consciousness, Waleed was forced to lay on the ground. "One of the police was pissing on me and laughing at me," the prisoner said. He was placed in a dark room and beaten with a broom. "And one of the police, he put a part of his stick that he always carries inside my ass, and I felt it going inside me about two centimeters, approximately. And I started screaming, and he pulled it out and he washed it with water inside the room. And the two American girls that were there when they were beating me, they were hitting me with a ball made of sponge on my dick. And when I was tied up in my room, one of the girls, with blond hair, she is white, she was playing with my dick. I saw inside this facility a lot of punishment just like what they did to me and more. And they were taking pictures of me during all these instances."

In the classified files, some of the photographed soldiers also provide firsthand accounts of the abuses. Pvt. Lynndie England testified that on November 8th -- the evening of her twenty-first birthday -- she went to the Hard Site to visit Spc. Graner, her boyfriend. Just after midnight, seven Iraqi detainees accused of taking part in a fight at one of the many tent compounds used to house prisoners at Abu Ghraib were brought to Tier 1A. For England, the evening was a break from the tedium of her job processing prisoners. For Nori Al-Yasseri, detainee number 7787, it quickly became a "night which we felt like 1,000 nights."

Al-Yasseri and the other prisoners arrived at the Hard Site with empty sandbags over their heads to prevent them from seeing where they were and their hands bound behind their backs with plastic handcuffs. The guards threw the men against the walls until they collapsed on the floor in what England called a "dog pile." Some of the MPs took turns running across the room and leaping on top of the men. "A couple of the detainees kind of made an 'ah' sound, as if this hurt them or caused them some type of pain," Spc. Jeremy Sivits testified in a sworn statement. While the Iraqis were on the floor, England and Sgt. Javal Davis stomped on their fingers and feet. Sivits was certain that the men felt pain this time because he heard them scream.

So did Sgt. Shannon Snider, who was working in an office on the top tier. Drawn by the cries of pain, Snider leaned over the railing and in a fury yelled down to Davis to stop abusing the prisoners. Davis stepped away from the men, and Snider left.

"I believe that Sgt. Snider thought it was an isolated incident," Sivits testified, "and that when he ordered Sgt. Davis to stop, it was over." But it was just getting started.

After Snider had gone, the MPs pulled the prisoners to their feet one by one and removed their handcuffs. Graner, who had learned a few key phrases in Arabic, ordered the detainees to strip. As one prisoner took off his clothes, Graner cradled the man's head in one arm and smashed his fist into the naked and hooded man's temple. "Damn, that hurt!" Graner complained, waving his hand in the air. The prisoner went limp, and someone removed his hood. "I walked over to see if the detainee was still alive," Sivits testified. "I could tell that the detainee was unconscious, because his eyes were closed and he was not moving, but I could see his chest rise and fall, so I knew he was still alive."

According to England, Staff Sgt. Ivan Frederick made an X on another prisoner's chest with his finger and said, "Watch this." Then the six-foot-tall Fredericks punched the man in the chest. The hooded prisoner lurched backward and fell to his knees. He gasped for air. "Frederick said he thought he put the detainee in cardiac arrest," Sivits later told investigators. England was asked why she thought Frederick assaulted the man. "I guess just because he wanted to hit him," she said.

Eventually, all seven Iraqis were standing naked and hooded, and the MPs got out their cameras. A few pictures had been taken earlier in the evening, but now the abuse turned into a photo-op. Men taught to be ashamed of appearing naked in front of other men were forced to assume a series of humiliating and bizarre poses. Graner had them climb on top of each other to form a human pyramid, and the MPs took turns taking each other's picture standing behind the men. In one photo, Graner and England smile and give the thumbs-up sign behind the men, who are naked except for the green sandbags covering their heads. The Iraqis were made to crawl across the floor on their hands and knees while the guards rode on their backs. Two were posed as if performing oral sex on each other, and others were lined up against the wall and forced to masturbate while England pointed at their genitals and leered. And all the while, the Americans were laughing, cracking jokes and taking pictures.

An Army investigator later asked one of the seven Iraqis how he felt that night. "I was trying to kill myself," replied Hussein Al-Zayiadi, detainee number 19446, "but I didn't have any way of doing it."

The secret files make clear that day-to-day living conditions at Abu Ghraib were "deplorable" for soldiers as well as prisoners. The facility was under constant attack from mortars and rocket-propelled grenades. The files make no reference to the number of attacks, but a partial list obtained by Rolling Stone indicates that there were more than two dozen explosions between July and September alone. Six detainees and two soldiers were killed, and seventy-one were injured. But officers at Abu Ghraib told Taguba that their repeated requests for combat troops and armored vehicles to protect the facility were ignored by top brass. "I feel, and my soldiers feel, that we're just sitting out there, waiting to die," said Cpt. James Jones of the 229th MP Company. "As a commander, I'm charged with bringing my soldiers home, but how do I control that? It's frustrating. It's frightening."

The prison was filled far beyond capacity. Some 7,000 prisoners were jammed into Abu Ghraib, a complex erected to hold no more than 4,000 detainees. Prisoners were held in canvas tents that became ovens in the summer heat and filled with rain in the cold winter. One report found that the compound "is covered with mud and many prisoner tents are close to being under water." Another report described the conditions in one compound: "The area is littered with trash, has pools of water standing around latrines, and the bottles of water carried by detainees for water consumption are filthy. The tents lack floors and are inadequate to provide protection from the elements." Detainees wore soiled clothes because laundry facilities were inadequate; mentally ill detainees were "receiving no treatment."

In a series of increasingly desperate e-mails sent to his higher-ups, Maj. David DiNenna of the 320th MP Battalion reported that food delivered by private contractors was often inedible. "At least three to four times a week, the food cannot be served because it has bugs," DiNenna reported. "Today an entire compound of 500 prisoners could not be fed due to bugs and dirt in the food." Four days later, DiNenna sent another e-mail marked "URGENT URGENT URGENT!!!!!!!!" He reported that "for the past two days prisoners have been vomiting after they eat."

Officers reported that their repeated pleas for adequate food and supplies went unheeded, even though prisoners were attacking soldiers. "I don't know how they're not rioting every day," Jones told Taguba. The worst riot occurred on November 24th. According to an internal investigation, prisoners in one compound "were marching and yelling, 'Down with Bush,' and 'Bush is bad' and other slogans to that effect." The detainees threw rocks at guard towers and at soldiers on the other side of the concertina wire. One guard said that "the sky was black with rocks"; another added that he "feared for his life." The riot quickly spread to other compounds, where several guards were injured by flying debris. The soldiers fired nonlethal ammunition at the mob but quickly exhausted their meager supplies. Fearing they were on the verge of a mass prison break, the guards were given the go-ahead to use deadly force, and they opened fire with live ammunition. Three detainees were killed and nine were wounded. Nine soldiers were also injured in the riot.

That same evening, a detainee in Tier 1A told an MP that a prisoner had a gun and several knives. The informant even knew where he was: Cell 35. The guards instructed every prisoner on the tier to put their hands through the cell bars to be handcuffed, a standard precaution before searching a cell or moving a prisoner. But when the MPs came to Cell 35, the man inside refused to put his hands out. Instead, he told the guards he "had no gun."

No one had used the word gun around the prisoner. Sgt. William Cathcart, one of the MPs on duty that night, immediately made a grab for the man's wrists. The prisoner pulled away and fell to his knees to say a prayer. "At that point," Cathcart told investigators, "I knew it would be a gun battle." He was right. The detainee suddenly turned, withdrew a 9 mm pistol from under his pillow and opened fire on Cathcart from close range. A bullet struck the MP in the chest. Fortunately, before beginning the search, Cathcart had put on his "full battle rattle" - a Kevlar vest with pockets holding ceramic plates - and wasn't injured. Another MP shot the inmate with two nonlethal rounds, knocking the man down. But the prisoner jumped back up and continued to fire. An MP finally ended the incident by firing a load of buckshot into the man's legs.

How did a detainee in the Army's toughest prison in Iraq get his hands on a gun?

According to an internal Army investigation contained in the secret files, the civilian-run Coalition Provisional Authority had hired at least five members of Fedayeen Saddam -- a paramilitary organization of fanatical Saddam loyalists -- to work as guards at the prison. An Iraqi guard, probably one of "Saddam's martyrs," had smuggled the gun and two knives into the prison in an inner tube, placed them in a sheet and tossed them up to the second-story window of Cell 35. In May, when Taguba testified before the Senate Armed Services Committee, Sen.Wayne Allard asked him a direct question: "Did we have terrorists in the population at this prison?" Taguba answered, "Sir, none that we were made aware of." His own files make clear, however, that a more accurate response would have been: "Yes, sir -- but only among the guards."

Taguba was only authorized to investigate the role of military police in the torture at Abu Ghraib -- even though the Hard Site was controlled by military intelligence when the worst abuses occurred. Nevertheless, the classified annexes indicate that responsibility for the torture extends at least as high as several top-ranking officers in Iraq who have yet to be disciplined or removed from command. Maj. Gen. Barbara Fast, who remains director of military intelligence in Iraq, was aware of the conditions at Abu Ghraib and received regular reports from officers at the prison. Lt. Col. Steven Jordan, who directed intelligence at the prison, admitted to Taguba that he did not actually report to the British colonel who was supposedly his supervisor. "On paper, I work directly for him," Jordan told Taguba. "But between you, me and the fence post, I work directly for General Fast." Fast is currently under investigation, but unlike lower-ranking officers and soldiers, she has not been reprimanded or charged in the abuses.

Miller, who was sent by Rumsfeld to speed up interrogations at Abu Ghraib, spent ten days in Iraq touring prisons and meeting with intelligence officials. The two-star general was commander of the military prison at Guantenamo Bay, Cuba -- known as Gitmo -- where "enemy combatants" were already being subjected to harsh interrogation techniques, including the use of military dogs to frighten prisoners. According to Col. Thomas Pappas, who commanded the military intelligence brigade at Abu Ghraib, Miller spoke with him about using dogs on prisoners: "He said that they used military working dogs, and that they were effective in setting the atmosphere for which, you know, you could get information." Brig. Gen. Janis Karpinski, who was in charge of all military prisons in Iraq, told Rolling Stone that Miller described his plan to "Gitmo-ize interrogation operations" in Iraq and boasted that prisoners at Guantenamo "were treated like dogs, because you can never let them be in charge."

Miller has denied making either statement. But whatever he said, his plan to "rapidly exploit internees for actionable intelligence" was quickly adopted at Abu Ghraib. A slide presentation in the classified files spells out the new "Interrogation Rules of Engagement," specifying that soldiers, with proper approval, may subject prisoners to dietary manipulation, sleep deprivation, stress positions and the "presence of mil working dogs." In at least one instance documented by Taguba and photographed by soldiers, a prisoner at Abu Ghraib was bitten by a dog. Most of the MPs who have been charged with crimes say they were told by military intelligence officers to "soften up" prisoners prior to interrogations. "MI wanted to get them to talk," Spc. Sabrina Harman told investigators, saying she was told to keep detainees awake. Sgt. Davis, who jumped on the pile of seven detainees on November 8th, said intelligence officers would tell guards to "loosen this guy up for us" and "make sure he has a bad night."

The classified files also show that intelligence officers at Abu Ghraib felt pressured to produce results. "Sir," Lt. Col. Jordan told Taguba, "I was told a couple of times . . . that some of the reporting was getting read by Rumsfeld, folks out at Langley [the Central Intelligence Agency], some very senior folks."

In May, after photos of the torture were published, Rumsfeld declared that he would take "all measures necessary" to ensure that such abuse "does not happen again." But the defense secretary had already sent a clear signal to commanders in Iraq about his position on the proper way to interrogate prisoners. In April, Rumsfeld transferred Gen. Miller from Guant?namo to Baghdad, putting him in charge of all military prisons in Iraq. Instead of court-martialing the man who authored the plan to subject prisoners at Abu Ghraib to harsh abuses, Rumsfeld has left him in charge of the facility.

"Ladies and gentlemen, we have changed this," Miller told reporters in May. "Trust us. We are doing this right." - http://www.rollingstone.com/p...

BUSH & CHENEY'S WAR CRIMES: More News on Rape and Sodomy at Abu Ghraib ...

07.31.04 (7:49 am) [edit]

RONALD REAGAN JR.: "The Case Against George W. Bush"

07.30.04 (4:48 pm) [edit]

It may have been the guy in the hood teetering on the stool, electrodes clamped to his genitals. Or smirking Lynndie England and her leash. Maybe it was the smarmy memos tapped out by soft-fingered lawyers itching to justify such barbarism. The grudging, lunatic retreat of the neocons from their long-standing assertion that Saddam was in cahoots with Osama didn't hurt. Even the Enron audiotapes and their celebration of craven sociopathy likely played a part. As a result of all these displays and countless smaller ones, you could feel, a couple of months back, as summer spread across the country, the ground shifting beneath your feet. Not unlike that scene in The Day After Tomorrow, then in theaters, in which the giant ice shelf splits asunder, this was more a paradigm shift than anything strictly tectonic. No cataclysmic ice age, admittedly, yet something was in the air, and people were inhaling deeply. I began to get calls from friends whose parents had always voted Republican, "but not this time." There was the staid Zbigniew Brzezinski on the staid NewsHour with Jim Lehrer sneering at the "Orwellian language" flowing out of the Pentagon. Word spread through the usual channels that old hands from the days of Bush the Elder were quietly (but not too quietly) appalled by his son's misadventure in Iraq. Suddenly, everywhere you went, a surprising number of folks seemed to have had just about enough of what the Bush administration was dishing out. A fresh age appeared on the horizon, accompanied by the sound of scales falling from people's eyes. It felt something like a demonstration of that highest of American prerogatives and the most deeply cherished American freedom: dissent.

Oddly, even my father's funeral contributed. Throughout that long, stately, overtelevised week in early June, items would appear in the newspaper discussing the Republicans' eagerness to capitalize (subtly, tastefully) on the outpouring of affection for my father and turn it to Bush's advantage for the fall election. The familiar "Heir to Reagan" puffballs were reinflated and loosed over the proceedings like (subtle, tasteful) Mylar balloons. Predictably, this backfired. People were treated to a side-by-side comparison - Ronald W. Reagan versus George W. Bush - and it's no surprise who suffered for it. Misty-eyed with nostalgia, people set aside old political gripes for a few days and remembered what friend and foe always conceded to Ronald Reagan: He was damned impressive in the role of leader of the free world. A sign in the crowd, spotted during the slow roll to the Capitol rotunda, seemed to sum up the mood - a portrait of my father and the words NOW THERE WAS A PRESIDENT.

The comparison underscored something important. And the guy on the stool, Lynndie, and her grinning cohorts, they brought the word: The Bush administration can't be trusted. The parade of Bush officials before various commissions and committees - Paul Wolfowitz, who couldn't quite remember how many young Americans had been sacrificed on the altar of his ideology; John Ashcroft, lip quivering as, for a delicious, fleeting moment, it looked as if Senator Joe Biden might just come over the table at him - these were a continuing reminder. The Enron creeps, too - a reminder of how certain environments and particular habits of mind can erode common decency. People noticed. A tipping point had been reached. The issue of credibility was back on the table. The L-word was in circulation. Not the tired old bromide liberal. That's so 1988. No, this time something much more potent: liar.

Politicians will stretch the truth. They'll exaggerate their accomplishments, paper over their gaffes. Spin has long been the lingua franca of the political realm. But George W. Bush and his administration have taken "normal" mendacity to a startling new level far beyond lies of convenience. On top of the usual massaging of public perception, they traffic in big lies, indulge in any number of symptomatic small lies, and, ultimately, have come to embody dishonesty itself. They are a lie. And people, finally, have started catching on.

None of this, needless to say, guarantees Bush a one-term presidency. The far-right wing of the country - nearly one third of us by some estimates - continues to regard all who refuse to drink the Kool-Aid (liberals, rationalists, Europeans, et cetera) as agents of Satan. Bush could show up on video canoodling with Paris Hilton and still bank their vote. Right-wing talking heads continue painting anyone who fails to genuflect deeply enough as a "hater," and therefore a nut job, probably a crypto-Islamist car bomber. But these protestations have taken on a hysterical, almost comically desperate tone. It's one thing to get trashed by Michael Moore. But when Nobel laureates, a vast majority of the scientific community, and a host of current and former diplomats, intelligence operatives, and military officials line up against you, it becomes increasingly difficult to characterize the opposition as fringe wackos.

Does anyone really favor an administration that so shamelessly lies? One that so tenaciously clings to secrecy, not to protect the American people, but to protect itself? That so willfully misrepresents its true aims and so knowingly misleads the people from whom it derives its power? I simply cannot think so. And to come to the same conclusion does not make you guilty of swallowing some liberal critique of the Bush presidency, because that's not what this is. This is the critique of a person who thinks that lying at the top levels of his government is abhorrent. Call it the honest guy's critique of George W. Bush.

The most egregious examples OF distortion and misdirection - which the administration even now cannot bring itself to repudiate - involve our putative "War on Terror" and our subsequent foray into Iraq.

During his campaign for the presidency, Mr. Bush pledged a more "humble" foreign policy. "I would take the use of force very seriously," he said. "I would be guarded in my approach." Other countries would resent us "if we're an arrogant nation." He sniffed at the notion of "nation building." "Our military is meant to fight and win wars. . . . And when it gets overextended, morale drops." International cooperation and consensus building would be the cornerstone of a Bush administration's approach to the larger world. Given candidate Bush's remarks, it was hard to imagine him, as president, flipping a stiff middle finger at the world and charging off adventuring in the Middle East.

But didn't 9/11 reshuffle the deck, changing everything? Didn't Mr. Bush, on September 12, 2001, awaken to the fresh realization that bad guys in charge of Islamic nations constitute an entirely new and grave threat to us and have to be ruthlessly confronted lest they threaten the American homeland again? Wasn't Saddam Hussein rushed to the front of the line because he was complicit with the hijackers and in some measure responsible for the atrocities in Washington, D. C., and at the tip of Manhattan?

Well, no.

As Bush's former Treasury secretary, Paul O'Neill, and his onetime "terror czar," Richard A. Clarke, have made clear, the president, with the enthusiastic encouragement of Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld and Paul Wolfowitz, was contemplating action against Iraq from day one. "From the start, we were building the case against Hussein and looking at how we could take him out," O'Neill said. All they needed was an excuse. Clarke got the same impression from within the White House. Afghanistan had to be dealt with first; that's where the actual perpetrators were, after all. But the Taliban was a mere appetizer; Saddam was the entrée. (Or who knows? The soup course?) It was simply a matter of convincing the American public (and our representatives) that war was justified.

The real - but elusive - prime mover behind the 9/11 attacks, Osama bin Laden, was quickly relegated to a back burner (a staff member at Fox News - the cable-TV outlet of the Bush White House - told me a year ago that mere mention of bin Laden's name was forbidden within the company, lest we be reminded that the actual bad guy remained at large) while Saddam's Iraq became International Enemy Number One. Just like that, a country whose economy had been reduced to shambles by international sanctions, whose military was less than half the size it had been when the U. S. Army rolled over it during the first Gulf war, that had extensive no-flight zones imposed on it in the north and south as well as constant aerial and satellite surveillance, and whose lethal weapons and capacity to produce such weapons had been destroyed or seriously degraded by UN inspection teams became, in Mr. Bush's words, "a threat of unique urgency" to the most powerful nation on earth.

Fanciful but terrifying scenarios were introduced: Unmanned aircraft, drones, had been built for missions targeting the U. S., Bush told the nation. "We don't want the smoking gun to be a mushroom cloud," National Security Advisor Condoleezza Rice deadpanned to CNN. And, Bush maintained, "Iraq could decide on any given day to provide a biological or chemical weapon to a terrorist group or individual terrorists." We "know" Iraq possesses such weapons, Rumsfeld and Vice-President Cheney assured us. We even "know" where they are hidden. After several months of this mumbo jumbo, 70 percent of Americans had embraced the fantasy that Saddam destroyed the World Trade Center.

All these assertions have proved to be baseless and, we've since discovered, were regarded with skepticism by experts at the time they were made. But contrary opinions were derided, ignored, or covered up in the rush to war. Even as of this writing, Dick Cheney clings to his mad assertion that Saddam was somehow at the nexus of a worldwide terror network.

And then there was Abu Ghraib. Our "war president" may have been justified in his assumption that Americans are a warrior people. He pushed the envelope in thinking we'd be content as an occupying power, but he was sadly mistaken if he thought that ordinary Americans would tolerate an image of themselves as torturers. To be fair, the torture was meant to be secret. So were the memos justifying such treatment that had floated around the White House, Pentagon, and Justice Department for more than a year before the first photos came to light. The neocons no doubt appreciate that few of us have the stones to practice the New Warfare. Could you slip a pair of women's panties over the head of a naked, cowering stranger while forcing him to masturbate? What would you say while sodomizing him with a toilet plunger? Is keeping someone awake till he hallucinates inhumane treatment or merely "sleep management"?

Most of us know the answers to these questions, so it was incumbent upon the administration to pretend that Abu Ghraib was an aberration, not policy. Investigations, we were assured, were already under way; relevant bureaucracies would offer unstinting cooperation; the handful of miscreants would be sternly disciplined. After all, they didn't "represent the best of what America's all about." As anyone who'd watched the proceedings of the 9/11 Commission could have predicted, what followed was the usual administration strategy of stonewalling, obstruction, and obfuscation. The appointment of investigators was stalled; documents were withheld, including the full report by Major General Antonio Taguba, who headed the Army's primary investigation into the abuses at Abu Ghraib. A favorite moment for many featured John McCain growing apoplectic as Donald Rumsfeld and an entire table full of army brass proved unable to answer the simple question Who was in charge at Abu Ghraib?

The Bush administration no doubt had its real reasons for invading and occupying Iraq. They've simply chosen not to share them with the American public. They sought justification for ignoring the Geneva Convention and other statutes prohibiting torture and inhumane treatment of prisoners but were loath to acknowledge as much. They may have ideas worth discussing, but they don't welcome the rest of us in the conversation. They don't trust us because they don't dare expose their true agendas to the light of day. There is a surreal quality to all this: Occupation is liberation; Iraq is sovereign, but we're in control; Saddam is in Iraqi custody, but we've got him; we'll get out as soon as an elected Iraqi government asks us, but we'll be there for years to come. Which is what we counted on in the first place, only with rose petals and easy coochie.

This Möbius reality finds its domestic analogue in the perversely cynical "Clear Skies" and "Healthy Forests" sloganeering at Bush's EPA and in the administration's irresponsible tax cutting and other fiscal shenanigans. But the Bush administration has always worn strangely tinted shades, and you wonder to what extent Mr. Bush himself lives in a world of his own imagining.

And chances are your America and George W. Bush's America are not the same place. If you are dead center on the earning scale in real-world twenty-first-century America, you make a bit less than $32,000 a year, and $32,000 is not a sum that Mr. Bush has ever associated with getting by in his world. Bush, who has always managed to fail upwards in his various careers, has never had a job the way you have a job - where not showing up one morning gets you fired, costing you your health benefits. He may find it difficult to relate personally to any of the nearly two million citizens who've lost their jobs under his administration, the first administration since Herbert Hoover's to post a net loss of jobs. Mr. Bush has never had to worry that he couldn't afford the best available health care for his children. For him, forty-three million people without health insurance may be no more than a politically inconvenient abstraction. When Mr. Bush talks about the economy, he is not talking about your economy. His economy is filled with pals called Kenny-boy who fly around in their own airplanes. In Bush's economy, his world, friends relocate offshore to avoid paying taxes. Taxes are for chumps like you. You are not a friend. You're the help. When the party Mr. Bush is hosting in his world ends, you'll be left picking shrimp toast out of the carpet.

All administrations will dissemble, distort, or outright lie when their backs are against the wall, when honesty begins to look like political suicide. But this administration seems to lie reflexively, as if it were simply the easiest option for busy folks with a lot on their minds. While the big lies are more damning and of immeasurably greater import to the nation, it is the small, unnecessary prevarications that may be diagnostic. Who lies when they don't have to? When the simple truth, though perhaps embarrassing in the short run, is nevertheless in one's long-term self-interest? Why would a president whose calling card is his alleged rock-solid integrity waste his chief asset for penny-ante stakes? Habit, perhaps. Or an inability to admit even small mistakes.

Mr. Bush's tendency to meander beyond the bounds of truth was evident during the 2000 campaign but was largely ignored by the mainstream media. His untruths simply didn't fit the agreed-upon narrative. While generally acknowledged to be lacking in experience, depth, and other qualifications typically considered useful in a leader of the free world, Bush was portrayed as a decent fellow nonetheless, one whose straightforwardness was a given. None of that "what the meaning of is is" business for him. And, God knows, no furtive, taxpayer-funded fellatio sessions with the interns. Al Gore, on the other hand, was depicted as a dubious self-reinventor, stained like a certain blue dress by Bill Clinton's prurient transgressions. He would spend valuable weeks explaining away statements - "I invented the Internet" - that he never made in the first place. All this left the coast pretty clear for Bush.

Scenario typical of the 2000 campaign: While debating Al Gore, Bush tells two obvious - if not exactly earth-shattering - lies and is not challenged. First, he claims to have supported a patient's bill of rights while governor of Texas. This is untrue. He, in fact, vigorously resisted such a measure, only reluctantly bowing to political reality and allowing it to become law without his signature. Second, he announces that Gore has outspent him during the campaign. The opposite is true: Bush has outspent Gore. These misstatements are briefly acknowledged in major press outlets, which then quickly return to the more germane issues of Gore's pancake makeup and whether a certain feminist author has counseled him to be more of an "alpha male."

Having gotten away with such witless falsities, perhaps Mr. Bush and his team felt somehow above day-to-day truth. In any case, once ensconced in the White House, they picked up where they left off.

In the immediate aftermath and confusion of 9/11, Bush, who on that day was in Sarasota, Florida, conducting an emergency reading of "The Pet Goat," was whisked off to Nebraska aboard Air Force One. While this may have been entirely sensible under the chaotic circumstances - for all anyone knew at the time, Washington might still have been under attack - the appearance was, shall we say, less than gallant. So a story was concocted: There had been a threat to Air Force One that necessitated the evasive maneuver. Bush's chief political advisor, Karl Rove, cited "specific" and "credible" evidence to that effect. The story quickly unraveled. In truth, there was no such threat.

Then there was Bush's now infamous photo-op landing aboard the USS Abraham Lincoln and his subsequent speech in front of a large banner emblazoned MISSION ACCOMPLISHED. The banner, which loomed in the background as Bush addressed the crew, became problematic as it grew clear that the mission in Iraq - whatever that may have been - was far from accomplished. "Major combat operations," as Bush put it, may have technically ended, but young Americans were still dying almost daily. So the White House dealt with the questionable banner in a manner befitting a president pledged to "responsibility and accountability": It blamed the sailors. No surprise, a bit of digging by journalists revealed the banner and its premature triumphalism to be the work of the White House communications office.

More serious by an order of magnitude was the administration's dishonesty concerning pre-9/11 terror warnings. As questions first arose about the country's lack of preparedness in the face of terrorist assault, Condoleezza Rice was dispatched to the pundit arenas to assure the nation that "no one could have imagined terrorists using aircraft as weapons." In fact, terrorism experts had warned repeatedly of just such a calamity. In June 2001, CIA director George Tenet sent Rice an intelligence report warning that "it is highly likely that a significant Al Qaeda attack is in the near future, within several weeks." Two intelligence briefings given to Bush in the summer of 2001 specifically connected Al Qaeda to the imminent danger of hijacked planes being used as weapons. According to The New York Times, after the second of these briefings, titled "Bin Laden Determined to Attack Inside United States," was delivered to the president at his ranch in Crawford, Texas, in August, Bush "broke off from work early and spent most of the day fishing." This was the briefing Dr. Rice dismissed as "historical" in her testimony before the 9/11 Commission.

What's odd is that none of these lies were worth the breath expended in the telling. If only for self-serving political reasons, honesty was the way to go. The flight of Air Force One could easily have been explained in terms of security precautions taken in the confusion of momentous events. As for the carrier landing, someone should have fallen on his or her sword at the first hint of trouble: We told the president he needed to do it; he likes that stuff and was gung-ho; we figured, What the hell?; it was a mistake. The banner? We thought the sailors would appreciate it. In retrospect, also a mistake. Yup, we sure feel dumb now. Owning up to the 9/11 warnings would have entailed more than simple embarrassment. But done forthrightly and immediately, an honest reckoning would have earned the Bush team some respect once the dust settled. Instead, by needlessly tap-dancing, Bush's White House squandered vital credibility, turning even relatively minor gaffes into telling examples of its tendency to distort and evade the truth.

But image is everything in this White House, and the image of George Bush as a noble and infallible warrior in the service of his nation must be fanatically maintained, because behind the image lies . . . nothing? As Jonathan Alter of Newsweek has pointed out, Bush has "never fully inhabited" the presidency. Bush apologists can smilingly excuse his malopropisms and vagueness as the plainspokenness of a man of action, but watching Bush flounder when attempting to communicate extemporaneously, one is left with the impression that he is ineloquent not because he can't speak but because he doesn't bother to think.

George W. Bush promised to "change the tone in Washington" and ran for office as a moderate, a "compassionate conservative," in the focus-group-tested sloganeering of his campaign. Yet he has governed from the right wing of his already conservative party, assiduously tending a "base" that includes, along with the expected Fortune 500 fat cats, fiscal evangelicals who talk openly of doing away with Social Security and Medicare, of shrinking government to the size where they can, in tax radical Grover Norquist's phrase, "drown it in the bathtub." That base also encompasses a healthy share of anti-choice zealots, homophobic bigots, and assorted purveyors of junk science. Bush has tossed bones to all of them - "partial birth" abortion legislation, the promise of a constitutional amendment banning marriage between homosexuals, federal roadblocks to embryonic-stem-cell research, even comments suggesting presidential doubts about Darwinian evolution. It's not that Mr. Bush necessarily shares their worldview; indeed, it's unclear whether he embraces any coherent philosophy. But this president, who vowed to eschew politics in favor of sound policy, panders nonetheless in the interest of political gain. As John DiIulio, Bush's former head of the Office of Community and Faith-Based Initiatives, once told this magazine, "What you've got is everything - and I mean everything - being run by the political arm."

This was not what the American electorate opted for when, in 2000, by a slim but decisive margin of more than half a million votes, they chose . . . the other guy. Bush has never had a mandate. Surveys indicate broad public dissatisfaction with his domestic priorities. How many people would have voted for Mr. Bush in the first place had they understood his eagerness to pass on crushing debt to our children or seen his true colors regarding global warming and the environment? Even after 9/11, were people really looking to be dragged into an optional war under false pretenses?

If ever there was a time for uniting and not dividing, this is it. Instead, Mr. Bush governs as if by divine right, seeming to actually believe that a wise God wants him in the White House and that by constantly evoking the horrible memory of September 11, 2001, he can keep public anxiety stirred up enough to carry him to another term.

Understandably, some supporters of Mr. Bush's will believe I harbor a personal vendetta against the man, some seething resentment. One conservative commentator, based on earlier remarks I've made, has already discerned "jealousy" on my part; after all, Bush, the son of a former president, now occupies that office himself, while I, most assuredly, will not. Truth be told, I have no personal feelings for Bush at all. I hardly know him, having met him only twice, briefly and uneventfully - once during my father's presidency and once during my father's funeral. I'll acknowledge occasional annoyance at the pretense that he's somehow a clone of my father, but far from threatening, I see this more as silly and pathetic. My father, acting roles excepted, never pretended to be anyone but himself. His Republican party, furthermore, seems a far cry from the current model, with its cringing obeisance to the religious Right and its kill-anything-that-moves attack instincts. Believe it or not, I don't look in the mirror every morning and see my father looming over my shoulder. I write and speak as nothing more or less than an American citizen, one who is plenty angry about the direction our country is being dragged by the current administration. We have reached a critical juncture in our nation's history, one ripe with both danger and possibility. We need leadership with the wisdom to prudently confront those dangers and the imagination to boldly grasp the possibilities. Beyond issues of fiscal irresponsibility and ill-advised militarism, there is a question of trust. George W. Bush and his allies don't trust you and me. Why on earth, then, should we trust them?

Fortunately, we still live in a democratic republic. The Bush team cannot expect a cabal of right-wing justices to once again deliver the White House. Come November 2, we will have a choice: We can embrace a lie, or we can restore a measure of integrity to our government. We can choose, as a bumper sticker I spotted in Seattle put it, SOMEONE ELSE FOR PRESIDENT. - http://www.truthout.org/docs_...

Bush/Cheney Should Reimbourse U.S. Taxpayers for Billions $$$ Embezzled, Stolen & "Lost"!!!

07.30.04 (7:11 am) [edit]

Our Right-Wing Media kills a Troubling Story that the Rest of the World Saw

07.30.04 (7:04 am) [edit]

[b]Our Media kills a Troubling Story that the Rest of the World Saw[/b]

The allegation that Iraqi Interim Prime Minister Iyad Allawi [Saddam-Hussein-Version-2 .0, as neo-con puppet-cum-ruthless-dicta tor for corrupt Bush/Cheney War Criminals] shot seven restrained prisoners (killing six) in a fit of anger—with a number of witnesses present—is certainly newsworthy.

But, remarkably, the U.S. media has chosen not to cover it, preferring to accept official denials. The foreign press is not so trusting. The disconcerting result is that we simply aren’t getting the same picture of Iraq that citizens of every other English-speaking country see.

If you haven’t caught the story, here’s how Australia’s leading daily, the Sydney Morning Herald broke it on July 17th http://www.commondreams.org/h... :

“Iyad Allawi, the new Prime Minister of Iraq, pulled a pistol and executed as many as six suspected insurgents at a Baghdad police station, just days before Washington handed control of the country to his interim government, according to two people who allege they witnessed the killings.

They say the prisoners – handcuffed and blindfolded – were lined up against a wall in a courtyard adjacent to the maximum- security cell block in which they were held at the Al-Amariyah security center…

The Prime Minister’s office has denied the entirety of the witness accounts in a written statement to the Sydney Morning Herald in Australia, saying Dr Allawi had never visited the center and he did not carry a gun. But the informants told the newspaper that Dr Allawi shot each young man in the head as about a dozen Iraqi policemen and four Americans from the Prime Minister’s personal security team watched in stunned silence…”

In Scotland, the award-winning Sunday Herald ran its sister-publication’s copy, as did the New Zealand Sunday Star Times, the Irish Examiner and Canada’s Toronto Post. The London Daily Mail and South Africa’s Sunday Mail (same ownership) ran a story with a similar lead, although the denial comes right up front:

“IRAQ'S new Prime Minister was fighting to clear his name last night after he was accused of executing as many as six suspected insurgents.

Iyad Allawi is alleged to have shot the prisoners at a Baghdad police station days before power was handed to the interim Iraqi government last month.”

Australia’s Shadow Minister for Foreign Affairs, Kevin Rudd, told the Australian Broadcasting Corporation that while he personally found the allegations “unbelievable,” he also thought that, “because they are written by a credible journalist, [Foreign Minister Alexander] Downer's responsibility is to get the truth from the Australian embassy in Baghdad and from the Government of the United States. It's important that these matters are clarified.”

In the UK, there were also calls for an inquiry. “It is vital that [the allegations] are cleared up one way or another and that needs an independent inquiry,” said former British Foreign Secretary Robin Cook, who resigned his Cabinet post over the war.

The story was out to a limited degree in the United States, as well. Newsweek reported on the allegation and it also appeared on the UPI wire. In its usually direct way, UPI led with: “Iraqi Interim Prime Minister Iyad Allawi killed six suspected insurgents just days before he was handed power, the Sydney Morning Herald reports.”

But, according to a Lexis-Nexis search, no major papers picked up the UPI story. The Los Angeles Times did run a piece under the headline: “Rumors circulate about Allawi's itchy trigger finger,” which was republished by the Kansas City Star, the Baltimore Sun and the San Francisco Chronicle. This is how those papers’ readers got the story:

“There are many versions of the story on the street. In one, interim Prime Minister Iyad Allawi is driving through downtown Baghdad and sees a frail old man being confronted by three armed men attempting to steal his vehicle.

Allawi leaps out of his car and shoots dead the would-be carjackers.

In another, Allawi is in a Baghdad jail where he interviews suspects, hears their confessions, declares “they deserve to die” and shoots them on the spot.

A third version sets the scene of his violent retribution in the Shiite city of Najaf, which has been racked by violence in recent months.

Is there any truth to these tales that Allawi has shot suspects? The stories have been denied by Allawi and dismissed by members of his government, the U.S. Embassy and a State Department spokesman.”

On the last point, Scotland’s Sunday Herald reported: “Senior US officials have not made an outright dismissal of the allegations but Allawi’s office has denied the claims.”

But regardless, while there may be several stories out there, only one was reported by an award-winning journalist, Paul McGeough, in one of our closest ally’s leading daily papers. McGeough, while acknowledging that in Iraq “it's very difficult to separate out what people are telling you from what they are hearing,” defended the story nonetheless. He found the two witnesses separately, and he and his Iraqi interpreter judged them credible. When he “tested” parts of their stories, they held up.

At least readers of the LA Times and the other three papers that ran its story knew that a “rumor” about Allawi killing the prisoners was out there. That put them ahead of readers of the New York Times, the Washington Post, the Wall Street Journal and every other major daily. They heard nothing whatsoever of the matter.

The New York Sun, a conservative alternative paper, ran the only other U.S. story that came back from a Lexis-Nexis search. It reported the allegations were thought unlikely because of Allawi’s character. The Sun’s lead was: “Iraq's top human rights official said yesterday allegations that Prime Minister Allawi summarily executed six prisoners before taking power is a baseless smear spread to undermine the government.”

That was based on a Federal News Service interview with Iraq's Human Rights Minister Bakhtiya Amin, in which he said: “This is not the Iyad Allawi that I know. He's not a killer. And he's not the type of person who goes out killing people.”

It’s an odd line of defense in light of the fact that, as Douglas Valentine wrote in Counterpunch: “According to published reports, Allawi began his career in the killing business in the 1960s on behalf of Saddam Hussein; but in 1978, he switched to the CIA after Hussein tried to kill him. In 1991 Allawi co-founded an anti-Saddam, CIA-front organization, the Iraqi National Accord (INA), which the New York Times described as “a terrorist organization.” A number of European papers routinely refer to Allawi as a “former assassin,” or in similar terms.

I sent the original Sydney Morning Herald story to the New York Times’ sometimes brave Public Editor Daniel Okrent, with a note that read: “Clearly, the story that follows is not flattering. But it is just as clearly newsworthy and nobody's covering it.”

Okrent’s assistant sent me a link to a Times story titled: “A Tough Guy Tries to Tame Iraq.” The story was about “rumor and innuendo” that Allawi was “overseeing the interrogation of a cabal of Lebanese terrorists” when he said ‘Bring me an ax,’ and then “lopped off the hand of one the Lebanese men.” It’s a nasty story, yes, but not quite the same.

Now, I’m not arguing that the Allawi story is true, only that the citizens of Australia, Britain, Ireland, Scotland, Canada and South Africa have a view of the Iraqi Interim Government that Americans do not share. That disconnect is striking, and has lead to stories like the one in Pakistan’s Daily Times under the headline: “[b]US Media Kills Story that Iraqi PM Executed 6 Prisoners[/b].” http://www.commondreams.org/h...

[b]Joshua Holland (jholland@usc.edu) is Editor-in-Chief of the USC Trojan Horse, the University of Southern California’s “fiercely progressive voice of reason.” [/b] - http://www.commondreams.org/v...

Our Right-Wing Media kills a Troubling Story that the Rest of the World Saw

07.30.04 (7:02 am) [edit]

Our Right-Wing Media kills a Troubling Story that the Rest of the World Saw

07.30.04 (7:00 am) [edit]

U.S. Inspector General Supports FBI Whistle-Blower Bush/Cheney Want to Keep Silent

07.30.04 (6:56 am) [edit]

[b]Justice IG Supports FBI Whistle-Blower [/b]

The Department of Justice's inspector general has concluded that an FBI whistle-blower's allegations against a colleague in her office "were at least a contributing factor" in the firing of the whistle-blower, according to a letter to Congress by FBI Director Robert S. Mueller III.

Inspector General Glenn Fine also concluded that the FBI failed to "adequately pursue" allegations of espionage by whistle-blower Sibel Edmonds against the co-worker, a conclusion that prompted the FBI to review its handling of the allegations and conduct "additional investigation as appropriate," Mueller wrote.

Edmonds, a former translator in the FBI's Washington field office, has alleged that her co-worker attempted to censor translations of wiretapped conversations involving an unnamed group to which the co-worker belonged.

Mueller's letter said, however, that Fine "did not conclude the FBI retaliated against" Edmonds, a former translator under contract to the FBI's counterterrorism program. She is suing the government over her March 2002 dismissal.

The apparent conflict between that conclusion and the assertion that Edmonds was fired partly because of her allegations against another translator has prompted head-scratching at the FBI, said a senior bureau official, who asked not to be named because the case is being litigated and involves classified information. The bureau is "still trying to figure out" what Fine meant, he said.

Mueller's letter was written on July 21 and posted yesterday on the Internet by the Project on Government Oversight, a nonpartisan study group.

In the letter, Mueller, who has told lawmakers that whistle-blowers will be protected, promised that FBI officials will work with Fine to determine whether any agency employees should be disciplined. He said he plans to send a letter to employees reiterating "that I encourage them to raise good faith concerns about mismanagement or misconduct."

Mueller's letter, first reported in Thursday's editions of the New York Times, was written in response to congressional anger over the treatment of Edmonds, who is at least the third FBI whistle-blower to accuse the bureau of retaliation or interference since 2001. That year, Coleen Rowley, a legal counsel in the Minneapolis office, complained to Congress that her office had been blocked by senior officials from pursuing suspicions against terrorist suspect Zacarias Moussaoui.

In 2002, an FBI investigator in Washington, John E. Roberts, accused senior officials of trying to intimidate him for publicizing his concerns on "60 Minutes." Edmonds subsequently appeared on "60 Minutes" to voice her critique of the bureau, although it told her not to do so. She also testified in secret before the Sept. 11 commission.

"It is a vindication," Edmonds said yesterday. But she complained that the bureau "is not doing anything to fix these problems. On the one hand, they are asking the public to be more vigilant regarding this terrorist threat. On the other hand, they are not being vigilant within their own department."

Edmonds was born in Iran and reared in Turkey, and has Turkish citizenship. In addition to English, she speaks Farsi, Turkish and Azerbaijani. She has not publicly named the group wiretapped by the FBI but said her Turkish American co-worker attempted to recruit her into it. She has told her lawyer, Mark S. Zaid, that the FBI never interviewed her about the alleged attempted recruitment or spoke to a key witness.

Mueller's letter was sent to Senate Judiciary Committee Chairman Orrin G. Hatch (R-Utah) and two other committee members who have raised concerns about the FBI's response, Sen. Patrick J. Leahy (D-Vt.) and Sen. Charles E. Grassley (R-Iowa). All declined to comment yesterday. But a Senate official who asked not to be named said Mueller promised to arrange for Fine's report to be partially declassified and provided to Congress in that form. - http://www.washingtonpost.com...

U.S. Inspector General Supports FBI Whistle-Blower Bush/Cheney Want to Keep Silent

07.30.04 (6:52 am) [edit]

Bush/Cheney's Theft of U.S. Taxpayer $$$: NO RECORDS FOR IRAQ SPENDING!!!

07.29.04 (6:01 pm) [edit]

[b]U.S. Lacks Records for Iraq Spending [/b]

WASHINGTON - U.S. civilian authorities in Baghdad failed to keep good track of nearly $1 billion in Iraqi money spent for reconstruction projects and can't produce records to show whether they got some services and products they paid for, anew audit concludes.

The former Coalition Provisional Authority paid nearly $200,000 for 15 police trucks without confirming they were delivered, and auditors have not located them, the report from the CPA's Inspector General said. Officials also didn't have records to justify the $24.7 million pricetag for replacing Iraqi currency which used to carry Saddam Hussein (news - web sites)'s portrait, the report said.

The report, released in Iraq (news - web sites) late Wednesday, is the first formal audit of contracting procedures under the CPA, which oversaw billions in reconstruction spending that critics say was doled out without proper controls. The agency's defenders say it did the best it could given the pressure of operating in a war zone and trying to get reconstruction going quickly.

The one-star general overseeing reconstruction contracts in Iraq said in response to the audit that the lack of documentation didn't prove the money was wasted.

"We believe the contracts awarded with Iraqi funds were for the sole benefit of the Iraqi people, without exception," Army Brig. Gen. Stephen M. Seay wrote to the inspector general.

The Coalition Provisional Authority ran Iraq from May of 2003 until the United States handed over power to an interim Iraqi government June 28. The CPA used seized funds from Saddam's government and oil revenues to pay for 1,928 contracts worth about $847 million, the inspector general's report said.

A CPA rule issued last August called for following international law and United Nations (news - web sites) regulations while spending Iraqi money. But the CPA did not issue standard operating procedures or develop effective contract review, monitoring and evaluation, the report said.

Seay said the CPA contracting office was overworked, understaffed and under constant threat of attack. The general said his office had overhauled policies and organization in recent months to do better contract oversight.

The investigators reviewed 43 contracts and found 29 had incomplete or missing documentation. For each of the 29, "we were unable to determine if the goods specified in the contract were ever received, the total amount of payments made to the contractor or if the contractor fully complied with the terms of the contract," investigators wrote.

For example, the official overseeing a contract for 15 double-cab pickup trucks for an Iraqi police department paid $87,500 before the trucks were delivered and another $100,000 without getting written records that the trucks arrived at the police department, the report said. The report did not say whether the trucks were ever delivered.

The report also criticized the contract for exchanging Iraqi currency, which had been cited as a key success by former CPA administrator L. Paul Bremer.

The Defense Contract Audit Agency reviewed the proposed contract in August 2003 and identified $5 million in possible savings. But the CPA awarded the contract at the original amount and has no documentation showing any further review of costs, the inspector general report said.

Seay's response to the audit said the CPA and the new organization overseeing contracts, the Project and Contracting Office, had made changes to fix some problems such as the lack of review and monitoring.

The CPA inspector general released another report earlier this week saying that the company responsible for the largest logistics contract in Iraq had lost track of more than $18 million worth of equipment including vehicles and electric generators.

The report said investigators could not track down 52 of 164 randomly selected items in an inventory of more than 20,000 items overseen by KBR, a subsidiary of Halliburton. The missing items included two electric generators worth nearly $1 million, 18 trucks or SUVs and six laptop computers.

Project and Contracting office officials said they easily tracked down most of the missing items, but the inspector general's investigators said they could not find the gear despite working with officials from KBR and military contracting officers.

After the audit, the Defense Contract Management Agency found three of the missing vehicles in the hands of "unauthorized users" but discovered 111 vehicles had not been returned for required check-in after two weeks of use.

KBR is working with DCMA to track down all of its equipment in Iraq, Halliburton spokeswoman Wendy Hall said.

"The facts show that KBR has adequately managed the property for this mission by aggressively monitoring its property management functions," Hall said in a statement. - http://news.yahoo.com/news?tm...

Bush/Cheney's Theft of U.S. Taxpayer $$$: NO RECORDS FOR IRAQ SPENDING!!!

07.29.04 (5:58 pm) [edit]

Fear of Speaking Out in the USA ...

07.29.04 (7:41 am) [edit]

[b]In Bush's shadow: Crawford residents fear speaking out against their neighbor[/b]

CRAWFORD - The tallest structure in this town is a row of grain silos. A dusty banner across their tops reads, "Crawford, Texas - Bush Country." The city of 700 is draped in signs of all sizes proclaiming "Bush 2004," and "We will not falter," and "Bush is good for Crawford." Pro-Bush rhetoric dominates the skyline in this town where there is no Wal-Mart or McDonald's to break the continuity.

Crawford has experienced a boom in tourism since Bush came to town five years ago and has attracted the attention of reporters, developers, business owners and others. In recent years, politicians from surrounding areas have started to include Crawford on their campaign trails, as have various church fund-raisers.

With the Western White House only a few miles away, Crawford has been roped into the political arena, to the chagrin of many area residents. Some of Crawford's townspeople said they do not support the president and plan to vote against him. But many refused to comment on the record, for fear of damaging their reputations or risking exposure to personal attack.

[b]Small-town livin' in Bush country[/b]

Tourists and locals gather for a meal at Spanos' Family Coffee Center, Crawford's combination gas station, convenience store and cafe, and sit among life-size cardboard cutouts of the Bush family and members of his administration. They may never have met the president, but many are quick to sing his praises: He is a great neighbor, a man of integrity, a man of faith. In this small diner in his adopted hometown, Bush enjoys a great deal of support.

"I think he's honest, and he tells you what he's thinking," said Randy Nutter, a card-carrying Republican visiting Crawford from Center Township, Penn. "I think he tells you what he's going to do, and I think he then does it, and that's refreshing in a politician. I think he also does what he thinks is right rather than what is politically popular."

Republican campaigns are looking forward to strong support from Crawford's voters, and officials feel the city reflects the sentiments of state.

"Crawford is predominantly a Republican area, as is most of rural Texas. There's some good Republicans and some good Democrats out there," said Sen. Kip Averitt, R-McGregor. "Just because the president has moved there, I don't think it's changed the political climate at all. It just brings a higher focus to what goes on in that town."

Gina Hollenbeck, a spokeswoman for congressional candidate Rep. Arlene Wohlgemuth, R-Burleson, said Crawford is loyal to Bush and other Republican candidates and will remain so.

"This is Bush country, and people here, including the representative, are very proud of the job he's done," Hollenbeck said, adding that Crawford is home to many Republicans who strongly support the president and provide a strong base of support for Republican campaigns.

"We are expecting very good support from Crawford [in the upcoming election]," she said.

However, things aren't as simple as they seem, and there is another side to politics in the president's backyard.

[b]Quiet little town[/b]

Robert Campbell, the city's mayor, Congressman Chet Edwards and State Rep. John Mabry are Democrats. Many of the townspeople speak critically of the president's policies in Iraq. While it seems there is a diversity of opinion, Crawford's people can also be evasive and vague about their political leanings.

Many refused to talk about their political beliefs, and anyone with anything critical to say about the president and his policies refused to go on the record.

Paul McDaniel, a spokesman for the Crawford Peace House, a base of operations for peace activists, said his organization has had silent support from locals.

"We've had people come to us and almost say on the Q.T., quietly, 'Hey, we agree with you guys. I just can't stand here and hold a sign, because my boss might see me, or my neighbor or my church member might see me, but I really agree with you,'" said McDaniel, who has been with the Peace House since it was established across the tracks from downtown in 2002.

Politics in Crawford are nuanced. While Peace House efforts have received local support, McDaniel said that most of Crawford's residents just want their quiet little town back and have told him they'd be glad to see their city's fame fade. Many people said it is an inconvenience, especially when Bush comes to town, and the Secret Service blocks off all the streets.

"The presidency, as an organization, whether on the road or in Washington, lives in a bubble that is surrounded by privilege and high-tech equipment and extraordinary spending that deals with the presidency and the press corps," said Bruce Buchanan, a government professor at the University who specializes in presidential politics. "There's no question that it's a hassle, and people feel it's a hassle. It's a problem for every president. I'm not sure what, if anything, you can do about it. Presidents have to go somewhere. We wouldn't begrudge them their dwellings."

Buchanan said presidents, by their very nature, create logistical difficulties wherever they go, and people who experience those difficulties generally don't like the situation. He added that he understands residents' concerns, but the president keeping his home in rural town of 700 is better than him living in the middle of Manhattan, where a visit would inconvenience millions.

But it isn't all about logistics. Many area residents also said they believe open support for a group that opposes the president's policies can be a scarlet letter for people living in Bush's backyard.

[b]Silence[/b]

"I know what happened to the Dixie Chicks," said Ginger Roberson, a Crawford resident. "I'm not going to say anything bad about [Bush] because, you know, he might be kicking my butt."

Many agreed to discuss their feelings but asked not to be quoted or identified by name. One resident said people are tired of being misquoted by the press and being made out to sound like "ignorant hicks." Another woman refused to comment about politics out of respect for her neighbors.

"I don't want to get in politically one way or the other," she said. "I just let people be what they want to be, and I do what I want. I'm not going to talk about the man in the office next door, because I've known him all my life. That's like talking about your neighbor. You don't want to talk about your neighbor and have it printed in the paper."

Others said for the average joe, it doesn't really matter who is in office.

"Truthfully, I really don't think it makes a hootin' damn which one of them gets elected," said a customer at Spanos' Family Coffee Center who requested anonymity. "They're both going to ... cheat on you. So which one is going to do the least cheating than the other?"

He said he plans to vote for Bush in the next election, but in the end, the White House will go to one wealthy person or the other, and partisan politics only impact very wealthy people.

The fear and caution among Crawford's citizens isn't surprising and fits the mold of any small town in America where the president enjoys a large margin of support, Buchanan said. He said it is probable that 30 percent to 40 percent of people in Crawford oppose Bush and his policies but remain silent.

"These are folks that, only in the last few years, have had to worry about the sensibilities or the impact or influences on the lives of a president," Buchanan said. "It's understandable that regular people with no long experience at this level would feel intimidated about speaking their minds, especially with Bush as a neighbor."

Buchanan added that people might often be too intimidated to say anything due to "a vague anxiety of what might happen to them."

While he empathized with their situation, Buchanan also said such fear isn't entirely rational, and the Bush administration has probably done nothing to intimidate Crawford's residents. Buchanan said this kind of cautious reaction is to be expected of people not deeply engaged in the political process.

[b]Symbolism[/b]

Crawford has become a staging ground for Bush's presidency as well as for peace activists and protestors. Peace House organizers said the town has taken on a symbolic significance and has transcended local politics.

"We knew that it was going to be Bush's style as a president to use this off-site from the White House as a place to meet his allies," McDaniel said. "He likes to do the sort of hometown-boy, Mr. Cowboy-on-the-range kind of thing. And he's done quite well with that."

Michael Moore, the filmmaker behind the anti-Bush documentary "Fahrenheit 9/11," broadcast his message to this small town Wednesday, with a screening of his film in the parking lot of the city's high school football field. While the event attracted international attention, Moore opted not to come, canceling his much-anticipated Crawford visit to stay at the 2004 Democratic National Convention in Boston. Approximately 150 anti-Bush activists gathered at the Peace House before the Crawford screening.

Despite Moore's absence, the occasion prompted a Republican counter-protest at Spanos' Family Coffee Center, where Wohlgemuth spoke to approximately 500 people in support of the president and American troops in Iraq.

Bush supporters rallied in opposition to the film, sporting T-shirts that said "no Moore" and "Moore equals profiteering."

One woman was wearing a chicken mask and a T-shirt with the words, "Moore is a chicken" written across the front.

"There are tons of protests that have gone on in Crawford since Bush moved here, so you get a little complacent," said Valerie Duty, a Crawford resident attending the counter-protest. "But they've never been this biased against the president. [This movie] is an atrocity."

Peace House officials said they are hopeful that bringing the movie to the home of the president will help to create a dialogue where it has been absent. While the Peace House's message is directed at the media and at those across the country whose eyes are upon Crawford, organizers also hope to reach the local citizens and provide them their own forum, McDaniel said.

"Our hope is that, should the time come when they're in the voting booth, they feel secure enough that they vote their conscience," he said. - http://www.dailytexanonline.c...

Bush/Cheney's Shadow of Terror & Fear: Crawford residents fear speaking out ... in the USA?

07.29.04 (7:39 am) [edit]

Bush/Cheney's Shadow of Terror & Fear: Crawford residents fear speaking out ... in the USA?

07.29.04 (7:34 am) [edit]

Bush Floats War Against Iran

07.29.04 (7:28 am) [edit]

[b]Bush Floats War Against Iran [/b]

Cuba needs dollars. But a Cold War-era trade embargo prohibits American tourists from visiting. Fortunately, ingenious border control officers thought of a solution: When U.S. citizens arrive at Havana, the Cubans don't stamp their passports. When tens of thousands of Americans come back home to the U.S., they tell immigration that they were in Mexico or Canada instead. Which they were--to change planes.

Israel offers a similar courtesy. "Do you plan to visit any Muslim countries?" customs clerks ask travelers at Tel Aviv. If the answer is positive, they affix the visa stamp to a separate piece of paper. Nicholas Berg, the American entrepreneur beheaded in Iraq (news - web sites), didn't know to ask. His Israeli passport stamp got him picked up at a Iraqi checkpoint, and cost him his life.

For reasons ranging from economic dependence upon migrant labor (hello Rio Grande!) to religion and politics, numerous nations fail to document the movement of foreign nationals through their territory. Sometimes, for reasons no one asks and nobody tells, border guards don't bother to stamp a passport upon entry from abroad. It's happened several times to me at JFK in New York.

Failing to stamp passports is commonplace. Yet the Bush Administration, operating on the assumption that most Americans don't know that, is floating the possibility of war against Iran based on that innocuous practice.

According to a Newsweek report about the new 9/11 Commission Report, "Iranian officials instructed their border inspectors not to place Iranian or Afghan stamps in the passports of Saudi terrorists traveling from Osama bin Laden (news - web sites)'s training camps through Iran." Calling this "the strongest evidence yet of a relationship between Iran and Al Qaeda," the report notes that "eight to ten of the 'muscle' hijackers of the September 11 plot" crossed through Iran from Afghanistan (news - web sites), "undoubtedly help[ing] the 9/11 terrorists pass into the United States without raising alarms among U.S. Customs and visa officials...the report raises new, sharper questions about whether the Bush Administration was focused on the right enemy when it decided to remove Saddam Hussein (news - web sites)."

The invasion of Iraq was preceded by similar trial balloons in the press. Should Bush remain in office this November and the "we invaded the wrong Ira-" argument catch fire among a complacent and compliant media, we may be fighting a third unwinnable war against a Muslim state a year from now.

There's even less evidence of a link between Al Qaeda and Iran than between Al Qaeda and Iraq--but that's not stopping E-Z Boy warriors like Cheney and Rumsfeld.

First and foremost, there's no reason to believe that Afghan or Iranian visa stamps would have caused alarm at the U.S. border. My passport is thick with stamps from countries in Central Asia and the Middle East, including those issued by both the Taliban and Northern Alliance governments of Afghanistan. Only two countries, France and Israel, have asked me about them. Even after 9/11, U.S. Customs never examined them.

Furthermore, Iran doesn't stamp Saudi passports for good reason: the Saudi government, dominated by Wahhabi Sunni extremists, despises Shia Iran. Viewing Shiites as pseudo-Islamic heretics more contemptible than infidels, the Saudi regime takes a dim view of those who travel to Iran--a fact that Iranian customs takes into account when welcoming Saudi visitors so they don't get into trouble back home.

Another mystery: Why does the December 2001 National Security Agency memo cited by Newsweek mention Afghan visa stamps? Iran has no more ability to issue Afghan visas than Mexico has to issue American ones.

The big reason to doubt an Iran-Al Qaeda connection is historical. In one of many events unknown to most Americans, Taliban forces under Mullah Mohammad Omar seized the Iranian consulate at Mazar-e-Sharif in 1998. After the Afghans murdered ten Iranian diplomats and one journalist there, Iran massed troops on the border and threatened war against Afghanistan. (The crisis passed when the Taliban apologized and turned over the bodies.)

To say the least, it's extremely unlikely that Iran would have formed a cozy alliance with Mullah Omar's bosom buddies in Al Qaeda just two years later in 2000, as the Bushies now claim. In fact, despite having no diplomatic relations with the United States, Iran provided back-channel assistance to the Bush Administration during the U.S. invasion of Afghanistan in 2001, including turning over Al Qaeda suspects and offering to rescue American pilots shot down near the Iran-Afghanistan border. "It's definitely the case that there was no love lost between Iran and the Taliban," John Pike, director of the defense think tank Global Security, said in 2002.

Odds are that others will see through the current attempt to blame tie Iran to 9/11. That's why they've already got a new argument in reserve: the "yet unknown role" Iran allegedly played in the 1996 bombing of the Khobar Towers apartment complex in Saudi Arabia. It's the same tactic we saw during the run-up to war against Iraq: lie, retreat, repeat. The question is, will we fall for it again? - http://www.commondreams.org/v...

Too Dangerous, Too Stupid, Too Corrupt: Bush Floats War Against Iran

07.29.04 (7:24 am) [edit]

'Out of This Long Political Darkness a Brighter Day Will Come' ...

07.29.04 (7:22 am) [edit]

[b]'Out of This Long Political Darkness a Brighter Day Will Come'

by Barack Obama

Keynote Speech

Democratic National Convention
Boston, Mass.
July 27, 2004[/b]

Thank you so much. Thank you so much. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you so much. Thank you so much. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you, Dick Durbin. You make us all proud.

On behalf of the great state of Illinois, crossroads of a nation, Land of Lincoln, let me express my deepest gratitude for the privilege of addressing this convention.

Tonight is a particular honor for me because — let’s face it — my presence on this stage is pretty unlikely. My father was a foreign student, born and raised in a small village in Kenya. He grew up herding goats, went to school in a tin-roof shack. His father — my grandfather — was a cook, a domestic servant to the British.

But my grandfather had larger dreams for his son. Through hard work and perseverance my father got a scholarship to study in a magical place, America, that shone as a beacon of freedom and opportunity to so many who had come before.

While studying here, my father met my mother. She was born in a town on the other side of the world, in Kansas. Her father worked on oil rigs and farms through most of the Depression. The day after Pearl Harbor my grandfather signed up for duty; joined Patton’s army, marched across Europe. Back home, my grandmother raised their baby and went to work on a bomber assembly line. After the war, they studied on the G.I. Bill, bought a house through F.H.A., and later moved west all the way to Hawaii in search of opportunity.

And they, too, had big dreams for their daughter. A common dream, born of two continents.

My parents shared not only an improbable love, they shared an abiding faith in the possibilities of this nation. They would give me an African name, Barack, or ”blessed,” believing that in a tolerant America your name is no barrier to success. They imagined me going to the best schools in the land, even though they weren’t rich, because in a generous America you don’t have to be rich to achieve your potential.

They are both passed away now. And yet, I know that, on this night, they look down on me with great pride.

I stand here today, grateful for the diversity of my heritage, aware that my parents’ dreams live on in my two precious daughters. I stand here knowing that my story is part of the larger American story, that I owe a debt to all of those who came before me, and that, in no other country on earth, is my story even possible.

Tonight, we gather to affirm the greatness of our nation — not because of the height of our skyscrapers, or the power of our military, or the size of our economy. Our pride is based on a very simple premise, summed up in a declaration made over two hundred years ago: ‘We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal. That they are endowed by their Creator with certain inalienable rights. That among these are life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness.’

That is the true genius of America — a faith in simple dreams,, an insistence on small miracles. That we can tuck in our children at night and know that they are fed and clothed and safe from harm. That we can say what we think, write what we think, without hearing a sudden knock on the door. That we can have an idea and start our own business without paying a bribe. That we can participate in the political process without fear of retribution, and that our votes will be counted at least, most of the time.

This year, in this election, we are called to reaffirm our values and our commitments, to hold them against a hard reality and see how we are measuring up, to the legacy of our forbearers, and the promise of future generations.

And fellow Americans, Democrats, Republicans, Independents — I say to you tonight: we have more work to do. More work to do for the workers I met in Galesburg, Ill., who are losing their union jobs at the Maytag plant that’s moving to Mexico, and now are having to compete with their own children for jobs that pay seven bucks an hour. More to do for the father that I met who was losing his job and choking back the tears, wondering how he would pay $4,500 a month for the drugs his son needs without the health benefits that he counted on. More to do for the young woman in East St. Louis, and thousands more like her, who has the grades, has the drive, has the will, but doesn’t have the money to go to college.

Now don’t get me wrong. The people I meet — in small towns and big cities, in diners and office parks — they don’t expect government to solve all their problems. They know they have to work hard to get ahead — and they want to.

Go into the collar counties around Chicago, and people will tell you they don’t want their tax money wasted, by a welfare agency or by the Pentagon.

Go into any inner city neighborhood, and folks will tell you that government alone can’t teach our kids to learn — they know that parents have to teach, that children can’t achieve unless we raise their expectations and turn off the television sets and eradicate the slander that says a black youth with a book is acting white. They know those things.

People don’t expect government to solve all their problems. But they sense, deep in their bones, that with just a slight change in priorities, we can make sure that every child in America has a decent shot at life, and that the doors of opportunity remain open to all.

They know we can do better. And they want that choice.

In this election, we offer that choice. Our Party has chosen a man to lead us who embodies the best this country has to offer. And that man is John Kerry. John Kerry understands the ideals of community, faith, and service because they’ve defined his life. From his heroic service to Vietnam, to his years as a prosecutor and lieutenant governor, through two decades in the United States Senate, he has devoted himself to this country. Again and again, we’ve seen him make tough choices when easier ones were available.

His values — and his record — affirm what is best in us. John Kerry believes in an America where hard work is rewarded; so instead of offering tax breaks to companies shipping jobs overseas, he offers them to companies creating jobs here at home.

John Kerry believes in an America where all Americans can afford the same health coverage our politicians in Washington have for themselves.

John Kerry believes in energy independence, so we aren’t held hostage to the profits of oil companies, or the sabotage of foreign oil fields.

John Kerry believes in the Constitutional freedoms that have made our country the envy of the world, and he will never sacrifice our basic liberties, nor use faith as a wedge to divide us.

And John Kerry believes that in a dangerous world war must be an option sometimes, but it should never be the first option.

You know, a while back, I met a young man named Shamus [Seamus?] in a V.F.W. Hall in East Moline, Ill.. He was a good-looking kid, six two, six three, clear eyed, with an easy smile. He told me he’d joined the Marines, and was heading to Iraq the following week. And as I listened to him explain why he’d enlisted, the absolute faith he had in our country and its leaders, his devotion to duty and service, I thought this young man was all that any of us might hope for in a child. But then I asked myself: Are we serving Shamus as well as he is serving us?

I thought of the 900 men and women — sons and daughters, husbands and wives, friends and neighbors, who won’t be returning to their own hometowns. I thought of the families I’ve met who were struggling to get by without a loved one’s full income, or whose loved ones had returned with a limb missing or nerves shattered, but who still lacked long-term health benefits because they were Reservists.

When we send our young men and women into harm’s way, we have a solemn obligation not to fudge the numbers or shade the truth about why they’re going, to care for their families while they’re gone, to tend to the soldiers upon their return, and to never ever go to war without enough troops to win the war, secure the peace, and earn the respect of the world.

Now let me be clear. Let me be clear. We have real enemies in the world. These enemies must be found. They must be pursued — and they must be defeated. John Kerry knows this.

And just as Lieutenant Kerry did not hesitate to risk his life to protect the men who served with him in Vietnam, President Kerry will not hesitate one moment to use our military might to keep America safe and secure.

John Kerry believes in America. And he knows that it’s not enough for just some of us to prosper. For alongside our famous individualism, there’s another ingredient in the American saga. A belief that we’re all connected as one people.

If there is a child on the south side of Chicago who can’t read, that matters to me, even if it’s not my child. If there’s a senior citizen somewhere who can’t pay for their prescription drugs, and has to choose between medicine and the rent, that makes my life poorer, even if it’s not my grandparent. If there’s an Arab American family being rounded up without benefit of an attorney or due process, that threatens my civil liberties.

It is that fundamental belief, it is that fundamental belief, I am my brother’s keeper, I am my sister’s keeper that makes this country work. It’s what allows us to pursue our individual dreams and yet still come together as one American family.

E pluribus unum. Out of many, one.

Now even as we speak, there are those who are preparing to divide us, the spin masters, the negative ad peddlers who embrace the politics of anything goes. Well, I say to them tonight, there is not a liberal America and a conservative America — there is the United States of America. There is not a Black America and a White America and Latino America and Asian America — there’s the United States of America.

The pundits, the pundits like to slice-and-dice our country into Red States and Blue States; Red States for Republicans, Blue States for Democrats. But I’ve got news for them, too. We worship an awesome God in the Blue States, and we don’t like federal agents poking around in our libraries in the Red States. We coach Little League in the Blue States and yes, we’ve got some gay friends in the Red States. There are patriots who opposed the war in Iraq and there are patriots who supported the war in Iraq.

We are one people, all of us pledging allegiance to the stars and stripes, all of us defending the United States of America. In the end, that’s what this election is about. Do we participate in a politics of cynicism or do we participate in a politics of hope?

John Kerry calls on us to hope. John Edwards calls on us to hope.

I’m not talking about blind optimism here - the almost willful ignorance that thinks unemployment will go away if we just don’t think about it, or the health care crisis will solve itself if we just ignore it. That’s not what I’m talking about. I’m talking about something more substantial. It’s the hope of slaves sitting around a fire singing freedom songs. The hope of immigrants setting out for distant shores. The hope of a young naval lieutenant bravely patrolling the Mekong Delta. The hope of a millworker’s son who dares to defy the odds. The hope of a skinny kid with a funny name who believes that America has a place for him, too.

Hope in the face of difficulty. Hope in the face of uncertainty. The audacity of hope! In the end, that is God’s greatest gift to us, the bedrock of this nation. A belief in things not seen. A belief that there are better days ahead.

I believe that we can give our middle class relief and provide working families with a road to opportunity. I believe we can provide jobs to the jobless, homes to the homeless, and reclaim young people in cities across America from violence and despair. I believe that we have a righteous wind at our backs and that as we stand on the crossroads of history, we can make the right choices, and meet the challenges that face us.

America! Tonight, if you feel the same energy that I do, if you feel the same urgency that I do, if you feel the same passion I do, if you feel the same hopefulness that I do — if we do what we must do, then I have no doubts that all across the country, from Florida to Oregon, from Washington to Maine, the people will rise up in November, and John Kerry will be sworn in as president, and John Edwards will be sworn in as vice president, and this country will reclaim its promise, and out of this long political darkness a brighter day will come.

Thank you very much everybody. God bless you. Thank you.

Thank you, and God bless America. - http://www.commondreams.org/v...

DNC: 'Out of This Long Political Darkness a Brighter Day Will Come'

07.29.04 (7:18 am) [edit]

Ask A U.S. Veteran Who Served With John F. Kerry About His Heroism ...

07.28.04 (5:11 pm) [edit]

[b]The Reverend David Alston [/b]

BOSTON, July 27 /PRNewswire/ -- The following is a transcript of a speech by David Alston at the Democratic National Convention on Monday, July 26, 2004:

Good evening.

My name is David Alston, and I am a minister from Columbia, South Carolina. I join you here tonight in Boston-birthplace of the American Revolution-to celebrate the bedrock ideals on which our nation was founded-freedom, equality, and democracy.

I also come here tonight to honor a friend of mine, a man of courage and conviction who has fought for these ideals his entire life: John Kerry. Many of you in this hall already know John Kerry well. Others across this land are still learning about his long and distinguished record of public service.

I know him from a small boat in Vietnam, where we fought and bled together, serving our country. There were six of us aboard PCF-94, a 50-foot, twin-engine craft known as a "Swift Boat." We all came from different walks of life, but all of us-including our skipper, John Kerry-volunteered for combat duty. And combat is what we got.

We usually patrolled the narrow waterways of the Mekong delta, flanked on both sides by thick jungle. As our crewmate Gene Thorson put it, we were a traveling bulls-eye. And we often came under sudden attack from the enemy, hidden in the shadows. Machine-gun fire, rocket-propelled grenades, it all came fast and furious, and Lieutenant Kerry had to make quick, life-or-death decisions for the entire boat.

You have to realize, a Swift Boat isn't armored. The hull is aluminum, about as thick as two nickels. And in the middle of a narrow river or canal, with no cover at all, even small-caliber bullets could punch right through it -- and often did.

Manning the deck guns, most of us got wounded sooner or later, including Lieutenant Kerry. It would have been easiest, in an ambush, to simply rake the shore with return fire and roar on down the river to safety. But Lieutenant Kerry was known for taking the fight straight to the enemy. I can still see him now, standing in the doorway of the pilothouse, firing his M-16, shouting orders through the smoke and chaos.

Once, he even directed the helmsman to beach the boat, right into the teeth of an ambush, and pursued our attackers on foot, into the jungle. In the toughest of situations, Lieutenant Kerry showed judgment, loyalty and courage.

Even wounded, or confronting sights no man should ever have to see, he never lost his cool. And when the shooting stopped, he was always there too, with a caring hand on my shoulder asking, "Gunner, are you OK?" I was only 21, running on fear and adrenaline. Lieutenant Kerry always took the time to calm us down, to bring us back to reality, to give us hope, to show us what we truly had within ourselves. I came to love and respect him as a man I could trust with life itself.

I am a man of faith, and I did not come here tonight to glorify what we did. I came here to share my personal knowledge of a young naval officer who rose to the challenges and responsibilities of leadership, and who has always shown the courage to speak truth to power.

The 27th Psalm tells us, "Though an army besiege me, my heart will not fear. Though war break out against me, even then I will be confident" I stand before you tonight alive, while many of our brothers never made it home. I am grateful to have lived to enjoy my children, to see them grow up. But I stand here before you only because almighty God saw our boat safely through those rivers of death and destruction, by giving us a brave, wise, and decisive leader named John Kerry.

Today, 30 years after Vietnam, American soldiers are once again fighting and dying on distant battlefields, at war with an elusive enemy. We pray for these brave men and women. They are our friends, our neighbors, our loved ones. Their loss brings all of us sadness beyond measure.

In a few short months, we will choose our next President. I believe we need to elect a man of faith, experience, and wisdom. A man who knows that defending America means defending our most fundamental rights. A man who knows that leadership is not just about telling others what to do, but inspiring them to do it. A man who knows the true meaning of freedom, equality, and democracy. And that man is my former skipper, my friend, and our next commander-in-chief, John Kerry.

Friends, here in this city more than two centuries ago, patriots launched a revolution that changed history. Generations since have marched, fought, and died to defend the sacred ideals of life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness-and to make these ideals a reality for every American.

It is now our turn to defend these ideals. It is our time to speak out. It is our duty to exercise our most precious right as Americans: the right to vote.

So come November 2nd, join me in casting your ballot for a new, principled, and courageous leader-America's next president-John Kerry.

Thank you. - http://www.prnewswire.com/cgi...

... Whoa, Maybe Michael Moore Should Be THANKED For Exposing Bush/Cheney's CRIMES!!!

07.28.04 (2:56 pm) [edit]

[b]'Four more years for Big Brother?[/b]

In December 2003 a mystery prankster erected a large sign on Key Bridge across the Potomac river, in Washington DC.

"Read Orwell"

Perhaps the culprit was film director Michael Moore, whose Fahrenheit 9/11 about the bellicose extremism of the Bush administration ends with a quote from George Orwell's classic dystopian novel Nineteen Eighty-four.

Is it far-fetched to compare America under the Bush administration to a political order defined by "doublethink" and "newspeak"? Orwell wrote his masterpiece in 1948 and reversed the last two digits. Was it his only mistake not to have called it 2004?

Orwell's dark vision was largely informed by his insight into the inner workings of Stalinism in the Soviet Union. But it was also a prophetic warning of the potentially corrosive impact of the looming cold war on western democracies.

Life in the society of Oceana that Orwell describes had three organising mottoes. Each does seem to have its eerie echoes today.

[b]War is peace [/b]

The first perverse slogan, quoted in Moore's film, was "WAR IS PEACE". Its function was to brainwash people into believing that permanent war was normal.

Since invoking the image of an America pitted against the "axis of evil" in 2002, the United States president has proudly declared himself a "war president". The 9/11 catastrophe has led him to mobilise American society against what he projects as an array of invidious external enemies engaged in an omnipresent conspiracy. To engage in this war is a mark of virility, authority, and patriotism. To refuse it is to be weak, defeatist, and un-American.

The Bush ideologues have transmuted warmongering into a civic virtue. "Bring it on" has become the politically-correct attitude.

To maintain the public in a state of militarised mobilisation, attorney-general John Ashcroft orchestrates a colour-code of threats for citizens: in effect, be scared, very scared, or very, very scared. (Never mind that the administration's economic message boils down to "don't worry, be happy.")

A senior official in the Bush White House told me in 2003 that inside the administration the brothers of war were full of "truculent glee" about launching their pre-emptive invasion of Iraq and equally giddy about the prospects for further armed interventions abroad. Their catchphrase was: "Wimps talk about Iraq; real men are already thinking about Syria." For the Bush "utopians", it does indeed seem that perpetual conflict is not a problem, it's the solution.

If war is peace, war is also profit. One of the most clever innovations of the defense industry has been the privatisation of war through directly outsourcing a large range of activities, including even security, logistics and interrogation services in Iraq, to a clique of heavyweight corporations such as vice-president Dick Cheney's former employer, the hydra-headed Halliburton.

To be clear, the point is not that the United States faces no security threats. It does, and they are serious. The point is that the Bush administration seems to be in a quest for further threats and that it amplifies them, making it hard to tell fact from fiction. Worse, the reckless campaign in Iraq may have only increased these security risks.

[b]Freedom is slavery [/b]

The second motto of Oceana was "FREEDOM IS SLAVERY". This too has its uncanny resonance in the present. Perhaps the prime example is the Patriot Act, which was passed by a Congress without being seriously debated or even read.

The essential message of the Patriot Act is that the American people's constitutional freedoms are endangering us. (All of them, it seems, except the right to bear arms.) The Founding Fathers were evidently not patriotic enough and did not anticipate the politics of permanent war. On the Bush-Cheney view, homeland security requires the abridgement of liberties. Not satisfied with the first instalment but plainly encouraged by the docility of Congress, the administration now seeks a more far-reaching, privacy-encroaching Patriot Act II.

To help make sure citizens don't exercise their remaining freedoms too liberally, the government has instituted a confidential phone line. All suspicious activity can be reported. It is important to understand that there is a logic to such initiatives. What if you don't report such activity when your neighbours do? Will this be registered on the system, and if so isn't this a step towards "Big Brother" watching us?

[b]Ignorance is strength [/b]

The third motto of Oceana was "IGNORANCE IS STRENGTH". This insight finds reflection in several aspects of the current White House. To begin with, there is the president's own aversion to reading and debate.

As worrisome is the cult of secrecy that shrouds the activities of the administration. So many documents are now routinely classified that US officials are constantly confused as to what they can talk about.

The result of expanding government secrecy is a narrowing space for democratic deliberation. The message from Karl Rove's would-be Ministry of Truth is simple: the less you know, the less you ask, the better for you.

By and large (with a few outstanding exceptions) the establishment print and network media, captured by big corporate interests or fearing retribution, have been enablers of the Bush administration's campaign to tame public debate.

The consequence for journalists who wish to come to their own conclusions is clear. Under Bush-Cheney, you are either embedded or excluded. The White House has implemented a rigorous policy of discipline-and-punish. Write unkindly and you can kiss your access goodbye.

In our potential Oceana the opposition in Congress often behaves like an annex of the Ministry of Truth. Until quite recently, the Democratic leadership was too intimidated and risk-averse to fulfil its principal role as a check on executive power.

But also, far too many of us in civil society and the private sector heeded the then White House spokesman Ari Fleischer's warning to "watch what you say" as he equated patriotism with obedience.

1984 is not the present-day USA. But the risks are not pure fiction. What Orwell perceived was that the three dark mottoes go together. External conflict, internal ignorance, and the self-enslavement of buying manipulative media reinforce and need each other.

It is not that it will happen, but we would be complacent to believe that "it can't happen here".

Can we change in time? There are signs of a turning-point. The Supreme Court, which may now regret the unprecedented role it played in putting the president in office, seemed to send a clear message in the detention cases that due process still matters and that extra-judicial incarceration is un-American. (Hint: so is torture).

Even the much-maligned CIA recently blew the whistle by authorising publication of a current secret agent's book titled Imperial Hubris exposing the Bush administration's ill-conceived war planning, anti-terrorism campaign, and Middle East strategy.

The key challenge for John Kerry and John Edwards is to build on this rising tide of dissent, break the grip of the military-industrial complex, and help shake America free of Bush-Cheney doublethink.

The stakes in this year of decision could not be higher. Give Big Brother four more years and indeed, war might become our peace, ignorance our strength, and slavery our freedom. - http://www.smirkingchimp.com/...

It's Really A Hate-Hate Relationship!!!

07.28.04 (10:47 am) [edit]

[b]Bush hates the world & the world hates Bush!!!

Bush hates working people & working people (with brains) hate Bush!!!

Bush hates human life throwing human beings away as cannon-fodder in his insane neo-con wars based on lies & U.S. soldiers, veterans are turning against Bush in record-numbers!!![/b]

[u][b]Bush Flip-Flops, Taxes & Corporate Liars[/b][/u]

[b]Reality: irrelevant

Two more books against Bush; are undecided voters a myth?[/b]

OK, here's my brilliant Insider Insight du jour: The D's aren't going to get much of a bounce out of this convention because this race is already so tight there just ain't enough swing votes to bounce anywhere.

The popular selection of John Edwards for veep didn't provide much of a bounce, and neither will the Beantown Bash. Aside from that, everyone is having a wonderful time.

Marty Nolan, a scholar of Boston, quotes T.S. Eliot on "Boston doubt," defined as a readiness to yield "to all suggestions which dampen enthusiasm or dispel conviction." That could account for a lot about John Kerry.

President Bush's slightly alarming claim to the Amish on July 9 that God speaks through him -- that's what he said, God speaks through him -- raises some troubling prospects. First of all, I think God has a better grasp of subject-verb agreement than George W. Bush do. Also, when Bush changes his mind, as he frequently does, do we think God has had to rethink things after the polls have come out?

Nice to see President W. employing the tactic Texans got so familiar with under Governor W.: the "Gee, I'm really for it, but I can't be bothered to expend one iota of political energy trying to help it pass." (He also frequently uses the reverse ploy by announcing he opposes something he can't be bothered to spend an iota of energy on.)

This is the game Bush is playing on the assault weapons ban, which he officially favors renewing (soccer mom vote there), but -- surprise! -- since he won't do anything to get it renewed it will be allowed to lapse (NRA vote there). Just what we need in this country, more automatic assault rifles.

A more subtle play is the White House decision to oppose a two-year extension of the Bush tax cuts on the grounds that it's not a five-year extension. This dubious ploy, from the right's point of view, sacrifices a tax cut in the hand for a political issue in the bush, as it were. I'm not sure they can run that one: "Those nasty Democrats would only vote for a two-year tax cut instead of a five-year tax cut," he pouted. "See, they just hate tax cuts."

Kind of hard, even in the funhouse mirrors of the campaign, to argue that Democrats in Congress have spent a lot of time successfully thwarting Bush on anything. But R's are much in the habit of seeing themselves as victims, so it will make them happy.

Meantime, those faithful political junkies following the festivities here on C-SPAN may need some reading material to tide them over during the boring speeches, and I have two pips to recommend. Hendrik Hertzberg (his friends call him Rick) has put out a collection called simply, "Politics: Observations and Arguments, 1966-2004," that is pure pleasure to read. The New Yorker editor and former editor of The New Republic has such a good mind, such a strong sense of ethics and honor. There is an almost physical pleasure, like having an itch scratched, in watching him come to grips with some of the thorniest, nastiest, most divisive issues of the past 40 years, and slice them cleanly into comprehensible form. Besides, he writes like a dream.

A book that is both more dense and more important is David Cay Johnston's "Perfectly Legal." The obligatory, explanatory subtitle is "The Covert Campaign to Rig Our Tax System to Benefit the Super Rich -- and Cheat Everybody Else." This, too, is like having an itch scratched, in that one keeps saying, "Aha, so that's how they do it." And it is fascinating. And horrifying. The ease with which corporations evade taxes is well known, but finding out just how much money their cute little tricks are worth will curl your hair.

I suppose if one were as rich as Bill Gates, one would be tempted to save a billion or two in taxes, but it seems kind of pointless when one is sitting on that many billions. Seriously, the super rich have been allowed to accumulate so much money that one finally has to ask what they think the point is. Those far more detestable are the congressmen who sneak special tax advantages and exemptions into the law in exchange for campaign contributions and then lecture the rest of us on patriotism.

Government really is about who benefits and who pays. Who gets screwed and who's doing the screwing. And there is no point at which that can be seen more clearly than in our tax system. Johnston, a superb reporter for The New York Times, has broken one story after another about how the system really works, and it's all here.

That so much of what passes for debate about our tax system is gross misinformation is not, unfortunately, the result of accident or ignorance. There are a lot of people blowing smoke in your ear who know much better. They get paid to lie. Happily, Johnston gets paid to find the truth, and he does so in this book with admirable tenacity. This is the real story of what is happening in America.

Too bad we're watching a political campaign in which reality is considered irrelevant. Happy warm and fuzzies. - http://www.workingforchange.c...

Neoconservative Dead-Enders Regroup & Start Plotting their Comeback (Next Stop: IRAN)!!!

07.28.04 (8:52 am) [edit]

[b]Neoconservative dead-enders regroup and start plotting their comeback[/b]

Apparently comfortable with the moral cesspool http://www.talkingpointsmemo.... into which he wandered during the Abu Ghraib hearings, Senator Joe Lieberman announced in a July 20 [i]Washington Post [/i]op-ed that he planned to join with the least reputable figures in national-security circles to relaunch the Committee on the Present Danger (CPD), an organization not heard from since the last days of disco. A good rule of thumb for telling whether a foreign-policy group intends to offer a serious contribution to the public debate or is more interested in pulling the wool over people's eyes is whether or not its membership includes Laurie Mylroie. Naturally enough, she's a member, along with fellow travelers from the American Enterprise Institute (AEI) like James Woolsey and Danielle Pletka.

Mylroie's shtick is pushing the entirely discredited theory that Saddam Hussein not only had "links" to al-Qaeda but was, in fact, a major sponsor of the group. As such, Hussein is held to be responsible for the September 11 attacks, the 1993 World Trade Center bombing, and, indeed, every major foreign terrorist attack against the United States in the past decade. It's the kind of theory that, though lamentably lacking in evidentiary support, would obviously be helpful to an administration determined to, say, invade Iraq. As such, Mylroie followed up her first book on Hussein's alleged terrorism sponsorship with a second work, [i]Bush Versus The Beltway[/i], explaining that the president wisely understood the truth of her paranoid fantasies but was being held back by lazy bureaucrats at the CIA and FBI more interested in covering up Hussein's crimes than defending America.

This "I would have gotten away with it, too, if it hadn't been for you meddling intelligence analysts" account has suffered lately as the administration has (repeatedly) explained that it believes no such thing -- and independent inquiry after independent inquiry backs up the intelligence community's position on the matter. Nowadays, right-wingers hoping to be taken seriously point not to the discredited Mylroie but to Stephen Hayes' The Connection, which puts forward a much more modest version of the al-Qaeda-Hussein story.

Like all good hawks these days, those at the CPD are long on talk about their interest in spreading democracy around the world. Their seriousness of purpose here, however, is subject to question. The group's founding executive director has already been dismissed after Prospect contributor Laura Rozen revealed that he was a lobbyist for Jorg Haider's neofascist Austrian Freedom Party, which apparently didn't sit well with the group's largely Jewish membership. Less objectionable to the CPD, though perhaps even more at odds with its ostensible aims, is Hannaford's history of work for such democratic stalwarts as the People's Republic of China, Saudi Arabia, and Algeria.

Justin Raimondo, meanwhile, has reported that another of the group's founding members, Hedieh Mirahmadi, is general secretary of the Islamic Supreme Council of America, "a small Sufi cult devoted to the teachings of one Shaykh Hisham Kabbani."

As Raimondo notes, the supreme council’s thoughts on foreign policy consist largely of apologetics for Uzbek President Islam Karimov, who's ruled the country since the communist era and whose contributions to governance including widespread torture, scalding dissidents, and jailing men whose beards are too long.

The group's very name smacks of dishonesty and a preference for propaganda over serious policy analysis. The original Committee on the Present Danger was formed in the 1950s to raise awareness of the Soviet threat, but the current outfit hearkens back more to the second CPD, formed in the late 1970s around Senator Scoop Jackson of Washington. In an eerie echo of contemporary events, the CPD 2 busied itself arguing that U.S. intelligence was underestimating Soviet strength when it was, in fact, overestimating it. Politically, the CPD 2 served as a bridge for hawkish Democrats to exit the party and join the Ronald Reagan-led GOP, but they misjudged Reagan almost as badly as they misjudged the Soviet Union. In the chief accomplishment of his presidency, Reagan ultimately rejected the CPD’s counsel, recognized the underlying feebleness of the Soviet system, and agreed to work with Mikhail Gorbachev to bring the Cold War to a successful conclusion.

The ostensibly new group may not be so new after all. Its membership contains significant overlap with that of the Foundation for the Defense of Democracies (FDD), http://www.defenddemocracy.or... which co-sponsored the CPD launch event, and the two groups share office space in Washington. The FDD, in turn, began life as a pro-Israel public-relations outfit tied to the Israeli Foreign Ministry.

But what does the CPD want? Its public statements are maddeningly vague, describing its primary purpose as "educat[ing] the American people about the threat posed by a global Islamist terror movement," though the existence of such a threat is hardly a well-kept secret. There are indications, though, that the group's agenda is to push the United States into conflict with Iran. The Post op-ed announcing the groups' creation, co-authored by Lieberman and Senator Jon Kyl, described "the present danger our generation faces" as not only "international terrorism from Islamic extremists" but also "the outlaw states that either harbor or support them." Coming 18 months ago, one would take that as a reference to Iraq, but in the present context it either means Iran or it's nonsense.

So is another war around the corner? Probably not. The CPD's formation is more a sign of weakness than strength. The troubled occupation of Iraq has decreased the credibility and influence of the neoconservative faction in the Pentagon, and Robert Blackwill, who was brought in to pull the president’s chestnuts out of the fire and take over Iraq policy from his desk at the National Security Council (NSC), is known to favor engagement with Iran.

What's more, the CPD wasn't even able to round up all the usual suspects to join its group. Key figures like Weekly Standard Editor Bill Kristol and Project for a New American Century Executive Director Gary Schmitt pointedly failed to sign on. This is just the latest in a growing list of indications of a split within the movement between the Kristol’s circle and another centered at the AEI. When the administration broke with neocon favorite Ahmad Chalabi, the latter group broke with the administration, sided with Chalabi, and began bitterly griping about Paul Bremer and the growing influence of the State Department and the NSC staff. The Standard, meanwhile, stayed silent on the Chalabi question and has published a series of fawning Bremer profiles by Executive Editor Fred Barnes.

Still, it's fair to say that we're not out of the woods yet. The president was notably not eager to side with the Iraq hawks in his administration when he first took office. Steps long favored by Paul Wolfowitz, like arming the Iraqi opposition and supporting it with air power, were put on hold in favor of an effort to improve the sanctions regime. Only after the shock of 9-11 did the hawks have the chance to implement their agenda. For now, they seem to be down, but as the launch of their new group reminds us, they're still here, waiting for their moment. - http://www.prospect.org/web/p...

Neoconservative Dead-Enders Regroup & Start Plotting their Comeback (Next Stop: IRAN)!!!

07.28.04 (8:49 am) [edit]

Incompetence & Corporate Fascism?

07.28.04 (8:42 am) [edit]

[b]'Can candidate Kerry capitalize on Bush admin incompetence?'[/b]

As the Democrats gather in Boston to anoint John Kerry as their leader in the quest to win the White House, George W. Bush and his gang are doing everything they can to keep the residence that enables them to wield power and use government influence for the benefit of the corporate clients and wealthy elite they serve so well.

The president admits that privileged constituency, coupled with the radical religious right, is his base, and the Democrats would be wise to remind the voters of this at every opportunity. But articulating the simple message of the Bush administration's servitude to the rich and the powerful at the expense of working-class Americans expressed in tax policies and in a colonial war of choice seems difficult, so far, for the party out of power.

If John Kerry and John Edwards can't sell that message, the worst president in American history will continue sleeping at 1600 Pennsylvania Ave. for 400 more days.

That calculation is based on a second term reduction of Bush's already light work load to about 100 days a year. The rest of the time he'll be down on the ranch or attending Republican fund-raisers, hustling more money so brother Jeb can take over while Dick Cheney continues calling the important shots for the administration and acts as the presidential security blanket. Lord Halliburton is brooding more than usual these days, testier than normal and worried that, at long last, the truth may emerge about the black hole of deceptions that has made him so rich and powerful.

Federal prosecutors and a grand jury are probing Cheney's role in Halliburton's potentially illegal dealings with Iran when he was CEO of the energy-military contractor that was heavily dependent on the government policies and privatization he orchestrated when he was secretary of defense under Bush the Elder.

The grand jury is looking at evidence that a Halliburton subsidiary did work in Iranian oil fields and may knowingly have violated U.S. sanctions against the nation. That kind of a maneuver has Cheney's style written all over it.

Remember, just a few years ago he was clamoring to get sanctions lifted on Iraq so his company could do business there. That failing, he took office and arranged to have a war to get what he wanted for his old company and other Republican-favored corporations. You just have to love that entrepreneurial spirit.

Cheney is already feeling the heat from Securities and Exchange Commission and French government investigations into $180 million in bribes Halliburton executives are suspected of slipping into the hands of corrupt politicians in Nigeria in order to land a cut of a natural-gas plant deal.

Under Cheney's watch, a culture of corporate corruption flourished and continues to, as the Pentagon rewards Halliburton with more and more goodies to provide services to the troops stuck in the long, bloody occupation in Iraq.

As my colleague John Hanchette wrote last week, United Nations auditors are trying to get information about three Halliburton no-bid contracts funded with the proceeds from Iraqi oil revenue. The administration, in true Cheney form and to the delight of Halliburton, is balking at turning over records of the deal.

Never mind Halliburton's present sins -- war profiteering and price gouging with no-bid cost-plus contracts -- it's the company's past "indiscretions" that haunt the man who actually runs our government.

The 9/11 Commission made the al-Qaida-Iran connection Cheney could never could make with al-Qaida and Iraq. The commission found several of the hijackers slipped through Iran, but the cooperative government there didn't mark their passports so suspicions wouldn't be aroused when they traveled to the United States.

Most of the hijackers got their visas to enter the United States from Saudi travel agencies and were not even required to visit the U.S. Embassy. That was because of our then "special friendship" with the Saudi government, a relationship that has been most profitable for the Bush family but deadly for thousands of Americans.

The 9/11 Commission report calls the Saudis "a problematic ally in combating Islamic terrorism," a reference to the Saudi royal family's long association with the Wahhabi sect whose clerics preach hate and terrorism.

The commission notes, "The problems in the U.S.-Saudi relationship must be confronted openly," and concludes that the relationship must be "about more than oil."

That will never happen with George W. Bush in the White House. He will never condemn Wahhabism by name and never say or do anything about the Saudis that would threaten his family's money interests. That is a truth the Democrats should shout from the mountain tops. So let's see. The hijackers got help from Pakistanis, Iranians and Saudis, but Bush still insists the "frontline" in the war on terrorism is Iraq. That is a colossal absurdity and the greatest canard of our times. The commission is stone silent on the war in Iraq and what, if anything, it means in connection with the continuing threat from al-Qaida. It's clear the commission members wanted to stick to a consensus and avoid the split that surely would result from any discussion of Bush's warped reasons for war and the terrorism his recklessness has created.

Before the report even got back from the printer, Republican House Speaker Dennis Hastert was out using one of those foolish number ploys the Republicans employ for just about everything these days.

Hastert, who looks and acts like a dull, humorless 75-year-old Michael Moore, was quick to declare that the report should not be turned into a "political football," and then made the oh-so-political observation that "the report covers eight years of the Clinton administration and eight months of the Bush administration."

Hastert is a supreme partisan, sort of like Newt Gingrich without the charm. His outstanding qualification for high office is that the former high school wrestling coach does everything House Majority Leader Tom DeLay tells him to. DeLay holds Hastert in a full nelson and pins the third-rate speaker on all issues great and small. As a result, the U.S. House of Representatives under their control is one of the worst legislative bodies on earth and makes the Niagara Falls City Council look like a rational deliberative forum.

The Bushites have this fascination with trying to make reality a simple function of numbers. National Security Adviser Condoleezza Rice defended the big lie Bush included in the 2003 State of the Union address -- that Iraq was shopping for enriched uranium in Niger, Africa -- arguing that "it was only 16 words." We're supposed to accept the notion that the number of words is what really matters in measuring the truth and forgive the deceptions if they are only briefly mentioned. Of course, one of those 16 words was "nuclear" -- intended to scare the hell out of people and get them to go along with Bush's march to war.

Many profound thoughts require few words: " I love you," " Look out!" " I'm sorry," " Please," or, as Lord Halliburton is fond of saying, "Go f*** yourself."

The 9/11 Commission also learned one week after the terrorist attacks White House Counterterrorism Director Paul Kurtz wrote Rice a memo insisting that "no compelling case" existed for Iraq's involvement in the attacks -- a view she conveniently shielded from the public.

Since there was no case, Rice -- knowing what the prez wanted and always eager to please him, Cheney and others -- would just have to make one up. Sadly, it worked, although now only 40 percent of the American people believe Iraq had a role in the terrorist attacks, down from 70 percent on the eve of the invasion.

The Democrats have an opportunity to speak important truths this week and they should make them brief and make them count.

Here in Detroit last Friday, President Bush spoke to the Urban League, a predominately black civil rights organization. He was smooth, warm and witty, even bantering with Rev. Al Sharpton.

He made some important points, urging the audience to question whether the Democratic Party takes African-American voters for granted.

"I know plenty of politicians assume they have your vote," Bush said, "but do they earn it and do they deserve it?"

Sen. John Kerry spoke the day before and he was dull, ponderous and humorless. Sure, it's his style, but the Democratic candidate has to do better. The message is there, but he must deliver it much better.

Like so many politicians, he thinks long is better and fails to recognize the virtue of brevity.

As a priest in college once told me, the trick to good public speaking is simple: "Be bright, be brief, and be gone." Pray John Kerry learns that lesson. World peace and the strength of our republic depend on it.

[b]Bill Gallagher, a Peabody Award winner, is a former Niagara Falls city councilman who now covers Detroit for Fox2 News. His e-mail address is gallaghernewsman@aol.com.[/b] - http://www.niagarafallsreport...

Kerry Must Show Bush's Incompetence & Cheney's Corporate Fascism Are Destroying the U.S.A.!!!

07.28.04 (8:33 am) [edit]

Republican Senator Chafee Criticizes Bush for ''Host of Mistakes'' in Iraq ...

07.28.04 (8:20 am) [edit]

MIDDLETOWN, R.I. (AP) Republican Sen. Lincoln Chafee criticized the Bush administration on Tuesday for a ''host of mistakes'' in its postwar reconstruction of Iraq, saying the country is less secure than before and that basic infrastructure is still not working.

The senator, on a tour of a Middletown company that provides security details to contractors in Iraq, said the U.S. effort will fail if the White House doesn't do a better job of working with other countries in the region and re-engage itself in the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.

''I don't think we can be successful if we're not working regionally,'' he told The Associated Press. ''If we keep saber-rattling with these countries, it could make this job (stabilizing Iraq) impossible.''

Chafee was the only Republican to vote against the White House war resolution in October 2002 leading up to the U.S.-led invasion of Iraq. He said he favored recruiting more allies, and feared that demagogues in the Middle East and terrorists would exploit a U.S. invasion. He did vote to authorize reconstruction money.

On Tuesday, Chafee took issue with Bush's ''harsh words'' for Iran in recent weeks, and said the administration needs to work more closely with that country, Jordan and Syria.

The United States believes Tehran is developing nuclear weapons, a view reinforced by Iran's recent decision to resume construction of centrifuges a key step in the development of a uranium-based bomb. Iran insists its nuclear program has nothing to do with weaponry and is meant to meet domestic electricity needs.

''I feel there's been a whole host of mistakes,'' said Chafee, who is a moderate in the GOP. ''One might be the (too few) number of troops. The other is (not working closely enough) with surrounding countries.''

Washington is spending $1 billion a week in Iraq, according to Chafee. Yet the senator said he's heard electricity doesn't work in some places, some schools are not open, and water treatment plants remain out of commission. The senator said the country is more dangerous now than when he visited in October.

''The pressure's on us to perform,'' Chafee said.

''The question is if this investment is going to pay off,'' he continued. ''We're at a key moment here. The task is enormous.'' - http://www.boston.com/dailyne...:.shtml

Republican Senator Chafee Criticizes Bush for ''Host of Mistakes'' in Iraq ...

07.28.04 (8:14 am) [edit]

Bush's 'Job Boom' Is Another Neo-Con Scam - U.S. Wages Not Keeping Up With Inflation!!!

07.27.04 (3:22 pm) [edit]

[b]Was the Bush 'Job Boom' Merely Hype?[/b]

The economic downturn that began in March of 2001 has differed dramatically from other business cycles of the past 60 years. Most troubling has been the extended period of declining employment levels (continuing for 31 months from the beginning of the downturn or for a period about three times longer than the average of other business cycles during the past 60 years) and the weakness in the pace of job recovery after employment levels finally hit bottom in August 2003. It was not until this spring that the labor Department began to report significant employment gains with 353,000 jobs added in March and somewhat slower growth in April and May.

Vice President Dick Cheney extolled the monthly job figures, "American businesses have created jobs for nearly a million workers in the last 100 days alone, and we've added over 1.4 million jobs since last August."

Supporters of administration tax policies were even more enthusiastic about the job numbers. Writer Jerry Boyer stated, "For the month of March, the Bureau of Labor Statistics has reported a massive increase of 308,000 new jobs in the payroll survey ... now the payroll survey is booming too," and The Washington Times ran a headline "A Jobs Boom Bounce."

Supply-side economic commentator Lawrence Kudlow reported, "At his rate, budget deficits will evaporate rapidly as the economy quickly marches toward full employment."

Scholars at The Heritage Foundation also joined in the exaltation:

This is the first time in years the labor markets show universally positive gains in every area — job growth, wages, and hours — in almost all sectors and across all demographics. The U.S. economy is moving from recovery into a self-sustaining expansion.

A Web site supportive of the administration used the jobs data to go on the attack:

Contrary to Kerry's hyperbolic claims the economic conditions under which we currently live should be heralded by the mainstream press as a Golden Age ... Take for example the extraordinary news released May 7, 2004, about jobs from the Department of Labor. http://apnews.myway.com/artic... The great American job creating engine added 288,000 new jobs in April alone.

[b]There were of course a number of other statistics that were left out of these reports including the continuing decline in real wages and the decline in average hours worked. But another question that escaped scrutiny was how big this "boom" really was compared to job growth before the "golden age."[/b]

One reason for the enthusiasm for the spring employment numbers is the almost unprecedented decline in employment that occurred during the previous three years. But how do these months compare to other periods over the past half century?

During the first six months of 2004 employment grew from 130,035,000 in December to 131,301,000 in June or by 0.97%. Is that significantly better than previous six month periods? The answer is no. When compared to the first and last six months of each year for the last 50 years, this past six months ranks 59th out of the 100 — in other words not only not great, but not even quite middling.

Does the performance improve if we examine only the last quarter? The second quarter was a little better than the first and certainly was the best of this administration. But a very similar comparison emerges for the second quarter when compared to the 199 other quarters in the last 50 years. The 0.51% increase in employment in the second quarter of 2004 was exceeded by 116 of the 199 other quarters. Again, a performance that did not reach the median for job growth.

Even so March was a very good month, 353,000 jobs — right? To answer that question we calculated the percentage growth of the labor force in every month for the last 50 years and sorted the months from best to worst. We also color coded the months based on the administration that was in office at that particular time. Eisenhower is light blue; Kennedy is orange and so forth. The Bush II administration is yellow. Of the 600 months analyzed, only 225 are represented in the graphs but all are represented in table at the end of the report.

[u]Download the full report[/u]: http://www.americanprogress.o...%7BE9245FE4-9A2B-43C7-A52 1-5D6FF2E06E03%7D/SPINBOO M07-16.PDF

[u][b]Wages Not Keeping Up With Inflation[/b][/u]

The Bush administration's well-touted "recovery" appears to have hit another wall of economic reality. The Bureau of Labor Statistics reported late last week that hourly wages, after adjusting for inflation, fell 1.1 percent in June – the steepest decline in real hourly wages since 1991. At the same time, prices for everything from gas and electricity to health care and college tuition are on the rise.

[b]. Prices continue to rise while wages remain stagnant.[/b] Despite large gains in productivity and corporate profits, wages for production workers – non-management employees, about 80 percent of workers – are failing to keep up with the increase in costs for most goods and services. As the Economic Policy Institute (EPI) reports, real hourly wages have declined for at least 5 of the last 6 months, even as the overall economy has grown.

[b]. As a result, middle class families feel more squeezed than ever.[/b] With wages down and prices up, middle class families are taking on more and more debt to cover the costs of basic household needs and important long-term concerns like health care and education. Continuing the downward cycle, declining wages could in turn dampen the overall economic recovery and put even more pressure on the middle class.

[b]. Massive tax cuts for the wealthy have failed to help millions of struggling Americans and left a legacy of debt our children will carry for years.[/b] More than $2 trillion in tax cuts – aimed almost exclusively at the top 2 percent of earners – have done little to help middle class families get by or get ahead and have produced staggering budget deficits now projected to top $5 trillion by the end of the decade. - http://www.americanprogress.o...

............ Ronald Reagan Jr. Backs John F. Kerry ............

07.27.04 (3:12 pm) [edit]

[b]Reagan Jr. backs Kerry[/b]

Ron Reagan, son of a Republican president, urged Americans today to vote for Democrats this fall because they support stem-cell research using human embryos.

Considered a political coup and major irritant for Republicans, Reagan's prime-time speech focused on the potential for research to cure fatal and debilitating diseases.

"I am not here to make a political speech and the topic at hand should not, must not, have anything to do with partisanship," he said in prepared remarks.

Still, the late president Ronald Reagan's youngest son made it clear where his affiliation lies.

"In a few months, we will face a choice. Yes, between two candidates and two parties but more than that."

"We have a chance to take a giant step forward for the good of all humanity. We can choose between the future and the past, between reason and ignorance, between true compassion and mere ideology."

"This is our moment and we must not falter."

President George W. Bush, in a nod to his socially conservative base, has restricted U.S. government funds for research on human embryos.

Democrat John Kerry has promised to reverse that position if he makes it to the White House.

Reagan, addressing the moral beliefs of those who feel using cells from early stage embryos is wrong, said many are "well-meaning and sincere."

"Their belief is just that, an article of faith and they are entitled to it," said Reagan.

"But it does not follow that the theology of a few should be allowed to forestall the health and well-being of the many."

Republicans hosted week-long state funeral honours in June for Reagan's father, who succumbed to a decade-long battle with Alzheimer's.

And the Bush administration has been trying to assume his legacy of optimism as they campaign for re-election.

But Reagan's opposition to Bush and the mixture of politics and religion is nothing new. He was even critical of the president during a speech at his father's funeral, saying Bush appeared to lead Americans with a mandate from God.

A liberal TV commentator, Reagan has also called Bush unqualified, been critical of the Iraq war and said the administration is "just plain corrupt." - http://www.thestar.com/NASApp...

WHEN THE LAW GOES FLAT

07.27.04 (8:51 am) [edit]

[b]'When the law goes flat'[/b]

Amidst all the outrages of the Bush Administration -- raiding the Federal treasury, starving education and social services, trashing the environment, launching an aggressive war -- it is all too easy to overlook the erosion of the rule of law. Yet the law is the institution that most immediately affects us all, because the law, as established by the founders of our nation, protects us all from the reckless power of abusive government -- from what Hamlet called, "the insolence of office."

To be sure, laws can be petty or even silly, especially in local jurisdictions. Far worse, they can be cruel and unjust when enacted by oppressive regimes such as Nazi Germany or the Soviet Union. But this is not the case in the United States of America. Our laws are founded on our Constitution, ratified with "the consent of the governed," and devised, in the words of the Preamble, "in order to form a more perfect union, establish justice, insure domestic tranquility, provide for the common defense, promote the general welfare, and secure the blessings of liberty." When our courts are functioning properly, laws judged to be in violation of these Constitutional objectives and protections are ruled null and void.

The protection of the law, and the loss of that protection, is the central theme of Robert Bolt's play and movie, "A Man for All Seasons," which dramatizes the life and martyrdom of Thomas More. In the play, More warns his son-in-law:

"[i]Would you cut a great road through the law to get after the Devil? ... And when the last law was down, and the Devil turned round on you, where would you hide.., the laws all being flat? This country is planted thick with laws from coast to coast..., and if you cut them down... do you really think you could stand upright in the winds that would blow then? Yes, I give the Devil benefit of law for my own safety's sake[/i]."

Thomas More's offense, which eventually cost him his life, was his refusal to recognize the supremacy of the English Monarch over papal authority. More, a legal scholar, believed that so long as he remained silent, the law would protect him, even from the sovereign, Henry VIII. But when that law was "flattened" as it became subordinate to and a political weapon of that sovereign, Thomas More's fate was sealed.

The fate of Thomas More, and of countless others throughout history who have fallen victim to the corruption of law by the wealthy and powerful, must stand as a warning to all Americans today. For the evidence of the corruption of law in the hands of the present administration and its party is compelling to any who have the eyes to see and the judgment to appreciate the threat. Put bluntly, the Bush administration is literally an "outlaw" regime -- it has placed itself outside the law that both constrains and protects the rest of us.

I will examine five of the many offenses by the Bush Administration against the rule of law: the election of 2000, the unequal enforcement of the law, the violation of international treaties, the infringement of civil liberties, and the attempt through so-called "tort reform" to deny ordinary citizens the protection of civil law.

[b]The 2000 Election: [/b] To begin, we must never forget that this administration was conceived in lawlessness. Thousands of Florida voters were unlawfully "purged" and denied access to the polls. Military ballots postmarked past the deadline were counted. In Miami-Dade county, an official act of ballot counting was shut down by a "yuppie riot" of GOP staff members -- an event as blatantly illegal as the disruption of a trial or of a debate on the floor of the Congress. Yet no one was ever charged, much less punished, for this lawlessness.

Article Two, Section One of the U.S. Constitution explicitly states that "each State shall appoint, in such manner as the legislature thereof may direct, a number of electors." Thus it is the business of the states, as interpreted by the Supreme Courts of the states, to select the presidential electors. Accordingly, the Supreme Court of Florida ordered the continued counting of the ballots, and that decision was upheld by two appellate federal courts. No matter. In a legally indefensible ruling ("limited to the present circumstances"), clearly concocted with the sole purpose of putting George Bush in the White House, five Republican judges on the Supreme Court ordered an end of the vote counting and, in effect, selected the President. (See my "A Day of Infamy," http://www.igc.org/politics/i... and a collection of legal and journalistic responses to Bush v. Gore: "We Dissent." http://www.igc.org/gadfly/dis... ).

Subsequently, [u]more than 600 Professors of law signed a petition of protest[/u], http://www.the-rule-of-law.co... which included the following:

[i]We are Professors of Law at American law schools, from every part of our country, of different political beliefs. But we all agree that when a bare majority of the U. S. Supreme Court halted the recount of ballots under Florida law, the five justices were acting as political proponents for candidate Bush, not as judges[/i].

[b]The Unequal Enforcement of the Law:[/b] Carved above the entrance to this same Supreme Court, are the words "Equal Justice under Law." Would that it were so. Unfortunately, there are two kinds of "justice." There is one standard of justice for the wealthy murderer with a team of high-priced attorneys, and another standard for the poor murder suspect with the court-appointed lawyer. There is one law for wealthy users of powdered cocaine or oxycontin, and another for poor black users of crack cocaine. There is one law for the corporate executive who fixes energy prices, another for "Grandma Millie" who must pay those inflated prices. There is one law for the Republican donor who cheats thousands of taxpayers of billions of invested dollars, and another for Democratic contributor, Martha Stewart, caught "dumping" $50,000 of stock on an "insider tip." There is one law of perjury for Casper Weinberger, Eliot Abrams and Oliver North, all of whom escaped fine and imprisonment due to "technicalities" and presidential pardons, and another law for President Bill Clinton caught, at last, in a "perjury trap" over a non-material sexual indiscretion.

[b]The Violation of International Treaties:[/b] Article Six of the Constitution decrees that "all treaties made, or which shall be made, under the authority of the United States, shall be the supreme law of the land." But not, apparently, to this Administration which has casually ignored and violated numerous treaties at its convenience. The most outrageous has been the violations of the Geneva Conventions in Iraq, and specifically at the Abu Ghraib prison. In a March 6, 2003, memo from the Pentagon "working group," we read: "In light of the President's complete authority over the conduct of war, without a clear statement otherwise, criminal statutes are not read as infringing on the President's ultimate authority in these areas." Regarding this memo, Molly Ivins wrote http://www.workingforchange.c... : "Quite literally, the president may as well wear a crown -- forget that 'no man is above the law' jazz. We used to talk about 'the imperial presidency' under Nixon, but this is the real thing."

[b]Civil Rights:[/b] George Bush's violation of the rights of citizens' is open and flagrant. Until very recently, at least three U. S. Citizens (that we know of) were incarcerated without specific charges, without access to counsel, without expectation of a jury trial -- all this in violation of the Fifth, Sixth, Seventh and Eighth Amendments to the Constitution (the Bill of Rights). Even worse violations of basic judicial rights were visited upon the non-citizens held at Guantánamo. But now, at last, the courts have dug in their heels, as the very Supreme Court that appointed Bush to his office, finally drew the line and ordered that U.S. citizen Yaser Hamdi be allowed access to his lawyer and be formally charged. (The Supremes "punted" the similar case of Jose Padilla back to the state court).

Even so, the Bush Administration's aspirations to "transcend" the law remain a constant threat. Last month, the conservative legal journalist, Stuart Taylor, Jr., http://www.progressivetrail.o... wrote:

"[i]These warped analyses [by the Defense Department legal team] are not just the work of a few lawyers carried away with clever circumvention of the law. They reflect an attitude deeply entrenched in the Bush White House -- including Bush and Dick Cheney as well as (White House counsel Alberto) Gonzales -- that whenever the president invokes national security, he enjoys near-dictatorial powers and is quite literally above the law. ... These perversions of the law would allow Bush to seize, imprison, and torture anyone in the world, at any time, for any reason that he associates with national security. Little did the Framers suspect that their Constitution would be twisted by a president to claim powers more appropriate to Roman emperors, Russian czars, and King George III[/i]."

Anyone claiming to be an authentic "conservative" who can still support this president, is engaging in an extraordinary feat of mind-bending.

[b]"Tort Reform:" [/b]Finally, we come to the issue of "tort reform," brought to public attention by the selection of "trial attorney" John Edwards as the Democratic Candidate for Vice President.

Libertarians, and in particular the libertarian faction of the Republican party, have long contended that tort law -- court mandated compensation for damages -- would accomplish all that government regulation attempts to achieve, and that it would do this more effectively and at less cost. Unfortunately, history clearly testifies that it simply won't work. Furthermore, the attempt to have tort law take on the same task as regulation would entail a re-establishment of the same sort of bureaucracy that the libertarians deplore. This is a bold charge that I make against the libertarian "tort and court" remedy. Because I have defended this criticism of libertarianism at length in a published article, "With Liberty for Some," I will not repeat that argument here.

But just suppose that the libertarians are right: that the work of the EPA, the Food and Drug Administration, the Securities and Exchange Commission, and other regulatory agencies, can all be accomplished through the threat of personal lawsuits against private corporations. This proposed alternative to government regulation is insincere, to say the least of it. For if the Republicans really believed that the courts could and should protect the citizens and consumers from injuries from the corporations, then they would be in the vanguard of those who would at least retain, and perhaps even increase, the legal penalties imposed upon offending parties and corporations. And, of course, the opposite is the case.

Instead, they propose "tort reform" which would make access to the courts prohibitively expensive for ordinary citizens. In addition, this so-called "reform" would result in "settlements" unlikely to fully compensate for damages, and would exact costs to large corporations sufficiently small to have virtually no deterrent effect. Such "reform" would truly be a "flattening" of the law, leaving little or no protection for private citizens from corporate abuses, damages and injuries. But, of course, that's precisely the objective of "tort reform."

In short, the GOP and its corporate sponsors want it both ways: no protection of the consumer-citizen through enforcement of government regulation, and no protection of the consumer-citizen through punishing court settlements. The corporation as screwer -- the citizen as screwee.

[b]In Conclusion:[/b] The founders of our Republic resolved that the inalienable rights of every citizen would be protected by the equal application of the rule of law. They understood that in a well-ordered polity, justice, embodied in the rule of law, is above politics; the law sets the rules and defines the constraints of acceptable political activity. The Law is the "referee" that assures "fair play." And it does so blindly, with equal fairness to the various factions. The law protects the individual citizen from the abuse of power, from the lowliest citizen to the President. This is what Robert Bolt's Thomas More had in mind, when he said that "I give the Devil benefit of law for my own safety's sake."

The blindfolded Lady Justice makes no distinctions: all are to be protected equally by the law. And when the blindfold is torn off and the scales of justice are weighted in favor of the rich and powerful, and against the opposing parties and dissenting citizens, then the lowliest citizen is not safe. Worse still, when that citizen comes to appreciate this fact, he will no longer look to the law for justice and protection. Law, for the citizen, will then have ceased to be his protector, and will instead have become his oppressor - a political tool of a sovereign that has thus forfeited his right to govern. "When in the course of human events" such misfortune befalls a public, the time has come to replace the government -- peacefully if possible, but forcibly if necessary.

[u]If you disagree, then your argument is not with me, it is with all the signers of the Declaration of Independence[/u].

[b]Dr. Ernest Partridge is a consultant, writer and lecturer in the field of Environmental Ethics and Public Policy. He publishes the website, "The Online Gadfly" (www.igc.org/gadfly) and co-edits the progressive website, "The Crisis Papers" (www.crisispapers.org).[/b] - http://www.smirkingchimp.com/...

...---... ---...---... WHEN THE LAW GOES FLAT!!! ...---...---...---...

07.27.04 (8:48 am) [edit]

...... New Analysis: An excuse-spouting Bush is busted by 9/11 report ......

07.27.04 (8:39 am) [edit]

[b]'An excuse-spouting Bush is busted by 9/11 report'[/b]

[i][b]Busted![/b][/i] Like a teenager whose beer bash is interrupted by his parents' early return home, President Bush's nearly three years of bragging about his "war on terror" credentials has been exposed by the bipartisan 9/11 commission as nothing more than empty posturing.

Without dissent, five prominent Republicans joined an equal number of their Democratic Party peers in stating unequivocally that the Bush administration got it wrong, both in its lethargic response to an unprecedented level of warnings during what the commission calls the "Summer of Threat," as well as in its inclusion of Iraq in the war on terror.

Although the language of the commission's report was carefully couched to obtain a bipartisan consensus, the indictment of this administration surfaces on almost every page.

Bush was not the first U.S. president to play footsie with Muslim extremists in Afghanistan, Saudi Arabia and Pakistan, nor was the Clinton administration without fault in its fitful and ineffective response to the Al Qaeda threat. But there was simply no excuse for the near-total indifference of the new president and his top Cabinet officials to strenuous warnings from the outgoing Clinton administration and the government's counter-terrorism experts that something terrible was coming, fast and hard, from Al Qaeda. Osama bin Laden's gang, they said repeatedly, was planning "near-term attacks," which Al Qaeda operatives expected "to have dramatic consequences of catastrophic proportions."

As early as May 2001, the FBI was receiving tips that Bin Laden supporters were planning attacks in the U.S., possibly including the hijacking of planes. On May 29, White House counter-terrorism chief Richard Clarke wrote national security advisor Condoleezza Rice that "when these attacks [on Israeli or U.S. facilities] occur, as they likely will, we will wonder what more we could have done to stop them." At the end of June, the commission wrote, "the intelligence reporting consistently described the upcoming attacks as occurring on a calamitous level." In early July, Atty. Gen. John Ashcroft was told "that preparations for multiple attacks [by Al Qaeda] were in late stages or already complete and that little additional warning could be expected." By month's end, "the system was blinking red" and could not "get any worse," then-CIA Director George Tenet told the 9/11 commission.

It was at this point, of course, that George W. Bush began the longest presidential vacation in 32 years. On the very first day of his visit to his Texas ranch, Aug. 6, Bush received the now-infamous two-page intelligence alert titled, "Bin Laden Determined to Attack in the United States." Yet instead of returning to the capital to mobilize an energetic defensive posture, he spent an additional 27 days away as the government languished in summer mode, in deep denial.

"In sum," said the 9/11 commission report, "the domestic agencies never mobilized in response to the threat. They did not have the direction, and did not have a plan to institute. The borders were not hardened. Transportation systems were not fortified. Electronic surveillance was not targeted against a domestic threat. State and local law enforcement were not marshaled to augment the FBI's efforts. The public was not warned."

In her public testimony to the commission, Rice argued that the Aug. 6 briefing concerned vague "historical information based on old reporting," adding that "there was no new threat information." When the commission forced the White House to release the document, however, this was exposed as a lie: The document included explicit FBI warnings of "suspicious activity in this country consistent with preparations for hijackings or other types of attacks, including recent surveillance of federal buildings in New York." Furthermore, this briefing was only one of 40 on the threat of Bin Laden that the president received between Jan. 20 and Sept. 11, 2001.

Bush, the commission report also makes clear, compounded U.S. vulnerability by totally misleading Americans about the need to invade Iraq as a part of the "war on terror."

For those, like Vice President Dick Cheney, who continue to insist that the jury is still out on whether Al Qaeda and Iraq were collaborators, the commission's report should be the final word, finding after an exhaustive review that there is no evidence that any of the alleged contacts between Bin Laden and Saddam Hussein "ever developed into a collaborative operational relationship. Nor have we seen evidence indicating that Iraq cooperated with Al Qaeda in developing or carrying out any attacks against the United States."

So, before 9/11, incompetence and sloth. And after? Much worse: a war without end on the wrong battlefield. - http://www.latimes.com/news/o...,1,7719764.column

...... New Analysis: An excuse-spouting Bush is busted by 9/11 report ......

07.27.04 (8:38 am) [edit]

Vote for John F. Kerry Who Said 'SEND ME' to Vietnam & to Serve Our Nation!!!

07.27.04 (8:34 am) [edit]

[b]John F. Kerry said "SEND ME" to Vietnam ... And John F. Kerry has always said 'SEND ME' to serve our nation!!![/b]

Bush said: [i]Where's the bottles of booze and don't tell 'em where I am since I'm AWOL from Vietnam in a drunken stupor and where are the sluts tonight 'cause I've got a 'hard-on'? Oh, and by the way, where are the fat juicy tax cuts for the rich so that I can live like Emperor Caligula? ...[/i]

[b]Check out http://awolbush.com [/b]

[b]Also be sure to read[/b]: [b][u]Pschoanalyst describes Bush as "paranoid meglomaniac," "untreated alcoholic"[/u][/b] http://www.unknownnews.net/in...

Vote for John F. Kerry Who Said 'SEND ME' to Vietnam & to Serve Our Nation!!!

07.27.04 (8:33 am) [edit]

FEAR OF FRAUD: Will Dubya & Jeb Get Away With Rigging the Election Again???

07.27.04 (8:27 am) [edit]

[b]Fear of fraud[/b]

It's election night, and early returns suggest trouble for the incumbent. Then, mysteriously, the vote count stops and observers from the challenger's campaign see employees of a voting-machine company, one wearing a badge that identifies him as a county official, typing instructions at computers with access to the vote-tabulating software.

When the count resumes, the incumbent pulls ahead. The challenger demands an investigation. But there are no ballots to recount, and election officials allied with the incumbent refuse to release data that could shed light on whether there was tampering with the electronic records.

This isn't a paranoid fantasy. It's a true account of a recent election in Riverside County, Calif., reported by Andrew Gumbel of the British newspaper The Independent. Mr. Gumbel's full-length report, printed in Los Angeles City Beat, makes hair-raising reading not just because it reinforces concerns about touch-screen voting, but also because it shows how easily officials can stonewall after a suspect election.

Some states, worried about the potential for abuse with voting machines that leave no paper trail, have banned their use this November. But Florida, which may well decide the presidential race, is not among those states, and last month state officials rejected a request to allow independent audits of the machines' integrity. A spokesman for Gov. Jeb Bush accused those seeking audits of trying to "undermine voters' confidence," and declared, "The governor has every confidence in the Department of State and the Division of Elections."

Should the public share that confidence? Consider the felon list.

Florida law denies the vote to convicted felons. In 2000 the state hired a firm to purge supposed felons from the list of registered voters; these voters were turned away from the polls. After the election, determined by 537 votes, it became clear that thousands of people had been wrongly disenfranchised. Since those misidentified as felons were disproportionately Democratic-leaning African-Americans, these errors may have put George W. Bush in the White House.

This year, Florida again hired a private company - Accenture, which recently got a homeland security contract worth up to $10 billion - to prepare a felon list. Remembering 2000, journalists sought copies. State officials stonewalled, but a judge eventually ordered the list released.

The Miami Herald quickly discovered that 2,100 citizens who had been granted clemency, restoring their voting rights, were nonetheless on the banned-voter list. Then The Sarasota Herald-Tribune discovered that only 61 of more than 47,000 supposed felons were Hispanic. So the list would have wrongly disenfranchised many legitimate African-American voters, while wrongly enfranchising many Hispanic felons. It escaped nobody's attention that in Florida, Hispanic voters tend to support Republicans.

After first denying any systematic problem, state officials declared it an innocent mistake. They told Accenture to match a list of registered voters to a list of felons, flagging anyone whose name, date of birth and race was the same on both lists. They didn't realize, they said, that this would automatically miss felons who identified themselves as Hispanic because that category exists on voter rolls but not in state criminal records.

But employees of a company that prepared earlier felon lists say that they repeatedly warned state election officials about that very problem.

Let's not be coy. Jeb Bush says he won't allow an independent examination of voting machines because he has "every confidence" in his handpicked election officials. Yet those officials have a history of slipshod performance on other matters related to voting and somehow their errors always end up favoring Republicans. Why should anyone trust their verdict on the integrity of voting machines, when another convenient mistake could deliver a Republican victory in a high-stakes national election?

This shouldn't be a partisan issue. Think about what a tainted election would do to America's sense of itself, and its role in the world. In the face of official stonewalling, doubters probably wouldn't be able to prove one way or the other whether the vote count was distorted - but if the result looked suspicious, most of the world and many Americans would believe the worst. I'll write soon about what can be done in the few weeks that remain, but here's a first step: if Governor Bush cares at all about the future of the nation, as well as his family's political fortunes, he will allow that independent audit. - http://www.nytimes.com/2004/0...

FEAR OF FRAUD: Will Dubya & Jeb Get Away With Rigging the Election Again???

07.27.04 (8:24 am) [edit]

Vote for John F. Kerry Who Said 'SEND ME' to Vietnam & to Serve Our Nation!!!

07.26.04 (6:57 pm) [edit]

The Republican -- U.S. Veteran back from Iraq: "We even shot women and children" ...

07.26.04 (2:34 pm) [edit]

[b]Soldiers tell stories about Iraq [/b]

When his turn came to speak at the community dialogue on the Iraq War, Staff Sgt. Jimmy Massey of the United States Marines Corps chewed his gum slowly and slowly scanned the 150 people in the audience.

What he was about to say required deliberation. "We shot a man with his hands up," he said, "We even shot women and children."

Massey was one of three Iraq War veterans to speak yesterday at a forum sponsored by the Veterans Education Project and the American Friends Service Committee.

The event, held at the Veterans of Foreign Wars, Michael Curtin Post, in the Florence neighborhood, offered the audience and opportunity to hear first-hand experiences of veterans who hold varying opinions on the war in Iraq.

Air Force Reserve Tech. Sgt. Pablo Rodriguez, a Northampton police officer, and Army National Guard Sgt. Richard Riley of Amherst, spoke about their experiences in Iraq.

Both Rodriguez and Riley said they were proud to serve in Iraq, and if called they would go back.

"I'm glad I had an opportunity to serve," said Rodriguez, who did security details at the Baghdad Airport.

Riley, who served with the Guard's 180th Engineering Detachment, built bridges as well as housing and other facilities for GIs in Iraq and Kuwait.

Massey told the audience of his disillusionment with the war. The only one of the three to engage in combat, the 12-year veteran from North Carolina said he was fully prepared to kill or be killed. But that was before the war.

Today he said he takes five different anti-depressant and anti-anxiety pills to help him deal with Post Traumatic Stress Disorder.

Firing on civilians and securing oil fields was not the duty he signed up for, he said.

"Why are Marines learning to shut down oil wells - are we the Environmental Protection Agency now?" he asked as he told the audience of his realization that this war was not one he agreed with.

He started asking questions and was reassigned to combat duty.

"I'm in the desert, I'm gung-ho, ready to kill," he said, putting "your tax dollars to work. Unfortunately, your tax dollars went into a lot of civilians. I was there. I pulled the trigger.

"My main purpose in life, for 12 years, was to meet the enemy on the battlefield and destroy him," he said. "When I left to go to Iraq I didn't care whether or not I died. If you die in combat, that's an honor."

There were days when he thought to himself, "Today is a good day to die," said Massey, who received an honorable discharge.

But earlier in the evening, as people streamed into the hall and the sun lit up his face he realized yet again, "I'm glad to be in the sun." - http://fairuse.1accesshost.co...

The Republican -- U.S. Veteran back from Iraq: "We even shot women and children" ...

07.26.04 (2:30 pm) [edit]

Bush Gets Booed Everywhere (Except Where US Military Soldiers Are Ordered Not To Boo)!!!

07.26.04 (12:20 pm) [edit]

[b]Bush gets booed[i] where-ever [/i]he goes ([i]except[/i] where US military soldiers are screened and ordered [i]not [/i]to boo)!!![/b]

[u]Refer to[/u]:

Bush Booed at Martin Luther King Gravesite, http://www.commondreams.org/h...

Anti-war protestors on march over Bush visit, http://www.waterford-news.com...

Thousands protest against Bush, http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/en...

[b]In fact, unprecedented armies of police and security are required [i]where-ever [/i]Bush goes because he is the most hated president in US history!

Bush the Most Hated Man in the History of the World? - http://www.opednews.com/kall0...

[/b]

Sacrificing & Dying for Halliburton: U.S. Soldier Guarding Iraq Oil Tankers Killed ...

07.26.04 (7:07 am) [edit]

[b]U.S. Soldier Guarding Iraq Oil Tankers Killed In Roadside Bombing [/b]

A U.S. soldier died Sunday from wounds suffered a day earlier when a roadside bomb exploded in northern Iraq.

A U.S. military spokesman said another soldier was injured in the same incident while they were protecting oil tankers near Biji, 190 miles (300 kilometers) north of Baghdad.

The American soldiers in the patrol arrested an Iraqi man near the site of the explosion.

Military sources said 13 insurgents were killed Sunday in clashes with Iraqi and U.S. forces near Baquba, 40 miles (60 kilometers) northeast of Baghdad. A civilian was killed and others, mostly women and children, were injured during that fighting.

In Dora, a western district of Baghdad, unidentified gunmen shot and killed Col. Khalid Daoud, a top officer in the dissolved Iraqi army under Saddam Hussein. Daoud and his son were killed as they sat in their car. - http://feeds.bignewsnetwork.c...

Sacrificing & Dying for Halliburton: U.S. Soldier Guarding Iraq Oil Tankers Killed ...

07.26.04 (7:04 am) [edit]

How to Lose the War on Terror

07.26.04 (7:02 am) [edit]

[b]How to Lose the War on Terror

A CIA bin Laden expert’s lament[/b]

[i]One of the striking things about the Iraq War is the extent to which American foreign-affairs professionals—intellige nce analysts, diplomats, and high-ranking military officers—recognize it is a tragically misguided venture. Among the most recent to speak out is the CIA officer formerly charged with analyzing Osama bin Laden. Known only as “Anonymous,” he is the author of the new book Imperial Hubris —a scathing look at the way the United States has conducted the War on Terror thus far. TAC editors Philip Giraldi (a CIA veteran with extensive Mideast experience), Kara Hopkins, and Scott McConnell recently visited with the author. Here are excerpts of the conversation[/i].

TAC: You’ve said that Iraq was the best Christmas present that Osama bin Laden could have possibly received …

ANON: Have you seen the movie “Christmas Story,” where the boy wants a Red Rider air gun and his mom says no? Then at the end of Christmas day, when he has opened all his presents, he gets the gun and he thinks, “My God, I really got it. I never thought I’d get it.” Iraq was Osama’s Red Rider BB gun. It was something he always wanted, but something he never expected.

Iraq is the second holiest place in Islam. He’s now got the Americans in the two holiest places in Islam, the Arabian Peninsula and Iraq, and he has the Israelis in Jerusalem. All three sanctities are now occupied by infidels, a great reality for him. He also saw the Islamic clerical community, from liberal to the most Wahhabist, issue fatwas that were more vitriolic and more demanding than the fatwas that were issued against the Soviets when they came into Afghanistan. They basically validated all of the theological arguments bin Laden has been making since 1996, that it is incumbent on all Muslims to fight the Americans because they were invading Islamic territory. Until we did that in Iraq, he really had a difficult time making that argument stick, but now there is no question.

It’s also perceived widely in the Muslim world that we attacked Iraq to move along what, at least in Muslims’ minds, is the Israelis’ goal of a greater Israel from the Nile to the Euphrates. While we’re beating the hell out of the Iraqis, Sharon and the Israelis are beating the hell out of the Palestinians every day. So we have an overwhelming media flow into the Muslim world of infidels killing Muslims. It’s a one-sided view, but it’s their perception. And unless you deal with what they think, you’re never going to understand what we’re up against.

TAC: I was interested in your analysis of terrorism versus insurgency …

ANON: I worked on the war against the Soviets in Afghanistan and watched the organizational structure and the ability of the Afghan insurgent groups to absorb tremendous punishment and survive, and then I worked for the next period of my career on terrorism, where the groups were much smaller. Their leadership is more concentrated, and if you hurt them to a significant degree, they cease to be as much of a threat. They are lethal nuisances, not national-security risks. Al-Qaeda is not a terrorist group but an insurgency with an extraordinary ability to replicate at the leadership level. When Mr. Johnson was executed in Saudi Arabia, the Saudi authorities killed four al-Qaeda fighters, one of them named Mukrin. Within four hours, al-Qaeda’s media enterprise had issued a statement acknowledging the death of Mukrin, appointing his successor, and providing a brief résumé.

TAC: You suggest that al-Qaeda would be delighted to have George Bush stay in the White House because nothing could be better for their international objectives. How do you see this playing out in terms of—this is totally hypothetical—a potential terrorist incident, somewhat like the bombing in Spain?

ANON: I said that al-Qaeda itself has said that it could not wish for a better government than the one that is now governing the U.S. because, on the policies of issue to Muslims, al-Qaeda believes this government is wrong on every one and thus allows their insurgency to grow larger to incite other groups to attack Americans.

TAC: One of your principal points is that this is a much broader war against Islam. How do you deflect critics who would suggest that Islam is, in fact, a lot more complicated? Countries like Malaysia don’t really fit the Islamist or the fundamentalist profile …

ANON: I don’t know if we have to say we are at war with Islam, but I think it defies reality to say that a growing part of Islam is not at war against us. I am at a loss to understand how this far along into the bin Laden problem we can still be saying that this war has nothing to do with religion. It has everything to do with religion in terms of the motivation bin Laden, his followers, sympathizers, and Muslims generally feel to fight us.

Bin Laden’s genius has been to focus the Muslim world on specific U.S. policies. He’s not, as the Ayatollah did, ranting about women who wear knee-length dresses. He’s not against Budweiser or democracy. The shibboleth that he opposes our freedoms is completely false, and it leads us into a situation where we will never perceive the threat.

TAC: Unless we believe that bin Laden is rational, we are underestimating him …

ANON: Tremendously. One of the prime examples of our underestimation is the whole discussion of Iraq and al-Qaeda. Bin Laden would not be very likely to deal with the Iraqis, not because he didn’t like them, not because he hated Saddam—both of those are true—but because the Iraqis were a third-rate service. They are ham-handed, clumsy. Most of their terrorist operations result in killing their own people. We have never seen al-Qaeda associate with someone who posed a risk to the security of their organization, operatives, or plan of attack. Al-Qaeda is a first-rate insurgent organization with a first-rate intelligence and counterintelligence service. Bin Laden has shown throughout his career that he deals with equals.

TAC: Can you give us a sense of where al-Qaeda is now in terms of popularity and resonance in the Muslim world?

ANON: We dealt al-Qaeda some serious blows in terms of its people who are designated to attack the United States, but they have been succeeded by others who were understudying before those people disappeared.

In terms of popularity, it would be difficult to underestimate the growth in popular support across the Muslim world. Bin Laden has identified six specific U.S. policies that appeal to the anger of Muslims: our unqualified support for Israel; our ability to keep oil prices within a tolerable range for consumers; our support for people who oppress Muslims, i.e., Russia in Chechnya, India in Kashmir, China in Western China; our presence on the Arabian Peninsula; our military presence in Iraq and Afghanistan; and finally our support for Muslim tyrannies from the Atlantic to the Indian Ocean. Bin Laden is a formidable enemy because he has recognized what are deemed by many Muslims, even those who don’t support his martial activities, as threats to Islam.

TAC: You suggest that the situation with al-Qaeda requires two things: an acceptance that this is a war against the major insurgency that encompasses a major part of the earth, and while we are fighting the war, we have to address the policy issues that have made the it happen. If you were the czar today, what would you do to make this happen?

ANON: I don’t think we can win this war until we have a debate over what has caused it and recognize that it is in our power to win this war over a period of time or to fight this war forever. This is not a choice between war and peace. It is a choice between war and endless war.

People say we are going to do public diplomacy—magazines for Muslims. Well, as long as Al-Jazeera is broadcasting from Gaza and the West Bank live, 24 hours a day, no one is going to listen to the Americans. We are talking to basically ourselves and to the Europeans, who don’t like us much anyway.

Certainly, I am not smart enough to formulate foreign policy for the whole country, but we must have this kind of a debate. We pursued policies for 30 years which have led us to 9/11 and which will lead us to further 9/11s, and unless we decide that we are willing to wage this war aggressively with the military, but also complement it with genuine political movement, we are in a position where we are going to be defeated time and again.

TAC: I don’t understand how the aggressive military part complements the political strategy. Aggressive action would seem to imply a lot of collateral damage, which would undercut political efforts …

ANON: War is what it was when there were cavemen or when Napoleon went into Russia or when we fought World War II. Collateral damage is a natural condition of war, especially when you are fighting an opponent that is uniform-less.

Why do I say we need to be more aggressive? We went into Afghanistan in October 2001, the estimate was 50,000 Taliban fighters under arms and 8-10,000 al-Qaeda. If we give the military intense credit and say they killed 20 percent of that number, 45,000 went home with their guns to fight another day. Why would anyone define that as winning?

It’s a politically correct handicap to think that you can have a war but maintain a position where we don’t want to kill the enemy, we don’t want collateral damage, and we don’t want our people to die. That falls in the category of analysis by assertion. You can say it’s true, but it’s not. It’s never been true. Unless we address the policy issue, we have left ourselves with only the military option.

TAC: But when you have an insurgency that is organized like a terrorist group, it is dispersed and difficult to find. To destroy that group in a conventional military sense goes into decimation of whole groups of people as a way to get at the terrorists.

ANON: It is a very complex problem, but I have never understood my oath of office to “preserve, protect, and defend the Constitution” and care just as much about foreigners as Americans. If I had to choose between the president attacking somebody and killing some civilians to protect my children and not doing it, I think I would support the president.

I am not arguing that we carpet-bomb someplace just for the sake of killing civilians. What I am saying is that if you have an opportunity to hit the enemy, you don’t spend a lot of time discussing if the evidence will make it in the Southern District of New York. Intelligence is not evidentiary material. It is information, and when you get to the level where you think you are not going to get any better, you act. That is something we failed utterly on in the ’90s.

TAC: Do you think we could have pretty much gotten rid of al-Qaeda in Afghanistan at the end of 2001?

ANON: I think if we had been prepared to act on the day of the attack or the next couple of days, we would have dealt them a very serious blow. Bin Laden had declared war on us in 1996, but the military had absolutely no response ready. When they did respond, they spent a month destroying 30-year-old Soviet junk. From Sept. 11 until Oct. 7, al-Qaeda and the Taliban dispersed. And then when we did get there, we used surrogates rather than our own soldiers.

TAC: How important is getting bin Laden?

ANON: Of decreasing importance as the years go by, but bin Laden has a genius: he has the only organization of its kind in the Muslim world. He has Muslims from multiple ethnic groups and they work together with a lot of friction, but they work together effectively. We’ve watched the Palestinians for 45 years. They are all Palestinians, and they can’t go across the street together.

Without bin Laden, al-Qaeda initially will lose some of its cohesiveness because of his very genuine credentials as a leader, but al-Qaeda is now a very mature organization. It is into its second generation of leadership, and the second generation seems to be more professional and businesslike. They’re quieter. - http://amconmag.com/2004_08_0...

Al Qaeda Couldn't Ask For More! ... How Bush/Cheney Are Losing the War on Terror!

07.26.04 (6:55 am) [edit]

What's Next?

07.26.04 (6:50 am) [edit]

[b]A must-read is "Over 905 And Counting" on http://www.tblog.com/template... [/b]

[b]Iran's Next

by Gordon Prather [/b]

For at least two years the Bush-Cheney administration has been demanding that the International Atomic Energy Agency Board of Governors judge Iran to be in violation of the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT).

Should the IAEA Board make such a judgment, it would then be obliged to report that to the UN Security Council. It would then be up to the Security Council to decide what action – if any – was appropriate.

If the Council concluded that Iran's nuclear program constituted a danger to peace in the region, it could pass a resolution that Bush-Cheney could use – once reelected – as an excuse to do unto Iran in 2005 what they did to Iraq in 2003.

But, first, Bush-Cheney has to get IAEA Director General Mohamed ElBaradei to report that Iran is not fulfilling its NPT obligations.

The IAEA was made the international "Safeguards" inspectorate under Article III of the NPT:

[i]Each non-nuclear-weapon state party to the treaty undertakes to accept Safeguards [as set forth in an agreement to be negotiated and concluded with the International Atomic Energy Agency in accordance with the Statute of the International Atomic Energy Agency and the Agency's Safeguards system] for the exclusive purpose of verification of the fulfillment of its obligations assumed under the treaty, with a view to preventing diversion of nuclear energy from peaceful uses to nuclear weapons or other nuclear explosive devices[/i].

As it became obvious to Iran and to North Korea that Bush-Cheney intended to invade Iraq – purportedly to eradicate Saddam's illicit nuke program – they reacted very differently.

The state-run Korean News Service of the Democratic Peoples Republic of Korea issued this statement on April 6, 2003, just days after Bush-Cheney invaded Iraq:

[i]The United States is gravely encroaching upon the sovereignty of Iraq for the purpose of removing the present leadership of Iraq – in defiance of even the elementary international code of conduct – and, furthermore, putting the Mideast region under its control.

The present Iraqi crisis teaches a serious lesson: that the imperialists' inspection of weapons in sovereign states leads to disarming, it spills into a war and any concession and compromise with the imperialists allow the sovereignty and interests of countries and nations to be encroached upon and, in the long run, they will fall victim to imperialism.

The U.S. intends to force the DPRK to disarm itself.

The Iraqi war shows that to allow disarming through [UN] inspection does not help avert a war but rather sparks it. Neither international public opinion nor the UN Charter could prevent the U.S. from mounting an attack on Iraq.

Only the physical deterrent force – tremendous military deterrent force powerful enough to decisively beat back an attack supported by any ultra-modern weapons – can avert a war and protect the security of the country and the nation. This is a lesson drawn from the Iraqi war[/i].

However, by the time Bush-Cheney invaded Iraq, Iran was already committed to the UN inspection route so disdained by the DPRK.

As ElBaradei reported to the Board last November, "Iran has committed itself to a policy of full disclosure and has decided, as a confidence-building measure, not only to sign the Additional Protocol – making way for more robust and comprehensive inspections – but also to take the important step of suspending all enrichment related and reprocessing activities and to accept IAEA verification of this suspension."

Furthermore, Iran thought it had an agreement with UK-Germany-France that by committing itself to that policy and pursuing it, UK-Germany-France would ensure that the IAEA would never make a report of NPT non-compliance to the Security Council.

So last month Bush-Cheney attempted to take things directly to the Security Council. They got the leaders of the Group of Eight industrialized countries – which includes UK-Germany-France – to demand that Iran comply with the NPT.

How did Iran react to this Bush-Cheney attempt to end-run the IAEA?

They've resumed enrichment-related activities. The Israelis claim they'll have nukes by 2007.

Bush-Cheney also got the G-8 leaders to call on North Korea to "visibly, verifiably and irreversibly dismantle any nuclear weapons programs."

How did the DPRK react to the Bush-Cheney attempt to end-run the "six-party" talks? From the Korean News Service:

[i]Do the countries styling themselves "advanced nations" like so much to spark the same miserable crisis as that in Iraq?

The paragraphs related to the DPRK in the document adopted at the G-8 summit only provides it [DPRK] with enough justification to increase its [DPRK] nuclear deterrent force for self-defence with the help of strong catalyst[/i].

[b]Physicist James Gordon Prather has served as a policy implementing official for national security-related technical matters in the Federal Energy Agency, the Energy Research and Development Administration, the Department of Energy, the Office of the Secretary of Defense and the Department of the Army. Dr. Prather also served as legislative assistant for national security affairs to U.S. Sen. Henry Bellmon, R-Okla. -- ranking member of the Senate Budget Committee and member of the Senate Energy Committee and Appropriations Committee. Dr. Prather had earlier worked as a nuclear weapons physicist at Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory in California and Sandia National Laboratory in New Mexico.[/b] - http://www.antiwar.com/orig/p...

Iran's Next!

07.26.04 (6:46 am) [edit]

More on Bush's Blood-Thirsty Plans to Illegally & Immorally Invade IRAN!

07.26.04 (6:41 am) [edit]

Nuclear Whistleblower Says Lives of Millions Endangered by Israeli Nuclear Reactor

07.25.04 (1:59 pm) [edit]

[b]Vanunu tells Al Hayat: Dimona reactor endangers millions [/b]

Nuclear whistleblower Mordechai Vanunu says the Dimona nuclear reactor endangers the lives of millions throughout the Middle East, Army Radio reported late Saturday.

In an interview published Sunday with the London-based Arabic-language newspaper Al Hayat, that a strong earthquake in the region may crack the reactor, causing radioactive leakage that would result in the death of millions.

Al-Hayat claims that this is the first interview Vanunu has given to a newspaper since his release from an Israeli prison in April, Israel Radio reported. If Vanunu did in fact give the interview, it could constitute a violation of the limitations placed upon him by the Shin Bet upon his release from prison.

Vanunu also told the paper that the Jordanian government should prepare for possible leaks from the reactor, just as Israel has plans to distribute iodine anti-radiation pills to residents living close to the nuclear reactor in Dimona. He said that Jordanians living close to the border with Israel should be examined for possible nuclear radiation, explaining that the Hashemite Kingdom is particularly at risk from the reactor as it operates mainly when "the wind blows toward Jordan."

He said he does not believe that the United States and European nations will pressure Israel into revealing the full extent of its nuclear capabilities. Vanunu also took the opportunity to blast United Nations nuclear watchdog chief Mohammed El Baradei for visiting Israel earlier this month and not putting any pressure on it to open up its nuclear program to international inspection. "He should have done here what he did in Iraq," he was quoted as saying.

The former nuclear technician was freed in April after serving 18 years for revealing Israel's nuclear secrets to the Sunday Times of London.

Vanunu went on to say that he told the Sunday Times all he knew and that the information he had "was enough to conclude that Israel presents a real danger to the entire Middle East." He also said that he believes Israel has managed to build up its nuclear arsenal in the years in which he was incarcerated. - http://www.haaretzdaily.com/h...

Nuclear Whistleblower Says Lives of Millions Endangered by Israeli Nuclear Reactor

07.25.04 (1:36 pm) [edit]

We're Less Secure Today Because Bush Went After The Wrong Target

07.25.04 (6:54 am) [edit]

[u][b]Spinning Our Safety[/b][/u]

Maybe it's because I've been instructed to pack a respirator escape hood along with party dresses for the Boston convention. Maybe it's because our newspaper has assigned a terrorism reporter to cover a political convention. Maybe it's because George Bush is relaxing at his ranch down there (again) while Osama is planning a big attack up here (again). Maybe it's because there are just as many American soldiers dying in Iraq post-transfer, more Muslims more mad at us over fake W.M.D. intelligence and depravity at Abu Ghraib, and more terrorists in more diffuse networks hating us more.

Maybe it's because the F.B.I. is still learning how to Google and the C.I.A. has an acting head who spends most of his time acting defensive over his agency's failure to get anything right. Maybe it's because so many of those federal twits who missed the 10 chances to stop the 9/11 hijackers, who blew off our Paul Reveres - Richard Clarke, Coleen Rowley and the Phoenix memo author - still run things. Call me crazy, Mr. President, but I don't feel any safer.

The nation's mesmerizing new best seller, the 9/11 commission report, lays bare how naked we still are against an attack, and how vulnerable we are because of the time and money the fuzzy-headed Bush belligerents wasted going after the wrong target.

Even scarier, the commissioners expect Congress, which they denounced as "dysfunctional" on intelligence oversight, to get busy fixing things just as lawmakers are flying home for vacation.

The report offers vivid details on our worst fears. Instead of focusing on immediately hitting back at Osama, Bush officials indulged their idiotic idée fixe on Saddam and ignored the memo from their counter-terrorism experts dismissing any connection between the religious fanatic bin Laden and the secular Hussein.

"On the afternoon of 9/11, according to contemporaneous notes, Secretary Rumsfeld instructed General Myers to obtain quickly as much information as possible," the report says. " The notes indicate that he also told Myers that he was not simply interested in striking empty training sites. The secretary said his instinct was to hit Saddam Hussein at the same time - not only bin Laden."

At the first Camp David meeting after 9/11, the report states, "Deputy Secretary Wolfowitz made the case for striking Iraq during 'this round' of the war on terrorism."

Six days after the World Trade Center towers were pulverized, when we should have been striking Osama with everything we had, the Bush team was absorbed with old grudges and stale assumptions.

"At the September 17 N.S.C. meeting, there was some further discussion of 'phase two' of the war on terrorism," the report says. "President Bush ordered the Defense Department to be ready to deal with Iraq if Baghdad acted against U.S. interests, with plans to include possibly occupying Iraqi oil fields."

President Bush was unsure of himself, relying too much on a vice president whose deep, calm voice belied a deeply cracked world view.

He explained to the commissioners that he had stayed in his seat making little fish faces at second graders for seven minutes after learning about the second plane hitting the towers because, as the report says, "The president felt he should project strength and calm until he could better understand what was happening."

What better way to track the terror in the Northeast skies than by reading "My Pet Goat" in Sarasota?

The commissioners warn that the price for the Bush bullies' attention deficit disorder could be high: "If, for example, Iraq becomes a failed state, it will go to the top of the list of places that are breeding grounds for attacks against Americans at home. Similarly, if we are paying insufficient attention to Afghanistan, the rule of the Taliban or warlords and narcotraffickers may re-emerge and its countryside could once again offer refuge to Al Qaeda, or its successor."

And, if that's not ominous enough, consider this: "The problem is that Al Qaeda represents an ideological movement, not a finite group of people. It initiates and inspires, even if it no longer directs."

"Yet killing or capturing" Osama, the report says, "while extremely important, would not end terror. His message of inspiration to a new generation of terrorists would continue."

If the Bush crowd hadn't been besotted with the idea of smoking Saddam, they could have stomped Osama in Tora Bora. Now it's too late. Al Qaeda has become a state of mind. - http://www.nytimes.com/2004/0...

We're Less Secure Today Because Bush Went After The Wrong Target

07.25.04 (6:52 am) [edit]

Blindsided or blind?

07.25.04 (6:47 am) [edit]

[b]Sucking-up to Dubya and Cheney [i]ain't [/i]a career and we US taxpayers shouldn't have to pay for[i] that[/i]!

Blindsided or blind?[/b]

[b]Highly qualified but strangely inattentive, Condoleezza Rice has missed the signs of the Soviet collapse, the importance of terrorism before 9/11, and more.[/b]

Presidents rely on their national security advisers for a host of services. Although the position of adviser is not specified in the law that created the National Security Council (NSC), the needs of presidents in formulating policies, considering options, and then implementing decisions led Dwight D. Eisenhower to create the position and his successors to endow it with steadily broadening powers.

Eisenhower's "special assistant for national security affairs" shepherded policy papers through the bureaucracy, monitored implementation, and warned the president of upcoming or problematic issues. John Kennedy's man, McGeorge Bundy, added the role of traffic cop, controlling access to the president--and greatly expanded the security adviser's function of giving actual advice. Bundy was also the first to make a formal foreign visit on the president's business (Averell Harriman and Andrew Goodpaster had done so informally for Presidents Truman and Eisenhower). Working for President Lyndon B. Johnson, Walt Rostow substantially strengthened the security adviser's advisory role and his grip on the president's schedule.

In the Nixon administration, Henry Kissinger took the job to a new level, actually concentrating the reins of national security power in the White House. Suddenly, the real negotiations conducted with foreign powers--Russia, North Vietnam, and others--were run by the security adviser, not the secretary of state. Gen. Brent Scowcroft under Gerald Ford cut back the role to a degree, but under Jimmy Carter, Zbigniew Brzezinski restored the power of the security adviser to that of Nixon's day. During the Reagan administration, the national security adviser gained new functions as congressional lobbyist and public spokesperson (it was the first time that the NSC staff employed a press secretary and the adviser held public press conferences). The excesses of the Iran-contra affair forced President Reagan to curtail operational activities by the NSC staff, however.

Scowcroft returned for a second run as national security adviser during the administration of the current president's father, George H. W. Bush. Scowcroft added a fresh dimension to the role, that of personal confidant to the president. Bill Clinton's security advisers, Anthony Lake and Sandy Berger, lost some of the confidant role, but added to the role of public spokesperson. That was the situation in 2001 when George W. Bush came to office. [1]

As national security adviser to George W. Bush, Condoleezza Rice fulfills all the functions of her predecessors. And she pushes the envelope.

[b]A meteoric rise[/b]

As a child standing in front of the White House on a family visit to Washington, Condoleezza Rice told her father, "One day I'll be in that house." [2] The thought was not preposterous, except that at the time Rice aspired to be a concert pianist.

Born in Birmingham, Alabama, on November 14, 1954, Rice had every advantage that her affluent, well-educated parents could give her--French, piano lessons, and more. She lived in Titusville among Birmingham's African-American elite. The family moved to Tuscaloosa in 1965 when her father became president of Stillman College and then to Denver when he was appointed vice chancellor of the University of Denver.

A prodigy, Rice gave her first piano recital at age four, finished eighth grade at 11, entered the University of Denver at 15, and graduated cum laude in political science in 1973. After obtaining a master's degree from Notre Dame, she dropped plans to attend law school and returned to the University of Denver to complete a PhD in international studies.

Rice traces her interest in international affairs to Josef Korbel, whom she first met when taking a political science class as a junior majoring in music. His lecture on Joseph Stalin's tactics in solidifying his control of communist Russia was a eureka moment for Rice.

Korbel had been the Czech ambassador to Yugoslavia in 1948 when his country's government was overthrown by the Russians and a communist regime installed. He served briefly as the Czech representative on a U.N. commission in Kashmir, then booked passage to the United States aboard the ocean liner America in 1949. He attained citizenship seven years later. Philip Mosely of the Russian Institute at Columbia University, always on the lookout for talent, arranged an offer for Korbel to teach at the University of Denver. In 1959 he was appointed dean of its graduate school of international studies, and he worked hard to make it a first-class department. Korbel developed a view of American power as a force for morality in the world and retained the staunch anti-communism of the disillusioned. He wrote books on Czechoslovakia, Yugoslavia, Kashmir, and détente in Europe.

Rice danced gracefully into Korbel's orbit, absorbing the Korbelian world view. Though she wrote her dissertation under Catherine Kelleher--Korbel died in 1977--it concerned the political control of Czech armed forces and was dedicated to Korbel. Rice earned her doctorate in 1981, was immediately invited to teach at Stanford University, and appointed assistant professor the following year. She was by all accounts a stellar teacher.

Rice made key connections at Stanford. In 1984, friend and colleague Coit Blacker introduced her to Colorado's Sen. Gary Hart, who was at the time in the midst of a bid for the Democratic presidential nomination. Hart's position on military reform appealed to her, but his politics were too liberal for Rice. Her dissertation was published that year as The Soviet Union and the Czechoslovak Army, 1948-1983: Uncertain Allegiance.

At around the same time, Rice met Brent Scowcroft at the Center for International Security and Cooperation. Scowcroft--who had either chaired or been a member of key Reagan administration presidential commissions dealing with nuclear force development--came to Stanford to address those issues at an event. At dinner, Rice dazzled the general with a probing question, and he decided to get to know her better. Scowcroft was then co-director of the Aspen Strategy Group, a high-powered seminar of movers and shakers sponsored by the Aspen Institute, and he invited Rice to attend its sessions.

When the first Bush won the election in 1988, he appointed Brent Scowcroft his national security adviser. Scowcroft recommended, and Bush selected, Condoleezza Rice as NSC staff director for Soviet and East European affairs. It was Rice's first shot at a key inside job and she succeeded brilliantly.

In A World Transformed, a reflection on his presidency that Bush wrote together with Scowcroft in 1998, he says of Rice: "I had chosen Condi because she had extensive knowledge of Soviet history and politics, great objective balance in evaluating what was going on, and a penetrating mind with an affinity for strategy and conceptualization. . . . She was charming and affable, but could be tough as nails when the situation required." Bush's style as president also played to Rice's strengths.

Robert Gates spent the first couple of years of the Bush administration as deputy national security adviser under Scowcroft and recounts that on really serious issues Bush relied on quiet and constant convocations among small groups of top advisers, including Paul Wolfowitz and Stephen Hadley at the Defense Department, Robert Zoellick and Dennis Ross at the State Department, and Robert Blackwill, Richard Haass, and Rice at the NSC. [3]

As it turned out, Rice was in the catbird seat--the Soviet Union collapsed and the Cold War ended on Bush's watch, and these key events were in her area of responsibility. The Soviet retreat had been signaled before Bush took office, in a speech Mikhail Gorbachev gave to the United Nations in December 1988. In it, the Soviet leader announced unilateral reductions in Russia's armed forces and withdrawals from East Germany, along with what amounted to the abandonment of the Brezhnev doctrine (a policy that promised direct intervention should any East European nation seek to break away). The question for the United States was how best to respond. Years later, Rice admitted that by focusing exclusively on the Soviet troop reductions, "I missed completely, really, the revocation of the Brezhnev doctrine." [4]

The administration was so at odds about how to respond that in February 1989 Bush ordered a pause in Soviet-American diplomacy that became a freeze of many months. [5] Rice's failure to focus on this critical change is important to note because the same curious inattention was to arise after Rice became national security adviser.

Inside the Bush administration, two factions engaged in struggle. One viewed Gorbachev's initiatives as a sign of weakness and favored pressing Moscow to extract every possible ounce of flesh. The other wished to respond by matching concessions to help defuse the Cold War. For those coming late to this history, it is vital to realize that the Soviet Union's demise was not a foregone conclusion--desperate Soviet leaders might just as well have decided to lash out. Rice sided with the hardliners; her memos argued that the Soviets needed to do more to prove their good faith.

Before long, though, events overtook the debate. One after another, Moscow's Warsaw Pact allies dropped away. Gorbachev's failure to respond as the Soviet hold over Eastern Europe disappeared could not have been a clearer signal. On November 9, 1989, the Berlin Wall opened, and crowds began tearing it down. Just how fast events were moving could be seen the very next day, when the communist leader of Bulgaria resigned. Robert Hutchings, NSC staff director for European affairs, recalls the moment: "Rice and I looked at each other in utter bemusement. We had been so totally preoccupied with Germany . . . that we had not even thought of Bulgaria for weeks and certainly had no premonition of impending change." [6]

Although Scowcroft worried about expectations rising from a premature summit, Bush, who was under domestic and European pressure, decided to meet Gorbachev in Malta in early December. After Malta, the attitude changed to one of increasingly explicit support for Gorbachev--even as evidence emerged of his growing political isolation. This policy extended to keeping at arm's length Gorbachev's major competitor, Boris Yeltsin, who had been elected to the Duma in March 1989.

In the U.S. government, the faction that sought to crush the Soviet Union supported Yeltsin as the best hope to challenge the existing government. That group included Dick Cheney (then secretary of defense), his deputy Paul Wolfowitz, and his chief of staff I. Lewis "Scooter" Libby. Bush stuck to his policy of backing Gorbachev, which Rice strongly supported. In an often-recollected incident (including by Rice herself), the NSC staff director for the Soviet Union would have an unfortunate face-off with Yeltsin when the Russian politician visited the White House in 1989. Furious that he was being admitted to the White House by what he thought a side entrance, and by not being taken immediately to see the president, Yeltsin threatened to storm out, and Rice spoke sharply to the Russian leader. Different versions of how Yeltsin had been treated broke down along the lines of the different policies officials had been advocating, creating a certain grudge against Rice. The internal cleavages on this matter during the first Bush administration would have reverberations in the second.

Rice saw the problem of ending the Cold War as one of securing the reunification of Germany under the Western umbrella without triggering a response from Moscow. And Rice certainly understood the possible dangers. Describing Soviet characterizations of the threat posed by the West, in her dissertation on the Czech military, Rice had written: "This specter of an imminent threat from the West was bolstered by the claim that NATO would not be satisfied until Germany was reunited under an imperialist West German leadership." [7] That, of course, except for the "imperialist" part, was Rice's goal, and it would be achieved before the end of the Bush administration, mostly before she left the NSC staff in March 1991. In 1995, Rice and another staffer, Philip Zelikow, wrote a book, Germany Unified and Europe Restored, describing this diplomatic feat.

Rice returned to Stanford as provost, the youngest in its history. There she demonstrated her "tough as nails" side in abundance. Stanford faced a budget deficit, problems with inadequate university housing, and questions about the core curriculum and faculty hiring practices. Rice slashed the budget and made progress on the curriculum. She handled firings and layoffs with minimal faculty consultation, which Rice explained by saying, "I don't do committees." [8]

Housing and hiring remained intractable, and the federal government launched an investigation of Stanford's practices on minority hiring during Rice's tenure, though that did not preclude her serving on a federal advisory committee on gender-integrated training in the military. She left in 1997 for the Hoover Institution, where she acquired a new mentor, the former secretary of state in the Reagan administration, George P. Schultz.

When Gov. George W. Bush of Texas began his campaign for the presidency, Schultz arranged private briefings for him on world affairs. Rice participated in these briefings and impressed the younger Bush so much that she emerged as the head of his foreign policy advisory staff. Eventually Rice would address the Republican National Convention that nominated Bush in 2000. Rice was a natural choice for national security adviser, and her appointment was made early in the transition period.

[b]The illusion of process[/b]

One lesson Rice absorbed during the first Bush administration was that a personal relationship with the president mattered a great deal, and she forged her relationship with George W. early on. She and the candidate could talk sports--Rice was a big football fan and Bush a former owner of the Texas Rangers baseball team--and Rice could tell stories of baseball great Willie Mays, who had once been her mother's student in high school. George Bush was a fitness buff and Rice, who used more than one personal trainer, worked out with him. Among the "Vulcans," the self-styled coterie of Bush foreign policy advisers, Rice was the one who could explain issues in a way the candidate understood easily. "I like to be around her," Bush was quoted as saying, "Besides, she's really smart!" [9]

The other Vulcans, whom Bush also brought into his administration, included many of the same people who had fought over policy during the first Bush administration. Cheney became vice president, Scooter Libby his chief of staff. Paul Wolfowitz would be deputy secretary of defense, Stephen Hadley, deputy national security adviser, and Colin Powell, secretary of state. Among the few new faces was Donald H. Rumsfeld, the secretary of defense, but he had been Cheney's mentor in the Ford and Nixon administrations.

The first question about Rice's role as security adviser is, how was she able to stay out of the line of fire of the neocons who had fought her over Russia policy in the first Bush administration, and the evident answer is, only by staying close to the president. That, in turn, carried implications for Rice's ability to speak truth to power.

The basic lineup in the administration acquired increasing importance as cleavages developed between State and Defense. By the summer of 2001 it was already clear that the State Department had much greater regard for U.S. alliance and treaty relationships than the Rumsfeld Pentagon, which was intent on overriding the Anti-Ballistic Missile (ABM) Treaty in order to move up the deployment of missile defenses (which remain technically immature three years later, even as they go into the ground).

Rice aligned herself with the Pentagon neocons. It was Rice, not Powell, who made the first official visit to Russia as the president's emissary in August 2001, and Rice, not the Cabinet officials along on that trip, who was treated to a private weekend at Russian President Vladimir Putin's dacha. (Rice has since made numerous foreign trips at Bush's behest and is now the most traveled national security adviser since Henry Kissinger.) Bob Woodward's accounts of U.S. planning for the invasions of Afghanistan and Iraq, based on detailed interviews with the president and other senior officials, make it abundantly clear that the division between State and the Pentagon persists. [10]

[b]Deciding what matters[/b]

Every presidency begins with the new chief executive and his National Security Council initiating a wide range of policy reviews that enable the new administration to put its stamp on U.S. policies. As they proceed, these reviews are discussed at the NSC Deputies Committee and then rise to the level of the NSC Principals Committee. Under Bush, the process of orderly review leads to National Security Presidential Directives (NSPDs) that specify decisions taken. Aside from any of its other consequences, Rice's testimony before the 9/11 Commission revealed that NSPD-9, the basic counterterrorism directive and authorization for the military campaign against Afghanistan, approved on September 17, 2001, was the first substantive policy directive approved by President George W. Bush during his term in office. [11]

That no directive had been approved earlier does not mean that the Bush administration had not acted on foreign policy. The abrogation of the ABM Treaty, the U.S. withdrawal from the Kyoto environmental protocols and the International Criminal Court agreement, and other measures, all took place during this early period. What the revelation about NSPD-9 does mean, however, is that all of those early Bush actions were carried out without interagency policy review.

Conversely, the policy review on intelligence was carried out at the president's request by a group headed by Scowcroft. That review was completed around the time of September 11, 2001, but its conclusions had yet to be acted upon at the time of Rice's testimony to the 9/11 commission, more than two years later. This indicates that the policy process in the Bush administration functions much differently from the standard established earlier. The current system might be broadly characterized as a "personality-based policy."

An examination of particular policy areas and of the role of Rice and the NSC staff in those matters confirms this view. One more point needs to be made about Rice's 9/11 testimony. The testimony of senior Clinton and Bush administration officials, including Rice, establishes that Clinton administration officials very consciously made certain to indicate to Rice, Bush, and others, their view that terrorism would be the major foreign policy preoccupation in the immediate future.

Rice, Bush, and others proceeded to act as if these concerns had not been enunciated. It may be hindsight to point it out, but the Clinton officials were correct in their concerns, and the way Bush administration officials treated the issue is exactly analogous to the way the first Bush administration responded to Gorbachev's speech in December 1988. In each case, no response was made and crucial time was lost while the matter was subjected to formal policy review. In fact, the point is even sharper in the case of terrorism; current Bush administration officials acted quickly in many other areas while holding back on counterterrorism before conducting a lengthy review. As cited earlier, Rice had thought about the earlier failure and personally conceded her own blindness in the waning days of the Cold War. It is regrettable that a similar incident occurred when Rice returned to the White House.

[b]And in other areas?[/b]

The Middle East. For almost five years, including the last Clinton administration, the CIA and its director, George Tenet, played a key part as intermediaries between Palestinians and Israelis in trying to move forward on the peace process. After Tenet had made 11 trips to the area, in March 2001, Bush announced he was ending the CIA role. Instead, Bush sent Secretary of State Colin Powell on a mission that led nowhere.

From that moment on, Bush began giving Rice an increasing share of Mideast action. Rice had first visited Israel in 2000 as a private citizen. During that trip, she told the Israeli press it felt like returning home, though she had never before been there. [12] Whatever Rice knew of the situation was, unfortunately, of recent vintage and from quick study. As the Middle East became the epicenter of the foreign policy dilemmas of the Bush administration, in spring 2002, Rice was telling Bush that the basic reason why peace talks never seemed to progress was Yasser Arafat. [13] That May, in one of her increasingly frequent speeches, she described racism in the American South as "homegrown terrorism," which she equated to the overall problem of international terrorism. [14]

Bush responded to Rice's advice by tilting toward Israel in the Palestinian political crisis, and the tilt led essentially to immobility. For its own reasons, the Sharon government postponed peace talks, posed impossible conditions for their resumption, backed away from previous commitments, and relied on what amounts to a military strategy to counter the Palestinians. Bush has focused on the Palestinians and demanded that they shut down the groups responsible for political violence, essentially offering unconditional support for the Israeli position. Years have now been spent attempting to force a change in Palestinian leadership as a condition for progress in talks, yet the Palestinians know full well that the identity of their leaders is not the factor that will determine Tel Aviv's stance on the West Bank, Jerusalem, or any of the key issues separating the sides. Bush's favoritism, shown to high relief this spring when he publicly supported Ariel Sharon's bid to substitute partial and conditional withdrawals for an overall settlement, removed any possibility that the administration would act as an honest broker in the area.

The tiny amount of progress that was made from direct U.S. efforts came from the CIA--through quiet meetings at which the agency's station chief in Tel Aviv brought together Palestinian and Israeli security officials to agree on confidence-building measures. Another Tenet trip offered some temporary hope of relief. Meanwhile, the grand U.S. scheme, the so-called Roadmap, which was crafted over the opposition of Europeans active in Mideast peace efforts, installed by a Rice mission to the area in spring 2003, and blessed by a presidential visit and summit at Sharm el Sheik that June, was swept away by the Sharon plan.

The United States could have been expected to resist the Sharon plan, and that was indeed the early bidding. But a succession of trips to Tel Aviv were made by Rice's subordinates--several by Elliott Abrams, staff director for the Middle East since December 2002, and the last by Stephen Hadley, deputy national security adviser. The Israelis apparently got their interlocutors to give up opposing the Sharon maneuver, not the other way around. When Sharon came to Washington in April it was to have his withdrawal gambit consecrated by Bush. Then, only days after Bush stood by Sharon's side to back the Israeli policy, Tel Aviv cashed in the chip, blindsiding Bush by launching new strikes that killed key Palestinian leaders, triggering a fresh wave of anti-Israeli violence. In one of her television appearances Rice dismissed the strikes, remarking: "We don't get a heads-up on Israeli military operations." [15] The Israeli government had played Bush and his national security advisers for everything they could get. There is effectively no longer a peace process.

North Korea. With considerable difficulty, including threatened military action, the Clinton administration had reached an accord with Pyongyang in 1994 that provided North Korea with incentives, including energy assistance, not to proceed with its nuclear weapons program. The "Agreed Framework" arrangement was about to be broadened with normalization of relations, confirmed by a Clinton state visit to North Korea, when Bush won the 2000 election and the initiative was canceled. [16] In short order, the Bush administration backtracked on what had been achieved, ended the policy of incentives, and refused to engage in negotiations with Pyongyang.

The Bush people regarded Clinton-era policies as deeply flawed, but their approach led North Korea to threaten fresh nuclear initiatives, claim to have nuclear weapons, carry out new tests of medium-range ballistic missiles, and announce the resumption of plutonium production. This was a far cry from the Agreed Framework, which was supposed to lead in its third stage to Pyongyang's dismantling of its nuclear facilities. In 2002, when Bush put North Korea on his "axis of evil" list, the administration policy of no negotiations had created a cycle of escalating rhetoric from both sides.

In July 2002, Powell briefly spoke to a senior North Korean official for the first time, even as U.S. intelligence concluded that Pyongyang might have begun the clandestine enrichment of uranium. In October 2002, Assistant Secretary of State for East Asia John Kelly went to North Korea, but he had scripted instructions from the NSC to demand Pyongyang reveal its nuclear activities. When the North Koreans did just that, Kelly had nowhere to go. [17]

The United States halted famine relief aid to North Korea and tried to get the other Framework states to end fuel deliveries as well. South Korea's president-elect asserted in January 2003 that the United States had considered military attacks on North Korean nuclear facilities. [18] Rumsfeld, NSC counterproliferation director Robert Joseph, and John L. Bolton, undersecretary of state for arms control, were known to favor a hard line, and in March 2003 the Pentagon ostentatiously deployed two dozen B-1 and B-52 heavy bombers to Guam, within range of North Korea.

When China sponsored a regional meeting in Beijing a month later, dangling before Pyongyang the prospect of a private session with the United States, Kelly was again crippled by narrowly drawn instructions that permitted no side meetings. The North Koreans walked out of the conference. A direct Chinese appeal to Rice had no effect. During a July 2003 trip to Africa, Colin Powell got the president to agree to a direct meeting with the North Koreans, which took place in late August at a regional conference in Beijing. This time Kelly not only bore strict instructions, he was monitored by Michael Green of the NSC staff and Richard Lawless, standing in for Rumsfeld. Even Chinese officials said the main problem was not North Korea, but U.S. policy. [19]

A further session of regional talks on North Korea was tentatively set for Beijing in December. In preparation for that negotiation the NSC, including Dick Cheney, rejected a Chinese draft because it did not provide for verifiable, irreversible dismantling of North Korean facilities. The United States refused to provide incentives for North Korean action. [20] This round of talks was eventually held in late February 2004. Suddenly the Bush administration resumed food aid to North Korea, and acquiesced in a South Korean offer of economic incentives for Pyongyang's efforts at disarmament.

Another working-level meeting was set for Beijing in May. Depending on the discussion there, a higher-level meeting may occur this summer. Thus, after more than three years, the Bush administration has just about returned North Korea policy to where it stood in December 2000.

[b]Obsession?[/b]

All of this looks like nothing so much as a policy of fixed ideas, and that is before examining the administration record on Iraq or the slow development of a policy against terrorism before September 11. In the months before the war, Rice actively worked toward another fixed idea--that the United States should carry out a war against Iraq--including the taking of measures to avoid effective arms inspections by the United Nations. [21] Aside from Rice's private advice on the war, her efforts to build public support, and her stage managing of the war plan, Rice's NSC staff had the lead role in post-war planning. [22] On January 20, 2003, after numerous White House sessions on the subject, Bush signed a presidential directive making the NSC Deputies Committee under Stephen Hadley the lead authority for post-war issues. Hadley even took credit for the effort in a speech to the Council on Foreign Relations on February 12: "There has been a tremendous interagency effort, led by the National Security Council and the Office of Management and Budget, to think through reconstruction needs and objectives." The original scheme for the occupation was approved at a White House national security meeting on February 28.

Yet in a major review of U.S. planning for post-war Iraq, James Fallows found two names missing from accounts officials gave him of the process. One was that of the president, which he never once heard, and "the other conspicuously absent figure was Condoleezza Rice." [23] Rumsfeld, on the other hand, was a major presence. He had edged out a State Department-sponsored post-war planning project to substitute a Pentagon-based unit. Just weeks into the occupation, Hadley's NSC committee recalled that group and replaced it with the Coalition Provisional Authority. Throughout this time of low-balled cost estimates, exclusive contract awards, and exclusion of participation by nations that had opposed the war, Hadley's interagency committee retained the formal authority at the Washington level.

Faced with continued instability and a barely functional reconstruction effort, in October 2003 Bush created yet another Washington entity to run the occupation, the Iraq Stabilization Group, and put Rice in direct charge. Rice's memorandum describing the revamp, sent out on October 2, was the first Rumsfeld (by his own account) had ever heard of the move. The reorganization was interpreted as a slap at Rumsfeld and a measure to introduce efficiency. Eight months later, though, with Rice in command, the occupation is still a disaster and U.S. credibility has been crippled by revelations regarding the treatment of Iraqi detainees at U.S. interrogation centers. Rice, who brought in as point man on Iraq Robert Blackwill, former ambassador to India and an NSC staff colleague from the first Bush administration, has been singularly ineffective.

Rice has also been directly implicated in the shenanigans leading up to the war. The controversy over the misleading language in Bush's 2003 State of the Union speech revealed that Rice had been a direct recipient of CIA memos objecting to similar language in a previous text. Answering this charge, Rice confused one incident with another. Her comments on the Iraq national intelligence estimate led many to question whether she had actually read it. She also made strenuous efforts to coordinate the administration's lobbying efforts through the White House Information Group, including frequent speeches and interviews in which she crafted verbiage suggesting that Iraq posed the threat of mushroom clouds over American cities.

In 1997, when Rice was out of government and commenting on the end of the Soviet Union, she said of her first stint on the NSC staff: "You tend very much to focus on what you can know; because a government, unlike academics or the press, cannot focus on what might be Soviet policy, but really on what Soviet policy is." [24] On Iraq, Rice presided over a process that made up its own vision of what Baghdad was about and then fought a war based on that hypothetical.

Back in the heady days of the campaign, Rice authored an overview of her candidate's world views and intentions that appeared in Foreign Affairs. Referring to the Clinton administration's resort to force in Kosovo, she wrote: "The Kosovo war was conducted incompetently, in part because the administration's political goals kept shifting and in part because it was not, at the start, committed to the decisive use of military force." [25] Substitute "Iraq" for the name of the country, understand Rumsfeld's "lite" invasion plan for what it was, and that observation applies exactly to Bush's war in Iraq as stage-managed by Rice.

Stage management is a matter of process, and it is the process of Rice's NSC that needs examining. Two factors greatly complicated the possibility of a smoothly running system. One is the deep chasm between Colin Powell's State Department and Donald Rumsfeld's Pentagon. The second complication is Dick Cheney, a vice president with unprecedented sway on national security issues, who forged an underground policy structure of his own with connections to Rumsfeld and links to key officials elsewhere such as Hadley on the NSC staff and Bolton at State. Cheney not only has the president's ear, he has the ability to create and push paper in the bureaucracy. Previous national security advisers, faced with State-Defense Department competition, have played traffic cop outside the Oval Office (in Kissinger's case, he moved to supplant both agencies and pull the reins of power into the White House). Rice has chosen instead to cultivate her direct relationship with the president, essentially getting out of the way of the policy war. Rice's ideological predilections, more attuned to those of the Cheney-Rumsfeld alliance, help assure that the NSC process is more a matter of ideology than of issues, evidence, and attainable objectives.

Finally, a word about Rice's role as public persona. During the Clinton administration, Tony Lake and Sandy Berger made the national security adviser more of a public person through their speeches and television appearances. Rice has taken this effort to an entirely new level. Frequently appearing on multiple news shows on a single day, spending hours in successions of interviews, presenting speeches in tandem with other officials in coordinated public relations offensives, making many speeches on her own, Rice has acquired unprecedented visibility as a spokesperson. I have not taken a systematic survey, but an estimate of her appearances would include speeches in the dozens and news contacts in the hundreds. The wide variety of public positions Rice has taken on substantive issues restricts her ability to act impartially in the policy process. And the sheer effort required to sustain her public appearances may seriously curtail the time Rice has available to actually manage the Bush administration policy process, such as it is.

[b]A report card[/b]

During the 2000 presidential campaign, when Rice was auditioning for her current position as national security adviser, she offered two statements that make perfect points of departure for an evaluation of the Bush administration's national security record. One is her January 2000 article in Foreign Affairs. The other is Rice's speech, accompanied by a discussion with the audience and host Charlie Rose, before the Council on Foreign Relations on October 12, 2000.

Rice argued in Foreign Affairs that "multilateral agreements and institutions should not be ends in themselves." [26] She objected specifically to the Kyoto Treaty and the Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty, on which the Bush administration has been as good as its word. Both of these agreements, as well as the ABM Treaty, are history. As mentioned earlier, U.S. actions opting out of these treaties were taken without reference to process. Whether the United States is better off as a result is disputable.

Rice also maintained that "the Clinton administration's attachment to largely symbolic agreements and pursuit of, at best, illusory 'norms' of international behavior [has] become an epidemic." One may easily make an identical comment with regard to the Bush administration's Roadmap in the Middle East.

Rice went on, "There is work to do with the Europeans too," pointing to the enlargement of NATO and defining what holds the transatlantic alliance together. The Bush administration has succeeded in enlarging NATO by incorporating East European nations. At the same time it has substantially undermined relations with key partners, leaving the overall NATO relationship shakier than ever before.

Rice saw China as "a potential threat to stability in the Asia-Pacific region," to be countered by deepening U.S. cooperation with Japan and South Korea. Today the United States is actually dependent on China, both as a source of imports and as a diplomatic intermediary with North Korea. Rice wrote that China was not a status quo power and thus was "a strategic competitor, not the 'strategic partner' the Clinton administration once called it." In fact, the Bush administration now relies on China as a strategic partner. Meanwhile, U.S. relations with South Korea are worse than before, and important differences have emerged with both South Korea and Japan regarding North Korea.

The United States, wrote Rice, needed to pay "immediate attention to the safety and security of Moscow's nuclear forces and stockpile. The Nunn-Lugar program should be funded fully and pursued aggressively." Today these nuclear safety programs are in a virtual state of suspended animation.

The "rogue regimes" in Iraq, Iran, and North Korea, Rice explained, "are living on borrowed time, so there need be no sense of panic about them." This statement speaks for itself.

Most important, Rice insisted, "Foreign policy in a Republican administration will most certainly be internationalist." That statement clearly conflicts with the Bush administration's unilateral abrogation of treaties, its unilateral push toward ballistic missile defenses, its flouting of the United Nations in the war with Iraq, and its treatment of alliance relationships. It has virtually ignored Latin America and conditioned foreign aid on performance norms.

On the Middle East, Rice told the Council on Foreign Relations, "The circumstances that created the opening for direct Palestinian/Israeli dialogue really goes [sic] back to a significant change in the circumstances in the Middle East coming out of the [1991] Persian Gulf War." [27] A bit of overdetermined analysis that clearly foreshadows the miscalculation that led to the Iraq war?

Speaking the night after candidate Bush said in a presidential debate that the United States needed to be "humble" on the international stage. Rice told the Council, "Ever since I first talked to Governor Bush about foreign policy, this has been something that has been on his mind."

Once in power, however, the Bush administration has acted in the exact opposite fashion, as if it could sweep the board clear on the international plane. Rice also described Bush's view of U.N. peacekeeping: "I think he's somewhat skeptical of the idea that the United Nations could become a major force." In power, the Bush administration initiated a war with Iraq, ostensibly to strengthen the United Nations by enforcing a U.N. resolution.

With regard to ballistic missile defense, Rice said the system would be deployed when "it is capable of protecting our allies." Yet the Bush administration is now in the process of deploying a system with no such capability (and which may not work).

Asked for her greatest criticism of the departing administration, Rice accused it of having no strategy: "If you look around the world and you look at what has happened to the American military while it has been engaged in operations that . . . are 300 percent greater that at any time during the Cold War, and you ask to what purpose, you look at some of these operations and you think, what were we doing?"

Needless to say, the Bush administration has deployed even more forces than the Clinton administration, and "what were we doing?" is the question everyone is now asking about Iraq. Moreover, in spite of massive increases in military spending in every year of the administration, combat readiness is no better (and may be worse) than during the 2000 election, when faults in military readiness were a major charge leveled at the Democrats by the Bush campaign.

There is much more, but the particulars are similar. All of the issues were ones to be dealt with by the NSC process captained by Condoleezza Rice. Certainly, Rice believed that all these issues were important. Certainly, she had the capacity to affect all of them. In some people's eyes, she was a magician. If issues were avoided because Rice shied away from bureaucratic infighting, that is an indictment of process and person. If matters got worse because of single-minded ideological focus, that is a failure of vision. September 11, 2001, is no excuse. [i][b]What was she doing?[/b][/i]

[b]John Prados is a senior analyst with the National Security Archive in Washington, D.C. His current books are Hoodwinked: The Documents That Reveal How Bush Sold Us a War (2004) and Inside the Pentagon Papers (2004), with Margaret Pratt Porter.[/b] - http://www.thebulletin.org/is...

1. For a more complete account see John Prados, Keepers of the Keys: A History of the National Security Council from Truman to Bush (New York: William Morrow, 1991).

2. Evan Thomas, "The Quiet Power of Condi Rice," Newsweek, Dec. 16, 2002, p. 34.

3. Robert Gates, From the Shadows: The Ultimate Insider's Story of Five Presidents and How They Won the Cold War (New York: Simon and Schuster, 1996), p. 454.

4. Cable News Network/National Security Archive, "Interview with Dr. Condoleezza Rice," Dec. 17, 1997 (www.gwu.edu /~nsarchiv/coldwar/interv iews/episode-24/rice1.html), hereafter cited as "CNN Interview: Rice."

5. George Bush and Brent Scowcroft, A World Transformed (New York: William Morrow, 1998). See also Don Oberdorfer, From the Cold War to a New Era: The United States and the Soviet Union, 1983-1991 (Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press, 1998) and Michael R. Beschloss and Strobe Talbott, At the Highest Levels: The Inside Story of the End of the Cold War (Boston: Little, Brown and Co., 1993).

6. Robert L. Hutchings, American Diplomacy and the End of the Cold War: An Insider's Account of U.S. Policy in Europe, 1989-1992 (Washington, D.C.: Woodrow Wilson Center Press, 1997), p. 81.

7. Condoleezza Rice, The Soviet Union and the Czechoslovak Army: Uncertain Allegiance (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1984), p. 136.

8. Elaine Sciolino, "Compulsion to Achieve: Condoleezza Rice," New York Times, Dec. 18, 2000, p. A21.

9. Elaine Sciolino, "Bush's Foreign Policy Tutor: An Academic in the Public Eye," New York Times, June 16, 2000, p. A26.

10. Bob Woodward, Bush At War (New York: Simon and Schuster, 2002), Plan of Attack (New York: Simon and Schuster, 2004).

11. National Commission on Terrorist Attacks Upon the United States (9/11 Commission), Condoleezza Rice Testimony, April 8, 2004.

12. Yediot Aharonot, cited by Kurt Nimmo, "The Hardness of Condoleezza Rice, Huckstress of Israeli Myths" (www.counterpunch .org/nimmo052703.html).

13. Elizabeth Bumiller, "A Partner in Shaping an Assertive Foreign Policy," New York Times, Jan. 7, 2004, p. A6.

14. American Jewish Committee press release, "Condoleezza Rice Affirms Support for Israel, Recalls Personal Battle Against Intolerance, Terrorism," May 10, 2002 (www .charitywire.com/charity11/02783.html).

15. John Mintz, "No 'Heads Up' on Israeli Attack, Rice Says," Washington Post, April 19, 2004, p. A13.

16. Don Oberdorfer, The Two Koreas: A Contemporary History (New York: Basic Books, 2002). See also Robert Gallucci, Joel S. Wit, and Daniel Poneman, Going Critical: The First North Korean Nuclear Crisis, an insider account of the Clinton administration's North Korea policy (Washington, D.C.: Brookings Institution, 2004).

17. Glenn Kessler, "U.S. Has a Shifting Script on North Korea," Washington Post, Dec. 7, 2003, pp. A1, A31.

18. Doug Struck, "S. Korean Says U.S. Considered Attack on North," Washington Post, Jan. 19, 2003, p. A18.

19. Kessler, "U.S. Has a Shifting Script."

20. Glenn Kessler, "U.S. Won't Offer Incentives at N. Korea Talks," Washington Post, Dec. 19, 2003, p. A45.

21. John Prados, Hoodwinked: The Documents That Reveal How Bush Sold Us a War (New York: The New Press, 2004), pp. 156-174.

22. Bob Woodward, Plan of Attack.

23. James Fallows, "Blind Into Baghdad," Atlantic Monthly, January-February 2004, p. 72.

24. CNN Interview: Rice.

25. Condoleezza Rice, "Life After the Cold War," Foreign Affairs, January 2000.

26. Ibid.

27. Council on Foreign Relations transcript, "Condoleezza Rice on the Foreign Policy of Governor George W. Bush," October 12, 2000.

Condi Rice's Pathetic Legacy: An Astonishing Lack of Imagination!!!

07.25.04 (6:45 am) [edit]