| 15th August 2006 08:15 PM |
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| sirmoonie |
quote:
not bound to please wrote:
are you okay feej? The voices in my head told me you are not well.
[Edited by not bound to please]
Holy moly, that is horrific. |
| 15th August 2006 08:16 PM |
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| Fiji Joe |
quote:
glencar wrote:
They Hindus...
Oh...so there is a balance developing...I'm encouraged |
| 15th August 2006 08:21 PM |
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| Riffhard |
quote:
Brainbell Jangler wrote:
You bring the strawman and I'll bring the matches.
And how about those Bushies prodding the Brits to bust the "liquid bombers" before they were ready in an effort to influence the Connecticut primary?
You,my friend,are the one hoisting strawmen! The bust happened too late to effect the moron voters in Conn. Chuck,in his choices on cut and paste jobs,has proven that what he thinks is that Bush,Israel,and Blair are trying to play politics with terrorism. Well I hate to burst your tinfoil bubble but the fact is that there is ample evidence that this terror plot was very real. That you guys look for some rediculous conspiracy in everything is insane. You come across as a Blame America type. You completely ignore facts just because you have this irrational hatered of your president. Hate Bush all you want. I could care a less,but do not even atempt to deny,or play down the fact that their are some very evil twisted fucks that want us all dead. Bush had nothing to do with that shit. That's just a stupid insiped "Bush Sucks!" argument that does nothing to win libs any real credibility. By the way Leiberman is already way ahead in the polls in Connecticut. He will win easily. Thank God for that!
Riffy |
| 15th August 2006 08:24 PM |
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| glencar |
Riffy, I don't care if Lieberman gets his Joementum back. He's learned his lesson & he'll be as bad as Dean in the future. |
| 15th August 2006 08:34 PM |
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| Riffhard |
quote:
glencar wrote:
Riffy, I don't care if Lieberman gets his Joementum back. He's learned his lesson & he'll be as bad as Dean in the future.
And ya know that's the funny thing about this whole Leiberman episode. He has easily one of the most liberal voting records in the Senate! He has voted with the looney libs over 90% of the time,but because he wants the USA to actually win the WOT he gets thrown under the bus. It is the lib/far left Dem MO these days. Bush sucks,and that's their whole game plan. No ideas. No plan. No anything! Just Bush sucks. Well I hope they run on that platform.
I admire Leiberman for one reason only. Because he put his political beliefs on the back burner for what he believes is the right thing to do. Funny then that the libs rise up and slay him for it! He will win come Novemeber though,and I hope that he will tell the Dems to go fuck themselves. Not likely gonna happen given his record,but it would be funny to see.
Riffy |
| 15th August 2006 08:40 PM |
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| Chuck |
Bush administration seeks changes to War Crimes Act Moves to shield government officials from prosecution
By Kate Randall
15 August 2006
WSWS
http://www.wsws.org/articles/2006/aug2006/crms-a15.shtml
The Bush administration is seeking changes to war crimes law in an effort to protect government officials, CIA officers and former military personnel from prosecution for mistreatment of war prisoners.
According to US officials speaking on condition of anonymity, the administration has drafted amendments to the War Crimes Act, passed by Congress in 1996 and expanded in 1997, that criminalized violations of the Geneva Conventions in federal criminal courts. The changes are aimed at narrowing the scope of potential criminal prosecutions, particularly those involving cruel, humiliating and degrading treatment of wartime prisoners. No one has ever been charged under the act.
The move to amend the law comes in the wake of the June 29 Supreme Court decision in Hamdan v. Rumsfeld, in which the high court ruled that the Bush administration’s flouting of the Conventions in relation to trying Guantánamo detainees in military tribunals was illegal.
The American military is also facing exposure of numerous cases of its soldiers committing atrocities against Iraqi civilians. Testimony and evidence in the cases under investigation have revealed a deeply dehumanized military force deployed in the US occupation, with soldiers involved in murder, rape and other brutal acts against the civilian population, including woman and children.
While such cases are handled in the military court system and come under the jurisdiction of a separate law, the Uniform Code of Military Justice, the Bush administration is concerned about the potential liability of high-level military officials and is moving aggressively on a number of fronts to shield administration and military officials from future prosecution.
At issue in particular are the Article 3 provisions common to the four Geneva Conventions of 1949, which prohibit “outrages upon personal dignity, in particular humiliating and degrading treatment.” The changes in the War Crimes Act would limit potential criminal prosecutions to 10 specific categories of illegal acts against prisoners or detainees, including torture, murder, rape and hostage-taking, thus avoiding the article’s broader application.
Abuses prohibited by Article 3 have been documented in the US treatment of prisoners at both the Guantánamo Bay detention camp and at the Abu-Ghraib prison in Iraq, and have provoked international revulsion. These include forced nakedness, use of dog leashes, and various instances of sexually humiliating treatment.
The Bush administration has sought to circumvent prohibition of such abuses since the early days of the “global war on terror.” In a February 2002 policy memorandum, Bush made clear that in the administration’s view Article 3 did not apply “to either Al Qaeda or Taliban detainees.” This followed the advice of Alberto Gonzales (then White House counsel and currently attorney general), who said that such a determination would make future prosecutions of US agents under the War Crimes Act more difficult.
Former attorney general John Ashcroft also advised Bush that not applying the protections of the Conventions to prisoners in the war in Afghanistan would “provide the highest assurance that no court would subsequently entertain charges that American military officers, intelligence officials, or law enforcement officials violated Geneva Conventions rules relating to field conduct, detention conduct or interrogation of detainees.”
Such abuses by American forces have been systemic, both in the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq, the handling of prisoners at Guantánamo, and in the treatment of the untold numbers of individuals picked up by the US in the “war on terror” and interrogated and tortured in secret prisons at locations around the world.
A military investigation into intelligence activities in Iraq and Afghanistan documented some of the methods being used on prisoners, including “removing clothing, isolating people for long periods of time, using stress positions, exploiting fear of dogs and implementing sleep and light deprivation.”
Amnesty International (AI) has sharply criticized the new administration efforts to amend the War Crimes Act. The human rights group warns that “any such measure would undermine the rule of law and send a dangerous message about impunity. Torture and ill-treatment thrive on impunity.”
AI has drawn attention to the case of Guantánamo prisoner Mohamed al-Qahtani, which gives an indication of the type of abuse the Bush administration is seeking to protect by shielding those who are authorizing it from prosecution.
According to Amnesty International, al-Qahtani “was subjected to intense isolation for three months in late 2002 and early 2003. He was variously forced to wear a woman’s bra and had a thong placed on his head; was tied by a leash and led around the room while being forced to perform a number of dog tricks; was forced to dance with a male interrogator....”
He was stripped and strip-searched in the presence of woman, and subjected to “sexual humiliation, culturally inappropriate use of female interrogators, and to sexual insults about his female relatives; had water repeatedly poured over his head; had pictures of ‘swimsuit models’ hung around his neck; was subject to hooding, loud music, white noise, and to extremes of heat and cold through manipulation of air conditioning” and to sleep deprivation.
Al-Qahtani was also “forced to urinate in his clothing when interrogators refused to allow him to go to the toilet.” He was interrogated for 18 to 20 hours a day for 48 out of 54 consecutive days.
The methods used against this prisoner were the type authorized at Guantánamo Bay by Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld in late 2002. They were also being used against detainees in Afghanistan. A narrowing of the scope of the War Crimes Act is aimed specifically at protecting such senior administration officials from prosecution.
Eugene Fidell, president of the non-profit National Institute of Military Justice, commented to the Washington Post, “I think what this bill can do is in effect immunize past crimes. That’s why it’s so dangerous.” He said the revisions were aimed not only at “protection of political appointees, but also CIA personnel who led interrogations.”
Appearing August 2 before the Senate Armed Services Committee, Attorney General Gonzales was asked by Sen. Carl Levin (Democrat, Michigan) whether he believed that techniques such as “waterboarding, stress positions, intimidating use of military dogs, sleep deprivation, forced nudity” would be “consistent with common Article 3”—the provision the administration is seeking to limit.
“Waterboarding” refers to an interrogation practice in which prisoners are strapped to a plank and dunked in water until they believe they will drown. The attorney general evaded the question, responding only that the reliability of statements obtained under such techniques was questionable.
In addition to seeking the War Crimes Act amendments, the Bush administration has requested Congress pass legislation barring a prisoner’s right to sue for the enforcement of these protections. They have also asked that an “absolute” human rights standard in interrogations be replaced by legislation which puts intelligence-gathering needs above protection of these basic rights.
Attorneys representing the International Committee of the Red Cross, the organization responsible for upholding the Geneva Conventions, visited the Pentagon and State Department earlier this month to express their opposition to the proposed amendments, but left without any assurance that their objections would be heeded. The Bush administration is pressing to have the major revisions in the War Crimes Act pushed through Congress after Labor Day.
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| 15th August 2006 08:46 PM |
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| Chuck |
LOL---why is the right wing attacking the Commander-in-Chief during a time of war?
======================
Monday, August 14, 2006
http://glenngreenwald.blogspot.com/2006/08/defeatism-and-attacks-on-commander-in_14.html
Defeatism and attacks on the Commander-in-Chief during a time of war
We have a rule in our country that "attacking the Commander-in-Chief during a time of war" helps The Terrorists and emboldens our enemies. Joe Lieberman put it this way: "in matters of war, we undermine presidential credibility at our nation's peril."
President Bush said during the campaign that John Kerry's criticisms of Iraq "can embolden an enemy." And this year he warned us: "In a time of war, we have a responsibility to show that whatever our political differences at home, our nation is united and determined to prevail." And last week, Ken Mehlman gave a speech in Cleveland and attacked what he said is a growing "defeatism," and then oh-so-cleverly remarked: "Today's Democrat Party has become the Defeat-ocrat Party."
In the wake of the Bush administration's engineering of the Israel-Lebanon U.N. resolution, it looks like the Commander-in-Chief has a lot of new enemies and the The Terrorists have a lot of new allies:
National Review Editors:
In addition to winning in Lebanon, Iran has the upper hand both in Iraq and in the contest over whether it will be allowed to acquire nuclear weapons. If current trends continue, the Bush administration’s project in the Middle East will require the same sort of expedient we have just seen in the Israel–Lebanon conflict: a papering over of what is essentially a failure.
Dan Riehl:
So, it turns out the lofty anti-terrorism rhetoric of Bush was little more than what some speech writer wrote to be read from a screen. . . . The man has looked over his head for much of his second term. Now, it's becoming more clear just how far. This will embolden the opposition in Iraq and could lead ultimately to the destruction of Israel.
Our war President has turned out to be a disgrace. At this point in world history, the Islamofascists look like they deserve to win. In fact, they might.
Paul Mirgenoff, Powerline Blog:
Over at NRO's corner, John Podhoretz contends that this would mean the end of the Olmert government. I'm tempted to suggest that our government, having seemingly lost its will to oppose (or even to let others oppose) our deadliest enemies, deserves the same fate.
Michelle Malkin:
Israel and the West surrender to Hizballah.
Terrorists and the U.N. win.
Peter Brookes, Senior Fellow, Heritage Foundation, NRO Symposium:
If there is a clear winner in this war, it’s Iran.
Soshana Bryen, NRO Symposium:
Thus far, the U.S. and Israel lose; Iran wins.
Anne Bayefsky, NRO Symposium:
Kofi Annan’s wide grin, as he stood side-by-side with Secretary Rice on Friday, said it all. He won. But America and freedom’s cause lost.
Jeff Goldstein:
Israel and the US have been defeated. Hizballah will grow emboldened. As will Iran.
Pamela "Atlas" Oshry, interviewer to John Bolton:
Bush Administration Betrays Israel and America
Daily Pundit - in a post recommended by Instapundit: "Read the whole thing, especially if you work in the White House.":
Bush's proud words of five years ago stand revealed as hollow and meaningless. What happened?
What happened was one of the biggest failures of leadership in Presidential history. Bush supporters will claim that Bush was done in by a liberal media and the ferocious hatred of liberals and leftwingers, but that is one of the things true leadership is all about: Managing and overcoming opposition in order to achieve the necessary goals - in this case, the destruction of world Islamist terrorism and the regimes that support it.
Bush turned out to be singularly ill-equipped for this task, both by skill and by temperament. His public relations management was curiously hesitant and badly timed, and, of course, his inabilty to speak effectively in public was a gigantic handicap. His temperament, it eventually became clear, was hesitant, overly calculating, timid, and "compassionate."
Compassion has its place, but not in warfighting. The Bush we know would not have pulled the trigger on Hiroshima and Nagasaki. He abdicated the hard decisions in favor of political maneuvering and meaningless gestures.
As for me? I've moved on. The first administration of the first century of the American Third Millennium will, in my estimation, be remembered as one of the biggest failures of that century. Bush's great failure was, not invading Iraq, but not weathering the adversity that followed through acts of real leadership, and then pressing on with the necessary military destruction of the other regimes he, himself, named as most dangerous five years ago.
I'm hoping we can get through the next two years without any major disasters, and then I'm looking to elect a real war leader to the White House - somebody with a warrior's temperament and a leader's skills. George Bush has neither. He is a dangerous failure, and America will be well rid of him.
====================
Bill Kristol and Charles Krauthammer both said this weekend on Fox that Hezbollah won and Iran has been strengthened. Attacks on the Commander-in-Chief and proclamations of American defeat are ubiquitous - among the same group that insisted for the last five years that such attacks are dangerous and wrong and that talk of American defeat helps the terrorists.
Aren't terrorists going to be so happy to see that Americans are divided in this way? Doesn't it make us less safe for all of these people to be branding the U.S. as weak losers and to be glorifying the strength and power of our enemies? Don't these people realize that we're in a war and that weakening the Commander-in-Chief with such criticisms and declaring American defeat endangers all of us?
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| 15th August 2006 08:51 PM |
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| sirmoonie |
Chuck, I think if you have news you want to post, you should just post the link and then your summary of what is in it, maybe with select quotes. Posting the whole article is annoying.
Liberman sucks, BTW. Zionist in the extreme, whacked out liberal, and easily the most two faced, sloganeering politician on either side of the ridiculous, imaginary aisle this society has set up. Hopefully his lame ass schtick caught up to him, but I doubt given the voting public these days. |
| 15th August 2006 08:56 PM |
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| Fiji Joe |
All I know is I spent 3 hours a day on a school bus as a child and people are still as racist as they've ever been...any chance I had at making the bball team went out with desegragation...fucking Wallace had it right the first time |
| 15th August 2006 08:57 PM |
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| Riffhard |
Chuck has it ever occured to you that your liberal argument is always about trying to find fault with Bush's attempt to win this war? I mean I can never remember one instance where your side ever really slammed the the assholes that would have you and your entire family dead. You support the rights of the fucknuts in Gitmo while at the same time slamming the people that put them there. You,and your side's,priorities are based purely on your hatered for Bush. Very strange,and very telling of who you feel is responsible for the terror that is raging worldwide right now.
I could give two shits about the rights of the terrorists. Where were the rights of Nick Berg while his head was being sawed off with a kitchen knife? I guess that was Bush's fault though. My bad. Keep running on with that though. That should work wonders for the Dems come Novemember!
Riffy |
| 15th August 2006 09:00 PM |
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| Fiji Joe |
quote:
Riffhard wrote:
Where were the rights of Nick Berg while his head was being sawed off with a kitchen knife? I guess that was Bush's fault though.
Dude...he was jewish...pick another example before corks start popping |
| 15th August 2006 09:08 PM |
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| Riffhard |
quote:
Fiji Joe wrote:
Dude...he was jewish...pick another example before corks start popping
Shit right you are! I forgot that Jews are at fault too!
How about the four contractors that were strung up on the bridge in Iraq? Were they Jewish?
They were American so I guess they were at fault. Damn this is so hard. I keep trying to put the blame on these Allah fearing terrorists but I guess that is wrong of me. They are really just Freedonm Fighters afterall.
Riffy |
| 15th August 2006 09:59 PM |
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| not bound to please |
quote:
Fiji Joe wrote:
Dude...he was jewish...pick another example before corks start popping
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| 15th August 2006 10:23 PM |
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| Fiji Joe |
quote:
not bound to please wrote:
Ahh...there's my lackey...ever since I mastered the carnal techniques of tantrism, bitches been following me around like hellhounds on an Angola darkie
[Edited by Fiji Joe] |
| 15th August 2006 10:35 PM |
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| not bound to please |
quote:
Fiji Joe wrote:
Ahh...there's my lackey...ever since I mastered the carnal techniques of tantrism, bitches been following me around like hellhounds on an Angola darkie
[Edited by Fiji Joe]
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| 15th August 2006 10:42 PM |
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| sirmoonie |
quote:
Fiji Joe wrote:
Ahh...there's my lackey...ever since I mastered the carnal techniques of tantrism, bitches been following me around like hellhounds on an Angola darkie
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| 15th August 2006 10:57 PM |
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| not bound to please |
Bucky has abandoned his baby. I'm calling DCFS. |
| 15th August 2006 11:00 PM |
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| Fiji Joe |
quote:
sirmoonie wrote:
And there's my other bootlicker...damn tantrism even causing the men to go buck wild
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| 15th August 2006 11:07 PM |
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| sirmoonie |
quote:
Fiji Joe wrote:
And there's my other bootlicker...damn tantrism even causing the men to go buck wild
 |
| 15th August 2006 11:09 PM |
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| not bound to please |
feej - your special friend needs you
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| 15th August 2006 11:44 PM |
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| Zulu Fun Mix |
DAMN, Feej, how'd you get those big ugly tits? Those tits belong on a barnyard animal or something! Not that there's anything we could tell you about barnyard animals you don't already know... HEE HEE HEE !
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| 16th August 2006 02:01 AM |
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| pdog |
Is this Jay Leno or Joey?
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| 16th August 2006 05:39 AM |
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| lotsajizz |
quote:
sirmoonie wrote:
Liberman sucks, BTW. Zionist in the extreme, whacked out liberal, and easily the most two faced, sloganeering politician on either side of the ridiculous, imaginary aisle this society has set up. Hopefully his lame ass schtick caught up to him, but I doubt given the voting public these days.
It will. Those who claim Lieberman has a snowball's chance in hell know nothing of CT politics. People in that stinkhole called New Jersey view it through their prism and think some referendum on conservative-liberal is being held, but all politics is local. And Lieberman demonstrated loyalties to a party besides his own and a country besides his own. Never mind his state....
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| 16th August 2006 09:37 AM |
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| WinslowStud |
Wow. If this thread is any indication of how you guys write around here, I am heading back to Cleveland. Makes no sense whatsoever.
As a matter of fact, this thread sucks worse than the Pittsburgh Steelers. |
| 16th August 2006 09:37 AM |
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| WinslowStud |
Wow. If this thread is any indication of how you guys write around here, I am heading back to Cleveland. Makes no sense whatsoever.
As a matter of fact, this thread sucks worse than the Pittsburgh Steelers. |
| 16th August 2006 09:48 AM |
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| Fiji Joe |
quote:
WinslowStud wrote:
Wow. If this thread is any indication of how you guys write around here, I am heading back to Cleveland. Makes no sense whatsoever.
As a matter of fact, this thread sucks worse than the Pittsburgh Steelers.
Wow...if the fact that you posted this twice is any indication of your penis size, I'm not sure there's any woman in Cleveland that will be jumping for joy upon your return...sup now my nizzle? |
| 16th August 2006 09:52 AM |
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| Chuck |
The US media and the London terror scare
By David Walsh
16 August 2006
WSWS
http://www.wsws.org/articles/2006/aug2006/medi-a16.shtml
Since August 10, when British authorities arrested two dozen individuals in connection with an alleged plot to blow up a number of airplanes over the Atlantic Ocean, the American mass media has worked ceaselessly to create a climate of fear.
For the first several days after the news of the alleged plot broke, American news programs were virtually unwatchable. The lurid logos and wild, unsubstantiated allegations made a mockery of claims that the networks and cable channels are in the business of “news-gathering.”
The responses of the cable news channels to events like the August 10 arrests are predictable. One knows ahead of time that each of the channels will have its own sensationalist logo and catch-phrase. However, the combination of limited imaginations and shared political goals—centered on keeping the US population in a state of constant panic—often results in a certain overlap. CNN, for example, chose “Target: USA” as its phrase, Fox News opted for “Terror in the Sky,” and MSNBC neatly combined the two with “Target America: Terror in the Sky.”
On the morning of August 10, CNN anchors Soledad O’Brien and Tony Harris did their best to terrify their viewers. O’Brien began: “You’re watching a special edition of ‘American Morning,’ as we bring you breaking news that has begun really in Great Britain, but has rippled its way right here to the United States. We’re talking about terror.
“British officials are saying that they have disrupted a plot to commit mass murder. That’s a quote, ‘a plot to commit mass murder.’ They said mass murder on an unimaginable scale. They believe, in fact, that they have foiled the plot. Twenty one people are now under arrest.”
O’Brien introduced a later segment this way: “A sophisticated terror plot has been foiled. Now worldwide aviation has been thrown into chaos as unprecedented security measures are now being put into place...
“Lots of unknowns, of course, at this point as the investigation is just getting under way. How many planes, for example? Was there a specific date planned? We do not know.”
The CNN anchor neglected to place the very existence of the plot in the category of “unknowns.” That she and her colleagues accepted without questioning. She made no use of the word “alleged.” Her phrase, a “terror plot has been foiled,” would be repeated by commentators dozens and dozens of times over the next several days, as though this were an established fact.
Inadvertently acknowledging the public’s growing skepticism about terror scares organized by the Bush administration, CNN reporters recurrently referred to this new terror scenario as “the real deal.”
O’Brien couldn’t help herself over the course of the morning: “A source close to the investigation says this is the real deal,” “People close to the investigation say this is the real deal,” “A source close to the investigation says, ‘this is the real deal.’”
Nor could her co-anchor, Harris, who first asked a CNN reporter: “You travel all over the world, does this feel like the real deal to you?” and then assumed ownership of the phrase himself, “And a source close to the investigation says this is the real deal.”
CNN correspondent John King also got in on the act, “This senior administration official moments ago saying that this is very much the real deal, in his view.” Jeanne Meserve, CNN homeland security correspondent, carried the torch throughout the morning and afternoon, repeating the phrase on several different CNN programs: “Just talked to a US government official, who, when I asked about the seriousness of this threat, called it the real deal,” “According to one official I talked to, this was, quote, ‘the real deal,’” “A US official telling me this morning this was the real deal in his opinion” and “Officials call this the real deal.”
And if the plot turns out, in the end, not to be the ‘real deal,’ will there be any consequences for these individuals? Of course not. The entire affair will simply be allowed to die away.
The shift into terror mode is less immediately noticeable on Fox News Channel, since this Rupert Murdoch-owned propaganda arm of the Bush administration is perpetually on a ‘war footing.’ On Fox, no one even bothered with the word “alleged” in reporting the British airplane conspiracy.
On a typical Fox afternoon program last week, “In the wake of the London bomb plot...” one of their stupid female announcers begins, over the logo “Terror in the Sky.” Scotland Yard is conducting “70 anti-terror investigations,” we are informed. One of the suspects in the airplane plot planned to “use his infant as a decoy” while carrying out the dastardly deed. The British government has “stopped four bomb plots” since last July.
No evidence, no proof for any of this.
At one point a list of spectacular “Plot Details” appears on the screen:
* Blow up planes in midair
* Up to 50 terrorists involved
* 21 arrested so far
* Use liquid explosions to blow up planes
* Target American planes
Chris Wallace of Fox begins an interview, with yet another “terrorism analyst,” in the following manner: “When British authorities broke up that terror plot to blow up several aircraft heading for the US, they prevented a massacre over the Atlantic.” No reason to bother with the formality of an investigation, much less a trial.
On August 11, Fox’s John Gibson, a vicious proponent of police-state measures, questioned Attorney General Alberto Gonzalez. Gibson asked: “What is the role that either the Patriot Act or the NSA surveillance program or any of those kinds of things where American authorities listen in on people, what role did that play in this investigation?” Gonzalez more or less sidestepped the question, on the grounds that “We don’t want to jeopardize the subsequent prosecution.”
Gibson wasn’t to be put off so easily: “Let me put it this way, Mr. Attorney General. Apparently the Brits did use ‘sneak and peek’ as well as telephone taps. Does that illustrate, or should that illustrate to the American public, why those are necessary tools here?”
Gonzalez replied by providing the justification offered by every dictatorial regime for spying on the population: “We have had a very dangerous and very determined enemy, and they’re very smart. And they’re very wise in the ways that they communicate with each other. And I think we have a responsibility in government to ensure that we’re taking advantage of changing technology ourselves. We shouldn’t handicap ourselves.”
The alleged airline bomb plot has caused massive disruption to international air traffic. As always, the Bush administration would like to have it both ways: terrify the public yet not cut into the profits of giant corporations. On Fox’s “Your World with Neil Cavuto” August 10, the host of the program raised this vexing matter with Frances Townsend, White House homeland security adviser.
Cavuto worried that many members of the flying public “might be canceling reservations. In a way, then, do the terrorists succeed by not succeeding?” Townsend provided this rather shaky assurance: “Well, you know, they—if people begin to cancel their reservations and not travel, the—the terrorists do, in some measure, succeed. You know, this is about fear. It’s about instilling that fear in the flying public, both British and American.
“And you heard, today, the president, and you heard [Homeland Security] Secretary [Michael] Chertoff say, the measures we are taking, while they will create an inconvenience for the flying public, is the—are the very same measures that ought to give them the reassurance that it is safe to continue flying.”
Should one laugh or cry?
On MSNBC, with certain notable exceptions, the same general tone was struck. On August 10, Tucker Carlson, something of an idiot, introduced his afternoon program as follows: “The news today, absolutely chilling. What could well have been the most spectacular terror attack since 9/11, a murderous plot involving jumbo jets and targeting thousands of unsuspecting American travelers. But unlike the deadly attacks on New York and Washington almost five years ago, this plot was thwarted, possibly at the very last minute.”
At 7 p.m., Chris Matthews chimed in, beginning his “Hardball” program, “coming to you tonight from outside the headquarters of the Department of Homeland Security in Washington,” with: “A terror plot of unimaginable scope was thwarted today. British authorities arrested 24 British subjects, suspected in a plot to blow up nine airplanes on their way from London to the US. President Bush and US officials worked with their British counterparts in the days leading up to today’s arrests.”
Later in the evening, right-wing former congressman Joe Scarborough started off “Scarborough Country” as follows: “Tonight, governments in America, England and across the world are working feverishly to unfold that terror plot to blow up those flights from Great Britain to the United States. Thank God the plot was foiled by Scotland Yard, with the help of US authorities, who picked up an unusually high amount of chatter over the past month.”
On his August 14 program, Carlson interrogated Dr. Azzam Tamimi, director of the Institute of Islamic Political Thought and a senior member of the Muslim Association of Britain, who raised doubts about the terror plot, noting that “we have been told that this entire alleged plot was uncovered by the Pakistanis.... And I don’t have any confidence in the Pakistani intelligence or in any intelligence in that part of the world because they function as contractors. They do things in order to appease certain circles, and we’ve been there before.”
This was too much for Carlson, who interjected indignantly, “So, wait, you are basing your claim that this is likely a hoax simply on the fact that you don’t like the ISI, the Pakistani Intelligence Service, and that they’ve been wrong before? I mean, do you have evidence that this was a hoax? Because it’s an awfully poisonous thing to say otherwise.”
The application of the adjective “poisonous” to the defense of individuals who have been jailed and branded would-be mass murderers by two of the most powerful governments on earth, but not charged or found guilty of any crime: Does this not sum up the contemptuous attitude of the American media toward democracy?
Tamimi proceeded to point out the obvious: “I don’t have evidence that it is a hoax, but there is no evidence that it was real.”
Keith Olbermann of MSNBC’s “Countdown” program represented something of an exception to the uncritical transmission of government claims as facts. He began his program August 10, remarking, “The hysteria stops here,” and later, “The source is the British, the same people who missed both subway bombings in London last year, then shot a purported terrorist wearing a suicide-bomb vest and running from police, only it turned out he was a 27-year-old electrician wearing an ordinary shirt and walking.”
Olbermann asked, “How much of the plot was actually operational, how much of it feasible, how much of the reaction political?”
On August 14, Olbermann returned to the alleged bomb plot, in a segment called “The nexus of politics and terror.” He noted that “the plot, while real, might not have been quite as real as it was being advertised.” Among the revelations he mentioned: “Now we know, from senior members of British intelligence, that no attack was imminent, that those suspected had yet to buy airline tickets, and some of them didn’t even have passports.... Our government insisted on immediate arrests, and proceeded, both before and after them, to make every imaginable piece of political [hay] out of them.”
Olbermann even raised a thoroughly taboo question in the American media, “whether a government would really exaggerate or manipulate terror developments, not to allay the fears of the citizenry, but rather to inflame them.”
A fascistic rant
A special note must be added about the presence on CNN’s Headline News channel of Glenn Beck, a reactionary radio talk show host, who has been given his own evening program. Pretending to provide “straight talk,” Beck, an obviously unstable individual, carries on in the manner of a homegrown American fascist.
Lest we be accused of exaggerating, here are a few samples. From his August 10 program: “Does your gut tell you that this [the alleged bomb plot] is the start of something much bigger? We’re at red alert for the very first time in our nation’s history, and I for one don’t think it should be just because of what happened in London.”
Beck then referred to the case of two Muslim men from Dearborn, Michigan, arrested on terrorism charges for purchasing hundreds of cell phones. The claims have subsequently been exposed as fraudulent, the men released and the terrorism charges dropped.
Beck ranted on: “Also bodies of Iran’s Revolutionary Guard have reportedly been found among the Hezbollah fighters slain in Lebanon. [Another entirely unsubstantiated assertion.] I have been saying this the whole time. And now we have proof positive. We are at world war with Iran. They are assembling forces and mobilizing our enemies on a global level. Iran is the head of the snake.”
And later on the same program: “The story out of London is huge. But it is part of something much bigger, and much more dangerous. This is why I’ve been saying we’re in World War III. It’s just—we’re at the beginning, and we’re just now beginning to see how everything is really tied together.”
On August 14, Beck returned to the Iranian threat and its apocalyptic character. [Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad] “is a force for evil who is more dangerous than Hitler. Hitler really didn’t want to die to fulfill his sick vision. This guy does and will.
“I also know that I am no longer going to call this a war on terror. Mainly because that implies that it’s kind of like the war on drugs. You know, something that will always be around, we just need to contain it. Just saying no doesn’t really work with crazy people.
“We have to wipe this threat out completely, not contain it. We need to kill them before they kill us.”
This is the type of filth to which the American public is subjected on a daily basis.
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| 16th August 2006 11:09 AM |
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| sirmoonie |
quote:
lotsajizz wrote:
It will. Those who claim Lieberman has a snowball's chance in hell know nothing of CT politics. People in that stinkhole called New Jersey view it through their prism and think some referendum on conservative-liberal is being held, but all politics is local. And Lieberman demonstrated loyalties to a party besides his own and a country besides his own. Never mind his state....
I like it when politicians break party lines - like all the Republicans quietly and bashfully deserting George Walker Bush III - after all, theoretically we are voting for an individual, although very few voters are actually intelligent or honest enough to themselves to behave that way.
But yeah, you know the score on what soil Lieberman considers home, even if "those guys" - those newly minted, whatever-fits-my-story-for-today Zionists - brand you an anti-semite. Its J-card nation time! |
| 16th August 2006 11:45 AM |
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| telecaster |
quote:
sirmoonie wrote:
Chuck, I think if you have news you want to post, you should just post the link and then your summary of what is in it, maybe with select quotes. Posting the whole article is annoying.
Amen. Plus post it isn't "news" if it is from a 3rd graders
personal blog or his MySpace.com page
Chuck, will your Mommy be mad when she comes home from work and finds out you have been using the computer? |
| 16th August 2006 11:51 AM |
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| not bound to please |
Notice howe Feej posts pics of fat women and dogs when he refers to me - but posts a pic of a hot guy in Hilfiger undies when he refers to moonie?
Paging Dr. Freud... |
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