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P
I C T U R E O F T H E D
A Y
Rainbow
©2005 Pierre-Paul
Feyte
PROLOGUE
When I was 11 years old I sat next to my friend and
fellow class clown Jeffery, quietly thinking of ways
to torture the unsuspecting substitute teacher. Jeffery
and I were competing comedians, always trying to "get
over" on each other in school. Jeffery was good
and there were no limits to what he would do.
On this particular day we sat next to each other, sharing
one of the double desks with which Brooklyn school children
of the 70's were so familiar. As our unsuspecting substitute
turned his back to write something on the black board,
Jeffery raised his arm and launched all his own books
across the room in the direction opposite from where
I was seated, immediately turning towards me with a
look of horror and shock plastered on his face. The
teacher, alarmed by the noise of the book launching,
spun around only to see Jeffery's books scattered around
the room. His loose leaf binder had opened up and produced
an explosion of confetti in the form of notes and homework
sheets.
A quick glance our way by the teacher brought into
view a shocked Jeffery, who appeared to be the victim,
sitting right next to me and staring at me with an expression
of, "What the hell did you just do?" splashed
on his face. I sat there, speechless, as the person
on the right side of Jeffery's books prior to their
launch to the left. I had nothing
to say because the truth was simply not believable and
no convincing lie presented itself.
Anyone witnessing this scene from the teacher's vantage
point could only come to one conclusion, Jesse did it.
Even if I tried to explain that
Jeffery launched the books, who would believe me? After
all, who would have done this to his own property?
Jeffery would have to spend the
next hour or so reassembling his loose leaf binder.
There is no way he would have done this to himself.
No way, except for one thing...he
did do this to himself, his motive...comedy.
I was the patsy for two good reasons. First, I was sitting
right there when it happened, and second - I had a history
of being a clown. I understood why people thought I
was guilty and let me be the first to commend Jeffery
for executing the perfect crime. He did the unthinkable
and set up a patsy with his convincing claim of innocence.
In this sad, but true story, I was kicked out of the
class by our substitute teacher. I was only 11 years
old but I knew enough to understand that there was no
way in hell that anyone would believe me if I told the
truth and said that Jeffery was guilty of tossing his
books . And so, having no proof that I was blameless,
I swallowed my defeat and walked out of the room wondering
what form my revenge against Jeffery would take.
The point to be made is this: sometimes,
the more outrageous an action, the easier it is to get
away with. Sometimes, there is no way that people can
connect the criminal with the crime: the very idea of
guilt is so far out of the norm as to be unthinkable.
Very simply, it is possible to
escape blame if you do something that nobody in the
world believes you could do. If the deed is egregious
enough, even if some proof of your culpability surfaces,
you'll be on safe ground. If people cannot imagine your
involvement in an unthinkable action, they will simply
not believe you could possible be complicit in its commission.
Think about it.
THE ART OF DENIAL
Flashback to a heinous crime of the recent past: When
Susan Smith appeared before the public to beg the kidnapper
of her children to return them to her, the nation cried
with her. Her description of the guilty assailant was
so very believable. It fit right into the criminal stereotype
that had been etched into the psyche of Americans by
the corporate media. And for a few very long days, everyone
believed her.
But there was one huge problem
with her story. It was Susan Smith, herself, who killed
her children. Yes, the unbelievable was true.
A young mother had actually allowed her own children
to drown. It was inconceivable. It just couldn't be.
But it was.
Susan Smith had tried to throw the blame for her crime
to a reasonable patsy. Had her story gone unchallenged,
she might have gotten away with it. As it was, her crime
fell apart because there was an effective investigation.
Smith had no way of curtailing or controlling the inquiry
into her crime. And as a result, justice was done, and
Susan Smith was eventually charged and convicted of
murder.
Truth and reality often can be
totally unbelievable. It is very possible for people
to totally deny assertions presented to them, even when
provided with very credible of evidence that corroborates
what they are told. A perfect example of such
denial occurred when eye witness accounts of the Holocaust
began coming out of war torn Europe. The unimaginable
horror of what was being reported was simply too terrible
to believe. It was easier to
deal with the information as some sort of exaggeration
and overreaction. Humans simply could not do
this to other humans.
Think about what we know about acts of genocide in
the Congo or Rwanda or Darfur? The art of denial is
a well honed form of human self protection. Sometimes
it is far easier to close one's eyes to the truth than
to acknowledge what is very painful. Think about that
as well.
9/11 AND AMERICAN DENIAL
In this post 9/11 era, most Americans are unable even
to consider the possibility of US government complicity
in the attacks on our nation even when confronted with
a mountain of evidence. In contrast, many of these same
people accept far less believable scenarios simply on
the basis of faith and without a single shred of evidence
such as believing in the existence of a God. Tragically,
they seem to have the exact same blind trust in the
Bush administration.
At close inspection, the official version of 9/11 is
outrageously full of holes. When
those of us who are knowledgeable discuss the evidence
that has been unearthed about that day, there is so
much to reveal that we don't know where to start or
where to stop. When tapped
for what we know, we have so much to expose that the
torrent of information that rushes can sound like the
meaningless rant of a lunatic. Regardless of
how credible or tangible the evidence, when rolled out
in front of the public, it often sounds too far fetched
or irrational to believe.
The facts that have come out about 9/11 differ so greatly
from the official story that they almost defy validity.
On the contrary, the official version is so simple as
to be perfectly believable. It places the entire blame
on the work of a handful of terrorists who hated us
for our freedom. Case closed.
It is important to keep in mind that the 9/11 issue
is not simply a question of whose version of a story
is correct. This is a case in which millions of people
would be taking a great risk. They would have to consider
that the very government they have trusted and supported
for more than four years may have participated in an
unthinkable atrocity. That, in itself, may be impossible.
By opening their minds to an objective examination of
what has been discovered about the 9/11 attacks, millions
of Americans would have to abandon their blind faith
in this administration, and reject the mistaken belief
that those in charge of our nation can do no wrong.
That, too, may be impossible.
Herein lies the paradox. If
the American people want truth they must acknowledge
that they have been deceived. If
that were to happen, and if they were to accept the
facts that have been uncovered by the independent 9/11
research community, their faith in their government
would be irreparably destroyed. In the long run,
it is far easier to maintain one's faith in a deceptive
government than to deal with the painful details of
that deception.
The consequence of such denial is that people end up
believing what they must, rather than what is true.
As time passes, they totally erase the distinction between
fact and fiction in order to believe in their government,
and they find themselves living in the America of 2005.
The greater tragedy of course, is the nature of the
deception that has been accepted. There
are lies, and there are lies. There are deceptions,
and there are horrendous deceptions that alter history.
It is one thing for Jeffery to have gone unpunished
for throwing his own books around so he could claim
the crown of class clown. Thirty years after the fact,
our mutual friends now believe the truth, and we can
laugh at what went on.
It would have been another thing altogether to have
allowed Jeffery to perpetrate a Columbine-like massacre
to claim that same crown. There is no way that could
have resulted in denial, and there is no way that any
one would have dared to laugh.
BOTTOM LINE
Ironically, it's almost funny when the fact-based 9/11
research community gathers to discuss the events of
that day. The official government
version of what happened loses so much credibility in
the light of the available facts, films, testimony &
chronicled history that it is almost impossible not
to laugh in disbelief when we start to share what we
know. The evidence that has been amassed is so
persuasive as to rip the official version of 9/11 to
shreds. And still, there is no
one but ourselves to hear us.
We go on and on and on like people obsessed because
as responsible citizens of the world we have assigned
ourselves the task of exposing the truth. But we also
have to accept the obstacles we face. We must understand
how and why people refuse to believe what we say despite
all the evidence in our possession. To explain that
phenomenon I think about my friend Jeffery and his book
launch. He did something no one believed he could possibly
have done. As a result, he carried it off.
The people who were responsible for the attacks of
9/11 did something so unbelievable that most people
would not believe they did it, even if presented with
conclusive evidence of their guilt. As a result, they
also carried it off, and the evidence be damned.
In the end, there is always the comment by those who
would discredit the research and the evidence that has
been uncovered. The defenders
of the official version of 9/11 inevitably ask how so
many people could keep a secret. "Wouldn't someone
have blown the whistle by now?" is the constant
challenge by the champions of denial. How naïve
they are.
At the higher levels of government the issue is no
longer about secrecy, but about survival. The
extent of the 9/11 crimes are so great that a very real
scenario of self preservation has arisen. Exposing the
truth about 9/11 would virtually mean the end of the
United States of America as a viable power. If
the good people in our government and in our intelligence
community exposed the truth, America would never ever
regain its credibility in the world. We would never
again be respected or trusted. We would immediately
relinquish our leadership position in the world and
sink to the position of a rogue nation that had committed
an unforgivable atrocity against its own people for
political purposes. We would expose
the huge betrayal of trust that has been developed and
nurtured over our 230 year history as a nation.
The minute any ranking government official was charged
with complicity in 9/11, this nation would be no more.
We would never recover. The people who were involved
in 9/11 know this. They know that there is more at stake
than their exposure. They know that once they did what
they did, they would never be held accountable. As I
did with Jeffery, let me be the first to admit that
these folks committed the perfect crime. Not in the
sense that they would not be discovered, but in the
sense they knew it would do more harm to the country
to expose them than it would to play along with them.
The perpetrators of 9/11 knew they were they protected
by the blind loyalty of the American people who would
refuse to believe they could have been involved. But
they had another ace in the hole as well. They knew
that no one who cared for the nation would reveal the
truth, for to seek justice would in essence bring down
the nation.
Bottom line: the truth is out there, the evidence is
real. But there are none so blind as those who will
not see. Think about that, and weep for us all. |
ALEXANDRIA, Va. - Zacarias Moussaoui
pleaded guilty Friday to conspiring with the Sept. 11
attackers and declared he was chosen by Osama bin Laden
to fly an airliner into the White House in a separate
assault.
Over the objection of his lawyers, Moussaoui calmly
admitted his guilt in a courtroom a few miles from where
one of the hijacked planes crashed into the Pentagon
in 2001, setting up a showdown with prosecutors who
quickly reaffirmed they will seek Moussaoui's execution.
"I will fight every inch against the death penalty,"
Moussaoui told U.S. District Judge Leonie Brinkema as
he became the only person convicted in a U.S. court
in connection with the Sept. 11 plot that killed nearly
3,000 people.
The unshackled Moussaoui, wearing a beard and green
prison jumpsuit, told the judge he had not been promised
a lighter sentence for his guilty pleas. Then he added,
"I don't expect any leniency from the Americans."
Moussaoui, a 36-year-old French citizen, pleaded guilty
to six felonies, four of which carry the death penalty.
They accuse him of conspiring with the 19 hijackers
and al-Qaida leaders in a broad plot to kill Americans
using commercial airliners as weapons. The conspiracy
included the Sept. 11 attacks.
In a "statement of facts" compiled by prosecutors
and signed Friday by Moussouai, he acknowledged lying
to federal agents after his arrest in August 2001 to
avoid exposing the Sept. 11 hijackers.
The pleas ended a three-year legal drama during which
Moussaoui attempted to fire his lawyers, ranted against
Brinkema and prosecutors and produced arguments over
national secrets and access to captured al-Qaida leaders
that reached the Supreme Court.
Before accepting the guilty pleas, Brinkema complimented
Moussaoui, who in the past had derided her in handwritten
court filings.
"He has a better understanding of the legal system
than some lawyers I have seen in court," the judge
said.
Prosecutors will seek to put Moussaoui to death, Attorney
General Alberto Gonzales said at a news conference shortly
after Moussaoui's hearing ended. "The
fact that Moussaoui participated in this terrorist conspiracy
is no longer in doubt," he said, hailing Moussaoui's
"chilling admission of guilt."
Moussaoui was arrested on immigration charges in August
2001 after drawing attention at a Minnesota flight school
because he had said he wanted to learn to fly a Boeing
747 although he had no pilot's license. He was in custody
on Sept. 11.
In contrast with previous court appearances
where he angrily taunted his accusers, Moussaoui on
Friday occasionally joked, calmy answered questions
and described for the first time how he was being trained
to fly a jet in to the White House. It was not clear
when that attack was to occur.
"How do you plead?" Brinkema asked him for
each of the six felony counts. Each time, he answered,
"Guilty."
The judge asked Moussaoui to review the lengthy statement
of facts in which prosecutors laid out their case against
him. He appeared to carefully review it as hushed court
spectators watched intently. Brinkema asked if he understood
it.
"Yes, I have read more than 10
times this statement," he said. "I pondered
each paragraph and find it factual."
In the statement, Moussaoui said bin Laden had personally
selected him to take part in an attack on the White
House with a commercial airliner.
Bin Laden told Moussaoui, "Sahrawi, remember your
dream," according to the statement. Abu Khaled
al Sahrawi was one of the names Moussaoui used.
Brinkema asked defense lawyer Alan Yamamoto, the only
attorney Moussaoui has been willing to talk to in recent
weeks, if he was satisfied his client understood what
he was doing by pleading guilty.
"When I have spoken to him, we
have disagreed," Yamamoto said. "He is facing
the possibility of death or life in prison. He has told
me that he understands that."
Prosecutor Robert Spencer told the court he believed
Moussaoui should be ordered to pay restitution to the
Sept. 11 victims.
When the judge noted that part of the
penalties could include a $250,000 fine, Moussaoui replied,
"I wonder where I will get the money."
Before he formally entered the plea, he was asked if
he understood the statement could be used against him
to prove he was guilty. "Absolutely, I do understand
that," he said.
A few seconds later, he added, "Where
do I get the pen?"
Outside the courthouse, family members of Sept. 11
victims expressed satisfaction with the outcome and
their gratitude to the government for pursuing the case.
Dominic J. Puopolo Jr. of Miami Beach, Fla., whose
mother from Dover, Mass., died on American Airlines
Flight 11 that crashed into the World Trade Center,
said he had "a tremendous feeling justice is being
served." He said, "I promised my mother shortly
after she was murdered I'd somehow have justice." |
Last week the alleged "20th
hijacker," Zacarias Moussaoui, changed his plea
for a third time in pretrial proceedings in federal
court in Virginia. Mr. Moussaoui has now tried every
possible plea: attempting not to plead at all, pleading
no contest, pleading guilty and, finally, pleading not
guilty to conspiring in the events of Sept. 11.
Some see his erratic behavior as evidence of insanity.
Others argue that Judge Leonie M. Brinkema is shamefully
letting a crazy man represent himself. But there is
a third party to this case, and it deserves its share
of the blame for Mr. Moussaoui's conduct: the United
States government, which deliberately charged him with
a crime that it couldn't prove.
Most of the public and much
of the news media may believe the government has a solid
case against Mr. Moussaoui. With a careful reading of
the indictment in the case, however, this certainty
begins to falter. The indictment is a colorful
and dramatic depiction of the Sept. 11 attacks, detailing
the assembling of the hijackers and their preparations
in a perfect narrative arc.
But the story it tells is hardly an airtight case against
Mr. Moussaoui. Periodically, the indictment splices
in parallel activities of Mr. Moussaoui - weaving his
actions into the story of what happened Sept. 11 the
way Tom Hanks was spliced into historical footage in
"Forrest Gump." The
indictment never connects him to the other 19 hijackers
- who were interconnected with one another - and never
suggests he even met them. Save for a single
money transfer to Mr. Moussaoui from someone also transferring
funds to the group, nothing in
the indictment ties him to these men beyond his membership
in Al Qaeda.
Scrutinizing the indictment, three possibilities emerge:
the government is not presenting crucial evidence tying
Mr. Moussaoui to the Sept. 11 attacks; the government
has no evidence tying Mr. Moussaoui to the Sept. 11
attacks; or federal conspiracy law is so infinitely
elastic that Mr. Moussaoui could receive the death penalty
for simply buying knives, learning to fly and training
in Qaeda camps.
Most trial watchers assumed the first possibility was
true: the government could tie Mr. Moussaoui to Sept.
11, but chose not to do so in the indictment. But Mr.
Moussaoui, who fired his lawyers, opted for door No.
3. He made it clear last week that he'd been operating
under the assumption that under United States law, he
was guilty of conspiring to kill thousands of Americans
on Sept. 11, simply because he was a member of Al Qaeda
and had operated a guest house. He did not change his
plea until Judge Brinkema painstakingly explained to
him: "If you're standing in court today and saying,
'I am a member of Al Qaeda and provided a guest house,
but I never intended or I never agreed to kill or maim
persons in the United States,' then you're not agreeing
to this particular conspiracy." Mr. Moussaoui simply
made the mistake of taking the government's expansive
reading of conspiracy law at face value.
This may explain a good deal of Mr. Moussaoui's bizarre
conduct to date. He behaves like a paranoid lunatic
because, until last week, he believed he was facing
the death penalty for Sept. 11 just for being a member
of Al Qaeda. Under the government's version of the law
- the only version to which he had access - he assumed
he was being paraded in a show trial that was more about
revenge than justice.
There are several reasons the government may have charged
Mr. Moussaoui with a conspiracy he never knew about.
It could be hoping to leverage a better plea bargain.
By charging him with a capital crime, it can disqualify
any juror who opposes the death penalty, thus ensuring
a more conservative jury. Most profoundly, finding him
guilty of conspiring in the attacks would begin to avenge
the atrocities of Sept. 11.
But this is no way to fight terror.
Frankly, military tribunals or a life sentence in a
military brig would be preferable.
No one is arguing Mr. Moussaoui is innocent. It's increasingly
clear he was training for a different mission, and good
lawyering will allow us to prosecute him for whatever
he intended to do. But as egregious as Mr. Moussaoui's
sins may be, our legal system must reflect the principles
by which we live: no one should be found guilty of a
crime he did not commit. Unless we intend to try every
Qaeda member we can find with capital conspiracy for
Sept. 11, we must try Mr. Moussaoui for whatever crimes
he committed, and not for the crimes we wish we could
avenge. |
ABSTRACT - Editorial says Justice
Dept is trying to trample Bill of Rights in trial of
Zacarias Moussaoui, so-called 20th hijacker, by denying
him right to see evidence critical to his defense and
then suggesting it might transfer his case to military
tribunal if it does not like judge's ruling on matter;
says war on terrorism has not repealed Constitution,
and Judge Leonie Brinkema must ensure that it applies
fully in Moussaoui's case [...] |
Tempting the judge presiding over
the Zacarias Moussaoui trial to dismiss the case, federal
prosecutors said Wednesday they will not cooperate with
her latest order to permit two top al Qaeda captives
to testify on Moussaoui's behalf.
"The government cannot, consistent with the interests
of national security, comply with the court's order,"
prosecutors said in papers filed with U.S. District
Judge Leonie Brinkema in Alexandria, Virginia.
Moussaoui, 35, a French citizen of Moroccan descent
and the lone U.S. defendant in connection with the September
11 terror plot, maintains that he had no role in the
attacks, but admits belonging to al Qaeda, the Islamic
terrorist group behind them.
He said he was not called upon to act in the September
11 attacks and is not guilty of any conspiracy related
to them. Instead, he has argued
that he was waiting to participate in a later plot outside
the United States.
Moussaoui faces six charges of conspiracy -- to commit
terrorism transcending national boundaries; to commit
aircraft piracy; to destroy aircraft; to use weapons
of mass destruction; to murder United States employees;
and to destroy property.
Part of his defense requires testimony from two top
al Qaeda operatives captured in Pakistan more than six
months ago and are being held in undisclosed military
locations by the United States.
Last month, Brinkema ordered the government to make
available Khalid Shaikh Mohammed, the reputed architect
of the September 11 attacks, and Mohamed al- Hawsawi,
an alleged financier of the 19 hijackers who crashed
planes into the World Trade Center, the Pentagon, and
a field in Pennsylvania, killing some 3,000 people.
Brinkema ordered videotaped depositions via satellite
by December 5.
The Justice Department opposes the order, prosecutors
said, in part "because the deposition will result
in the disclosure of classified information."
Prosecutors have also argued the depositions would
disrupt ongoing interrogations of the detainees and
subvert President Bush's constitutional powers as commander-in-chief
to conduct the war on terrorism.
However, Brinkema has decided the
detainees' testimony is necessary for a fair trial,
saying they might clear Moussaoui of involvement in
the September 11 conspiracy or at least spare him a
death sentence.
"The government realizes that the attorney general's
objection means that the depositions cannot go forward
and obligates the court now to dismiss the indictment
unless the court finds that the interests of justice
can be served by another action," prosecutors said.
Even before Brinkema ordered access to Mohammed and
al-Hawsawi, Moussaoui's trial was delayed by a parallel
dispute over access to accused September 11 coordinator,
Ramzi Binalshibh, who allegedly wired thousands of dollars
to Moussaoui in the United States.
Attorneys assisting Moussaoui's defense have suggested
that the government might choose to declare Moussaoui
an enemy combatant and move his case to a military tribunal
instead of allowing him to talk with detained al Qaeda
members.
"These unprecedented depositions of three enemy
combatants would needlessly jeopardize national security
at a time of war with an enemy who has already murdered
thousands of our citizens," prosecutors said.
Prosecutors indicated they plan to pursue appeals of
Brinkema's orders and any legal sanctions she might
impose, including dismissal.
A government appeal of the earlier Binalshibh order
is already pending before the 4th U.S. Circuit Court
of Appeals in Richmond, Virginia.
"I'm disappointed we won't get the witnesses,
because they exculpate my client," said Frank Dunham,
one of the defense attorneys assisting Moussaoui, who
is representing himself.
In her opinion last month, Brinkema said the testimony
of Mohammed "supports the defense contention that
Moussaoui was not involved in the September 11 operation
and supports the claim that Moussaoui was not part of
the September 11 plot, because the defendant was in
the United States at the time, but was not contacted"
by the plotters.
Prosecutors have distanced themselves
from statements by government officials asserting that
Moussaoui would have been the 20th hijacker on September
11 had he not been jailed on an immigration violation
a month before the attacks.
Instead, prosecutors now allege, Moussaoui,
who attended two flight schools in the United States
in 2001, was destined to pilot a fifth hijacked plane
into the White House. |
The serial killer Harold Shipman
hanged himself in his jail cell because he could not
face the prospect of spending the rest of his life in
prison and wanted to ensure his wife was financially
secure, an inquest jury concluded yesterday.
In a lengthy narrative verdict, the jurors at Leeds
crown court said that a contributing factor was "knowing
if he lived beyond 60 years of age, the pension lump
sum due to his widow, Primrose Shipman, would be reduced
yearly until 65".
Shipman was found hanging in his cell at Wakefield
prison, West Yorkshire, in January 2004 on the eve of
his 58th birthday. His wife had been due to visit him
in prison the following day and had spoken to him on
the telephone the night before, when all appeared well.
Shipman had his GP's pension stopped by the then health
secretary, Alan Milburn, following his conviction for
murdering 15 patients in 2000. But his wife was still
entitled to a widow's pension if he died before the
age of 60.
During the nine-day hearing, extraordinary details
emerged about Shipman's life in prison. He liked to
play Scrabble, joined a card school and was writing
a biography of Napoleon. He enrolled in an English literature
course and studied the peninsular wars. He kept his
cell free of clutter - but had a radio, jigsaw, books
and newspapers.
He also kept a secret prison diary in which he spoke
of his deep despair. One of the diary entries read:
"Phones tapped. Letters read. Probably get away
with this as the POs [prison officers] are so lazy."
Another entry spoke of him "sobbing with despair"
in his cell following a visit from his wife, and questioning
whether the new year would be worth seeing through if
an appeal was not successful.
There were allegations that he had been told by prison
officers to "go and hang himself" - but these
claims were rejected by the jury yesterday.
Shipman was later found by a public inquiry to be responsible
for 250 patients' deaths in Hyde, Greater Manchester,
Todmorden, and Pontefract, West Yorkshire.
The jury said: "It was clear from the evidence
- the diary entries, phone call entries, conversations
with prisoners and prison staff - that Mr Shipman had
great affection for his wife and family whom he regarded
as his priority."
They found Shipman was "neither bullied nor goaded"
into taking his own life. [...] |
WASHINGTON, D.C. - The unsettling
story of whistleblower Sibel Edmonds took another twist
on Thursday, as the government continued its seemingly
endless machinations to shut her up. The U.S. Court
of Appeals here denied pleas to open the former FBI
translator's First Amendment case to the public, a day
after taking the extraordinary step of ordering a secret
hearing.
Edmonds was hired after 9-11 to help the woefully staffed
FBI's translation department with documents and wiretaps
in such languages as Farsi and Turkish. She
soon cried foul, saying the agency's was far from acceptable
and perhaps even dangerous to national security. She
was fired in 2002.
Ever since, the government has been trying to silence
her, even classifying an interview she did with 60 Minutes.
Oral arguments in her suit against
the federal government were scheduled for this morning,
but yesterday the clerk of the appeals court unexpectedly
and suddenly announced the hearing would be closed.
Only attorneys and Edmonds were allowed in.
No one thought the three-judge appeals court panel
would be especially sympathetic to the Edmonds case.
It consists of Douglas Ginsburg, who was once nominated
for the U.S. Supreme Court by President Reagan. He withdrew
after it was revealed he had smoked pot as a college
student; he later joined the appeals court. Another
member, David Sentelle, was chair of the three-judge
panel that appointed Ken Starr to be the special prosecutor
investigating Clinton. Karen LeCraft Henderson was appointed
a federal judge during the Reagan period, then put on
the appeals court by the elder President Bush.
In making a plea to open the Edmonds hearing, the ACLU
noted appellate arguments normally are accessible to
the public. "When the United States asked the Supreme
Court to close part of the oral argument in the Pentagon
Papers case - a case that involved classified information
of the greatest sensitivity - that motion was denied,"
the ACLU said. "Likewise, in an appeal in the ongoing
prosecution of Zacarias Moussaoui, an alleged conspirator
in the September 11th terrorist plot, the court rejected
the government's move to close the entire hearing."
Edmonds, an American citizen, was born in Iran and
grew up in Turkey. She speaks Farsi, Turkish, and other
languages of central Asia. She was hired by the FBI
in the hectic aftermath of 9-11 to translate various
top-secret materials collected by the bureau from wire
taps, surveillance reports, interviews with agents,
etc.
In that capacity she began observing the bureau's bizarre,
even surreal practices, including such things as sending
people to Guantanamo to translate statements by prisoners
who spoke Farsi. Only trouble was the translators weren't
speakers of Farsi, but were instead Kurds speaking a
Turkish dialect. She stumbled
across various mistranslations and interpreters who
were not able to make accurate translations. Then she
discovered someone was signing her initials to approve
translations she never made. And she observed translations
being doctored or blocked by the actions by one translator
or another. She discovered one translator whose relative
was working for an embassy which the FBI had under surveillance.
When Edmonds protested to her
supervisors, she has said, the ignored her or told her
off, at one point calling her "a whore." Eventually
she was fired by a supervisor who told Edmonds he'd
look forward to meeting her again - in jail.
Taking her protests to Congress, she won support from
the leaders of the Senate Judiciary Committee, who exchanged
letters with the Justice Department's Inspector General's
office, which said it was making an investigation. In
the midst of all this, then attorney general John Ashcroft
stepped in and threw down a gag order by invoking the
arcane states secrets privilege, under which the government
can classify whatever materials it wishes in the interests
of national security. Last year, the Edmonds
case was dismissed by a federal district court judge.
The government had never even bothered to file an answer
to her complaint.
The case that was argued this morning concerned a complaint
by Edmonds that the government was denying her First
Amendment rights. Only after she was fired did Edmonds
go to the Congress. She is saying she played by the
rules and was squashed by the government without cause
or explanation. And when she
went outside the official channel to reveal what was
going on within the bureau, the government responded
by classifying her previous attempts to speak out, including
press accounts written before the classification came
down. One of them was a 60 Minutes segment.
"The federal government is routinely retaliating
against government employees who uncover weaknesses
in our ability to prevent terrorist attacks or protect
public safety," said Ann Beeson, associate legal
director of the ACLU. "From
firing whistleblowers to using special privileges to
cover up mistakes, the government is taking extreme
steps to shield itself from political embarrassment
while gambling with our safety." |
With Hospital Emergency
Room Infrastructure To Provide Secure ID and Medical
Record Access For VeriChip Patients, Thought and Opinion
Leaders to Play Key Role in Adoption of VeriChip(TM)
VeriChip Corporation, a wholly-owned subsidiary of
Applied Digital (NASDAQ: ADSX), announced today that
the Bergen County, New Jersey Chief of Police has been
implanted with the VeriChip. Chief of Police Jack Schmidig,
a member of the police force for over 30 years, received
a VeriChip as part of the Company's strategy of enlisting
key regional leaders to accelerate adoption of the VeriChip.
With hospital emergency room infrastructure forming,
patients will have the ability to provide secure ID
and medical record access in an emergency or clinical
situation. |
See Also: Iraq
and the Dangers of the Policy of Appeasement
The U.S. and its Coalition of the Morally Bankrupt have
used their invasion of Iraq as a means through which to
achieve many goals apart from its primary goal of gaining
control of Iraq and its natural resources. This war has
been a vehicle through which the U.S. not only elevated
propaganda to new heights at the expense of the truth,
but actually undertook the murder of independent journalists.
By targeting journalists for murder, a clear threat was
delivered to any one daring to publicise any facts in
opposition to the U.S. and Coalition goals. Now the example
of the invasion is being utilised as a concrete threat
to any other nation that dares to demonstrate any opposition
whatsoever to international U.S./Zionist goals. Victory
has not been won by the Coalition in Iraq by any means,
and yet, by destroying buildings, statues and other symbols
of the legitimate Iraqi leadership and by encouraging
widespread looting, the Coalition is hoping to convince
the Iraqi people as well as the international community
of its power to give life or death to whomsoever it wills.
Bogus accusations of 'pursuing weapons of mass destruction'
were part of the foundation upon which the Coalition based
its invasion of Iraq. Now, even as the country of Iraq
continues to resist, the U.S. warns other nations to 'draw
the appropriate lesson from Iraq.' In particular, the
U.S. threatens Iran, Syria and Korea with the possibility
of a U.S. or 'Coalition' invasion, should they attempt
to retain the right to oppose U.S. foreign policy. John
R. Bolton, U.S. Undersecretary of State for Arms Control
and International Security, warned Syria and other countries
in the region to 'open themselves' up to 'new possibilities
for peace'. In other words, no one has the right to self-defence
or defence of the homeland. 'New possibilities for peace'
require capitulation to U.S./Zionist aims and are predicated
upon total disarmament by any country that is in a position
to threaten the Zionist entity.
Bolton declared that: 'With respect to the issue of the
proliferation of weapons of mass destruction in the post-conflict
period, we are hopeful that a number of regimes will draw
the appropriate lesson from Iraq that the pursuit of weapons
of mass destruction is not in their national interest.'
Of course, proliferation of nuclear arms is not only
allowed but encouraged in the case of the Zionist entity,
an illegal political entity that never signed the Non-Proliferation
Treaty and one that has threatened the U.S. government
with the possibility of becoming a 'rogue state' if the
U.S. should ever waver in its support. In 1986, Francis
Perrin, high commissioner of the French atomic energy
agency from 1951 to 1970, told the press that France and
the illegal Zionist entity had worked for two years in
the late 1950s to design an atom bomb. Perrin declared,
inter alia, that: 'We [France] thought the Israeli bomb
was aimed against the Americans, not to launch it against
America but to say 'if you don't want to help us in a
critical situation we will require you to help us, otherwise
we will use our nuclear bombs.'
Indeed, the Zionists vowed before the current American
invasion of Iraq that, should Iraq attack the Zionist
illegal entity, they would feel free to use nuclear weapons
in response. This is the same Zionist entity that attempted
to conceal its own nuclear capacity from the world for
decades. In fact, despite all propaganda to the contrary,
it was only Iraq who possessed no weapons of mass destruction,
and the American invasion had nothing whatsoever to do
with the 'threat', actual or potential, from a nation
weakened by over a decade of punitive sanctions.
An U.S. Air Force report from 1999 declared the Zionist
entity to be building a nuclear naval force meant to respond
to any nuclear strike by such countries as Iran or Iraq.
The number of Zionist nuclear weapons cited in the report
was 400 atomic and hydrogen weapons, double that of previous
assessments. Some of these 400 nuclear and thermonuclear
weapons could be deployed by the Zionist navy on the fleet
of three German-built Dolphin-class diesel submarines,
giving the Zionist entity a second strike capability with
nuclear cruise missiles. The same report declared that:
'the first basing options for the new second-strike force
of nuclear missile capable submarines include Oman, located
strategically near Iran' but that the Zionist entity might
be able to use Jordanian air space for a nuclear strike
on Iran. It stated finally that: 'Israel's Defense Ministry
has requested from the government of Prime Minister Ariel
Sharon authorisation for a retaliatory nuclear strike.'
In the spring of 2002, the Zionist entity contemplated
a 'pre-emptive strike' against Iran. The Coalition invasion
of Iraq made it unnecessary for the Zionists to carry
out their own threats against Iraq, but they still remain
eager to see both Iran and Syria weakened significantly
or destroyed. The Bush administration now has made it
clear that it could be persuaded to turn its aggression
next towards either Syria or Iran.
Iran, despite its rather despicable attempts to curry
favour with the U.S. by abetting the U.S. invasion of
Afghanistan and its own compliance with international
law in terms of its nuclear programmes, has not won either
security or safety with the U.S. and its allies. In terms
of nuclear weapons, Iran, unlike the Zionist entity, is
party to the nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty, has accepted
full scope safeguards and is entitled to import nuclear
reactors and other technologies under the provisions of
the treaty. The International Atomic Energy Agency regularly
has inspected all of Iran's declared nuclear facilities,
reports it to be in full compliance with the NPT and has
found no evidence of a nuclear weapons effort. Since 1991,
the IAEA invoked authority to conduct special inspections
of undeclared sites and Iran allowed the IAEA to visit
any site upon request. The agency failed to uncover any
non-sanctioned activites in any of its several visits.
Despite all of this, Iran remains a potential target for
the next act of American/Zionist aggression and will not
be removed from Bush's characterisation as part of his
'axis of evil'. Demonstrations of disgraceful jubiliation
at the Coalition's current successes in Iraq will change
nothing.
In reality, it should be far more frightening to contemplate
nuclear weapons at the disposal of the Zionists, an aggressive
colonialist racist regime proven to have expansionist
aims towards the Arab Nation than nuclear power in the
hands of Syria, Iran or Korea. In fact, the only nation
that has used nuclear weapons and used them on a civilian
population is the United States, the nation that demonstrated
its aggressive, law-defying nature once again in its invasion
of the sovereign country of Iraq.
A U.S. poll was taken to show that half of the United
States population would support U.S. military action against
Iran if it continued to move toward nuclear weapons development
and 42 percent of those surveyed said the United States
should take action against Syria if it were helping Iraq.
Polls only represent the views of those chosen to participate,
and one hopes that this is not the opinion of the people
of the United States, but only of those brainwashed by
official U.S./Zionist propaganda. Even so, it is a rather
frightening prospect, and if a valid poll, definitely
supports the notion of culpability of the people of the
United States for the blood shed and crimes committed
by its government.
Bolton continued to elaborate upon his threat by stating
that: 'I think Syria is a good case where I hope that
they will conclude that the chemicals weapons program
and the biological weapons program that they have been
pursuing are things that they should give up. It is a
wonderful opportunity for Syria to foreswear the pursuit
of weapons of mass destruction and, as with other governments
in the region, to see if there are not new possibilities
in the Middle East peace process. He concluded by stating
that the priority of the United States was the 'peaceful
elimination of these programmes.'
The U.S./Coalition invasion of Iraq is a demonstration
of how 'peaceful elimination' is achieved. Indeed, it
is obvious that other nations do need to 'draw the appropriate
lesson from Iraq'. The U.S. and its allies must be stopped
now. Half-hearted attempts to support Iraq while attempting
to placate the U.S. will accomplish nothing.
The real lesson to be drawn from Iraq is that one must
not acquiesce in self-destruction at the hands of the
enemy. Iraq actually attempted to conform to the dictates
of the United Nations with respect to its weapons and
resources for self-defence while the United States never
had any intention of forswearing its own plans for invasion.
While Iraq destroyed weapons at the behest of U.N. inspectors,
the United States amassed troops and weapons in preparation
for invasion.
Indeed, it is interesting to look at the example of North
Korea and its response to U.S. pressure. In a statement
made on the 6th of April, a spokesman for the Foreign
Ministry of the Democratic People's Republic of Korea
demonstrated clear recognition of the dangers that face
any nation that dares to oppose U.S. world domination
and gave its own response to recent threats made by the
U.S.
Stating that 'the DPRK has so far made every possible
effort to ensure stability and peace in the Korean Peninsula
and the region', it accused the United Nations Security
Council first of dealing with the nuclear issue on the
peninsula in such a manner as to make it a 'prelude to
war' to be 'misused by the U.S. as an excuse for war.'
One can hear the echo of similar United Nations discussions
and resolutions on Iraq here and recall the recent U.S.
manipulation, bullying and ultimate disregard of the international
community in its inexorable aim to invade Iraq.
The DPRK then stated very forcefully that: 'The U.S.
intends to force the DPRK to disarm itself. The Iraqi
war shows that to allow disarming through inspection does
not help avert a war but rather sparks it.'
Furthermore, that: 'Neither international public opinion
nor the U.N. Charter could prevent the U.S. from mounting
an attack on Iraq. This suggests that even the signing
of a non-aggression treaty with the U.S. would not help
avert a war.'
And finally:
'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.'
Syria and Iran should take note and respond in like fashion.
The DPRK continues by rejecting the entire fabric of deceit
upon which the U.S. relies to support its worldwide aggressions,
stating that:
'The U.S. is seriously mistaken if it thinks that the
DPRK will accept the demand for disarming while watching
one of the three countries the U.S. listed as part of
an 'axis of evil' already subject to a barbarous military
attack.'
In conclusion, the DPRK vowed that, should the U.S. target
North Korea, the DPRK would have 'no other option but
to beef up the deterrent force for war by mobilising all
the potentials.'
In like manner, Syria and Iran must recognise the need
for absolute resistance to the U.S. foreign policy 'programme'.
Unity against the U.S. is vital. The lesson to be learned
from the U.S./Coalition invasion of Iraq is that the U.S.
is ruthless in its programme to eliminate any potential
threats to its own status as the most powerful dictator
in the international community. At the heart of U.S. world
domination plans are Zionist interests and this never
was more obvious than when the U.S. chose to invade Iraq,
a country without any so-called 'weapons of mass destruction'
rather than taking any action towards Korea, a nation
possessing nuclear deterrent power. The Zionists have
no interest in Korea at present, but they do have an interest
in increasing their sphere of control within the Arab
Nation and Iran. The appointment of Jay Garner, a Zionist
puppet, to supervise the so-called 'post-Saddam Hussayn'
admininstration of Iraq is damning evidence of U.S./Zionist
collaboration.
Furthermore, Iraq was chosen as the first target probably
because the U.S. believed that it would have United Nations
support and because it was able to invade Iraq in the
First Gulf War without any effective resistance from the
Arab Nation as a whole. Despite Arab opposition to the
first U.S. invasion of Iraq, and the anger and frustration
with respect to the economic sanctions that punished Iraq
for over a decade, the leaders of the Arab Nation made
it clear that they would not actually oppose a second
U.S. invasion. Moreover, much of the military apparatus
for a second invasion of Iraq was in place and indeed,
the U.S. and British had been invading parts of Iraq throughout
the past decade, under spurious claims of 'enforcing'
the sanctions.
Iraq, therefore, was a much easier target than Syria,
Iran or Korea. The oil resources in Iraq made it irresistable
to Western governments determined to take multi-national
control over Arab resources and radically diminish the
power of OPEC.
An invasion of Syria certainly would be in Zionist interests,
perhaps even more than the invasion of Iraq, but Iraq
posed an easier target in terms of the degree of passivity
that the U.S. could expect from the rest of the world,
even if most of the world opposed a military invasion
of Iraq. After all, the brutal economic sanctions against
Iraq had been allowed to proceed year after year without
any sort of effective intervention from any one.
Iraq is by no means defeated, and the U.S. cannot claim
true victory of any sort at this point in time. Even so,
it is vital for every country to take note of the unequivocally
aggressive nature of U.S. foreign policy and to respond
as the DPRK responded. No one can afford to wait to see
what ultimately happens in Iraq, hoping that perhaps the
United States will become so entangled in a long war of
attrition that it will not be able to open another front.
After all, the United States proved itself willing to
invade Iraq even while continuing military actions in
Afghanistan, and it carried out attacks in Afghanistan
and Iraq simultaneously.
There is no middle path here, and a policy of appeasement
with respect to the United States will not grant safety,
peace or security to any nation. Any country that decides
to work with the United States in an attempt to win either
U.S./Zionist friendship or tolerance is committing suicide.
The U.S./Zionist aims to destroy the Arab Nation and Iran
will not waver. Any U.S. 'road map' for Palestine ultimately
will facilitate Zionist security in the region, and thus
must be repudiated categorically.
Like an abusive marriage, any so-called alliance with
the U.S. or the Zionists operates to the benefit only
of the abusive partner. Any gains for the victim are illusory
at best. Independence from U.S. control is the only path
to true survival. |
With fresh indictments
last week, the UN oil-for-food scandal took an unexpected
turn into the Labyrinth -- the tangled skein of war profiteering
and state terrorism that has seen the Bush Family's lust
for blood money emerge in three of the darkest criminal
episodes in modern American history: Iran-Contra, Iraqgate
and the BCCI affair.
Texas oil baron David Chalmers of Bayoil and his partners
were hit with criminal charges for allegedly cutting deals
with Saddam Hussein in the notorious skim operation that
outflanked UN sanctions and diverted funds intended for
humanitarian relief. Prosecutors were shocked -- shocked!
-- to find such collusion and corruption in the oil business.
Of course, the fact that three U.S. presidents -- the
two George Bushes and their new best pal, Bill Clinton
-- actually brokered massive backroom oil deals for Saddam
that dwarfed Bayoil's petty chiseling, plus the fact that
Saddam's nation-strangling thievery has since been eclipsed
by the epic rapine of Bush II's Babylonian Conquest, in
no way mitigates the seriousness of the Chalmers indictment.
But somehow we doubt you'll be seeing those august statesmen
sharing leg irons with old Davy anytime soon.
Chalmers is a longtime denizen of the Labyrinth. In
the mid-1980s, he joined up with Chilean gun-runner Carlos
Cardoen, the Financial Times reported. Cardoen was a CIA
frontman used by Presidents Ronald Reagan and Bush I to
funnel cluster bombs and other weapons secretly to Saddam
Hussein during the Iran-Iraq War. At Reagan's direct order,
Saddam received U.S. military intelligence, billions of
dollars in credits and a steady supply of covert "third-country"
arms to sustain his war effort, even though the White
House was fully aware of Saddam's "almost daily use"
of illegal chemical weapons, The Washington Post reported.
Later, Bush I, as president, would also mandate the sale
of WMD material to Saddam, including anthrax -- long after
Saddam notoriously "gassed his own people" at
Halabja.
As in the present UN scandal, Saddam paid for his covert
cluster bombs with oil. Chalmers would move the actual
black stuff and broker its sale for the CIA and Cardoen,
taking a cut in the process. Since 1999, Chalmers has
been doing the same thing on behalf of Italtech, owned
by another crony in the old Cardoen gun-running scheme.
The Texas baron must be aghast to find himself in hot
water for an activity that was once blessed at the highest
levels. Perhaps he neglected to cross the requisite Bushist
palms with sufficient silver -- or else, as with many
a Bush minion, he's just been tossed overboard as chum
for the sharks when he's no longer of any use.
But let's be fair. Helping Saddam kill people with chemical
gas was not the only reason why Reagan and Bush I aided
their favorite dictator. They had bigger fish to fry --
using the Constitution as kindling for the feast.
In 1986, George Bush I visited the Middle East with a
secret message to be passed to Saddam via Egyptian President
Hosni Mubarak: "Drop more bombs on Iran's cities."
How do we know this? From the sworn testimony of Howard
Teicher, the National Security Council official who accompanied
Bush and wrote the official "talking points"
for the trip. Ostensibly, Bush urged this mass killing
of civilians as a strategy to halt Iran's gains at the
front. But as The New Yorker reported -- 13 years ago
-- there was another layer to this covert plot.
A fierce aerial offensive by Saddam would force Iran
to seek more spare parts for its U.S.-made planes and
anti-aircraft weapons, inherited from the ousted Shah.
Bush was already waist-deep in the Iran-Contra scam, which
involved selling Tehran U.S. military goods through back
channels, then funneling the secret profits to the Contras,
the gang of right-wing insurgents and CIA-trained terrorists
in Nicaragua. Congress had forbidden U.S. aid to the Contras,
so Reagan and Bush used the mullahs (and Central American
drug lords) to run their illegal terrorist war. More innocent
deaths in Iran meant more backdoor cash for the Contras.
A win-win situation!
When Bush I became president, he clasped Saddam even
closer, sending him billions in U.S.-backed "agricultural
credits" through BNL, an Italian bank tied up with
BCCI -- the international "financial consortium"
that was actually "one of the largest criminal enterprises
in history," according to the U.S. Senate. BCCI laundered
money and financed arms dealing, terrorism, smuggling
and prostitution, while corrupting government officials
worldwide with bribes and extortion.
As Bush well knew, Saddam was using the BNL cash for
arms, not food; indeed, that was the point of the exercise.
When some honest U.S. officials threatened to unravel
the BNL gun-running scam, Bush appointed Cardoen's own
lawyer to a top Justice Department post -- overseeing
the investigation of his former boss. Under heavy White
House pressure, the case was quickly whittled down to
the usual "bad apple" underlings carrying out
some minor fraud.
But perhaps Papa Bush was just being fatherly. Earlier,
another BCCI offshoot bank had bailed out one of Bush
Junior's many business failures with $25 million in cash.
That deal had been brokered by mysterious Arkansas tycoon
Jackson Stephens, one of the Bush family's biggest campaign
contributors. Curiously enough, Stephens was also a top
moneyman for another leading politician: Bill Clinton.
When Clinton took office, he obligingly deep-sixed the
continuing probes into BCCI, Iraqgate and Iran-Contra.
That's how the system really works. All the guff about
law, democracy and morality is just cornball for the yokels
back home -- and for the cannon fodder sent off to die
in the elite's commercial and dynastic wars. The Labyrinth
-- that knotted gut of blood and bile -- has poisoned
us all. |
WASHINGTON - The Army has cleared
four top officers - including the three-star general
who commanded all U.S. forces in Iraq - of all allegations
of wrongdoing in connection with prisoner abuse at Abu
Ghraib and will not be punished, officials said Friday.
Lt. Gen. Ricardo Sanchez, who became the senior commander
in Iraq in June 2003, two months after the fall of Baghdad,
had been faulted in earlier investigations for leadership
lapses that may have contributed to prisoner abuse.
He is the highest ranking officer to face official allegations
of leadership failures in Iraq, but he has not been
accused of criminal violations.
After assessing the allegations against Sanchez and
taking sworn statements from 37 people involved in Iraq,
the Army's inspector general,
Lt. Gen. Stanley E. Green, concluded that the allegations
were unsubstantiated, said the officials who
were familiar with the details of Green's probe.
Green reached the same conclusion in the cases of two
generals and a colonel who worked for Sanchez.
The officials who disclosed the findings spoke only
on condition of anonymity because Congress has not yet
been fully briefed on Green's findings and the information
has not yet been publicly released. Green had scrutinized
the actions of Sanchez and 11 other officers.
Iraqi detainees at Abu Ghraib were physically abused
and sexually humiliated by military police and intelligence
soldiers in the fall of 2003. Photos of some of the
abuse created a firestorm of criticism worldwide.
Congress has hotly debated the question of accountability
among senior Army and Defense Department officials who
were in positions of responsibility on Iraq detention
and interrogation policy. Some
Democrats have accused the Pentagon of foisting all
the blame onto low-ranking soldiers.
In a statement Friday that did not mention specific
cases, Senate Armed Services Committee Chairman John
Warner, R-Va., said that as soon as all Pentagon assessments
of accountability are complete he will hold a hearing
"to examine the adequacy of those reviews"
and to hear senior civilian and military officials address
the issue.
Warner said he strongly agrees with one investigation
report that concluded last year that commanders should
be held accountable for their action or inaction and
that military as well as civilian leaders in the Pentagon
"share this burden of responsibility." [...]
Some have said the blame should
rest with Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld, although
none of the 10 investigations done so far has concluded
that he was directly at fault. [...]
Sanchez has been at the center of the Abu Ghraib controversy
from its start.
He issued a policy on acceptable interrogation techniques
on Sept. 14, 2003, then revised it on Oct. 12, about
the time the abuses were happening. The Army inspector
general found in an investigation last year that the
policies were ambiguous and subject to misinterpretation
by soldiers.
A separate investigation by
a panel headed by former Defense Secretary James Schlesinger
concluded that Sanchez should have taken stronger action
in November 2003 when he realized the extent of problems
among military intelligence and military police units
running Abu Ghraib. [...]
Sanchez and his former top deputy, Maj. Gen. Walter
Wojdakowski, were cited in the Kern-Fay-Jones report
for failure to "ensure proper staff oversight of
detention and interrogation operations" in Iraq,
specifically at the Abu Ghraib prison.
It was left to Green, the Army inspector general, to
weigh the gravity of the various allegations against
Sanchez and other senior officers and determine whether
they could be substantiated. In only one case - that
of Janis Karpinski, an Army Reserve brigadier general
who commanded the 800th Military Police Brigade at Abu
Ghraib - did Green decide that the allegations were
substantiated. She has been suspended from her command
and given a written reprimand.
In addition to clearing Sanchez, the Army inspector
general has determined that there should be no punishment
given to Wojdakowski or to Maj. Gen. Barbara Fast, who
was Sanchez's intelligence chief in Baghdad, or to Col.
Mark Warren, Sanchez's top legal adviser at the time.
[...] |
A week before she was killed by
a suicide bomber, humanitarian worker Marla Ruzicka
forced military commanders to admit they did keep records
of Iraqi civilians killed by US forces.
Tommy Franks, the former head of US Central Command,
famously said the US army "don't do body counts",
despite a requirement to do so by the Geneva Conventions.
But in an essay Ms Ruzicka wrote a
week before her death on Saturday and published yesterday,
the 28-year-old revealed that a Brigadier General told
her it was "standard operating procedure"
for US troops to file a report when they shoot a non-combatant.
She obtained figures for the number of civilians killed
in Baghdad between 28 February and 5 April, and discovered
that 29 had been killed in firefights involving US forces
and insurgents. This was four times the number of Iraqi
police killed.
"These statistics demonstrate that the US military
can and does track civilian casualties," she wrote.
"Troops on the ground keep these records because
they recognise they have a responsibility to review
each action taken and that it is in their interest to
minimise mistakes, especially since winning the hearts
and minds of Iraqis is a key component of their strategy."
Sam Zia-Zarifi, deputy director
of the Asia division of Human Rights Watch, the group
for which Ms Ruzicka wrote the report, said her discovery
"was very important because it allows the victims
to start demanding compensation". He added:
"At a policy level they have never admitted they
keep these figures."
Exactly how many Iraqi civilians have been killed in
the last two years is unclear. Iraq
Body Count, a group that monitors casualty reports,
says at least 17,384 have died. But
the group bases its totals only on deaths reported by
the media, and says it can therefore only "be a
sample" of the total actually killed. Its
website says: "It is likely that many if not most
civilian casualties will go unreported by the media.
That is the sad nature of war."
A peer-reviewed report published last year in The Lancet
and based on an extrapolation of data suggested that
100,000 civilians may have been killed during the invasion
and its aftermath. One of the report's author, Dr Richard
Garfield, professor of nursing at Columbia University,
said: "Of course they keep records and of course
they pretend they don't. Why is it important to keep
the numbers of those killed? Well, why was it important
to record the names of those people killed in the World
Trade Centre? It would have been inconceivable not to.
These people have lives of value.
"We are still fighting [to record] the Armenian
genocide. Until people have names and are counted they
don't exist in a policy sense."
Ms Ruzicka, from California, was killed in Baghdad
after her car was caught in the blast of a suicide bomber
who attacked a convoy of security contractors on the
road to the city's airport. She was in Iraq heading,
Civic, the organisation she set up to record and document
civilians killed or injured by the US military, and
to seek compensation. She carried out a similar project
in Afghanistan.[...]
'The public must know how many have died'
This is an edited extract of an article written by
Marla Ruzicka a week before her death:
In my two years in Iraq, the one question I am asked
the most is: "How many Iraqi civilians have been
killed by American forces?" The American public
has a right to know how many Iraqis have lost their
lives since the start of the war and as hostilities
continue.
In a news conference at Bagram air base in Afghanistan
in March 2002, General Tommy Franks said: "We don't
do body counts." His words outraged the Arab world.
During the Iraq war, as US troops pushed toward Baghdad,
counting civilian casualties was not a priority for
the military. Since 1 May 2003, when President Bush
declared major combat operations over and the US military
moved into "stability operations", most units
began to keep track of civilians killed at checkpoints
or during patrols by US soldiers.
Here in Baghdad, a brigadier general explained to me
that it is standard procedure for US troops to file
a spot report when they shoot a non-combatant. It is
in the military's interest to release these statistics.
A number is important not only to
quantify the cost of war, but as a reminder of those
whose dreams will never be realised in a free and democratic
Iraq. |
BAGHDAD, Iraq - The 12-year-old
orphan remembers Marla Ruzicka as a smiling blonde apparition
who gave him a glass of juice and changed his clothes
when bullet splinters in his spine made it painful to
move and walking virtually impossible. The American
activist took up Rakan Hassan's cause, securing a surgeon
in the United States to perform the operation he needs
to recover from the attack that killed his parents.
But Ruzicka died before she could complete her mission,
cut down by the same relentless violence that has shattered
the lives of the many Iraqis she tried to help.
Ruzicka was killed with her Iraqi translator and another
foreigner on April 16 when a car bomb exploded as they
drove in two vehicles along the treacherous road leading
to Baghdad's airport. She will be buried Saturday in
her hometown of Lakeport, Calif.
At first, the Hassan children were told Ruzicka died
in a car accident, their relatives offering a more benign
version of the truth to the youngsters still longing
for their parents, Kamila and Hussein.
But Intisar Hassan, the eldest at 24, learned the truth
when she watched the news that night on television.
She began to cry.
"That woman who was killed was a nice woman,"
Intisar Hassan said by telephone from the family's concrete-block
home in Tal Afar, 90 miles east of the Syrian border.
"She was kind and nice, and we hoped at the time
she would be able to help Rakan get better."
At the time of her death, Ruzicka was in contact with
officials from the U.S. Embassy and State Department
to arrange Rakan's medical evacuation. Since
then, however, his cause has stalled. The embassy said
Friday it was still processing his case.
Everyone who knew the 28-year-old activist - from the
Iraqi families she helped, to the U.S. Senators and
war correspondents she lobbied - extolled Ruzicka's
relentless campaign for compensation for the innocent
victims of war.
A one-woman human rights movement,
Ruzicka was instrumental in securing millions of dollars
in aid for distribution in Iraq. She'd been traveling
to and from the country since U.S.-led forces invaded
in March 2003, often going door-to-door to meet wounded
Iraqis and collect the figures for her surveys on the
number hurt and killed.
She badgered the military for numbers and Washington
for money. She sweet-talked journalists and soldiers
alike into helping her out. And everyone got a hug.
Ruzicka refused to accept the official line that the
U.S. military does not keep track of civilian casualties,
writing in an op-ed piece the week before she was killed
that this position "outraged the Arab world and
damaged the U.S. claim that its forces go to great lengths
to minimize civilian casualties."
An Associated Press survey of deaths in the first 12
months of the occupation found that more than 5,000
Iraqis died violently in just Baghdad and three provinces.
Since then, however, neither U.S. nor Iraqi officials
have produced a complete tally.
Ruzicka thought she was close
to uncovering the figures. [...]
The U.S. military did not immediately respond to her
claims.
Ruzicka was on her way to visit an Iraqi girl injured
in a bomb blast when she was killed, according to her
colleagues from the Campaign for Innocent Victims in
Conflict, the organization she founded.
As for Rakan, he now lies motionless on a bed borrowed
from neighbors, staring listless and depressed at the
walls of a bleak, dank room, waiting for help to walk
through the door again.
Rakan's parents were killed when
a U.S. military foot patrol fired on the family's car
one dark, starless night in January in the border town
of Tal Afar. The incident was widely reported,
but Ruzicka was one of few foreigners to risk traveling
north to meet Rakan and his seven siblings earlier this
month.
Rakan said he felt sorry for Ruzicka's
parents "because she cared about me. I should care
about her family in return."
Still struggling with the loss of his own parents,
Rakan said through a translator that he wanted to send
a message to Clifford and Nancy Ruzicka, preparing to
bury their much-loved daughter on the other side of
the world.
"I say to her parents: God bless
her soul, God give them strength to endure this tragedy,"
he said. "I lost her, they lost her and every poor
Iraqi has lost her." |
THE group led by Jordanian-born
militant Abu Musab al-Zarqawi has reportedly claimed
responsibility for shooting down a helicopter, killing
all on board.
The 11 victims - including one who suffered a broken
leg and was allegedly shot after the crash - died on
Thursday after the Bulgarian Mi-8 helicopter was brought
down with a missile.
A video posted on Islamic websites and shown in part
on al-Jazeera television, carrying the logo of the Islamic
Army in Iraq, reportedly shows the aftermath of the
attack.
In the video, a voice can be heard saying in Arabic,
as the survivor is shot: "We are applying God's
law."
The group said it killed the survivor "in revenge
for the Muslims who have been killed in cold blood in
the mosques of tireless Fallujah before the eyes of
the world and on television screens, without anyone
condemning them".
It was apparently referring to the shooting by an American
soldier of a wounded Iraqi in a Fallujah mosque on November
13 during a US offensive in the city.
The group has also claimed responsibility for attempting
to assassinate interim Prime Minister Iyad Allawi on
Wednesday.
A car bomb targeting Dr Allawi's motorcade killed two
policemen. It was the fifth attempt on his life.
Six of the helicopter occupants were American, three
were Bulgarian and two were identified by Bulgaria as
Filipinos and by the Canadian company that owned the
helicopter as Fijian.
At least 13 foreign security specialists have been
killed in Iraq in the past two days. [...] |
I am convinced Bill
Gertz is a CIA plant. Gertz works for the Washington
Times, a newspaper founded, owned, and controlled by
Rev. Sun Myung Moon's Unification Church, a whacked
out religious mind-meld cult if ever there was one (see
Behind
the Times: Who Pulls The Strings at Washington's No.
2 Daily?). Since the Washington Times is already
far right-wing territory, it is a near perfect platform
for Gertz (billed as "defense
and national security reporter for The Washington Times,
a position he has held since 1985?), as a CIA operative,
to launch a disinformation campaign in regard to terrorism:
viz., Abu Musab Zarqawi has a nuke and plans to use
it. Of course, as usual, "analysts are unable to
gauge the reliability of the information's sources"
in regard to the Abu Nuke, but that sure didn't prevent
the editors over at Moonie Central from cooking up a
big old scary headline: Reports reveal Zarqawi nuclear
threat.
"Recurrent intelligence reports say al Qaeda terrorist
Abu Musab Zarqawi has obtained a nuclear device or is
preparing a radiological explosive-or dirty bomb-for
an attack, according to U.S. officials," warns
Gertz. "The classified reports have been distributed
to U.S. intelligence agencies for several consecutive
months and say Zarqawi, al Qaeda's leader in Iraq, has
stored the nuclear device or dirty bomb in Afghanistan,
said officials familiar with the intelligence."
Notice how it is now a foregone conclusion that Abu
Musab Zarqawi-who
was reported killed some time ago-is "al Qaeda's
leader in Iraq." (Gertz tells us Abu is "formally"
linked to al-Qaeda.) If the corporate media "reports"
spurious "facts" long enough, they simply
become gospel. "We were basically paying up to
$10,000 a time to opportunists, criminals and chancers
who passed off fiction and supposition about Zarqawi
as cast-iron fact, making him out as the linchpin of
just about every attack in Iraq," a military intelligence
agent told Adrian
Blomfield of the UK Telegraph last year. "Back
home this stuff was gratefully received and formed the
basis of policy decisions. We needed a villain, someone
identifiable for the public to latch on to, and we got
one."
Gertz continues:
A report by the Commission on the Intelligence Capabilities
of the United States Regarding Weapons of Mass Destruction
faulted U.S. intelligence agencies for not understanding
al Qaeda's unconventional weapons programs in Afghanistan
prior to 2001, when U.S. forces helped oust the Islamist
Taliban government.
Is it possible al-Qaeda did not have an "unconventional
weapons program," as assumed by the Commission
on the Intelligence Capabilities of the United States
Regarding Weapons of Mass Destruction (i.e., Bush's
nine eleven white wash commission)? Of course, we know
"al-Qaeda" (or what would latter become al-Qaeda
for the sake of political expediency) was awash in conventional
weapons, courtesy of the United States government. For
instance, we know that "the United States funneled
more than $ 2 billion in guns and money to the mujaheddin
[in Afghanistan] during the 1980s, according to U.S.
officials. It was the largest covert action program
since World War II," according to Steve Coll of
the Washington Post (see Anatomy
of a Victory: CIA's Covert Afghan War).
But what about the dead Abu Musab Zarqawi getting a
suitcase nuke or two from the dead Osama bin Laden?
As Carey
Sublette notes, the Osama-has-a-nuke story originated
from a story that appeared in an Arabic language newspaper,
al-Watan Al-'Arabi, in 1998. "Nearly all of the
claims that have circulated since then about bin Laden's
nuclear capabilities are derived directly from this
report," writes Sublette. "The unsourced claims
made in Al-Watan Al-'Arabi did not attract immediate
attention in the West. It was not until about a year
later that stories began surfacing in English repeating
these assertions. For example, a story in the 25 October
1999 issue of the Jerusalem Report (quoted in Bin
Laden has several Nuclear Suitcases) asserted that
Osama bin Laden's terrorist organization al Qaeda has
acquired a number of these devices in exchange for a
'$30 million in cash and two tons of Afghan heroin',
a claim taken directly from Al-Watan Al-'Arabi."
(It should be noted that the Jerusalem Report is owned
by Conrad Black, who also owns the Strausscon influenced
Jerusalem Post and several other Israeli newspapers
and periodicals.) "The Jerusalem Report story provided
as the source of this allegation Yossef Bodansky, an
apparently a free-lance analyst with connections to
Israeli intelligence and conservative Republican think
tanks. Bodansky's source for this information was not
disclosed."
In other words, it appears the original Osama-has-nukes-and-wants-to-irradiate-your-kids
story was dreamed up by Israeli intelligence and so-called
"conservative Republican think tanks," more
than likely of the PNAC-JINSA-AEI variety, i.e., the
Likudite influenced Strausscons.
In short, the story ranks high on the bullshit meter.
Of course, now that Osama is persona non grata, and
Abu the Terrible is the locus of Islamic turpitude,
it stands to reason that the al-Qaeda nuke fairy tale,
apparently cooked up by the Likudite-Strausscon alliance,
take on a new life. It is Bill Gertz's responsibility,
as CIA (or Israeli intelligence) propagandist, to roll
out a new booga-booga story designed to scare the pants
off little girls and weak-kneed American adults no longer
able to use their cerebral cortexes, thanks to decades
of incessant televised propaganda.
Gertz wraps up his scary parable as follows:
The reported threat of nuclear terrorism comes amid
other intelligence indicating that Zarqawi is planning
an attack on the United States. Still other intelligence
says Zarqawi was planning a chemical weapons attack
in Europe, officials said…. In February, U.S.
intelligence and security officials said information
showed bin Laden had asked Zarqawi to focus future
attacks on targets inside the United States. The threat
was contained in a classified bulletin to state and
local security officials.
In other words, a dead terrorist with a highly improbable
bomb will attack the Great Satan, probably between now
and a generation or two-remember, we are engaged in
a generational war, as
our fearless leader and his minions keep telling us-although
there is no evidence and even if the government had
evidence they wouldn't tell us about it, but instead
issue a "classified bulletin to state and local
security officials," who routinely complain that
they don't have the money to protect us, let alone secure
the borders (another fairy tale is that terrorists,
reportedly Chechens, are sneaking into the country with
suitcase nukes). |
BAGHDAD - A car bomb
killed nine people outside a Baghdad mosque packed with
Shiite worshippers.
Another 26 people were wounded by the blast during
the main weekly Muslim prayers, in what appeared to
be the latest in a string of sectarian attacks by Sunni
Arab insurgents against Iraq's Shiite majority community.
"Six of those hurt are in a serious condition,"
said a staffer at the capital's Kindi hospital where
many of the casualties were treated.
An interior ministry official said the attack might
have been a suicide operation.
"Some witnesses said they saw a bomber in the
car, a white BMW, but we are checking these reports,"
he said.
Shiite leaders swiftly condemned the bombing.
Sheikh Sadreddin al-Kubbanji warned the faithful at
prayers in the Shiite holy city of Najaf that they faced
"calculated terrorist acts aimed at dividing Shiites
and Sunnis." [...] |
What was the purpose
of Donald Rumsfeld's visits to Azerbaijan and Kyrgyzstan
last week? According to Alex Jones's news service, "There
was no official statement on the agenda of the meetings
with top Azerbaijan government officials. But the very
next day, the commander of NATO forces in Europe, General
Johns, issued a statement in the local press saying
that the U.S. planned to deploy military bases in the
Caspian region in order to ensure regional security.
"Azerbaijan is seen as one of the launch pads
for launching an attack on Iran, which some see coming
as early as June. Local analysts say that the deal was
already all but tied up and Rumsfeld's visit was simply
part of the finalization process."
The US has been quietly expanding military bases all
over Central Asia, but particularly in the south surrounding
Iran. We can discount US denials that there is "no
intention to attack Iran" as strangely reminiscent
of George Bush's denials that he had no intention of
invading Iraq. My Israeli sources say that the IDF is
preparing against a multi-nation Arab attack on Israel
in 2006. The US intervention in Iran and Syria may be
either fomenting that conflict or attempting to cut
both countries down to size beforehand.
It does appear that US and British
black operations are trying to cause social unrest in
Iran, in order to destabilize the country and provide
an excuse to intervene. Al Jazeera has been banned
from the country for supposedly publishing inflammatory
material leading to the recent riots in Iran among the
country's Arab minority. According to various reports,
three people have died in ethnic clashes in Iran's southwestern
Khuzestan province over the past few days. What al Jazeera
actually did was become the first to broadcast the news
of the demonstrations, thus alerting the rest of the
Arab world to the growing unrest in Iran's Khuzestan
region. But it also called upon other Arabs to join
in "peaceful" demonstrations to act in solidarity
with others. The Iranians feel this is provocative.
It might well be, despite the fact that Arabs make up
only 3% of the population of Iran. Keep in mind that
al Jazeera has roots in a BBC outfit from London that
was known to be a front for British intelligence.
US Hypocrisy: I must continually
point out to my readers the huge gap in consistency
between the US policies toward Iran and North Korea.
As the AP commented, "The United States has repeatedly
said it has no intention to attack the North, and has
sought to convince Pyongyang to return to international
disarmament talks that have been on hold since last
June." Why the double standard? Iran isn't anywhere
near as dangerous to the world as North Korea, which
already has missiles capable of reaching parts of the
US.
In point of fact, North Korea continually flaunts its
claims of increasing production of nuclear weapons,
and still the US pledges not to intervene. But for some
reason, the North Koreans are bargaining for something
more than US verbal assurance of non-aggression. The
AP story continues, "North Korea said Thursday
that the international standoff over its nuclear ambitions
could be resolved if the United States gives up what
Pyongyang alleges are its plans to overthrow the communist
regime by a nuclear attack."
Apparently, it hasn't been lost on the Pyongyang that
Cuba secretly received such written assurances from
the US that Cuba would not be attacked or undermined
politically. North Korea wants the same thing in writing.
The US is probably unwilling to give such a guarantee,
not because it actually intends to attack, but because
it fears Kim Yong Il can't be trusted not to wave that
piece of paper before the world and expose the Bush
administration for the hypocrite it is.
The larger question: A question I am often asked about
a US attack on Iran is how Russia, an ally of Iran,
would react to such an attack. My answer is to remember
Russia's betrayal of Iraq, of which it was also an ally.
I think Russia will sacrifice Iran and/or Syria as well.
Doing so furthers Russia's long range goal of painting
the US as the "bully of the world," eventually
justifying Russia's long-planned pre-emptive nuclear
strike on America-that will forever change the world's
balance of power. The only reason Russia might react
otherwise is if it intends for a larger Middle East
war to serve as a flash point for the Russia/China attack
on the West and the ensuing World War III. In that case,
we would see the Iran/Syria/Egypt coalition strike back
with missiles both at US forces in Iraq and at Israel.
I think, however, that it is still too early for the
big war. Watch out during the next decade, when China
will reach mega-power status.
RICE IN RUSSIA-PLAYING RUSSIAN ROULETTE Sec. of State
Condoleezza Rice put out dozens of mixed signals concerning
Russia during her two-day visit to the country, voicing
concerns and provocations on one hand, and calming words
on the other.
Reuters reported, "Secretary of State Condoleezza
Rice on Tuesday called the Kremlin's tight grip on power
and the media 'very worrying' and urged Russian President
Vladimir Putin not to cling on to power beyond his present
term." Of course, the latter caution is a red herring,
as neither Putin nor Yeltsin before him are the real
leaders in Russia. They cover for "former"
Communist leaders like Boris Berezovsky and other wealthy
"exiles" who made themselves wealthy by signing
over large blocs of Russian industry to themselves before
going underground.
Rice continued: "The centralization of state power
in the presidency at the expense of countervailing institutions
like the Duma (parliament lower house) or an independent
judiciary is clearly very worrying." Savvy Russia
watchers have always known, however, that the majority
of "opposition" parties in Russia are also
controlled entities, like Solidarity was in Poland.
Real dissidents are relegated to small parties that
are never allowed to gain a large following.
Then, when Russia reacted with feigned offense at the
Secretary's remarks, she responded with soothing words.
The AP quoted her as saying that "there is a considerable
amount of individual freedom" in Russia nowadays.
"One can't imagine reverting back to Soviet times,"
Rice declared. She went even further, according to Reuters,
claiming that "despite serious setbacks to Russian
democracy, there is no sign that the country is poised
to return to its totalitarian past." No sign? What
world does she live in? There are, in fact, no signs
of real democracy in Russia. Worse, the US seems to
be not-so-subtly sowing the seeds of future unrest within
most of the former Soviet States still under the yoke
of Russia's euphemistically named "Commonwealth
of Independent States." Look at the Ukraine, and
now Belarus.
As the Washington Times reported, "The United States
and its NATO allies ventured into the former Soviet
Union yesterday, where Secretary of State Condoleezza
Rice clashed with her Russian counterpart at the close
of a tough trip that contrasted sharply with her February
visit to Europe. With the alliance holding its first
high-level meeting on ex-Soviet soil, Miss Rice took
time to meet with opposition leaders of Belarus (one
of the ex-Soviet states that has a rabid Communist as
leader), a nation heavily dependent on Russian economic
aid.
"'While it may be difficult and long and at times
even far away, there will be a road to democracy in
Belarus. We admire your courage, and we admire your
dedication and we want you all to know you are in our
thoughts,' Miss Rice told a group of seven dissidents
who drove from the Belorussian capital of Minsk for
the meeting." That's no small provocation to Russia,
even though almost all "dissidents" the US
chooses to meet with are plants provided by Moscow-like
Vaclav Havel turned out to be in the phony "Velvet
Revolution" in Czechoslovakia. Once again, despite
the soothing words, it appears as if there is a globalist
strategy to antagonize Russia into someday striking
out at the West, and simultaneously facilitating that
strike.
At this same NATO meeting, Russia and NATO signed an
agreement that allows Russia access to transit routes
for transporting troops and military equipment through
NATO countries. The signing in Vilnius, Lithuania of
the Status of Forces Agreement by Russia and NATO comes
at the alliance's first-ever ministerial meeting on
the soil of a former Soviet republic. This symbolism
is meant to give a powerful message of accommodation
with Russia, while sending signals that the US is intervening
in CIS internal affairs-which gives Russia an excuse
for eventual pre-emptive retaliation against the US.
|
A neighbor recently insisted I
read the Left Behind series. "Especially now after
9/11," he said, "and the blessed countdown
for the Rapture has begun."
"Why are you so ... well, cheerful, about the
end of the Earth?" I asked him.
He gazed at me with the true alarm of deep pity. "I'm
afraid you'll have a rough time of it here during the
Tribulations -- plagues of locusts, frogs, viruses ...
the Earth attacked by tsunamis, volcanoes, dark legions
of the unsaved."
"Don't you love any of us you believe will suffer
so?" I said.
This gave my neighbor a moment's pause. But then he
admitted with some chagrin. "You
can't blame us born-agains for at last getting our heavenly
rewards. We've waited thousands of years for End Times."
My neighbor's fervor sent me to search the Internet
for the Rapture Index -- a "prophetic speedometer,"
which concludes that we've hit 153, and the warning,
"Fasten Your Seatbelts." Giddily, the Rapturers
anticipate ecological collapse, Mideast holy wars and
Christian Zionists as evidence of the Second Coming.
In a twinkling, they say, the righteous will ascend,
dropping golden dental work, our nightgowns and perhaps
even some spouses.
All this might seem darkly comic,
if not for a Time magazine poll that 56 percent of Americans
"believe the prophecies in the Book of Revelation
will come true." And that the Left Behind
books are the biggest selling fictional series in the
United States.
In complex and challenging times, apocalypse is such
a simple answer. This fight-or-flight fear is hardwired
into our reptilian, forest-slashing, migrating, pioneering
species -- leave the Old World behind, find a New World.
No need to really change, adapt
or evolve, just find another planet or heaven to plunder
for our own rewards. After all, the dark side of fundamentalism
is consumerism.
The next time I saw my neighbor he sported a new bumper
sticker: "This Vehicle Will Be Unmanned in Case
of Rapture." It was a surprisingly sunlit Seattle
day and we strolled down to our backyard beach on the
Salish Sea to continue our End Times talk. We sat down
on driftwood and watched the comic black-and-white tuxedo
harlequins diving and popping up in the waves. A Great
Blue Heron swooped in with the caw of a dinosaur bird.
How could this ancient bird fly with such huge wings?
How did she escape extinction? Somehow the Great Blue
had adapted and survived beautifully.
"So," my neighbor asked excitedly, "what
did you think of the Rapture Index?"
"Doesn't the Scripture say, 'For God so loved
the world?' " I asked. "Well, I'm going to
start a Real Rapture Index with signs and wonders of
how beautiful and sacred this Earth is. Another mantra
is: For we so love the world ... ."
My neighbor looked at me, startled, then fell very
quiet as we watched a harlequin float past, his bright
beak dripping a tiny fish. Happy, so happy in this moment.
The Great Blue cawed hoarsely and stood on one leg in
a fishing meditation. Wave after bright wave lapped
our beach and the spring sunshine warmed our open faces.
I put my arm around my neighbor, the driftwood creaking
slightly under our weight.
"Listen," I said softly,
"I want to be left behind."
Left Behind to figure out a way to fit more humbly
into this abiding Earth, this living and breathing planet
we happily call home, we call holy.
Slowly my neighbor took my hand and we sat in silence,
listening to waves more ancient than our young, hasty
species, more forgiving than our religions, more enduring.
Rapture.
Brenda Peterson is a novelist and nature writer,
most recently of "Animal Heart" from Sierra
Club Books. |
One of the major problems America
faces is a large population of religious fundamentalists
who have become as fanatical in their own way as any
Middle Eastern Ayatollah. At present, they are caught
up in their own version of the myth of the end of the
world, and hope that by working to bring it about, they'll
get to sit at the right hand of their deity and to hell
with everyone else. No doubt
fistfights will break out over who gets to sit closest,
but that is a subject for another article.
So fervent is the belief of the
mythoholics that they are ready and willing to sacrifice
money, children, civil rights, freedom, even life itself
(so long as it is someone else's) to bring about the
final rapture and end of the world. Never mind
that the guy selling this belief is a child molester
and makes money off of these fables, the seekers (and
there is one born every minute) do so want to believe!
So, I thought it might be appropriate to list some
of the many other times in history that religious fanatics
of all kinds have decided the world was about to end,
what they did about it, and what really happened to
those who followed them when the world did not end as
scheduled. [...] |
WASHINGTON - A senior House Democrat
who has been sharply critical of State Department reporting
on terrorism is accusing Secretary of State Condoleezza
Rice of denying Congress and the public important information
about the number of incidents.
"There appears to be a pattern in the administration's
approach to terrorism data: favorable facts are revealed
while unfavorable facts are suppressed," Rep. Henry
A. Waxman of California said in a letter to the department's
acting inspector general, Cameron R. Hume.
The question is "whether political considerations
played a role in Secretary Rice's decision" to
hand off a State Department report to a government counterterrorism
center, Waxman said. He requested an inspector general's
investigation.
State Department spokesman Adam Ereli said of the request,
"it's a matter under consideration." The department
is "committed to being responsive to Congress and
to contributing to an informed public debate,"
he said.
Waxman's letter followed an announcement Monday that
the department had decided to stop publishing its annual
statistical account of terror incidents worldwide, turning
the task over to a government center established last
year by Congress — the National Counterterrorism
Center. [...] |
WASHINGTON - The nomination of
John Bolton as U.S. ambassador to the United Nations
was cast in further doubt on Friday when a fourth Republican
on the Senate Foreign Relations Committee said more
time was needed to review his record.
A spokeswoman for Sen. Lisa Murkowski of Alaska said
the senator felt the committee "did the right thing
delaying the vote on Bolton in light of the recent information
presented to the committee."
Asked if Bolton, an outspoken critic of the United
Nations, had Murkowski's support, spokeswoman Kristin
Pugh said, "I can't speculate on how she would
vote."
She said Murkowski was traveling and could not be reached.
Before the recent allegations that
Bolton threatened and bullied subordinates and sought
to influence U.S. intelligence assessments improperly,
Pugh said Murkowski had met with Bolton and expressed
support.
Since then, she said, Murkowski had decided the accusations
merited further examination. [...] |
The stakes over the arch-hardliner
John Bolton's confirmation to be American envoy to the
United Nations have grown even higher, with a veiled
attack on the nominee by Colin Powell, and public criticism
of Mr Bolton's conduct from a former US ambassador who
worked with him on the North Korea nuclear issue.
It emerged yesterday that General
Powell, who was President George Bush's first secretary
of state, has been in touch with two wavering Republicans
on the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, telling them
in private conversations that Mr Bolton was a tough
operator but "very problematic", according
to The Washington Post and The New York Times.
[...]
His views still carry much weight among Republican
moderates, and he has sent two clear signals of how
he feels. The first was his failure to sign a letter
from former Republican secretaries of state and defence
endorsing the nominee; the second was a statement by
his former chief-of-staff Lawrence Wilkerson that Mr
Bolton would make an "abysmal" ambassador
to the UN. [...]
Mr Bolton has already been beset by charges that he
bullied subordinates, and sought to manipulate intelligence.
In a new setback, Thomas Hubbard,
former US ambassador to South Korea, has challenged
testimony by Mr Bolton to the committee earlier this
month and accused him of rude and undiplomatic behaviour
in his handling of delicate negotiations with North
Korea to persuade it to give up its nuclear weapons
programme.
This week the 18-member panel postponed a vote on whether
to send Mr Bolton's nomination to the full Senate. It
now plans to hold the vote on 9 May. |
Three years into an economic recovery,
workers are losing ground--so much so that the mainstream
media are finally having to take notice.
Once inflation is taken into account, compensation
for nonsupervisory workers in the private sector--about
80 percent of the workforce--dropped 0.4 percent in
2004. Analyses in the New York Times and Los Angeles
Times blamed the usual suspects: globalization and the
outsourcing of jobs overseas, a slack labor market and
weak unionization rates. (Source: State of Working America,
2004-05) [...]
The economic reality for U.S. workers today bears increasing
similarities to their counterparts in less developed
countries: a small and shrinking sector of better-paid
workers amid a sea of low-paid and often temporary labor,
a country where unions are weak and any economic gains
for workers are under constant threat, and where the
state has abandoned almost all pretence of a social
safety net.
That, said Sylvia Allegretto of the
liberal Economic Policy Institute (EPI), is the real
character of what George W. Bush calls "the ownership
society."
Until the 1970s, "corporations provided health
care and pensions, and the government was there when
they failed," she told me. "Today, fewer employers
provide health care, and there is less of a government
safety net. It is a huge shifting of risks from big
business and the government onto workers' backs. An
ownership society? To own something, you have to be
able to afford it." [...]
The pattern of wage stagnation and decline has worsened
the precarious situation of U.S. workers. While overall
real pay last declined in the early 1990s, hourly wages
either declined or stagnated throughout the period between
1973 and 1995. Beginning in the mid-1990s, tight labor
markets finally pushed up pay, particularly among low-wage
workers. Unions were able to reverse some of the downward
trends--workers went on strike at UPS in 1997 and General
Motors to win more full-time jobs; at Bell Atlantic/Verizon,
workers struck twice to win better pay and benefits.
But the recession of 2001 and the weak recovery since
unraveled many of these gains. Although real wages continued
to grow slowly during the recession, the economy shed
large numbers of jobs, particularly in manufacturing,
which saw 41 straight months of employment decline.
[...]
The result is that while the
U.S. economy in 2004 generated 2.2 million jobs, that
total is 1.4 million less than expected, based on averages
from previous economic recoveries. About
20 percent of the jobless today are among the long-term
unemployed--people who have been 27 weeks without a
job-- "an unprecedented development in the post-[Second
World War] period," according to the EPI.
[...]
The numbers add up to this conclusion: The success
of the U.S. economy has been decoupled from improvements
in the lives of U.S. workers. The idea that increases
in productivity will automatically lead to wage increases
and improvements in living standards--the assumption
of liberal Keynesian economists and union leaders alike--has
been shattered. [...]
The latest wage statistics underline the point: It's
no longer true--if it ever was--that a rising economic
tide will lift all boats. It's class war from above
that's allowed America's rulers to accumulate their
vast power-- and it will require class war from below
for workers to make any significant gains. |
Christmas came early this year
for credit-card corporations, courtesy of Capitol Hill.
After an eight-year multimillion dollar lobbying effort
by financial-industry giants, the House of Representatives
overwhelmingly passed their heinous "Debt Slavery"
Bankruptcy Bill (S. 256/H.R. 685) last week by a lopsided
302-126 vote.
Members of the House briefly debated this important
matter before they voted.
However, the speeches on both sides tended to be surprisingly
simplistic, given the complexity of the bankruptcy bill,
largely because the Republican majority leadership chose
to display their contempt for democratic processes by:
- disallowing votes on the 35 amendments the Democrats
had proposed;
- ordering the House Rules Committee to allocate
only one hour -- far
too little time -- for substantive
debate on this complicated 500-page bill; and
- ordering the House moderator to rudely interrupt
every Democratic speaker when they lined up one-by-one
to register their objections to the bill in brief
biting statements.
When the shallow-but-acrimonious debate ended, 229
Republicans (98.7%) and 73 Democrats (36.1%) supported
the bill by voting "yes," whereas no Republicans
(0%) and 125 Democrats (62%) opposed the bill by voting
"no." Additionally, three Republicans (1.3%)
and four Democrats (1.9%) abstained.
The Senate passed the same bill in March by an equally
lopsided vote of 74-25, with Senator Hillary Clinton
abstaining. And Mr. Bush signed
it on April 20th, so it will become this nation's federal
bankruptcy law six months from enactment. [...]
NOW President Kim Gandy said of the Republicans: "Once
again George W. Bush and his Congressional enablers
have rewarded their corporate allies at the expense
of low- and middle-income working people, single mothers,
minorities, veterans and the elderly. This
bill further shreds the safety net for even the most
financially troubled people. It is a reckless
move for Congress to squeeze families in economic and
health crises while providing loopholes for corporate
executives to skirt their debts. These payouts to big
business must stop immediately."
Two Overarching Conclusions: Morally Bankrupt And Deeply
Divided.
The lopsided House and Senate votes favoring this bill
-- 302-126 and 74-25, respectively -- were tantamount
to a Congressional declaration of MORAL BANKRUPTCY.
Why? Sadly, "money talks and social justice walks"
inside the Capitol Hill bribe-ocracy.
Our Congresspersons knew full well that they were allowing
the financial industry's predatory lending practices
to continue unabated, and yet sharply limiting individual
access to debt-liquidating personal bankruptcies. That
might be the correct formula for winning political support
from the financial industry, but it's certainly not
the politics of social justice!
They knew that the foreseeable
social consequences of this bankruptcy bill over time
will be that millions of financially-desperate Americans
will either commit suicide because they cannot see any
way out of debt slavery, or be forced into the homeless
underground, or commence a life of crime. These
socially-destructive consequences are the real legacy
of supposedly "compassionate" conservatives'
bankruptcy bill. [...] |
It is widely believed
that the Chinese are eating our lunch. Their factories
hum and belch smoke, while ours go silent and send up
weeds in the parking lot. This phenomenon is commonly
called "globalization." But it is also commonly
misunderstood.
In the reverie of modern Americans, globalization means
the rest of the world sends you things you don't have
to pay for. The burden of today's little essay is two-fold.
The first part is easy; we point out that anyone who
thinks such a thing is a fool. The second point is harder
– and more important.
The world has been globalized for a long time. An Englishman
in 1910 could sit in his parlor off St. James Park and
drink tea that came all the way from Ceylon in cups
that came all the way from China. Then, putting down
his drink, he could pick up a Cuban cigar, put it to
his lips...and perhaps sprinkle a few ashes on the carpet
that he had bought in Egypt...or the leather boots he
had ordered from a shop down the street that sold Italian
goods. He could buy stocks in New York as easily as
he could pick up oranges from Spain or the latest French
novels to make their way across the channel.
But as Niall Ferguson points out in the current issue
of Foreign Affairs magazine, globalization is not without
its disappointments. In 1910, England had been a great
world power...and one of the world's greatest economies...for
two centuries. But global competition had recently edged
the British out of the top spot. American GDP surpassed
it at the turn of the century. Germany marched by a
few years later. Relatively, England, that "weary
Titan," was in decline.
Still, why would the English complain? They lived well
– perhaps better than anyone else. Even if they
didn't, they thought they did. The rest of the world
was content too. People liked buying and selling. People
in Europe liked globalization, because it brought them
oranges in the wintertime. People in the warm latitudes
liked it – now they had someone to sell their
oranges to. Even then, people spoke of the "annihilation
of distance," and assumed that more miles would
be destroyed in the years to come.
Globalization is nothing more than the extension of
the division of labor across international boundaries.
Our little village in France has the vestiges of a self-contained
community. As recently as the end of WWII, almost everything
people needed was produced right there. The farms grew
wheat. Farmers raised vegetables...and cows...pigs...chickens.
There was a machine shop...a forge...a woodworking atelier.
There still remain the 'Versailles' boxes, in which
lemon trees were planted. The boxes allowed the trees
to be moved into heated space in the winter. Otherwise,
they would freeze and die.
But as distance was annihilated, commerce in lemons
was born. There was no longer any need to plant lemon
trees in transportable wooden boxes when the lemons
themselves could be shipped, quickly and cheaply, by
the millions. One country can produce lemons. Another
can produce machine gun cartridges.
Individuals...towns...enterprises...regions...can divide
up the labor, work more efficiently, and produce more
things at lower cost. Everyone involved gets a little
richer.
There are really only two ways to get what you want
in life, dear reader. You can do so honestly...or dishonestly.
You can get it by working for it...or by stealing it.
You can get it by trade and commerce...or by force and
fraud. You can get it by civilized methods...or by barbaric
ones. You can get rich by "economic means"
or by "political means," as the great German
sociologist, Franz Oppenheimer put it. Globalization
is merely an elaboration of the economic means of getting
things. It requires civilized relationships to make
it work; people have to get along with each other in
order to trade. They must rely on others – even
other people in strange, faraway places – for
their daily bread. They must also be able to count on
the medium of exchange that they trade goods and services
in. If they can't trust the money, they are not likely
to want to do business.
The end of history has been announced several times.
But it never seems to arrive. People always tend to
think that what is will remain...that trends in place
right now will continue at least indefinitely, and perhaps
forever. The odds of anything going wrong, they tell
themselves when the going is good, are like the extreme
edges of a bell curve – vanishingly small. But
people badly "underestimate the persistence of
history's traditional side, the rise and fall of empires,
the rivalry of regimes, and the disastrous exploits
of great men," wrote French historian Raymond Aron.
That is to say, they tend to ignore the political means
that tend to mess things up...and the rare, fat tail
events that make history interesting.
Such a fat tail event happened in 1914. A European
war disturbed nearly 100 years of peace and progress.
People thought the war could not happen. And if it did
happen, they said, it would be short and sweet. They
were wrong on both points. Globalization had entered
a shrinking phase.
Then, on April 2, 1917, Woodrow Wilson stood before
Congress and announced that the world's biggest economy
was about to shift to "political means" to
get what it wanted. Instead of merely doing business
with the Entente powers, America, too, was going to
get involved in killing people. This day marked not
only another big setback for globalization...it also
establishes a frontier for where one empire ended and
another began. Britain ceased being the world's hegemonic
imperial power. Henceforth, the United States was the
cock of the walk...the Alpha nation...the biggest damned
bull in the field.
There are times when civilization goes forward. And
there are times when it goes in the other direction.
Woodrow Wilson slammed the United States into reverse
in 1917. It has been backing up ever since, in the sense
that Americans rely more on force and fraud to get what
they want. Gun-toting soldiers now defend America's
many supposed interests all over the world – even
in places where America seems to have no interests.
The U.S. government takes far more of its citizens'
money than it did in 1917...and provides detailed instructions
to Americans on such a wide variety of matters that
one can scarcely toss a chicken out the window or blow
up an outhouse without asking permission of the authorities.
But we're not complaining. For while the U.S. Empire
was growing, so was world trade. In the free world until
1989...and now almost everywhere...a "pax dollarum"
greatly aided the cause of globalization throughout
the second half of the 20th century. But this new globalized
commerce has a fraudulent side to it. The hegemonic
power is using political means, even while it shops.
During the last big boost in the division of labor,
in the 19th century up until 1914, the money in which
transactions were calibrated was backed by gold. No
country – not even an imperial one – could
cheat.
If a country consumed more than it produced, other
countries found themselves with surpluses of the laggard
nation's currency. They then could ask for gold in settlement.
Gold was real, the ultimate money. When a nation's gold
horde was in danger, it quickly adjusted its policies
to correct the imbalance. The dollar, on the other hand,
is merely a piece of paper, backed by nothing more than
the full faith and credit of the United States treasury.
How good a promise is that? No one knows for sure. Niall
Ferguson explains why it may be worth less than many
think:
"A rising proportion of Americans may consider
themselves to have been 'saved' in the Evangelical sense,
but they are less good at saving in the economic sense.
The personal savings rate among Americans stood at just
0.2 percent of disposable personal income in September
2004, compared with 7.7 percent less than 15 years ago.
Whether to finance domestic investment (in the late
1990s) or government borrowing (after 2000), the United
States has come to rely increasingly on foreign lending.
As the current account deficit has widened (it is not
approaching 6% of GDP), U.S. net overseas liabilities
have risen steeply to around 25% of GDP. Half of the
publicly held federal debt is now in foreign hands;
at the end of August 2004, the combined U.S. Treasury
holdings of China, Hong Kong, Japan, Singapore, South
Korea, and Taiwan were $1.1 trillion, up by 22% from
the end of 2003."
The odd thing about the spurt of globalization in the
last five years is that it's so lopsided. The U.S. takes...but
it doesn't give. It borrows...but it doesn't pay back.
It buys...but it doesn't sell. It imports...but it doesn't
export. The only reason foreigners put up with those
shenanigans is because they receive paper currency in
payment. They assume their dollars will be as valuable
in the future as they are now. They assume the trends
of the last 50 years will continue unchanged. They assume
that no terrorists will knock off an archduke...and
no fat tail will plop itself down in the currency markets.
They assume that someone, somewhere, had the situation
under control. And yet..."If the private market
– which knows that with high probability the dollar
is going down someday – decides that that someday
has come and that the dollar is going down now,"
writes Brad DeLong, "then all the Asian central
banks in the world cannot stop it."
What will happen when the world figures out that the
United States is pulling a fast one? We don't know.
But like the period following the sinking of the Lusitania,
we're sure it will make the history books. |
JAKARTA - The leaders
of Japan and China met Saturday at the close of the Asian-African
Summit to try to mend a serious rift between their two
countries.
The secretary general of the United Nations, Kofi Annan,
who was in Jakarta for the summit, told reporters he was
hoping good things would come from the meeting between
Japanese Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi and Chinese
President Hu Jintao.
"I hope that the meeting between the two leaders
will help reduce the temperature a little bit and set
their relations back on track," he said.
Koizumi and Hu smiled and shook hands before sitting
down to begin the talks, which were closed to the media.
|
Pupils at six secondary
schools in England are to be shown swearing, fighting and
downloading porn in a documentary filmed with hidden cameras.
They were filmed by a teacher using cameras in a button
and a briefcase. [...]
She says she saw chairs being smashed, pupils fighting
in class and that she was sworn at by pupils and was falsely
accused of touching them.
Other bad behaviour by pupils included verbal abuse,
general rowdiness and the use of mobile phones or CD players.
Teaching sometimes became impossible, she said.
Five's senior programme controller, Chris Shaw, said:
"I hope this film will open every parent's eyes to
the chaos that reigns in many classrooms and makes meaningful
teaching almost impossible." |
Russian President Vladimir Putin
denies there had been a cooling in relations between
Moscow and the United States, saying he had "very
good personal ties" with President George W. Bush.
"Russia and the United States have a great deal
of common interests and joint work. This lies at the
basis of our very good personal relations with the US
president," Putin said in an interview with Israel's
First channel, a text of which was provided by the Kremlin
press service.
Putin described Washington and Moscow's position on
Iran's nuclear program and the Middle East peace process
as "very close".
"I know the US president voiced his support for
the (Middle East) roadmap peace plan, and I am of the
same opinion," he said.
The roadmap is a phased plan which aims to end nearly
five years of violence in the region by creating an
independent Palestinian state alongside a secure Israel.
US Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice earlier this
week praised Russia as a US strategic partner but slammed
Moscow for backsliding on democratic reforms, voicing
concern about Putin's centralization of power and clampdown
on independent broadcast media.
Rice criticized the judiciary, warned
Putin against illegally seeking a third term in 2008
and cautioned that "people are watching" to
see how state moves against the oil giant Yukos and
its jailed chairman play out.
Putin brushed off the concerns, saying they were Moscow's
internal affairs.
"We can share no opinions on Russia's internal
affairs, because Russia's internal affairs are our business,"
even though "we find our partners' opinion interesting,
if it is objective and friendly, not an instrument to
gain their own interests", he said.
"As for 2008, we have the constitution,
and we will act according to the Russian law, not the
view held by our partners, however respected,"
Putin added.
Putin is due to visit Israel on Wednesday
and Thursday, in the first visit by a Moscow leader
to the Jewish state. |
Poland is demanding that Israel
extradite for trial a Jewish man accused of brutal tortures
and mass killings in a Soviet concentration camp.
Solomon Morel, 86, was commandant of a death camp at
Swietochlowice, Poland after World War II. The camp's
population included many innocent Polish men, women,
and children of German descent whose homes, businesses
and belongings had been seized by Jewish communist authorities.
The victims were then herded into numerous concentration
camps, one at Swietochlowice.
Morel was indicted in 1994 by a Polish court and ordered
to face charges of "crimes against humanity."
Among the crimes the Jewish commandant
allegedly committed: murders by bashing the heads of
babies against stone walls; bludgeoning inmates to death
with stools and clubs; inflicting extreme pain by forcing
objects up inmates' anus; forcing women and children
to parade around nude in subfreezing temperatures; making
inmates eat human feces; and starving people to death.
Upon his indictment, Solomon Morel, assisted by the
Israeli government, fled to Tel Aviv, Israel where he
has been hiding out. American television's 60 Minutes
program tracked him down and located Morel in that city.
His whereabouts are known to the
Israeli authorities.
Up to 80,000 people are believed to
have died as a result of torture, deprivation, and starvation
in post-World War II concentration camps, all of which
were headed by Jewish commandants.
According to a report in London's The Telegraph, newspaper
(January 2, 2005) and in John Sack's investigative book,
An Eye for An Eye, "Stalin deliberately picked
Jews as camp commandants in the knowledge they would
show little mercy to the inmates."
The Polish public prosecutor leading the Morel case,
Eva Kok, insisted that the claims could not be "swept
under the carpet." She added: "The Israelis
are extremely efficient in pursuing people they have
accused of such crimes - and they must accept that other
nations want to do the same."
(Note: For additional information on Solomon Morel
and the Jews who committed barbaric acts in Soviet concentration
camps, Power of Prophecy offers John Sack's eye-opening
exposé book, An Eye For An Eye, $15 plus S&H.
Order by phone 1-800-234-9673, or write to Power of
Prophecy, 1708 Patterson Road, Austin, Texas 78733) |
LONDON - Young, hip,
educated - and anti-Semitic.
Is this the latest trend on elite British campuses?
The recent refusal by the biggest university students'
union in the country to condemn anti-Semitic attacks suggests
that, sadly, this could be the case.
The group, known as the National Union of Students (NUS),
with 5.5 million members and headquarters in a London
building named for Nelson Mandela, failed to support three
Jewish students who resigned from its executive last week,
in protest of a lack of action amidst growing anti-Semitism
on campus.
Student union leaders allowed anti-Jewish leaflets to
be distributed at their general meeting in London - without
comment. The literature contained material saying that
Jews are part of a plot for worldwide domination.
Further, the executive declined to investigate complaints
about a comment that burning down a synagogue is a "rational
act." Leaders have refused for months to take action
over anti-Semitic slurs and actions, which are occurring
at some of the world's finest schools, according to reports.
The issue hit the front page in the U.K. because one
of the students involved is Luciana Berger, 23, who is
romantically linked to Euan Blair, the eldest son of British
Prime Minister Tony Blair.
She left the NUS conference in tears, after a resignation
speech in which she accused student leaders of turning
a "blind eye" to anti-Semitism on campus.
"(The union) says it is proud of its policy of diversity,
but it should be ashamed. The situation cannot be allowed
to get worse," Berger told reporters, adding that
she has been spat on and called a "dirty Zionist
pig."
The controversy is occurring this spring as international
organizations mark 60th anniversary dates of the end of
World War II, during which the Nazis exterminated 6 million
Jews. This week, there were ceremonies at the Bergen-Belsen
camp where Anne Frank died in the gas chamber.
It is also occurring amidst a sharp increase in anti-Semitic
acts across Britain - up 42 per cent to 532 incidents
in 2004 - and a feeling of isolation among Jewish students.
"We are being lumped into groups of good Jews and
bad Jews," Danny Stone, from the Union of Jewish
Students, told the Toronto Star. "Good Jews oppose
the Israeli army and the occupation of Palestine and bad
Jews support Zionism. But the truth is it's easy to dislike
any Jew.
"It has become acceptable for the intelligentsia
to go beyond harbouring racist thoughts and actually put
them into practice," he added. "We're very upset
about the climate here."
He stressed that statistics cover reported incidents
only, adding that many go unreported.
In The Sunday Telegram last weekend, Berger accused all
political parties, including Blair's Labour party, of
inflaming racial tensions over issues of immigration and
asylum in the campaign for the May 5 vote. There is a
nasty undertone to campaign language and she said it is
urgent that people do not remain silent.
"One lesson we learn from the Holocaust is that
when silence prevails, evil triumphs," James Smith,
director of the Beth Shalom Holocaust Centre, said in
a statement this week.
"We are acutely aware of where anti-Semitism and
racist hatred ultimately lead. It is essential that the
lessons of the Holocaust are applied by our student community
- the future leaders of British society."
To date, the student union executive has not investigated
the resignations.
A spokesperson said leaders are waiting for a written
complaint from Berger, and the other students, before
taking action.
"We need the reasons for their resignations in writing.
We must ensure that everything is done properly,"
insisted the official, asking to remain anonymous because
she doesn't sit on the executive.
She was unable to explain why reasons are necessary,
given that Berger detailed what's going on in a speech
to delegates at the NUS meeting, before resigning. As
well, complaints in writing have poured into NUS headquarters
for months, without results. Letters of protest have continued
in recent days.
NUS president Kat Fletcher was not available for comment.
"You and other members of (the union executive)
should be leading by example," Simon Goliogorsky,
of the Union of Jewish Students, wrote to Fletcher last
week.
He criticized their "collective disinterest in fighting
anti-Semitism (on) campuses such as Leeds, Oxford, the
School for Oriental and African Studies (at the University
of London) and Birmingham, (where) Jewish students have
suffered from acts of violence and verbal abuse because
they are Jewish."
Jason Pearlman, a spokesperson for the influential Board
of Directors of British Jews, says there is a correlation
between the rise in anti-Semitic incidents in Britain
and British policy in the Middle East - both support for
the Israeli government and participation in the invasion
of Iraq.
He is concerned that "liberal and open-minded"
people who oppose British policy on the Middle East seem
to feel it is justified and acceptable that British Jews
are punished as a consequence.
"It is very tangible. We feel it in the streets.
Thank God, there have been no deaths yet, but is getting
ugly," he said.
At 22, he added that he finds it particularly distasteful
to hear anti-Jewish sentiment from his peers.
Berger has been particularly critical of the "liberal
left" in her comments.
In another letter to NUS leaders, Jewish union student
Martyn Redstone asked why they continually ignore complaints,
including an article in a leading student magazine advocating
suicide terrorism by Palestinians.
As well, a speaker at a recent school forum said: "I
am not going to say whether it is right or wrong to burn
down synagogues. I can see that it is a rational act."
Redstone added that Fletcher should have pledged to investigate
reports of anti-Semitic incidents.
The National Union of Students underscores its message
of "equality, diversity and democracy at its core"
on its website, and boasts: "We are proud of our
record in tackling racism, fascism and anti-Semitism where
it occurs."
Says Jewish student activist Stone: "Except where
it occurs right under their noses." |
RAMALLAH, April 23
(Xinhuanet) -- Palestinian leader Mahmoud Abbas is expected
to meet with Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon before
his visit to Washington in May, Palestinian and Israeli
sources said on Saturday.
Abbas met with Sharon in February, when they agreed
on a mutual ceasefire at a summit at the Egyptian Red
Sea resort of Sharm el-Sheikh.
Chief Palestinian negotiator Saeb Erekat met on Friday
with Sharon's advisor Dov Weisglass. They discussed matters
concerning a meeting between Abbas and Sharon, but no
date has been set.
Meanwhile, Palestinian sources said Saturday that Abbas
congratulated Israeli President Moshe Katsav and Sharon
on the Jewish holiday of Passover.
Speaking to Katsav and Sharon separately over phone,
Abbas expressed his hope that Passover would be a beginning
for peace for all people. |
AUT Council today decided to boycott
Haifa University and the Bar-Ilan University.
The executive committee will issue guidance to AUT
members on these decisions.
Council delegates also referred a call to boycott the
Hebrew University of Jerusalem and the executive committee
will investigate the background to this and will report
in due course.
Council delegates also agreed to circulate to all local
associations a statement from Palestinian organisations
calling for an academic boycott of Israeli institutions.
|
SAN FRANCISCO - IBM and the chief
scientist of Israel's Ministry of Industry, Trade and
Labor on Friday said they have agreed to a pact to foster
development of open-standards technology by Israeli
start-ups.
The pact calls for IBM to provide hardware, technology
expertise and sales and marketing support, while the
Israeli Ministry of Industry, Trade and Labor will supply
funding to Israeli start-ups. No financial terms were
disclosed.
IBM officials said individual companies might stand
to receive government grants of up to $100,000 or more.
IBM is the biggest, but not the exclusive, technology
vendor taking part in the Israeli industrial research
and development program. [...]
"It is not money (that) we are providing,"
said Meir Nissensohn, IBM Israel general manager. "We
are providing access to technology, experts, (research)
centers and access to global markets." IBM seeks
to combine such innovations into their own broader lines
of hardware and software, he added.
Israel is home to 4,000 technology
companies, second only to California's Silicon Valley
in its concentration of technological innovation.
IBM is working with more than 700 software vendors
in Israel, and has active marketing or sales relationships
with 150 firms, the company said.
Israeli companies that Armonk, New York-based IBM is
already are working include start-ups like Actimize,
CashU and ItemField, along with established companies
such as Nice Systems Ltd. and Retalix Ltd.
Gabriel Tal, an executive with
an arm of IBM's sales and distribution in Israel, is
looking to support software developers in the area of
computer security systems and storage management,
for example.
The goal of the agreement is to help accelerate the
adoption of open standards in Israel, while at the same
time helping Israeli start-ups expand in Israel and
globally.
Open standards is an approach to technology development
in which inventors make the underlying progamming code
publicly available for other developers to build on
and extend. It contrasts with the proprietary, or closed
development approach most major technology companies,
led by Microsoft Corp., have used to maximize their
control over products they build. [...] |
It was hardly an intimate
gathering, but I got my audience with Pope Benedict.
The world's media have been swarming all over the Vatican
since the death of John Paul II.
Over the past month, we have seen some extraordinary
sights in and around St Peter's Square.
We witnessed the vigils for the dying pope, and marvelled
at the millions who came to say farewell.
There was the solemn splendour of a papal funeral, and
the excitement of the white smoke that greeted the election
of his successor.
Today, Benedict XVI called us in, 4,000 of us, to thank
us for our journalistic efforts.
Lucky tourists
The tension of the past weeks seemed to have evaporated.
No more police cordons and arguments about passes and
access. Even the usually stern Swiss Guards were smiling.
We were ushered into a vast audience hall used by popes
to greet pilgrims. Even with so many journalists present,
the hall was only half full.
The Vatican quietly allowed in groups of startled tourists,
to fill up some of the vacant seats behind us.
They couldn't believe their luck. They were expecting
a stroll around St Peter's Square in the sunshine. Instead
they got to see the Pope.
"Fortuna, fortuna," said one couple from Sicily,
in disbelief: "We were so lucky!"
It was a smart move by the Vatican. Pilgrims, being less
cynical than hardened journalists, could be relied on
to cheer and clap in the right places.
In fact, the papal minders need not have worried. The
journalists were neatly attired for the occasion, with
male correspondents wearing suits and ties.
And when the pope walked in, everyone stood and applauded,
in many cases with real enthusiasm.
Having been shown due respect, Benedict XVI seemed prepared
to forgive us for all those reports saying how many Catholics
were alarmed by his election.
'Thanks for the coverage'
Sitting on a papal throne that looked too big for his
small frame, the pope pulled out his gold-rimmed reading
glasses and proceeded to address us in Italian, English,
French and German.
"Thanks to all of you, these historically important
events have had worldwide coverage," he said.
"I know how hard you have worked, far away from
your homes and families, for long hours and in sometimes
difficult conditions."
The international media made a mental note to pass on
the Pope's words to their editors.
I noticed that the pontiff was wearing the red leather
slippers that I had seen a few days earlier in the window
of the papal tailors.
At the end of the audience, which lasted about 15 minutes,
Benedict XVI rose to give us his blessing.
Then with a friendly wave and the words "Grazie,
arrivederci!" he left the stage.
This was not, by any stretch of the imagination, a press
conference. There was no opportunity for the media to
ask any questions, polite or otherwise.
Some journalists were disappointed that the Pope's remarks
contained nothing of substance to give us a clue about
the direction his papacy will take.
Controlled papacy
The style was also a little different from the audience
for the press given by John Paul II, back in 1978.
Then, in a media melee, the new pope shook hands with
reporters, and responded to their shouted questions.
Today's proceedings were more dignified and everything
was firmly under control. In fact, some people believe
control may be the watchword for this papacy.
However, the way some British newspapers have reported
the background of the Pope - including his enforced membership
of the Hitler Youth - has irritated the media in Germany.
"It is so silly, but they do the same at every football
match," said one German TV journalist.
"They use the language of the war when we should
be looking forward, not bringing up the past."
Following the media profiles, the new Pope has surprised
many people with his engaging manner, which is rather
at odds with his image as a hard-line conservative.
On Sunday, at his inaugural mass, he has the opportunity
to win more hearts and minds. |
ST. JOHN'S, NFLD. -
The Boston Globe on Friday retracted a story by a Halifax-based
freelance writer that purported to describe the opening
of the seal hunt.
The story, which was published Wednesday, contained details
that "hunters on about 300 boats converged on ice
floes, shooting seal cubs by the hundreds, as the ice
and water turned red."
However, the seal hunt was actually delayed until Friday
morning due to bad weather.
The newspaper said the story should not have been published,
and the Globe has discontinued use of correspondent Barbara
Stewart.
"The author's failure to accurately report the status
of the hunt and her fabrication of details at the scene
are clear violations of the Globe's journalistic standards,"
the Globe said in an editor's note on its website.
"Because the freelancer was not reporting from the
scene, Globe editors should have demanded attribution
for any details she provided about the hunt itself,"
the newspaper said.
The Boston Globe is owned by The New York Times Co. |
A HUGE asteroid which
is on a course to miss the Earth by a whisker in 2029
could go round its orbit again
and score a direct hit a few years later.
Astronomers have calculated that the 1,000ft-wide asteroid
called 2004 MN4 will pass by the Earth at a distance
of between 15,000 and 25,000 miles - about a tenth of
the distance between the Earth and the Moon and close
enough to be seen with the naked eye.
Although they are sure that it will miss us, they are
worried about the disturbance that such a close pass
will give to the asteroid's orbit. It might put 2004
MN4 on course for a collision in 2034 or a year or two
later: the unpredictability of its behaviour means that
the danger might not become apparent until it is too
late. [...] |
Astronomers tone down
the Torino Earth-impact scale.
After 5 years of frequently controversial warnings
about possible-but- unlikely asteroid encounters, astronomers
have modified the Torino impact hazard scale. They hope
the revised scale will let them inform the public about
near-Earth objects (NEOs) without causing needless alarm.
Massachusetts Institute of Technology astronomers created
the Torino scale in 1999 to alert the public to the
risk of asteroids or comets striking Earth. The scale
ranked Earth-approaching objects from zero, virtually
no risk of impact or damage, to ten, a certain "global
climatic catastrophe." [...]
The new scale suggests that public attention is merited
only if there is more than one chance in 100 of a regionally
damaging impact within a decade.
Previously, a NEO rating of 2 on the Torino scale would
have been described as "meriting concern."
Now, however, it will carry the comment, "While
meriting attention by astronomers, there is no cause
for public attention … or concern."
Many astronomers support the change. "This is
a step toward making the public aware of this very low
probability but high risk phenomenon," says Yeomans.[...]
Robert Adler is a freelance science writer living in
Santa Rosa, California. He is the author of Science
Firsts: From the Creation of Science to the Science
of Creation (Wiley & Sons, 2002). |
MINETTO - Amateur astonomer
Joseph Bush said he can, and does, spend hours at a time
with his eye to the lens watching the Moon.
"I've been fascinated with the Moon since I was
a kid," said Bush. He remembers his first telescope
was from the Montgomery Ward catalog - a far cry from
the remote-controlled, 1,900mm Meade 125 scope he uses
now.
"I can pick up a marble sitting on the Moon with
this thing," he added, nodding at his telescope.
Which is why at 4 o'clock in the morning on clear nights,
while most of us are asleep in our beds, Bush can be found
out on his back deck or front yard staring into space.
Bush said although he has no formal training in astronomy,
he has been researching and reading everything he can,
particularly about the Moon.
"People say the Moon is dead, but
it's still alive," he said. "I've got (photos
with) eruptions coming off of the Moon."
Bush takes pictures with a 35mm camera
attached to the telescope, using 110 speed black-and-white
film to eliminate what he calls "noise," or
spots, on the photos you would normally get with color
film. He pointed out as there is no atmosphere on the
Moon, he cannot say the short-lived eruptions are volcanic,
but suggests it is high-pressure steam being released.
Bush claims he is the only man who has caught an eruption
on the Moon on film. He keeps up a e-mail correspondence
with Dr. James B, Garvin, lead scientist for Mars Exploration
with NASA.
"When I sent him my photos, they
actually turned the Hubble Space Telescope (HST) to check
it out," he said.
According to an e-mail received from Garvin by Bush,
this is indeed unusual as the HST is used primarily for
space observations much further away than the Moon, which
is "only" about 384,403 kilometers (238,857
miles) from Earth, a figure that changes as it orbits
Earth.
Because of how busy the HST is for what Garvin describes
as "critical astrophysical observations, finding
time to make lunar observations with it is difficult.
"This is why it is important for people such as
yourselves and other Earth-based telescopic observers
to continue to look at the Moon," writes Garvin.
Although he prefers the manual method, his state-of-the-art
telescope is equipped with a remote control which can
pinpoint about 40,000 different celestial bodies. All
you need to do, explained Bush, is set the telescope up
so it is facing dead north, select the body you want to
view and press "go to" on the remote.
"I once actually caught a meteor
as it slammed into the Moon," said Bush. "I
saw a blue flash and then I could see dirt flying all
over when it hit."
Bush said it is common to see meteorites,
pieces of a meteor, hitting the Moon's surface, however,
but it was a rare occurrence to catch a meteor strike.
"The Moon is our sister planet,"
he said. "It keeps us in orbit, governs our seas
and it takes a lot of (meteorite) hits for us."
He said by Lake Ontario and in particular, Fair Haven,
are great places to set up because they are so clear.
Bush has a photo of what is called a star burst, which
is when a star explodes.
"It's so far away, it probably actually exploded
millions of years ago, and we are just seeing it now,"
he said.
Because he watches the Moon so often
and for hours at a time, Bush has seen things he said
he cannot identify, which he calls, of course, UFOs (unidentified
flying objects).
"Everything I've taken (photos)
so far as the UFOs have come from the southwest (sky),"
he said. "I've picked up some small unidentified
objects between 700-900 miles out."
When it comes to UFOs, he said his colleagues
at NASA, such as Garvin, of course will neither confirm
nor deny these sightings as UFOs. But, this does not deter
Bush, who understands NASA's stance on the matters of
UFOs. He continues to send NASA all of his sightings,
under the enthusiastic encouragement of Garvin who writes,
"Both Dr. (Anne) Kinney, our leading astronomer and
director at NASA headquarters, and myself are very impressed
with your work and interest and look forward to continued
interactions."
Bush resides in Minetto with his wife, Betty. |
He had lain in his
icy tomb on an Alpine glacier in northern Italy for
5,300 years, a perfectly preserved Stone Age warrior,
complete with fur robes, leather shoes and bow and arrow.
But since being found 14 years ago, five of the people
who came in close contact with Oetzi the Iceman have
died, leading to the inevitable question: is the mummy
cursed?
Konrad Spindler, head of the Iceman investigation team
at Innsbruck University, died on Monday, apparently
from complications arising from multiple sclerosis.
But that has not stopped his name being linked to a
string of strange deaths related to the mummy.[...]
The other "victims" of the mummy include
the forensic expert Dr Rainer Henn, who placed the cadaver
in a body bag with his bare hands, and who died in a
road accident on his way to a conference to discuss
his famous subject.
The Alpine guide Kurt Fritz organised the transportation
by helicopter of the mummified remains, and was killed
by a snowslide in an accident in the mountains, in an
area he knew well. He was the only one of a party of
climbers to die.
Then there was journalist Rainer Hoelz, who filmed
the recovery of the Iceman, and who died of a brain
tumour.
The fourth death was that of Helmut Simon, the German
tourist who spotted the Iceman in 1991 while on a walking
trip with his wife. He became bitter that he was not
recognised or financially compensated for his discovery.
Last October he failed to return from a mountain hike
and was found dead eight days later, the victim of a
300ft fall. Local newspapers recorded that his body
was found frozen, under a sheet of snow and ice.
A possible sixth victim has also been named, that of
Dieter Warnecke, the man who helped find the missing
69-year-old and who died of a heart attack after attending
his funeral.[...] |
URUMQI, China --
After years of controversy and political intrigue, archaeologists
using genetic testing have proved that Caucasians roamed
China's Tarim Basin 1,000 years before East Asian people
arrived.
The research finding -- which the Beijing government
apparently delayed releasing, fearing it could fuel
Uighur Muslim separatism in China's western- most Xinjiang
region -- is based on a cache of ancient dried-out corpses
that have been found around the Tarim Basin in recent
decades.
The discoveries in the 1980s of the undisturbed 4,000-year-old
"Beauty of Loulan" and the 3,000-year-old
body of the "Charchan Man" are legendary in
international archaeological circles for the fine state
of their preservation and for the wealth of knowledge
they bring to modern research.
In historic and scientific circles, the discoveries
along the ancient Silk Road were on a par with finding
the Egyptian mummies.
But the separatists in Xinjiang have embraced the
Caucasoid mummies as evidence that the Uighurs do not
belong in China, forcing Beijing to slow the research.
"It is unfortunate that the issue has been so
politicized, because it has created a lot of difficulties,"
said Victor Mair, a specialist in the ancient corpses
and co-author of "The Tarim Mummies."
The desiccated corpses, which avoided natural decomposition
because of the dry atmosphere and alkaline soils in
the Tarim Basin, have given historians a glimpse of
life in the Bronze Age.
Mr. Mair, a University of Pennsylvania professor who
played a pivotal role in bringing the discoveries to
Western scholars in the 1990s, has struggled to take
samples out of China for genetic testing. One recent
expedition was allowed to take five samples out.
"From the evidence available, we have found that
during the first 1,000 years after the Loulan Beauty,
the only settlers in the Tarim Basin were Caucasoid,"
Mr. Mair said.
East Asian peoples began showing up in the eastern
portions of the Tarim Basin only about 3,000 years ago,
he said, while the Uighurs arrived after the collapse
of the Orkhon Uighur Kingdom, largely based in modern-day
Mongolia, about the year 842.
A study last year by Jilin University also found that
the mummies' DNA had Europoid genes.
Meanwhile, Yingpan Man, a nearly perfectly preserved
2,000-year-old Caucasoid mummy, was allowed this month
to leave China for the first time, and is being displayed
at the Edo-Tokyo Museum.
The Yingpan Man, discovered in 1995 in the region
that bears his name, has a gold foil death mask -- a
Greek tradition -- covering his blond bearded face,
and wears elaborate golden embroidered red and maroon
garments with seemingly Western European designs.
His nearly 6-foot-6 body is the tallest of all the
mummies found, and the clothes and artifacts discovered
in the surrounding tombs suggest the highest level of
Caucasoid civilization in the ancient Tarim Basin region.
When the Yingpan Man returns from Tokyo to Urumqi,
where he has long been kept out of public eye, he is
expected to be finally put on display when the Xinjiang
Museum opens this year. |
In a Collector's Edition
entitled "Secrets of the Da Vinci Code," published
by US News and World Report, there is a brief interview
with James Robinson, general editor of the Nag Hammadi
Library. In response to Dan Brown's reference to the
Nag Hammadi texts as scrolls, Robinson points out: "They
are codices – books with individual pages. They
are actually the oldest example we have of leather-bound
books."
Amazingly, whatever the significance of their content
(and we have just barely begun to comprehend what that
might be), the Nag Hammadi Codices (NHC) are rare original
artifacts, the earliest surviving examples of bound
books. A close reading of these arcane materials shows
that Gnostics were deeply concerned with alien intrusion
into human affairs. The entities they called Archons
appear to be identical to the ET's of modern Ufology.
Both Grey and Reptilian types are explicitly described
in the codices. I would estimate that up to one-fifth
of the core material in the NHC concerns the Archons,
their origin, methods and motives.[...]
So, the earliest surviving books contain a description
of Alien intrusion, but what about the earliest known
writings? Archeologists tell us that cuneiform writing
was invented in Mesopotamia around 3200. The cuneiform
record gives us the most extensive repertoire of stories
about human prehistory. Cuneiform texts such as Atrahasis,
Enuma Elish, and Enki and World Order, present stories
of a non-human race called the Annunaki, "those
who from heaven to earth came," as Zecharia Sitchin
translates that term. Sitchin is known for densely researched
books on the Annunaki, whom he identifies with the Biblical
Nefhilim, "the Watchers" of the Book of Enoch.
These are alien entities who "came into the daughters
of men," as Genesis says.
The story of the Annunaki describes how an alien race
intervenes deeply in human evolution. Sitchin and others
accept this plot as if it were an actual record of events
in prehistory. Cuneiform tablets describe how two Annunaki
leaders, Enki and his half-sister Ninhursag, produced
a hybrid, slave race from the indigenous ape-like peoples
of the planet. Hence, an alien "interbreeding program"
is central to the Annunaki narrative. It
is an indisputable fact that this story is written down
in the oldest surviving records, but is the story
itself a fact?
Both the oldest writings and the earliest
books tell us the same story. Isn't this amazing? To
my knowledge, little or no attention has yet been given
to this odd "coincidence."
However, there is a world of difference in the way
the story is treated in these two sources. The cuneiform
record tells the intervention scenario as if it were
(pre)historical fact, a set of events that really happened.
In the NHC, the story of the Annunaki (Archons) is introduced
in a cosmological perspective, and then it is analyzed.
In other words, the Gnostics had a view of the cosmic
origins of the Annunaki, and they also took a critical
approach to intervention. The cuneiform record is just
a story, without critical commentary. The description
of alien interbreeding occurs in both cases, but the
NHC tell us the attempt failed:
"The Archons came to Adam. When they saw Eve talking
to him they said to each other, 'What sort of creature
is this luminous woman?' … Now come, let us lay
hold of her and cast our seed into her, that she may
become soiled and unable to access her inner light.
Then those who she bears will be under our charge…
But Eve, being a free power, laughed at their decision.
She put mist in their eyes [and escaped them]."
(The Origin of the World, 116)
This is one of several NHC passages that show Eve outwitting
the Archons. It presents a mythological event, and comments
on the outcome of that event. In the Gnostic view, the
Archon/Annunaki do attempt to interbreed with humanity,
but fail. Other texts describe how Eve leaves her "phantom
image" which the Archons defile, but they are unable
to actually access her body, i.e., human genetic structure.
The "Reptilian Agenda" is a modern interpretation
and extension of the Sumerian cuneiform story, but it
ignores the Gnostic version of that story, and the critical
commentary. Sitchin's weak points are his inability
to present a convincing case for the origin and motives
of the Annunaki, and his failure (or refusal) to describe
their physical appearance. Most ET theorists who follow
him assume the Annunaki are Reptilians: for instance,
R. A. Boulay in Flying Serpents and Dragons (an excellent
book, by the way, and more deeply researched than Sitchin
in some ways). The entire Reptilian Agenda stands or
falls on how we view the cuneiform accounts, the oldest
version of the alien intrusion plot.
But who wrote the cuneiform stories? The answer is,
scribes in the service of the Sumerian theocrats. This
answer is not complete, however, because scribes write
things down, they do not originate what they write.
Who then originated the cuneiform intervention stories
taken down by scribes? I propose that it was soothsayers
and advisors in the service of the theocrats. No ancient
court was without a psychic channeller, if not a whole
team of them. If we assume the critical distance of
the Gnostics, we can understand how psychics advising
the theocrats would produce a story to fit the need
of their masters: specifically, the need to see themselves
as descendents of "gods" and, at the same
time, as slaves )albeit privileged ones) to a higher
race that claims to have produced them. This message
is schizophrenic, and as such it is totally consistent
with channeled material and the mentality that produces
it.
If the cuneiform stories are the product of psychic
channeling in ancient times, the Reptilian Agenda, the
modern elaboration of those stories, needs to be entirely
reexamined in the light of Gnostic Archon theory. The
first step in confronting the Reptilian menace, whatever
it is, is to set the story straight. |
The primary purpose
of this paper is to explore the free speech implications
of the censorship campaign that has been waged against
David Icke in Canada by Richard Warman and other members
of the Canadian and Ontario Green parties, who were,
at least initially, assisted in their efforts by various
non-governmental organizations (NGOs)....This paper
will examine the nature and extent of the campaign against
David Icke, the justifications that have
been used to support it, and the various deceptive and
dangerous tactics that have been used to enforce it.
[...] |
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