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Wolf Britain, Poet and Activist
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Unless Otherwise Noted, All Material Copyright © 1998-2004 in the U.S.A. and Internationally by Wolf Britain. All Rights Reserved.
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Unless Otherwise Noted, All Material Copyright © 1998-2004 in the U.S.A. and Internationally by Wolf Britain. All Rights Reserved.
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Unless Otherwise Noted, All Material Copyright © 1998-2004 in the U.S.A. and Internationally by Wolf Britain. All Rights Reserved.
Prescript: I'm looking for someone to go 50/50 with me and move to either Ecuador, Costa Rica, Belize, Guatemala, or Mexico where we can make a very low income go much further with a lower cost, and higher standard, of living (than living in the States on such a low income). This includes an only income of Social Security Disability (SSDI) and/or Retirement benefits. The Social Security Administration most definitely DOES allow SSDI and/or Retirement benefits, but not Supplemental Security Income (SSI) benefits, to be sent to recipients in most other countries! There are many books about moving and living abroad available at the public library and/or at Amazon.com . Naturally, I realize we would probably have to spend some time getting to know eachother, and finding out if we're compatible, before moving abroad together. We could even have our own separate "spaces" by choosing to rent or purchase a house or apartment with separate quarters, and still save considerable money in monthly costs compared to living in the States on the same income. If you might be interested, want to ask me some questions, and/or want to discuss it, please e-mail me at the address below.
CONTENTS OF THIS PAGE
(Click on the link to go to that part of the page):
Grassroots Interview: U.S. Senator Byrd
(MoveOn.org -- On or About 5-9-03)
"The Truth Will Emerge"
(Senator Byrd's Address to the Senate on 5-21-03)
"Another Day, Another $350 Billion in Debt"
(By Bill Moyers, on "Now with Bill Moyers" [PBS -- May 30, 2003])
Terrorists vs. Terrorists
(From Alternative Internet, AlterNet.org)
Bill Moyer Speaks Out
(A Presentation by Don Hazen, Executive Editor of AlterNet.org)
"If The CIA And The U.S. Government Weren't Involved
In The September 11 Attacks, What Were They Doing?"
"U.S. Protects al-Q'aeda Terrorists
In Kosovo (Post-9/11)"
"Pentagon Aims Guns At Lynch Reports"
(By Robert Scheer, AlterNet(.org) [May 29, 2003])
MORE OF MY COMMENTS AND FAVORITE QUOTES ON VARIOUS TOPICS CONCERNING 9-11-01, TERRORISM, EVIL, HATE, INJUSTICE, RACISM, BIGOTRY, PREJUDICE, DISCRIMINATION, INEQUALITY, REVENGE, RETALIATION(S), INVASION, WAR, MORE TERRORISM, MURDER, GREED, MONEY-MONGERING, WAR-MONGERING, "AMERICAN" FOREIGN POLICY(IES), CONQUEST, OCCUPATION, CONTROL, FALSE IMPRISONMENT, CAPITALISM, GLOBALISM, IMPERIALISM, COLONIALISM, HYPOCRISY, CORPORATE FASCISM, TOTALITARIANISM, DESPOTISM, DICTATORSHIP, OPPRESSION, REPRESSION, GENOCIDE, EUGENICS, NATIONAL AND INTERNATIONAL HUMAN RIGHTS AND CIVIL LIBERTIES, TRUE PEACE, FREEDOM, DEMOCRACY, LIBERATION, EQUALITY, JUSTICE, AND LAST BUT THE GREATEST, LOVE, ADDED TO THE SITE ON 5-26-03:
GRASSROOTS INTERVIEW: U.S. SENATOR BYRD
(MoveOn.org -- On or About 9 May 2003)
The following are the personal responses of Senator Robert Byrd (D-WV) to the top-ranked questions MoveOn.org members posed last week:
"First of all, before I begin, let me thank MoveOn(.org) and its thousands of members for the support that you have given to me and to so many others who are willing to stand up and make their opinions known. Your willingness to be active participants in this Republic makes a real difference, and I hope that you will continue to let your voices be heard."
Question One: "What are the ways we can impact the choices being made today as powerfully as possible?"
-- Michael McCann, West Lebanon, NH
"Mr. McCann, you ask a very good question. Many of those who want to speak out are cowed by the intimidation and ridicule that often accompanies going against the perceived grain. That is as true in Congress as it is outside the Capitol Beltway. At times of national distress, it is natural to want to come together and to look for leadership from a single, clear voice. But America's song has never been expressed by a single note. It was never intended to be. America's music is not a solo, but rather a symphony made richer by the harmony of different views. Remember, our founders rejected a Monarchy, and sought, instead, a Republic. They chose a representative form of government that allowed the many voices of America to be heard.
"Write your Members of Congress. Write your newspaper. Talk with your neighbors. Do not sit back and assume that everything will work out for the best. If we are going to make a difference, if we are going to break through the constant beat of rhetoric and bombast that fills the airwaves each day, we cannot be complacent. The freedom to dissent, to speak out, and to question is the birthright of every American.
"There is a power which can serve as a check against abuses by a government or by government officials and that power is the power of the informed citizen -- one who has read enough, who understands enough, who has developed a base of knowledge against which to judge truth or falsehood. Participation in the great debates of our time must not be relegated to the power elites in Washington. An informed citizenry has to participate, ask questions, and demand answers and accountability to make a country like ours work.
"Without some base of knowledge upon which to make judgments about the critical issues that face us, the average citizen will be buffeted this way and that by spin doctors from the White House, statements by politicians seeking to please voters, and daily news coverage and talk shows which often have an editorial agenda.
"I say, for the sake of our country, arm yourself with information. Especially with an Administration which has a demonstrated penchant for secrecy, our people must be vigilant. We must resist excessive invasion of personal privacy because of a well-intentioned zealousness by government to hunt down terrorists, and we must question the necessity of all measures which seem extreme.
"Dictators and despots triumph when the people become complacent, drop their guards, and leave government to "the powers that be." Remember, sheep could never be peacefully led to slaughter if they could ask where they were headed and get an honest answer.
"It is up to each citizen to do what he or she can to provide that all-important check on power, the wisdom of the people."
Question Two: "How can we stop the right wing revolution of George W. Bush?"
-- Elizabeth C. Mark, Alexandria, VA
"Ms. Mark, you are not alone in your frustrations. Many Americans are concerned about what they see as a bias in the media.
"There are voices in the media that seek to present an alternative point of view. But too often, these men and women are sent packing because their corporate bosses fear a commercial backlash.
"I do not question the media's right to report on stories and to have talk shows which express opinion. That right is clearly laid out in the First Amendment of the Bill of Rights. "Congress shall make no law...abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press." This Amendment, ratified in December, 1791, gives broad power to the press. Our Constitutional Framers understood that the Republic would not function properly if the press is not allowed to operate freely and without intervention from government. However, the media must also recognize the responsibility it has to the public that relies so heavily on the information learned in the daily reports.
"The free press must be a fair press. Through the First Amendment, our Framers guaranteed a free press. We, the people, demand a fair press, one that meets its responsibilities and our expectations. A free press cannot exist without the trust of the public it serves. To win and maintain that trust, the press must be fair in its work.
"As I recently said on the floor of the Senate, the American people unfortunately are used to political shading, spin, and the usual chicanery they hear from public officials. They patiently tolerate it up to a point. But there is a line. The calculated intimidation which we see so often of late by the "powers that be" will only keep the loyal opposition quiet for just so long. Because eventually, like it always does, the truth will emerge. There is no obstacle that cannot be overcome by the vigorous mind determined to follow the truth."
Question Three: "How can we regain freedom of the press and airwaves, and restore free public speech and debate? Where are the liberal intellectuals and think tanks and how could they have been so easily marginalized?"
-- (Pastor) Gerry Staatemeier, Tucson, AZ
"First, let me thank you, (Pastor) Staatemeier, for your more than kind remarks. I am humbled by them. ...Mr. Staatemeier asks a question very similar to that of Ms. Mark. The media. What to do about the media. This should not come as a great shock but, while I have a good understanding of the complexities of the Constitution and the issues facing the nation, I have very little understanding of the enigma of the modern media. I have often wondered how Daniel Webster or Henry Clay or James Madison would have come across on television. How would they do in 20-second sound bites? Yet their ideas helped to build the foundation for this country. Would their beliefs have been as strongly followed if all people heard were short bits and pieces?
"These questions have all shared common themes. How can we speak out? How can we make our voices heard? How can we break through the barriers that seem to hold back balanced opinion? It is frustrating, I know. I have, for months, pushed, prodded, and pleaded with my colleagues to speak out, to let their voices be heard, and to not be intimidated by this Administration or others who would criticize.
"The best advice I have is to read, listen, and participate. Share your opinions with your family and friends. Talk at your churches and community organizations. Not everyone will agree with you. When there are those who do not, stay civil. Rely on reason, logic, and facts...."
Question Four: "What can citizens do?"
-- Sid Kemp, San Antonio, TX
"Mr. Kemp, you ask for specifics. I have already outlined many of the steps that I think are important: ready; study; write; talk with your neighbors; contact your lawmakers; ask real questions and do not settle for half-answers. Stay involved in politics. Support candidates who share your views. Vote. Get your neighbors to vote. Each of us has a part in making this government good by exercising the duty and privilege of the ballot box. We can show our gratitude for all that our nation means to us by the quality of our citizenship."
Question Five: "Why is Congress giving up its Constitutional duty?"
-- Eli Pariser, New York, NY
"Mr. Pariser, your question is one that has vexed me for several months. The October 11 vote by the Senate to hand over to the President the authority to solely determine when, where, how, and why to declare war will go down in history as one of the lowest points in the Senate's existence. Twenty-three Senators voted against that resolution. Twenty-three Senators would not walk away from their Constitutional duties. Reversing that vote will not be easy, especially in this climate and with this President.
"What also concerns me is this new doctrine of preemptive strikes. I continue to believe that this policy of preemptive strikes is a dangerous policy that carries unintended consequences. When America acts unilaterally to enforce its will on other nations, without an imminent, direct threat to our security and without regard for the rest of the world or even our traditional allies, we endanger the peace of the world. America is the world's remaining superpower. But that unique status does not give America the right to impose its will whenever and wherever it chooses. We have a responsibility to lead, not to bully.
"As post-war reconstruction moves forward, more than just the Iraqi nation needs attention. The United States would be well advised to reconstruct many of the diplomatic relationships that have been seriously strained because of the doctrine of preemptive strikes. In the months and years ahead, we will need the world's support of our allies. We will need assistance in the effort to stop global terrorism; we will need the goodwill of the world to foster peaceful resolutions to dangerous situations. It is especially important that America show the world that we have the confidence and wisdom to step back from this policy of preemption and return to the steadier course of diplomatic resolution."
Question Six: "Can Democrats offer an alternative vision for America?"
-- Susan Faraone, Chicago, IL
"Ms. Faraone, I certainly believe so. We have many brave men and women in Congress, in state government, and in local government who are working to improve the lives of their fellow citizens. And one does not have to be in government to make that difference.
"This nation faces daunting challenges in the coming years. The baby boomer generation will begin to retire in the year 2008. Because of the demands of that generation, both the Social Security and Medicare trust funds are expected to be running in the red by 2016. In 2015, more than 60 million Americans expect to rely on Social Security as a backbone of their retirement and more than 45 million Americans will rely on Medicare for their health care. But what steps have we taken to prepare for this looming crisis? Not one. Not a single dime is devoted to shoring up Social Security. Not one penny is directed to pay back the IOUs that Congress has been putting in the trust fund kitty for so many years.
"Education. We know that 75 percent of our nation's school buildings are inadequate to meet the needs of our children. In fact, the average cost of capital investment needed is $3,800 per student. But are we providing the dollars to build and renovate schools? No.
"The American Society of Civil Engineers has graded the nation's infrastructure. How did we do? Abysmally. Roads: D-plus. Aviation: D-minus. Schools: D-minus. Transit: C-minus. Drinking water: D. Overall, in 10 different areas, the nation's infrastructure received an average grade of D-plus.
"When touting his tax cut packages, the President is fond of saying that we ought to give the people their money back. I think we ought to give the people their money's worth. Instead of more massive tax cuts, we ought to look toward tomorrow and repair our outdated infrastructure. We ought to help provide for safe highways and bridges; airports and transit systems that work; clean air; safe drinking water; and schools that help children to learn. We ought to plan ahead to insure that Social Security and Medicare will be available in the long-term.
"In his book, The Greatest Generation, Tom Brokaw discusses the greatness of the generation of Americans of the 1930s and the 1940s. He points out that it was this generation of Americans who "came of age in the Great Depression when economic despair hovered over the land like a plague." This was "the greatest generation any society has ever produced."
"Like Mr. Brokaw, I too admire the generation of Americans who survived the hardships of the Great Depression and won World War II. They were truly outstanding Americans, a great generation. I am proud to say that they are my generation.
"But ever since reading Mr. Brokaw's book, I can't help but think of the greatness of not only this generation of Americans, but the greatness of generation after generation of Americans. It seems that in every age of our history, Americans have risen to meet the challenges and the difficulties of their times and to move our country toward further greatness. We will not fall short now.
"After answering these questions, I am reminded of a poem that I have recited since my youth. The words were penned by Josiah Gilbert Holland in the 19th Century, but the message carries forth into the 21st Century."
"God give us men!
A time like this demands strong minds,
great hearts, true faith, and ready hands.
Men whom the lust of office does not kill;
Men whom the spoils of office cannot buy;
Men who possess opinions and a will;
Men who have honor; men who will not lie.
Men who can stand before a demagogue
And brave his treacherous flatteries without (bl)inking.
"Tall men, sun-crowned;
Who live above the fog,
In public duty and in private thinking.
For while the rabble with its thumbworn creeds,
It's large professions and its little deeds,
mingles in selfish strife,
Lo! Freedom weeps!
Wrong rules the land and waiting justice sleeps.
"God give us men!
Men who serve not for selfish booty;
But real men, courageous, who flinch not at duty.
Men of dependable character;
Men of sterling worth;
Then wrongs will be redressed, and right will rule the earth.
God Give us Men!"
Copyright (c) 2003 in the U.S.A. and Internationally by MoveOn.org, Senator Robert Byrd, and/or Josiah Gilbert Holland, his estate, and/or the publishers. All rights are reserved. ( http://www.MoveOn.org/ )
"THE TRUTH WILL EMERGE"
By Sen. Robert Byrd
May 23, 2003
Senate Floor Remarks -- May 21, 2003
""Truth, crushed to earth, shall rise again,
The eternal years of God are hers;
But Error, wounded, writhes in pain,
And dies among his worshippers."
"Truth has a way of asserting itself despite all attempts to obscure it. Distortion only serves to derail it for a time. No matter to what lengths we humans may go to obfuscate facts or delude our fellows, truth has a way of squeezing out through the cracks, eventually.
"But the danger is that at some point it may no longer matter. The danger is that damage is done before the truth is widely realized. The reality is that, sometimes, it is easier to ignore uncomfortable facts and go along with whatever distortion is currently in vogue. We see a lot of this today in politics. I see a lot of it - more than I would ever have believed - right on this Senate Floor.
"Regarding the situation in Iraq, it appears to this Senator that the American people may have been lured into accepting the unprovoked invasion of a sovereign nation, in violation of long-standing International law, under false premises. There is ample evidence that the horrific events of September 11 have been carefully manipulated to switch public focus from Osama bin Laden and al-Q’aeda... to Saddam Hussein who did not. The run up to our invasion of Iraq featured the President and members of his cabinet invoking every frightening image they could conjure, from mushroom clouds, to buried caches of germ warfare, to drones poised to deliver germ laden death in our major cities. We were treated to a heavy dose of overstatement concerning Saddam Hussein's direct threat to our freedoms. The tactic was guaranteed to provoke a sure reaction from a nation still suffering from a combination of post traumatic stress and justifiable anger after the attacks of 9/11. It was the exploitation of fear. It was a placebo for the anger.
"Since the war's end, every subsequent revelation which has seemed to refute the previous dire claims of the Bush Administration has been brushed aside. Instead of addressing the contradictory evidence, the White House deftly changes the subject. No weapons of mass destruction have yet turned up, but we are told that they will in time. Perhaps they yet will. But, our costly and destructive bunker busting attack on Iraq seems to have proven, in the main, precisely the opposite of what we were told was the urgent reason to go in. It seems also to have, for the present, verified the assertions of Hans Blix and the inspection team he led, which President Bush and company so derided. As Blix always said, a lot of time will be needed to find such weapons, if they do, indeed, exist. Meanwhile bin Laden is still on the loose and Saddam Hussein has come up missing.
"The Administration assured the U.S. public and the world, over and over again, that an attack was necessary to protect our people and the world from terrorism. It assiduously worked to alarm the public and blur the faces of Saddam Hussein and Osama bin Laden until they virtually became one.
"What has become painfully clear in the aftermath of war is that Iraq was no immediate threat to the U.S. Ravaged by years of sanctions, Iraq did not even lift an airplane against us. Iraq's threatening death-dealing fleet of unmanned drones about which we heard so much morphed into one prototype made of plywood and string. Their missiles proved to be outdated and of limited range. Their army was quickly overwhelmed by our technology and our well trained troops.
"Presently our loyal military personnel continue their mission of diligently searching for WMD. They have so far turned up only fertilizer, vacuum cleaners, conventional weapons, and the occasional buried swimming pool. They are misused on such a mission and they continue to be at grave risk. But the Bush team's extensive hype of WMD in Iraq as justification for a preemptive invasion has become more than embarrassing. It has raised serious questions about prevarication and the reckless use of power. Were our troops needlessly put at risk? Were countless Iraqi civilians killed and maimed when war was not really necessary? Was the American public deliberately misled? Was the world?
"What makes me cringe even more is the continued claim that we are "liberators." The facts don't seem to support the label we have so euphemistically attached to ourselves. True, we have unseated a brutal, despicable despot, but "liberation" implies the follow up of freedom, self-determination and a better life for the common people. In fact, if the situation in Iraq is the result of "liberation," we may have set the cause of freedom back 200 years.
"Despite our high-blown claims of a better life for the Iraqi people, water is scarce, and often foul, electricity is a sometime thing, food is in short supply, hospitals are stacked with the wounded and maimed, historic treasures of the region and of the Iraqi people have been looted, and nuclear material may have been disseminated to heaven knows where, while U.S. troops, on orders, looked on and guarded the oil supply.
"Meanwhile, lucrative contracts to rebuild Iraq's infrastructure and refurbish its oil industry are awarded to Administration cronies, without benefit of competitive bidding, and the U.S. steadfastly resists offers of U.N. assistance to participate. Is there any wonder that the real motives of the U.S. government are the subject of worldwide speculation and mistrust?
"And in what may be the most damaging development, the U.S. appears to be pushing off Iraq's clamor for self-government. Jay Garner has been summarily replaced, and it is becoming all too clear that the smiling face of the U.S. as liberator is quickly assuming the scowl of an occupier. The image of the boot on the throat has replaced the beckoning hand of freedom. Chaos and rioting only exacerbate that image, as U.S. soldiers try to sustain order in a land ravaged by poverty and disease. "Regime change" in Iraq has so far meant anarchy, curbed only by an occupying military force and a U.S. administrative presence that is evasive about if and when it intends to depart.
"Democracy and Freedom cannot be force fed at the point of an occupier's gun. To think otherwise is folly. One has to stop and ponder. How could we have been so impossibly naive? How could we expect to easily plant a clone of U.S. culture, values, and government in a country so riven with religious, territorial, and tribal rivalries, so suspicious of U.S. motives, and so at odds with the galloping materialism which drives the western-style economies?
"As so many warned this Administration before it launched its misguided war on Iraq, there is evidence that our crack down in Iraq is likely to convince 1,000 new bin Ladens to plan other horrors of the type we have seen in the past several days. Instead of damaging the terrorists, we have given them new fuel for their fury. We did not complete our mission in Afghanistan because we were so eager to attack Iraq. Now it appears that al-Q’aeda is back with a vengeance. We have returned to orange alert in the U.S., and we may well have destabilized the Mideast region, a region we have never fully understood. We have alienated friends around the globe with our dissembling and our haughty insistence on punishing former friends who may not see things quite our way.
"The path of diplomacy and reason have gone out the window to be replaced by force, unilateralism, and punishment for transgressions. I read most recently with amazement our harsh castigation of Turkey, our longtime friend and strategic ally. It is astonishing that our government is berating the new Turkish government for conducting its affairs in accordance with its own Constitution and its democratic institutions.
"Indeed, we may have sparked a new international arms race as countries move ahead to develop WMD as a last ditch attempt to ward off a possible preemptive strike from a newly belligerent U.S. which claims the right to hit where it wants. In fact, there is little to constrain this President. Congress, in what will go down in history as its most unfortunate act, handed away its power to declare war for the foreseeable future and empowered this President to wage war at will.
"As if that were not bad enough, members of Congress are reluctant to ask questions which are begging to be asked. How long will we occupy Iraq? We have already heard disputes on the numbers of troops which will be needed to retain order. What is the truth? How costly will the occupation and rebuilding be? No one has given a straight answer. How will we afford this long-term massive commitment, fight terrorism at home, address a serious crisis in domestic healthcare, afford behemoth military spending and give away billions in tax cuts amidst a deficit which has climbed to over $340 billion for this year alone? If the President's tax cut passes it will be $400 billion. We cower in the shadows while false statements proliferate. We accept soft answers and shaky explanations because to demand the truth is hard, or unpopular, or may be politically costly.
"But, I contend that, through it all, the people know. The American people unfortunately are used to political shading, spin, and the usual chicanery they hear from public officials. They patiently tolerate it up to a point. But there is a line. It may seem to be drawn in invisible ink for a time, but eventually it will appear in dark colors, tinged with anger. When it comes to shedding American blood - when it comes to wreaking havoc on civilians, on innocent men, women, and children, callous dissembling is not acceptable. Nothing is worth that kind of lie - not oil, not revenge, not reelection, not somebody's grand pipedream of a democratic domino theory.
"And mark my words, the calculated intimidation which we see so often of late by the "powers that be" will only keep the loyal opposition quiet for just so long. Because eventually, as it always does, the truth will emerge. And when it does, this house of cards, built of deceit, will fall."
Copyright (c) 2003 in the U.S.A. and Internationally by Senator Robert Byrd. All rights are reserved. ( Source: http://www.AlterNet.org/ )
"ANOTHER DAY, ANOTHER $350 BILLION IN DEBT"
By Bill Moyers, on "Now with Bill Moyers"
(PBS - May 30, 2003)
"You no doubt saw this - Mr. Bush signing his tax cut. A big day for the President. But in fact, it's the richest Americans - the top one percent - who get the lion's share of the tax cuts - people like Secretary of the Treasury John Snow, Vice President Dick Cheney and Secretary of Commerce Don Evans, multimillionaires all. Mr. Cheney actually cast the deciding tie-breaker vote in favor of the tax cut in the Senate. As a headline in the Wall Street Journal says, some [wealthy] people could wind up paying virtually no tax at all.
"Where's that money coming from to make the rich richer? Some of it's coming from the working poor. Remember that $400 per child tax credit that was in the tax bill? We have now learned that at the very last minute, behind closed doors, the Republican leaders in Congress pulled a bait-and-switch. They eliminated from the bill that $400 child credit for families who make just above the minimum wage. They will use that money to pay for the cut on dividend taxes. Eleven million children in families with incomes roughly between ten thousand and twenty six thousand dollars a year won't be getting the check that was supposed to be in the mail this summer. Eleven million children punished for being poor, even as the rich are rewarded for being rich.
"Nothing was said about cutting out the working poor from this tax credit as Mr. Bush signed his tax bill. Nor was anything said when the President closed the door to his office and quietly put his signature on another bill, this one raising the debt ceiling to its highest level in history. No sooner had this happened than it was revealed by the Financial Times - a British newspaper by the way - that the White House withheld a Treasury department study showing that the country faces chronic deficits totaling over $44 trillion dollars. They kept it secret lest it throw the fear of God into Congress and the financial markets and cost them the tax cut for the rich.
"This was enough to send us over to the debt clock just a few blocks from our offices in mid-town New York. Standing there you can watch the country's future slip deeper and deeper into a black hole of red ink. At mid-day today the national debt was over 6 trillion dollars and climbing. It makes you wonder . . . exactly why are these rich guys smiling?"
Bill Moyers is host of the weekly newsmagazine program "Now with Bill Moyers" on PBS.
Copyright (c) 2003 in the U.S.A. and Internationally by the Public Broadcasting Service (PBS) and/or Bill Moyers. All rights are reserved.
( Source: http://www.AlterNet.org/ )
Continued below:
Continued:
MORE OF MY COMMENTS AND FAVORITE QUOTES ON VARIOUS TOPICS CONCERNING 9-11-01, TERRORISM, EVIL, HATE, INJUSTICE, RACISM, BIGOTRY, PREJUDICE, DISCRIMINATION, INEQUALITY, REVENGE, RETALIATION(S), INVASION, WAR, MORE TERRORISM, MURDER, GREED, MONEY-MONGERING, WAR-MONGERING, "AMERICAN" FOREIGN POLICY(IES), CONQUEST, OCCUPATION, CONTROL, FALSE IMPRISONMENT, CAPITALISM, GLOBALISM, IMPERIALISM, COLONIALISM, HYPOCRISY, CORPORATE FASCISM, TOTALITARIANISM, DESPOTISM, DICTATORSHIP, OPPRESSION, REPRESSION, GENOCIDE, EUGENICS, NATIONAL AND INTERNATIONAL HUMAN RIGHTS AND CIVIL LIBERTIES, TRUE PEACE, FREEDOM, DEMOCRACY, LIBERATION, EQUALITY, JUSTICE, AND LAST BUT THE GREATEST, LOVE, ADDED TO THE SITE ON 5-29-03:
TITLE ADDED BY ME: TERRORISTS VS. TERRORISTS
From Alternative Internet, AlterNet.org
A Division of Independent Media Institute
Confused? Having difficulty telling the good guys from the bad guys? Use this handy guide to tell the differences between Terrorists and the U.S. Government:
TERRORISTS: Supposed leader is the spoiled son of a powerful politician, from an extremely wealthy oil family.
U.S. GOVERNMENT: Supposed leader is the spoiled son of a powerful politician, from an extremely wealthy oil family.
TERRORISTS: Leader has declared a holy war ('Jihad') against his 'enemies'; believes any nation not with him is against him; believes god is on his side, and that any means are justified.
U.S. GOVERNMENT: Leader has declared a holy war ('Crusade') against his 'enemies'; believes any nation not with him is against him; believes god is on his side, and that any means are justified.
TERRORISTS: Supported by extreme fundamentalist religious leaders who preach hatred, intolerance, subjugation of women, and persecution of non-believers.
U.S. GOVERNMENT: Supported by extreme fundamentalist religious leaders who preach hatred, intolerance, subjugation of women, and persecution of non-believers.
TERRORISTS: Leadership was not elected by a majority of the people in a free and fair democratic election.
U.S. GOVERNMENT: Leadership was not elected by a majority of the people in a free and fair democratic election.
TERRORISTS: Kills thousands of innocent civilians, some of them children, in cold blooded bombings.
U.S. GOVERNMENT: Kills thousands of innocent civilians, some of them children, in cold blooded bombings.
TERRORISTS: Operates through clandestine organization (al-Q'aeda) with agents in many countries; and uses bombing, assassination, and other terrorist tactics.
U.S. GOVERNMENT: Operates through clandestine organization (CIA) with agents in many countries; and uses bombing, assassination, and other terrorist tactics.
TERRORISTS: Supposed leader has extensive financial ties to the Supposed leader of the U.S. GOVERNMENT.
U.S. GOVERNMENT: Supposed leader has extensive financial ties to Supposed leader of the TERRORISTS.
TERRORISTS: Supposed leader invested heavily in U.S. bio-chemical companies.
U.S. GOVERNMENT: Supposed leader invested heavily in U.S. bio-chemical companies.
TERRORISTS: Using war as a pretext to clamp down on dissent and undermine civil liberties.
U.S. GOVERNMENT: Using war as a pretext to clamp down on dissent and undermine civil liberties.
Copyright © 2001 in the U.S.A. and Internationally by Independent Media Institute. All rights are reserved. ( Source: http://www.AlterNet.org/story.html?StoryID=11847 )
BILL MOYERS SPEAKS OUT
A Presentation by Don Hazen,
Executive Editor of AlterNet.org,
A Division of Independent Media Institute,
Of a Speech by Bill Moyers on 10-16-01
As the country continues to reel from the attacks of September 11, evil and greed seems to have gained the upper hand under the smokescreen of patriotism. Decades of gains in social progress are threatened, fear is pervasive, and hypocrisy has taken center stage.
Many of us have been torn, concerned about terrorism and have been giving our government the benefit of the doubt, as it struggled to respond to our biggest crisis in 60 years. But the opportunity for smart and humane leadership is being squandered.
It is time to draw the line and say not in our name. If we are not vigilant, democracy will be the victim, and many millions more people at home and across the globe will suffer. The biggest crisis of our lifetimes requires the largest organizing effort we have ever contemplated. It's time to push aside our confusion and pain, and rally the tens of millions of us who want a better and safer world, not one made more unstable and oppressive, not one turned into a profit opportunity for giant corporations and the most wealthy in the country.
At times like this, we look to leaders to step up and articulate in clear, fundamental ways what is happening and what is at stake. Call them our Paul Reveres warning of the dangers ahead, or our Tom Paines, insisting that dissent is American, or our Sojourner Truths, telling us what it takes to be free, or our Martin Luther Kings, speaking truth to power.
Many men and women are saying and writing extraordinary things at this crucial moment in history. Increasingly, citizens of America and the world are listening. One of those leaders is Bill Moyers, who has a special talent to frame the essence of powerful truths and have millions of Americans listen carefully.
On October 16, 2001 in Brainerd, Minnesota Bill Moyers gave the keynote address to the Environmental Grantmakers Association. In that speech he captured the moment at hand. Here are several excerpts from that lengthy and extraordinary presentation:
"My friend, Thomas Hearne, the president of Wake Forest University, reminded me recently that while the clock and the calendar make it seem as if our lives unfold hour by hour, day by day, our passage is marked by events -- of celebration and crisis. We share those in common. They create the memories which make of us a history, and make of us a people, a nation.
"Pearl Harbor was that event for my parents' generation. It changed their world, and it changed them. They never forgot the moment when the news reached them. For my generation it was the assassinations of the Kennedys and Martin Luther King, the bombing of the 16th Street Baptist Church, the dogs and fire hoses in Alabama. Those events broke our hearts. We healed, but scars remain.
"For this generation, that moment will be September 11, 2001 -- the worst act of terrorism in our nation's history. It has changed the country. It has changed us.
"That's what terrorists intend. Terrorists don't want to own our land, wealth, monuments, buildings, fields, or streams. They're not after tangible property. Sure, they aim to annihilate the targets they strike. But their real goal is to get inside our heads, our psyche, and to deprive us -- the survivors -- of peace of mind, of trust, of faith; they aim to prevent us from believing again in a world of mercy, justice, and love, or working to bring that better world to pass.
"We have also been reminded that despite years of scandals and political corruption, despite the stream of stories of personal greed and pirates in Gucci’s scamming the treasury, despite the retreat from the public sphere and the turn toward private privilege, despite squalor for the poor and gated communities for the rich, we have been reminded that the great mass of Americans have not yet given up on the idea of "We, the People." And they have refused to accept the notion, promoted so diligently by our friends at the Heritage Foundation and by Grover Norquist and his right-wing ilk, that government -- the public service -- should be shrunk to a size where they can drown it in the bathtub (that's what Norquist said is their goal)....
"It didn't take long for the war time opportunists -- the mercenaries of Washington, the lobbyists, lawyers, and political fundraisers -- to crawl out of their offices on K street determined to grab what they can for their clients. While in New York we are still attending memorial services, while everywhere Americans' cheeks are still stained with tears, while the President calls for patriotism, prayers and piety, the predators of Washington are up to their old tricks in the pursuit of private plunder at public expense....
"This is their game: they are counting on your patriotism to distract you from their plunder. They are counting on you to be standing at attention with your hand over your heart, pledging allegiance to the flag, while they pick your pocket. If, in the name of the war on terrorism, President Bush hands the state over to the energy industry, it's every patriot's duty to join the loyal opposition.
"The playwright Tony Kushner wrote more than a decade ago, "There are moments in history when the fabric of everyday life unravels, and there is this unstable dynamism that allows for incredible social change in short periods of time. People and the world they're living in can be utterly transformed, either for the good or the bad, or some mixture of the two."
He's right. This could go either way.
"Let's face it: they present citizens with no options but to climb back in the ring. We are in what educators call "a teachable moment." And we'll lose it if we roll over and shut up. What's at stake is democracy. Democracy wasn't canceled on the 11th of September, but democracy won't survive if citizens turn into lemmings.
"I know you see the magnitude of the challenge. I know you see what we're up against. I know you get it -- the work that we must do. It's why you mustn't lose heart.
"Your adversaries will call you unpatriotic for speaking the truth when conformity reigns. Ideologues will smear you for challenging the official view of reality. Mainstream media will ignore you, and those gasbags on cable TV and the radio talk shows will ridicule and vilify you. But I urge you to hold to these words: "In the course of fighting the present fire, we must not abandon our efforts to create fire-resistant structures of the future."
"Those words were written by my friend Randy Kehler more than ten years ago, as America geared up to fight the Gulf War. They ring as true today. Those fire-resistant structures must include an electoral system that is no longer dominated by big money, where the voices and problems of average people are attended on a fair and equal basis. They must include an energy system that is more sustainable, and less dangerous. And they must include a media that takes its responsibility to inform us as seriously as its interest in entertaining us."
Copyright © 2001 in the U.S.A. and Internationally by Bill Moyers and/or Independent Media Institute. All rights are reserved. ( Source: http://www.AlterNet.org/ )
"Oh Lucy! - You Gotta Lotta 'Splainin' To Do"
"IF THE CIA AND THE U.S. GOVERNMENT WEREN’T INVOLVED IN THE SEPTEMBER 11 ATTACKS, WHAT WERE THEY DOING?"
"Bin Laden Met with the CIA in July (2001) and Walked Away(!)"
by Michael C. Ruppert
(Copyright © 2001 in the U.S.A. and Internationally by Michael C. Ruppert and From The Wilderness Publications [www.CopvCIA.com]. All rights are reserved.)
"FTW, November 2, 2001 -- 12:00 PST -- On October 31, the French daily Le Figaro dropped a bombshell. While in a Dubai hospital receiving treatment for a chronic kidney infection last July, Osama bin Laden met with a top CIA official - presumably the Chief of Station. The meeting, held in bin Laden's private suite, took place at the American hospital in Dubai at a time when he was a wanted fugitive for the bombings of two U.S. embassies and this year's attack on the U.S.S. Cole. Bin Laden was eligible for execution according to a 2000 intelligence finding issued by President Bill Clinton before leaving office in January. Yet on July 14th he was allowed to leave Dubai on a private jet and there were no Navy fighters waiting to force him down.
"In 1985 Oliver North -- the only member of the Reagan-Bush years who doesn't appear to have a hand in the current war - sent the Navy and commandos after terrorists on the cruise ship Achille Lauro. In his 1991 autobiography "Under Fire," while describing terrorist Abu Abbas, North wrote, "I used to wonder: how many dead Americans will it take before we do something?" One could look at the number of Americans Osama bin Laden is alleged to have killed before September 11 and ask the same question.
"It gets worse, much worse. A more complete timeline listing crucial events both before and after the September 11th suicide attacks, which have been blamed on bin Laden, establishes CIA foreknowledge of them and strongly suggests that there was criminal complicity on the part of the U.S. government in their execution. It also makes clear that the events which have taken place since September 11th are based upon an agenda that has little to do with the attacks.
"One wonders how these events could have been ignored by the major media or treated as isolated incidents. Failing that, how could skilled news agencies avoid being outraged, or at least even just a little suspicious?
"1. 1998 and 2000 - Former President George H.W. Bush travels to Saudi Arabia on behalf of the privately owned Carlyle Group, the 11th largest defense contractor in the U.S. While there he meets privately with the Saudi royal family and the bin Laden family. (Source: Wall Street Journal, Sept. 27, 2001. See also FTW, Vol. IV, No 7 -- "The Best Enemies Money Can Buy," ([http://www.CopvCIA.com/members/carlyle.html].)
"2. Feb 13, 2001 -- UPI Terrorism Correspondent Richard Sale -- while covering a trial of bin Laden's Al Q'aeda followers - reports that the National Security Agency has broken bin Laden's encrypted communications. Even if this indicates that bin Laden changed systems in February it does not mesh with the fact that the government insists that the attacks had been planned for years.
"3. May 2001 -- Secretary of State Colin Powell gives $43 million in aid to the Taliban regime, purportedly to assist hungry farmers who are starving since the destruction of their opium crop in January 2001 on orders of the Taliban regime. (Source: The Los Angeles Times, May 22, 2001.)
"4. May, 2001 -- Deputy Secretary of State Richard Armitage, a career covert operative and former Navy Seal, travels to India on a publicized tour while CIA Director George Tenet makes a quiet visit to Pakistan to meet with Pakistani leader General Pervez Musharraf. Armitage has long and deep Pakistani intelligence connections and he is the recipient of the highest civil decoration awarded by Pakistan. It would be reasonable to assume that while in Islamabad, Tenet, in what was described as "an unusually long meeting," also met with his Pakistani counterpart, Lt. General Mahmud Ahmad, head of the ISI. (Source: The Indian SAPRA news agency, May 22, 2001.)
"5. July, 2001 -- Three American officials: Tom Simmons (former U.S. Ambassador to Pakistan), Karl Inderfurth (former Assistant Secretary of State for South Asian affairs) and Lee Coldren (former State Department expert on South Asia), meet with Taliban representatives in Berlin and tell them that the U.S. is planning military strikes against Afghanistan in October. Also present are Russian and German intelligence officers who confirm the threat. (Source: The Guardian, September 22, 2001; and the BBC, September 18, 2001.)
"6. Summer 2001 - According to a Sept. 26 story in Britain's The Guardian, correspondent David Leigh reported that, "U.S. department of defense official, Dr. Jeffrey Starr, visited Tajikistan in January. The Guardian's Felicity Lawrence established that U.S. Rangers were also training special troops in Kyrgyzstan. There were unconfirmed reports that Tajik and Uzbek special troops were training in Alaska and Montana."
"7. Summer 2001 (est.) -- Pakistani ISI Chief General Mahmud (see above) orders an aide to wire transfer $100,000 to Mohammed Atta, who was according to the FBI, the lead terrorist in the suicide hijackings. Mahmud recently resigned after the transfer was disclosed in India and confirmed by the FBI. (Source: The Times of India, October 11, 2001.)
"8. June 2001 -- German intelligence, the BND, warns the CIA and Israel that Middle Eastern terrorists are "planning to hijack commercial aircraft to use as weapons to attack important symbols of American and Israeli culture." (Source: Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung, September 14, 2001.)
"9. Summer 2001 -- An Iranian man phones U.S. law enforcement to warn of an imminent attack on the World Trade Center in the week of September 9th, 2001. German police confirm the calls but state that the U.S. Secret Service would not reveal any further information. (Source: German news agency "online.de", September 14, 2001.)
"10. August 2001 -- The FBI arrests an Islamic militant linked to bin Laden in Boston. French intelligence sources confirm that the man is a key member of bin Laden's network and the FBI learns that he has been taking flying lessons. At the time of his arrest the man is in possession of technical information on Boeing aircraft and flight manuals. (Source: Reuters, September 13, 2001.)
"11. Summer 2001 -- Russian intelligence notifies the CIA that 25 terrorist pilots have been specifically training for suicide missions. This is reported in the Russian press and news stories are translated for FTW by a retired CIA officer.
"12. July 4-14, 2001 -- Osama bin Laden receives treatments for kidney disease at the American hospital in Dubai and meets with a CIA official who returns to CIA headquarters on July 15th. (Source: Le Figaro, October 31st, 2001.)
"13. August 2001 -- Russian President Vladimir Putin orders Russian intelligence to warn the U.S. government "in the strongest possible terms" of imminent attacks on airports and government buildings. (Source: MS-NBC interview with Putin, September 15, 2001.)
"14. August/September, 2001 -- The Dow Jones Industrial Average drops nearly 900 points in the three weeks prior to the attack. A major stock market crash is imminent.
"15. Sept. 3-10, 2001 -- MS-NBC reports on September 16 that a caller to a Cayman Islands radio talk show gave several warnings of an imminent attack on the U.S. by bin Laden in the week prior to 9/11.
"16. September 1-10, 2001 -- 25,000 British troops and the largest British Armada since the Falkland Islands War, part of Operation "Essential Harvest," are pre-positioned in Oman, the closest point on the Arabian Peninsula to Pakistan. At the same time two U.S. carrier battle groups arrive on station in the Gulf of Arabia just off the Pakistani coast. Also at the same time, some 17,000 U.S. troops join more than 23,000 NATO troops in Egypt for Operation "Bright Star." All of these forces are in place before the first plane hits the World Trade Center. (Sources: The Guardian, CNN, FOX, The Observer, and International Law Professor Francis Boyle, the University of Illinois.)
"17. September 6-7, 2001 -- 4,744 put options (a speculation that the stock will go down) are purchased on United Air Lines stock as opposed to only 396 call options (speculation that the stock will go up). This is a dramatic and abnormal increase in sales of put options. Many of the UAL puts are purchased through Deutschebank/AB Brown, a firm managed until 1998 by the current Executive Director of the CIA, A.B. "Buzzy" Krongard. (Source: The Herzliyya International Policy Institute for Counterterrorism [http://www.ICT.org.il/], September 21, 2001; The New York Times; and The Wall Street Journal.)
"18. September 10, 2001 - 4,516 put options are purchased on American Airlines as compared to 748 call options. (Source: ICT -- above)
"19. September 6-11, 2001 - No other airlines show any similar trading patterns to those experienced by UAL and American. The put option purchases on both airlines were 600% above normal. This at a time when Reuters (September 10) issues a business report stating, "Airline stocks may be poised to take off."
"20. September 6-10, 2001 -- Highly abnormal levels of put options are purchased in Merrill Lynch, Morgan Stanley, AXA Re(insurance) which owns 25% of American Airlines, and Munich Re. All of these companies are directly impacted by the September 11 attacks. (Sources: ICT, above; and FTW, Vol. IV, No.7, October 18, 2001 [http://www.CopvCIA.com/members/oct152001.html].)
"21. It has been documented that the CIA, the Israeli Mossad and many other intelligence agencies monitor stock trading in real time using highly advanced programs reported to be descended from Promis software. This is to alert national intelligence services of just such kinds of attacks. Promis was reported, as recently as June, 2001 to be in Osama bin Laden's possession and, as a result of recent stories by FOX, both the FBI and the Justice Department have confirmed its use for U.S. intelligence gathering through at least this summer. This would confirm that CIA had additional advance warning of imminent attacks. (Sources: The Washington Times, June 15, 2001; FOX News, October 16, 2001; FTW, October 26, 2001 [http://www.CopvCIA.com/members/magic_
carpet.html]; FTW, Vol. IV, No.6, Sept. 18, 2001 [http://www.CopvCIA.com/members/sept1801.html]; and FTW, Vol. 3, No 7, 9/30/00 [http://www.CopvCIA.com/stories/may_
2001/052401_promis.html].)
"22. September 11, 2001 -- General Mahmud of the ISI (see above), friend of Mohammed Atta, is visiting Washington on behalf of the Taliban. (Source: MS-NBC, Oct. 7, 2001.)
"23. September 11, 2001, For 35 minutes, from 8:15 AM until 9:05 AM, with it widely known within the FAA and the military that four planes have been simultaneously hijacked and taken off course, no one notifies the President of the United States. It is not until 9:30 that any Air Force planes are scrambled to intercept, but by then it is too late. This means that the National Command Authority waited for 75 minutes before scrambling aircraft, even though it was known that four simultaneous hijackings had occurred -- an event that has never happened in history. (Sources: CNN, ABC, MS-NBC, The Los Angeles Times, and The New York Times.)
"24. September 13, 2001 -- China is admitted to the World Trade Organization quickly, after 15 years of unsuccessful attempts. (Source: The New York Times, Sept. 30, 2001.)
"25. September 15, 2001 -- The New York Times reports that Mayo Shattuck III has resigned, effective immediately, as head of the Alex (A.B) Brown unit of Deutschebank.
"26. September 29, 2001 -- The San Francisco Chronicle reports that $2.5 million in put options on American Airlines and United Airlines are unclaimed. This is likely the result of the suspension in trading on the NYSE after the attacks which gave the Securities and Exchange Commission time to be waiting when the owners showed up to redeem their put options.
"27. October 10, 2001 -- The Pakistani newspaper The Frontier Post reports that U.S. Ambassador Wendy Chamberlain has paid a call on the Pakistani oil minister. A previously abandoned Unocal pipeline from Turkmenistan, across Afghanistan, to the Pakistani coast, for the purpose of selling oil and gas to China, is now back on the table "in view of recent geopolitical developments."
"28. Mid October, 2001 -- The Dow Jones Industrial Average, after having suffered a precipitous drop has recovered most of its pre-attack losses. Although still weak, and vulnerable to negative earnings reports, a crash has been averted by a massive infusion of government spending on defense programs, subsidies for "affected" industries and planned tax cuts for corporations.
"Now, let's go back to the October 31, 2001 story by Le Figaro -- the one that has Osama bin Laden meeting with a CIA officer in Dubai this June.
"The story says that, "Throughout his stay in the hospital, Osama bin Laden received visits from many family members [There goes the story that he's a black sheep!] and Saudi Arabian Emirate personalities of status. During this time the local representative of the CIA was seen by many people taking the elevator and going to bin Laden's room.
""Several days later the CIA officer bragged to his friends about having visited the Saudi millionaire. From authoritative sources, this CIA agent visited CIA headquarters on July 15th, the day after bin Laden's departure for Quetta....
""According to various Arab diplomatic sources and French intelligence itself, precise information was communicated to the CIA concerning terrorist attacks aimed at American interests in the world, including its own territory."....
""Extremely bothered, they [American intelligence officers in a meeting with French intelligence officers] requested from their French peers exact details about the Algerian activists [connected to bin Laden through Dubai banking institutions], without explaining the exact nature of their inquiry. When asked the question, "What do you fear in the coming days?' the Americans responded with incomprehensible silence."....
""On further investigation, the FBI discovered certain plans that had been put together between the CIA and its "Islamic friends" over the years. The meeting in Dubai is, so it would seem, consistent with 'a certain American policy.'"
"Even though Le Figaro reported that it had confirmed with hospital staff that bin Laden had been there as reported, stories printed on November 1, 2001 contained quotes from hospital staff that these reports were untrue. On November 1, 2001, as reported by the Ananova press agency, the CIA flatly denied that any meeting between any CIA personnel and Osama bin Laden took place at any time.
"In the most ironic twist of all, FTW has learned that Le Figaro is owned by the Carlyle Group, the American defense contractor which employs George Bush Sr., and which had as investors -- until they sold their stake on October 26, 2001 - the bin Laden family.
"Who do you believe? In coming stories FTW will prove to you that this war, which according to Dick Cheney, may not end in our lifetimes, has been in the works for at least four years (since well-before 9-11-01)."
Mike Ruppert
http://www.CopvCIA.com/
Michael C. Ruppert
P.O. Box 6061-350, Sherman Oaks, CA 91413
(818)788-8791 * fax(818)981-2847
MRuppert@CopvCIA.com
Copyright © 1998, 1999, 2000, 2001 in the U.S.A. and Internationally by Michael C. Ruppert. All rights are Reserved.
"U.S. PROTECTS AL-Q'AEDA TERRORISTS IN KOSOVO"
by Umberto Pascali
Executive Intelligence Review
1-888-347-3258
"While the United States is relentlessly bombing Afghanistan with the official aim of getting Osama bin Laden, one of bin Laden's top collaborators is running a terrorist training camp in an area of Kosovo that is {under U.S. control.} The shocking revelation has been confirmed by multiple sources: Macedonian intelligence agencies, as reported by several Macedonian media, including the leading daily {Dnevnik}; Russian press agencies, including Novosti and ItarTass; and the London {Independent}. This intelligence coheres with Lyndon LaRouche's assessment of the Sept. 11 attacks on the United States, as a strategic covert operation by an enemy {within} the U.S. and "allied" security services, for geopolitical purposes.
"The Russian media quoted, as the source of their detailed revelation, the Russian troops stationed not far from the reported terrorist training camp. This is in itself exceptional, in the sense that there is hardly a precedent of the Russian military in Kosovo reporting events of such gravity to the leading news agencies. These revelations, and the clear position taken by Macedonian intelligence in confirming and expanding them, are now reopening the explosive question of the protection and sponsorship granted to the narco-terrorists by Anglo-American agencies. But this is only a small part of the new strategic geometry opened up by the revelations. The red-hot political point concerns the very basis for the "war against terrorism" launched after the war-like attacks of Sept. 11, and the immediate concentration on bin Laden and Afghanistan as the perpetrators of those attacks--and the threatened extension of the "infinite war" to Syria, Iraq, and so on. If the Anglo-Americans are at "war" with bin Laden's terrorism, why are bin Laden operatives active in Kosovo in an area totally controlled by NATO? Furthermore, in the U.S. zone in Kosovo? Investigations on the bin Laden connection into the Balkans and Kosovo could, according to experts, lead to even more explosive truths in a very short period of time.
- Keep The Clash Going -
"On Oct. 16, 2001 Novosti reported: "A training camp of Albanian militants functions near the village of Ropotovo, close to Kosovska Kamenica, in the Yugoslav province of Kosovo, which is controlled by the American forces, sources from the Russian peacekeeping force in Kosovo reported on [Oct. 16, 2001].
"According to [the sources], the camp is now training 50 Afghan and Algerian mujahideen, led by Zaiman Zawahiri. He is reportedly the brother of one of the closest associates of international terrorist Osama bin Laden. This camp prepares militants for terrorist formations in Kosovo and Macedonia. Their `instructors' are former [ethnic] Albanian officers who, in 1991-92, deserted from the Yugoslav Army." The {Independent} reported on Oct. 21, 2001 that Interpol has linked bin Laden to Kosovo Liberation Army (KLA) crime gangs, and that he "supplied one of his top military commanders for an elite KLA unit" in Kosovo. That was only the beginning. The target of the terrorist gangs' deployment into Macedonia: to prevent, by violence, the return of Macedonian refugees into the villages "cleansed" by the KLA during this year; and to take over the water reserve on which the Macedonian capital, Skopje, depends.
"Beyond that, these extremists are out to re-ignite the ethnic "Clash of Civilizations" in the Balkans, to crush the escalating resistance of Macedonia--which has been actively playing the LaRouche card in response to its national crisis (see {EIR,} Oct. 19, 2001)--and to continue the march of destruction, possibly triggering in the near future, an ethnic upheaval in Greece or Bulgaria.
"The fact that such an operation is taking place in the middle of the "war on the Taliban and al-Qaeda"--the fact that NATO's Lord George Robertson, U.S. Ambassador James Pardew, and the European Union's Javier Solana insist, to this very day, that Macedonia has to surrender to the KLA ultimata, including the subversion of the Macedonian Constitution, opens up a dramatic contradiction. That contradiction throws light on the virtual reality the world has been propelled into after the Sept. 11 attacks.
- Who Runs Al-Zawahiri? -
"The Macedonian daily {Dnevnik} reported on Oct. 19, 2001 that the group led by the brother of Dr. Ayman al-Zawahiri, the closest associate of bin Laden, had crossed the border from Kosovo into Macedonia. Quoting intelligence sources, {Dnevnik} wrote: "The younger brother of the chief of the Balkan headquarters of al-Qaeda, Ayman al-Zawahiri, with around 50 mujahideen, has entered Macedonia and has started building fortifications in the Skopska Crna Gora region. The aim of the terrorist group is to attack the water supply" for Skopje.
"The newspaper reported that the gang had been stationed earlier in the training camp near the village of Ropotovo, Kosovo--as Novosti also reported--and received orders to enter the Macedonian town of Matejce. On Oct. 16, 2001, a convoy of refugees, who were previously expelled by the KLA, were supposed to visit their destroyed houses.
"However, the observers from the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe entered the village first, and reported that at least 50 armed men had communicated they were going to fire on the convoy if they dared to enter Matejce. The OSCE order to the heartbroken refugees was: Go back, we cannot guarantee your security!
"But who is Dr. Ayman al-Zawahiri, whose brother Zaiman is running terrorist camps under NATO protection in the U.S. zone in Kosovo? As the London {Guardian} wrote recently, "Even to say he is bin Laden's right-hand man may understate his importance." He is considered by many to be the real head of what is known as the bin Laden group. "Some analysts believe that in his current role in Afghanistan, al-Zawahiri has taken over control of much of bin Laden's terrorist finances, operations, plans, and resources," wrote the {Guardian}.
"His known terrorist career started no later than 1981, with his involvement in the assassination of Egyptian President Anwar Sadat; it includes the massacre of 70 people on a tourist bus. in 1997 Luxor, Egypt, and the assassination attempt against Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak in 1995. Strangely enough, according to January 2000 U.S. Congressional testimony, al-Zawahiri was granted U.S. residence by the Immigration and Naturalization Service--something almost impossible for many legitimate immigrants to obtain. Should we be surprised that one of the centers of operation for al-Zawahiri was London, where one of his closest relatives resided? President Mubarak is believed to have referred to him when, after the Luxor massacre, he stated: "There are people who carried out crimes and who were sentenced [in Egypt] and live on British soil." 30-30."
Copyright © 2001 in the U.S.A. and Internationally by Umberto Pascali and Executive Intelligence Review. All rights are reserved. ( Source: http://www.LaRouchPub.com/ )
"PENTAGON AIMS GUNS AT LYNCH REPORTS"
By Robert Scheer, AlterNet(.org)
May 29, 2003
"It is one thing when the talk-show bullies, who shamelessly smeared the last president even as he attacked the training camps of Al Qaeda, now term it anti-American or even treasonous to dare criticize the Bush administration. It's another when our Pentagon - a $400-billion-a-year juggernaut - savages individual journalists for questioning its version of events.
"Especially if you're that journalist (i.e., 'me'--the author).
"Last week, this column reported the findings of a British Broadcasting Corp. special report that accused the U.S. military and media of inaccurately and manipulatively hyping the story of U.S. Pvt. Jessica Lynch and her rescue from an Iraq hospital. The column was also informed by similar and independently reported articles and statements in the Toronto Star, the Washington Post and other reputable publications.
"Expected - and received - was a hysterical belch of outrage from the right-wing media, led by Rupert Murdoch's Fox empire, which has already committed a huge book advance to the telling of this mythic tale. A fiery and disingenuous response from the Pentagon, however, was quite a bit more sobering.
"Calling the column a "tirade," Assistant Secretary of Defense for Public Affairs Victoria Clarke wrote in a letter to The Times that "Scheer's claims are outrageous, patently false and unsupported by the facts."
""Official spokespeople in Qatar and in Washington, as well as the footage released, reflected the events accurately," the Pentagon letter continued. "To suggest otherwise is an insult and does a grave disservice to the brave men and women involved."
"Actually, what is a grave disservice is manipulating a gullible media with leaked distortions from unnamed official sources about Lynch's heroics in battle. That aside, it would have been easier to rebut the Pentagon if its spokeswoman had actually questioned any of the facts the BBC or this column reported. In particular, the Pentagon turned down the request by the BBC and other media to view the full, unedited footage of the rescue.
"Perhaps Clarke is frustrated that in the days since the BBC report, several major publications such as the Chicago Tribune and the London Daily Mail have independently verified much of the BBC's disturbing account of what the broadcasting corporation called "one of the most stunning pieces of news management ever conceived."
"The distortions concerning Lynch began two days after the rescue with a front-page Washington Post story by veteran reporters Susan Schmidt and Vernon Loeb. They cited U.S. officials as the source of their information that Lynch "fought fiercely and shot several enemy soldiers, firing her weapon until she ran out of ammunition" and that she "continued firing after she sustained multiple gunshot wounds." The Post quoted one of the unnamed U.S. officials as saying "she was fighting to the death. She did not want to be taken alive."
"Despite their current defensiveness, Clarke and other Pentagon honchos had to know that the story attributed to U.S. officials was false, because Lynch had at that point already been rescued and examined by U.S. military doctors, who found no evidence of a single gunshot wound, let alone multiple gunshot wounds. Yet they did nothing to challenge the Post story, which was carried worldwide and quickly became the main heroic propaganda myth of the U.S. invasion of Iraq.
"It was only last week, after the BBC-initiated brouhaha, that the Pentagon finally launched its own investigation of what actually occurred when Lynch was taken prisoner. According to the Washington Times, the investigation came about after top Pentagon officials cast doubt on the Lynch battle-scene account, of which she has no memory.
"However, the Pentagon investigators were not asked to look into the circumstances surrounding Lynch's subsequent rescue. Much of the BBC's account has now been supported by other media investigations, which confirm that a U.S. attack on an unguarded hospital was spun into the stuff of Hollywood heroics.
"The Tribune's Monday story, for example, provided new details of how slickly a tale of daring-do was created, enhanced for television by that five-minute Pentagon-supplied night-vision video. The Tribune also added details supporting the BBC account that hospital staff members had placed Lynch in an ambulance and tried to deliver her to a U.S. checkpoint before being turned back by random American fire.
"What is particularly sad in all of this is that a wonderfully hopeful story was available to the Pentagon to sell to the eager media: one in which besieged Iraqi doctors and nurses bravely cared for - and supplied their own blood to - a similarly brave young American woman in a time of madness and violence. Instead, eager to turn the war into a morality play between good and evil, the military used - if not abused - Lynch to put a heroic spin on an otherwise sorry tale of unjustified invasion.
"The truth hurts, but that's no excuse for trying to shoot the messenger."
Robert Scheer writes a weekly column for The Times. ( Source: http://www.AlterNet.org/ ) Copyright (c) 2003 in the U.S.A. and Internationally by AlterNet.org and Robert Scheer. All rights are reserved.
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Postscript: I'm looking for someone to go 50/50 with me and move to either Ecuador, Costa Rica, Belize, Guatemala, or Mexico where we can make a very low income go much further with a lower cost, and higher standard, of living (than living in the States on such a low income). This includes an only income of Social Security Disability (SSDI) and/or Retirement benefits. The Social Security Administration most definitely DOES allow SSDI and/or Retirement benefits, but not Supplemental Security Income (SSI) benefits, to be sent to recipients in most other countries! There are many books about moving and living abroad available at the public library and/or at Amazon.com . Naturally, I realize we would probably have to spend some time getting to know eachother, and finding out if we're compatible, before moving abroad together. We could even have our own separate "spaces" by choosing to rent or purchase a house or apartment with separate quarters, and still save considerable money in monthly costs compared to living in the States on the same income. If you might be interested, want to ask me some questions, and/or want to discuss it, please e-mail me at the address below.
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