Twenty-three killed in Middle East 'tit for tat' violence

By Ravi Nessman, AP
11 June 2003

A Palestinian suicide bomber blew himself up on a bus in central Jerusalem today, killing at least 16 people and wounding 70 a day after Hamas threatened bloody revenge for an Israeli attack on one of its leaders. Passengers were hurled from the bus by the force of the blast.

Less than an hour later, Israeli attack helicopters fired missiles at a car in Gaza City, killing at least seven Palestinians, including two Hamas militants and five bystanders. Witnesses said several missiles were fired as bystanders were trying to pull the passengers out of the car.

Abdel Aziz Rantisi, a Hamas co–founder and target of Israel's failed attack on yesterday, stopped short of claiming direct responsibility for the Jerusalem bombing. Speaking to The Associated Press from his hospital bed, he said that "the Zionists will pay an expensive price for all of their crimes."

He said the bus bombing "took place at a time when the Zionists were on utmost alert, more evidence that our people will not be defeated."

Today's explosion went off during evening rush hour on city bus No. 14 on Jaffa Street, Jerusalem's main thoroughfare, near the Mahane Yehuda outdoor market which has repeatedly been targeted by Palestinian militants in the past.

The blast blew out windows and tore a large hole into the left side of the red–and–white bus. The bus had just left Jerusalem's nearby central bus station when the explosion went off. [...]

Comment: While the above report says "less than an hour later", most reports specify that the Israelis struck back " minutes later". Seems like Sharon was a little too eager on this one and may have left himself and the truth exposed. That is, Israel must have known beforehand about the suicide bombing which is natural when we consider that Israel trained and funded Hamas.

We noitice in the above report that Abdel Aziz Rantisi, a co-founder of Hamas and the subject, two days ago, of an Israeli assassination bid, does not claim responsibility for yesterday's bus bombing, he simply says, "the Zionists will pay an expensive price for all of their crimes." Perhaps one of Israel's crimes that he has knowledge of is that Israel murders its own people in faked "suicide bus bombings."

Bush Condemns Deadly Jerusalem Bombing

By JENNIFER LOVEN
The Associated Press
Wednesday, June 11

CHICAGO - President Bush deplored Wednesday's bus bombing in Jerusalem and urged all nations to block financial assistance to the Palestinian militant group Hamas and similar organizations and "isolate those who hate so much that they are willing to kill to stop peace."

Visibly angry, Bush spoke after a suicide bomber blew himself up on a bus in downtown Jerusalem, killing more than a dozen people and wounding dozens more. "Today there was a terrible bombing in Jerusalem," Bush said. [...]

The bombing came just a week after Bush stood with Palestinian Prime Minister Mahmoud Abbas and Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon in Aqaba, Jordan, to announce support for the so-called "road map" to peace and a Palestinian state alongside Israel.

That plan calls on both sides to end violence.

But Bush found himself for the third day in a row denouncing new outbreaks of violence in Israel. [...]

On Tuesday, Bush said Israel's helicopter attack on the Hamas leader could make it harder for the new Palestinian leadership to combat terrorism and made no contribution to Israel's security - some of his administration's strongest words against Israeli actions to combat Palestinian terrorism.

Comment: It's just jaw dropping for Dubya to say ""isolate those who hate so much that they are willing to kill to stop peace."

What?

Time for a FLASHBACK! Is Dubya Nuts? - As a board-certified psychiatrist, I feel it's my duty to share my understanding of his psychopathology. Possibilities: Antisocial Personality Disorder - Dissociative Identity Disorder - Narcissistic personality disorder - Dependent Personality Disorder

Comments from readers on "Is Dubya Nuts?":

1) I read the above 'diagnosis', and if I did not have any experience at all with GWB, I would say he is definitely an organic portal and totally STS in orientation.

2) From a Spirit Attachment point of view all that diagnosis would pale into insignificance with the probable amount of extremely dark attachments filling up every nook and cranny of this pyramidal OP. Only the best for Dubya. Lucky critters that they are....

3) Although I personally favor the idea that Dubya suffers from brain damage caused by Greenbaum programming, this site offers a plausible third-density hypothesis:

Alcoholics Anonymous has a name for someone who is a drunk in every way except for the actual imbibing of spirits. Whether George W. Bush is or was an alcoholic is not the point here. I am taking him at his word that he stopped what he termed "heavy drinking" in 1986, at age 40. The point here is that, based on Bush's recent behavior, he could very well be a "dry drunk." Of course, he may just be an immature bully who will gladly sacrifice thousands of lives to get his way even against the advice of the most respected and mature members of his own party. Still, Bush's past battles with the bottle are worth pondering at a time like this, one of the most dangerous in the nation's history.

Expert warns of dangers of the corporate psychopath - Corporate executives should be screened for psychopathic behaviour disorders, just as teachers and police are, a leading Canadian researcher says. "Why wouldn't we want to screen for them?" Robert Hare said yesterday after a speech to 150 members of the Canadian Police Association. "We screen ... police, teachers. Why not people who are going to handle hundreds of billions of dollars?" - He turned his attention to a little-known subset of psychopaths: the corporate kind. - The problem, he said, is corporate headhunters rely on resumes and standard face-to-face interviews, which reveal little about a candidate's psychological profile. "The average psychopath has no trouble moving through that process," Dr. Hare, who teaches at the University of British Columbia, said. "That's not even a hurdle." - When there's chaos, when the rules no longer apply -- enter, stage right, the psychopath. A psychopath flourishes in that atmosphere."

There are other arenas where the psychopath flourishes - the New Age COINTELPRO, for example. We have been slowly, but surely, wading through this issue and much of the Adventures Series is devoted to the subject and our own experiences with psychopathy. We have posted a chapter of Hervey Cleckley's groundbreaking study on the site, which describes in some detail the exact type of personality that alerted us to this problem.

One thing you can say for him, Sodamn Insane knows how to play to the public! Bush-the-boy-emperor, on the other hand, makes jokes about sending people to the execution chamber. ("Please," Bush whimpers, his lips pursed in mock desperation, "don't kill me." — Bush mocking what Karla Faye Tucker said on Larry King when asked, "What would you say to Governor Bush?" prior to her execution by lethal injection as reported by Talk magazine, September 1999)

As it turns out, the Larry King-Karla Faye Tucker exchange Bush recounted never took place, at least not on television. During her interview with King, however, Tucker did imply that Bush was succumbing to election-year pressure from pro-death penalty voters. Apparently Bush never forgot it. He has a long memory for slights." [Carlson, Talk, 9/99]

Bush himself, as Maureen Dowd points out in her lampoon piece, operates at about the intellectual level of a 10 year old. However, there is something far more troubling about Bush's use of language. Have a look at some of his most revealing comments:

"There ought to be limits to freedom. We're aware of the site, and this guy is just a garbage man." — Bush, commenting on the website www.gwbush.com

"I will do everything in my power to restrict abortions." — George W. Bush, Dallas Morning News October 22, 1994

"I saw the report that children in Texas are going hungry. Where? You'd think the governor would have heard if there are pockets of hunger in Texas." — George W. Bush whose state ranks 2n in total number of children living in poverty to Austin American Statesman, 12/18/99

"People that are really very weird can get into sensitive positions and have a tremendous impact on history." "If I decide to [run for President], it will be to restore the promise of America. And I'll define what that means later." (11/15/98)

"The vast majority of our imports come from outside the country."

"The Holocaust was an obscene period in our nation's history. I mean in this century's history. But we all lived in this century. I didn't live in this century."... 9/15/95

"I have made good judgments in the past. I have made good judgments in the future."

"The future will be better tomorrow."

"I stand by all the misstatements that I've made."... 8/17/93

"We have a firm commitment to NATO, we are a part of NATO. We have a firm commitment to Europe. We are a part of Europe."

"We are ready for any unforeseen event that may or may not occur." ... 9/22/97

"Illegitimacy is something we should talk about in terms of not having it." ... 5/20/96

"Well, I think if you say you're going to do something and don't do it, that's trustworthiness."

"I mean, there needs to be a wholesale effort against racial profiling, which is illiterate children."

"You f--cking son of a bitch. I saw what you wrote. We're not going to forget this."-- to writer Al Hunt, 1998

"They misunderestimated me."—Bentonville, Ark., Nov. 6, 2000

"I know how hard it is for you to put food on your family."—Greater Nashua, N.H., Chamber of Commerce, Jan. 27, 2000

"I know the human being and fish can coexist peacefully."-Saginaw, Mich., Sept. 29, 2000

"Rarely is the question asked: Is our children learning?"-Florence, S.C., Jan. 11, 2000

"The most important job is not to be governor, or first lady in my case."-Pella, Iowa, as quoted by the San Antonio Express-News, Jan. 30, 2000

"I think if you know what you believe, it makes it a lot easier to answer questions. I can't answer your question."— Reynoldsburg, Ohio, Oct. 4, 2000

"Natural gas is hemispheric. I like to call it hemispheric in nature because it is a product that we can find in our neighborhoods."—Austin, Texas, Dec. 20, 2000

"The senator [McCain] has got to understand if he's going to have—he can't have it both ways. He can't take the high horse and then claim the low road."—To reporters in Florence, S.C., Feb. 17, 2000

"They want the federal government controlling Social Security like it's some kind of federal program."—Debate in St. Charles, Mo., Nov. 2, 2000

Now, what is so troubling about these "mixed up" remarks? Those of you who have read the segments of the Adventures Series about psychopathy, are already aware that this "thinking discrepancy" is proposed as one of the observable symptoms of congenital psychopathy.

Hare writes:

What makes psychopaths different from all others is the remarkable ease with which they lie, the pervasiveness of their deception, and the callousness with which they carry it out.

But there is something else about the speech of psychopaths that is equally puzzling: their frequent use of contradictory and logically inconsistent statements that usually escape detection.  Recent research on the language of psychopaths provides us with some important clues to this puzzle, as well as to the uncanny ability psychopaths have to move words - and people- around so easily. […]

Here are some examples:

When asked if he had ever committed a violent offense, a man serving time for theft answered, "No, but I once had to kill someone."

A woman with a staggering record of fraud, deceit, lies, and broken promises concluded a letter to the parole board with, "I've let a lot of people down… One is only as good as her reputation and name.  My word is as good as gold."

A man serving a term for armed robbery replied to the testimony of an eyewitness, "He's lying.  I wasn't there.  I should have blown his fucking head off."

From an interview with serial killer Elmer Wayne Henley:

Interviewer:  "You make it out that you're the victim of a serial killer, but if you look at the record you're a serial killer."
Henley:  "I'm not."
I:  "You're not a serial killer?"
H:  "I'm not a serial killer."
I:  You're saying you're not a serial killer now, but you've serially killed."
H:  "Well, yeah, that's semantics."

And so on.  The point that the researchers noted was that psychopaths seem to have trouble monitoring their own speech.  What is more, they often put things together in strange ways, such as this series of remarks from serial killer Clifford Olson:  "And then I had annual sex with her."  "Once a year?"  "No.  Annual.  From behind."  "Oh.  But she was dead!"  "No, no.  She was just unconscientious."  About his many experiences, Olson said, "I've got enough antidotes to fill five or six books - enough for a trilogy."  He was determined not to be an "escape goat" no matter what the "migrating facts." [Hare]

Sounds like Dubya, eh? And that's the scary part.

Jews: Zionism is cause of instability in the world

This coming Sunday a group of anti-Zionist Orthodox Jews will be rallying against Zionism and the Zionist State that will be celebrated by marchers in their so-called Israel Day Parade.

The Anti-Zionist Orthodox Jews will proclaim their loyalty to pure Judaism and their opposition to Zionist heresy, which violates every principle of the Jewish religion. These people believe that the idolatrous Zionist ideology has nothing to do with Orthodox Jews, and that Jews are obligated by Judaism to live in peace and harmony with all other nations throughout the world, including Palestinian natives of course.

Pure Judaism proclaims that we are to accept the decree of Exile of G-d and live among the nations in every corner of the Earth, and we must not establish a State thus attempting to end the divinely ordained Exile.

Pure Judaism forbids uprooting the natives of the Holy Land, it proclaims its principles of humanity and justice and demands total restoration of all human, civil, economic and political rights of the Palestinians, including the right of return of all Palestinians to their homes in historic Palestine, thereby enabling Palestine to be governed by its original native inhabitants», – their group’s statement says, which was published on Khilafah.com internet edition.

«These principles are essential ingredients of Judaism, and no amount of Zionism brainwashing of many Jews throughout the world and Zionist media propaganda can ever do away with these eternal principles. We declare to all non-Jews who believe that support for Zionist idolatry and ethnic cleansing demonstrates sympathy for the Jewish People that this is a grave error!!

We beseech all well-meaning non-Jews to understand the truth of what Judaism teaches, and we encourage our fellow Jews to resist the incessant hysterical and paranoia-filled propaganda of the Zionists, their heresy and their xenophobia, and learn the truth of what Judaism is and what Zionism is.

The statement also says: "Zionism is the cause of bloodshed in the Middle East and hatred of Jews throughout the world."

Comment: "Every time anyone says that Israel is our only friend in the Middle East, I can't help but think that before Israel, we had no enemies in the Middle East." -- John Sheehan, S.J. (a Jesuit priest)

Israel Day Parade demonstration

On Sunday, June 1, 2003 at 5th Ave. and 59th St. in Manhattan, NYC a group of anti-Zionist Jews demonstrated against Zionism and the Zionist State celebrated by marchers in the so-called Israel Day Parade.

Comment: Being a New Yorker, I have witnessed these demonstrations in the past. So far, I have not seen them covered in the mass media, (or as we should start calling it the mass "murder" media) which gives the impression that there is a deliberate lack of coverage to promote the idea that all Jews are united in their support for Zionism.

Robber flees empty handed after victim laughs at his mask

Wednesday 11th June 2003

A would-be robber fled empty-handed in South Carolina after a filling station attendant burst out laughing at his makeshift mask. The man walked into the filling station, in Newberry County, wearing a black T-shirt and a pair of red shorts over his head.

Todd Johnson, spokesman for the Newberry County Sheriff's Department, says the man arranged his mask so he could see through an armhole and a leg opening.

"She literally burst into laughter," Mr Johnson told The State. A 37-year-old local man, believed to be responsible for a string of other offences over the course of the night, was later arrested.

Mr Johnson says deputies found the black T-shirt and red shorts at his home, adding: "He had a bad night!"
The man faces charges of armed robbery, attempted armed robbery and burglary.

Comment: I don't know if this would-be robber is a psychopath, but psychopath's cannot stand to be made fun of or laughed at. Pyschopath's are the elephant in the middle of the room that no one talks about. For more information on this topic please see Laura's revealing research: THE PSYCHOPATH - The Mask of Sanity

ARE YOU ANGRY YET?

You should be! You've been lied to. Your tax money has been taken from you and spent under false pretenses. Your children have been sent off to kill and be killed in an illegal war launched without Congressional approval. You who fought in the war and think you came back home healthy, well, you've been lied to as well. Your health is all downhill from here (ask any Vet from Desert Storm), and your children will have a higher incidence of birth defects because that depleted uranium isn't as harmless as you were told it was. And those VA medical benefits you were promised? That was a lie too. Are you angry yet?

And those of you who sold your better judgment for a free hot-dog and a flag at a Clear Channel sponsored pro-Bush rally, well, you were lied to as well, and worse, made to look totally stupid before the rest of the world. The media which walked right past peace demonstrations to video tape the Clear Channel party plastered your face across the TV sets of the planet, waving your flag and shouting "Sig WMD! Sig WMD" and singing "Dubya Dubya Uber Alles" or something to that effect.

And here you stand now, with egg on your collective faces, finally facing up to what your more intelligent neighbors knew all along; There were no weapons of mass destruction in Iraq. Bush made a total fool of you.

The whole world is laughing at you.

Those lacking the courage to admit they were wrong will no doubt descend into the ranks of fanatical "true believers", ready to drink the Kool-Aid for his highnessness der Dubyer. For the rest of you brave enough to admit you were fooled, are you angry yet?

And for you Congressional types reading this web site [..] Bush made total jackasses out of you as well.[...] Bush bypassed you. He got his illegal war right past you. The President has made the entire Congress look like weak and impotent idiots and fools before the rest of the world for not exercising due diligence over a serious matter like war.

Are you angry yet?

Our media has tried to teach us all that hate and anger are bad. Anger must be "managed". Hate of any and all kinds must be suppressed.

Well, I am here to tell you that certain hates and angers are not only justified, they are essential. I hate drug dealers, don't you? I hate liars, don't you? You're a sucker if you don't. I hate spies who use deception to trick our nation into doing things it ought not to be doing. Hate and anger helped drive the British out of the colonies 1776. Hate and anger fueled the victory of WW2, which is why Bush, with his lies, tried to trick us all (or at least the gullible ones) into hating and being angry at a designated target for invasion.

I am very angry. #$%^#%$ anger management, I am pissed off! And if you carry any of the blood of those who made this nation what it is today you have to be angry too. You should be angry. You must be angry. Because right now there is a battle about to start over whether this nation will continue to be ruled by those who lie, or whether the liars will be kicked out. Whether we will have honest government or not. Whether we will be slaves to liars, or free citizens with honorable and respectful and fair government.

Be angry. Be very angry. Hate liars. Focus your anger on them Drive them from office and from the media. There is no other choice but permanent servitude.

Comment: [...] since the great masses of the people in the very bottom of their hearts tend to be corrupted rather than consciously and purposely evil, and that, therefore, in view of the primitive simplicity of their minds, they more easily fall victim to a big lie than to a little one, since they themselves lie in little things, but would be ashamed of lies that were too big.

Such a falsehood will never enter their heads, and they will not be able to believe in the possibility of such monstrous effrontery and infamous misrepresentation in others; yes, even when enlightened on the subject, they will long doubt and waver and continue to accept at least one of these causes as true. Therefore, something of even the most insolent lie will always remain and stick -- a fact which all the great lie-virtuosi and lying-clubs in the world know only too well and also make the most treacherous use of.
-- Adolph Hitler "Mein Kampf"

Impeach bush poll running at 90%+ for a yes vote!

Hand grenade attack at US consulate in Turkey, no casualties

Thursday June 12, 2:54 AM

A Turk hurled two hand grenades at the US consulate in the southern Turkish city of Adana -- allegedly to protest at Israel's crackdown on Palestinian militants -- causing an explosion but no injuries, local officials said.

The assailant, who threw the grenades after being stopped at a security checkpoint, was immediately detained by police and admitted responsibility for the attack, Adana Governor Kemal Onal said on NTV television.

"There is no damage and no injuries," the governor said. [...]

Pinter blasts 'Nazi America' and 'deluded idiot' Blair

Angelique Chrisafis and Imogen Tilden
Wednesday June 11, 2003
The Guardian

The playwright Harold Pinter last night likened George W Bush's administration to Adolf Hitler's Nazi Germany, saying the US was charging towards world domination while the American public and Britain's "mass-murdering" prime minister sat back and watched.

Pinter, 72, was at the National Theatre in London to read from War, a new collection of his anti-war poetry that had been published in the press in response to events in Iraq.

In conversation on stage with Michael Billington, the Guardian's theatre critic, Pinter said the US government was the most dangerous power that had ever existed.

The American detention centre in Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, where al-Qaida and Taliban suspects were being held, was a concentration camp.

The US population had to accept responsibility for allowing an unelected president to take power and the British were exhausted from protesting and being ignored by Tony Blair, a "deluded idiot" Pinter hoped would resign.

After a big operation for cancer, Pinter returned to public life last year to speak out against American belligerence. He called it a return from a "personal nightmare" to an "infinitely more pervasive public nightmare".

The playwright said: "The US is really beyond reason now. It is beyond our imagining to know what they are going to do next and what they are prepared to do. There is only one comparison: Nazi Germany. [...]

Comment: Pinter is not wrong, unless the American people begin to awake from their mind controlled slimber, it is likely that very soon it really will be too late to do anything about it.

Major 911 Oddities Revealed In NY Firehouse Documentary

[...] Truly significant -- indeed crucial -- oddities, anomalies and flagrantly irreconcilable contradictions with the "official" "version" of the staggering WTC devastation are brought forth in this film, which serve to further prove the UTTER FALSITY of the federal government/Bush administration/mass media's threadbare official lies on nearly every single important aspect of this tremendous, horrific tragedy. [...]

Comment: For further details and articles see: American Coup d'état - 9/11 and after

France says suspected German Islamic militant had contact with bin Laden

Thursday June 12, 2:47 AM

A suspected German Islamic militant arrested in Paris earlier this month is a top official in the al-Qaeda network with ties to Osama bin Laden, French Interior Minister Nicolas Sarkozy said.

"Intelligence services know that he is a high-ranking al-Qaeda official who has been in contact with Osama bin Laden and who has spent time in Afghanistan and Bosnia," Sarkozy said of 36-year-old Christian Ganczarski.

The minister told parliamentary deputies that the German national, suspected of involvement in planning an attack on a Tunisian synagogue in April 2002 that left 21 people dead, was a "computer and telecommunications expert". [...]

While in detention, Ganczarski confessed to being an al-Qaeda supporter and to having trained in camps in Afghanistan, but never said he had been in contact with bin Laden, according to sources close to the investigation.

But several pieces of evidence indicate that the German national was in contact with the fugitive al-Qaeda leader at least once before 2001, the sources said. [...]

Blix hits out at "bastards" in Pentagon

London (AFP) - Outgoing chief UN weapons inspector Hans Blix has described certain members of the US administration as "bastards" who set out to undermine him during his three years at the helm.

In an uncharacteristic outburst to a British newspaper published Wednesday, Blix said: "I have my detractors in Washington. There are bastards who spread things around, of course, who planted nasty things in the media. Not that I cared very much."

In his interview to The Guardian, Blix also accused Washington of regarding the United Nations (news - web sites) as an "alien power" which it hoped would sink without trace. Asked if he believed he had been the target of a deliberate smear campaign, Blix told the daily: "Yes, I probably was at a lower level."

Iraq Debate Splits Democrats; U.S. Public Unworried

By John Whitesides, Political Correspondent
Wed June 11, 2003

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - The growing chorus of questions about whether the United States manipulated Iraqi weapons evidence has rekindled Democratic divisions over the war but so far inflicted little political damage on President Bush.

While many Democrats on Capitol Hill and some 2004 Democratic presidential hopefuls have questioned the administration's justification for war and pushed for a full inquiry, other Democratic contenders have refused to join in.

Polls, meanwhile, show a majority of the public is unconcerned. A recent CNN/Gallup/USA Today poll found 56 percent of Americans believe the conflict was justified even without evidence of Iraqi weapons of mass destruction. [...]

A discovery that the administration deliberately distorted evidence, or a failure to find any sign of the arsenal, could help puncture Bush's high personal approval ratings and give Democrats an opening, analysts said.

Some Democrats worry an all-out attack on Bush could backfire, particularly if the weapons eventually surface.

"I'd be concerned about Democrats focusing too heavily on this, it could strengthen perceptions in some quarters that Democrats are not the folks you want to trust with your security," said Lawrence Haas, who served as a communications director for former Democratic Vice President Al Gore.

BLAIR HOUNDED BY QUESTIONS

Bush, who has faced far less political pressure on the issue than British leader Tony Blair, has rejected questions about U.S. credibility and said intelligence established that Iraq had a weapons program. [...]

Senate committee to hold closed hearings on U.S. intelligence on Iraq

Roberts says allegations 'must be cleared up'

By Sean Loughlin
CNN Washington Bureau

WASHINGTON (CNN) -- The Senate Intelligence Committee will hold closed-door hearings as part of its ongoing review of U.S. intelligence on Iraq, the chairman of that panel announced Wednesday, but there will not be a formal, public inquiry as sought by Democrats.

The move comes amid questions about whether the Bush administration manipulated intelligence data to bolster its case for war.

Sen. Pat Robert, R-Kansas, made it clear that he has seen no evidence that any intelligence data was slanted or politicized, but he said the allegations from anonymous officials saying they were under pressure to "skew their analysis" were serious and "must be cleared up." [...]

Roberts said his panel would work with the Senate Armed Services Committee, but a joint formal investigation would be "very premature."

"Let's do our homework first," he said.

Comment: or should he say "give us more time to make up a load of horse hockey while Bush finds a way to plant some WMD in Iraq"

Another dead end in search for Iraqi weapons

June 11 2003 at 03:14AM
By Rupert Cornwell

Washington - After visiting 230 sites, American troops have run out of new places to check for Iraq's alleged chemical and biological weapons.

This is despite new assertions by United States President George Bush and Defence Secretary Donald Rumsfeld on Tuesday that they do in fact exist.

This latest dead end will only increase pressure for a full congressional investigation into what critics say is a massive US intelligence failure. [...]

British prime minister refuses to appear before second inquiry on Iraq

LONDON (AFP) Jun 11, 2003

British Prime Minister Tony Blair said Wednesday he would not appear before a parliamentary foreign affairs committee probing claims that the government embellished intelligence on Iraq's weapons of mass destruction to beef up the case for war.

At his weekly question and answer session in the House of Commons, Blair insisted that "in relation to the allegations that have been made, there is not a shred of truth" in them.

Asked if he would give evidence to an investigation by the Foreign Affairs Select Committee, the prime minister told deputies: "In accordance with convention, I will not attend that committee," although Foreign Secretary Jack Straw would.

Comment: When asked what convention he was speaking of in the above Blair responded, "the one I just created for the occasion". If he is telling the truth, then surely this will come out in an open and honest investigation.

UK jobless total jumps

BBC

The prospect of a further UK rate cut appeared to rise on Wednesday following an increase in the number of jobless and a drop in earnings growth.

Data from the Office for National Statistics (ONS) showed the number of people out of work in the three months to April rose by 36,000 on the previous quarter to 1,495,000.

Comment: It looks like Blair has managed to not overlook anything and is following all of his lap dog policies to the letter. He is dismantling the economy of the U.K. just like Bush is doing to the U.S. Psychopaths feed off of human misery.

US military investigating death of Iraqi prisoner

Washington-AP -- The death of an Iraqi prisoner has triggered a criminal investigation by the U-S military.

U-S Central Command says the prisoner died last week at a prisoner-of-war camp near Nasiriyah (nah-sih-REE'-uh). He'd been held since his capture May third.

Officials aren't discussing the cause of death, but the involvement of the Naval Criminal Investigative Service suggests the prisoner may have been killed.

It's the first U-S investigation into an Iraqi P-O-W death. The British are looking into the deaths of two other Iraqi P-O-W's, and two cases of alleged mistreatment.

Thousands of Iraqis were taken prisoner by coalition forces during and after the war. Hundreds have been released.

Japan PM struggles to defend support for US with no Iraqi WMD found

TOKYO (AFP) Jun 11, 2003

Japanese Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi struggled to justify his support for the Iraq war Wednesday as he came under fire from opposition leaders amid the continued failure of the US occupation forces to unearth Saddam Hussein's alleged weapons of mass destruction.

"I think they will be discovered eventually. Over time, the authorities will do their best to find them," Koizumi told a legislative session as the leaders of the opposition parties took turns to grill him.

"We must closely monitor what sort of weapons will be discovered," he said.

His answers prompted jeers from opposition lawmakers, who charged he was simply following Washington's orders in expressing support for the war without proof Iraq possessed viable weapons of mass destruction.

Religious police told to smile

Brian Whitaker
Tuesday June 10, 2003
The Guardian

Saudia Arabia's feared religious police are being given special training to "deal effectively and pleasantly with the public", the Jeddah-based daily Arab News reported yesterday.

About 200 members have attended the course in "communication skills" and "success strategies".

The mutawwa - officially known as the commission for the promotion of virtue and prevention of vice - enforce strict standards of behaviour. Besides ensuring that businesses close for the five daily prayers, and that women observe the dress code, they arrest unrelated men and women who are found together, and check text messages on teenagers' mobiles.

During a school fire in Mecca in March they reportedly drove back girls who tried to escape without wearing headscarves, and prevented male rescuers from entering the building on the grounds that they would be "mixing" with the opposite sex. Fourteen girls died in the blaze.

Yesterday Amnesty International was sceptical about the training programme. "Saudi Arabia's religious police have an appalling record of brutality and discrimination going far beyond failings with interpersonal skills," a spokesman said. "Their track record includes making violent and arbitrary arrests, subjecting women in particular to taunts and vicious beatings, and lashing out at people taken into detention.

"This issue is not whether a law enforcement agency should be learning to be more courteous, but whether the Saudi authorities are genuinely prepared to root out the habitual human rights abuses."

Comment: Let's see: The U.S. destroyed the secular society of Iraq, when Saddam was already a CIA tool, and the U.S. are allies with Saudi Arabia which has a continous policy of brutal human rights violations that are being covered up with a PR campaign. Makes perfect sense - to a psychopath

U.S. Can't Rule Out N.Korea Strike, Perle Says

By Jim Wolf

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - The United States should be ready to smash North Korea's Yongbyon reactor if necessary to keep Pyongyang from trafficking in nuclear weapons, an influential member of Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld's advisory panel said on Wednesday.

"Whether we can effectively mobilize a coalition -- including China, Russia, the South Koreans, the Japanese, ourselves -- and so isolate them that they will abandon this program, that remains to be seen," said Richard Perle, an architect of the U.S. invasion of Iraq.

"That's certainly the preferable way to deal with it," he added in a speech to an Iraqi reconstruction conference sponsored by King Publishing Group, a Washington-based newsletter publisher.

"But I don't think anyone can exclude the kind of surgical strike we saw in 1981," he said, citing Israel's surprise air attack that destroyed Iraq's Osirak nuclear reactor near Baghdad on June 7, 1981. "We should always be prepared to go it alone, if necessary," he said.

Yongbyon, site of a reactor and a plutonium reprocessing plant that North Korea has said it has restarted, lies about 60 miles north of Pyongyang. [...]

"I think we must assume that if they had a nuclear weapon, and if al Qaeda wished to purchase a nuclear weapon, it's a deal that could be done," said Perle, who was assistant secretary of defense for international security policy under President Ronald Reagan.

"I think we should be encouraging its failure," he said of the Iranian government without specifying how he might propose to do this. He contended that the Iranian government would fall "because it's despised by the people."

Comment: Look out Iran, the U.S. is using the same excuse they used for Iraq. Start educating your children what cluster bomblets look like now . . .

Iraq's children bear brunt of unexploded munitions

By Ruth Gidley

LONDON (AlertNet) - The war in Iraq has left the country littered with explosives - landmines, ammunition left behind by Iraqi forces and live bomblets from U.S. and British attacks -- which have injured at least 15 people a day since Saddam Hussein's government fell on April 9.

U.S. and British coalition officials said last week they had used cluster bombs in Iraq, in spite of pre-war pleas by advocacy groups to avoid using them in civilian areas where inquisitive children and men looking for scrap metal have paid a high price.

Sean Sutton of U.K.-based Mines Advisory Group (MAG) told AlertNet: "There's going to be a lot of reminders around for other children not to play with the stuff. I can't imagine there's going to be a classroom in the north without scarred children in it. It's so widespread."

Many deaths and injuries are not registered, so it is difficult to estimate casualties, but Sutton said MAG had reported 320 injuries in northern Iraq in the first month after April 9.

He said the actual figure was probably much higher, since deaths were recorded only if they took place in hospital, or if MAG gathered data by speaking to victims in hospital and found out from relatives or doctors that other people had been killed in the same accident. [...]

How the media might have to cop the blame for Bush's blushes

From rushing to report on the no-WMDs scandal, the press has been caught up in the scandal, writes Russ Baker.

The growing scandal over the Bush Administration's manipulation of intelligence data on Iraqi weapons of mass destruction focuses on the role of the White House. But it doesn't devote proper attention to the role of the US media in the propaganda effort that misled the world. [...]

OUTRAGE AT ADMINISTRATION LYING MISSES A CRUCIAL POINT

Ira Chernus

[...] In our perplexed outrage, we are missing a crucial point.  While we quite rightly try to digest mountains of facts that contain the truth, we also need to consider the peculiar fate of facts in this postmodern world.  While we quite rightly drink in the words of a Noam Chomsky or a Howard Zinn (and we should be immensely thankful for them), we would do well to give equal time to a Fredric Jameson.

Jameson taught us, better than anyone else, that the American empire rests on three legs:  global corporate capitalism, digital technology, and the triumph of image over factual reality.  He taught us why the empire needs each of these legs to stay stable, and how each reinforces the others in a totalitarian web of seemingly benign postmodern imperium.  Most of us already understand the power of, and links between, digitized high-tech and globalization.

The crucial piece many have missed is the third leg.  In postmodern capitalism, commodities are reduced to digital images, and images are sold as commodities.  The images take on a life of their own.  They become the reality.  Reality becomes an endless commercial.  Advertising is no longer just a means to an end; it is the essential activity of our whole society.

That is a simple truth we all know, because most of us live it every day.  I surely do.  I think The Matrix and the new Honda ad and my new screensaver are pretty cool, too.  

Intellectuals like Jameson help us take the next step, to understand what happens when images replace reality.  Our society stops asking the questions that used to point the way to truth:  “Does the image accurately represent the reality it claims to represent?  Does it represent any reality at all?”  When those questions are no longer asked, the issue of truth becomes irrelevant.  

Then it is easy enough to declare the elected leader of a whole nation, or even the entire United Nations, “irrelevant,” because the words are just images anyway.   All questions of truth and reality simply vanish in the airwaves filled with the digitized pictures and sounds that are now the be-all and end-all of our collective life.  

So the Bush administration's warnings of Iraqi WMD were merely images, an ad campaign clever enough to sell us a war we did not need.  But no one ever bought the reality, because there was no reality to buy.  The public bought the commercials.  In a postmodern society, that is all we ever buy, because images are all that is for sale. [...]

'Mass grave' found in Aceh

BBC

More than 12,000 people have been killed since the conflict began.
A mass grave has been discovered in the Indonesian province of Aceh, according to an independent human rights organisation.

The Indonesian National Commission of Human Rights is investigating what it calls credible reports of a mass grave in the area of Biruen, an area which has seen fierce fighting in recent weeks.

A member of the group, Mr M M Billah, told the BBC that the grave was believed to contain dozens of bodies but their identities were not yet known.

Stories of mass graves in Aceh have been circulating for some days, but the military authorities in the province have placed severe restrictions on journalists, making independent verification extremely difficult.

There have been persistent reports of human-rights abuses committed by both sides in the conflict, including beatings, rape and extrajudicial killings.

Earlier this week, three Indonesian soldiers serving in Aceh were found guilty by a military tribunal of beating civilians unconscious during recent security operations. [...]

Experts: Looting, neglect spoil Iraqi treasures

By Marsha Walton

(CNN) -- A team of archaeologists said Wednesday that some historical sites in Iraq suffered serious damage during and after the U.S.-led war, warning that looting continues in some areas of the country.

[...] Among those items are some of the world's earliest professional sculptures, he said. He also said many records were destroyed. [...]

FTC Says Needs More Authority to Fight Spam
            
By Peter Kaplan and Andy Sullivan

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - The U.S. Federal Trade Commission asked Congress on Wednesday for additional authority to fight the unwanted Internet "spam" that now accounts for up to half of all e-mail traffic.

In testimony before the House of Representatives Energy and Commerce Committee, FTC commissioners said they need the ability to secretly investigate those who send deceptive e-mail and more leeway to go after spammers who send their messages across international borders.[...]

The FTC also said it should be allowed to oversee telecommunications firms and other "common carriers" that currently fall outside its jurisdiction.

Comment: We all hate spam, right? But, do we need the FTC to start using this as an excuse for snooping? A reader comments: "I've been watching the news as the 'war on spam' has been heating up, wondering, why all the attention, why are companies like Microsoft and Symantec involved with the 'war' now? Well here it becomes just a little clearer: FTC wants ability to secretly spy on people who send junk email and they want oversight over telecom companies too.  Great. Since anybody can spoof an email, or relay through some open mail server, this is ridiculous." Can we trust the FTC to confine themselves to spammers?

House votes to restrict Net gambling

By Declan McCullagh
Staff Writer, CNET News.com

The U.S. House of Representatives voted on Tuesday evening to slap broad restrictions on Internet gambling by targeting credit cards and bank accounts that Americans use to pay offshore casinos.[...]

Rep. Michael Oxley, R-Ohio, chairman of the Financial Services committee, said restricting offshore gambling was necessary to thwart al-Qaida and other terrorist cells. [...]

Rep. Spencer Bachus, R-Ala., said enacting a law was necessary to protect America's children.

Comment: This is "rich", while the US economy falls apart due to Bush and Co's bloody excesses, the only thing the now entirely impotent US congress can do is pass a law on gambling, citing Osama is under the bed, unbelievable!..

URANIUM IS DELICIOUS, TRY IT

No More Fake News

June 11. Here is a blockbuster announcement from the US Federal Register, dated June 9. The Department of Health and Human Services announces it will amend safety standards for bottled water by "establishing an allowable limit for unraium" [...]

The Matrix Reloaded banned in Egypt

CAIRO, Egypt - Egyptian censors have banned the international box office hit The Matrix Reloaded , claiming it raises religious issues that have caused crises in the past. [...]

Police: Boy, 12, killed self after friends wouldn't go along with school attack

Associated Press
Jun. 11, 2003 09:05 AM

WELLSBORO, Pa. - A fifth-grader who committed suicide in a school restroom had planned an assault on the school but killed himself after his friends wouldn't go along with the plan, police said. [...]

Marine had baby on ship in war zone

By Rowan Scarborough
THE WASHINGTON TIMES

A Marine gave birth aboard the amphibious assault ship USS Boxer in the Persian Gulf last month, marking what Pentagon officials believe is the first time an active-duty woman delivered a baby on a combat ship in a war zone. [...]

Human cloning: Dolly scientist wins approval to use 'virgin birth' technique

By Steve Connor, Science Editor
10 June 2003

Bees do it, ants do it, and so apparently did the Goddess Athena. Parthenogenesis - Greek for "virgin birth" - could now allow British scientists to create human embryos from unfertilised eggs.

Athena was perhaps the first mythical character to undergo parthenogenesis, having emerged fully formed from the forehead of her father, Zeus. Hence her temple on the Acropolis is called The Parthenon.

Yesterday, Britain's fertility watchdog gave approval for scientists to create human embryos using a parthenogenetic process, in a landmark experiment that could pave the way for human cloning.[...]

Study: Odd skulls from oldest modern humans

By Richard Stenger
Wednesday, June 11, 2003

(CNN) -- Three skulls unearthed in Ethiopia, pocked with mysterious cuts, represent the oldest known evidence of modern humans, according to a new study in Nature.

The fossilized craniums, which are estimated to be 160,000 years old, have a previously unseen combination of primitive and modern features, paleontologists involved in the excavation said.

Classified as a new subspecies of Homo sapiens, the remains help boost the theory that modern man came from Africa, according to the group, led by scientists from the University of California, Berkeley.

"They ... represent the probable immediate ancestors of anatomically modern humans. Their anatomy and antiquity constitute strong evidence of modern-human emergence in Africa," wrote Berkeley researcher Tim White and colleagues in Nature.

The international team found the skulls in the eroding, sandy sediments of an ancient river in Herto, a village about 140 miles (230 kilometers) northeast of the Ethiopian capital, Addis Ababa. [...]

Aliens in Clay County? Crop circles dot the landscape of Todd Young's Clay County farm.

KNOBEL, Ark. -- They are the talk of Clay County, crop circles in a local field of wheat. But don't go calling Agents Mulder and Scully on the phone and turn this one into an X-file just yet.

The first-ever crop circle formation was recorded in London, England, in 1647. The most recent, Knobel, Arkansas.

"We just flew over it and spotted it and it kind of surprised us," said Bruce Catt, who was flying over Clay County farmland over the weekend. "We circled it a few times and thought we need to get some pictures of it."

"By no means, I'm a farmer by occupation," Catt said. "I also do some flying, just to look at the farm."

There are some that maintain that there are aliens that are trying to communicate with us by the use of ancient Sumerian symbols.

"There's ten circles, the first one being the biggest," Catt said. "It's around thirty eight (feet), the next one's twenty eight, and around eighteen and eight, and they just kind of taper off." [...]

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