I don’t suppose that any of us should find it surprising that Mr. Ole 60 Grit was the Warden of Poltical Reliability for PNAC on the Tigris. These sorts of rich old white men have been using the public’s money as hog slop for the Friends and Family of the Politically Well Connected since just days after 9/11, the Reagan era, Viet Nam, Teapot Dome, ah… um… well, since like, forever.
I had my own thoughts about how the NeoCons were using the CPA as a resume builder for their poltical proteges and as a nepotism dump for former college republicans and other operatives who weren’t finding useful work at, say, Pajamas Media.
Particularly brazen and galling to me was the gaming of the Washington Post by the Ledeen Clan, particularly about the very nature of the "grab" aspect of the "smash and grab" of Baghdad.
Did anyone else catch this? Here we have the WaPo presenting Simone Ledeen as the sensitive but spunky accidental tourist working in Iraq, almost, gosh, by pure coincidence….
Ledeen’s journey to Baghdad began two weeks earlier when she received an e-mail out of the blue from the Pentagon’s White House liaison office. The Sept. 16 message informed her that the occupation government in Iraq needed employees to prepare for an international conference. “This is an amazing opportunity to move forward on the global war on terror,” the e-mail read.
For Ledeen, the offer seemed like fate. One of her family friends had been killed in the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks, and it had affected her family deeply. Without hesitation, she responded “Sure” to the e-mail and waited — for an interview, a background check or some other follow-up. Apparently none was necessary. A week later, she got a second e-mail telling her to look for a packet in the mail regarding her move to Baghdad.
Er….Randomly selected young republican? “out of the blue”? How about…."daughter of the man who quite possibly forged the Niger-Uranium documents and handed them over to SISMI "?
In early 2002 Hadley was tasked with shutting down the unauthorized meetings Harold Rhode, Larry Franklin and Michael Ledeen were holding with Iraqi and Iranian exiles, and Italian intelligence figures including the head of SISMI, Nicolo Pollari, in Rome in late 2001.
On September 9th, 2002, Hadley met with Pollari in Washington. According to the Italian daily La Repubblica Pollari was there to press the details of the Niger-uranium story. The NSC has now confirmed that the meeting took place but claims it was a brief meeting and that no one present remembers the yellowcake story coming up.
In other words, it’s a quite hazy denial if it’s even a denial at all.
The 2004 WaPo article mentions Michael Ledeen in passing:
“The 28-year-old daughter of neoconservative pundit Michael Ledeen…” but fails to mention that Papa Mike is armpit deep in the administrations propaganda blitz in the runup to the war.
Last night, fortunate circumstance found me watching REM’s induction into the Georgia Music Hall of Fame. The man who presented their award to them was Senator Max Cleland .
REM’s Michael Stipe was exceptionally gracious in his acceptance speech, a good third of which was about being humbled and honored to share the stage with Cleland, a great American who had given so much for his country. I found myself reflecting upon Cleland’s defeat by the odious and oily Saxby "I’d rather be golfing" Chambliss .
(In the 1960s, during the Vietnam War, Chambliss was given a student deferment so he could attend law school. After that, he received a medical deferment (4-F) because of a bad knee.)
I was reminded of the war cry of the NeoCon "realists" as they dry humped the country into the war in Iraq: "Now the grownups are in charge!" Looking at the people who were maligned by the puerile "Path to 9/11"- Bill Clinton, Sandy Berger, Madeleine Albright, Richard Clarke, et al- and contrasting them to the current pack of ideologues, cronies and snake oil salesmen- The O’Biernes, the Ledeens, Barbara "The" Comstock "Load", Victoria Toensing, Douglas "The Stupidest Fucking Guy in the Universe" Feith…
It looks less and less like the grownups are in charge, and more like we’re all trapped on the NeoCon version of Pinocchio’s "Pleasure Island"…
Had enough?
Related posts:
Spotlight
Support this site!
Subscribe to the newsletter
Advertise on Firedoglake
Send
us your tips
Make us your homepage
About Firedoglake
Advanced search
FDL!
Fitz!
cheers for strong women and compassionate men
Yo Patrick!
Expose the War Profiteers!
This is one story that keeps getting swept under the rug. We MUST make sure it stays at the forefront – this is one of the biggest motivating forces for the invasion of Iraq.
Hi Patrick!
Greetings Patrick…..a timely post, I’m sorry to say. Thanks!
Patrick-
re: Chambliss. Here is a link to a site I found through Howie Klein’s DWT site. Check out where Chambliss and Isakson are in this assessment. Hint- keep on scrolling down.
http://www.progressivepunch.or…..&y=11
This site really has some good stuff. Naturally I had to check out where Lieberman was among the Dems in progressive voting. Hint- keep scrolling down.
http://www.progressivepunch.or…..&y=11
Here`s kudos to all those whose minds have moved beyond junior high school & are NOT ashamed of the fact
We need more of them
“The whole aim of practical politics is to keep the populace alarmed (and hence clamorous to be led to safety) by menacing it with an endless series of hobgoblins, all of them imaginary.” – H. L. Mencken
I hope someone is trying to scare up some MSM coverage of the hearing tomorrow on this subject.
Hi Patrick and thanks.
I agree with CW and I hope that a new Congress with a Democratic majority in one house will lead to multiple investigations of what has happened (Follow the Money!).
I am curious, though, as this story has been around for a while that the WaPo chose to highlight it now? Just the new book?
Patrick,
To me the contrast is simple.
Clinton worked his way up from a simple background to Rhodes Scholar and President. Not a gimme along the way. I think this was part of the Establishment pushback against Clinton – can’t have uppity peasants getting delusions of grandeur.
Contrast that to the BoyKing, who used family money and connections to run several businesses into the ground, and of his own merit, could not have risen higher than dogcatcher of Midland, Texas.
No wonder Bushco spins so. The truth is harsh and unflattering.
Maybe the point is that they never really wanted to rebuild Iraq anyhow. So why hire anyone who had a chance of doing so? They’d just get PO’d and expose the mess.
It makes sense to hire the hopelessly unqualified, given the initial considerations.
Stupid question time!
Posters @ FDL can do a strike out, because the button is right there above us. :)
How does one accomplish that “on the outside”?
Patrick!
You know, I admit, I probably wouldn’t have made it to the top of a corporate ladder even had I wanted to (too ornery). But just for giggles, let’s say I had. Let’s say I were in position to decide whether to hire one/some of these “graduates” of the CPA School of Resume-Building . . .
What on earth would that “credential” show me, except that Young Candidate Gooper here was in on the biggest, the most mindless, the least competent clusterfuck in all of U.S. history?
So run along and play in some other company’s sandbox, YCG — preferably our closest competitor. Hey, tell you what — let me give you a ride right over there this very minute!
Cheerio, pip pip!
Nice
In the pre-war rampup I a friend and I argued about the rationale for war.
Our joint supposition was that there was not enough money involved for that to be the sole reason. My friend was certain that there must be clear evidence of a nuclear threat, regardless of how little was actually presented.
We both agreed that there was not enough money or oil involved.
We were half right. There is not enough oil.
But the money stolen from the US coffers is staggering.
The key that unlocked this coffer is fear.
As long as you can scare half the population (or close enough to half to steal the difference) to disregard common sense and decency, you can pretty much get away with murder.
Speaking truth to power is a popular phrase around these parts. And such speaking makes us all feel good. I know I loved Colbert’s Press Club routine.
But, IMO, more important is speaking truth to fear.
al Quaida’s threat to America is only fully realized by our own actions.
The 3000 lives lost and billions of dollars destroyed on September 11 have been trivialized by the 10 iof thousands of lives destroyed and 100s of billions of dollars spent in it’s wake. These are decisions our elected leaders mad with popular support. In hindsight these decisions were obviously flawed.
Fear was the enabling factor.
Fear as a direct result of a terrorist action.
We all need a little more work on “Becoming Fearless”
We need to continue to speak sense to fear not just truth to power.
Can someone go downstairs and pick up the trash? comment by Steve #257. Quick before I get a broom myself. Thanks.
sorry…#259
Sorry to step on your post patrick.
You forgot Pletkapalooza!!!!!!!!
And then we have the latest in the Iran buildup from Time magazine via TPM.
I guess these M*****F**KERS really are just THAT batshit crazy.
All of these inbreed washington types need their priviledge clipped. bush becomes president because who his dad is, Ledeen getting a job because who her dad is. When will people be judged by their own accomplishments instead of their fathers? 60 Grits husband who only gives job to the cool aide drinkers and their kids would do well to read about all the German scientists who left Europe and helped America build the BOMB! No I am not saying American scientist will go to Iraq, but they might start going to Canada. American domince in science is now being threatened, stem cells, cloning, evolution, global warming, gulf war sickness 1,and 2, economics (real Economics not supply sider myth) the safety of nuclear power and disposal of waste question vs the benefits of nuclear power. Scientific progress is slowed when it has to make the EXTRA EFFORT TO make the science match the politics. And Kate has the nerve to say racial quotas are wrong because they promote unqualifed people, UNQUALIFED LIKE YOUR HUSBANDS HIRES! Katie your just afraid your unqualifed inbreed kids can’t compete against kids who were given half the oppertunites yours were!
lotus @ 15
But isn’t this exactly the sort of resume that you’d need to get in at the AEI or the Heritage Foundation, PNAC, and so on? There’s a career path there for the “right-thinkers”. Whether or not they could succeed in a money-making enterprise that was not dependent on gooper foundations/government funds, I’m not so sure. The NY Post/other propaganda arms lose $$ but they keep the ideology in circulation.
This is a great post and reminds me that this is what democrats should be doing every day for the next two months. It annoys me to no end that the dems have to be so nicey nice when they should be smearing the rethuglicans every day with their own s–t, and the beauty of it is that it’s all true. i’m sorry but i don’t believe talking about medicare and better education and the environment is going to get out the vote. Its time to get down and dirty and expose these creeps for what they really are, a criminal gang.
by the way patrick has anyone ever called you pat rex? lol!!!
I’ll link to this again, just because it’s so relevant to this discussion. From the British documentary series called “Dispatches”.
Iraq’s Missing Billions – The theft of a nation by the Coalition Provisional Authority.
It is a powerful and moving 40 minute documentary.
Yeah, I loved how the person Shrub’s little dictator Bremer appointed a person to set up a Stock Exchange and other financial apparati and the person wasn’t even an Accoutant. But she was a right winger, and that was enough.
The last question in the post was: had enough?
YES!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Raoul
And we’re not giving back that 9 billion smackers, either. Go pound sand.
By the way, Iraq is going A OK. Lovely.
Suck….I mean, good Americans.
Question
1) are conservatives nervous about evolution because their afraid they are being left behind? the NATURE question.
2) Or are conservatives afraid that by handing everything to their kids like bush’s “gentlemens C ” grades at an ivy/inbreed league college their kids grow up not knowing how to think/compete/work the NURTURE question. (one could argue Karl has won bush’s elections and Chenney runs the government. What bush actually does it seems is decide between two or more predeterimined choices drawn up by people with agendas that DON’T put the AMERICA’S welfare first.
The Bush family influence is insidious. They have powerful financial and political connections around the world. The President’s brother, the Gov. of Florida is being groomed for the presidency. Make no mistake, the Bush’s are not about to abandon their ‘right to rule’. Unfortunately, the Bush greedy political dynasty will continue. For a long time.
Things like this are why the Lamont campaign is so important to me. It’s insiders versus the people as I see it. The insiders have enriched themselves with power at the expense of everyday people. They are terrified that the masses will wake up and demand accountability. Joe’s haughty dismissals of his constituents (whether they support him or not) is an example of their disdain for us.
I am so sick of it.
Right you are, Kak at 22 — this IS “exactly the sort of resume that you’d need to get in at the AEI or the Heritage Foundation, PNAC, and so on.”
And thus we’re bound to beat their pathetic asses one of these days soon. Hey, the tribes of Afghanistan and Iraq are having no trouble with them. Why should we?
Alison @
13
Bingo, we have a winner!
mOropeza @ 27
Bingo again!We have a double winner! and the inbreeding has never seemed to bother the Windsor’s (to which dubya is distantly related)
Oklahoma kiddo @ 28
Kiddo I can’t remember who posted it last thread but the Bush family connections chart is awesome, if you get a chance.
HSAT – its also the basis of their primal fear of wanting to eliminate the inheritance tax.
1) the “money” advantage has drained their lineage of all intrinsic motivation to succeed on merit alone
2) they are afraid, justifiably, to compete on a “level” playing field to be filled with folks bigger, faster and smarter than themselves.
The linky for BushCo connections:
http://www.politicalfriendster…..;images=on
Binyamin — mweee heee! Good ‘un!
There will never be peace in the Middle East until the Palestinian-Israeli conflict is solved. Fairly.
Oklahoma kiddo @ 37
Yep, and this is why chimpco ignored the escalating violence early on in his pResidency.
He was laying the groundwork for the permanent war for non-eventual Peace.
HopeSpringsATurtle @ 31
Hiring the unqualified–it’s not a bug, it’s a feature.
Patrick, btw, your posts are insightful and on-point.
Are you cross-posting here from your own blog?
As Americans pass thru the hell of another
election cycle of mis-spokes,near lies and
simple real lies we surely can hope things
may be looking better in December of 2006 in
terms of DCLAND.
Then again we may all come away feeling like
born fools for having thought it could ever
have been possible to get off the current
train wreck in progress known as the Bush2WH
and the stamp-a-matic GOP run concession stand
known as the United States Congress.
Perhaps Disney CORP. could be persuaded to
create DC DISNEY WORLD where all the myths and
everspin really do come to life. Convert the
whole place to one big never ever was land.
My favorite would then likely be the TELL
A BIG ONE ride. Thats where you ride around
a replica of IMPORTANT AND SERIOUS moments
in DC history of last 5 years—
Congress doing oversight
Checks and Balances
Cut taxes but never cut and run
Saddam is one evil dude–AND HE HAS WMD’s!!!
Stop burning our flag moments
Social Security? You must be kidding
K STREET thrill ride
Tired of that? Then go GOLFING!!!
STAY THE COURSE GOLF COURSE… where you
can golf on and on and on…
Tired of that? Kids bored? THEN GO HERE!!!
PNAC LAND…meet NEOCON THE FUNNY CLOWN!!
Well…you get the point by now I hope.
On a more serious note check out ZMAG.org
website and read article found in latest set
of entries on American Imperialism. Very good
rundown on AI. Wont be seeing anything like
this in NYT or WAPO anytime soon.Wonder why?
lotus @ 30
I hope you’re right, I really do! (and I’m trying to do my little bit to help)
HopeSpringsATurtle @
33
Here it is. Original poster suggested starting with bankruptcy link and working from that point.
http://www.politicalfriendster…..;images=on
Say, is that Harlem Hooter Hubbub past its news cycle yet?
No?…Haiku time, then.
Irrelevant crone
Seeks quarrels with young bosoms
As hers brush her knees
;>)
HopeSpringsATurtle @ 35
rogues’ gallery.
I went to this link last night and signed up to see a screening of Greenwald’s Iraq for Sale: http://bravenewtheaters.com/
Eureka Springs, AR @ 43
My God. These are the people who basically run the world.
Funny for the second time in what 45 days a Potomac Pravda writer has a book out about Iraq. And just like with Ricks and Fiasco Rajiv Cheandrasa (sp) is telling us stuff they should have told us 3 years ago in the pages of the paper.
I been sayin’…Its worse that you can bear. I got through about 20 minutes worth of ‘connections’ before feeling sick and utterly helpless. I’m better now but they (BushCo) are not playing Nixonian ‘dirty tricks’, they are playing for keeps. What’s it Jane says? “All of the marbles…”
Here is a link I had from a while ago about some of the Pioneer” donors to Bush’s 2004 campaign…see anyone intersting?
http://www.whitehouseforsale.o…..search.cfm
Off with their heads
klyde @ 48
Not to mention Woodward’s handjobs, that also should have been in the fricking paper!
jmba @ 50
This is obscene.
You know, the potential DNC ads should be just about writing themselves. The Republicans are giving them so much material.
Had Enough?
A whole cast of unscrupulous characters. Interesting aint it?
bush Pioneers what a useful list I wonder how many of them paid for the Disney 9/11 abortion and I wonder which of and why they hate American Airlines?
jmba @ 55
what’s worse– our whole, entire country and the planet is for sale and being traded by “them that’s got the power” in lieu of life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness everywhere.
democracy, schamocracy.
we simply must prevail in November!
Another article reinforcing the fact that we HAVE to get out and vote in HUGE numbers come November……
http://www.washingtonpost.com/…..tml?sub=AR
Speaking of Disney, I’m still boycotting and writing the odd letter, but then, I don’t watch TV and don’t have kids so just me isn’t going to bring the mouse to his knees.
Any news on that front?
angie — I sure hope so, coz I fear there may not be a next time.
Meanwhile back in DC Jr. demands retroactive immunity.
This must not happen!
Interesting story about how Jr got to be on the board at Cateraire. They asked him to leave! From Wikipedia
here’s a portion of the the haliburton story everyone is missing
even before the war, they took one of their branches off shore, and THEN recieved government contracts and didn’t pay a dime in taxes
I think greenwald should address that part of the play which came before Iraq
Ot – if you turn on ‘mystery’ on PBS right now, you will see that the villain looks like Joe Lieberman!
Eureka Springs, AR @ 60
Linky?
Seriously – check out PBS!
HotFlash @ 61
dubya thought his job was to destroy it, he thought the name was Craterair and ergo…
the deciderator has always misheard, misunderstood, and misspeaked (er-a-ted).
The numbers look good for this November.
Valley Girl @ 64
Here is a link (to crooksandliars) for the video from Countdown on Friday of J. Turley discussing how Bush may be “covering his backside” by trying to jam this new-found need to re-define Article 3 of the Geneva Convention
http://www.crooksandliars.com/…..tment-act/
oops…don’t know how to use these new-fandangled computers….I am just a cavewoman….
me to me @ 62
Presidential Candidate Kerry said that he was going to close those tax loopholes, but dammit, he looked French, the Pope (quiet meeting with Neil Bush) wouldn’t let him take Communion, and worst of all, Kerry requested Swiss cheese on his Philly Cheese Steak.
hackworth @ 70
grrrr.
As Tweety said the other eve: the 2004 election was about the windsurfer vs the waterboarder.
jmba- I fixed it. I’ve made the same mistake too. When adding a comment to a quote, just make sure that the cursor is at the end of the quoted text. I eventually figured this out.
Valley Girl @ 64
balkinblogspot has links to full pdf’s of Presidential Bill and other versions currently under consideration. All include retroactive immunity from violations of common article III.
This is what he wants immunity from. fundamental human decency and International human rights.
Print this page
Convention (III) relative to the Treatment of Prisoners of War. Geneva, 12 August 1949.
Part I : General provisions
ARTICLE 3Database ‘IHL – Treaties & Comments’, View ‘COMART’
In the case of armed conflict not of an international character occurring in the territory of one of the High Contracting Parties, each Party to the conflict shall be bound to apply, as a minimum, the following provisions:
(1) Persons taking no active part in the hostilities, including members of armed forces who have laid down their arms and those placed ‘ hors de combat ‘ by sickness, wounds, detention, or any other cause, shall in all circumstances be treated humanely, without any adverse distinction founded on race, colour, religion or faith, sex, birth or wealth, or any other similar criteria.
To this end, the following acts are and shall remain prohibited at any time and in any place whatsoever with respect to the above-mentioned persons:
(a) violence to life and person, in particular murder of all kinds, mutilation, cruel treatment and torture;
(b) taking of hostages;
(c) outrages upon personal dignity, in particular humiliating and degrading treatment;
(d) the passing of sentences and the carrying out of executions without previous judgment pronounced by a regularly constituted court, affording all the judicial guarantees which are recognized as indispensable by civilized peoples.
(2) The wounded and sick shall be collected and cared for.
An impartial humanitarian body, such as the International Committee of the Red Cross, may offer its services to the Parties to the conflict.
The Parties to the conflict should further endeavour to bring into force, by means of special agreements, all or part of the other provisions of the present Convention.
The application of the preceding provisions shall not affect the legal status of the Parties to the conflict.
OT, but not really. Great review/overview of Frank Rich’s new book in the NYTimes Book Review Section. It would be wonderful to get him on a FDL book engagement.
Oklahoma kiddo @ 67
And then John Conyers can ask him to leave. Need to talk to more people, though. And make sure the votes get counted right.
Night folks, to unseat Republicans I must sleep (w/ apologies to pere de Chardin).
I guess the good Senator forgot that there is a war going on in Afghanistan…
snip
On statewide Connecticut television today, Sen. Joe Lieberman criticized those who want to redeploy U.S. troops from Iraq and have them better focused on international terrorist hotspots like Afghanistan. In the process, he insulted thousands of U.S. troops currently serving in combat in Afghanistan by claiming they aren’t actually there. Specifically, Lieberman said, “A lot of people want to fight the other war [in Afghanistan], the one we’re not involved in.”
Lieberman’s claim that we’re “not involved in” Afghanistan came one day after the AP reported “thousands of American and Afghan troops unleashed a new offensive against Taliban militants in eastern Afghanistan on Saturday in an effort to expand the government’s reach into the volatile Pakistani border region.
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/…..29627.html
A great book on Florida and national politics as it relates to Cubans (of Miami and Cuba)and the Bush family is Cuba Confidential by Ann Louise Bardach. Puts together much of a puzzle. Anybody read it besides me?
http://balkin.blogspot.com/200…..posts.html
http://balkin.blogspot.com/
this is the next step in the war in Iran
breed hate
this video is scary, and I’m telling you, it’s going to be effective
http://video.google.com/videop…..=obsession
Richmond @ 74
Great review also of IMPERIAL LIFE IN THE EMERALD CITY
http://www.washingtonpost.com/…..01329.html
Valley Girl @
64
From BobbyG
SEC. 6. SATISFACTION OF TREATY OBLIGATIONS…
(b) RIGHTS NOT JUDICIALLY ENFORCEABLE.—
(1) IN GENERAL.—No person in any habeas action or any other action may invoke the Geneva Conventions or any protocols thereto as a source of rights, whether directly or indirectly, for any purpose in any court of the United States or its States or territories.
SEC. 9. RETROACTIVE APPLICATION.
This Act shall take effect on the date of the enactment of this Act and shall apply retroactively, including to any aspect of the detention, treatment, or trial of any person detained at any time since September 11, 2001, and to any claim or cause of action pending on or after the date of the enactment of this Act.
Link here. PDF ALERT
metome: linky no worky
NYC Mayor Bloomberg to campaign for Lieberman
(Hartford-AP, Sept. 17, 2006 9:45 PM) _ Republican New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg will host a fundraiser for Sen. Joe Lieberman, D-Conn., at the mayor’s Manhattan town house, Lieberman’s campaign announced Sunday night.
http://www.wtnh.com/Global/sto…..p;nav=3YeX
ccmask @ 76
omg, HOW I hate this scumbag! A completely and totally awful unpatriotic, unamerican, very not ‘nice’ POS Senator who was absent from so many “party line” votes on the wars. Any doubt we had us a bushbot from the gitgo now? I am talking to you Rahm and Hil and Chuckie and all y’all!
Thanks, OFG.
CSPAN is showing Ann Richards 1988 Dem Convention speach. Lordy am I going to miss that woman. That woman knew how to kick ass and tell the truth.
http://www.americanrhetoric.co…..988dnc.htm
These comments are about Daddy Bush….. that apple sure did not fall far from that tree.
katymine– she certainly radiated beauty from the inside out. luminous. thanks for the tip.
Valley Girl @ 85
Looks like you rooted it out before I could post it. I talked to BobbyG by phone and he has laboriously poured over the text of the Bush proposal. The dude is on fire. Good thing about these innernets is that it allows complete fleshing out of the facts.
Patrick,
Great post. No, I would never have made the father-daughter link, and as a fairly new re-entrant into the political process, I am well behind the learning curve of all the nasty and insidious players that make up the wingnut welfare system.
Thanks for shedding some light on the text for me. For me, who are they and what have they done in the past is mandatory in understanding what they said today–which means very little.
Thanks OFG – That and a link from Hugh are the original linkys.
Amazing once one looks at article III and realizes what is actually at risk. He wants to change the laws of all civilized governments just for immunity because he broke them by ordering the worst imanginable crimes.
OFG- I found the link, and that’s all. Not the text that you posted. Thanks again, and next time you talk to BobbyG give him my regards.
Slow tonight. I commented, then I went to watch Murder on the Orient Express with the family. Back now and not even EPU’d. Once again, Hope is too kind to me.
So here’s my question: If we are just now documenting the need for tin hats, why is Hilary Clinton still pulling her punches? She was onto this 10-12 years ago, right? Is she flying under the radar, hoping to expose them without getting Wellstoned? Why is she not wringing them out like dishcloths? She has more money than God and can hire a fleet of researchers.
Why are we waiting for the WaPo to do the job? Where are the big dog et ux?
Valley Girl @ 90
I’m in BobbyG’s home town, Las Vegas. He takes the stage tomorrow night as a musician. I’ll be there, and I’ll send him your good thoughts.
ccmask @ 83
Bloomberg is an idiot. Just like Joe.
Finally figured out that Dem phrase “We can do better”…. it is the end of Ann Richards speech. Everyone should read that speech, so much applies to what is happening right now. Amazing that it was 18 years ago but so much is so current.
OFG goes cosmo on us.*g* Hope we get a jazzy review.
katymine @ 94
I’ll miss Ann Richards too. The only reason to watch Larry King in the last few years were her appearances.
kylde @ 48 – Packer’s Assasin’s Gate has fair chunks of this info too and it’s been out for awhile. No one is making it a recurring theme and topice
multiple OT catch ups.
1. Someone mentioned the insurance CIA agents are getting and there have been several references to the violationsof the Geneva Conventions etc. and I want to clear up some things that I think may not be clear While the Geneva Conventions are the “law” of the law, as they have been ratified by Congress, there is no private cause of action under the Conventions. IOW, if you are the victim of a violation – you have the rights of a victim of a crime. Report it, and then it is up to the prosecution wings to take action. In this case, the prosecution wing is the Department of Justice that approved the violations.
Per Hamdan, the Conventions are also incorporated into our UCMJ, but again, there is no private cause of action (you can’t get damages for violations) however, there is some judicial ability to intervene and disallow the military or Executive branch from taking actions that are contrary to the conventions (for example, sentencing someone without an adequate trial/commission under the Conventions).
The lack of a private cause of action is also true under the the Torture Act, http://www.watchingjustice.org/pub/doc_417/Torture Act.doc and possibly the War Crimes Act http://www4.law.cornell.edu/us…..-000-.html
SO these are all “laws” but they rely upon a functioning non-corrupted Dept of Justice to bring charges under them. Show of hands for anyone who has any faith whatsoever that violations of the War Crimes and torture act will be prosecuted against people who violated the law bc Bush told them too. Absent an independent investigator -it won’t happen.
The victims, if they live or ever get legal access etc do have some recourse under other legal approaches, however, even where you have a free and obviouslywronged party, like el-Masri, the same DOJ that would normally be tasked with pursuing charges for violations of the War Crimes Act and Torture Act is instead – with knowledge that he was mistakenly made the subject of torture and kidnap etc. – instead of prosecuting – they are filing “state secrets” defenses for the gov (they can’t reveal whether they screwed up and kidnapped and tortured a man for no reasons whatsoever except sadism and incompetence, bc how sadistic and incompetent Bush is needs to be kept a “secret” according to the filings).
It’s a lovely situaton that leaves you once again asking: Who would work for Ashcroft or Gonzales?
2. Torture statements I’ve seen several references to the arguments that the tortured CIA detainees can’t be tried bc of the torture and I have to, very sadly, direct attention to both the Salah and Padilla cases. Both have tortured and coerced statements at issue and in both cases – courts are going forward with those torture statements as evidence that may be introduced. It’s not pretty out there, and if civil courts sink so far into depravity as to adopt this standard – put paid to any legislation that authorizes torture.
Yeah, ny. I know he is.
UptownNYChick @ 93
Bloomberg is also a Republican. Just like
Joe.
Please refresh F5 for Mary (our Mary)
VG @ 78,
Thanks for that. It’s amazing to see how back then, some people were aware of what was going on, what was likely to occur.
I just saw a commercial on tv for this website:
theotheriraq.com Interesting.
ccmask @ 102
the partitioning has already happened. It’s Iraqi Kurdistan.
the Turks are not happy.
Interesting article in the New Yorker on the Clintons.
This week in the magazine, David Remnick profiles Bill Clinton. Here, with Blake Eskin, Remnick discusses the ex-President’s legacy and Hillary Clinton’s political future.
http://www.newyorker.com/onlin…..lineonly02
I think Joe is going thru kiss withdrawals…I winder if his wife gets jealous.
snip
“You know what troubled me throughout this is the number of people that I found in the Democratic Party _ and can find their mirror opposite in the Republican Party _ who approach politics with an emotion that really comes close to hate,” he said. “They don’t just disagree with the other side. They hate the other side.”
“The fact that Lamont was making a big deal out of the fact that George Bush gave me a hug after one State of the Union speech, you know maybe we’d better in this country if there was more hugging and less hating,” he said. “I mean it.”
http://www.newsday.com/news/lo…..onnecticut
Still OT – questions that I don’t think anyone will be asking, but I wish they would
1. Where the “advanced” techniques used on Mr El-Masri and can you tell us if they have been used on people who have been innocent victims of govt mistake?
2. What has happened to KSM’s children that were in US custody and in how many instances have we also rendered families and children along with suspected terrorists.
3. Where most of the GITMO detainees actually taken on a battlefield? How many are from Afghanistan? Iraq? Other countries?
4. Would a Canadian who donated to a Hezbollah charity be liable, under your legislation, to be legally kidnapped from Canada and taken to a black site for enahanced interrogation?
5. Do you rely on the same kinds of intelligence that made you believe Iraq had WMDs to determine that someone may know information that would need to be
torturedenhanced interrogated out of them?6. Are there plans to turn over the CIA agents indicted in Italy and are any of the detainees now taken to GITMO related to that case?
7 Were there any passengers on the flights that touched down in Spain and if there were, would Spain be within its rights to pursue criminal charges against the US?
…
I could go on and on *sigh* Makes me nuts.
Angie: I can’t figure out what theotheriraq.com website is for, do you?
Alison @
91
in last post (book salon) Arianna says she thinks Hillary fears losing.
I’m still thinking about that…
neurophius @ 99
bbl
Mary, I noticed in the CIA agents insurance article
http://www.washingtonpost.com/…..86_pf.html
Basically it’s backed by the US Gov. If the DOJ (tax payers) won’t cover the legal bill then we (tax payers) will. After all 300 dollars for 200K coverage isn’t so bad. I would love to know how many policy’s were sold.
ccmask @ 107
here it is ccmask– the ads have been running for a while now– not too many, but my sis told me a couple of months ago that NPR’s reporter signed off with his name (?) reporting from “Iraqi Kurdistan”. It about attracting the military industrial complex to invest in the stable and oil- rich part of Iraq, which is not the real and deadly Iraq.
http://www.theotheriraq.com/
Valley Girl – you are the best. I think I’ve been told (and forgot) that the “i” word is a problem for spam reasons. Thanks for being patient – one glass of wine and I get very forgetful.
angie @ 103
Really – they started to enter into independent oil development contracts right after the Constituion was adopted -whichwas supposed to require that national resoure be treated through a centralized govt control (so SUnnis not in such an oil rich area could share) Turks see a move for a Kurdistan that would endanger their waterways and are being harrassed by PEK and we aren’t doing anything to reel that in (although, apparently, we have condemed Hussein for not reeling in PEK)
A mess.
Btw – I just read through watertigers super snark and a few of the links The Poor Men and Friedman – is there a bigger idiot, who still gets treated seriously, than Friedman? What made that man’s reputation – bc his “we had to kick butt in theME and Hussein was a good one to go after” idiocy is appalling. Anyone care to send him some pics of the real victims in Iraq since we decided to kick butt? The infants just don’t look that much like Saddam – must be the lack of mustache on their partially blown apart features. He must have no shame of any kind.
ccmask @ 107
Click the green bar at the bottom and it will take you to this site:
I reviewed all the public viewable source code and it is all in english.
These brats sound like Judy Garland and Mickey Rooney in one of those “hey, kids, let’s put on a show” films.
In our case there were grown-ups in the wings, a State Department teeming with people knowledgeable about the pitfalls of nation-building. They were ignored in the run-up to war. Strange enough. But that they were bypassed in its wake is bewildering. How did this happen?
Two general reasons are: First, there was no love lost between the Busheviks and State. Second, Bremer’s
udystopian experiment, as Naomi Klein details in “Baghdad Year Zero,” called for free market ideologues.But it’s more complicated than that. Someone had to pull Bremer’s oars, and not every CPA staffer fits the brat profile. Many had reputations to uphold. They weren’t making much for their work, and they risked life and limb traveling in and out of the Green Zone. How did so many agree to be cogs in the CPA’s careening wheel?
I got to know someone who was working for the CPA. Well-credentialed, she brought real expertise to the table. It would have done some good, of course, only if the reconstruction had miraculously panned out. Yet she fully believed it would, to my growing consternation as the returns streamed in, and kept going to Baghdad even after one of the planes she flew in was nearly downed.
It eventually dawned on me that she’d passed a screen test, but not one that ended in her drinking Heritage Foundation Kool-Aid. It was more that she had a well-established concern for Iraq that gave an opening for her particular expertise and gave her the will to blink away contrary evidence and carry on day-to-day in spite of it. Her profile resembles Noah Feldman’s, the NYU law professor retained to help draft a constitution. He brought legal credentials and a familiarity with Islamic culture. Yet it was not identical.
Human stories never are, and the Bush years have produced many of them. The Powells, the Wilkersons, the Tenets, the Paul Pillars (who wrote the prewar NIE) — all these are in ways similar, but each is unique. All were earnest enough to have regrets yet were suckered into the gambit and left it too late.
As the history of these awful times emerges, one question is how so many sensible people rationalized a crossover to the dark side in Luke Skywalker fashion. The analogy is deliberatel crude. In real life it’s more a matter of grasping for a rung on the ladder that seems “a chance to be part of something big” or some such thing.
The lessons learned could fill the Library of Congress. Octavio sums it up in Rules of the Game. The really awful thing in life is this: everyone has his reasons.
Alison @
91
I’m afraid the fix is in with Hil too. I’ve felt she can’t be trusted for the longest time. Big Dog as well. Not because they are ‘bad’ just because they are too entrenched in the political playground to see the actual ‘landscape’…just my opinion but i bet I’m right.
Did T-rex finally get 86′d?
I was in the poetry scene in Portland in the 70’s. Lotsa characters– people too wrapped up in being who they were. One I knew, this kid, Billy Somethingorother–wanted to be the greatest street poet of our group. Never wrote a word. To talk to him was to get a massive dose of the world according to Billy. Wonder whatever happened to him anyway.
HIllary wreaks of fear.
These people crave power so very badly. It’s in their DNA.
The problem with that is most of us are pretty sick of watching our Presidents work out their personal psycho-social dramas on the national stage. Get your own god damned country.
Mary @ 112
Friedman needs to disappear like Ken ‘cake walk’ Adelman did. Morons.
nsr @
116
Patrick (who wrote this post) is TRex’s twin brother….I expect that TRex will be wandering by soon.
Mary -
I think I speak for most of the FDL crew on this: It’s obvious you have gotten over your fears (last thread @5:24):
Let the record show:
Mary @ 106
Mary, you are indeed a treasure around these parts. And not at all nuts.
Mary, are you saying and have I missed documentation that children are being tortured as part of the rendition process?
ccmask: to clarify my # 111, it was not a couple of months ago but instead from a May 10th email I got from my sis:
time flies…
Off topic Drive by …
Arnold Gone Wild
HopeSpringsATurtle @
115
I’m afraid the fix is in with Hil too. I’ve felt she can’t be trusted for the longest time. Big Dog as well. Not because they are ‘bad’ just because they are too entrenched in the political playground to see the actual ‘landscape’…just my opinion but i bet I’m right.
Too true, I fear.
meta @ 121
IOS: U.S. Holds 60 Children at Gitmo
Thanks, katymine.
this from 2004 meta, and I cannot imagine anything has changed, anywhere in this “GWOT”– how better to catch boogeymen?:
http://www.sundayherald.com/43796
Mary, I am, as always, in awe. Reading your posts I see your precision, your compassion, your passion for justice, and how tired and sick this is making you because you understand more than we do how really, really evil this is, and how you won’t quit. Strong like Ann Richards — Molly tells about her being so tired she was crying while folding laundry. Well, I don’t know about the laundry part. I can’t fly where you do, but I listen and learn. Thank you.
I am too tired to read any more, and I know I will feel better in the morning. Good night, guys.
As a side part of children being at Gitmo… My boyfriend lives in Oregon, he and his then 16 yr old son went to one of Senator Ron Wyden’s townhalls. His son asked the Senator what he thinks about holding children at Gitmo… the description of Wyden’s face, the “WHAT did you say” and asking it again….. the “I know nothing about children” and even asked that a 16 yr old boy to fax his Senate office with the information.
The sad thing, Wyden never responded about the information faxed to his office and then later went to Gitmo and gave it a verbal “Everything is fine here” bill of health.
new thread upstairs
Here’s something that’ll give me nightmares for sure:
http://www.rawstory.com/showou…..id=2455343
Not surprised about Wyden. He got to the senate as an activist for the Grey Panthers, then voted yes on letting the pharmaceutical companies write their own “reform” bill.
angie, thank you. God, I can’t believe I hadn’t read any of this.
1. I enjoyed reading comments early this afternoon when Arianna Huffington was in the house. What a bunch of wonderful women blog here at fdl!
2. Then we went out to listen to Jeff Lang. If you live in Georgia, he’s headed there after Alaska – and he’s awesome:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=K17MsJOCD2E
3. Great post, Patrick. When Laura Rozen and Josh Marshall got really close to exposing Michael Ledeen as the Niger forger, they suddenly stopped writing about it and it appears their sources stopped helping. I remember watching that one fairly closely, and even reading Ledeen’s blog for a while, because he’s incredibly knowledgeable about Iran.
4. Interestingly, National Review has disappeared many of Ledeen’s articles from their online archives. I think somebody found traces of Niger document fingerprints in one or more of his essays and took care of the problem.
As an example, if you go to their archives, you can only access little from 2003, and none from earlier, ie – the time the forgeries were created:
http://author.nationalreview.c…..p=MjAwMw==
But here’s an informative article on Iran, which pisses on Dick Armitage, from the time of the run-up to the Iraq War. I got it from Google:
http://www.nationalreview.com/…..102302.asp
Maybe I’m reading too much into it – the earlier articles are obviously cached somewhere at NRO, you just can’t get there in a normal way.
angie @
131
Angie, now you see why I had to go to church with my older son after he came home from a church camp (all his friends went too) and told me about being “slain in the spirit” and speaking in tongues. I just thought it was a regular protestant church! Who knew?
Oh Margot, this is just too frightening… up to and including the derision and branding of Palestinians and Pakistanis and all ‘those’ people from all those different places… “we’re better ’cause we are the ‘truth’ “…
omg. Thank you for being a wonderful and watchful parent.
I remember seeing my dad slain in the spirit when I was 11 years old. The preacher laid his hands on him and *boom* dad went over like a bowling pin. There was a team ready to catch him, because I guess everyone who had the preacher’s hands on his/her head landed on their back in the aisle.
I can’t catch my breath… So many make perfect sense.. Tell me that is NOT the deepak chopra.
Quickly, please!!!!!!
Just a nit-picky comment about the clip:
The one shot of ‘Arabs’ was really a picture of Palestinians.
My husband and I had the privilege of attending the induction of REM into the Ga. Music Hall of Fame Saturday night. As usual, Stipe & company were a class act, having Max Cleland present their award and dedicating one of their songs to Anne Richards. I hope our guv, Sonny Perdue, was more than a little uncomfortable! There is hope yet for our very red state.
Have you googled dick cheney’s other daughter recently? Not the lesbian one, the other one.
l8r,
b4real
Bad news on the Patrick Fitzgerald front, from WayneMadsenReport.com. I haven’t seen any discussion of this anywhere… Do they really have Fitzgerald hamstrung, or will he still prevail? Why would he have gone as far as he has if he knew that they had dirt on him? Is this just GOP dirty tricks? I do hope so!!
Styve
…
Ney is said to have agreed to cooperate with Justice prosecutors in return for a sentence of 27 months in prison and a $500,000 fine. In reality, Gonzales’ prosecutors are more interested in how much Ney discovered about links between top GOP and White House officials and the arms smuggling business involving Iran, Iraq, and the Zayat, Abdul Qadeer (AQ) Khan, and other shady networks connected to neocon and Russian-Israeli Mafia activities. By finding out what Ney knows, Cheney and his neocon provocateurs will be able to neutralize any embarrassing information on their proliferation activities prior to the November 7 election. In fact, during the DOJ investigation of Ney, the congressman, aware that wireless communications in the House was in the hands of Israeli-owned MobileAccess Communications (formerly Foxcom Wireless), studiously avoided communicating with sensitive sources through any member of his staff.
FN Aviation’s chief lobbyists in the United States, people whose activities were of interest to Ney (and Brewster Jennings and the CIA) were Roy Coffee and David DiStefano, both of whom work for failed Supreme Court nominee Harriet Miers’ old law firm, Locke Liddell & Sapp. According to the Jan. 24, 2006, Dallas Morning News Coffee, who was a one time deputy campaign manager for then-Texas Governor George W. Bush, and DiStefano, pressured Ney to lobby the State Department to grant an export license for the sale of U.S. spare aircraft parts by FN Aviation to Iran. Coffee has been called Bush’s “eyes and ears on K Street,” a reference to the lobbyist district of Washington, DC. WMR has been told that Ney was passing the information he was getting on FN Aviation’s activities, as well as other intelligence, to BJ&A. After BJ&A’s cover was blown by Karl Rove, Dick Cheney, and Richard Armitage (who was worried that the CIA would discover his own involvement in shady deals in Azerbaijan), Ney’s intermediary activities also became known to the White House and the Special Prosecutor named to investigate the leak of the classified CIA information to the media — Patrick Fitzgerald.
Fitzgerald’s decision not to prosecute Karl Rove and to seek the lesser charges of perjury and obstruction of justice against Cheney’s former Chief of Staff Lewis “Scooter” Libby stems from Fitzgerald’s own conflicts-of-interest in the CIA case. Ney and BJ&A were uncovering past and embarrassing links between the Russian-Israeli mob and key players in the Bush administration. Zayat’s myriad aircraft firms in Uzbekistan and Kyrgyzstan are based in the same locations as those of Russian Mafia arms smuggler (and favored Pentagon contractor) Viktor Bout. Bout’s Kyrgyzstan companies — Phoenix Aviation and Inter Transavia, both connected to U.S. private military contractors operating in Iraq and Africa — and Zayat’s Kyrgyz-based aviation company, Aqua Transit, share the same airfield in the Kyrgyz capital of Bishkek. Zayat’s Samaya Investments Ltd. comfortably resides in Tashkent, Uzbekistan along with firms controlled by the Uzbek-speaking Bout. Bout and Zayat share more than central Asian airports and capitals in common — they both have high level contacts in the Bush administration, contacts that reach right into the Oval Office.
When she was National Security Adviser, Condoleezza Rice interceded with Sharjah authorities not to arrest Bout. She informed U.S. intelligence to “look but don’t touch” with regard to Bout. And Alberto Gonzales’ Justice Department, while convicting Ney, has yet to go after Zayat’s lobbyist, Coffee, George W. Bush’s former deputy campaign manager and “eyes and ears” on K Street. And there is continued Department of Homeland Security disinterest in the activities of Bout’s Syrian associate Monzer al Qasser, who has been involved with his brother Ghassem in arms and drug smuggling and counterfeiting of $100 U.S. notes. Interpol has long been interested in the al Qassers’ weapons smuggling and counterfeiting activities but the official U.S. Secret Service replies have echoed Rice’s “look but don’t touch” orders. Monzer Al Qasser’s weapons smuggling activities, selling former East Bloc arms and using secret bank accounts in Luxembourg and Switzerland, cross the path of Viktor Bout’s supply of weapons to the Taliban, Al Qaeda, and pro-Al Qaeda Islamist elements in the Balkans. The supply of arms from Mafia smugglers to Muslim guerrillas in Bosnia and Kosovo also involve the financial networks employed by the Bosnia Defense Fund, a 1990s weapons-purchasing slush fund set up at Riggs Bank in Washington, DC and the Central Bank of Bosnia in Sarajevo by Richard Perle and Douglas Feith. WMR has learned of a significant Washington, DC-based lobbying and smuggling operation involving Al Qasser and Bout. This operation appears to be sanctioned by high-level Bush administration officials.
And there is even more to this story. Bout was a supplier of logistics and arms to both the Taliban and Osama Bin Laden in Afghanistan. As WMR has reported, a classified French intelligence report obtained by WMR shows that Bin Laden remained under the operational control of the CIA and Britain’s MI-6 until 1995. According to U.S. intelligence sources, Fitzgerald, working for then-US Attorney for Southern New York James Comey, failed to translate from Arabic and Farsi and present to the grand jury and jury in the trials of 1993 World Trade Center bombers several important telecommunications intercepts. The intercepts proved that Bin Laden, who was based in Sudan at the time and living on the largesse of the Saudi-backed Sudanese government, was directly involved in the 1993 bombing of the World Trade Center. Suspiciously, the attack took place only a few weeks after Bill Clinton was sworn in an President. Sudanese and Bin Laden involvement in the bombing was proven by NSA-decrypted messages sent between the Sudanese Mission to the UN and the Sudanese Foreign Ministry in Khartoum. According to a former Sudanese government officials, the NSA possessed a backdoor into the encryption equipment Sudan’s Foreign Ministry purchased from a Hamburg, Germany firm named PK Electronics. Fitzgerald also covered up key evidence that a US Army Special Forces non-commissioned officer, Ali Mohammed, was in direct contact with Bin Laden in Afghanistan while still on active duty and reporting to the U.S. Special Forces command in Fort Bragg, North Carolina.
It is believed by many legal and intelligence observers that the Washington, DC U.S. District Court grand jury’s decision to indict Karl Rove last May was derailed after Attorney General Alberto Gonzales confronted Fitzgerald with his past prosecutorial misconduct in the 1993 World Trade Center trials. Therefore, an unusual “SEALED vs. SEALED” indictment of the grand jury against Rove remains sealed to this day and Rove attorney Robert Luskin maintains a veil of secrecy around a 10-page letter, dated June 12, 2006, that stated that Fitzgerald did not intend to charge Rove in the leak of Valerie Plame Wilson’s name and identity to a number of journalists. Nor did Fitzgerald charge either Rove or Libby with the underlying crime of violating the Intelligence Identities Protection Act — an act cited by federal appellate Judge David Tatel in a February 2005 as having “serious” national security implications. In fact, Tatel wrote that Valerie Plame Wilson “worked for the CIA in some unusual capacity relating to counterproliferation.” In fact, Mrs. Wilson and her CIA network were targeting the very same smuggling and money laundering networks that were aided and abetted by Cheney and his neocon influence network.
It is now clear that Fitzgerald has been playing what the French call a “double jeu” — a “double game.” Eager to protect his and then-New Jersey federal prosecutor Michael Chertoff’s own cover-up of the U.S. intelligence links to the 1993 World Trade Center bombers, Fitzgerald folded when confronted with the threat of exposure from Gonzales, who was acting on behalf of Cheney, Rove, and Bush. Cheney’s and Libby’s ties to Russian-Israeli mobsters like Marc Rich, a major global smuggler in his own right, and their involvement in the proliferation of weapons of mass destruction to form the conditions to promote a casus belli for neocon war goals were the real reasons behind the Cheney’s operation to expose Mrs. Wilson and her BJ&A network and Abramoff’s and Gonzales’ entrapment of CIA asset Ney in a double cross sting operation.