"Richard Wolffe has had more conversations with the guy one-on-one, even than Bob Woodward - and unlike Woodward, his writing isn't full of speculations and imaginings as to what it's like being inside Obama's head"
Wednesday, 6 March 2013
Tuesday, 5 March 2013
I hate them virulently.
They have stalked down the corridors of endless power all through history… What man of sanity would say on hearing of the atrocities committed by the Japanese against British and Anzac prisoners of war,
“We shall wipe them out, everyone of them, men, women, and children. There shall not be a Japanese left on the face of the earth”?
Such simple-minded cravings for revenge leave me with a horrified but reluctant awe for such single-minded and merciless ferocity.”
Monday, 4 March 2013
These are all people who have BEEN THROUGH due process, many of them detailed and convicted at Guantanamo and then LET OUT by the Military Commissions under the Bush Administration from 2006-2009.
These are people who have been turned and recruited by CIA in Camp X-Ray and sentenced to time served.
They are a CIA- Mossad Contra Death Squad created as policy under Cheney and turned into protected hired killers to destabilise foreign governments and cause carnage.
The CIA's Anti-Castro Cuban program alone left us with several thousand homicidal case studies of the consquences of training and setting up these guys as fifth column counter-revolutionary mass murderers-at-large and produce what Bobby Kennedy referred to euphamistically as "a disposal problem". This is what WILL happen again, and people will die by the thousand:
The more things change, the more they stay the same...
And I am in 100% agreement with Ali on this point:- Whack them.
Sunday, 3 March 2013
"You gotta fight for your right to Party" - Tha King Ad Rock
"Party for your right to Fight" - Chuck D
Even so, these guys outside the Egyptian Parliament building are pretty damn pathetic.
They haven't so much as even basic grasp of basic choreography (or rhythm) and the awful, cheap streetmarket knockoff Mickey Mouse head is a DEAD give away, these guys are native sons and daughters and the real deal.
They haven't so much as even basic grasp of basic choreography (or rhythm) and the awful, cheap streetmarket knockoff Mickey Mouse head is a DEAD give away, these guys are native sons and daughters and the real deal.
I think we can say with confidence, they are not foreign-backed. Although, they DO have plenty of reason to get just as pissed off and take to the streets, given developments such as the first introduction of bans prohibiting the sale out alcohol away from the main tourist centres....
Mossad Morsi looks to be here for the duration.
I don't see these guys flying over to appear on the Daily Show and make self-deprecating jokes about camel charges anytime soon.
The leader and deputy leader of the main anti-Morsi group have rejected an invitation to meet with John Kerry during his visit, supposedly because of his appeal to them to participate in the new government.
This is a shame and a mistake on their part, but an understandable one, given the circumstances - Egypt has no history of party politics or participatory democracy, so they take the old Sinn Feinn view that to take part in an oppressive government you oppose and you regard as a hostile force is a waste of time and legitimises criminal behaviour - they miss the fact that the US WANTS to develop a close relationship with them, with a view to helping them out as Morsi becomes increasingly unpopular and untennible, which is surely inevitable and don't consider political expediency as a factor in any decision.
They are insulted to have been asked, which I can understand. But hopefully, Kerry will continue to court them via channels going forward.
This is a shame and a mistake on their part, but an understandable one, given the circumstances - Egypt has no history of party politics or participatory democracy, so they take the old Sinn Feinn view that to take part in an oppressive government you oppose and you regard as a hostile force is a waste of time and legitimises criminal behaviour - they miss the fact that the US WANTS to develop a close relationship with them, with a view to helping them out as Morsi becomes increasingly unpopular and untennible, which is surely inevitable and don't consider political expediency as a factor in any decision.
They are insulted to have been asked, which I can understand. But hopefully, Kerry will continue to court them via channels going forward.
Saturday, 2 March 2013
"The digital recording, and the dead-serious conspiratorial conversation it captures so chillingly in tone and substance ("I'm only reporting this back to Roger. And that's our deal," McFarland assured Petraeus as she unfolded the offer) utterly refutes Ailes' disingenuous dismissal of what he and Murdoch were actually attempting: the buying of the presidency.
The Murdoch story – his corruption of essential democratic institutions on both sides of the Atlantic – is one of the most important and far-reaching political/cultural stories of the past 30 years, an ongoing tale without equal.
The tape that Bob Woodward obtained, and which the Washington Post ran in the style section, should be the denouement of the Murdoch story on both sides of the Atlantic, making clear that no institution, not even the presidency of the United States, was beyond the object of his subversion. "
Carl Bernstein absolutely, unequivocally KNOWS what is going on, and what the free world has just lived through;
I missed this story too - not only was this Op-Ed column NOT published (or even much promoted) in the American media (the most important and devastating piece Bernstein authored previously had been published in Rolling Stone, not in the Washington Post), the fact of the dateline being three days before Christmas surely cannot be coincidental.
Why the US media ignored Murdoch's brazen bid to hijack the presidency.
Did the Washington Post and others underplay the story through fear of the News Corp chairman, or simply tin-eared judgment?
Carl Bernstein
The Guardian, Thursday 20 December 2012
So now we have it: what appears to be hard, irrefutable evidence of Rupert Murdoch's ultimate and most audacious attempt – thwarted, thankfully, by circumstance – to hijack America's democratic institutions on a scale equal to his success in kidnapping and corrupting the essential democratic institutions of Great Britain through money, influence and wholesale abuse of the privileges of a free press.
In the American instance, Murdoch's goal seems to have been nothing less than using his media empire – notably Fox News – to stealthily recruit, bankroll and support the presidential candidacy of General David Petraeus in the 2012 election.
Thus in the spring of 2011 – less than 10 weeks before Murdoch's centrality to the hacking and politician-buying scandal enveloping his British newspapers was definitively revealed – Fox News' inventor and president, Roger Ailes, dispatched an emissary to Afghanistan to urge Petraeus to turn down President Obama's expected offer to become CIA director and, instead, run for the Republican nomination for president, with promises of being bankrolled by Murdoch. Ailes himself would resign as president of Fox News and run the campaign, according to the conversation between Petraeus and the emissary, K T McFarland, a Fox News on-air defense "analyst" and former spear carrier for national security principals in three Republican administrations.
All this was revealed in a tape recording of Petraeus's meeting with McFarland obtained by Bob Woodward, whose account of their discussion, accompanied online by audio of the tape, was published in the Washington Post – distressingly, in its style section, and not on page one, where it belonged – and, under the style logo, online on December 3.
Indeed, almost as dismaying as Ailes' and Murdoch's disdain for an independent and truly free and honest press, and as remarkable as the obsequious eagerness of their messenger to convey their extraordinary presidential draft and promise of on-air Fox support to Petraeus, has been the ho-hum response to the story by the American press and the country's political establishment, whether out of fear of Murdoch, Ailes and Fox – or, perhaps, lack of surprise at Murdoch's, Ailes' and Fox's contempt for decent journalistic values or a transparent electoral process.
The tone of the media's reaction was set from the beginning by the Post's own tin-eared treatment of this huge story: relegating it, like any other juicy tidbit of inside-the-beltway media gossip, to the section of the newspaper and its website that focuses on entertainment, gossip, cultural and personality-driven news, instead of the front page.
"Bob had a great scoop, a buzzy media story that made it perfect for Style. It didn't have the broader import that would justify A1," Liz Spayd, the Post's managing editor, told Politico when asked why the story appeared in the style section.
Buzzy media story? Lacking the "broader import" of a front-page story? One cannot imagine such a failure of news judgment among any of Spayd's modern predecessors as managing editors of the Post, especially in the clear light of the next day and with a tape recording – of the highest audio quality – in hand.
"Tell [Ailes] if I ever ran," Petraeus announces on the crystal-clear digital recording and then laughs, "but I won't … but if I ever ran, I'd take him up on his offer. … He said he would quit Fox … and bankroll it."
McFarland clarified the terms: "The big boss is bankrolling it. Roger's going to run it. And the rest of us are going to be your in-house" – thereby confirming what Fox New critics have consistently maintained about the network's faux-news agenda and its built-in ideological bias.
And here let us posit the following: were an emissary of the president of NBC News, or of the editor of the New York Times or the Washington Post ever caught on tape promising what Ailes and Murdoch had apparently suggested and offered here, the hue and cry, especially from Fox News and Republican/Tea Party America, from the Congress to the US Chamber of Commerce to the Heritage Foundation, would be deafening and not be subdued until there was a congressional investigation, and the resignations were in hand of the editor and publisher of the network or newspaper. Or until there had been plausible and convincing evidence that the most important elements of the story were false. And, of course, the story would continue day after day on page one and remain near the top of the evening news for weeks, until every ounce of (justifiable) piety about freedom of the press and unfettered presidential elections had been exhausted.The tape of Petraeus and McFarland's conversation is an amazing document, a testament to the willingness of Murdoch and the wily genius he hired to create Fox News to run roughshod over the American civic and political landscape without regard to even the traditional niceties or pretenses of journalistic independence and honesty. Like the revelations of the hacking scandal, which established beyond any doubt Murdoch's ability to capture and corrupt the three essential elements of the British civic compact – the press, politicians and police – the Ailes/Petraeus tape makes clear that Murdoch's goals in America have always been just as ambitious, insidious and nefarious.
The digital recording, and the dead-serious conspiratorial conversation it captures so chillingly in tone and substance ("I'm only reporting this back to Roger. And that's our deal," McFarland assured Petraeus as she unfolded the offer) utterly refutes Ailes' disingenuous dismissal of what he and Murdoch were actually attempting: the buying of the presidency.
"It was more of a joke, a wiseass way I have," Ailes would later claim while nonetheless confirming its meaning. "I thought the Republican field [in the primaries] needed to be shaken up and Petraeus might be a good candidate."
The recording deserves to be heard by any open-minded person trying to fathom its meaning to the fullest.
Murdoch and Ailes have erected an incredibly influential media empire that has unrivaled power in British and American culture: rather than judiciously exercising that power or improving reportorial and journalistic standards with their huge resources, they have, more often than not, recklessly pursued an agenda of sensationalism, manufactured controversy, ideological messianism, and political influence-buying while masquerading as exemplars of a free and responsible press. The tape is powerful evidence of their methodology and reach.
The Murdoch story – his corruption of essential democratic institutions on both sides of the Atlantic – is one of the most important and far-reaching political/cultural stories of the past 30 years, an ongoing tale without equal. Like Richard Nixon and his tapes, much attention has been focused on the necessity of finding the smoking gun to confirm what other evidence had already established beyond a doubt: that the elemental instruments of democracy, ie the presidency in Nixon's case, and the privileges of free press in Murdoch's, were grievously misused and abused for their own ends by those entrusted to use great power for the common good.
In Nixon's case, the system worked. His actions were investigated by Congress, the judicial system held that even the president of the United States was not above the law, and he was forced to resign or face certain impeachment and conviction. American and British democracy has not been so fortunate with Murdoch, whose power and corruption went unchecked for a third of a century.
The most important thing we journalists do is make judgments about what is news. Perhaps no story has eluded us on a daily basis (for lack of trying) for so many years as the story of Murdoch's destructive march across our democratic landscape. Only the Guardian vigorously pursued the leads of the hacking story and methodically stuck with it for months and years, never ignoring the underlying context of how Rupert Murdoch conducted his take-no-prisoners business and journalism without regard for the most elemental standards of fairness, accuracy or balance, or even lawful conduct.
When the Guardian's hacking coverage reached critical mass last year, I quoted a former top Murdoch deputy as follows: "This scandal and all its implications could not have happened anywhere else. Only in Murdoch's orbit. The hacking at News of the World was done on an industrial scale. More than anyone, Murdoch invented and established this culture in the newsroom, where you do whatever it takes to get the story, take no prisoners, destroy the competition, and the end will justify the means."
The tape that Bob Woodward obtained, and which the Washington Post ran in the style section, should be the denouement of the Murdoch story on both sides of the Atlantic, making clear that no institution, not even the presidency of the United States, was beyond the object of his subversion. If Murdoch had bankrolled a successful Petraeus presidential campaign and – as his emissary McFarland promised – "the rest of us [at Fox] are going to be your in-house" – Murdoch arguably might have sewn up the institutions of American democracy even more securely than his British tailoring.
Happily, Petraeus was not hungering for the presidency at the moment of the messenger's arrival: the general was contented at the idea of being CIA director, which Ailes was urging him to forgo.
"We're all set," said the emissary, referring to Ailes, Murdoch and Fox. "It's never going to happen," Petraeus said. "You know it's never going to happen. It really isn't. … My wife would divorce me."
Thursday, 28 February 2013
“...at a meeting of the Soviet leadership [Kruschev] made this unprecedented statement:
"We have to help Kennedy."
"President Kennedy was under intense U.S. military and congressional pressure to invade Cuba."
Sergei Khrushchev (1935–), son of Nikita Khrushchev, writes in his book Nikita Khrushchev: Creation of a Super- power,
“When Father argued at a meeting of the Soviet leadership in favor of withdrawing the missiles, he made this unprecedented statement:
’We have to help Kennedy withstand pressure from the hawks [supporters of war]. They are demanding an immediate military invasion.’”
The Soviet Premier knew an invasion would lead to nuclear war.
Khrushchev agreed to a U.S. president’s “promise” not to invade Cuba again. According to Sergei Khrushchev, this would have been “inconceivable” only a few years earlier.
Excerpt from “Communiqué to President Kennedy Accepting an End to the Missile Crisis, October 28, 1962”
"Esteemed Mr. President:
I have received your message of October 27, 1962. I express my satisfaction and gratitude for the sense of proportion and understanding of the responsibility borne by you at present for the preservation of peace throughout the world which you have shown. I very well understand your anxiety and the anxi- ety of the United States people in connection with the fact that the weapons which you describe as “offensive” are, in fact, grim weapons. Both you and I understand what kind of weapon they are.
In order to complete with greater speed the liquidation of the conflict dangerous to the cause of peace, to give confidence to all peo- ple longing for peace, and to calm the American people, who, I am certain, want peace as much as the people of the Soviet Union, the Soviet Government, in addition to previously issued instructions on the cessation of further work at building sites for the weapons, has is- sued a new order on the dismantling of the weapons which you de- scribe as “offensive,” and their crating and return to the Soviet Union.
Mr. President, I would like to repeat once more what I had al- ready written to you in my preceding letters—that the Soviet Gov- ernment has placed at the disposal of the Cuban Government eco- nomic aid, as well as arms, inasmuch as Cuba and the Cuban people have constantly been under the continuous danger of an in- vasion [from the United States]....
We stationed them there in order that no attack should be made against Cuba and that no rash action should be permitted to take place.
I regard with respect and trust your statement in your message of October 27, 1962, that no attack will be made on Cuba—that no invasion will take place—not only by the United States, but also by other countries of the Western Hemisphere, as your message pointed out. Then the motives which promoted us to give aid of this nature to Cuba cease. They are no longer applicable, hence we have instructed our officers—and these means, as I have already stated, are in the hands of Soviet officers—to take necessary mea- sures for stopping the building of the said projects and their dis- mantling and return to the Soviet Union....
I note with satisfaction that you have responded to my wish that the said dangerous situation should be liquidated and also that conditions should be created for a more thoughtful appraisal of the international situation which is fraught with great dangers in our age of thermonuclear weapons, rocket technology ... global rockets, and other lethal weapons. All people are interested in insuring peace. Therefore, we who are invested with trust and great respon- sibility must not permit an exacerbation of the situation and must liquidate the breeding grounds where a dangerous situation has been created fraught with serious consequences for the cause of peace. If we succeed along with you and with the aid of other peo- ple of good will in liquidating this tense situation, we must also con- cern ourselves to see that other dangerous conflicts do not arise which might lead to a world thermonuclear catastrophe....
Mr. President, I trust your statement. However, on the other hand, there are responsible people who would like to carry out an invasion of Cuba at this time, and in such a way to spark off a war. If we take practical steps and announce the dismantling and evacua- tion of the appropriate means from Cuba, then, doing that, we wish to establish at the same time the confidence of the Cuban people that we are with them and are not divesting ourselves of the re- sponsibility of granting help to them.
We are convinced that the people of all countries, like yourself, Mr. President, will understand me correctly. We do not issue threats. We desire only peace. Our country is now on the upsurge. Our people are enjoying the fruits of their peaceful labor....
We value peace, perhaps even more than other people, because we experienced the terrible war against Hitler. However, our people will not flinch in the face of any ordeal. Our people trust their government, and we assure our people and the world public that the Soviet government will not allow itself to be provoked.
Should the provocateurs unleash a war, they would not escape the grave consequences of such a war. However, we are confident that reason will triumph. War will not be unleashed and the peace and security of people will be insured....
Khrushchev.
October 28, 1962.
The primary consequence of the Cuban Missile Crisis was that the American public now believed that the Soviet Union’s nuclear capabilities equalled those of the United States. Citizens would not listen to numbers that showed the United States with far more missiles. As far as Americans were concerned, each country could totally annihilate the other— or, for that matter, all life on earth. It was the last of the Cold War “missile bluff” diplomacies.
Both sides had so frightened the other during the Cuban Missile Crisis that the first serious negotiations in con- trolling nuclear weaponry began in August 1963. The United States, the Soviet Union, and Great Britain—which also had nu- clear capabilities—signed the Limited Test-Ban Treaty to ban nu- clear testing underwater, in the atmosphere, and in outer space.
"I often think how necessary it is for men who are vested with trust and great power to be inspired with the understanding of what seems to be an obvious truism, which is that we live on one planet and it is not in man’s power—at least in the foreseeable future—to change that. In a certain sense there is an analogy here—I like this comparison—with Noah’s Ark where both the “clean” and the “unclean” found sanctuary. But regardless of who lists himself with the “clean” and who is considered to be “unclean,” they are all equally interested in one thing and that is that the Ark should successfully continue its cruise. And we have no other alternative: either we should live in peace and cooperation so that the Ark maintains its buoyancy, or else it sinks. Therefore we must display concern for all of mankind, not to mention our own advantages, and find every possibility leading to peaceful solutions of problems."
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