Sunday April 20th 2008

A Guide to 'NYT' Scoop on Media Compliciity With Pentagon War Propaganda
Must Read - A quote...."NEW YORK The front-page David Barstow epic in today's New York Times on how the Pentagon, starting in 2002, assembled a crew of retired military officers to disseminate propaganda via all-to-willing network and cable news outlets is drawing wide attention (see other story). Barstow aptly refers to this as "a kind of media trojan horse." -- Even if it confirms what many have already sensed the details are truly damning and shocking -- more Orwell than oh, well. And it continues up to the present day, with the revelation that Gen. Petraeus met with members of this propaganda group just two weeks ago (he had met with them previously, as well). "Anything we can do help," one analyst described this most recent meeting. -- The Pentagon referred to the analysts as "message-force multipliers."

Pentagon propaganda over torture and Iraq revealed
Related article - A quote...."The Pentagon and the US media have been exposed for using pre-programmed “military analysts” to win hearts and minds of Americans over the war in Iraq, torture and detentions in Guantanamo Bay. - Kenneth Allard, an NBC military analyst and teacher at National Defence University, described the propaganda exercise as a "coherent, active," sophisticated information operation."

NYT Investigation Exposes Pentagon Pimps & Propaganda Operation
Related article - A quote...."If you thought the US media had hit a new low with last week's ABC Debate Debacle, read Sunday's New York Times's 10,000 (plus) word cover story, "Behind TV Analysts, Pentagon's Hidden Hand." -- Using 8000 pages of e-mail messages, transcripts and records, accessed through suing the Pentagon, the NYT report exposes the Pentagon's propaganda machine, its control over access and information, and its selling of the "war on terror" --beginning with the buildup to the Iraq war. As someone posting here put it, Goebbels would be proud."

Pentagon Propaganda & Antiwar Analysts
Related article - A quote...."The Sunday Times' article detailing the massive, secret coordinated campaign by the Pentagon and all the leading television news channels to sell and defend the administration's Iraq policy is a critical piece of investigative journalism. David Barstow provided meticulous and aggressive reporting, even referencing how The Times'amplified Pentagon "surrogates" without sufficient disclosure for readers.

Pentagon uses military analysts as ‘puppets’ to push talking points.
Related article - A quote...."A new New York Times article reveals that the Pentagon has wooed military analysts with private briefings and access to classified information “in a campaign to generate favorable news coverage of the administration’s wartime performance.”

Major revelation: U.S. media deceitfully disseminates government propaganda
Related article - A quote...."This morning's "blockbuster" New York Times article by David Barstow, documenting the Pentagon and U.S. media's joint use of pre-programmed "military analysts" who posed as objective experts while touting the Government line and having extensive business interests in promoting those views, is very well-documented and well-reported. And credit to the NYT for having sued to compel disclosure of the documents on which the article is based. There are significant elements of the story that exemplify excellent investigative journalism."

The New York Times article is shown below....


Editor's special note: - This article will take a while to work its way into the national dialogue, to become incorporated into this nation's consciousness, when it does the consequences may be unforeseen and possibly quite traumatic.  To say that this article will cause a massive upsurge in cynicism would probably be an understatement  It's doubtful that those currently serving  in the armed forces who weren’t in the "know" regarding these issues or who didn't personally profit from the defense contracts involved will feel favorably toward the current and former officers who besmirched their reputations and helped destroy the lives of tens of thousands of Americans and hundreds of thousands of people who live in the Middle East by participating in this "racket".

These revelations are unfortunate, necessary, and most likely are just the beginning of what's to come. - mpg
========== ========== ========== ========== ========== ========== ========== ====

Shoddy! Tawdry! A Televised Train Wreck!
Must Read - A quote...."“THE crowd is turning on me,” said Charles Gibson, the ABC anchor, when the audience jeered him in the final moments of Wednesday night’s face-off between Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama. -- I can’t remember a debate in which the only memorable moment was the audience’s heckling of a moderator. Then again, I can’t remember a debate that became such an instant national gag, earning reviews more appropriate to a slasher movie like “Prom Night” than a civic event held in Philadelphia’s National Constitution Center:

“Shoddy, despicable!” — The Washington Post
“A tawdry affair!” — The Boston Globe
“A televised train wreck!” — The Philadelphia Daily News

And those were the polite ones. Let’s not even go to the blogosphere.
========== ========== ========== ========== ========== ========== ========== ====

McCain, the Retired Military "Analysts" and the Myth of al-Qaeda in Iraq
A quote...."I am quoted in this NYT piece today on John McCain's allegations that the US is fighting "al-Qaeda" in Iraq and that there is a danger of "al-Qaeda" taking over the country if the US leaves. -- Those allegations don't make any sense. McCain contradicts himself because he sometimes warns that the Shiites or Iran will take over Iraq. He doesn't seem to realize that the US presided over the ascension to power in Iraq of pro-Iranian Shiite parties like Nuri al-Maliki's Islamic Mission Party and Abdul Aziz al-Hakim's Islamic Supreme Council of Iraq. So which is it? There is a danger that pro-Iranian Shiites will take over (which is anyway what we have engineered) or that al-Qaeda will? It is not as if they can coexist. Since the Shiites are 60 percent and by now well armed and trained, how could the 1 percent of the 17 percent of the country that is Sunni Arab and maybe supports Salafi radicalism hope to take over?"

Third NSA Source Confirms: Flight 93 Shot Down By Air Force Jet
A quote...."WMR has received another confirmation, bringing the total number to three, that United Flight 93, hijacked on the morning of September 11, 2001, was shot down over rural Pennsylvania by U.S. Air Force jets scrambled from Andrews Air Force Base in Maryland. There are also reports that one F-16 scrambled from Langley Air Force Base in Virginia returned to base minus one air-to-air missile but the National Security Agency CRITIC report specified the interceptors that downed United 93 took off from Andrews."

Do you REALLY Want 9/11 Truth Revealed? Of course you do. So let's do it NOW!
A quote...."Just yesterday, Richard Greene of Air America radio announced that May will be a MONTH of Truth; not a bad result after only two days of WEEK Of Truth -- the potential is truly enormous! The bulldozer has indeed already begun to roll; but we -- ALL OF US -- have to do our part to keep it rolling. Otherwise, frankly, we might as well go sleep on the beach."

Michael Mukasey, Day of 9/11, Osama bin Laden – 9/11 Timeline Additions as of April 20, 2008
A quote...."More material has been added covering the NSA's surveillance of Ahmed al-Hada, father-in-law of alleged Pentagon hijacker Khalid Almihdhar. Both President Bush and Vice President Cheney used the non-exploitation of calls between his phone in Yemen and the hijackers in the US to justify the NSA's warrantless wiretapping program in January 2006. Attorney General Michael Mukasey and Director of National Intelligence Michael McConnell attributed the failure to trace the calls to a 1981 executive order earlier this year, and Mukasey bizarrely then claimed that one of the calls was between the US and Afghanistan, rather than Yemen. This confused the media somewhat, and a group of congressmen asked Mukasey for an explanation."

14 Point Destruction of the NIST & FEMA 9/11 WTC Reports
A quote...."The Open Civil Engineering Journal has just published an article by Dr. Steven E. Jones, Dr. Frank M. Legge, Kevin R. Ryan, Anthony F. Szamboti, and James R. Gourley, known for their criticism of the official explanations of the destruction of World Trade Center Towers 1,2 & 7 and for advancing the theory that explosives brought them down."
========== ========== ========== ========== ========== ========== ========== ====

Cheney's and Maliki's new war in Iraq - Sunday round-up - 5 articles - [ Day 27 ]

Fear in Sadr City as cleric threatens war
A quote...."April 21, 2008 -- At the southern entrance to Sadr City several Iraqi men on the US military’s payroll are sweeping the street in the latest attempt to stop al-Mahdi Army militia from recruiting new fighters. -- The number of people working on such US-funded projects is tiny, however, because Shia militants loyal to the anti-American cleric Moqtada al-Sadr have ordered many in this Baghdad slum to stay away. Other residents simply prefer not to be associated with US troops, who are largely denounced as occupiers."

Renewed Clashes With Shi'ite Militias In Iraq
A quote...."Monday , 21 April 2008 -- There have been intense clashes between Shi'ite militants and joint U.S.-Iraqi forces in several parts of Iraq. - In the southern city of Al-Basrah, Iraqi troops backed by U.S. and British forces launched an operation in the city's Al-Hayaniyah district, where radical Shi'ite cleric Muqtada al-Sadr's forces are concentrated."

Al-Sadr's followers refuse to disband militia in Iraq
A quote...."Apr 20, 2008 15:02 EST -- Followers of hardline cleric Muqtada al-Sadr raised the stakes Sunday in the showdown with Iraq's government, refusing to disband their militia. The U.S. military said 40 Shiite militants were killed in fierce fighting in southern Iraq."

Rice calls anti-U.S. cleric a coward
Full quote...."AP on: 21.04.2008 [05:00 ] -- BAGHDAD - Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice mocked anti-American cleric Muqtada al-Sadr as a coward on Sunday, hours after the radical leader threatened to declare war unless U.S. and Iraqi forces end a military crackdown on his followers. -- Rice, in the Iraqi capital to tout security gains and what she calls an emerging political consensus, said al-Sadr is content to issue threats and edicts from the safety of Iran, where he is studying. -- "I know he's sitting in Iran," Rice said dismissively, when asked about al-Sadr's latest threat to lift a self-imposed cease-fire with government and U.S. forces. "I guess it's all-out war for anybody but him," Rice said. "I guess that's the message; his followers can go to their deaths and he's in Iran."

Calamity Condi does it again....she has her very own "bring it on" moment.  In the spirit of her epiphany however, let's paraphrase what she had to say with just a few little twists  -- "Condi you've been sitting in Washington DC on your big butt along with your boss and a bunch of your Neocon friends for a very long time now, tell you what....why don't you and your buddies get off your fat asses, grab some M-16s and give a little help to all them young boys you guys sent over there to Iraq. Or is it all out war for anybody and everybody on the planet but you guys?  Is that the message you were trying to send Condi, that those young boys can go to their deaths while you and your Neocon cronies remain in Washington DC?

US military threatens to hit back if Sadr launches war
A quote...."20 April 2008 -- BAGHDAD - A top US general in Iraq on Sunday threatened to strike back at hardline Iraqi Shia leader Moqtada Al Sadr after he warned of a new uprising by his militia. - 'I hope Moqtada al-Sadr continues to depress violence and not encourage it,' said Major General Rick Lynch, commander of US forces in the central Iraq Shia provinces of Babil, Wasit, Karbala and Najaf."

Cheney's and Maliki's new war in Iraq - Sunday round-up - [ Day 27 ]
========== ========== ========== ========== ========== ========== ========== ====

The Middle East: Turning the Page on US Foreign Policy - Part I
A quote...."One would think that the title of my talk – "The Middle East: Turning the Page on U.S. Foreign Policy" – is fairly noncontroversial, as such things go. Yet the very idea of turning the page – that is, of making a significant change – in our policy in the region is considered heresy, and not only in foreign policy circles but in Washington, D.C., generally. The reason is because our Middle Eastern policy has become hopelessly politicized, locked into a formulaic and increasingly unrealistic stance highly detrimental to our national interest yet artificially maintained by one of the most powerful lobbies in Washington."

Tomgram: 12 Reasons to Get Out of Iraq
A quote...."Can there be any question that, since the invasion of 2003, Iraq has been unraveling? And here's the curious thing: Despite a lack of decent information and analysis on crucial aspects of the Iraqi catastrophe, despite the way much of the Iraq story fell off newspaper front pages and out of the TV news in the last year, despite so many reports on the "success" of the President's surge strategy, Americans sense this perfectly well. In the latest Washington Post/ABC News poll, 56% of Americans "say the United States should withdraw its military forces to avoid further casualties" and this has, as the Post notes, been a majority position since January 2007, the month that the surge was first announced. Imagine what might happen if the American public knew more about the actual state of affairs in Iraq -- and of thinking in Washington. So, here, in an attempt to unravel the situation in ever-unraveling Iraq are twelve answers to questions which should be asked far more often in this country:"

India Warns against Military Action against Iran
A quote...." TEHRAN (FNA)- India on Saturday said that military action or sanctions against Iran would exacerbate the situation and that it favored a solution which involves Tehran. -- Sanctions or military action - none of them is a lasting solution and will only exacerbate the situation. We need to evolve something that involves Iran," Foreign Secretary Shivshankar Menon said in an interactive session at the India Global Forum in New Delhi. -- Menon said India has made its stand quite clear that while Iran may have the right to peaceful uses of nuclear energy it also has an obligation to various international commitments it undertook."

Carter presses Hamas to back Gaza peace talks
A quote...."Hamas was locked in an internal debate in Damascus yesterday over proposals put forward by former United States President Jimmy Carter for a unilateral ceasefire with Israel and more political flexibility, Palestinian politicians said. - Carter left the Syrian capital yesterday for Riyadh after an early morning meeting with Hamas leader Khaled Meshaal. In more than four hours of talks on Friday night, they discussed how the Islamist group could be drawn into a Middle East peace plan and end its opposition to peace talks between Israel and Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas, leader of the rival Fatah faction."

Israel says probes death of Reuters cameraman
A quote...."GAZA, April 20 (Reuters) - The Israeli army said on Sunday it was investigating the death of a Reuters cameraman in the Gaza Strip last week and declined to say why one of its tanks opened fire, killing the journalist and five other Palestinians."  --  For more on this issue see....Killing a Messenger

Can Carter open eyes of Americans?
A quote...."THE Gaza Strip is bracing for more violence after Israel "reciprocated" with ground and air attacks killing 18 Palestinians, one a cameraman for an international news agency, for the killing of three Israeli soldiers by Hamas fighters on Wednesday. Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert said Hamas bears "direct responsibility" for the fighting. Israel has reportedly threatened to launch a widescale operation to oust Hamas from the Gaza Strip but local media have speculated that it may wait until after the Jewish Passover holiday, which begins tomorrow."

Iranian official: Asian traders make up for losses due to German sanctions
A quote...."Germany's reduction in trade with Iran as part of sanctions imposed by the West is not hurting the country as competitors from Asia step in to fill the gaps, Iranian Deputy Foreign Minister Mehdi Safari said Friday. -- The economic sanctions against Iran were put in place in efforts to discourage the Islamic Republic from developing its disputed nuclear program."

Summit in a Bedouin's tent
A quote...."MOSCOW. (RIA Novosti commentator Andrei Murtazin) - Never before has Putin held high-level talks in a Bedouin's tent, but Libyan revolutionary leader Muammar Qaddafi, who is a son of the desert, would not have it any other way. Libyan protocol sets his Azizia residence, not far from Tripoli, as the only receiving area for all foreign guests."

Qatar Says China to Receive Gas Diverted From U.S. and Europe
A quote...."April 19 (Bloomberg) — Qatar, the world's largest producer of liquefied natural gas, is diverting supplies destined for the U.S. and Europe to China because the Asian country pays more, Qatar's oil minister said today. -- A supply agreement this month between Qatar and China ``is a diversion from Europe and the U.S., ``not new production, Abdullah bin Hamad al-Attiyah told reporters as he arrived in Rome for the International Energy Forum. ``We are not in the charity business. Whoever will give me the best price, I will follow him.''

PARAGUAY:  Historic Elections End Six Decades of Rule
Special Note - A quote...."ASUNCIÓN, Apr 20 (IPS) - Former Catholic bishop Fernando Lugo was elected president in a landslide victory Sunday in Paraguay, putting an end to 61 years of rule by the Colorado Party. -- With 52 percent of the ballots counted, the presidential candidate of the centre-left Patriotic Alliance for Change (APC) took 40 percent of the vote against the 31 percent garnered by governing party candidate Blanca Ovelar, who ceded defeat. -- Five exit polls had previously indicated that Lugo, known as "the bishop of the poor", was three to six percentage points ahead of Ovelar, the first-ever female presidential candidate of the National Republican Alliance, better known as the Colorado Party."

Paraguay cracks six decades of iron fist one party rule
Related article - A quote...."Former Catholic bishop Fernando Lugo won a historic victory in Paraguay's Sunday presidential election, signaling the demise of more than six decades of one-party hegemonic rule in one of South America’s poorest countries."

Ecuador's leader purges military and moves to expel American base
A quote...."MANTA, Ecuador: Chafing at ties between American intelligence agencies and Ecuadorean military officials, President Rafael Correa is purging the armed forces of top commanders and pressing ahead with plans to cast out more than 100 American military personnel from an air base here in this coastal city."

Dockers' protest forces arms cargo away from Durban port
A quote...."A Chinese ship carrying arms destined for Zimbabwe was last night forced to turn back after South African unions refused to unload it, claiming that to do so would be “grossly irresponsible”, South African media reported. -- The reversal is a humiliation for President Mbeki, who had said that the Government was powerless to stop the shipment of three million rounds of AK47 ammunition, 1,500 rocket-propelled grenades and more than 3,000 mortar rounds and mortar tubes to President Mugabe’s armed forces." -- If you ever saw the movie Lord of War, there was a scene in it where Yuri Orlov, an arms dealer, is about to deliver two truckloads of exactly the same sort ammunition to army units which will be used to slaughter thousands of innocent tribes people in a refugee camp.  His brother fails to stop him but dies trying....this is that scene.  And the dockworkers won. - mpg

Pope blesses U.N. flag, calls for “binding international rules”
A quote...."Pope Benedict XVI spoke to the U.N. General Assembly on Friday, warning nations against undermining the authority of the United Nations by acting unilaterally. The Pope also found time to bless the U.N. flag."

Where's George?
This one's fun - mpg - A quote...."So what ever happened to George W. Bush, the worst chief executive this nation has ever endured? - This is an election year. Aren't we supposed to be evaluating the legacy of the previous administration?"

The 2008 Election Will Be Stolen
A quote...."A new collection of essays edited by Mark Crispin Miller called "Loser Take All: Election Fraud and the Subversion of Democracy, 2000 - 2008," tells the story better than any single source I've seen yet. - The Supreme Court stopped a recount in Florida in 2000 that would have made Al Gore president. This is not speculation. The recount was later done."
========== ========== ========== ========== ========== ========== ========== ====

Swiss National Bank announces new injection of U.S. dollar liquidity
A quote...." The Swiss National Bank will offer up to US$6 billion (€3.8 billion) in short term credit to ease strains in jittery financial markets, the central bank said Friday. -- SNB's move will come in an auction of so-called repo loans, or repurchase agreements, to renew a similar measure of US$6 billion made last month in concert with the European Central Bank, the U.S. Federal Reserve and the Bank of Canada."

Alistair Darling plans unprecedented £50bn bank bailout
A quote...."An unprecedented £50 billion injection to bail out Britain’s ailing banking system could be doubled if it fails to stave off a collapse in the housing market. -- Alistair Darling will today tell MPs that the Bank of England is to allow lenders to swap assets [crap] for government-backed bonds in an attempt to restore confidence and ease the effects of the credit crunch."

Housing slump hits Spain
A quote...."The clearest indication of the impact of the global credit crunch is the sharp slowdown in the housing sector. The housing slump in Spain is particularly sharp. -- There are now very few areas in the country where you cannot see new building developments filled with banners displaying the phone numbers of people desperate to sell them. In the capital Madrid, buildings are littered with “For Sale” signs. Hardly a day goes by without stories appearing in the media of developers abandoning half-finished apartment buildings and leaving buyers with the terrible prospect of never seeing their homes finished. Growing numbers of borrowers are missing mortgage payments for the first time and figures have doubled from last year."

No need for OPEC to raise output now: president
A quote...."OPEC president Chakib Khelil said on Sunday that the oil-producer cartel should not increase output now because the market was well-balanced. -- "There is no need for OPEC to raise its production now ... Any increase in output will not affect oil prices because there is a balance between supply and demand," Khelil said in comments cited by the KUNA news agency."