Today brings yet another regrettable "friendly fire (AFP)" incident involving US troops, more of whom have also lost their lives in the almighty mess that is Iraq.
It scarcely took much intelligence, political astuteness or insight into world affairs to know and to say, well before it happened, that sending the world's most powerful army and an ally or two into that country would have appalling long-term consequences.
The surprise is that anybody might be genuinely surprised to see the latest thread in the tissue of lies about the war unravelled this week, with the news that Tony B "ignored warnings from British intelligence that a war on Iraq would make it easier for terrorists to get hold of weapons of mass destruction" (again from 'the factory').
AFP calls this a "revelation"!
A revelation not to be confused with the others to have come, separately, out of the Hutton Inquiry, which has yet to finish its work.
I've laid off on recent variations on the theme of Pandora's Box of late (Lara Croft's absurd adventures apart), not because I've lost interest but mainly out of such disgust as I can still muster and partly because it does nobody any good to join the "I told you so" chorus.
In a trip round the blogosphere yesterday, I noticed that a number of like-minded people, including some who are far more regular political animals than I am, thought it best to let pass the second anniversary of the atrocities in the United States in silence.
When the attacks came, I was as dismayed and aghast as everybody else in the newsroom, watching the tragedy unfold. Two years on, my admiration for the bravery and self-sacrifice that characterised so much of the disaster response goes undimmed. My feelings for the families of those who died and for everybody whose lives were forever changed through injury and loss are as strong as ever.
But the outrages perpetrated since by some of the world's political leaders, in the name of a nebulous "war on terror" where the goalposts move so fast not even Beckham could kick straight -- not to speak of the sometimes self-imposed muzzling of an American mass media once widely admired for its readiness to dig deep and wide in pursuit of the truth -- have coloured my outlook on "9/11" far too profoundly to avoid a complex emotional response.
"WASHINGTON - The Bush administration is so used to drawing rhetorical links between the war against Iraq and Sept 11, 2001, that nearly 70 per cent of Americans think Saddam Hussein was involved in the attacks, public opinion analysts say.
A Washington Post poll last week showed that 69 per cent of Americans thought it at least likely that Saddam was involved, although there was no evidence to support that belief.
Professor Pippa Norris, an expert on public opinion at Harvard's Kennedy School of Government, said this misconception 'comes partly from President George W. Bush and Donald Rumsfeld drawing these links to justify US intervention in Iraq'.
'Now that there actually is terrorism in Iraq, they can retrospectively justify their action there'," the 'Straits Times' reminds us today.
In the face of credulous imbecility which almost beggars belief -- the brainwashing of more than two-thirds of a nation if this figure is to be trusted -- is it any surprise that after more than four months' forced leave of absence from the heat of the newsroom, where such statistics are a routine part of the daily threats to sense and sensibility, my broadening interests have largely been elsewhere?
Thus it was that yesterday, while the large majority of bloggers who did anything at all to mark the anniversary mainly did so by an appropriate laying of wreaths, I went in search of the few writers and webmasters who ventured to take a different perspective.
At Privilogic, a visual design site, there was a timely reminder, using nothing but pictures, that though "America's friendships throughout the world have been strained to the breaking point" in the past couple of years, "it's important to remember, no matter what has happened since, how the world shared our grief and wept with us on that day."
Whoever put up those pictures, and stuck in Capra's famous Iwo Jima flag shot while they were about it, made no mention of the misguided, dangerous policies in Washington that have caused such strains to those friendships and widespread ill-feeling and resentment towards Americans.
At 'Scrappleface', Scott Ott (perhaps like me) thought it wisest not to tackle "9/11" head on until today, reserving yesterday's satire for another Mideast politico-military disaster zone -- Palestine -- and the shortcomings of US security screeners:
(2003-09-11) -- ABC News will televise an investigative report tonight showing how its reporters smuggled -- from North Carolina to Pennsylvania -- 65 cartons of deadly menthol cigarettes and a 'trunkload' of dangerous bottle rockets and roman candles."
That inveterate and ever-entertaining media watcher J.D. Lasica spent most of his day elsewhere, including the Beeb's "lessons for the US media" -- I didn't know the battered Auntie had any right now -- but not without turning up one excellent read: a veritable essay on fears of 'The End of the World'.
"Two years later I take a certain grim comfort in some people's disinterest in the war; if you'd told me two years ago that people would be piling on the President and bitching about slow progress in Iraq, I would have known in a second that the nation hadn't suffered another attack. When the precise location of Madonna's tongue is big news, you can bet the hospitals aren't full of smallpox victims. Of course some people are impatient with those who still recall the shock of 9/11; the same people were crowding the message boards of internet sites on the afternoon of the attacks, eager to blame everyone but the hijackers. They hate this nation. In their hearts, they hate humanity," opines James Lilek.
James. Apart from the fact that your 'Bleats and Blather' are forthwith on a blogroll where an overhaul's overdue, know that it's not your nation, far less humanity, that many of the rest of us loathe and fear. It's the liars, partners in corporate crime and scoundrels you may or may not have elected into office. As one Dennis Garwitz perhaps exaggerated to 'Pravda' a few days before "9/11", "this man [George Bush] spends more time posing for pictures than Bill Clinton ever did having sex".
In a completely different part of the spectrum, W. decided he had "no time to waste on the French", not even to denounce them again, and thought instead of the victims. He'd seen enough 'Merde in France' the previous day in the "newspaper of record" (unreadability, I think they mean) and had already purloined a Plantu cartoon I steal from him in turn:
"Let there be no more 9/11s. That would be too unfair!" (OMC: World Trade Organisation)
In W's eyes, that discourtesy earned the "intelligentsia's" rag ('Le Monde') the title-for-a-day of "Al-Jazeera on the Seine".
In conclusion, I only came across one columnist who took some of the hostility US policies have aroused straight to the White House lawn on the day itself:
"The surprise resignation of the forty-third President of the United States, George W. Bush, on the second anniversary of the terrorist attack on America, was hailed by chiefs of state throughout the world. Mr. Bush announced that after, 'two years of bloodshed, economic devastation, and spreading fear in America and abroad,' he saw no choice but to accept that, 'I have held a title which I did not win, and for which I have proven unqualified.'"
This article, 'Bush Resignation Hailed by World Leaders,' was by Greg Palast at the 'Common Dreams Newscenter' and came as the most welcome real surprise of the day in my little if-only world (via the observant Chris at 'one good move').
As a rule, the whole bunch of politicians now revolt me so much, whichever country they're in, that I'll happily leave most necessary comment to my good friend, the ever-vigilant Augustine, who can often be relied upon to say almost all that needs saying with commendable brevity.
There are, and I hope always will be, exceptions.
I've long had time for Tony Benn, one of Britain's most loathed or liked politicians and a man still a scapegoat among the country's so-called left for an unswerving career which they claim helped ruin the Labour Party and open the way for that frightful messiah, Margaret Thatcher.
I don't think they'll be there for ever, so catch the two RealPlayer audio extracts from this morning's 'Today' programme, when we were treated to Benn speeches turned into reggae, while you can.
For me, this manic discussion -- 'listen again' 1 and here's part two -- was the broadcast gem of the week!
7:06:58 PM link 
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