Dear Friends:

Sometimes language obscures the true meaning of things. Doublespeak often suggests a noble cause, thus justifying the death and destruction that accompany it. A democratic country can't successfully wage war without the popular support of its people, and a well-constructed myth, broadcast through mass media, can deliver that support--even when the noble cause seems doubtful to the rest of the world.

The following is an edited excerpt from the newly released book "Weapons of Mass Deception: the Uses of Propaganda in Bush's War on Iraq", by Sheldon Rampton and John Stauber, in which they delve into the impact of "information warriors and perception managers" on Bush's attempt to manipulate public opinion in favor of war on Iraq. ____________________________

AlterNet July 28, 2003

The Fog of War Talk by John Stauber and Sheldon Rampton

[Editor's Note: This is an edited excerpt from the newly released book "Weapons of Mass Deception: the Uses of Propaganda in Bush's War on Iraq", by Sheldon Rampton and John Stauber.]

"In our time, political speech and writing are largely the defense of the indefensible," George Orwell wrote in 1946. "Things like the continuance of British rule in India, the Russian purges and deportations, the dropping of the atom bombs on Japan, can indeed be defended, but only by arguments which are too brutal for most people to face, and which do not square with the professed aims of the political parties. Thus political language has to consist largely of euphemism, question-begging and sheer cloudy vagueness."

Orwell was a shrewd observer of the relationship between politics and language. He did not actually invent the term "doublespeak," but he popularized the concept, which is an amalgam of two terms that he coined in "1984," his greatest novel. Orwell used the term "doublethink" to describe a contradictory way of thinking that lets people say things that mean the opposite of what they actually think. He used the term "newspeak" to describe words "deliberately constructed for political purposes: words, that is to say, which not only had in every case a political implication, but were intended to impose a desirable mental attitude upon the person using them."

Hail the Noble Warriors

Doublespeak has accompanied war for thousands of years. English professor William Lutz has found examples as early as Julius Caesar, who described his brutal and bloody conquest of Gaul as "pacification." "The military is acutely aware that the reason for its existence is to wage war, and war means killing people and the deaths of American soldiers as well," he states. "Because the reality of war and its consequences are so harsh, the military almost instinctively turns to doublespeak when discussing war."

Doublespeak often suggests a noble cause to justify the death and destruction. Practically speaking, a democratic country cannot wage war without the popular support of its citizens. A well-constructed myth, broadcast through mass media, can deliver that support even when the noble cause itself seems dubious to the rest of the world.

Consider the now-famous phrase, "axis of evil," which was first used by President Bush in his Jan. 29, 2002 State of the Union address. The concept of an "axis," of course, evokes memories of the "Axis powers" of World War II and suggests an alliance or confederation of states that pose a significant danger precisely because of their common alignment -- a menace greater than the sum of the parts. But, in fact, Iran and Iraq have been bitter adversaries for decades, and there is no pattern of collaboration between North Korea and the other two states. As for being "evil," while all three nations have been involved in horrible violations of human rights, so have many U.S.-supported nations, such as Colombia or Saudi Arabia. In reality, "axis of evil" is a term chosen to selectively stigmatize countries for the purpose of justifying military actions against them.

If the bad guys have an "axis," the good guys have a "coalition of the willing," to use the term preferred by Colin Powell and other U.S. officials and often repeated uncritically by major television news outlets. The word "coalition" attempted to evoke the feeling of international unity that existed in during the first Gulf War, when the first Bush administration persuaded the United Nations to endorse a broad international coalition of nations who came together to drive Iraq from Kuwait. At a press briefing on Mar. 20, 2003, Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld said, "This is not a unilateral action, as is being characterized in the media. Indeed, the coalition in this activity is larger than the coalition that existed during the Gulf War in 1991."

In truth, the so-called "coalition of the willing" was almost entirely a U.S.-British campaign, with virtually no military contribution from other countries except Australia.

The code names used to designate wars have also become part of the branding process through which war is made to seem noble. Rather than referring to the invasion of Panama as simply a war or invasion, it became Operation Just Cause. (Note also the way that the innocuous word "operation" becomes part of the substitute terminology for war.) The war in Afghanistan was originally named Operation Infinite Justice, a phrase that offended Muslims, who pointed out that only God can dispense infinite justice, so the military planners backed down a bit and called it Operation Enduring Freedom instead. For the invasion of Iraq, they chose Operation Iraqi Freedom.

In PR Week, columnist Paul Holmes examined the significance of the term. "It's possible, I suppose, that Iraqi freedom might be a by-product of this campaign," he wrote, "but to pretend that it's what the exercise is all about is intellectual dishonesty at its most perverse."

However, the phrase served as a powerful framing device. Television networks including Fox and MSNBC used Operation Iraqi Freedom as their tagline for the war, with the phrase appearing in swooshing, 3-D logos accompanied by imagery of flags and other symbols of patriotism. Other phrases favored by the Bush administration -- "the disarmament of Iraq," "coalition forces," the "war on terror," "America strikes back" -- appeared frequently in visual banners, graphics, and bottom-of-the-screen crawls, repeating and reinforcing the government's key talking points in support of war.

Neocon Doublespeak

Sometimes language is chosen for its ability to avoid the plain meaning of what its writers are talking about. Numerous examples of this can be found in "Rebuilding America's Defenses: Strategies, Forces and Resources for a New Century," a report published in 2000 by the Project for the New American Century (PNAC), whose members constitute much of the brain trust for the Bush administration's foreign policy. Criticized overseas as a blueprint for U.S. global domination, the report began by stating that the United States at present is a lone superpower that "faces no global rival. America's grand strategy should aim to preserve and extend this advantageous position as far into the future as possible." To achieve this goal, it recommended establishing permanent U.S. military bases in the Middle East and in regions of the world where they do not currently exist, including Southeast Europe, Latin America and Southeast Asia.

Of course, these ideas sound a bit radical if stated too clearly, so PNAC needed to find language that would soften their meaning. The PNAC report, hence, states that the United States needs to "perform the 'constabulary' duties associated with shaping the security environment in critical regions." The phrase "constabulary duties" is a vague way of transforming U.S. soldiers occupying foreign countries into friendly neighborhood cops. "Shaping the security environment" is polite language for controlling other people at gunpoint, and "critical regions" is a nice way of saying, "countries we want to control."

Similarly, U.S. nuclear weapons -- which would be called "weapons of mass destruction" if someone else owned them -- are described as "the U.S. nuclear deterrent," while missiles with global reach are "defenses to defend the American homeland." How do they "defend" us? They "provide a secure basis for U.S. power projection around the world."

Doublespeak enables PNAC to be simultaneously candid and ambiguous as it speaks of establishing "an American peace" that "must have a secure foundation on unquestioned U.S. military preeminence," in which U.S. troops are stationed throughout the world as the "first line of defense" of an "American security perimeter."

Shocking and Awful War

Sometimes doublespeak can seem very vivid and candid while nevertheless obscuring the real meaning of what is being discussed. For example, "shock and awe" was the term the Bush administration used to announce its strategy of massive, high-tech air strikes on Baghdad. As doctrine of warfare, this term was introduced in a 1996 book by military strategists Harlan K. Ullman and James P. Wade and published by the Command and Control Research Program (CCRP) within the Office of the Assistant Secretary of Defense of the United States. Titled "Shock and Awe: Achieving Rapid Dominance," the book describes shock and awe as a strategy "aimed at influencing the will, perception, and understanding of an adversary rather than simply destroying military capability." It points to several examples in which this strategy has been successful in the past, including the dropping of atom bombs at Hiroshima and Nagasaki, and the Nazi blitzkrieg strategy of World War II.

In January 2003, as the Bush administration moved toward war with Iraq, "Shock and Awe" author Harlan K. Ullman again invoked the example of Hiroshima as he explained the concept to CBS News. "You have this simultaneous effect, rather like the nuclear weapons at Hiroshima, not taking days or weeks but in minutes," he said. "You're sitting in Baghdad and all of a sudden you're the general and 30 of your division headquarters have been wiped out. You also take the city down. By that I mean you get rid of their power, water. In two, three, four, five days they are physically, emotionally and psychologically exhausted."

Upon the onset of actual war, however, military and media pundits depicted "shock and awe" in sanitary terms, claiming that the high accuracy of laser-guided "smart bombs" would make it possible to decapitate the Iraqi military while leaving the country's infrastructure intact and limiting civilian casualties. Similar claims were made during the first war in the Persian Gulf and were later found to be exaggerated. Like other examples of doublespeak, the concept of "shock and awe" enables its users to symbolically reconcile two contradictory ideas. On the one hand, its theorists use the term to plan massive uses of deadly force. On the other hand, its focus on the psychological effect of that force makes it possible to use the term while distancing audiences from direct contemplation of the human suffering that force creates.

The Language of Imperialism

Sometimes doublespeak completely reverses the meaning of words. Paul Holmes observed that "the most Orwellian usage of all has been the recent application of the word 'relevance,' as in 'the United Nations faced a test of its relevance, and failed.' Relevance, in this context, means willingness to rubberstamp whatever demands the U.S. makes. If that sounds very much like irrelevance to you, perhaps you don't understand the might-makes-right world in which we are living."

In normal times, "diplomacy" refers to the process by which nations seek to resolve their differences peacefully, through negotiations and compromise. During the buildup to war, however, "diplomacy" became the process through which the United States attempted to pressure other nations into supporting the war. When they refused, this became the "failure of diplomacy."

Similarly, the Bush administration used the phrase "pre-emptive defense" to describe its decision to attack first, without an overt act of Iraqi provocation -- a phrase that could be used to justify attacking anyone we want on the grounds that they might attack us one day. Note also the substitution of the word "defense" for "war" -- a perennial use of doublespeak that dates back in the United States to 1947, when the Department of War was renamed the "Department of Defense."

Sometimes language merely fogs up the meaning of things. "Regime change," another phrase credited to the Project for the New American Century, sanitizes the imperial project of overthrowing a foreign government through a military invasion. It makes the process seem tidy, efficient, and rational. The phrase makes it possible to talk about invading Iraq without even thinking about the human consequences: assassination, occupation, or the deaths of thousands of innocents.

And indeed there was no debate in the United States about these realities prior to the war. No questions were raised in the administration or Congress about whether the social cost actually justified the military action. Of course, raising such questions does not necessarily mean you must oppose military action. It is possible to raise these issues and to still argue that the benefits of invading Iraq and overthrowing its government outweigh the costs. In the United States, however, the Bush administration never attempted to make such an argument. Instead, it used language to sidestep addressing the harms caused by war.

The Chicago Tribune's Bob Kemper reported that federal civilian employees and military personnel were told by the White House to refer to the invasion of Iraq as a "war of liberation." Iraqi paramilitary forces were to be called "death squads."

The War to Never End Wars

The idea of a "war on terrorism" is itself a form of doublespeak. It reflects a now-pervasive habit of using war as a metaphor for all sorts of things that are not really wars at all. "Do you ever notice in this country that when we have a problem with something, we always have to declare war on it?," the comedian George Carlin once quipped. "The War on Illiteracy, the War on AIDS, the War on Homelessness, the War on Drugs... We don't actually do anything about it, but we've declared war on it."

At the very beginning of the "war on terrorism," a reporter asked Donald Rumsfeld, "Sir, what constitutes a victory in this new environment? I mean, Cap Weinberger in 1987 laid down some pretty clear rules for engaging U.S. forces. One was, clear goals that are militarily achievable, that you can explain that there's an endgame. What's some of your early thinking here in terms of what constitutes victory?"

"That's a good question, as to what constitutes victory," Rumsfeld replied. "Now, what is victory? I say that victory is persuading the American people and the rest of the world that this is not a quick matter that's going to be over in a month or a year or even five years. It is something that we need to do so that we can continue to live in a world with powerful weapons and with people who are willing to use those powerful weapons. And we can do that as a country. And that would be a victory, in my view."

Rumsfeld is a clever man, and figuring out the meaning behind his words requires careful reading. At first glance, you might be tempted to think that he was saying the United States would win a victory by maintaining its own possession of "powerful weapons." Actually, though, he was admitting that even as a superpower, the United States will not be able to stop the rest of the world from obtaining powerful weapons with which to "impose damage on us."

If terrorism itself cannot be ended, Rumsfeld was saying, we therefore need to change the way we think about the problem, so that we know better than to expect an "endgame" to the war on terror. His definition of victory, in short, becomes "persuading the American people" that real victory will never happen, and that the war itself may continue indefinitely.

President Bush explained the concept more succinctly in April 2003, after visiting wounded soldiers from the war in Iraq. "I reminded them and their families," he said, "that the war in Iraq is really about peace."

Now that's doublespeak.

--John Stauber, executive editor of PR Watch, and Sheldon Rampton editor of PR Watch, have co-authored three previous books: "Toxic Sludge Is Good For You: Lies, Damn Lies and the Public Relations Industry," "Mad Cow U.S.A.: Could the Nightmare Happen Here?" and "Trust Us, We're Experts: How Industry Manipulates Science and Gambles With Your Future."

© 2003 Independent Media Institute. All rights reserved. ________________________________

In peace,

Otoño ________________________________

Read all about it and get the news that matters by receiving the War and Peace Watch. To subscribe, visit our web site at http://www.warandpeacewatch.com or send an e-mail to: Reikiworks@compuserve.com Thank you for your support, The War and Peace Watch publisher. contact: Otoño Johnston ===========================================================(In accordance with Title 17 U.S.C. Section 107, this material is distributed without profit or payment for research and educational purposes only.) ============================================================
1:35:00 PM    

Dear Friends:

An error appeared in the headline to Robert Scheer's article of July 29, 2003. The correction is "Read Between the Lines of Those 28 Missing Pages."

In peace,

Otoño Johnston, publisher the War and Peace Watch newsletter
1:34:58 PM    

Re: Those Troublesome 28 Pages and 16 Words

Dear Friends:

Each year, Project Censored lists the top 25 stories ignored by the mainstream media. Their 2003 release, which chronicled overlooked news items from 2001-2002, ranked the Bush administration's role in thwarting pre-Sept.11 terrorist investigations at No. 4. "Bush Administration Hampered FBI Investigation into Bin Laden Family Before 9/11," they announced, using scattered news reports and former FBI deputy director John O'Neill's testimony to back claims that the government obstructed terrorism investigations and placed oil concerns above citizens' safety. "The main obstacles to investigating Islamic terrorism were US oil corporate interests and the role played by Saudi Arabia in it," O'Neill told French intelligence analysts Jean-Charles Brisard and Guillaume Dasquie. _____________________

BuzzFlash July 29, 2003

16 Words and 28 Pages by Maureen Farrell

"All of the answers, all of the clues allowing us to dismantle Osama Bin Laden's organization, can be found in Saudi Arabia." - Former FBI deputy director, John O'Neill.

Each year, Project Censored lists the top 25 stories ignored by the mainstream media. Their 2003 release, which chronicled overlooked news items from 2001-2002, ranked the Bush administration's role in thwarting pre-Sept.11 terrorist investigations at No. 4. "Bush Administration Hampered FBI Investigation into Bin Laden Family Before 9/11," they announced, using scattered news reports and former FBI deputy director John O'Neill's testimony to back claims that the government obstructed terrorism investigations and placed oil concerns above citizens' safety. "The main obstacles to investigating Islamic terrorism were US oil corporate interests and the role played by Saudi Arabia in it," O'Neill told French intelligence analysts Jean-Charles Brisard and Guillaume Dasquie.

Though O'Neill died in the World Trade Center on Sept. 11, questions linger. If he hadn't spoken to Brisard and Dasquie in July, 2001, for example, would hyped tales of his latest sin have made national headlines a month later? Or was this hype part of a larger campaign to smear him before his story could be told? And while O'Neill was discredited for his dogged determination to stop al-Qaeda, why was another FBI official awarded the "Presidential Rank of Meritorious Service" after hampering field agents' efforts to search Zaracarias Moussaoui's computer? In other words, why was one FBI official punished for trying to protect Americans, while those throwing cogs into an al-Qaeda investigation were rewarded?

Greg Palast's reports into ways FBI and military intelligence officials were instructed to "back off" investigations involving members of the bin Laden and Saudi royal families were also noted, and he revisited this story on the eve of Gulf War II. Addressing both Clinton's and Bush's reluctance to unearth the Saudis' connections to terrorists, he wondered why Bush was even more skittish than his predecessor. "But what made this new president take particular care to protect the Saudis, even to the point of stymying his own intelligence agencies?" he wondered. "The answers kept coming back: 'Carlyle' and 'Arbusto.'"

The convoluted ties that connect Poppy Bush's Carlyle Group and George W. Bush's Arbusto to the bin Ladens and the Saudis are ones this administration would probably prefer everyone just overlook. "When President Bush announced he is hot on the trail of the money used over the years to finance terrorism, he must realize that trail ultimately leads not only to Saudi Arabia, but to some of the same financiers who originally helped propel him into the oil business and later the White House," Wayne Madsen wrote. The late James Hatfield, who committed suicide 15 days after the following article was published, was considerably less delicate. Exposing a "plot by Saudi master terrorist, Osama bin Laden, to assassinate Dubya during the July 20 economic [G-8] summit of world leaders," which could entail "a James Bond-like aerial strike in the form of remote-controlled airplanes packed with plastic explosives," he asked, "Why would Osama bin Laden want to kill Dubya, his former business partner?" (This was only two months before the Sept. 11 attacks, mind you, and one month before the CIA warned that Osama would try to hijack U.S. planes. Didn't Condi Rice say that nobody imagined such a scenario?) Despite numerous attempts to explain these murky ties, however, Palast captured them best in a single sentence: "While some people have guardian angels, our president seems to have guardian sheiks."

Now that reports regarding the Sept. 11 attacks have been released (except for 28 pages that have been censored), lawmakers are saying that the Bush administration should level with the American public about Saudi Arabia's "complicity with terrorists." "I think [the 28 pages are] classified for the wrong reason," Sen. Richard Shelby, former vice chairman of the Senate Intelligence Committee, told NBC's Meet the Press, alluding to potential embarrassment to the Saudi government. Sen. Bob Graham, also a former chairman of the Senate Intelligence Committee, took things a step further and accused the administration of deliberately trying to "disguise and keep from the American people ineptitude and incompetence, which was a contributing factor toward Sept. 11."

On a recent appearance on HBO's Real Time with Bill Maher, Graham admitted that "the parts that were blocked out have primarily a focus on a foreign government that was providing direct assistance to some of the hijackers." The Washington Post also stated that the report proves that: 1) "President Bush was warned in a more specific way than previously known about intelligence suggesting that al Qaeda terrorists were seeking to attack the United States" and 2) "There was 'incontrovertible evidence' that Saudi individuals provided financial assistance to al Qaeda operatives in the United States." Once this is fully considered, Bush's ties to the Saudis become even more complicated -- especially since Carlyle Group honcho James A. Baker, Secretary of State during George H. W. Bush's presidency and a key Bush spokesman during the 2000 election fiasco, is a senior partner in Baker and Botts, the law firm representing the Saudis in a trillion-dollar lawsuit against the Sept. 11 victims' families.

"We've been fighting for nearly 21 months -- fighting the administration, the White House," Monica Gabrielle, whose husband Richard was killed in the World Trade Center, told Salon. "As soon as we started looking for answers we were blocked, put off and ignored at every stop of the way." Report after report of the White House's stonewalling and use of 9/11 to promote their preplanned agenda are made all the more poignant by Families of September 11 advocacy group cofounder Carie Lemack's recent observation in Newsweek. "[T]he fact that President Bush has chosen to classify [a section of the report] for what he says is national security makes me question just whose security he is protecting: our nation's or the Saudis'?

Though these connections have barely been considered until now, the American media wasn't entirely out to lunch. CNN addressed John O'Neill's allegations in 2002, and as early as October, 2001, the New Yorker's Seymour Hersh unearthed the Bush administration's Saudi charade. Commenting on the Saudi/American-arranged meeting between Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld and King Fahd, which took place in Saudi Arabia shortly before the bombing campaign in Afghanistan began, he uncovered the aircraft-carrier-sized propaganda value of photos from the meeting, which were transmitted worldwide. "The United States, however, has known that King Fahd has been incapacitated since suffering a severe stroke, in late 1995," Hersh wrote, on the administration's preference for semblance over substance. "A Saudi adviser told me last week that the King, with round-the-clock medical treatment, is able to sit in a chair and open his eyes, but is usually unable to recognize even his oldest friends."

Hersh also noted that U.S. intelligence officials were "particularly angered by the refusal of the Saudis to help the F.B.I. and the C.I.A. run 'traces' -- that is, name checks and other background information -- on the nineteen men, more than half of them believed to be from Saudi Arabia, who took part in the attacks on the World Trade Center and the Pentagon." Uncle Sam takes care of friends, however. The Fahd regime was, according to Hersh, also "a major financial backer of the Reagan Administration's anti-Communist campaign in Latin America and of its successful proxy war in Afghanistan against the Soviet Union" and by the end of 2000, "Halliburton, the Texas-based oil-supply business formerly headed by Vice-President Dick Cheney, was operating a number of subsidiaries in Saudi Arabia."

And though the President insists he's been "very satisfied" with the level of Saudi cooperation, a senior intelligence official told Hersh that the Saudis "have only one constant -- and it's keeping themselves in power." After Bill Maher recently reiterated Sen. Chuck Schumer's question, "Why is there a constant coddling and cover-up of the Saudis?" Sen. Graham explained the connection this way: "The Saudis and the United States have had a relationship that goes back to World War II and the essential agreement was that the United States would supply security and defense for the Saudi regime and the Saudi regime would assure that we had an open spigot for all the petroleum that we wanted. That's been the deal for better than 50 years."

"I can't think of a time when we've had a region emerge as suddenly to become as strategically significant as the Caspian," Dick Cheney told fellow oil industry executives in 1998, back when the free-flow of oil was assured in Saudi Arabia, but posed concerns in both Afghanistan and Iraq. As Project Censored pointed out, the U.S. had already decided to invade Afghanistan "in the interest of oil" before Sept. 11, with Jane's Defense News reporting that an invasion of Afghanistan was in the works as early as March, 2001 (six months before the World Trade Center and Pentagon attacks) and the Times of India spilling war talk beans in June, 2001. And thanks to newly released documents, we now that we know that the James A. Baker III Institute for Public Policy recommended that Cheney's task force consider "a 'military' option in dealing with Iraq," five months before the Sept. 11 attacks.

Aside from the Onion's eerily accurate January, 2001 spoof on George W. Bush's inauguration, the highest honors for prescient reporting go to the Chicago Tribune, which as early as August 2000 reported that, given Dick Cheney and Halliburton's "financial interests in the Persian Gulf, the Caspian region and the Balkans," Americans could "expect a Republic administration to increase U.S. intervention in regions when it suits Dick Cheney's oil and other corporate concerns." But Donald Rumsfeld was also particularly prescient. On the morning of Sept. 11, just hours before the attacks, he told selected members of Congress that "sometime in the next two, four, six, eight, 10, 12 months, there would be an event that would occur in the world that would be sufficiently shocking that it would remind people, again, how important it is to have a strong, healthy Defense Department. . . ." and was reportedly discussing attacking Iraq, even without evidence, that very afternoon. "Sweep it all up, things related and not," Rumsfeld reportedly said, five hours after American Airlines Flight 77 hit the Pentagon.

Moreover, in Feb. 2002, Colin Powell admitted (months before George Bush made his case before the UN) that even if weapons inspectors returned to Iraq, the United States would still pursue "regime change" with or without allies' support -- and it would seem, from but these few examples, that members of this administration are either the biggest opportunists or the greatest prophets the world has ever seen. Because throughout it all, Rummy, Cheney and the other folks at the Project for a New American Century, who lobbied for President Clinton to take out Saddam in 1998 and said we'd need another Pearl Harbor type attack to "Rebuild America's Defenses" have largely gotten whatever they have wanted.

Given this, does anyone outside La La Land honestly believe that Bush's stonewalling and heavy censorship of the Sept. 11 report is a matter of national security? The cascade of lies, hype and deliberate manipulation of information are conveniently reduced to "16 words," and "28 pages" as symbols of this administration's secrecy and deceit. There is no "leveling with the American people," as lawmakers have requested or "owning up to mistakes," as USA Today would like, but a series of frustrating, systematic and calculated means of pulling the wool over our collective eyes.

"The American nation is in the worst condition I can remember in my lifetime, and our prospects for the immediate future are even worse," Hunter S. Thompson recently wrote, bemoaning various troubles (and the return of "the same gang of ignorant greed-crazed bastards who brought us Vietnam, Afghanistan, the disastrous Gaza Strip and ignominious defeat all over the world"). "The Stock Market will never come back, our Armies will never again be No. 1, and our children will drink filthy water for the rest of our lives," he predicted. "The Bush family must be very proud of themselves today, but I am not. Big Darkness, soon come. Take my word for it."

Not to rain on anyone's parade -- especially those who still believe that George Bush is looking out for them and that America ventured into Iraq to bring liberation, democracy and dancing in the streets -- but Thompson's "Big Darkness" captures the essence of Bush's 16 words and 28 pages. And honestly, those who consider a billion dollars a week and a solider a day a small price to pay (while comparing the situation in Iraq to the one aggressor nations like Germany and Japan faced following W.W.II) are probably too deluded for redemption. But then again, those of us who cling to the notion that if enough Americans care and fight to revive the fading embers of Truth, Justice and the American Way, we might fend off the Big Darkness, may also be deluded. At this point, darkness may fall no matter what. We could very well be at the apex of George Bush's runaway roller coaster ride through the next worst chapter in American history. Time, as always, will tell.

Maureen Farrell is a writer and media consultant who specializes in helping other writers get television and radio exposure.

© Copyright 2003, Maureen Farrell

Unless otherwise noted, all original content and headlines are © BuzzFlash.

________________________________

In peace,

Otoño ________________________________

Read all about it and get the news that matters by receiving the War and Peace Watch. To subscribe, visit our web site at http://www.warandpeacewatch.com or send an e-mail to: Reikiworks@compuserve.com Thank you for your support, The War and Peace Watch publisher. contact: Otoño Johnston ===========================================================(In accordance with Title 17 U.S.C. Section 107, this material is distributed without profit or payment for research and educational purposes only.) ============================================================
12:06:21 PM    

Re: An Interesting Turn of Events

Dear Friends:

Saudi Arabia's foreign minister meets with George Bush today, and it is likely that he will request that portions of the September 11, 2001 report relating to Saudi Arabia be declassified. A section of the congressional report concerning Saudi Arabia was classified except for one page, and the Saudis would like to be able to respond to the section. How ironic that through the Saudi's influence America might be allowed to finally read the uncensored transcript. ____________________

Reuters July 28, 2003

Bush to Meet Top Saudi on Sept. 11 Report by Tabassum Zakaria

Washington (Reuters) - Saudi Arabia's foreign minister will meet President Bush on Tuesday and was likely to ask that portions of a Sept. 11 report related to Saudi Arabia be declassified, U.S. officials and diplomatic sources said.

Saudi Prince Saud al-Faisal requested a meeting with Bush and it was scheduled for Tuesday afternoon, officials said.

A section of the congressional report on the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks on whether there was any Saudi support for the hijackers was classified except for one page.

Saudi Arabia would like to be able to respond to the section.

"Saudi Arabia has nothing to hide. We can deal with questions in public, but we cannot respond to blank pages," Saudi Ambassador Prince Bandar bin Sultan said last week.

Democratic Sen. Bob Graham on Monday urged Bush to fully declassify the 28-page section.

"That will permit the Saudi government to deal with any questions which may be raised in the currently censored pages, and allow the American people to make their own judgment about who are our true friends and allies in the war on terrorism," Graham, a Florida Democrat who is running for president, wrote to Bush.

The congressional report on intelligence failures related to the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks released on Thursday said: "Through its investigation, the Joint Inquiry developed information suggesting specific sources of foreign support for some of the September 11 hijackers while they were in the United States."

But it went on to say that while the congressional inquiry uncovered material during a review of FBI and CIA documents "suggesting specific potential sources of foreign support for the September 11 hijackers," it did not investigate the accuracy and significance of that information because it was beyond the scope of the inquiry.

The report said while the material could suggest evidence of support for the hijackers, it was also possible that further investigation could reveal "legitimate, and innocent, explanations for these associations."

Fifteen of the 19 hijackers were Saudi. The FBI estimates that the Sept. 11 attacks cost $175,000 to $250,000 to finance and the funding mechanism was primarily through the banking and wire transfer system of the United Arab Emirates, the report said.

© Reuters ________________________________

In peace,

Otoño ________________________________

Read all about it and get the news that matters by receiving the War and Peace Watch. To subscribe, visit our web site at http://www.warandpeacewatch.com or send an e-mail to: Reikiworks@compuserve.com Thank you for your support, The War and Peace Watch publisher. contact: Otoño Johnston ===========================================================(In accordance with Title 17 U.S.C. Section 107, this material is distributed without profit or payment for research and educational purposes only.) ============================================================
12:06:19 PM    

Re: Why Doesn't Bush Trust the American People With the Truth?

Dear Friends:

Last week it was those 16 little words. This week, it's those 28 classified pages, censored from the long-delayed report on September 11. Why doesn't Bush trust the American people with the truth? Read on, and perhaps you'll see why.

The September 11 report finds no connections between Iraq and Al Qaeda terrorists. Bush, unwilling to confront the possible ties between Saudi Arabia and Osama bin Laden, went after Saddam Hussein instead. By drawing attention away from the militant Muslim networks centered in Saudi Arabia, Bush diverted the war against terror and chose waged a pre-emptive war and occupation against an innocent country.

Bush has used September 11 as an excuse to turn this country upside down, trampling on civil liberties and bankrupting our federal government with unprecedented deficit spending on war. The American people have a right to the uncensored truth of what happened that day. A few missing minutes on a transcription tape helped bring down the corrupt administration of Richard Nixon. Will 16 little words and 28 censored pages help bring down an equally-corrupt Bush administration? We certainly hope so. ______________________

Robertscheer.com July 29, 2003

Read Between the Lines of Those 29 Missing Pages Even censored, 9/11 report shows the focus was on the wrong nation by Robert Scheer

Love the truth; it ultimately bows to no master. Even for the president of the United States, the commander in chief of the world's most powerful propaganda machine, deceptions inevitably unravel.

In the last week we've moved from the 16 deceitful words in George W. Bush's State of the Union speech to the 28 White House-censored pages in the congressional report that dealt with Saudi Arabia's role in the Sept. 11 terrorist attack on the United States.

Yet even in its sanitized version, the bipartisan report, long delayed by an embarrassed White House, makes clear that the U.S. should have focused on Saudi Arabia, and not Iraq, in the aftermath of Sept. 11.

As we know, but our government tends to ignore, 15 of the 19 hijackers came from Saudi Arabia; none came from Iraq. Leaks from the censored portions of the report indicate that at least some of those Saudi terrorists were in close contact with -- and financed by -- members of the Saudi elite, extending into the ranks of the royal family.

The report finds no such connections between Iraq and Al Qaeda terrorists. It is now quite clear that the president -- unwilling to deal with the ties between Saudi Arabia and Osama bin Laden -- pursued Hussein as a politically convenient scapegoat. By drawing attention away from the Muslim fanatic networks centered in Saudi Arabia, Bush diverted the war against terror. That seems to be the implication of the 28 pages, which the White House demanded be kept from the American people when the full report was released.

Even many in Bush's own party are irritated that the president doesn't think we can be trusted with the truth.

"I went back and read every one of those pages thoroughly," Sen. Richard Shelby (R-Ala.), former vice chairman of the Senate Intelligence Committee, said Sunday on "Meet the Press." "My judgment is 95 percent of that information could be declassified, become uncensored so the American people would know."

Asked why he thought the pages were excised, Shelby, a leading pro-administration conservative, said, "I think it might be embarrassing to international relations."

Quite an embarrassment if the censored pages reveal that the Bush administration covered up the Saudi connection to the terrorist attacks.

Obviously alluding to Saudi Arabia, Sen. Bob Graham (D-Fla.), the former Senate Intelligence Committee chairman, said Sunday, "High officials in this government, who I assume were not just rogue officials acting on their own, made substantial contributions to the support and well-being of two of these terrorists and facilitated their ability to plan, practice and then execute the tragedy of Sept. 11."

On Monday, Graham, responding to reports that Saudi Arabia would welcome making public some of the pages, called on Bush to fully declassify "the currently censored pages."

Newsweek, relying on anonymous government sources, reported Monday that the "connections between high-level Saudi princes and associates of the hijackers" included helping Al Qaeda operatives enter the U.S. and financing their residence in San Diego, where they plotted their infamous attacks.

Remember too that it was well known that Saudi charities with ties to the royal House of Saud were bankrolling the Al Qaeda operation in Afghanistan -- even as George H.W. Bush visited the kingdom shortly after his son was elected, eager to secure contracts for his then-employer, the Carlyle Group.

The fact is, Riyadh, unlike Baghdad, has long been a key hotbed of extremist Muslim organizing. By shielding and nurturing our relationship with the Saudi sheiks, Bush & Son have provided cover for those who support terror.

After all, is it really likely that career-conscious FBI and CIA officers would be willing to criticize possible Al Qaeda-House of Saud links when the president's father is out hustling business ties with the same family?

Even after Sept. 11, 2001, the Bush administration immediately protected Saudis in the United States, including allowing members of the large Bin Laden family who were in this country to be spirited home on their government's aircraft before they could be questioned. This at a time when many immigrants from all over the world were being detained arbitrarily.

Bush has used Sept. 11 as an excuse to turn this country upside down, making a hash of civil liberties and bankrupting our federal government with unprecedented deficit spending on war and its materiel. Before we do any more irrevocable damage in the name of an open-ended "war against evil," we have a right and a responsibility to confront the uncensored truth of what happened that black day -- no matter what powerful people are brought to account.

Copyright © 2003 Robert Scheer ________________________________

In peace,

Otoño ________________________________

Read all about it and get the news that matters by receiving the War and Peace Watch. To subscribe, visit our web site at http://www.warandpeacewatch.com or send an e-mail to: Reikiworks@compuserve.com Thank you for your support, The War and Peace Watch publisher. contact: Otoño Johnston ===========================================================(In accordance with Title 17 U.S.C. Section 107, this material is distributed without profit or payment for research and educational purposes only.) ============================================================
12:03:09 PM