Regime Change Begins at Home Third Quarter of 2003 July 2003 ... August 2003 ... September 2003   A special note; As of 8/25/03 there will be a change of format. I will be placing in the main body of the text of my newsletters.

July 2003

7/1/03a http://story.news.yahoo.com/news? Democrats Begin Probe of Prewar Intel By KEN GUGGENHEIM, Associated Press Writer WASHINGTON - Democrats on the Senate Armed Services Committee announced Friday plans to stage their own inquiry on the credibility of prewar intelligence on Iraq's weapons of mass destruction and its links to the al-Qaida terror network. The announcement by Sen. Carl Levin (news, bio, voting record) of Michigan, the panel's top Democrat, marked an unusual split with Chairman John Warner, R-Va., on an issue with strong political overtones ahead of next year's elections. Warner and Levin are longtime colleagues on the committee and repeatedly stress bipartisan cooperation. Democrats in both the House and Senate have been pushing for widened examinations of prewar intelligence beyond reviews already under way by both bodies' intelligence committees. Levin said he has directed Democratic staff to examine the objectivity and credibility of the intelligence and its effect on Defense Department policy decisions, military planning and operations in Iraq. He said Warner refused his request to begin such an inquiry. In a letter released by Levin, Warner said the committee should wait until the Senate Intelligence Committee has completed its review, then decide how to move ahead. Both Levin and Warner are members of the intelligence panel. The Armed Services Committee, meanwhile, will continue oversight hearings on military operations in Iraq, Warner said in the letter. Defense Secretary Donald H. and Gen. Tommy Franks, head of U.S. Central Command, will appear before the panel the week of July 7. He said Levin's review is "clearly your prerogative" and said his staff may work periodically with Levin's. In a statement, Warner's press secretary, John Ullyot, said the committee has held four hearings on the weapons and intelligence issues and will hold more, in addition to the Intelligence Committee review. "Sen. Levin is welcome to direct his own staff to look into these matters as well," he said.   7/1/03b http://denverpost.com/Stories/0,1413,36%257E115%257E,00.html Scandal lurks in shadow of Iraq evidence By Diane Carman, Denver Post Columnist It's getting harder to ignore. More and more evidence is emerging to suggest that U.S. intelligence was manipulated to justify going to war with Iraq. Among the allegations: U.S. officials cited documents provided by foreign ambassadors - documents that they knew to be forgeries - as proof of the existence of an Iraqi nuclear weapons program. Aluminum tubes and gas centrifuges that President Bush said were used to "enrich uranium for nuclear weapons" had already been determined by the CIA to be ordinary rocket materials too flimsy to handle nuclear material. Claims by the administration that Iraq had unmanned aerial vehicles capable of delivering deadly biological agents around the world to the U.S. were known to be false; analysts estimated they didn't have the range even to reach Tel Aviv. Vice President Dick Cheney had visited CIA headquarters several times in the months before the war to pressure analysts to find evidence that would justify an attack on Iraq. And evidence that there was no connection between Saddam Hussein and al-Qaeda was deliberately withheld from Congress and the public in an attempt to mislead everyone about the danger Iraq posed. Several members of the Senate Intelligence Committee, including Democrats Bob Graham, D-Fla., and Richard Durbin, D-Ill., told The New Republic that they knew that evidence contradicting the Bush administration's claims had been concealed, but they were unable to reveal it because it was classified. Still, Congress, which spent $80 million to prove that, yes, Bill Clinton did have sexual relations with that woman, has yet to order an investigation. Rep. Diana DeGette claims to know why. "It's obvious. It's because the Republicans control Congress and the White House," the Colorado Democrat said. Last week, she called for a bipartisan investigation to determine if there was a "massive intelligence failure" leading up to the war in Iraq. Either there never was the irrefutable evidence of weapons of mass destruction and we were deceived, she said, or the deadly weapons exist in Iraq where Hussein is believed to be hiding and our intelligence is not capable of finding them. Regardless of which scenario Americans prefer to embrace, it's a troubling situation. We deserve an explanation.   7/1/03c http://www.blackboxvoting.com/modules.php?name=News&file=article&sid=30 WHISTLEBLOWER LAWSUIT: Insider Sues Voting Machine Company Date: Thursday, March 20 @ 19:11:06 EST Voting machine engineer sues, alleges machine design Flaws A test engineer for DRE "touch-screen" voting machines reported over 250 errors... Lawsuit indicates that the company did not address the flaws, and that the voting was not certified by independent testing labs despite known flaws. 2/25/2003 -- Dan Spillane, a voting machine test engineer, has filed a lawsuit against his former employer, DRE touch-screen voting machine manufacturer VoteHere. Spillane's lawsuit charges wrongful and retaliatory termination; he contends he was removed so that he could not blow the whistle to certification labs and pass critical information to the US General Accounting Office. He says he has evidence which shows voting systems are certified despite known flaws, demonstrating a weakness in both the NASED and the ITA system for certifying machines. -- SANTA CLARA COUNTY decided Tuesday night to purchase machines without a paper trail, despite the urgent warnings of over 100 of the nation's top security experts. Officials pointed to the strength of NASED and ITA certification when explaining their reasons for ignoring the warnings. -- Similarly, Collins County Texas decided this week not to follow safety recommendations for a paper ballot audit trail, in part due to assurances that the NASED and ITA certifications could be counted upon to catch errors or vote- rigging. Spillane, the first insider from a voting machine manufacturer to come forward, reports that system flaws sometimes go undetected. His former company, VoteHere, manufactures touch-screen machines of its own -- which have been certified by NASED and national ITAs -- but also markets its software for use inside machines made by other companies. Spillane says in his lawsuit that he reported over 250 issues in the VoteHere voting system, including critical errors that can prevent the machines from correctly registering the votes, or working efficiently on election day. He sought meetings with company officials to express concerns about integrity flaws, which he says led to his firing. His complaint indicates that VoteHere did not address the flaws, and that the VoteHere system was certified by independent testing labs despite known issues. Georgia recently approved VoteHere's machines, and the military and others are considering the technology. Spillane also alleges company officials bragged about using political connections to pass software, rather than meeting the rules.   7/1/03c http://www.commondreams.org/headlines03/0625-01.htm Published on Wednesday, June 25, 2003 by the New York Times Said to Tell Legislators He Was Pressed to Distort Some Evidence by James Risen and Douglas Jehl WASHINGTON, June 24 ˜ A top State Department expert on chemical and biological weapons told Congressional committees in closed-door hearings last week that he had been pressed to tailor his analysis on Iraq and other matters to conform with the Bush administration's views, several Congressional officials said today. Mr. Westermann's decision to speak out has caused a stir inside the House and Senate intelligence committees. The officials described what they said was a dramati moment at a House Intelligence Committee hearing last week when the weapons expert came forward to tell Congress he had felt such pressure.   7/1/03d http://www.nytimes.com/2003/06/24/opinion/24KRUG.html Denial and Deception By PAUL KRUGMAN Politics is full of ironies. On the White House Web site, George W. Bush's speech from Oct. 7, 2002 ˜ in which he made the case for war with Iraq ˜ bears the headline "Denial and Deception." Indeed. There is no longer any serious doubt that Bush administration officials deceived us into war. The key question now is why so many influential people are in denial, unwilling to admit the obvious. About the deception: Leaks from professional intelligence analysts, who are furious over the way their work was abused, have given us a far more complete picture of how America went to war. Thanks to reporting by my colleague Nicholas Kristof, other reports in The New York Times and The Washington Post, and a magisterial article by John Judis and Spencer Ackerman in The New Republic, we now know that top officials, including Mr. Bush, sought to convey an impression about the Iraqi threat that was not supported by actual intelligence reports. In particular, there was never any evidence linking Saddam Hussein to Al Qaeda; yet administration officials repeatedly suggested the existence of a link. Supposed evidence of an active Iraqi nuclear program was thoroughly debunked by the administration's own experts; yet administration officials continued to cite that evidence and warn of Iraq's nuclear threat. And yet the political and media establishment is in denial, finding excuses for the administration's efforts to mislead both Congress and the public. For example, some commentators have suggested that Mr. Bush should be let off the hook as long as there is some interpretation of his prewar statements that is technically true. Really? We're not talking about a business dispute that hinges on the fine print of the contract; we're talking about the most solemn decision a nation can make. If Mr. Bush's speeches gave the nation a misleading impression about the case for war, close textual analysis showing that he didn't literally say what he seemed to be saying is no excuse. On the contrary, it suggests that he knew that his case couldn't stand close scrutiny. Consider, for example, what Mr. Bush said in his "denial and deception" speech about the supposed Saddam-Osama link: that there were "high-level contact that go back a decade." In fact, intelligence agencies knew of tentative contacts between Saddam and an infant Al Qaeda in the early 1990's, but found no good evidence of a continuing relationship. So Mr. Bush made what sounded like an assertion of an ongoing relationship between Iraq and Al Qaeda, but phrased it cagily ˜ suggesting that he or his speechwriter knew full well that his case was shaky. Other commentators suggest that Mr. Bush may have sincerely believed, despite the lack of evidence, that Saddam was working with Osama and developing nuclear weapons. Actually, that's unlikely: why did he use such evasive wording if he didn't know that he was improving on the truth? In any case, however, somebody was at fault. If top administration officials somehow failed to apprise Mr. Bush of intelligence reports refuting key pieces of his case against Iraq, they weren't doing their jobs. And Mr. Bush should be the first person to demand their resignations. So why are so many people making excuses for Mr. Bush and his officials? 7/6/03a http://www.nationalcatholicreporter.org/fwis/fw052703.htm Is there anything left that matters? By Joan Chittister,OSB This is what I don't understand: All of a sudden nothing seems to matter. First, they said they wanted Bin Laden "dead or alive." But they didn't get him. So now they tell us that it doesn't matter. Our mission is greater than one man. Then they said they wanted Saddam Hussein, "dead or alive." He's apparently alive but we haven't got him yet, either. However, President Bush told reporters recently, "It doesn't matter. Our mission is greater than one man." Finally, they told us that we were invading Iraq to destroy their weapons of mass destruction. Now they say those weapons probably don't exist. Maybe never existed. Apparently that doesn't matter either. Except that it does matter. I know we're not supposed to say that. I know it's called "unpatriotic." But it's also called honesty. And dishonesty matters. It matters that the infrastructure of a foreign nation that couldn't defend itself against us has been destroyed on the grounds that it was a military threat to the world. It matters that it was destroyed by us under a new doctrine of "pre-emptive war" when there was apparently nothing worth pre-empting. It surely matters to the families here whose sons went to war to make the world safe from weapons of mass destruction and will never come home. It matters to families in the United States whose life support programs were ended, whose medical insurance ran out, whose food stamps were cut off, whose day care programs were eliminated so we could spend the money on sending an army to do what did not need to be done. It matters to the Iraqi girl whose face was burned by a lamp that toppled over as a result of a U.S. bombing run. It matters to Ali, the Iraqi boy who lost his family &emdash; and both his arms &emdash; in a U.S. air attack. It matters to the people in Baghdad whose water supply is now fetid, whose electricity is gone, whose streets are unsafe, whose 158 government ministries' buildings and all their records have been destroyed, whose cultural heritage and social system has been looted and whose cities teem with anti-American protests. It matters that the people we say we "liberated" do not feel liberated in the midst of the lawlessness, destruction and wholesale social suffering that so-called liberation created. It matters to the United Nations whose integrity was impugned, whose authority was denied, whose inspection teams are even now still being overlooked in the process of technical evaluation and disarmament. It matters to the reputation of the United States in the eyes of the world, both now and for decades to come, perhaps. And surely it matters to the integrity of this nation whether or not its intelligence gathering agencies have any real intelligence or not before we launch a military armada on its say-so. And it should matter whether or not our government is either incompetent and didn't know what they were doing or were dishonest and refused to say. The unspoken truth is that either as a people we were misled, or we were lied to, about the real reason for this war. Either we made a huge &emdash; and unforgivable &emdash; mistake, an arrogant or ignorant mistake, or we are swaggering around the world like a blind giant, flailing in all directions while the rest of the world watches in horror or in ridicule. If Bill Clinton's definition of "is" matters, surely this matters. If a president's sex life matters, surely a president's use of global force against some of the weakest people in the world matters. If a president's word in a court of law about a private indiscretion matters, surely a president's word to the community of nations and the security of millions of people matters. And if not, why not? If not, surely there is something as wrong with us as citizens, as thinkers, as Christians as there must be with some facet of the government. If wars that the public says are wrong yesterday &emdash; as over 70% of U.S. citizens did before the attack on Iraq &emdash; suddenly become "right" the minute the first bombs drop, what kind of national morality is that?   7/6/03b http://www.commondreams.org/headlines03/0705-01.htm Published on Saturday, July 5, 2003 by OneWorld.net 130 U.S. Communities Saying No to Repression by Jim Lobe WASHINGTON - More than 130 communities with a combined population of more than 16 million people in 26 states have passed resolutions directing local police to refrain from using racial profiling, enforcing immigration laws, or participating in federal investigations that violate civil liberties, according to a new report released on the eve of this year's Fourth of July celebrations by the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU). The 23-page report credits Ann Arbor, Michigan, with adopting the first resolution opposing key provisions of the USA PATRIOT Act, thus setting off a trend that shows no sign of abating. "In my conversations with people from across the political spectrum, I hear one refrain over and over," says Laura Murphy, who heads the ACLU's Washington, D.C. legislative office. "If we give up our freedoms in the name of national security, we will have lost the war on terrorism." "As this year's Fourth of July rolls around, we hope that this report will demonstrate to the White House, the Justice Department and Congress that we must be both safe and free." The ACLU, whose local offices played a major role in support of dozens of resolutions around the country, stressed that among the jurisdications that have taken action are a number of traditionally conservative areas of the country, such as Oklahoma City, Missoula, Montana; and Falgstaff, Arizona. Some of the larger cities include Denver, Colorado; Oakland and San Francisco, California; Seattle, Washington; Detroit, Michigan; Philadelphia, Pennsylvania; and Baltimore, Maryland. Three states have also adopted measures that call for strict respect for constitutional rights: Hawaii, Alaska, and Vermont.   7/6/03c http://www.villagevoice.com/issues/0310/hentoff.php Ashcroft Out of Control Ominous Sequel to USA Patriot Act February 28th, 2003 3:00 PM Many of the new security measures proposed by our government in the name of fighting the "war on terror" are not temporary. They are permanent changes to our laws. Even the measures that, on the surface, appear to have been adopted only as long as the war on terror lasts, could be with us indefinitely. Because, as Homeland Security director Tom Ridge himself has warned, terrorism is a "permanent condition to which America must . . . adjust." &emdash;American Civil Liberties Union, January 29 Since September 11, 2001, a number of us at the Voice have been detailing the Bush administration's accelerating war on the Bill of Rights&emdash;and the rising resistance around the country. This battle to protect the Constitution, and us, has entered a new and more dangerous dimension. On February 7, Charles Lewis, head of the Washington-based Center for Public Integrity, received a secret, but not classified, Justice Department draft of a bill that would expand the already unprecedented government powers to restrict civil liberties authorized by the USA Patriot Act. This new bill is called the Domestic Security Enhancement Act of 2003. Lewis, in an act of patriotism&emdash;since this still is a constitutional democracy&emdash;put the 86-page draft on the center's Web site, where it still remains (www.publicintegrity.org). On the evening of February 7, Charles Lewis discussed this new assault on our fundamental liberties on Bill Moyers's PBS program, Now. 7/9/03a http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A13536-2003Jul5.html Ex-Envoy: Nuclear Report Ignored Iraqi Purchases Were Doubted by CIA By Richard Leiby and Walter Pincus Washington Post Staff Writers Sunday, July 6, 2003; Page A13 Joseph C. Wilson, the retired United States ambassador whose CIA-directed mission to Niger in early 2002 helped debunk claims that Iraq had tried to obtain uranium there for nuclear weapons, has said for the first time publicly that U.S. and British officials ignored his findings and exaggerated the public case for invading Iraq.   7/9/03b http://news.ft.com/servlet/ContentServer?pagename=FT.com/StoryFT US admits Iraq-African uranium link 'bogus' By James Harding and Guy Dinmore in Washington and James Blitz in London Published: July 7 2003 20:55 | Last Updated: July 8 2003 7:37 The two chief advocates of war in Iraq - George W. Bush and Tony Blair - came under concerted pressure on Monday over their use of intelligence to justify military action against Saddam Hussein. The White House was forced to admit that an assertion by President Bush this year that Iraq was seeking to buy uranium from Africa was based on "bogus" information.   7/9/03c http://news.independent.co.uk/world/environment/story.jsp?story=421166 Reaping the whirlwind Extreme weather prompts unprecedented global warming alert 03 July 2003 In an astonishing announcement on global warming and extreme weather, the World Meteorological Organisation signalled last night that the world's weather is going haywire. In a startling report, the WMO, which normally produces detailed scientific reports and staid statistics at the year's end, highlighted record extremes in weather and climate occurring all over the world in recent weeks, from Switzerland's hottest-ever June to a record month for tornadoes in the United States - and linked them to climate change.   7/9/03d http://www.commondreams.org/headlines03/0705-01.htm Published on Saturday, July 5, 2003 by OneWorld.net 130 U.S. Communities Saying No to Repression by Jim Lobe WASHINGTON - More than 130 communities with a combined population of more than 16 million people in 26 states have passed resolutions directing local police to refrain from using racial profiling, enforcing immigration laws, or participating in federal investigations that violate civil liberties, according to a new report released on the eve of this year's Fourth of July celebrations by the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU). The 23-page report credits Ann Arbor, Michigan, with adopting the first resolution opposing key provisions of the USA PATRIOT Act, thus setting off a trend that shows no sign of abating.   7/9/03e http://observer.guardian.co.uk/politics/story/0,6903,992468,00.html Confess or die, US tells jailed Britons Outrage over plight of Guantanamo detainees Martin Bright, Kamal Ahmed and Peter Beaumont Sunday July 6, 2003 The Observer The two British terrorist suspects facing a secret US military tribunal in Guantanamo Bay will be given a choice: plead guilty and accept a 20-year prison sentence, or be executed if found guilty. American legal sources close to the process said that the prisoners' dilemma was intended to encourage maximum 'co-operation'. The news comes as Jack Straw, the Foreign Secretary, prepares to urge US Secretary of State Colin Powell to repatriate the two Britons. He will say that they should face a fair trial here under English law. Backed by Home Secretary David Blunkett, Straw will make it clear that the Government opposes the death penalty and wants to see both men tried 'under normal judicial process'.   7/9/03f This is a great article to read and to read to others who still "don't get it" http://www.nationalcatholicreporter.org/fwis/fw052703.htm Is there anything left that matters? By Joan Chittister,OSB This is what I don't understand: All of a sudden nothing seems to matter. First, they said they wanted Bin Laden "dead or alive." But they didn't get him. So now they tell us that it doesn't matter. Our mission is greater than one man. Then they said they wanted Saddam Hussein, "dead or alive." He's apparently alive but we haven't got him yet, either. However, President Bush told reporters recently, "It doesn't matter. Our mission is greater than one man." Finally, they told us that we were invading Iraq to destroy their weapons of mass destruction. Now they say those weapons probably don't exist. Maybe never existed. Apparently that doesn't matter either. Except that it does matter. I know we're not supposed to say that. I know it's called "unpatriotic." But it's also called honesty. And dishonesty matters. It matters that the infrastructure of a foreign nation that couldn't defend itself against us has been destroyed on the grounds that it was a military threat to the world. It matters that it was destroyed by us under a new doctrine of "pre-emptive war" when there was apparently nothing worth pre-empting. It surely matters to the families here whose sons went to war to make the world safe from weapons of mass destruction and will never come home. It matters to families in the United States whose life support programs were ended, whose medical insurance ran out, whose food stamps were cut off, whose day care programs were eliminated so we could spend the money on sending an army to do what did not need to be done. It matters to the Iraqi girl whose face was burned by a lamp that toppled over as a result of a U.S. bombing run.   7/9/03g http://www.computerbytesman.com/privacy/blair.htm Blair's Iraq Dossier Richard M. Smith (rms@computerbytesman.com) June 30, 2003 Microsoft Word documents are notorious for containing private information in file headers which people would sometimes rather not share. The British government of Tony Blair just learned this lesson the hard way. Back in February 2003, 10 Downing Street published a dossier on Iraq's security and intelligence organizations. This dossier was cited by Colin Powell in his address to the United Nations the same month. Dr. Glen Rangwala, a lecturer in politics at Cambridge University, quickly discovered that much of the material in the dossier was actually plagiarized from a U.S. researcher on Iraq. [casi] Intelligence? the British dossier on Iraq's security infrastructure ------------------------------------------------------------------------ * From: Glen Rangwala <gr10009@DELETETHIScam.ac.uk> * Subject: [casi] Intelligence? the British dossier on Iraq's security infrastructure * Date: 05 Feb 2003 15:53:37 +0000 ------------------------------------------------------------------------ A sideways comment: In preparation for Powell's presentation at 15:30 GMT today, I had a look at the third British government's "dossier" released last Thursday, "Iraq - Its Infrastructure Of Concealment, Deception And Intimidation" (30 January 2003). The document is at: http://www.number-10.gov.uk/output/Page7111.asp (references below to page numbers relate to the downloadable Word version). The document claims to draw "upon a number of sources, including intelligence material" (p.1, first sentence). Now this is a bit misleading. More precisely, the bulk of the 19-page document (pp.6-16) is directly copied without acknowledgement from an article in last September's Middle East Review of International Affairs entitled "Iraq's Security and Intelligence Network: A Guide and Analysis". http://meria.idc.ac.il/journal/2002/issue3/jv6n3a1.html 7/11/03a http://www.newsday.com/news/nationworld/nation/ 9/11 Panel: U.S. Hindering Probe By Thomas Frank Washington Bureau July 8, 2003, 8:18 PM EDT Washington -- The leaders of an independent commission investigating the Sept. 11 attacks voiced serious concerns Tuesday about federal agencies that were not providing key documents and were requiring witnesses to be interviewed in front of an official from their agency. The first interim report from the commission probing all aspects of what led to the attacks offered measured but blunt criticism of the Bush administration aimed at prodding but not angering federal agencies.   7/11/03b The Pentagon's Plan for Tracking Everything That Moves Big Brother Gets a Brain http://www.villagevoice.com/issues/0328/shachtman.php The Pentagon's Plan for Tracking Everything That Moves Big Brother Gets a Brain by Noah Shachtman July 9 - 15, 2000 The cameras are already in place. The computer code is being developed at a dozen or more major companies and universities. And the trial runs have already been planned. Everything is set for a new Pentagon program to become perhaps the federal government's widest reaching, most invasive mechanism yet for keeping us all under watch. Not in the far-off, dystopian future. But here, and soon.   7/11/03c http://www.washingtonpost.com/ac2/wp-dyn/A29985-2003Jul8?language=printer Washingtonpost.com Weapons of Mass Deception? Wednesday, July 9, 2003; Page A26 Barely a week after the publication of a lengthy article "explaining" unattributed factual errors in The Post's original Jessica Lynch story ["A Long and Incomplete Correction," Ombudsman, June 29], the following quotation was featured in a July 8 front-page article by Walter Pincus: "Knowing all that we know now, the reference to Iraq's attempt to acquire uranium from Africa should not have been included in the State of the Union speech." This statement was attributed to " a senior Bush administration official . . . in a statement authorized by the White House." How could The Post present an admission of error on an important national security matter as both authoritative and anonymous? Readers deserve a clear explanation of why the identity of this "senior Bush administration official," speaking with the approval of "the White House," is being concealed. GILBERT M. JOHNSON Bethesda The explanation of why President Bush cited the debunked "Iraqi uranium purchase from Niger" story in his State of the Union address defies credulity. If we are to believe the U.S. and British governments, the Bush administration decided to cite the story in the single most important speech an American president gives because British intelligence continued to believe the story, even though the CIA had debunked it. The Brits say they continued to believe the story because they thought the Americans believed it. And this is how we went to war, like two guilty idiots pointing at each other, saying, "He did it!" This allegation of Iraq's intentions, along with Saddam Hussein's alleged ties to al Qaeda, more than any other data, galvanized the American public to accept war as a necessary evil. Either both administrations are lying or, worse still, they are making decisions on whether to go to war based on sources that would have flunked them if they were writing a high school term paper. As an American, I feel either betrayed that I'm being lied to or horrified that my government is that stupid. ALEX TODOROVIC Belgrade   7/11/03d This is a long article but very interesting to read, none the less. While I don't much go in for conspiracy and this article hints at such, the statements and facts contained in it are enlightening and make for a lively read. http://www.fromthewilderness.com/free/ww3/070103_beyond_bush_1.html This is one of the excerpts The foundation of the impeachment - or the scandal that will prompt a regime change - was laid in a March 17 letter written by California Congressman Henry Waxman who has been dogging the Bush administration on its violations of law since it took office. Waxman's first battle was over the refusal of the administration to release the mostly still-secret records of Vice President Cheney's 2001 Energy Task Force. It is there that some of the biggest secrets of 9/11 lay buried. With respect to the Iraqi invasion -- using the record of official statements made by Bush, Cheney, Rumsfeld and Powel -- Waxman has already laid out and won the prima facie case that the administration has lied, deceived the public and broken the public trust. There can be no defense against this record once it gets into a legal proceeding.   7/11/03e To read the full text of Waxman's March letter please visit: http://www.house.gov/reform/min/inves_admin/admin_nuclear_evidence.htm This web page details Waxman's meticulous compilation of evidence and - from a legal, as opposed to political standpoint - is no doubt the core of any future impeachment case against Bush. It is damning and Waxman has diligently continued to build, brick by brick, the wall into which the administration could soon crash. An important historical novelty here is that Waxman's compilation of irrefutable criminal activity also guarantees that if Bush goes, so do Cheney, Rumsfeld and Powell. What then?   7/11/03f This was sent to me. At the URL below is a substantial article that details the extent to which we may have a problem with our "paperless" voting systems. http://www.whatreallyhappened.com/biggerthanwatergate.html This story is not so easy to follow at first but is well worth the read. Note the reference to the Alabama Governor's race, which I have referred to before. If you look at Gov. Riley you can see the extreme "Bush- wannabe" sickness that consumes him. He has even reated his own Alabama Dept.of Homeland Security. It s based in Baldwin county where his mysterious, winning votes appeared. What better way to return a BIG favor to the Baldwin Co.Sheriff (Republican) who conducted Riley's vote recount after poll watchers had left the polls. You see Riley DID get a recount even though the Republicans declared ANY post election recount illegal. This is not a defense of former Governor Seigleman's honesty or character, it is simply a presentation of the shady nature of present day elections. It is also notable that Pryor is up for a Federal judgeship after declaring that any recount of those same votes would be illegal. His reasoning: If the seals on the ballot boxes are broken, all the ballots contained therein are automatically invalid. Why do we have locked ballot boxes when, under this logic, a document shredder or fire would serve the same purpose?   7/11/03g What I have placed here are a few of the nuggets from the story. The whole article is at the link below http://www.liberalslant.com/wrp071103.htm Mr. Bush, You Are A Liar By: William Rivers Pitt - 07/11/03 A great hue and cry has been raised as to the timing of the data delivery to the policy-makers. Don Rumsfeld and Condoleezza Rice have both claimed they knew nothing of the forged Niger evidence, claiming the information was buried in the "bowels" of the intelligence services. Vice President Cheney's office has made similar demurrals. Obviously, the administration is attempting to scapegoat the CIA. Given the nature of Wilson's claims, and given who he is, and given the fact that he was sent to Niger at the behest of Dick Cheney, it is absurd to believe the administration was never given the data they specifically asked for over a year before the war began, and eleven months before Bush's fateful State of the Union Address. 27-year CIA veteran Ray McGovern, writing in a recent editorial, described a conversation he had with a senior official who recently served at the National Security Council. "The fact that Cheney's office had originally asked that the Iraq-Niger report be checked out," said the official, "makes it inconceivable that his office would not have been informed of the results." One Congresswoman, Democratic Representative Jan Schakowsky of Illinois, released a statement on July 8 that cuts right to the heart of the matter: "After months of denials, President Bush has finally admitted that he misled the American public during his State of the Union address when he claimed that Iraq attempted to purchase uranium in Africa. That is why we need an independent commission to determine the veracity of the other so-called evidence used to convince the American people that war with Iraq was unavoidable. "It is not enough for the White House to issue a statement saying that President Bush should not have used that piece of intelligence in his State of the Union address at a time when he was trying to convince the American people that invading Iraq was in our national security interests. Did the president know then what he says he only knows now? If not, why not, since that information was available at the highest level. 7/15/03a http://www.CounterPunch.com/ Bastille Day July 14, 2003 Time to End the Dodginess Intelligence Unglued By VETERAN INTELLIGENCE PROFESSIONALS FOR SANITY: MEMORANDUM FOR: The President FROM: Veteran Intelligence Professionals for Sanity SUBJECT: Intelligence Unglued The glue that holds the Intelligence Community together is melting under the hot lights of an awakened press. If you do not act quickly, your intelligence capability will fall apart--with grave consequences for the nation. The Forgery Flap By now you are all too familiar with the play-by-play. The Iraq-seeking-uranium-in-Niger forgery is a microcosm of a mischievous nexus of overarching problems. Instead of addressing these problems, your senior staff are alternately covering up for one another and gently stabbing one another in the back. CIA Director George Tenet's extracted, unapologetic apology on July 11 was classic--I confess; she did it.   7/15/03b http://www.washingtonpost.com/ac2/wp-dyn/A55857-2003Jul14?language=printer Black Thursday For Bush By David S. Broder Tuesday, July 15, 2003; Page A19 If President Bush is not reelected, we may look back on last Thursday, July 10, 2003, as the day the shadow of defeat first crossed his political horizon. To be sure, Bush looks strong. The CBS News poll released that evening had his approval rating at 60 percent, with solid support from his own party, a 26-point lead among independents and a near-even split among Democrats. Two-thirds of those surveyed could not name a single one of the nine Democrats vying for the right to oppose him. But "The CBS Evening News" that night was like Karl Rove's worst nightmare, and the other network newscasts -- still the main source of information for a large number of Americans -- were not much better.   7/15/03b Rumsfeld is quite a dancer, changing with the tempo. Talk about doing the Revisionist Rhumba in this one.... In testimony last week before the Senate, Rumsfeld said that he had only learned that the Niger documents were bogus within the last few days. Questioned about that by "This Week's" George Stephanopoulos, the Secretary of Defense spun out of control. http://www.defenselink.mil/transcripts/2003/tr20030713-secdef0384.html   7/15/03c http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/americas/3063361.stm Last Updated: Sunday, 13 July, 2003, 23:48 GMT 00:48 UK Core of weapons case crumbling By Paul Reynolds BBC News Online world affairs correspondent Of the nine main conclusions in the British government document "Iraq's weapons of mass destruction", not one has been shown to be conclusively true. The confusion evident about one of the claims, that Iraq sought uranium from Niger despite having no civilian nuclear programme, is the latest example of the process under which the allegations made so confidently last September have been undermined. The CIA has admitted that the claim should not have been in President Bush's State of the Union speech.   7/15/03d http://www.TomPaine.com/feature2.cfm/ID/8311 All Spin All The Time New York-based Russ Baker is an award-winning journalist who covers politics and media. Viva Nihilism! It must be great working in the Bush White House. Zero accountability. It's All Spin, All the Time. Nothing matters but politics, hence no unfounded claim requires correction or apology. Unless, of course, they are pushed to the end of the plank, as they were recently with the tale about Niger and nuclear materials. Take those elusive Weapons of Mass Destruction. Despite the failure of the concentrated might of the U.S. military-intelligence complex to find anything that might qualify in the remotest possible way, the administration labels critics "revisionist historians" and imperturbedly moves on. The initial assertions and touted "discoveries" usually get more attention than does the sound of a balloon deflating. That's why polls find a sizable chunk of the American public still under the impression that WMD have been found. Whatever Saddam's interest in WMD, the administration didn't know what he had and didn't have solid evidence to make the claims it did -- much less to launch a war over them. For those amateur "revisionist historians" out there, here is a partial, unscientific reconstruction of the claims that fizzled. (Here are the first two examples as a sampler from the article) THE CLAIM: "Iraq has trained Al Qaeda members in bombmaking and poisons and deadly gases... [which] could allow the Iraqi regime to attack America without leaving any fingerprints." - President Bush, Oct. 7, 2002. THE FACTS: The alleged Al Qaeda training camp, which Colin Powell described to the United Nations in February, is later revealed to be outside Iraq's control and patrolled by Allied warplanes. By late June, Michael Chandler, the head of the U.N. team monitoring global efforts to counter Al Qaeda tells Agence France Press: "We have never had information presented to us -- even though we've asked questions -- which would indicate that there is a direct link." THE SPIN: State Dept. spokesman Richard Boucher responds: "Secretary Powell provided clear and convincing evidence of the links between Iraq and Al Qaeda."   THE CLAIM: "The British government has learned that Saddam Hussein recently sought significant quantities of uranium from Africa," Bush declares in the State of the Union address. THE FACTS: In March, Mohamed ElBaradei, director-general of the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA), tells the U.N. Security Council that the documents substantiating the claim of alleged Iraqi efforts to buy uranium in Niger were fakes (and bad ones at that) and that "these specific allegations are unfounded." The unnamed ex-ambassador whom the CIA sent to check out the story tells The New Republic: "They knew the Niger story was a flat-out lie." THE SPIN: Pass the buck, finally 'fessing up in a White House statement delivered on July 7 that Bush should not have used the uranium allegations in his address. 7/20/03a http://www.nytimes.com/2003/07/15/international/asia/15KORE.html?hp North Korea Says It Has Made Fuel for Atom Bombs By DAVID E. SANGER WASHINGTON, July 14 &emdash; North Korean officials told the Bush administration last week that they had finished producing enough plutonium to make a half-dozen nuclear bombs, and that they intended to move ahead quickly to turn the material into weapons, senior American officials said today. The new declaration set off a scramble in American intelligence agencies &emdash; under fire for their assessment of Iraq's nuclear capability &emdash; to determine if the North Korean government of Kim Jong Il was bluffing or had succeeded in producing the material undetected. Officials said today that the answer was unclear. A preliminary set of atmospheric tests for the presence of a gas given off as nuclear waste is reprocessed into plutonium is the best indicator the United States has from one of the world's most closed nations. The most recent tests suggested that nuclear work has accelerated, but the results were inconclusive. More test results are expected at the end of this week   7/20/03b These paragraphs are extracted from the article... http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A56019-2003Jul14.html U.S., N. Korea Drifting Toward War, Perry Warns Former Defense Secretary Says Standoff Increases Risk of Terrorists Obtaining Nuclear Device Former defense secretary William Perry warned that the United States and North Korea are drifting toward war, perhaps as early as this year, in an increasingly dangerous standoff that also could result in terrorists being able to purchase a North Korean nuclear device and plant it in a U.S. city. "I think we are losing control" of the situation, said Perry, who believes North Korea soon will have enough nuclear warheads to begin exploding them in tests and exporting them to terrorists and other U.S. adversaries. "The nuclear program now underway in North Korea poses an imminent danger of nuclear weapons being detonated in American cities," he said in an interview. After weeks of debate, President Bush and his senior foreign policy advisers this week are expected to meet to resolve the administration's next step in the crisis over North Korea's nuclear programs. Officials have discussed how sharply to ratchet up the pressure, and how to react to a series of possible North Korean provocations, including nuclear tests. Perry is the most prominent member of a growing number of national security experts and Korea specialists who are expressing deep concern about the direction of U.S. policy toward Pyongyang. As President Bill Clinton's defense secretary, he oversaw preparation for airstrikes on North Korean nuclear facilities in 1994, an attack that was never carried out. He has remained deeply involved in Korean policy issues and is widely respected in national security circles, especially among senior military officers. They credit him with playing a key role in developing the U.S. high-tech arsenal of cruise missiles and stealth aircraft and also with righting the Pentagon after the short, turbulent term of Les Aspin, Clinton's first defense chief. Last week, North Korean officials told the administration they had completed reprocessing all of the fuel rods -- an assertion that U.S. officials have not been able to confirm through available intelligence. The administration policy toward North Korea, however, has been characterized by fierce disputes among senior policymakers, which officials privately acknowledge have hampered the administration's response. "There is an ongoing search for consensus within the administration itself," said Nicholas Eberstadt of the American Enterprise Institute. "The lack of a consensus to a significant extent has prevented U.S. policy from unfolding." 7/20/03c http://www.commondreams.org/views03/0716-09.htm Published on Wednesday, July 16, 2003 by the Boston Globe The Press Gives Bush A Free Ride On His Lies by Robert Kuttner I'M GLAD THAT the press is finally making an issue of President Bush's knowing use of a faked intelligence report on Iraq's supposed nuclear weapons program. But most of the press keeps missing the behind or who actually benefits from the tax cuts or what kind of drug coverage the administration's Medicare amendments will really provide or how the Bush Clear Skies Act actually degrades clean-air standards, the press has given the administration an astonishingly free ride. The back story of the politicization of intelligence has been hidden in plain view for months. Last fall, investigative reporter Robert Dreyfuss, writing in The American Prospect, where I am co-editor, exposed the efforts by Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld to take control of intelligence summaries from the CIA. In March, The New Yorker's Seymour Hersh exposed the forgery of the report, now belatedly in the headlines, that Saddam was trying to buy uranium from Niger. John Judis, in The New Republic, a magazine that supported the war, pieced together other efforts to politicize intelligence to justify the Iraq war. The New Yorker has also exposed how George Tenet, a Clinton appointee, has compromised his mission in his fawning efforts to ingratiate himself with Bush and the Pentagon. 7/30/03a   VOTING AND DEMOCRACY: THE CHALLENGES AHEAD MoveOn Bulletin Tuesday, July 29th, 2003 Co-Editors: Tai Moses and Don Hazen, AlterNet WE NEED MODERN AND SECURE VOTING SYSTEMS by Joan Blades and Wes Boyd In the wake of the 2000 election debacle, Congress passed the Help America Vote Act (HAVA), which was intended to ensure that all Americans have an opportunity to vote and have their vote counted. What's happened since HAVA was passed? When will old voting machines be retired? Can we trust the new touch screen voting systems, which promise better accessibility and reduced voter error? In this bulletin, we present a series of articles that dig into these issues. Voting reform is now largely in the hands of the states, so we also encourage you to contact your local Secretary of State and check into the status of HAVA implementation in your state. The states need to hear the concerns of voters. For us, the bottom line is that we must push for modernized voting systems, because we know that the bad old days of ballot manipulation and voter intimidation must be put behind us. But, at the same time, security concerns about touch screen voting are real and must be taken much more seriously by the states and counties as they work to implement HAVA. AFTER REVIEWING THE ARTICLES BELOW, CONTACT YOUR SECRETARY OF STATE You can find contact information for your state election officer at: http://www.nass.org/electioninfo/state_contacts.htm All the states are working to implement HAVA, and though they are lobbied every day by voting machine manufacturers, they almost never hear from the general public. Make your call today. If you wish to weigh in on the Federal legislation proposed to require a voter verifiable audit trail you can contact your Representative in Congress. Congressman Rush Holt is seeking cosponsors for HR 2239, which calls for a voter verifiable audit trail. The bill can be found at: http://thomas.loc.gov/cgi-bin/query/z?c108:H.R.2239: The main switchboard for the House of Representatives is House Switchboard: 202-224-3121 A VOTING AND DEMOCRACY PRIMER Don Hazen, AlterNet Election 2000 introduced a host of new voting issues for Americans to worry about, from flaws in electronic voting machines to voter roll purges. Now, with voting reform opportunities imminent, this overview will give you an introduction to the issues at hand and highlight the articles to follow. http://www.alternet.org/story.html?StoryID=16472 BEYOND VOTING MACHINES: HAVA AND REAL ELECTION REFORM Miles Rapoport, AlterNet The details of the Florida 2000 election proved, to Americans of all political persuasions, that our election laws are broken. Yet the debacle also created an opening for voting reform that we have not seen for decades. Today we have a real and concrete chance to shape the way America votes. Effective organizing over the next several months will create genuine new opportunities to expand the vote -- but there is no time to waste. http://www.alternet.org/story.html?StoryID=16490 COMPUTER VOTING IS OPEN TO EASY FRAUD, EXPERTS SAY John Schwartz, New York Times A team of computer security researchers say the software in electronic voting machines contains serious flaws that would allow voters to cast extra votes and permit poll workers to alter ballots. Voting machine companies, however, insist their code is proprietary and have refused to submit the software to public review. This might just be the tip of the iceberg when it comes to problems with computerized voting systems. http://www.nytimes.com/2003/07/24/technology/24VOTE.html THE THEFT OF YOUR VOTE IS JUST A CHIP AWAY Thom Hartmann, AlterNet You'd think in an open democracy that the government rather than a handful of corporations would program, repair and control the voting machines. You'd think the computers that handle our ballots would be open and their software and programming available for public scrutiny. You'd think there would be a paper trail of the actual hand-cast vote, which could be audited if there was evidence of voting fraud or if exit polls disagreed with computerized vote counts. You'd be wrong. http://www.alternet.org/story.html?StoryID=16474 THE VOTING RIGHTS STRUGGLE OF OUR TIME Kim Alexander, AlterNet The biggest problem with computerized voting systems is that they are not transparent. Some who think we don't need a paper trail tend to portray those of us who insist we do as paranoid conspiracy theorists. But any reasonable person who takes a moment to think about it quickly understands why it's not a good idea to trust 100 percent computerized, paperless voting systems run on secret software. http://www.alternet.org/story.html?StoryID=16476 ADVOCATES' GUIDE TO THE HELP AMERICA VOTE ACT Leadership Conference on Civil Rights The Help America Vote Act of 2002 impacts every part of the voting process, from voting machines to provisional ballots, from voter registration to poll worker training. Here are some hands-on suggestions to ensure that HAVA will be properly implemented by election officials, legislators and advocates in each state. http://www.alternet.org/story.html?StoryID=16493 JIM CROW REVIVED IN CYBERSPACE Greg Palast and Martin Luther King III, GregPalast.com While the media chased butterfly ballots and hanging chads after the 2000 election, a more sinister and devastating attack on voting rights went almost undetected: the computerized purges of legal voters from the registries. The overwhelming majority were innocent of any crime -- and just over half were black or Hispanic. http://www.alternet.org/story.html?StoryID=15890 BALLOTS CAN KEEP BULLETS FROM FLYING John Moyers and Elizabeth Ready, TomPaine.com A register-for-peace drive and a massive get-out-the-vote effort aimed at peace-minded citizens could bring a groundswell of new voters to the polls in 2004. Find out what several progressive groups are doing to educate, activate and involve everyday Americans in the electoral process. http://www.tompaine.com/feature2.cfm/ID/7605 7/30/03b http://www.washingtonpost.com/ac2/wp-dyn/A8908-2003Jul17?language=printer Something to Hide? By David Ignatius Friday, July 18, 2003; Page A19 Excerpts from the article As political crises mount in Washington and London over evidence about Iraq's weapons of mass destruction, it would be especially useful to have the testimony of a leading expert on the subject, Saddam Hussein's science adviser, Amir Saadi. Saadi (the seven of diamonds in the coalition's deck of cards) surrendered voluntarily to U.S. authorities in Baghdad on April 12. He was the first senior Iraqi official to do so. Because he had never been a member of the Baath Party, U.S. officials were hopeful that he would provide honest information. "He wanted to make himself available to the coalition forces for questioning and cooperation," said Saadi's German-born wife, Helma, in an e-mail message this week. One of Saadi's American supporters agrees: "He has everything to gain by being honest, and absolutely nothing to gain from continued deception." So where has Saadi been for the past three months? His family believes he has been imprisoned at the Baghdad airport along with other Iraqi captives. His wife said that she has been communicating through the Red Cross and that in his last communication, on June 15, he told her he was "being treated correctly," was "allowed to shower once a week" and was passing the time reading and writing. But why muzzle Saadi? At a time when there are political firestorms in America and Britain over Iraq's WMD program, why not let one of Iraq's leading scientists answer questions? For example: When (if ever) were banned weapons destroyed? If they were destroyed, why didn't Iraq make a full disclosure, as demanded by the United Nations? Was Hussein afraid that if he admitted he had destroyed his WMD stockpile, he would lose a deterrent against attack by Kurdish and Shiite enemies of his regime? These are precisely the questions Saadi could help clarify. Saadi's silence, I suspect, is evidence that the Pentagon and the White House have concluded that any public release of his testimony would undercut their position. After all, this White House is so desperate to protect President Bush on WMD issues that it is prepared to sacrifice CIA Director George Tenet. If Saadi's testimony could help the president, surely we would have heard it by now\ 7/30/03c http://www.washingtonpost.com/ac2/wp-dyn/A5497-2003Jul30?language=printer Scientists Still Deny Iraqi Arms Programs U.S. Interrogations Net No Evidence By Walter Pincus and Kevin Sullivan Washington Post Staff Writers Thursday, July 31, 2003; Page A01 Despite vigorous efforts, the U.S. government has been unsuccessful so far in finding key senior Iraqi scientists to support its prewar claims that former president Saddam Hussein was pursuing an aggressive program to develop nuclear, biological and chemical weapons, according to senior administration officials and members of Congress who have been briefed recently on the subject. 7/30/03d http://www.commondreams.org/views03/0728-05.htm Published on Monday, July 28, 2003 by the Guardian/UK Global Warming is Now a Weapon of Mass Destruction It Kills More People Than Terrorism, Yet Blair and Bush do Nothing by John Houghton If political leaders have one duty above all others, it is to protect the security of their people. Thus it was, according to the prime minister, to protect Britain's security against Saddam Hussein's weapons of mass destruction that this country went to war in Iraq. And yet our long-term security is threatened by a problem at least as dangerous as chemical, nuclear or biological weapons, or indeed international terrorism: human-induced climate change. As a climate scientist who has worked on this issue for several decades, first as head of the Met Office, and then as co-chair of scientific assessment for the UN intergovernmental panel on climate change, the impacts of global warming are such that I have no hesitation in describing it as a "weapon of mass destruction". Like terrorism, this weapon knows no boundaries. It can strike anywhere, in any form - a heat wave in one place, a drought or a flood or a storm surge in another. Nor is this just a problem for the future. The 1990s were probably the warmest decade in the last 1,000 years, and 1998 the warmest year. Global warming is already upon us. The World Meteorological Organization warned this month that extreme weather events already seem to be becoming more frequent as a result. The US mainland was struck by 562 tornados in May (which incidentally saw the highest land temperatures globally since records began in 1880), killing 41 people. The developing world is the hardest hit: extremes of climate tend to be more intense at low latitudes and poorer countries are less able to cope with disasters. Pre-monsoon temperatures this year in India reached a blistering 49C (120F) - 5C (9F) above normal. Once this killer heat wave began to abate, 1,500 people lay dead - half the number killed outright in the September 11 attacks on the World Trade Center. While no one can ascribe a single weather event to climate change with any degree of scientific certainty, higher maximum temperatures are one of the most predictable impacts of accelerated global warming, and the parallels - between global climate change and global terrorism - are becoming increasingly obvious. 7/30/03e http://www.commondreams.org/headlines03/0729-06.htm Published on Tuesday, July 29, 2003 by IRNA and Der Spiegel (Berlin) US Nobel Laureate Slams Bush Gov't as "Worst" in American History George A. Akerlof, 2001 Nobel prize laureate who teaches economics at the University of California in Berkeley. BERLIN - American Nobel Prize laureate for Economics George A. Akerlof lashed out at the government of US President George W. Bush, calling it the "worst ever" in American history, the online site of the weekly Der Spiegel magazine reported Tuesday. "I think this is the worst government the US has ever had in its more than 200 years of history. It has engaged in extradordinarily irresponsible policies not only in foreign policy and economics but also in social and environmental policy," said the 2001 Nobel Prize laureate who teachesg economics at the University of California in Berkeley. "This is not normal government policy. Now is the time for (American) people to engage in civil disobedience. I think it's time to protest - as much as possible," the 61-year-old scholar added. Akerlof has been recognized for his research that borrows from sociology, psychology, anthropology and other fields to determine economic influences and outcomes. His areas of expertise include macro-economics, monetary policy and poverty. 7/30/03f http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2003/06/25/iraq/printable560449.shtml Ex-Spies: CIA Workers Outraged NEW YORK, July 19, 2003 Before the bombs fell on Baghdad, there were analysts inside the American intelligence community who were troubled by the U.S. case for war, reports CBS News Correspondent Jim Acosta. Raymond McGovern, a former CIA analyst and supervisor, says, "Never before in my 40 years of experience in this town has intelligence been used in so cynical and so orchestrated a way." McGovern is one of several retired intelligence analysts who say they are speaking out for those who can't inside the CIA. "The Agency analysts that we are in touch with aredishearten 7/30/03g http://www.commondreams.org/headlines03/0720-02.htm Published on Sunday, July 20, 2003 by the Independent/UK Bush Ready to Wreck Ozone Layer Treaty - US Slips in Demand to Drop Ban on Harmful Pesticide by Geoffrey Lean President George Bush is targeting the international treaty to save the ozone layer which protects all life on earth from deadly radiation, The Independent on Sunday can reveal. New US demands - tabled at a little-noticed meeting in Montreal earlier this month - threaten to unravel one of the greatest environmental success stories of the past few decades, causing millions of deaths from cancer. The news comes at a particularly embarrassing time for the Prime Minister, Tony Blair, who pressed the President in their talks in Washington last week to stop his attempts to sabotage the Kyoto Protocol which sets out to control global warming: one of the few international issues on which they differ. Now, instead of heeding Mr Blair, Mr Bush is undermining the ozone treaty as well, by seeking to perpetuate the use of the most ozone-destructive chemical still employed in developed countries, otherwise soon to be phased out. Ironically, it was sustained pressure from the Reagan administration, in which Mr Bush's father served as vice-president, that ensured the treaty was adopted in the first place. It has proved such a success that environmentalists have long regarded it as inviolable. 7/30/03h http://www.msnbc.com/news/941425.asp?cp1=1 July 21, 2003 EDITORIAL ARCHIVES Some Dare Call It Treason A Story of Two Unidentified "Senior Administration Officials Who Allegedly Betrayed the National Security of the United States: No Response from the White House, and No Coverage in the Mainstream Press. A BUZZFLASH EDITORIAL If David Corn, the Washington editor for The Natio is correct in his suspicions, two unidentified "senior administration officials" are guilty of betraying our national security. (see A White House Smear) What is their crime against the people of the United States of America, if it is true? It would be an unforgivable treason: these two Bush administration officials allegedly revealed the identity of a CIA operative to conservative columnist Bob Novak, who printed her name in his syndicated newspaper column. (See The Mission to Niger) The outing most likely rendered her future, present -- and much of her past work -- useless in helping to protect the people of this nation. What is the specialty of this alleged CIA operative? Tracking the trafficking of weapons of mass destruction. This is a story that reveals an alleged act of cynical treason by at least two senior Bush administration officials. In a conversation that BuzzFlash had with Corn, a top-notch political journalist whose "Capital Games" column we link to frequently, Corn cautioned BuzzFlash that one can't ascertain if the CIA operative "outing" was approved by other administration officials, including Bush. On the other hand, Corn noted that the White House has not refuted the information in Novak's column. Furthermore, if the information is true -- and Novak told Corn that he stands by his sources -- the White House hasn't fired anyone or taken the first steps toward prosecuting the "senior administration officials" in question. If this is all some bizarre misunderstanding, then the White House should clear the allegations up right quick. But they haven't, according to Corn. Yes, it is once again a probable Bush administration betrayal that is so horrifyingly ironic, hypocritical, cynical, and destructive that it is hard to comprehend. Two Bush administration officials allegedly render a CIA operative useless, whose specialty is providing valuable information on exactly the threat that the Bush administration continues to insist justified the invasion of Iraq: Weapons of Mass Destruction. To Show Loyalty, Rice Lies for Bush by Joe Conason According to contemporary political lore, the Bush clan exalts loyalty above every other virtue. Other politicians envy that inviolable code, whose power is reflected in the absence of leaks from the White House, in the lockstep obedience of politicians in Congress and around the country, and in the enormous cash donations from hundreds of wealthy "friends." This is how dynasties are built to endure. But at the highest level, in the inner councils, such feudal allegiances often require awful sacrifice and compromise. For those who now work for George W. Bush, loyalty means surrendering professional integrity and accepting public humiliation. Loyalty means uttering words and phrases that nobody can believe. Loyalty means misleading the people and the press about the gravest matters of state. Loyalty means lying. Consider the poignant case of Condoleezza Rice, who entered this administration as a respected academic expert on Russian affairs and the former provost of Stanford University. Unlike some of the figures aroundthe President, Dr. Rice had no serious blots on her reputation when she was appointed national security advisor. From a family that suffered the indignities and deprivations of segregated Alabama, she has long been admired as an African-American woman who rose by dint of personal effort and scholarly ability as well as affirmative action. The list of honors, degrees, directorships and other achievements on her official résumé is extraordinary. After serving in the first Bush White House on the National Security Council, and then a stint in the 2000 campaign as a discreet adviser on foreign affairs, he had come to be regarded by the political clan as among its most reliable members. Sometimes she almost appeared to have been adopted by the President and his family. But during the past two years of internationalcrisis, Dr. Rice has been dispatched to prevaricate repeatedly in defense of her boss. She was caught spreading a false story about Sept. 11, claiming that Air Force One flew the President to Oklahoma after the attack on the World Trade Center and the Pentagon because "intelligence" indicated that terrorists were aiming for the White House and the Presidential jet. Later she testified that the U.S. government had never anticipated an assault by airliner, when in fact there had been many warnings of exactly such tactics˜most notably during the summer of 2001, when Western intelligence services set up anti-aircraft batteries around the Genoa summit to protect the President. Memories are short in this country, so Dr. Rice escaped those embarrassing incidents with her reputation more or less intact. Then last year, as the determination of the White House to wage war on Iraq became plain, she began to promote dubious stories about Saddam Hussein‚s regime. As national security advisor, she had access to all of the sensitive intelligence about Iraq, so the press and Congress took her pronouncements seriously

August 2003

8/03/03 WE NEED MODERN AND SECURE VOTING SYSTEMS by Joan Blades and Wes Boyd In the wake of the 2000 election debacle, Congress passed the Help America Vote Act (HAVA), which was intended to ensure that all Americans have an opportunity to vote and have their vote counted. What's happened since HAVA was passed? When will old voting machines be retired? Can we trust the new touch screen voting systems, which promise better accessibility and reduced voter error? In this bulletin, we present a series of articles that dig into these issues. Voting reform is now largely in the hands of the states, so we also encourage you to contact your local Secretary of State and check into the status of HAVA implementation in your state. The states need to hear the concerns of voters. For us, the bottom line is that we must push for modernized voting systems, because we know that the bad old days of ballot manipulation and voter intimidation must be put behind us. But, at the same time, security concerns about touch screen voting are real and must be taken much more seriously by the states and counties as they work to implement HAVA.   AFTER REVIEWING THE ARTICLES BELOW, CONTACT YOUR SECRETARY OF STATE You can find contact information for your state election officer at: http://www.nass.org/electioninfo/state_contacts.htm All the states are working to implement HAVA, and though they are lobbied every day by voting machine manufacturers, they almost never hear from the general public. Make your call today. If you wish to weigh in on the Federal legislation proposed to require a voter verifiable audit trail you can contact your Representative in Congress. Congressman Rush Holt is seeking cosponsors for HR 2239, which calls for a voter verifiable audit trail. The bill can be found at: http://thomas.loc.gov/cgi-bin/query/z?c108:H.R.2239: The main switchboard for the House of Representatives is House Switchboard: 202-224-3121   A VOTING AND DEMOCRACY PRIMER Don Hazen, AlterNet Election 2000 introduced a host of new voting issues for Americans to worry about, from flaws in electronic voting machines to voter roll purges. Now, with voting reform opportunities imminent, this overview will give you an introduction to the issues at hand and highlight the articles to follow. http://www.alternet.org/story.html?StoryID=16472 BEYOND VOTING MACHINES: HAVA AND REAL ELECTION REFORM Miles Rapoport, AlterNet The details of the Florida 2000 election proved, to Americans of all political persuasions, that our election laws are broken. Yet the debacle also created an opening for voting reform that we have not seen for decades. Today we have a real and concrete chance to shape the way America votes. Effective organizing over the next several months will create genuine new opportunities to expand the vote -- but there is no time to waste. http://www.alternet.org/story.html?StoryID=16490 COMPUTER VOTING IS OPEN TO EASY FRAUD, EXPERTS SAY John Schwartz, New York Times A team of computer security researchers say the software in electronic voting machines contains serious flaws that would allow voters to cast extra votes and permit poll workers to alter ballots. Voting machine companies, however, insist their code is proprietary and have refused to submit the software to public review. This might just be the tip of the iceberg when it comes to problems with computerized voting systems. http://www.nytimes.com/2003/07/24/technology/24VOTE.html THE THEFT OF YOUR VOTE IS JUST A CHIP AWAY Thom Hartmann, AlterNet You'd think in an open democracy that the government rather than a handful of corporations would program, repair and control the voting machines. You'd think the computers that handle our ballots would be open and their software and programming available for public scrutiny. You'd think there would be a paper trail of the actual hand-cast vote, which could be audited if there was evidence of voting fraud or if exit polls disagreed with computerized vote counts. You'd be wrong. http://www.alternet.org/story.html?StoryID=16474 THE VOTING RIGHTS STRUGGLE OF OUR TIME Kim Alexander, AlterNet The biggest problem with computerized voting systems is that they are not transparent. Some who think we don't need a paper trail tend to portray those of us who insist we do as paranoid conspiracy theorists. But any reasonable person who takes a moment to think about it quickly understands why it's not a good idea to trust 100 percent computerized, paperless voting systems run on secret software. http://www.alternet.org/story.html?StoryID=16476 ADVOCATES' GUIDE TO THE HELP AMERICA VOTE ACT Leadership Conference on Civil Rights The Help America Vote Act of 2002 impacts every part of the voting process, from voting machines to provisional ballots, from voter registration to poll worker training. Here are some hands-on suggestions to ensure that HAVA will be properly implemented by election officials, legislators and advocates in each state. http://www.alternet.org/story.html?StoryID=16493 JIM CROW REVIVED IN CYBERSPACE Greg Palast and Martin Luther King III, GregPalast.com While the media chased butterfly ballots and hanging chads after the 2000 election, a more sinister and devastating attack on voting rights went almost undetected: the computerized purges of legal voters from the registries. The overwhelming majority were innocent of any crime -- and just over half were black or Hispanic.http://www.alternet.org/story.html?StoryID=15890 BALLOTS CAN KEEP BULLETS FROM FLYING John Moyers and Elizabeth Ready, TomPaine.com A register-for-peace drive and a massive get-out-the-vote effort aimed at peace-minded citizens could bring a groundswell of new voters to the polls in 2004. Find out what several progressive groups are doing to educate, activate and involve everyday Americans in the electoral process. http://www.tompaine.com/feature2.cfm/ID/7605   8/19/03a http://www.workingforchange.com/printitem.cfm?itemid=15356 Silence of the Media Lambs: The Unreported Story of How They Fixed the Vote in Florida Part 2, from the book, The Best Democracy Money Can Buy (Penguin 2003) by Greg Palast [In the opening excerpt from Palast's book we learned that five months before the November 2000 election, Governor Jeb Bush of Florida and his Secretary of State, Katherine Harris, moved to purge 57,7000 people from the voter rolls, supposedly criminals not allowed to vote. Almost every one was innocent of crimes -- though the majority were guilty of being African American. BBC reporter Palast asks, "How did 100,000 US journalist sent to cover the election fail to get this vote theft story?"] Investigative reports share three things: They are risky, they upset the wisdom of the established order and they are very expensive to produce. Do profit-conscious enterprises, whether media companies or widget firms, seek extra costs, extra risk and the opportunity to be attacked? Not in any business text I've ever read. I can't help but note that Britain's Guardian and Observer newspapers, the only papers to report this scandal when it broke just weeks after the 2000 election, are the world's only major newspapers owned by a not-for-profit corporation. But if profit lust is the ultimate problem blocking significant investigative reportage, the more immediate cause of comatose coverage of the election and other issues is what is laughably called America's "journalistic culture." If the Rupert Murdochs of the globe are shepherds of the New World Order, they owe their success to breeding a fiock of docile sheep -- snoozy editors and reporters content to munch on, digest, then reprint a diet of press releases and canned stories provided by government and corporate public-relations operations. Take this story of the list of Florida's faux felons that cost Al Gore the presidential election. Shortly after the U.K. story hit the World Wide Web, I was contacted by a CBS TV network news producer eager to run a version of the story. The CBS hotshot was happy to pump me for information: names, phone numbers, all the items one needs for your typical quickie TV news report. I freely offered up to CBS this information: The office of the governor of Florida, Jeb Bush, brother of the Republican presidential candidate, had illegally ordered the removal of the names of felons from voter rolls -- real felons who had served time but obtained clemency, with the right to vote under Florida law. As a result, another 40,000 legal voters (in addition to the 57,700 on the purge list), almost all of them Democrats, could not vote. 8/19/03b http://observer.guardian.co.uk/international/story/0,6903,1015684,00.html 'Bring us home': GIs flood US with war-weary emails An unprecedented internet campaign waged on the frontline and in the US is exposing the real risks for troops in Iraq. Paul Harris and Jonathan Franklin report on rising fears that the conflict is now a desert Vietnam Sunday August 10, 2003 The Observer Susan Schuman is angry. Her GI son is serving in the Iraqi town of Samarra, at the heart of the 'Sunni triangle', where American troops are killed with grim regularity. Breaking the traditional silence of military families during time of war, Schuman knows what she wants - and who she blames for the danger to her son, Justin. 'I want them to bring our troops home. I am appalled at Bush's policies. He has got us into a terrible mess,' she said. 8/19/03c http://www.boston.com/dailyglobe2/222/nation/CIA_warned THE INTELLIGENCE CIA warned administration of postwar guerrilla peril Officials defend rebuilding plan By Bryan Bender, Globe Correspondent, 8/10/2003 WASHINGTON - In February, the CIA gave a formal briefing to the National Security Council, including Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld, Vice President Dick Cheney, and President Bush himself: ''A quick military victory in Iraq will likely be followed by armed resistance from remnants of the Ba'ath Party and Fedayeen Saddam irregulars.'' The administration seemed unmoved. In the weeks leading up to the Iraq war, top Bush administration officials made glowing predictions that Iraqis would welcome US troops with open arms, while behind the scenes they did little to prepare for a guerrilla war. 8/19/03d http://www.atimes.com/atimes/Middle_East/EH07Ak01.html Insider fires a broadside at Rumsfeld's office By Jim Lobe WASHINGTON - On most days, the Pentagon's "Early Bird", a daily compilation of news articles on defense-related issues mostly from the US and British press, does not shy from reprinting hard-hitting stories and columns critical of the United States Defense Department's top leadership. But few could help notice last week that the "Bird" omitted an opinion piece distributed by the Knight-Ridder news agency by a senior Pentagon Middle East specialist, Air Force Lt Col Karen Kwiatkowski, who worked in the office of Under Secretary of Defense for Policy Douglas Feith until her retirement in April. "What I saw was aberrant, pervasive and contrary to good order and discipline," Kwiatkowski wrote. "If one is seeking the answers to why peculiar bits of 'intelligence' found sanctity in a presidential speech, or why the post-Saddam [Hussein] occupation [of Iraq] has been distinguished by confusion and false steps, one need look no further than the process inside the Office of the Secretary of Defense [OSD]." Kwiatkowski went on to charge that the operations she witnessed during her tenure in Feith's office, and particularly those of an ad hoc group known as the Office of Special Plans (OSP), constituted "a subversion of constitutional limits on executive power and a co-option through deceit of a large segment of the Congress". 8/19/03e GW Bush's America Americans Pay Price for Speaking Out Dissenters Face Job Loss, Arrest, Threats But Activists not Stopped by Backlash by Kathleen Kenna He's a Vietnam War hero from a proud lineage of warriors who served the United States, so he never expected to be called a traitor. After 39 years in the Marines, including commands in Somalia and Iraq, Gen. Anthony Zinni never imagined he would be tagged "turncoat." The epithets are not from the uniforms but the suits ˜ "senior officers at the Pentagon," the now-retired general says from his home in Williamsburg, Va. http://www.washtimes.com/national/20030809-110412-5744r.htm 8/19/03f http://www.commondreams.org/headlines03/0806-01.htm Published on Wednesday, August 6, 2003 by the Global Warming May Be Speeding Up, Fears Scientist Alarm at 'unusual' heatwaves across northern hemisphere by John Vidal One of Europe's leading scientists yesterday raised the possibility that the extreme heatwave now settled over at least 30 countries in the northern hemisphere could signal that man-made climate change is accelerating. "The present heatwave across the northern hemisphere is worrying. There is the small probability that man-made climate change is proceeding much faster and stronger than expected," said Professor John Schellnhuber, former chief scientific adviser to the German government and now head of the UK's leading group of climate scientists at the Tyndall center. Prof Schellnhuber said "the parching heat experienced now" could be consistent "with a worst-case scenario [of global warming] that nobody wants to come true". He warned that several months' research would be needed to analyze data from around the world before scientists could say why the heatwaves are so intense this year. "What we are seeing is absolutely unusual," said Prof Schellnhuber. "We know that global warming is proceeding apace, but most of us were thinking that in 20-30 years time we would be seeing hot spells [like this]. But it's happening now. Clearly extreme weather events will increase 8/19/03g http://www.newsday.com/news/opinion/ny-vpcoc073404676aug07,0,4849578.column U.S. Clamps Secrecy on Warnings Before 9/11 U.S. Should Take the Shackles Off 9/11 Probe Jul 10, 2003 August 7, 2003 It's not just the Saudi secret that's being kept. by Marie Cocco The recent report of the joint congressional committee that probed intelligence failures before the terrorist attacks on the World Trade Center and the Pentagon reveals what the Bush administration doesn't want Americans to know about the American government. You would not know this from media accounts about this report. They have dwelled on what the Bush administration doesn't want us to know about the Saudi government. This is the famous 28-page chapter, a series of blank lines across page after page, that the president refuses to declassify despite the pleadings of the bipartisan group of lawmakers and the Saudi government itself. 8/19/03h http://www.washtimes.com/national/20030809-110412-5744r.htm Accused scientist says letter links to anthrax mailers By Guy Taylor THE WASHINGTON TIMES The FBI won't release an anonymous letter, which in the days before the 2001 fatal anthrax mailings, accused an Egyptian-born scientist of plotting biowarfare against the United States, saying it would divulge secret sources in the continuing investigation. In a July 7 note citing the sources, the FBI denied Ayaad Assaad, the letter's subject, access to the evidence. Mr. Assaad said he's convinced it is linked to a person or a group responsible for the anthrax mailings that killed five persons. "They know damn well that this letter is connected to the anthrax sender," he said, adding that the FBI's refusal to provide a copy suggests "they're trying toprotect whoever sent it." He said he suspects it led investigators to the Army's biodefense lab at Fort Detrick. 8/19/03i http://seattlepi.nwsource.com/opinion/134261_ambassed.html Sunday, August 10, 2003 CIA disclosure is dangerous SEATTLE POST-INTELLIGENCER EDITORIAL BOARD: There's a cancer somewhere in the Bush administration. Two officials revealed national security information to embarrass or scare critics of the administration's mishandling of Iraqi intelligence. Columnist Robert Novak wrote recently that the wife of former Ambassador Joseph Wilson -- the man who blew the whistle on the Niger uranium fraud -- is a Central Intelligence Agency operative, specializing in weapons of mass destruction. Novak attributed his information to two senior administration officials. Time magazine has said officials provided similar information. It's illegal for government officials to reveal the identities of CIA operatives who have worked overseas within the preceding five years. 8/19/03j http://www.sunspot.net/news/local/bal-md.voting07aug07,0,1419965.story Voting machine review ordered Hopkins study of flaws in security prods action; Purchase no longer 'a certainty'; California firm to analyze touch-screen system By David Nitkin Sun Staff August 7, 2003 In the wake of a study revealing security flaws in the costly touch-screen voting machines Maryland has agreed to buy, Gov. Robert L. Ehrlich Jr. ordered an outside review yesterday of the electronic system scheduled to be in place for next spring's presidential primary elect 8/19/03k http://www.cnn.com/2003/ALLPOLITICS/08/17/sprj.irq.clark.comments/ Clark talks like candidate, bashes Bush Ex-NATO commander: Iraq shouldn't be center of war on terror WASHINGTON (CNN) --Wesley Clark, who once served as NATO commander and might have presidential aspirations, attacked the Bush administration Sunday for launching a war with Iraq on "false pretenses" and spreading the military too thin amid the global war on terrorism. "You'd be taking them to the Better Business Bureau if you bought a washing machine the way we went into the war in Iraq," Clark said on CNN's "Late Edition with Wolf Blitzer." 8/19/03l http://www.floridatoday.com/!NEWSROOM/peoplestoryA1172A.htm Hank Brandli is at his Palm Bay home with a satellite image of the Middle East on the computer screen. Image © 2003, Rik Jesse, FLORIDA TODAY. Meteorologist's work featured in national weather magazine By Billy Cox FLORIDA TODAY On May 25, while scanning the Air Force Defense Meteorological Satellite Program images pipelined into his desktop from 450 miles in orbit, Hank Brandli skidded at a nighttime photo of Iraq. It looked familiar. But not exactly. Brandli retrieved another DMSP image he'd archived from May 3. He compared the two. The most recent photo showed a blazing corridor of light running the length of Kuwait, south to north, all the way to the Iraqi border. The image wasn't there on May 3. "It's going right up to Iraq's oil fields," says the retired Air Force colonel from his home in Palm Bay. "Maybe I'm full of s---. Maybe all they're doing is building a highway to put in McDonald's and sell hamburgers. But why go that way? I think we're in bed with Kuwait. I think we're pumping oil out of Iraq to pay for this war." 8/19/03m http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/world/ August 4, 2003 (excerpts from the article) Iran Closes In on Ability to Build a Nuclear Bomb Tehran's reactor program masks strides toward weapons capability, a Times investigation finds. France warns against exports to Islamic Republic. By Douglas Frantz, Times Staff Writer VIENNA &emdash; After more than a decade of working behind layers of front companies and in hidden laboratories, Iran appears to be in the late stages of developing the capacity to build a nuclear bomb. 8/19/03n http://www.military.com/NewContent?file=Defensewatch_080803&ESRC=army.nl Ralph Omholt: Is It Fresh Blood, or a Putsch? DefenseWatch August 8, 2003 Excerpts from the article: In the middle of the ongoing Iraqi guerilla war, with more military actions awaiting, the new U.S. Army uniformed leadership has forced at least six senior generals into early retirement, with another half-dozen earmarked for the same treatment in the near. The online news website InsideDefense.com, on Aug. 4 first revealed the early and forced retirements. They include Lt. Gen. John Caldwell, the military deputy to the Army's civilian acquisition director; Lt. Gen. Dennis Cavin, the commanding general of the Army Accessions Command; Lt. Gen. Joseph Cosumano, the commanding general of the Army's Space and Missile Defense Command. Lt. Gen. Johnny Riggs, director of the Army Objective Force Task Force, Gen. Paul Kern, commander of the Army Materiel Command, and Lt. Gen. Charles Mahan, deputy chief of staff for logistics) are also reportedly retiring early. Following that, Rumsfeld went looking for a new Army Chief of Staff from the roster of active-duty generals and came up empty. He then drafted Schoomaker from retirement for the top Army post, following the reported refusal of three active-duty Army generals - including former Central Command commander Gen. Tommy Franks and Keane himself - to take the position. Pentagon observers have termed those promotion refusals as a "legal mutiny" by three of the Army generals who deserve much of the credit for the preparation and conduct of the war against Iraq. When senior subordinates refuse to follow their leader - in this case, Secretary Rumsfeld - something is badly wrong. One has to ask, "What do they know?" 8/19/03o http://www.mirror.co.uk/news/allnews/content ROUTLEDGE: TAPE COULD SPELL END OF BLAIR Aug 14 2003 by Paul Routledge THE net is closing on the merchants of death in Downing Street as witness after witness gives damning testimony to the Hutton inquiry. None was more damning yesterday than the voice of Dr David Kelly. His taped conversation with Newsnight journalist Susan Watts establishes beyond doubt that Alastair Campbell is in the frame for exaggerating the Government's case for war against Iraq. 8/25/03 One wonders why Dr. Kelly's death occured. It is reported a suicide and may well be just that. But he seems to have provided support, considerable support for the prospect that the English government deliberately mislead their people into an war. Once the war started, this set of circumstances cost him his life: Kelly's chilling words: 'I'll be found dead in the woods' Revealed: how ministers tried to gag David Kelly By Raymond Whitaker, Jo Dillon and Kim Sengupta 24 August 2003 The Government went to extraordinary lengths to gag Dr David Kelly because of fears that he would expose fundamental flaws in its case for war. Four 9/11 Moms Battle Bush by Gail Sheehy This concerns the refusal of the country's leadership to be held accountable for the failure to execute its most fundamental responsibility. See how four moms, widowed by 9/11 are finding the government's story creates questions, not only for how Bush and Ashcroft reacted, but for how the military proceeded, and for discrepancies with and within its own timeline of events. New York Observer 8/23/03 We have Gray Davis speaking out about the conservative push to remove him and something of what he said. And two items on Arnie S. It seems he has a raft of "old hands" from the same people that brought you Gov. Wilson and our dear Mr. Quackenbush. and an opinion on the recall , fight the recall? The sexual life of the Terminator is being discussed openly and in detail in the British news media, as well as throughout the world, everyone EXCEPT in here in the "US mainstream news media" and in particular in California. Another very disturbing example of the corporatist control of the flow of news on network and cable TV, on AM radio and even in the big city newspapers. Here are a few places for information related to the Arnie story: underage sex?, the groping gov?, sexual harrassment?, affair with an underage girl? ,ass grabbing, a petition against Arnie. And how could we ignore the growing pile of evidence that the English government really did "sex up" its evidence. It seems there are details and conversations for the record: And yet more, the e-mails, the rewritten dossier and how No 10 Downing Street made its case for Iraqi war. And now the "sexed up" story expands to Howard's government in Australia, which now has some questions to answer And then we have an Afghanistan heating up enough to be noticed, by the CSM Meanwhile opponents of old, in Iraq, seem to be seeing each other in a better light. And then some evidence that OBL is still alive, and presumeably, mad as hell and not wanting to take it anymore. 8/30/03 The big power outage has some connections that are not being talked about. First Energy, was involved, perhaps mismanaged one of its plants, or how power was distributed, however, why would Bush investigate a company that has donated a good deal of money to his campain? Some other information here, Bush and fellows opposed a fix up in June ; yet says, after the fact: "Of course, we'll have time to look at it and determine whether or not our grid needs to be modernized. I happen to think it does, and have said so all along." Ongoing miasma, the energy policy of the Bush administration got underway a mere 10 days after Bush assumed the office, though it seems clear that Big Energy was the major player only some of the evidence has seen the light of day, this might change. The Iraqi National Monitoring Directorate was housed in a complext located in the Jadariya district of downtown Baghdad, adjacent to the campus of Baghdad University. Given the high priority the Bush administration placed on discovering evidence of weapons of mass destruction, it seems only logical that seizing the directorate archive would have been a top priority for the coalition forces &emdash; at least as important as the Iraqi Oil Ministry ... but it seems that most all of this vital evidence was destroyed, while we occupied Baghdad. Meanwhile Paul Bremmer says Iraq cannot pay for its own costs and much more will be needed, while in the U.S., our deficit seems likely to increase especially if Bush tax cuts become permanent. On another front some aid agencies reduce or remove their workers citing security issues. And speaking of Iraq, it seems that questionable actions are being exposed daily over "across the pond". Yes, in England the immenent threat that Iraq could launch threatening attacks in 45 minutes, was, apparently referring to conventional battle arms, not medium range missiles as was implied. It is relevant in that some people in the U.S., might begin, finally, to ask similar questions, or take the perspective that we were mislead into war. The consequences and the timing for Bush could be bad news, election year and all that. And speaking of Iraq, one of the reasons we had for going in was that they would not let inspectors check their weapons of mass destruction, so what about the Russia's? And while we are talking about that what about Germany, France, Belgium and Luxumbourg's plans for their own military union, do we see a split in NATO, the EU itself? One of the major side effects of the Afghan war is the return of poppy farming, the talliban had, for its own reasons, eliminated it, but it has come back, bigtime. One can only speculate as to the use such "income" might be put by those forces in opposition to us. A few articles illuminating where the terrorists are coming from, schools in Indonesia , Pakistan and Afghanistan In a strange but not so strange story we have US green activists vandalising polluting 4x4 cars causing millions of dollars worth of damage. Domestic terror coming out of the box? It bears mentioning because it could be that kinds of thins radicals could do to "express" themselves and not get caught, might catch other's eyes? Might we see more of this as time and Bush go on? An aside to that is the Bush Administration's plan to rework parts of the Clean Air Act, potentially allowing some 17,000 older power facilities to pollute according to environmentalists and several attorney's generals who are suing for prior changes and intend to challenge this as well, even the NYT has the story. What the hell is up, read these stories, Bush cuts combat pay for "our young men and women" , a bubbling up story about lying by the EPA, or rather their controllers, to New Yorkers after 9/11, and some light on the black out.

September 2003

9/11/03 The Heinous: The nature of terrorism does not appear to be something the poor, uneducated do, nor is is random, or chaotic as our media has been portraying it. Some research sheds light on the myths of terrorism. Then there is the persistent belief, nearly 70% of Americans believe Saddam was involved with 9/11, despite intelligence to the contrary, but because Bush "pushed the message." So we are more willing to sacrifice because we are responding to an attacker. And the Patriot Act, how do we know how or what it is doing, when no one can talk about it? Iraq: Here is a letter from our diplomat to Greece, who resigned to protest our invasion of Iraq, interesting insights in his letter, found here , then there is confusion about Turkey sending troops, and they want questions answered meanwhile, the Gulf States do not want to send any troops , I keep hearing that we have enough troops in Iraq, but then what about all the ammo dumps, some 2700 in all? So now, the Badr Boyz are in the hood. BAGHDAD (AFP) - The United States struggled before the war to convince the world there was a link between Saddam Hussein (news - web sites) and al-Qaeda network, but five months of US-led occupation of Iraq (news - web sites) may have created precisely such an unholy alliance. Stripped of their privileged positions under the ousted dictator's brutal regime, Saddam's henchmen may finally have thrown in their lot with their ideological adversaries in Osama bin Laden (news - web sites)'s terror network to wage war on their common foe two years after the suicide hijackings in the United States, analysts say. Then there is this piece giving an overview of the "oil motive" What will Georgie do to ensure 2004? Pakistan: Iran: More and more hints, advisements and evidence that they are working hard to produce nuclear weapons, nothing being said about how their being named as "the axis of evil" jump-started or accelerated their efforts. Korea: Nobel Prize winner and previous negotiator with Korea, president Jimmy Carter criticizes the Bush policy on Korea. USA : If you recall Colin Powel's UN speech you might be interested in the rebuttal that was never really heard. And if Michael Powel, yes he's related, had his way we'd hear even less, why doesn't he resign with some semblance of honor? As if we hadn't heard enough about how Bush et al ignored intelligence, sheesh. UN: It seems the US might be headed for a showdown with any kind of attempt the get UN support for the current state of affairs in Iraq. Well it seems that Bush had no idea how much it would cost to "do Iraq" and no one is rushing to chip in, or should I say ante up? and compare what was said before and what is being said or claimed now...OOPS. Some even said the occupation would be more difficult than the war. And if we want to use the UN to help out in Iraq, does it make sense to isolate and "contain" France? Muddle East: The roadmap for peace still existent? See Khaleej Times for 9/6/03: Threats from Hamas , Abbas resigns, Then there are the reasons our "PR blitz" of TV, radio, etc.. might not work. , what world leaders have been saying, Environment: 9/11: Well, you'd think that we'd be tired of these stories but this piece gives a retrospective of what was said, what was revealed and how the official story "is challenged." According to Michael Meacher, MP, England 1997 - 2003. Then again another story about the Bin Laden's escape in a special airliner in the days after 9/11. 9/15/03 The Heinous: Just a bit of flashback to 9/11 and how soon lying began and how some feel about how "things are going." So what does billionaire/activist George Soros think is wrong with the US? And, is it all G.W. Bush's fault, maybe not really. Then again, from Moscow, we have a nice piece providing an overview of election 2004. USA: How to spread a lie, first tell it to millions, then retract to thousands, Wolfowitz, you dog you. Iraq: Here are a few questions that our news media might consider asking, our occupant of the whitehouse. Then getting France to OK a UN resolution that would allow several nations to send troops could happen and then again, maybe not. Then we have an indefinitely delayed, but much expected "final" report on Iraq's WMD's. One wonders if its delayed because ... uh ... there were no weapons. No one is in any rush to reveal the information gained by the captured and interrogated faces of the 55 Most Wanted Deck. We have heard nothing from Foreign Minister Tarik Aziz, from Huda Ammash of anthrax fame. In fact, we have heard nothing from any of the 37 "most wanted" who have surrendered or been taken into custody to date. There is no urgency to share information on efforts to rebuild the Mosul-Haifa oil pipeline. Patience, patience, and paybacks, too.And why rush on explaining the pneumonia when in fact we have 4,500 soldiers, sailors, airmen, and marines who have been quietly medevac'ed home from Iraq because they became "physically or mentally ill." Iran: Are we beginning another run up to confrontation or war? Iran is given a deadline , here is an shorter version , and yet a third interesting the slight differences. Muddle East: Lots of information on the current situation. I have argued vocally, to my friends that Arafat, if he truly wanted to "get back at Israel, could simlpy retire and walk away from it all, the ensuing chaos would prove the point. Whatever he is, I believe that without him whatever organizations the palistinians have would devolve into conflicted factions held together by their emnity for Israel, not a pretty picture. Check out Slate.com's 9/12/03 . No longer news, in that light, is this, Israeli government officials openly calling for Arafat's death. Environment: We have a new "ozone hole season" and one that promises to be bigger than ever. Then, closer to home, cell phone companies complain that there is no reasong to look into health concerns related to the use of such devices, despite some interesting research. 9/11: It seems the recent Bin Laden tape is a patchwork containing old audio and video, one wonders what is u p with this? And then there are the lingering questions, about what happened on that day, confusion seems apparant. England: It seems that a "cabal" has come to light in the English government, one that was determined to have England go to war. I wonder what parallel we might draw in the US? More chaos as more allegations spring forth about the "case against Iraq. And then some more "misinterpretations" come to light. The Humor: I wish there were some entries here. The Hope: There is some hope, a person falsly accused of aiding and abetting the 9/11 pilots sues for damages. 9/20/03 The Heinous: USA: Some light on the upgrade to the USA PATRIOT ACT. And a speech that gives a slamming to Bush and company, delivered by Sen. Robert Byrd (D-WV) Discontent in the military, bubbling up? It seems that the NAZI angle with the Bush family keeps popping up. This page/site has details, details, details. How does our government decide economic issues: The story of steel tarrifs. And the results are in: Rich Richer, Walmart gets food stamps. Iraq: More and more it looks like we won't be hearing the WMD report, why? Check out this stories links Former Bush supporter and retired Marine General Anthony C. Zinni has words for Bush's Iraq policy. The intelligence leaks seem to see mixed results and prognostications for Iraq, despite the official and rosy story. And VP Cheney still thinks AQ and Iraq went arm in arm. and specific Cheney, shall we say, lies? So here is an update on that issue from the CSM. And if being a horrible sort of dictator is a reason for invading Iraq, what of Uzbekistan?. And get a load of who we are asking to manage Iraq's developing economy, jeezus lord save us now. England: The BBC has its work cut out for it, supporters, detractors. Iran: Things just keep popping up, is Iran next? Muddle East: Here we've an article, which about half way down, has the US in agreement with Israel regarding a new policy on Arafat, that is to say "getting rid of him." We feel that Syria is "not doing its part" and so again we rattle the subtle blade. Now there surfaces a report that the Saudi's might be thinking nuclear. One wonders where the US would come down on such an event, and how they'd distinguish between Israeli and Saudi nukes, in terms of policy that is. 9/11: Just when did the Bin Laden family leave the US? Why were they allowed to leave without any investigations? What would american public opinion have thought of this whole matter, come to think of it, what do they think? Did they have access to US airspace when the fleet was grounded? More about air flights and 9/11: The list of dead on those flights do not tally with the numbers given and the flights were, apparantly 70% empty, according to this site, why a descrepancy? Again, some other perspectives on the flights, especially the damage to the pentagon. And on the pentagon, check out this where is the plane, its wreckage, the strewn bits and pieces? And then there is the Jersey Girls, an excerpt from an interview with them pulling no puchnes And more about the flight of the Bin Laden clan after 9/11 a congressional investigation? It is interesting how Americans became convinced that Saddam and Bin Laden were allies and that therefore Saddam had involvement with 9/11. This article outlines the process. The Humor: I wish there were some entries here. The Hope: The american librarians must be raising the heat Ashcroft is receiving, else why would they get "special attention" Then if you want to get a daily dose of Bushist thought, you can by going here and signing on for free. Here we have our Senate refusing the new regulations that would have concentrated media ownership to a degree that alramed both conservative and liberal segments of society. Senator Kenedy saying the war against Iraq was a "put up job" And some scientists have come up with an SUV, that looks like one and acts like one but gets "ordinary" gas mileage, about 27mpg. Send a letter to support its being considered by manufacturers. 9/24/03 The Heinous: USA: Something from Australia, claims of a video showing Powell and Rice, boasting about how Iraq was not a threat that the sanctions and all that had worked etc., implying that the war was based on deception, plain and simple. And there is more on that same story, a few more details: here. More on how the EPA was manipulated into "clearing" the air at ground zero in the days following 9/11. and then we've this "brilliant idea" to incite terrorists into action so as to combat them, the only problem is that innocents get killed in the process. And here is how cozy Big Oil is with our regulators, our "government" In another realm, another reason, possibly, for going into Iraq. and here is a logical segue from that piece, dollar falls, euro rises? Syria: We seem to be seeing stories that lead me to think that we're rattling sabres at differing countries at different times, again it is Syrias turn this week. It could also be that we have made our enemies and are catching the flack for it, no matter, we can handle them all, "bring it on" as Mr. Bush said. Iraq: Here is the downside of the occupation. A glimpse into what it is like "in the trenches." Here is the speech and the UN. In sum it just doesn't offer anyone anything except the opportunity to help us in ways that suit us. Are we going to send more troops to Iraq, after being told numerous times that the troop level is enough? England: Previous stories about the English governments attacks on the BBC are important, just as this story about US scientists sending information to England's independent newspapers for exposure, proves. But the war continues and the tide, for now, seems going against them and I do mean REALLY Here it appears the English govt. really did want to "get Kelly." And then, t hey say, that they were "under no obligation to correct reports..." that were known to be incorrect concerning the 45 minute WMD threat of Iraq. Europe: It seems that there is more flexibility, NATO nations can "do their own thing" including military operations, Iran: Al-Ahram, Cairo, reports that the pressure to let the US et al check out the nukes grows And an overview of why we are not at all happy with Iran. Muddle East: Israeli, no surprise, tells the world where to get off as far as its plans for Arafat is concerned. 9/11: For a moment by moment breakdown of the Bush's day on 9/11 read this complete with media links. The Humor: Tom Tomorrow, is always good for a laugh, chuckle or wry smile. Then there is the stand up comedy performance of Mark Crispin, see a review The Hope: General Zini has a message for some "...policy wonk back here has a brain fart of an idea" Then there is Chirac of France responding to Mr. Bush's UN presentation, it all looks same-o, same-o. But France says it won't veto that is the difference. More on the Kennedy accusation that Iraq was/is a fraud and that we are paying for foreign troops. This is hopeful because Kennedy has little to loose, little to gain, and can loudly ask questions, and criticize. Once called irrelevant, now the UN is being asked for assistance, something of a change for Mr. Bush. Here is another's view of the speech. This just in from the Kucinich campain:Congressman Dennis Kucinich continued his leadership today on Capitol Hill today by introducing the first comprehensive bill to repeal offensive sections of the misnamed "USA PATRIOT Act."  The Kucinich bill -- called the "Benjamin Franklin True Patriot Act" -- is already supported by the ACLU, NAACP, a Jewish group, an Islamic group, and 20 members of Congress.