March 9, 2003
Media Compilation #120: Last Call to Stop the War Juggernaut
Dear journalist
With the world on the edge of a monstruously insane and completely illegal war, truth is already a casualty of this madness. When will the US media reveal the depleted uranium eternal mess of the first Gulf War? How many more innocent children, men and women will have to be sacrified to satisfy the bottomless greed of oil and weapon-making corporations? The hegemonic ambitions of the U.S. government are leading the world onto a very dangerous path...
There is no better time than NOW to stop the infernal descent into World War III
Bring the boys - and girls - home!
Jean Hudon
Earth Rainbow Network Coordinator
http://www.EarthRainbowNetwork.com
This compilation is archived at http://www.EarthRainbowNetwork.com/Archives2003/MediaCompilation120.htm
"...now we're about ready to send them into a war again -- we can't do it. We just can't do it. It's a crime against God. It's a crime against humanity to use uranium munitions ... (The) consequences last for eternity. The half-life of uranium 238 is 4.5 billion years. And we left over 320 tons all over the place in Iraq."
- US Army Major Douglas Rokke (see #1 below)
CONTENTS
1. Get Ready For More American Deaths From the Infamous 'Gulf Syndrome'
2. Bill Moyers: Patriotism and the Flag
3. Bush Pushes the Big Lie Toward the Brink
See also:
Mr Bush goes for the kill (March 9)
http://www.observer.co.uk/iraq/story/0,12239,910023,00.html
There is a "moral case" for taking out Saddam. But what about everybody else? (...) A recent UN report reckons that if and when the US starts bombing as many as 100,000 Iraqis will die.
THE COMMITTEE TO BOMB IRAQ
http://www.endthewar.org/cli1.htm
Background info on the people behind the war push. The report also sheds light on the motives for invading Iraq.
US Bullying African States To Support War (March 6)
http://allafrica.com/stories/printable/200303060556.html
AS THE UN Security Council nears a showdown vote on war against Iraq, the United States is making an all-out effort to enlist three key African nations in what critics are calling a "coalition of the coerced." Angola, Cameroon and Guinea, each with a potential swing vote on the Security Council, are the focus of intensive American lobbying in the run-up to the March 7 vote on a US-sponsored resolution authorising military force against Iraq. US officials pressing the three countries are engaging in "bullying and acts tantamount to bribery," according to a Washington-based think tank. The US preferential trade scheme known as the Africa Growth and Opportunity Act (Agoa) may be used as a lever to persuade Cameroon and Guinea to support the Iraq war resolution, warns the Institute for Policy Studies, a left-of-centre think tank. In an analysis of how the US is assembling a "coalition of the coerced," the institute points to a stipulation in the Agoa law requiring that nations "not engage in activities that undermine United States national security or foreign policy interests." Failure to vote in Washington's favour in the Security Council could therefore jeopardise Cameroon's and Guinea's eligibility for Agoa trade benefits, the Institute suggests.
US Bugging phones and emails of Security Council members (March 2)
http://www.observer.co.uk/international/story/0,6903,905899,00.html
Who Armed Iraq? (March 6) (MUST READ!)
http://www.alternet.org/story.html?StoryID=15322
(...) According to the December declaration, treated with much derision from the Bush administration, U.S. and Western companies played a key role in building Hussein's war machine. The 1,200-page document contains a list of Western corporations and countries – as well as individuals – that exported chemical and biological materials to Iraq in the past two decades.
Annan deeply deplores 'disproportionate and excessive' Israeli force in Gaza (March 7)
http://www.arabicnews.com/ansub/Daily/Day/030307/2003030722.html
United Nations Secretary-General Kofi Annan yesterday deeply deplored the use of "disproportionate and excessive force" by the Israeli military in a Gaza refugee camp, which reportedly led to the killing of 11 Palestinians and the injuring of more than 140. "Such military actions in densely populated areas, as well as the demolition of Palestinian homes, cannot be accepted as a legitimate means of self-defence and violate international humanitarian law," spokesman Fred Eckhard said in a statement on Israel's military action in the Jabalya refugee camp earlier today.
Mother of 10 children killed by Israel; 14 Palestinian dead (March 7)
http://www.arabicnews.com/ansub/Daily/Day/030307/2003030713.html
Some 11 Palestinians were killed and other 140 wounded including 40 in critical conditions, including 25 children and 4 journalists working for Reuters. Those Palestinians were victims of a new Israeli attack committed by the Israeli forces which broke yesterday, using 20 tanks and 4 bulldozers, escorted by military helicopters into Jabalia camp in Gaza and fired its shells and missiles randomly, leaving behind this large number of victims. These Israeli forces also totally demolished four Palestinian homes and damaged more than an additional 20 homes and destroyed electricity towers, telephone line, water networks and drainage systems.
Totally Unconvincing (March 7)
http://www.msnbc.com/news/882083.asp?0cl=c1
At his press conference, Bush failed yet again to make his case for war. Here’s why. He was steely, determined, resolute—and totally unconvincing to anyone who didn’t already agree with him.
Thirteen Myths About the Case for War in Iraq (March 4)
http://www.alternet.org/story.html?StoryID=15305
The Internet has certainly played a major role in the current debate over war in Iraq. Recently, a group of online "mythbusters" involved in the 13myths.org project went one step further. They posted a summary of key claims made by the proponents of war and then invited hundreds of people to offer suggestions on how to respond. The result is at http://www.13myths.org
More Evidence of U.S. Govt 9/11 Complicity (March 4) (MUST READ!!)
http://feralnews.com/issues/911/dewdney/media_release_030304.html
Professor A.K. Dewdney, author of 'Ghost Riders in the Sky', has released the results of an experiment testing the feasibility of claims that cellphone calls were made from 'hijacked' airplanes on September 11th 2001. The cellphone calls from hijacked planes were a crucial element of the 'official version' of the horrific events of '9/11', as they directly corroborated the notion that all four planes were hijacked by Arab terrorists. Dewdney's experiment suggests that it is highly unlikely the cellphone calls took place as reported...
'Dirty Bomb' Material Stolen From Halliburton In Nigeria (More Cheneynigan!)
http://rense.com/general35/dirt.htm
You Will Lose, Mr. President (March 4)
http://truthout.org/docs_03/030603A.shtml
A War Policy in Collapse (March 4 - in the Boston Globe)
http://truthout.org/docs_03/030603E.shtml
WHAT A DIFFERENCE a month makes. On Feb. 5, Secretary of State Colin Powell made the Bush administration's case against Iraq with a show of authority that moved many officials and pundits out of ambivalence and into acceptance. The war came to seem inevitable, which then prompted millions of people to express their opposition in streets around the globe. Over subsequent weeks, the debate between hawks and doves took on the strident character of ideologues beating each other with fixed positions. The sputtering rage of war opponents and the grandiose abstractions of war advocates both seemed disconnected from the relentless marshaling of troops. War was coming. Further argument was fruitless. The time seemed to have arrived, finally, for a columnist to change the subject. And then the events of last week. Within a period of a few days, the war policy of the Bush administration suddenly showed signs of incipient collapse. No one of these developments by itself marks the ultimate reversal of fortune for Bush, but taken together, they indicate that the law of ''unintended consequences,'' which famously unravels the best-laid plans of warriors, may apply this time before the war formally begins. Unraveling is underway. Consider what happened as February rolled into March: Tony Blair forcefully criticized George W. Bush for his obstinacy on global environmental issues, a truly odd piece of timing for such criticism from a key ally yet a clear effort to get some distance from Washington. Why now? CLIP
A Trial Balloon? - "Five to Ten Times Worse Than the Patriot Act"
http://www.fromthewilderness.com/free/ww3/022503_patriot_2.html
Secret Bush Legislation Sent to Cheney, Hastert, Deepens Assault on Constitution
Civil Liberties After 9/11: Timeline
http://www.pbs.org/now/politics/timeline.html
Vatican grasps olive branch amid rumours of address to UN (March 5)
http://news.independent.co.uk/world/politics/story.jsp?story=383934
U.K. soldiers told not to look aggressive
http://www.cbc.ca/stories/2003/03/04/uk_soldiers030304
Meet the People: No More Media Lies!!!! (March 2)
http://dc.indymedia.org/front.php3?article_id=53342&group=webcast
Fed-Up Viewers Say, “No More Lies!” People Smash Their TVs at NBC Studios
Dismantle the Weapons of Mass Deception! (...) One television smasher, Noah Hypocrisy, told reporters that he was fed-up with the invasion of the military-industrial-media complex in his life, especially in light of the impending war on Iraq: “In the United States and other Western powers, the corporate-owned media depend on the military for information, accepting what military officers at the Pentagon or the White House spinners offer as undeniable fact.” “I’m not that gullible, and I’m mad as hell at what I’m seeing on my television set!”
Iran calls for UN-sponsored election in Iraq (March 4)
http://www.cbc.ca/stories/2003/03/04/iranplan030304
Iran says neighbouring Iraq should hold elections supervised by the United Nations as a way of averting war.
H2 - POWERING THE FUTURE (Excellent site and resources on fuel cells!)
http://www.cbc.ca/venture/fuelcell/index.html
The world is growing more desperate by the day for a clean, cheap and stable energy source. Could it be hydrogen?
The Iceland Experiment
http://www.cbc.ca/venture/fuelcell/iceland.html
US Makes Afghanistan #1 in Heroin Again!
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/business/2814861.stm
Afghanistan retook its place as the world's leading producer of heroin last year, after US-led forces overthrew the Taliban which had banned cultivation of opium poppies. The finding was made in a key drug report, distributed in Kabul on Sunday by the US State Department, which supports almost identical findings by the United Nations last week.
Budget report sees $1.8 trillion in red ink (March 8)
http://www.omaha.com/index.php?u_np=0&u_pg=54&u_sid=675663
WASHINGTON (AP) - President Bush's budget would produce unyielding deficits through the next decade totaling $1.82 trillion, Congress' top budget analyst said Friday, prompting debate over Bush's plan for more tax cuts. The analysis by the nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office also accentuated how abruptly the government's fiscal fortunes are declining. Just two years ago, forecasters envisioned an unprecedented $5.6 trillion in surpluses for the next decade.
1.
WE MUST ALL CONTRIBUTE TO EXPOSE THIS CRIME AGAINST HUMANITY - AND AMERICAN SOLDIERS!
Get Ready For More American Deaths From the Infamous 'Gulf Syndrome'
Douglas Rokke has a PhD in health physics and was originally trained as a forensic scientist. When the Gulf War started, he was assigned by the US military to prepare soldiers to respond to nuclear, biological, and chemical warfare, and sent to the Gulf. What he experienced has made him a passionate voice for peace, traveling the US to speak out. The following interview was conducted by the director of the Traprock Peace Center, Sunny Miller:
Sunny Miller (SM): Any viewer who saw the war on television had the impression this was an easy war, fought from a distance and soldiers coming back relatively unharmed. Is this an accurate picture?
Douglas Rokke (DR): At the completion of the Gulf War, when we came back to the United States in the fall of 1991, we had a total casualty count of 760: 294 dead, a little over 400 wounded or ill. But the casualty rate now for Gulf War veterans is approximately 30 percent. Of those stationed in the theater, including after the conflict, 221,000 have been awarded disability, according to a Veterans Affairs (VA) report issued September 10, 2002.
Many of the US casualties died as a direct result of uranium munitions friendly fire. US forces killed and wounded US forces. We recommended care for anybody downwind of any uranium dust, anybody working in and around uranium contamination, and anyone within a vehicle, structure, or building that's struck with uranium munitions. That's thousands upon thousands of individuals, but not only US troops.
You should provide medical care not only for the enemy soldiers, but for the Iraqi women and children affected, and clean up all of the contamination in Iraq. And it's not just children in Iraq. It's children born to soldiers after they came back home. The military admitted that they were finding uranium excreted in the semen of the soldiers. If you've got uranium in the semen, the genetics are messed up. So when the children were conceived -- the alpha particles cause such tremendous cell damage and genetics damage that everything goes bad. Studies have found that male soldiers who served in the Gulf War were almost twice as likely to have a child with a birth defect, and female soldiers almost three times as likely.
SM: You have been a military man for over 35 years. You served in Vietnam as a bombardier and you are still in the US Army Reserves. Now you're going around the country speaking about the dangers of depleted uranium (DU). What made you decide you had to speak publicly about DU?
DR: Everybody on my team was getting sick. My best friend John Sitton was dying. The military refused him medical care, and he died. John set up the medical evacuation communication system for the entire theater. Then he got contaminated doing the work. John and Rolla Dolph and I were best friends in the civilian world, the military world, forever. Rolla got sick. I personally got the order that sent him to war. We were both activated together. I was given the assignment to teach nuclear, biological, and chemical warfare and make sure soldiers came back alive and safe. I take it seriously. I was sent to the Gulf with this instruction: Bring 'em back alive. Clear as could be. But when I got all the training together, all the environmental cleanup procedures together all the medical directives, nothing happened.
More than 100 American soldiers were exposed to DU in friendly fire accidents, plus untold numbers of soldiers who climbed on and entered tanks that had been hit with DU, taking photos and gathering souvenirs to take home. They didn't know about the hazards.
DU is an extremely effective weapon. Each tank round is 10 pounds of solid uranium-238 contaminated with plutonium, neptunium, americium. It is pyrophoric, generating intense heat on impact, penetrating a tank because of the heavy weight of its metal. When uranium munitions hit, it's like a firestorm inside any vehicle or structure, and so we saw tremendous burns, tremendous injuries. It was devastating.
The US military decided to blow up Saddam's chemical, biological, and radiological stockpiles in place, which released the contamination back on the US troops and on everybody in the whole region. The chemical agent detectors and radiological monitors were going off all over the place. We had all of the various nerve agents. We think there were biological agents, and there were destroyed nuclear reactor facilities. It was a toxic wasteland. And we had DU added to this whole mess.
When we first got assigned to clean up the DU and arrived in northern Saudi Arabia, we started getting sick within 72 hours. Respiratory problems, rashes, bleeding, open sores started almost immediately.
When you have a mass dose of radioactive particulates and you start breathing that in, the deposit sits in the back of the pharynx, where the cancer started initially on the first guy. It doesn't take a lot of time. I had a father and son working with me. The father is already dead from lung cancer, and the sick son is still denied medical care.
SM: Did you suspect what was happening?
DR: We didn't know anything about DU when the Gulf War started. As a warrior, you're listening to your leaders, and they're saying there are no health effects from the DU. But, as we started to study this, to go back to what we learned in physics and our engineering -- I was a professor of environmental science and engineering -- you learn rapidly that what they're telling you doesn't agree with what you know and observe. In June of 1991, when I got back to the States, I was sick. Respiratory problems and the rashes and neurological things were starting to show up.
SM: Why didn't you go to the VA with a medical complaint?
DR: Because I was still in the Army, and I was told I couldn't file. You have to have the information that connects your exposure to your service before you go to the VA. The VA obviously wasn't going to take care of me, so I went to my private physician. We had no idea what it was, but so many good people were coming back sick. They didn't do tests on me or my team members. According to the Department of Defense's own guidelines put out in 1992, any excretion level in the urine above 15 micrograms of uranium per day should result in immediate medical testing, and when you get up to 250 micrograms of total uranium excreted per day, you're supposed to be under continuous medical care.
Finally the US Department of Energy performed a radio-bio-essay on me in November 1994, while I was director of the Depleted Uranium Project for the Department of Defense. My excretion rate was approximately 1500 micrograms per day. My level was 5 to 6 times beyond the level that requires continuous medical care. But they didn't tell me for two and a half years.
SM: What are the symptoms of exposure to DU?
DR: Fibromyalgia. Eye cataracts from the radiation. When uranium impacts any type of vehicle or structure, uranium oxide dust and pieces of uranium explode all over the place. This can be breathed in or go into a wound. Once it gets in the body, a portion of this stuff is soluble, which means it goes into the blood stream and all of your organs. The insoluble fraction stays -- in the lungs, for example. The radiation damage and the particulates destroy the lungs.
SM: What kind of training have the troops had, who are getting called up right now -- the ones being shipped to the vicinity of what may be the next Gulf War?
DR: As the director of the Depleted Uranium Project, I developed a 40-hour block of training. All that curriculum has been shelved.
They turned what I wrote into a 20-minute program that's full of distortions. It doesn't deal with the reality of uranium munitions. The equipment is defective. The General Accounting Office verified that the gas masks leak, the chemical protective suits leak. Unbelievably, Defense Department officials recently said the defects can be fixed with duct tape.(AGAIN?)
SM: If my neighbors are being sent off to combat with equipment and training that is inadequate, and into battle with a toxic weapon, DU, who can speak up?
DR: Every husband and wife, son and daughter, grandparent, aunt and uncle needs to call their congressmen and cite these official government reports and force the military to ensure that our troops have adequate equipment and adequate training. If we don't take care of our American veterans after a war, as happened with the Gulf War, and now we're about ready to send them into a war again... we can't do it. We just can't do it. It's a crime against God.
It's a crime against humanity to use uranium munitions in a war, and it's devastating to ignore the consequences of war. These consequences last for eternity. The half life of uranium 238 is 4.5 billion years. And we left over 320 tons all over the place in Iraq.
We also bombarded Vieques, Puerto Rico, with DU in preparation for the war in Kosovo. That's affecting American citizens on American territory. When I tried to activate our team from the Department of Defense responsible for radiological safety and DU cleanup in Vieques, I was told no. When I tried to activate medical care, I was told no.
The US Army made me their expert. I went into the project with the total intent to ensure they could use uranium munitions in war, because I'm a warrior. What I saw as director of the project, doing the research and working with my own medical conditions and everybody else's, led me to one conclusion: uranium munitions must be banned from the planet, for eternity, and medical care must be provided for everyone, not just the US or the Canadians or the British or the Germans or the French but for the American citizens of Vieques, for the residents of Iraq, of Okinawa, of Scotland, of Indiana, of Maryland, and now Afghanistan and Kosovo.
SM: If your information got out widely, do you think there's a possibility that the families of those soldiers would beg them to refuse?
DR: If you're going to be sent into a toxic wasteland, and you know you are going to wear gas masks and chemical protective suits that leak, and you re not going to get any medical care after you're exposed to all of these things, would you go? Suppose they gave a war and nobody came. You've got to start peace sometime.
SM: It does sound remarkable for someone who has been in the military for 35 years to be talking about when peace should begin.
DR: When I do these talks, especially in churches, I'm reminded that these religions say, "And a child will lead us to peace". But if we contaminate the environment, where will the child come from? The children won't be there. War has become obsolete, because we can't deal with the consequences on our warriors or the environment, but more important, on the noncombatants. When you reach a point in war when the contamination and the health effects of war can't be cleaned up because of the weapons you use, and medical care can't be given to the soldiers who participated in the war on either side or to the civilians affected, then it's time for peace.
---
See also:
The WISE Uranium Project
http://www.antenna.nl/wise/uranium/
The National Gulf War Resource Center
http://www.ngwrc.org
Veterans for Common Sense
http://www.veteransforcommonsense.org
Sunny Miller's interview with Douglas Rokke was originally broadcast on WMFO (Boston) in November 2002 and is available for re-broadcast at http://www.traprockpeace.org
We Say Liberation, You Say War Crimes (March 7)
http://www.alternet.org/story.html?StoryID=15337
(...) In 1991, American gunners fired a million rounds of DU projectiles to destroy Iraqi armored vehicles. DU rounds are far more effective than regular ammunition at penetrating armor: They are denser and generate intense heat on impact, and literally burn their way through. The heat also causes the radioactive DU to disintegrate into fine particles that contaminate soil, water, air and people. The Pentagon does not deny that DU carries risks. Washington tightly regulates its creation and use, and mandates disposal into low-level radioactive waste dumps. But in Iraq, DU blows in the desert wind across its still-radioactive battlefields; it clings to old tank bodies; it contaminates the environment. (...) From Baghdad to Basra, and from government officials to foreign-trained doctors and impoverished mothers, the Iraqis I talked to all believe that DU is causing an epidemic of cancer and birth defects. According to Jawad Khudim al-Ali, director of the cancer ward at Saddam Teaching Hospital in Basra – the area most exposed to DU – cancer rates are now 11 times what they were before the last war. Doctors at the hospital wheeled out for me an elderly woman, who they said was dying of cancer caused by DU. (...) In the impending war, the Pentagon will again use DU weapons, and again controversy will flare in the United States over just how dangerous they are to American troops and Iraqi civilians. But in Iraq, there is no debate. And if the United States succeeds in taking over the country, it may come to understand another "side effect" of DU: the widespread belief that the "liberators" committed heinous war crimes. In such a climate, American prospects for nation building in Iraq are hardly bright.
Depleted Uranium: Nuclear Threat
http://www.justview.org/depleteduranium.html
2.
From: http://www.pbs.org/now/commentary/moyers19.html
Patriotism and the Flag
by Bill Moyers
February 28, 2003
I put the flag in my lapel tonight. First time. Until now I haven't thought it necessary to display a little metallic icon of patriotism for everyone to see. It was enough to vote, pay my taxes, perform my civic duties, speak my mind, and do my best to raise our kids to be good Americans. Sometimes I would offer a small prayer of gratitude that I had been born in a country whose institutions sustained me, whose armed forces protected me, and whose ideals inspired me; I offered my heart's affections in return. It no more occurred to me to flaunt the flag on my chest than it did to pin my mother's picture on my lapel to prove her son's love. Mother knew where I stood; so does my country. I even tuck a valentine in my tax returns on April 15.
So what's this flag doing here? Well, I put it on to take it back. The flag's been hijacked and turned into a logo -- the trademark of a monopoly on patriotism. On those Sunday morning talk shows, official chests appear adorned with the flag as if it is the Good Housekeeping seal of approval. And during the State of the Union, did you notice Bush and Cheney wearing the flag? How come? No administration's patriotism is ever in doubt, only its policies. And the flag bestows no immunity from error. When I see flags sprouting on official lapels, I think of the time in China when I saw Mao's Little Red Book on every official's desk, omnipresent and unread.
But more galling than anything are all those moralistic ideologues in Washington sporting the flag in their lapels while writing books and running Web sites and publishing magazines attacking dissenters as un-American. They are people whose ardor for war grows disproportionately to their distance from the fighting. They're in the same league as those swarms of corporate lobbyists wearing flags and prowling Capitol Hill for tax breaks even as they call for more spending on war.
So I put this on as a modest riposte to men with flags in their lapels who shoot missiles from the safety of Washington think tanks, or argue that sacrifice is good as long as they don't have to make it, or approve of bribing governments to join the coalition of the willing (after they first stash the cash). I put it on to remind myself that not every patriot thinks we should do to the people of Baghdad what bin Laden did to us. The flag belongs to the country, not to the government. And it reminds me that it's not un-American to think that war -- except in self-defense -- is a failure of moral imagination, political nerve, and diplomatic skill. Come to think of it, standing up to your government can mean standing up for your country.
What do you think?
---
See also:
Transcript: Bill Moyers Interviews Nat Hentoff (Feb 28)
http://www.pbs.org/now/transcript/transcript_hentoff.html
Total Awareness Information System still funded!
3.
From: http://www.latimes.com/news/opinion/la-oe-scheer4mar04,1,6834172.column
Bush Pushes the Big Lie Toward the Brink
By Robert Scheer
Even some in government can no longer be silent in the face of falsehood.
So the truth is out: George W. Bush lied when he claimed to be worried about Iraq's alleged weapons of mass destruction. Otherwise, Iraq's stepped-up cooperation with the U.N. on disarmament would be stunningly good news, obviating the need to rush to war.
Instead, the U.N. weapons inspectors' verification of Iraq's destruction of missiles, private meetings with Iraqi weapons scientists, visits to locations where biological and chemical weapons were destroyed in 1991 and a series of unfettered flights by U2 spy plans have been met with a shrug and sneer in Washington. The White House line is that even if the Iraqis destroy all their slingshots, Goliath is still bringing his tanks and instituting "regime change." The arrogance is breathtaking. We have demanded that a country disarm -- and even as it is doing so, we say it doesn't matter: it's too late; we're coming in. Put down your guns and await the slaughter.
Abraham Lincoln once observed that even a free people can be fooled for a time -- and this, mind you, was long before Fox News existed -- and in his chaotic two-year presidency, Bush has pushed the Big Lie approach so far that we are seeing dramatic signs of its cracking: an international backlash, a domestic peace movement and whistle-blowing from inside our own intelligence and diplomatic corps.
"We have not seen such systematic distortion of intelligence, such systematic manipulation of the American people, since the war in Vietnam," wrote John Brady Kiesling, a 20-year veteran of the U.S. Foreign Service in his letter of resignation last week to Secretary of State Colin Powell. Kiesling, who was political counselor in U.S. embassies throughout the Mideast, added that "until this administration, it had been possible to believe that by upholding the policies of my president, I was also upholding the interests of the American people and the world. I believe it no longer."
And this brave man is not the only one who has caught on. The entire world is astonished that our president is lying not about a personal indiscretion but about the most sacred duty of the leader of the most powerful nation in human history not to recklessly endanger the lives of his own or the world's people. Yet lie he has.
The first lie, claimed outright, was that Iraq aided and abetted the Sept. 11 terrorists. There is no evidence at all for this claim. It is also interesting to note that not a single leading Al Qaeda operative has turned out to be Iraqi. The latest to be nabbed, Khalid Shaikh Mohammed, was living in Pakistan, was raised in Kuwait and studied engineering -- and presumably the physics of explosives -- at a college in North Carolina.
The second lie was that Iraq's alleged weapons of mass destruction represent an imminent threat to U.S. security. Despite the most hugely expensive but secret high-tech spy operation in human history -- estimated by most at well over $100 billion a year -- and a vast network of defectors and spies, we have not been able to find their supposed weapons.
The third and most dangerous lie is that our mission now is to bring lasting peace to the Mideast by a devastating invasion of Iraq, which will end, as the president outlined last week, in U.S. dominance over the structure of government and politics throughout the region. After abandoning promising efforts by the previous administration to create peace between Israel and the Palestinians, the Bush team now claims that changing Muslim governments around the world will end the downward spiral of violence there. Which leads us to another lie: that this is all good for our ally, Israel -- the claim of the cabal of neoconservative ideologues running our Mideast policy. In fact, however, Israel will be placed in a terribly dangerous position, serving as a fig leaf for U.S. ambitions, further ensuring that it remain forever an isolated military garrison.
This construction of a new world order comes from a naive and untraveled president, emboldened in his ignorance by advisors who have been plotting an aggressive Pax Americana ever since the Soviet bloc's collapse. Bush insiders Richard Perle, Elliott Abrams, Dick Cheney, Paul Wolfowitz and Donald Rumsfeld are all members of something called the Project for a New American Century that has been pushing for a U.S. redesign of the Mideast since 1997. After Sept. 11, they seized on our national tragedy as a way to enlist George W. in support of their grand design. Not only was this reckless scheme never mentioned by Bush during the election campaign, it was the sort of thing renounced as "nation-building," something he would never support. Yet another lie.
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