Saturday, April 16 2005   -   9/11 Consequences

by Chris Floyd
April 15, 2005
Follow-up to "Into the Dark."

Yet another brutal wake up call for those still doubting that this administration would sacrifice innocent lives to further its geo-political agenda. - Ed.

More than two years ago, we wrote here of a secret Pentagon plan to foment terrorism: sending covert agents to infiltrate terrorist groups and goad them into action — i.e., committing acts of murder and destruction... It was a plan that countenanced — indeed, encouraged — the deliberate murder of innocent people and the imposition of U.S. military rule anywhere in the world that American leaders desired.

This plan is now being activated.

In fact, it's being expanded, as the New Yorker's Seymour Hersh revealed. Not only will U.S.-directed agents infiltrate existing terrorist groups and provoke them into action; the Pentagon itself will create its own terrorist groups and "death squads."  

Saturday, April 9 2005   -   9/11 Consequences

By George Monbiot
The Guardian UK
April 5, 2005

Liberal handwringing over the World Bank simply reflects a failure to recognise the role it exists to fulfil.

Big Picture Alert! Profoundly insightful piece on the role and redemption a former 9/11 insider may find proving two wrongs can make a right. - Ed.

It's about as close to consensus as the left is ever likely to come. Everyone this side of Atilla the Hun and the Wall Street Journal agrees that Paul Wolfowitz's appointment as president of the World Bank is a catastrophe. Except me.

 

Monday, March 28 2005   -   9/11 Consequences

Whistleblower Daniel Ellsberg on the Bush Administration, Civil Disobedience and the Eternal Fires of Hell

by Mira Ptacin
CommonDreams.org
March 29, 2005

Excerpts: "Right now there's at least one Special Forces team under control of the White House operating in this country to take 'extra legal actions'. Now, that sounds to me like a White House-controlled death squad. And that is what the White House sent against me. It's not clear whether the intention was to kill me then, the words were to 'incapacitate Daniel Ellsberg totally'. When I asked their prosecutor, 'does that mean to kill me?'... He said,'You have to understand these guys that were CIA assets never use the words 'kill'.'

I think that's the kind of thing we do have in our future, especially when there's another terrorist attack. In that case, I think we'll see enacted very quickly a new Patriot Act, which I'm sure has already been drafted which will make the first Patriot Act look like the Bill of Rights, and the Bill of Rights will be a historical memory...

It really is at this point for people to consider sacrificing their own freedom to have a chance to end a war. We need to take risks and we need to protest. People are capable but don't think of being called on for it. We are a rogue superpower and this is not a time to postpone and save ourselves for another time.

 

Saturday, March 26 2005   -   9/11 Consequences

-- Say hello to Taliban America and goodbye to godless judges, courts and law.

by W. David Kubiak
March 24, 2005

Tired of waiting for the Second Coming to enforce Christ's rule on Earth? Fortunately, so is your Congress and they know how to "bring it on."

Just when you thought the corporatist/Christian Coalition had milked the 9/11 "surprise" for all it was worth in powers, profits and votes, we regret to report that you may have to think again. Just in case you've briefly fallen behind on your rightwing mailing lists, you might have missed the March 3rd filing of Senate bill S. 520 and House version is H.R. 1070, AKA the "Constitution Restoration Act" (CRA).

 

Tuesday, March 22 2005   -   9/11 Consequences

USA Today
March 21, 2005

One big loss for Zacarias Moussaoui. One huge loss for the Bill of Rights and the US Constitution. But then again the 9/11 Commission Report took the government's word about "classified interrogations" on faith, why shouldn't Moussaoui's jury and we? - Ed.

WASHINGTON (AP) — The Supreme Court on Monday rejected terrorism suspect Zacarias Moussaoui's attempt to directly question three al-Qaeda prisoners and cleared the way for a trial of the only U.S. defendant charged in connection with the Sept. 11 attacks.  

Sunday, March 20 2005   -   9/11 Consequences

Courtesy: whitehouse.org

Pentagon strategic plan codifies unilateral, preemptive attacks. The doctrine marks a shift from coalitions such as NATO, analysts say.

[It also lumps international courts of justice with terrorists as threats to American power. - Ed.]

by John Hendren
Los Angeles Times
March 19, 2005

WASHINGTON - Two years after the U.S. invasion of Iraq, the Pentagon has formally included in key strategic plans provisions for launching preemptive strikes against nations thought to pose a threat to the United States.

 

Thursday, March 17 2005   -   9/11 Consequences

By Greg Palast
Reporting for Newsnight
BBC News
March 17, 2005

This report reveals that the Iraq invasion, masked as a coup d'?tat, was being planned while Bush was still celebrating his inauguration in January 2001. However, the invasion would require a massive US military mobilization and abrupt belligerant public support, none of which would have been politically possible without 9/11 and the ensuing Afghan war. The key unaddressed issue here is who would bother to plan a politically impossible adventure if the vital enabling events were not anticipated too. - Ed.

The Bush administration made plans for war and for Iraq's oil before the 9/11 attacks, sparking a policy battle between neo-cons and Big Oil, BBC's Newsnight has revealed.

Two years ago today - when President George Bush announced US, British and Allied forces would begin to bomb Baghdad - protesters claimed the US had a secret plan for Iraq's oil once Saddam had been conquered.

In fact there were two conflicting plans, setting off a hidden policy war between neo-conservatives at the Pentagon, on one side, versus a combination of "Big Oil" executives and US State Department "pragmatists".

 

Thursday, March 10 2005   -   9/11 Consequences

By Michael Shnayerson
Vanity Fair
March 7, 2005

Halliburton subsidiary KBR got $12 billion worth of exclusive contracts for work in Iraq. But even more shocking is how KBR spent some of the money. Former U.S. Army Corps of Engineers official Bunnatine Greenhouse is blowing the whistle on the Dick Cheney-linked company's profits of war.

Who profited most from 9/11 and the trail of lies that led us into Iraq? Another heroic female whistleblower exposes the increasingly barefaced military-industrial corruption that continues to enrich administration sponsors and insiders. (Recall too that Cheney still holds 433,333 unexercised Halliburton stock options that have skyrocketed in value these last few years.) - Editor

This time, she was sure, they were going to get her.

Bunnatine Greenhouse had been a huge nuisance since the buildup to the war in Iraq-questioning contracts, writing caveats on them in her spidery script, wanting to know why Halliburton and its subsidiary KBR (formerly known as Kellogg, Brown and Root) should be thrown billions of dollars of government business while other companies, big and small, were shut out.

 

Thursday, March 10 2005   -   9/11 Consequences

Congressional Record
-House H10122
October 29, 2003

Yet another 9/11 "Cui bono?" (who profits?) alert: This is almost ancient news by now if anyone was listening, but this is one of the clearest earliest Congressional examinations of rampant corruption in Iraq. It was a typical after hours empty chamber exercise, but the intrepid Marcy Kaptur did get Cheney's continuing possession of 433,333 Halliburton stock options and his consequent millions in war profits into the public record at last. - Ed.

Excerpts:
Mr. PALLONE. Mr. Speaker, earlier this month Congress approved an $87 billion supplemental for the war and reconstruction efforts in Iraq...

The Bush administration must account for its war strategy. The Bush administration must also answer the tough questions regarding questionable no-bid contracts, contracts that benefit Vice President DICK CHENEY's former employer, an employer that continues to pay CHENEY hundreds of thousands of dollars each year in deferred salary, contracts that are free of any oversight from Congress.

Mr. Speaker, right now Halliburton holds a monopoly on Iraq. The company's no-bid contract was first negotiated in secret and originally intended for the sole purpose of extinguishing oil fires that could result from the war. Once again in secret last spring, that contract was extended with the Army to include the reconstruction and repair of Iraq's oil infrastructure. The administration did not allow other companies an opportunity to bid on this reconstruction.

Now, today, Mr. Speaker, just today, Halliburton faces no competition and no oversight. And today also the Bush administration announced the contract would be extended longer than expected, blaming sabotage of oil facilities for delays in replacement contracts.

 

Tuesday, March 8 2005   -   9/11 Consequences

by Harvey Wasserman
Columbus Free Press / Ohio
March 7, 2005

The U.S. Senate's senior Constitutional scholar has correctly equated Bush with Hitler, and the usual attack dogs are howling. But they are wrong, and Americans must now face the harsh realities of an increasingly fascist and totalitarian GOP.

Extremely important "big picture" insights into the Bush team's 9/11-enabled world from a fearless senator and a Holocaust victim family member. - Editor

Excerpts: Byrd is one of the few in either house of Congress to truly understand the Constitution and to advocate for the Bill of Rights. He points out that like Hitler, Bush is pursuing a strategy designed to win absolute rule by one party and one leader. Hitler's central slogan "Ein Volk, Ein Reich, Ein Fuhrer" -- one people, one government, one dictator -- accurately describes the current GOP strategy of Karl Rove, Bush's Joseph Goebbels...

Fascism has long been clearly and simply defined as corporate control of the state, with strong totalitarian, militaristic, anti-feminist and anti-gay characteristics.

Both Mussolini's Fascist's and Hitler's Nazis used acts of terror and alleged terror to grab absolute power. Ranting at Bolshevism as the GOP now does against Islam, the Nazis used the burning of the Reichstag much as the GOP has capitalized on the terror attacks of September 11.

 

Tuesday, March 1 2005   -   9/11 Consequences

by Ray McGovern
March 2, 2005
TomDispatch.com

This long heads-up analysis of our apparently imminent war on Iran by CIA veteran (and 9/11 Truth Statement co-signer) Ray McGovern is vital reading for three reasons. One, it outlines the endgame of the Bush team's global petro-dominance plan, a plan that arguably first became public when planes started striking the WTC towers in New York. Second, it speaks clearly and courageously about Israel's provocative nuclear arsenal and the overwhelming power Israeli rightists like Sharon now wield over US policy. And finally, it instructively portrays the hell-bent Orwellian mindset of the reigning neocon crew, who were collectively called "the crazies" in the Reagan/Bush era and whom Colin Powell was still calling "the f**king crazies" a year after 9/11 hit. It is not a pretty picture, but understanding the methodic deception that empowers their madness also moves us closer to 9/11 truth. - Editor

"'This notion that the United States is getting ready to attack Iran is simply ridiculous.'
(Short pause)
"'And having said that, all options are on the table.'
"Even the White House stenographers felt obliged to note the result: '(Laughter).'"
-(The Washington Post's Dan Froomkin on George Bush's February 22 press conference)

For a host of good reasons -- the huge and draining commitment of U.S. forces to Iraq and Iran's ability to stir the Iraqi pot to boiling, for starters -- the notion that the Bush administration would mount a "preemptive" air attack on Iran seems insane. And still more insane if the objective includes overthrowing Iran's government again, as in 1953 -- this time under the rubric of "regime change."

But Bush administration policy toward the Middle East is being run by men -- yes, only men -- who were routinely referred to in high circles in Washington during the 1980s as "the crazies." I can attest to that personally, but one need not take my word for it.

Full Monty here"