Obviously the US does not need the poisonous U-238 for security as claimed. The US is already the one and only super power and can destroy any enemy, even the whole of humanity, at any time. In these perilous times, it is not beyond possibility that an 'End Times Nuclear War' would be launched by a religious Fundamentalist nutter Administration. They may think it is time for the religious Armageddon that Fundamentalists believe was promised in the Bible.

NEW YORK - The United States plans to produce highly radioactive plutonium 238 for the first time since the Cold War, The New York Times reported on Monday.
The newspaper quoted project managers as saying most, if not all, of the new plutonium was intended for secret missions. The officials would not disclose details, but the newspaper said the plutonium in the past powered espionage devices.
The Times said Timothy Frazier, head of radioisotope power systems at the US Energy Department, vigorously denied in a recent interview any of the classified missions would involve nuclear arms, satellites or weapons in space.
"The real reason we're starting production is for national security," Frazier was quoted as saying.
Officials at the Energy Department could not be reached for comment.

James Bamford's book "Body of Secrets" gives particularly valuable insight into who was involved in Northwoods; how pervasive such thinking was in the Pentagon, and how incredible extremist and evil it was. Secretary of Defence McNamara's rejection of the plan in 1962, for the US to create terrorist acts and blame Cuba as a pretext for launching a war on Cuba, did not stop such thinking and planning.

US PLANNED FAKE TERROR ATTACKS ON CITIZENS TO CREATE SUPPORT FOR CUBAN WAR
...In [Joint Chief's chair] Lemnitzer's view, the country would be far better off if the generals could take over. [JFK assassination legend has it some general presided over the fudgy JFK autopsy. --Mk]
For those military officers who were sitting on the fence, the Kennedy administration's botched Bay of Pigs invasion was the last straw. "The Bay of Pigs fiasco broke the dike," said one report at the time. "President Kennedy was pilloried by the super patriots as a 'no-win' chief . . . The Far Right became a fount of proposals born of frustration and put forward in the name of anti-Communism. . . Active-duty commanders played host to anti-Communist seminars on their bases and attended or addressed Right-wing meetings elsewhere."
From BODY OF SECRETS, James Bamford, Doubleday, 2001, p.82 and following.
Scanned and edited by NY Transfer News.

Anatomy of the Ultra-Secret National Security Agency From the Cold War Through the Dawn of a New Century
Back in 1982 James Bamford published THE PUZZLE PALACE, the first book-length study of the National Security Agency, the U. S. Government's mammoth but super-secretive agency devoted to electronic eavesdropping on the rest of the world. That book caused some sharp tremors in military and government circles.
Now Bamford is back with an updated and much more exhaustive study of the same subject. BODY OF SECRETS is detailed history, description, critical assessment, editorial comment, and character study all rolled into one massively researched volume. It should cause an earthquake or two.     Read an Excerpt

When the public liars sat down together -- in Crawford, in the Pentagon, in the Oval Office, at 10 Downing Street -- and very deliberately, very guilefully and very knowingly devised their act of mass murder in Iraq, it is unlikely they gave any thought to the most vulnerable targets of their war crime: the children. So in considering this aspect of the bloodbath, we should give the liars the benefit of the doubt. Let's not make them more monstrous than they are. Let's stick to the facts.

Bush knows enemies are much more politically potent vote-getters than peace partners looking for a solution to a very expensive 50 year problem. The US and Korea are still at war and Bush wants to keep it that way. So he spurned Kim's offer of nuclear peace talks.
The US has 10,000 nuclear weapons and Trident subs loaded with nuclear missiles cruising off the Coast of North Korea. They can wipe out North Korea anytime. Nevertheless the US propaganda machine will portray it as the ultra dangerous enemy with it's few nuclear weapons.

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - North Korean leader Kim Jong-il attempted to engage President Bush directly on the nuclear weapons issue three years ago but the administration spurned the overture, two American experts on Asia said on Wednesday.
Writing in the Washington Post, former U.S. ambassador to South Korea Donald Gregg and former journalist Don Oberdorfer expressed concern that Kim's November 2002 initiative was never pursued and urged Bush to respond positively to his current overture, made last week.

Claims Neo Con Agenda Is As 'Insane As Hitler And Nazi Party When They Invaded Russia In Dead Of Winter'
A former high-ranking Republican official, also a well-respected author, tells the American people to stop listening to Bush administration lies about Iraqi war and claims the mainstream media will not publish anything he writes against Bush or his policies.

Before another War Breaks Out
The 9/11 terrorist attacks and the so-called threat from Iraq's non-existent WMD's was just an excuse-a smokescreen this administration used as a way to skirt international laws and to sell the war to a gullible media and a misinformed public-the president's cabinet used so they could execute a decades-old plan cooked up by hardcore Neocons to spread democracy throughout the Middle East by conquering "rogue" nations such as Iraq like some modern day Roman Empire. They call it Pax Americana, Latin for "American Peace."

Everyone should see this DU documentary on Sunday June 26 at 11.00 pm on TV1 in NZ.
Poisoning the Iraq people and neighbouring states with DU weapons and residue is bad enough. But with a half life of 4.5 billion years, eventually DU dust will drift around the planet and contaminate all life.
That's all of us regardless of where we live, including our children, grandchildren and future generations.
Unless we can stop manufacture and use of this evil weapon (already used by the USA and UK in four wars), the whole planet will be poisoned.
It's time the NZ government took a position on banning DU weapons. Concerned citizens and nations took a stand to ban land mines. It was successful. The same kind of concern can apply to DU weapons which are far worse.
Ban them

. . . . evidence that the 9/11 attacks were were not as portrayed by the Bush Administration and the mass media.
I suggest that this tragedy and its implications, and the actions that have flowed from it, be of the greatest concern to responsible people everywhere. Two wars have been justified - Afghanistan and Iraq - on the basis of the official story of the 9/11 attack. The centre piece of the Bush Administration is the enormously expensive and destructive so-called "war on terror". More wars (perhaps on Iran and Syria and others) have been suggested.

Likely A Controlled Demolition And 'Inside Job'
Highly recognized former chief economist in Labor Department now doubts official 9/11 story, claiming suspicious facts and evidence cover-up indicate government foul play and possible criminal implications.
"If demolition destroyed three steel skyscrapers at the World Trade Center on 9/11, then the case for an 'inside job' and a government attack on America would be compelling," said Morgan Reynolds, Ph.D, a former member of the Bush team who also served as director of the Criminal Justice Center at the National Center for Policy Analysis headquartered in Dallas, TX.
See also Possible Bush Conspiracy in 9/11 Now A College Course

Lawmakers in the United States were scheduled to vote on Monday to approve $45 billion US in additional funding for operations in Iraq and Afghanistan, making the recent Middle East foray more expensive than the entire Korean War.
Since the Sept. 11 attacks, Congress has approved $350 billion, mostly for combat and reconstruction in Iraq and Afghanistan.
The amount, which includes $82 billion approved last month, is equal to the total amount in today's dollars spent on the Korean conflict from 1950-53.

The Downing Street memos have created such a stir that even Congress is rubbing its eyes and awakening from its long slumber to ask questions about the Iraq war: a hearing convened by antiwar Democrats, chaired by Rep. John Conyers (D-Mich.), has created quite a lot of buzz, generating headlines – and howls of outrage from all the usual suspects, as well as from the Washington Post's Dana Milbank and – surprise, surprise! – Howard "The Scream" Dean. Milbank snarks:
"In the Capitol basement yesterday, long-suffering House Democrats took a trip to the land of make-believe. They pretended a small conference room was the Judiciary Committee hearing room, draping white linens over folding tables to make them look like witness tables and bringing in cardboard name tags and extra flags to make the whole thing look official."

Americans, along with the rest of the world, are starting to wake up to the uncomfortable fact that President George Bush not only lied to them about the weapons of mass destruction in Iraq (the ostensible excuse for the March 2003 invasion and occupation of that country by US forces), but also about the very process that led to war.

It is inescapable historical reality that leaders of nations will lie to their people to trick them into wars they otherwise would have refused. It is not "conspiracy theory" to suggest that leaders of nations lie to trick their people into wars. It is undeniable fact.    This brings us to the present case.
Did the government of the United States lie to the American people, more to the point, did President Bush and his Neocon associates lie to Congress, to initiate a war of conquest in Iraq?
This question has been given currency by a memo leaked from inside the British Government which clearly indicates a decision to go to war followed by the "fixing" of information around that policy. This is, as they say, a smoking gun.

It's bad enough that the Bush administration had so little international support for the Iraqi war that their "coalition of the willing" meant the U.S., Britain, and the equivalent of a child's imaginary friends. It's even worse that, as the Downing Street memo confirms, they had so little evidence of real threats that they knew from the start that they were going to have manufacture excuses to go to war. What's more damning still is that they effectively began this war even before the congressional vote.
The Lies of George W. Bush by David Corn

This article below is particularly important because it reveals that the US itself creates many of the terrorism incidents and then blames other for these actions. Thus they are creating the excuse they need for increasing their military action.

A documentary featuring Noam Chomsky, Chalmers Johnson, Tariq Ali, and many more experts speaking about the Neo-Con agenda and the cloud of fear which the Neo-Cons have settled over America.

Bush and Blair connived to deceive their own people and the world, so as to make war on Iraq as the following article documents. Over 100,000 people were killed as a result of the deception of these two leaders, their staff and Ministers. Adding a new dimension of diabolical evil to their plot, they threatened to use nuclear weapons if Iraq resisted their invasion with any weapons which Bush and Blair classified as WMD. That could mean escalation to a nuclear WW III.

MINISTERS were warned in July 2002 that Britain was committed to taking part in an American-led invasion of Iraq and they had no choice but to find a way of making it legal.
The warning, in a leaked Cabinet Office briefing paper, said Tony Blair had already agreed to back military action to get rid of Saddam Hussein at a summit at the Texas ranch of President George W Bush three months earlier.

It is 1962, at the height of the induced US paranoia over Cuba. Pentagon Hawks and their right-wing political allies
created a diabolically evil plan to covertly murder American citizens and blame Cuban agents in the US. The purpose was to provide a believable excuse that would anger Americans and the world, causing them to support a US war against Cuba. All top Pentagon generals approved this plan. The Kennedy Administration did not approve it.

In his new exposé of the National Security Agency entitled Body of Secrets, author James Bamford highlights a set of proposals on Cuba by the Joint Chiefs of Staff codenamed OPERATION NORTHWOODS. This document, titled “Justification for U.S. Military Intervention in Cuba” was provided by the JCS to Secretary of Defense Robert McNamara on March 13, 1962, as the key component of Northwoods.

This story is a good illustration of how the Bush Administration wants to change the news to suit its policies.
They wish people to believe that there is no global warming threat. Anything that challenges their view gets altered to suit. They don't want to take any measures that would reduce the US's large contribution to global warming.

A White House official, who previously worked for the American Petroleum Institute, has repeatedly edited government climate reports in a way that downplays links between greenhouse gas emissions and global warming, The New York Times reported yesterday.

For years, Saddam was one of our government’s propped up and militarily supported puppets. Many people have seen the famous footage of Donald Rumsfeld shaking hands with Saddam. I suppose the two are smiling so big for the cameras because they are kindred spirits. After all of the hand-shaking and weapon brokering, when did Saddam become such a bad guy to Bush, Cheney, Halliburton and Co.?

The ever larger circles of war and destruction, promised by George Bush and his "poodle" coalition of the 'not so willing', has a nuclear component most overlook, or are not aware of.

...This education is a vast waste of the resources and potential of the young. It is boring beyond belief and useless--except to the powers and interests that depend on it. When A Ukranian student, a three-week arrival on these shores, writes the best-organized and most profound essay in English of the class, American education has something to answer for--especially to our youth.

Although this article was first published on Jan 1, 2004, it applies today.
It shows how a more moderate approach by the Bush Administration "to pull the plug on Iraq" was over-ruled
by the neoconservatives and Pentagon, who installed a diabolically evil 3 billion dollar fund to establish "a radical new counterinsurgency program."

Tucked away in the Iraqi appropriation was $3 billion for a new paramilitary unit. Vietnam similarities?
With the 2004 electoral clock ticking amid growing public concern about U.S. casualties and chaos in Iraq, the Bush administration’s hawks are upping the ante militarily. To those familiar with the CIA’s Phoenix assassination program in Vietnam, Latin America’s death squads or Israel’s official policy of targeted murders of Palestinian activists, the results are likely to look chillingly familiar.

Where is the Iraqi oil money?
.....Iraqi officials cannot explain what happened to $69 million worth of fuel oil produced in the second half of 2004,

The United States joined with other states to wreck the nuclear non-proliferation treaty’s 2005 review conference. Patricia Lewis of the United Nations Institute of Disarmament Research examines what went wrong.

It is an inspiration to read how Chavez is ploughing oil profits into benefits for the poor majority in Venezuela.
The Bush administration has supported the rich power elite in Venezuela and supported attempts to overthrow him.
For the benefit on Venezuela, Chavez will need support in the face of US efforts to replace him with their usual US-sponsored dictatorship or quisling regime. The US will claim that they are spreading democracy and freedom and liberation to Venezuela, as they invade, slaughter, torture and imprison - just as they continue to do in Iraq.
However, the people of Venezuela, having been given a taste of real democracy, power and wealth will have strong motivation to rally behind their leader and resist further US attempts at subversion.

In using oil wealth to help the poor, Venezuela's leader is an example to Latin America

Increasingly I am coming across articles that shows the US masquerading as terrorists and causing a terrorist act, and then blaming Iraqi terrorism. The purpose seems to be to create a chaotic situation they can use as an excuse to stay in Iraq indefinitely. It is part of the neocon plan to dominate the middle east and expand the war to neighbouring states.

What was coined as a discussion on real patriotism sounded more like a case for why the Bush administration has failed in foreign policy.
“I will not stand by and watch an appointed president send our sons and daughters around the world to kill terrorists for the oil companies,” Robert Bowman said.

What fury and outrage, especially when one considers the source! I mean, that Newsweek report about American soldiers flushing the Holy Koran down the crapper. Not only did the Pentagon brass get really bent out of shape, but even resident White House white washer and Mighty Mouth, Scott McClellan, conveyed the Bush administration’s anger and outrage, almost losing it himself! Clearly, the issue couldn’t be the absurdity that falsehoods and lies kill people – the Bush administration has demonstrated its total contempt for human life since it maneuvered itself into power. This outrage is about its sensing of rebellion and disloyalty to the state!

This article below is particularly important because it reveals that the US itself creates many of the terrorism incidents and then blames other for these actions. Thus they are creating the excuse they need for increasing their military action.

CIA's close relationship with Sudan's government enables genocide there to continue.
In Um Seifa, a dusty village in Sudan's western region of Darfur, a crowd of white-robed children stood outside their newly reopened school. . . . 'The government never gave us education, development, health [services or] equality,' said the headmaster. . . . So the people of Um Seifa built their own school. A week after your correspondent visited it, it was burned to the ground, and eight children murdered [by Sudanese army forces and the Arab Janjaweed]
—The Economist, April 2, 2005

Amnesty International USA urged foreign governments Wednesday to use international law to investigate Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld, Attorney General Alberto Gonzales and other alleged American "architects of torture" at Abu Ghraib, Guantanamo Bay and other prisons where detainees suspected of ties to terrorist groups have been interrogated.

With Negroponte, now Czar of all 14 US Intelligence organizations, we can expect more intelligence tailored to suit the policies the Bush administration wishes to implement.

Bush Nominates Terrorist for National Intelligence Director
"He will be a key figure in US counter-terror operations." --BBC News, Feb. 17, 2005
"I think he could have stopped all these assassinations and torture... We're against this nomination. If he didn't see human rights violations in Honduras, it's possible he won't see human rights violations anywhere in the world." --Leo Valladares Lanza, former head, Honduran Human Rights Commission, quoted in New York Times, March 29, 2005.

Call it Star Wars, parts VII-XXII; but last week, just as Revenge of the Sith was opening galaxy-wide -- multiplexes on Tatooine alone were expected to pull in billions -- reporter Tim Weiner revealed on the front page of the New York Times that a new presidential directive will soon essentially green-light the future U.S. militarization of space.
(When, in December 2001, the administration withdrew from the Antiballistic Missile Treaty, which forbade the weaponization of space, it opened the way for exactly the kind of Pentagon R&D that now threatens to come to mutant fruition in the heavens.) Just three days before Weiner's piece appeared, military analyst William Arkin reported in the Washington Post that "early last summer, Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld approved a top secret 'Interim Global Strike Alert Order,'" preparing the way for devastating attacks against hostile powers developing weapons of mass destruction, air strikes that could be carried out more or less on demand anywhere on the planet and, if so desired, included a "nuclear option."

To justify staying in Iraq, it is appears that the US is committing acts of terrorism and blaming those they describe as "terrorists" for committing these acts. If the US starts a civil war between religious factions, it provides further reasons to stay on as "peacemakers".

and Accuses US Troops of Detonating Car Bombs and Falsely Accusing Militants
Al-Qaeda in Iraq issued a refutation on Saturday May 14th, 2005 of western claims “about the weakening of the mujahideen [in Iraq]”. The organization claims that, despite Western statements that the mujahideen are “weakened and stagnant” the militants are “continuing until the day of final judgment”. The message states that “the mujahideen did not weaken and did not become stagnant, but they are transforming with the prosperity of the almighty and the grace of their creature. They are enjoying the composure and the jihad and seeking martyrdom.”

First Consider The Evidence, Then Draw Your Own Conclusions
Let us consider the possibility that the USA has become addicted, in an economic sense, to war. While the evidence offered below is by no means exhaustive, it is directly relevant and highly probative. Therefore, the reader should consider ALL of the evidence in Exhibits A through D before judging whether or not a prima facie case has been made that America is economically addicted to war.

CIA's close relationship with Sudan's government enables genocide there to continue.
In Um Seifa, a dusty village in Sudan's western region of Darfur, a crowd of white-robed children stood outside their newly reopened school. . . . 'The government never gave us education, development, health [services or] equality,' said the headmaster. . . . So the people of Um Seifa built their own school. A week after your correspondent visited it, it was burned to the ground, and eight children murdered [by Sudanese army forces and the Arab Janjaweed]
—The Economist, April 2, 2005

Bill Moyers brilliant paper exposes how easily Bush's neocon administration has been able to fool the US public into giving up their liberties and embracing an Orwellian world. He held high office in the Johnston administration and has been a top journalist for over 30 years. There are many indications of this in other U.S. sectors, but Moyers shows how U.S. journalism and corporate media and now public media, has been subverted to become little more than government propaganda outlets.

In this highly anticipated speech the veteran public broadcaster takes on the PBS coup and its right-wing engineers who are 'squealing like a stuck pig.'

The radioactive microscopic dust residue from depleted uranium weapons has a half-life of 4.5 billion years and eventually drifts from wherever it was first used, around the world. It kills and causes life-threatening diseases wherever it goes, and also contaminates the gene pool causing hideously malformed foetuses.
The US and UK like it because it is such an effective battlefield weapon; so they keep defending it's usage.
They have used D.U. weapons in 4 wars so far. It also kills or contaminates many US and UK war veterans and their offspring. There is a very large amount of evidence of it's damage, and many groups working to outlaw such weapons.
The long-term effects around the world are potentially devastating for the human race, as D.U. goes on killing forever.

“After the Americans destroyed our village and killed many of us, we also lost our houses and have nothing to eat. However, we would have endured these miseries and even accepted them, if the Americans had not sentenced us all to death.”

Uzbekistan dictator Islam Karimov's army, which last Friday opened fire on thousands of unarmed protesters in Andijan, in the Ferghana Valley, has been showered by Washington in the past few years with hundreds of millions of dollars (US$200 million in 2002 alone) - all on behalf of the "war on terror".
So you won't see the White House, or Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice, hammering Karimov. You won't hear many in Washington calling for free elections in Uzbekistan. The former strongmen of color-coded, "revolutionary" Georgia, Ukraine and Kyrgyzstan were monsters who had to be removed for "freedom and democracy" to prevail. So is the dictator of Belarus. Not Karimov. He's "our" dictator: the Saddam Hussein of Central Asia is George W Bush's man.

In 1987, the sociologist Alex Carey, a second Orwell in his prophesies, wrote "Managing Public Opinion: the corporate offensive". He described how in the United States "great progress [had been] made towards the ideal of a propaganda-managed democracy", whose principal aim was to identify a rapacious business state "with every cherished human value". The power and meaning of true democracy, of the franchise itself, would be "transferred" to the propaganda of advertising, public relations and corporate-run news. This "model of ideological control", he predicted, would be adopted by other countries, such as Britain.

Following this analysis, is a Pentagon paper on implementing Bush's new pre-emptive nuclear war doctrines.
It has much deeper implications than I first thought.
.....Bush, and his ally, the UK, both threatened to use nuclear weapons to accomplish their objectives - if they claimed their chosen enemy used what Bush and his allies decided was WMD. That is, Bush and his allies threatened to use nuclear weapons to accomplish military objectives in a war they started based on lies they invented.
I find that mind-blowingly evil and pathologically stupid.

"Geographic combatant commanders may request presidential approval for use of nuclear weapons for a variety of conditions," the paper says.

Is the CIA Behind the Iraqi "Insurgents"--and Global Terrorism?
The requirement of an ever-escalating level of social violence to meet the political and economic needs of the insatiable "anti-terrorist complex" is the essence of the new US militarism. What is now openly billed as "permanent war" ultimately serves the geo-political ends of social control in the interests of US corporate domination, much as the anti-communist crusade of the now-exhausted Cold War did.   See: http://ww4report.com/

In what may be the largest expansion of covert action by the armed forces since the Vietnam era, the Bush administration has turned to what the Pentagon calls the "black world" to pursue the War on Terrorism, defense analyst William M. Arkin wrote in the LA Times Oct. 27.

Competent NZ defence planners would advise against providing future potential enemies with ready-made
nuclear targets in New Zealand.

What this amounts to is that enough people in the US and UK have been fooled and are now courting Global Extinction. They have said: "we'll endorse Bush and Blair so they can do the same again. Of course they don't realise it and most don't think much at all. But the unexpected - nuclear extinction as a result - can easily happen. Without realising it, people are taking part in a lethal, perhaps terminal, gamble, to satisfy our leaders' drive for Empire.

All but unheard in the snarling din are the true voices of peace -- voices calling on the one group of nations to resist the demonic allure of nuclear arms and on the other group to rid themselves of the ones they have, leaving the world with a single standard: no nuclear weapons. Of the countries represented at the conference, fully 183 have found it entirely possible to live without atomic arsenals, and few -- barring a breakdown of the treaty -- show any sign of changing their minds. In the UN General Assembly the vast majority of them have voted regularly for nuclear abolition. Behind those votes stand the people of the world, who, when asked, agree. Even the people of the United States are in the consensus. Presented by AP pollsters in March with the statement, "No country should be allowed to have nuclear weapons," 66% agreed. In other countries, the percentage of supporters is higher. On the day their voices are heard and their will made active, the end of the nuclear age will be in sight.     www.tomdispatch.com - May 23rd edition

There's a political movement afoot today in this country, and its aim is to gradually replace "democracy" as we know it with "biblical law." It's called "Christian Reconstructionism." It's real, and they are deadly earnest. Don't just take my word for it--do a bit of research and you'll find out how real it is. Unfortunately, the politics of corporate greed, power and plunder overlap conveniently with the grim theology of the Reconstructionists, and an unholy alliance has been formed, each finding advantage in assisting the advancement of the other. In the person of George W. Bush, theology and corporatism have merged and are indistinguishable from one another, producing a truly dangerous hybrid.

This is a very powerful indictment of Bushism by an angry American lady. With great eloquence and insight she sees where Bush is leading the American people and the consequences for the world.
His poisoning of people with D.U. weapons, not just in Iraq, but eventually everywhere, means extinction for humanity - sooner for some, later for others. With a half life of 4.5 billion years, D.U. Microscopic particles drift around the world, poisoning, causing crippling diseases, and killing forever. There is no doubt whatsoever, that those using these insidious weapons, and those who order them to be used, are mass murderers, guilty of the most heinous war crimes and violations of international law. George Bush and Tony Blair know this - that they are war criminals - but they are willing to take any risks - multiple risks.

Getting the attention of the American people is, for the most part, a futile exercise -- like screaming into the wind. One wonders how many birth defects, such as babies born with no internal organs, fused organs, no brains, no eyes in empty sockets, will it take before Americans join their international counterparts and cry, "Enough!" When will we realize we are the terrorists, and our *weapon of mass destruction is Depleted Uranium?

Blair deliberately suppressed UK Attorney-General's advice that the war was illegal. He also ignored Hans Blix's report to the UN that "no weapons of mass destruction had been found so far".

The Iraq war has erupted as a major Election issue after legal advice warning Tony Blair that the conflict breached international law was sensationally leaked.
The Government's refusal to disclose the advice has been one of the most controversial issues since the war ended, but The Mail on Sunday can now reveal for the first time exactly what counsel Mr Blair received.

The fight to restore democracy in our country continues.  I can tell you one thing.  There is a core group of determined people who will not give up this fight, no matter how long it takes.  I invite you to stay informed, help spread the word, and to expand on a cliche, "DON'T get over it."
In this newsletter:
1) New lawsuit filed against e-voting machine company in Washington State
2) New investigation launched into Ohio recount
3) National Conference to Save our Democracy held
4) Election Reform Commission is stacked with GOP
5) Divestment campaign about to enter next phase
6) New tool for writing letters to election officials
7) New Up-to-the-minute Voting News available
8) The CD project
9) This Newsletter to be published in PDF

Professor Michael Klare, for many years, an internationally recognised specialist in Oil politics and anti-war issues has written the following first-rate paper on US reasons for planning a war against Iran. It's oil again. He, UN WMD inspector Scott Ritter, and others have predicted the US will begin the war in June 2005 unless people stop them.
                  PAN meeting on Monday May 2 at 7.30pm at the Greens office on Bedford Row, Christchurch, NZ

As the United States gears up for an attack on Iran, one thing is certain: the Bush administration will never mention oil as a reason for going to war. As in the case of Iraq, weapons of mass destruction (WMD) will be cited as the principal justification for an American assault. "We will not tolerate the construction of a nuclear weapon [by Iran]," is the way President Bush put it in a much-quoted 2003 statement.

Loaded labels are commonly used to influence the public's feelings about groups of people as well as individuals. Under Ronald Reagan the Afghan mujahedeen, who received CIA funding and weapons that they used to fight Soviet occupation forces, were called "freedom fighters." Iraqis who take up arms against U.S. occupation troops, on the other hand, are called "insurgents," a word that implies rebellion for its own sake. This was the same term used by the New York Times and other mainstream media to refer to anti-U.S. fighters in Vietnam during the 1960s. Only later, when the Vietnam War became unpopular, did American newspapers begin calling the former "insurgents" members of an infinitely more patriotic-sounding "resistance."

The most damning indictment of the following article is that "Wolfowitz authorised a sole source contract to Halliburton for Operation Restore Iraqi Oil (RIO) before the war began."
Now that he is rewarded by Bush with the World Bank position for a job well done on Iraq, he can continue his favouring of US corporate interests but on a much grander scale.

What did Wolfowitz know with regard to Halliburton's inside advantage in gaining Iraq contracts, and when did he know it? If the World Bank's board had applied the same kind of "due diligence" to Paul Wolfowitz that they purport to apply to major development projects, they might have uncovered a significant conflict of interest that could have led them to rethink their embrace of the architect of the Iraq war.

PhD at North Carolina Wesleyan College offers 9/11course for college credit and is looking for answers government has never given
The Bush administration's complicity in the events surrounding 9/11 has now made its way into the curriculum of a college political science course taught at Wesleyan College in North Carolina.
The course, entitled "9/11: The Road to Tyranny", was the brainchild of college professor Jane Christensen, who saw the social need to explore the many questions about the WTC attacks and the war on terrorism.
Being taught this spring, the course explores the validity of the government's official 9/11 story, the many alternative theories advanced and the way the war on terrorism has drastically changed American life.

To justify the war on Iraq and everything since, Bush's neocons wrote in their pre-9/11 Iraq war plans that "we need another Pearl Harbour". 9/11 gave it to them, and they were keen to start the pre-planned Iraq war from the day 9/11 happened. They did not have a shred of real evidence to support this war, so they created a litany of justifying lies. Other articles on this site under "US Elections" and "9/11 Questions" show US election fraud and doubt the 'official' story on the origins of 9/11.

This article below is particularly important because it reveals that the US itself creates many of the terrorism incidents and then blames other for these actions. Thus they are creating the excuse they need for increasing their military action.

The Pentagon Plan to Provoke Terrorist Attacks
This column stands foursquare with the Honorable Donald H. Rumsfeld, U.S. Secretary of Defense, when he warns that there will be more terrorist attacks against the American people and civilization at large. We know, as does the Honorable Donald H. Rumsfeld, U.S. Secretary of Defense, that this statement is an incontrovertible fact, a matter of scientific certainty. And how can we and the Honorable Donald H. Rumsfeld, U.S. Secretary of Defense, be so sure that there will be more terrorist attacks against the American people and civilization at large?
Because these attacks will be instigated at the order of the Honorable Donald H. Rumsfeld, U.S. Secretary of Defense.

If more unjust and illegal wars of aggression are looming on the horizon, it's our job as responsible people of conscience to stop them through either constitutional impeachment proceedings or collective civil disobedience -- which is to say, through our nonviolent noncooperation with evil

Scott Ritter said in a previous article that the US will be ready to start bombing Iran in June 2005, if Bush orders it.
He points out "that no one in the American media took it upon themselves to confront the President or his Secretary of State about the June 2005 date, or for that matter the October 2004 review by the President of military plans to attack Iran in June 2005."

Late last year, in the aftermath of the 2004 Presidential election, I was contacted by someone close to the Bush administration about the situation in Iraq.
There was a growing concern inside the Bush administration, this source said, about the direction the occupation was
going.
The Bush administration was keen on achieving some semblance of stability in Iraq before June 2005, I was told.
When I asked why that date, the source dropped the bombshell: because that was when the Pentagon was told to be prepared to launch a massive aerial attack against Iran, Iraq's neighbour to the east, in order to destroy the
Iranian nuclear programme.

The US never had any valid reason for invading, killing, imprisoning and torturing Iraqis. Even less reason today, as more and more US lies become further exposed as lies the Bush Administration created to justify war. Yet the US goes on piling up its record of horrible war crimes and pledging to continue and do more of these same crimes, both to the Iraqis and to others. They justify all crimes under the umbrella of "war on terrorism". Are Americans that dumbed down, that they actually believe this transparent series of lies?

A newly released memo shows that US General Ricardo Sanchez authorized illegal interrogation techniques in Iraq just months before the Abu Ghraib abuses. Colin Powell, meanwhile, regrets misinforming the UN about Iraq WMDs.
Also, imagine being typecast as Hitler.
Iraq: New Memo from Abu Ghraib, New Words from Powell

Step by step, Bush's 'US' is building its new Empire
Every nation not supportive of the continuing US crusade is a possible candidate for US assault.
Evan documents the insane doctrines of pre-emptive US war against anyone, anytime, anywhere the US unilaterally decides to attack. War policies are decided by a small coterie of un-elected, psychopathic neocons selected by President Bush. He has promoted them to the highest ranks of the US government. Bush does not listen to any criticism or alternative advice. They have been planning war against Iraq and other states for many years - long before the 9/11 attack.

Pentagon Confirms That Unilateral Preemptive Strikes Are Now US Policy
The Pentagon has released a new strategic plan, blandly titled "The National Defense Strategy of the United States of America," that explicitly endorses unilateral preemptive strikes.
This is yet another indication that the Bush administration is dramatically accelerating away from longstanding doctrines that are upheld by both general international law and seemingly-important transatlantic coalitions like NATO.

Chossudovsky is one of the world's leading analysts of US foreign and military policies.
The following paper proves that. His forte is determining where the US is really headed, and what strategy it intends to use to get there. He does not cover the potential dire consequences of US strategy, at least in this article.
But the consequences are huge. We are looking at the rapid militarization of US society as a whole, and harnessing the resources of the state and the people, to achieve bizarre, even paranoid, and exceedingly dangerous military objectives.

The Pentagon has released the summary of a top secret Pentagon document, which sketches America's agenda for global military domination.
This redirection of America's military strategy seems to have passed virtually unnoticed. With the exception of The Wall Street Journal (see below in annex), not a word has been mentioned in the US media.
There has been no press coverage concerning this mysterious military blueprint. The latter outlines, according to the Wall Street Journal, America's global military design which consists in "enhancing U.S. influence around the world", through increased troop deployments and a massive buildup of America's advanced weapons systems.

P.R. expert John Stauber and Pulitzer Prize-winning reporter Laurie Garrett comment on the Times' front page investigation of the 'fake news' scandals.
Editor's note: The following is an edited transcript of a Democracy Now! interview with PRwatch.org's John Stauber and Pulitzer-winning reporter Laurie Garrett. For the full transcript go to Democracy Now!
More Stories by Amy Goodman

Bush believes he is inspired by God, talks to God, and that whatever he does is blessed by God. This supposedly includes any torture and murder that Bush chooses to do. Of course Bush admits nothing and denies everything, so manages to fool enough Americans to continue to get public support... As the Red Cross points out, most of the victims are innocent and have no links with the so-called ‘terrorists’.

In the heady months after the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks, the chickenhawks of the Bush Regime were eager to flash their tough-guy cojones to the world. Led by the former prep-school cheerleader in the Oval Office, swaggering Bushists openly bragged of "kicking ass" with macho tactics like torture and "extraordinary rendition."

The media, even in NZ, do not mention Bush's illegal invasion based on lies and the killing of over 100,000 people in his pursuit of oil and control of Iraq. The corporate media do not draw attention to the fact that Bush and his administration have committed multiple war crimes and should be standing trial at the World Court at The Hague. The more Bush commits war crimes, the more enthusiastic the media becomes about relaying pro-Bush war propaganda.

.......And besides, someone has to keep the press honest. In recent weeks Krugman's column has focused heavily on the flaws in the president's Social Security proposal—flaws the media have downplayed, he says, because the press seems "extremely hostile to Social Security as it is" and "really buys into the notion of a crisis."
This might be because Social Security is an issue that is clearly important but that few in the media really understand. To the press, "it became a badge," Krugman says. "You needed to learn about two paragraphs of stuff and then you could go on a panel and sound like a grave, serious person concerned about the problems of the United States."

In February 2003 - a few weeks before the invasion of Iraq - President George W. Bush declared that "[r]ebuilding Iraq will require a sustained commitment from many nations, including our own: we will remain in Iraq as long as necessary, and not a day more. America has made and kept this kind of commitment before - in the peace that followed a world war."
However, Bush never addressed the question of cost. From the start, the administration has been, and continues to be, evasive about the costs of war in Iraq. But these costs cannot be ignored and must be weighed by the American public, particularly taxpayers, to determine whether they are willing to pay the price and make the necessary sacrifices to create a stable and peaceful democracy in Iraq - if that goal can be achieved at all.

Dr Roberts analysis is brilliant and spells out the true situation briefly and with clarity. However I don't think the neocon's want to "remake the Middle East in the American image". I think they want to make a barbarous wasteland and call it "freedom and democracy" in order to fool Americans into giving support for the slaughter.
I agree that the neocons want "to provoke a Pearl Harbour" and "may orchestrate a scenario that will suck the US into a wider war". That certainly coincides with my analysis based on years of studying the situation.

President Bush's invasion has turned Iraq into a recruiting and training ground for anti-U.S. terrorists, according to CIA Director Porter Goss in testimony before the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence on Feb. 16. Goss' report was supported by Vice Admiral Lowell Jacoby, director of the the Defense Intelligence Agency. Jacoby told the committee that "our policies in the Middle East fuel Islamic resentment." The Iraq insurgency, Jacoby reported, has grown "in size and complexity over the past year" with daily attacks increasing 240 percent.
The situation, in other words, is out of control. One hundred fifty thousand American troops are tied down by a few thousand lightly armed insurgents. The recent Iraq election was won by Shi'ites allied with Iran. U.S. casualties continue to mount, and our troops can seldom tell friend from foe.
Why isn't Bush looking for a way out of the greatest strategic blunder in American history? Why, instead, are Bush and his government doing all they can to spread the conflict into Syria and Iran?

How the US creates a new dependant market and destroys a local industry that has proven successful methods, - almost like a new form of economic enslavement, is well described in the following article by Jeremy Smith.
The US created a very rich bonanza for US construction corporations by massive bombing of Iraq before they illegally invaded it. Chosen US corporations, who support Bush, were then given contracts to rebuild it. Similarly US military corporations who supply materials and food to US troops, make weapons, supply military 'contracted' personnel to act as US mercenaries etc, are given a vested interest in the Iraq war and colonial occupation.

Although this article below was written in 2003, it does illuminate some of the mysteries of why so many Americans seem to be taken in, and echo, Bush lies and why so many seem to deny the very threatening realities that confront them every day....

....I realise that to many readers this will seem too bizarre to be possible. If so, remember that our supposedly ‘sane’ global society has lived on the brink of a nuclear self-annihilation for 60 years and, in spite of the end of the cold war, continues to work on the means to bring this about. Millions of people know that a nuclear holocaust has almost happened on several occasions, but they do nothing to prevent it or try and change the situation.. It’s a huge industry employing millions of people and costing trillions of dollars. Many people have learned to accept this situation as necessary for global security reasons, or as part of the human environment. The authors say “get smart, and then we will reclaim our Republic.”

US EXPANDS THREAT TO OTHER STATES

StratCom Will Oversee WMD Efforts

Dropping in on the Apocalypse

Xtreme Weather and the Planet's "Human Carrying Capacity"
"The countdown to climate-change catastrophe is spelt out by a task force of senior politicians, business leaders and academics from around the world -- and it is remarkably brief. In as little as 10 years, or even less, their report indicates, the point of no return with global warming may have been reached… And it breaks new ground by putting a figure -- for the first time in such a high-level document -- on the danger point of global warming, that is, the temperature rise beyond which the world would be irretrievably committed to disastrous changes. These could include widespread agricultural failure, water shortages and major droughts, increased disease, sea-level rise and the death of forests -- with the added possibility of abrupt catastrophic events such as 'runaway' global warming, the melting of the Greenland ice sheet, or the switching-off of the Gulf Stream.

Of Militarism, Fascism, War And National Consciousness:

Space Wars Dream - Will It Fizzle Out Again?

. . . . In this deadly nuclear gamesmanship, would the present or a future US administration ever decide to make a surprise massive first nuclear strike against Russia, China or some other state, taking a calculated risk that they can destroy the retaliatory power of their chosen enemy?

Star Wars Faces a Budget Hit

Unreliability is just one reason why funding is being cut.
The other is the changing nature of potential threats to U.S. security.

Iraq Elections A Fraud

Our website under "US Elections" shows that Bush, as he did in 2000, got another term as US President in 2004, due to 'fixed' electronic voting machines and other frauds.

Elections’ Aftermath

It is true that millions of Iraqis have participated in the “elections”, but by international standard, the turnout was very low. On the day of the elections Iraq was in a state of siege, cut off from all directions. Journalists were also limited to areas of higher turnout, and the international monitors stayed in Jordan, 1200 km from Iraq. The elections were designed to provide legitimacy to US Occupation.

On Iraqi People, Resistance and Oil versus American bases

Israel occupies Palestine, builds an apartheid wall, kills civilians, uproots trees, and destroys homes and villages while at the same time they demand a ‘reasonable’ Palestinian leadership to negotiate with, while Sharon imposes armed violence with impunity and support from the US.
The US (with the UK tagging along) occupies Iraq illegally and under false pretences, destroys its fragile infrastructure, drives the alien civil strife wedge deep into Iraqi society and yet demands to have ‘reasonable’ representatives of the Iraqi people (with the blessings of Negroponti and his 3000 embassy staff members) to negotiate with on its own (US) terms, laws and conditions that were illegally put in place by Bremer and Feldman, as it hugs the Iraqi oil and economy.

Did Anyone Oppose Alberto Gonzales' Confirmation

As Attorney General?
...At the end of the day, six turncoat Democrats did vote WITH the Republicans to confirm Mr. Gonzales (see their infamous names in Appendix B below ).  However, 35 Democrats and one Independent voted AGAINST this terrible appointment (see Appendix A below).  Perhaps the worst act of betrayal came when Democrat-in-name-only Joseph Lieberman (CT) chose to quote a Biblical passage about doing justice, but then perversely ignored Mr. Gonzales' recent complicity in grave injustices, while advocating his confirmation.  

Christian Zionists and neocons: a heavenly marriage

A fusion of religious zealotry, political dogma and anti-Islamism is becoming a potent and underestimated force in United States security policy.
This growth in Christian Zionism in recent years forms just one part of the wider increase in the conservative evangelism movement, the fastest-growing sector within American Christian churches. Donald Wagner estimates that it numbers 100-130 million adherents (the population of the United States is 293 million). The proportion of Christian Zionists among this figure is harder to assess, but perhaps 20-25% of US evangelicals could be described as sympathetic to the doctrine’s fundamentalist views. At the same time, larger numbers may be inclined to support Israel because of broader dispensationalist sympathies; and the fact that evangelical Christians seem particularly disposed to vote, and to be more likely to support the Republican Party, has allowed them to secure a power even greater than their numbers.

Life under the Bombs in Iraq

There is something thoroughly inspiring when people, under the threat of death, turn out to vote in a country that has become an armed camp. The urge of a long oppressed people to take back their lives, to act, is always moving and powerful. Certainly, the Iraq vote, as presented in the media here in the U.S., has also provided a boost to the Bush administration at home at a useful moment.
When you read Dahr Jamail's account below and meet the people under the bombs, imagine what sort of an Iraq they might actually be voting for. Tom

CIA changes tune on Iraq WMD

A January 18 report, titled "Iraq: No Large-Scale Chemical Warfare Efforts Since Early 1990s," concludes that Saddam Hussein abandoned major chemical weapons programs after the first Gulf War in 1991.

Dramatic Change in West Antarctic Ice Could Produce 16ft Rise in Sea Levels

Margaret Beckett, the Environment Secretary, who opened the conference, added another ominous prediction when she said that major global warming impacts on the world in the next 20 to 30 years could not be avoided. Whatever we do, potentially disastrous world temperature rises will take place because they are already "built into the system," she said.
Her forecast that we are powerless to prevent major damage from climate change is accepted by scientists but it is rare for such a frank admission from a politician. It reflects the concern at a high level.        lndependent/UK

Last Action Alert: 

The Full Senate Will Debate, And Then Vote On, Alberto

There is No Tomorrow

I read that the administrator of the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency has declared the election a mandate for President Bush on the environment. This for an administration :

•  That wants to rewrite the Clean Air Act, the Clean Water Act and the Endangered Species Act protecting rare plant and animal species and their habitats, as well as the National Environmental Policy Act, which requires the government to judge beforehand whether actions might damage natural resources.
  
•  That wants to relax pollution limits for ozone; eliminate vehicle tailpipe inspections, and ease pollution standards for cars, sport-utility vehicles and diesel-powered big trucks and heavy equipment.
  
•  That wants a new international audit law to allow corporations to keep certain information about environmental problems secret from the public.
  
•  That wants to drop all its new-source review suits against polluting, coal-fired power plants and weaken consent decrees reached earlier with coal companies.
  
•  That wants to open the Arctic [National] Wildlife Refuge to drilling and increase drilling in Padre Island National Seashore, the longest stretch of undeveloped barrier island in the world and the last great coastal wild land in America.

Global Warming is 'Twice as Bad as Previously Thought'

"An 11C-warmed world would be a dramatically different world... There would be large areas at higher latitudes that could be up to 20C warmer than today. The UK would be at the high end of these changes. It is possible that even present levels of greenhouse gases maintained for long periods may lead to dangerous climate change... When you start to look at these temperatures, I get very worried indeed."
Attempts to control global warming, based on the Kyoto treaty, concentrated on stabilizing the emissions of greenhouse gases at 1990 levels, but the scientists warned that this might not be enough. Mr Stainforth added: "We need to accept that while greenhouse gas levels can increase we need to limit them, level them off then bring them back down again."

The Global Descent of America

The mentality that the Americans brought into their attack on the people of Falluja was well indicated by the commanders who said on record that Falluja was ' a house of Satan'.

Rice Arrives Just in Time to Oversee U.S. Decline

The first Black female U.S. Secretary of State will inevitably preside over a general and dramatic decline in American influence in the world, a process that accelerates with each passing week. So bizarre is American behavior – so disconnected from objective facts and from international conversation and evolving human standards of conduct – that Condoleezza Rice cannot escape becoming a caricature of diplomacy.

DOES BUSH MEAN IT? - YES THEY DO

Look at Dr. Roberts background (at end)consider his experience, and then read his analysis.
In "Does Bush Mean It?, Craig warns us, and shows his concern and reasons for believing "Yes they do"
Everyone should be as concerned as everyone wished Germans had been in 1938.
Except now the predictions are for far, far worse.

Does Bush Mean It?

Readers in numbers beyond my ability to reply individually have challenged me whether President Bush’s inaugural speech is a statement of his intentions or merely a celebration of himself and American democracy. Surely Bush doesn’t believe America has the power to remake the world in its own image other than by being an example for others to follow?
...The answer is that it doesn’t matter whether Bush believes, or even understands, what he said. The neoconservatives believe it, and they control the Bush administration.

Trends Toward a Fascist Warfare State Seen In

Condoleezza Rice's Confirmation
President Bush has been been able to lead America into a phoney war based on his, and Condoleezza Rice's litany of lies. The war has proved to be disastrous, claimed 1,368 U.S. lives (as of Jan 250, and continues with increased violence and intensity at a cost of over $US200 billion so far. It was all done with Senate approval, including new laws that push the U.S. toward a U.S. brand of fascism.

"Standing for the Founding Principles of the Republic"

This doctrine of preemptive strikes places the sole decision of war and peace in the hands of the President and undermines the Constitutional power of Congress to declare war.

Democracy - It's not God's gift

. . .For Bush, as for Zarqawi, political principles come from God. In his "God-drenched" inauguration speech (as Ronald Reagan's former speechwriter, Peggy Noonan, described it), Bush explained that people have inalienable rights because they "bear the image of the Maker of heaven and earth," and that America's mission to spread democracy around the globe comes directly from "the Author of liberty."

Climate Change: Countdown to Global Catastrophe

Report warns point of no return may be reached in 10 years, leading to droughts, agricultural failure and water shortages
The global warming danger threshold for the world is clearly marked for the first time in an international report to be published tomorrow - and the bad news is, the world has nearly reached it already.
The countdown to climate-change catastrophe is spelt out by a task force of senior politicians, business leaders and academics from around the world - and it is remarkably brief. In as little as 10 years, or even less, their report indicates, the point of no return with global warming may have been reached.     Independent/UK

Global Warming Approaching Point of No Return, Warns Leading Climate Expert

He added that, because of inertia built into the Earth's natural systems, the world was now only experiencing the result of pollution emitted in the 1960s, and much greater effects would occur as the increased pollution of later decades worked its way through. He concluded: "We are risking the ability of the human race to survive."

Commandos See Duty on U.S. Soil in Role Redefined by Terror Fight

These commandos, operating under a secret counterterrorism program code-named Power Geyser, were mentioned publicly for the first time this week on a Web site for a new book, "Code Names: Deciphering U.S. Military Plans, Programs and Operation in the 9/11 World," (Steerforth Press) http://codenames.org. The book was written by William M. Arkin, a former intelligence analyst for the Army.

Bush Doctrine Is Expected to Get Chilly Reception

They were stunned when Bush leaned across a table in a private meeting and lectured Prime Minister Paul Martin about opposing the U.S. missile defense system. And they were later taken aback by a speech filled with what they considered the same "old Bush" foreign policy pronouncements that opened the divide with the allies in the first place.
"If he's going to take that speech to Europe," said a top Canadian official who attended the meeting between Bush and Martin, "he's not going to get a good reception."
SIGN OUR U.N. PETITION TO BAN WEAPONS AND WARFARE IN SPACE
http://www.thepetitionsite.com/takeaction/832338563

Bush's Inauguration Speech Promises

Death and Destruction for 'Freedom and Democracy'
In his inauguration speech, Bush equates American ideals of freedom, liberty and democracy to the Founding Fathers and to what Bush claims are his ideals and objectives....
He did not mention that the US, since World War II, has a long history of selecting oppressive dictators including Saddam, to install and support in different countries. Rather than liberate, Bush has authorised the killing of over 100,000 Iraqis, maiming, imprisoning, torturing and murdering many more and laying waste to the country. He continues to do this, including stepping up his mass destruction of cities like Fallujah. All this wanton killing and destruction, he continues to claim "is liberating the oppressed and giving them freedom, liberty and an elected government".

President Sworn-In to Second Term

Salvador Option Part of Plan?

The US is blaming Iran and Syria for helping and causing the increasing resistance in Iraq. They may spin that into excuses to make war on the two countries and perhaps others, thus fulfilling Bush's Jan 20th promise to bring "freedom and democracy" to the "oppressed people under totalitarian regimes" in the middle east and what US spin doctors call "regime change". If successful Bush will install selected personnel as "transitional governments" (as in Iraq). The US can call their new puppets "democratic" (as in Iraq) and continue as overlords who control and price most of the world's oil resources in the middle east.

Salvador Option

By any standard, the ongoing American occupation of Iraq is a disaster.
The highly vaunted US military machine, laurelled and praised for its historic march on Baghdad in March and April of 2003, today finds itself a broken force, on the defensive in a land that it may occupy in part, but does not control.
The all-out offensive to break the back of the resistance in Falluja has failed, leaving a city destroyed by American firepower, and still very much in the grips of the anti-American fighters.

Mass Murdering Iranians: Nearly Half of All Americans Agree

I have big problems with opinion polls, especially those conducted by the corporate news industry, but a recent survey by the Washington-based Opinion Research Corporation for the nonprofit and nonpartisan Results For America, which is a project of the Civil Society Institute, makes perfect sense, considering the mindset of at least half of all voting Americans, especially those in the Deliverance states. “A major new national opinion survey of 1,608 American voters released this week shows that only 42 percent would support the U.S. invasion of Iran to stop its nuclear program,” writes Anwar Iqbal for the World Peace Herald. “Nearly half—47 percent—of U.S. voters would oppose such a move and 11 percent are unsure.”

Why Terrorists May Be Coming Soon to a Mall Near You

If you live near a military base or installation, as I do here in New Mexico, you shouldn’t be surprised if terrorists attack, drive a suicide truck through the front gates and kill a whole lot of people.
Fair is fair, as they say, in love and war, especially war.
It shouldn’t come as a surprise because the Pentagon is now attacking the “military infrastructure” in Iran, as crack investigative journalist Seymour Hersh reports. Of course, when the Pentagon says “military infrastructure,” it means not only missile sites, ammo depots, etc., but also humans, the largest and most crucial part of any “military infrastructure.”

10, 000+ At Inaugural Parade - from ANSWER.

Over 10,000 antiwar protestors at A.N.S.W.E.R. Mass Convergence site on Inaugural Parade route between 3rd & 4th St. on Pennsylvania Ave. Thousands of other protestors blocked at Secret Service Checkpoints

Is This The Greatest Conspiracy in History?

I've read John Kaminski's interview and many other related papers on the "9/11 Questions" on this website, and checked on the many valuable links in Kaminski's paper. This collection and much associated data on this site, made me conclude that 9/11 and associated events like the 'US War On Iraq' and more wars to come, represent the world's greatest criminal conspiracy.

WING Spotlight Interview: John Kaminski

There is not now nor has there even been legal proof that Arab hijackers perpetrated the 9/11 horror. They could not be convicted of the crime in an honest court of law ("honest," of course, ruling out all U.S. courts). If Bush had real evidence, don't you think he would have produced it? Atta and the others were most likely Israeli Arabs posing as faux-hijackers to give the real perpetrators a believable cover story for their demolition-for-money of the World Trade Center.
http://69.28.73.17/issue4/kaminski.html

THE COMING WARS     What the Pentagon can now do in secret.

“Rumsfeld will no longer have to refer anything through the government’s intelligence wringer,” the former official went on. “The intelligence system was designed to put competing agencies in competition. What’s missing will be the dynamic tension that insures everyone’s priorities—in the C.I.A., the D.O.D., the F.B.I., and even the Department of Homeland Security—are discussed. The most insidious implication of the new system is that Rumsfeld no longer has to tell people what he’s doing so they can ask, ‘Why are you doing this?’ or ‘What are your priorities?’ Now he can keep all of the mattress mice out of it.”

Shredding The Law Ushers in US Fascism

Gonzales as US Attorney-General, would be a giant step toward a "1984" US Fascist state, under Bush and his Neo-con administration. This would have a profound effect on the world and facilitate, with a legal facade, anything and any crime the Bush Administration decided to commit. US torture of prisoners is a good example of how Gonzales tramples on the US Constitution and International Law to suit the Bush Administration. Bush and Rumsfeld authorised the torture. It was not just a few army rogues acting on their own. They were under orders that came from the top.

Action Alert: Vote On Gonzales Appointment Coming Soon...

....Ms. Aron stated that two issues have delayed the SJC's vote: (1) Mr. Gonzales' evasive  testimony during the SJC's 1-6-05 hearing -- he "failed to answer critical questions about whether the president has the power to authorize his subordinates to violate U.S. criminal laws and torture detainees [which is a blueprint for a dictatorship], and he did not explicitly repudiate waterboarding and other interrogation techniques that amounted to torture"; and (2) Bush administration stonewalling -- "...the White House has still not released documents necessary to evaluate Gonzales' role in formulating policies relating to the treatment of detainees and the applicability of the Geneva Conventions."

Bush’s Cambodia: Syria in the Crosshairs

...Bush and Crew were very shrewd to hitch their anti-Arab Strausscon-Zionist wagon up to the “war on terrorism” in the wake of 9/11—in fact, some of us claim 9/11 was an “inside job” pulled off expressly for that reason, to arouse hatred and manufacture consent for massive violence against people who happen to be a threat to Israel’s “security,” that is to say millions of Arabs and Iranians....

A Global Gulag to Hide the War on Terror's Dirty Secrets

The promise of imminent release for four British detainees held at the notorious US prison at Guantánamo Bay is obviously welcome, but it is only a tiny exception in the surge of bad news from the Bush team on the human rights front. The first few days of the new year have produced two shocking exposures already.
One is the revelation that the administration sees the US not just as a self-appointed global policeman, but also as the world's prison warder. It is thinking of building jails in foreign countries, mainly ones with grim human rights records, to which it can secretly transfer detainees (unconvicted by any court) for the rest of their lives - a kind of global gulag beyond the scrutiny of the International Committee of the Red Cross, or any other independent observers or lawyers.
The other horror is the light shone on the views of Alberto Gonzales, the White House nominee to be the chief law officer, the attorney general. At his Senate confirmation hearings last week he was revealed to be a man who not only refuses to rule out torture under any circumstances but also, in his capacity as White House counsel over the past few years, chaired several meetings at which specific interrogation techniques were discussed. As Edward Kennedy pointed out, and Gonzales did not deny, they included the threat of burial alive and water-boarding, under which the detainee is strapped to a board, forcibly pushed under water, wrapped in a wet towel, and made to believe he could drown.

US May Start War on Syria

Many articles on this site suggest that the US plans to dominate the Middle East, including wars on Iran and Syria, described by George Bush as part of the "Axis of Evil".
This article shows how the US is preparing for attacks on Syria by blaming it for backing the resistance in Iraq. The US describes any resistance to the illegal US invasion of Iraq as "terrorists". It continues to make more resistance in Iraq by bombing, poisoning, murder, torture and humiliation of Iraqis. Overextended in Iraq, the US plans to increase and broaden its attacks. Of particular significance, is the US rejection of Syrian offers of co-operation in order to build its justification for war on Syria.

U.S. Mulls Strikes on Syria

Bush administration hard-liners have been considering launching selected military strikes at insurgent training camps in Syria and border-crossing points used by Islamist guerrillas to enter Iraq in an effort to bolster security for the upcoming elections, according to former and current administration officials.

Converting America to Fascism

An important component of a state that is being manipulated to become fascist, is to progressively diminish civil liberties. This is happening with startling speed, and ease in the USA.

They Say They Can Lock You Up for Life Without a Trial

On Sunday, Jan 2, Dana Priest, writing in the Washington Post, described the plans of the Pentagon and the Justice Department to imprison indefinitely, perhaps for life, persons it wants "removed" from society. Having committed no crime, but believed to be associated with "terrorism" however that is defined at any given moment in time "the people will live in prison camps modeled on American prisons.

Reaction to Tsunami Deaths,

Compared to Reaction to Deaths Caused by US Illegal Wars
People and governments gave and pledged billions of dollars to relieve the suffering and rebuild the towns and cities of suffering victims. Thousands offered to work for nothing in order to help the Tsunami victims.
But very few are taking any action, or spending anything at all, to stop the 100,000 horrific deaths and suffering being purposefully inflicted by President Bush, Prime Ministers Blair and Howard and others on Iraqis. Nor do they act or spend to stop the even more horrific nuclear threats.. President Bush, by his actions, demonstrates to people every day, that it is okay to kill, maim, imprison and torture innocent Iraqis. Evidence and trials are not required according Bush, so long as he defines them as a "suspect terrorists or associates". Bush waves his magic propaganda wand and makes these innocent victims different from the Tsunami innocent victims. So the majority of people are unconcerned. Some even believe him.
The question is: How can people have so much sympathy for Tsunami victims, but little or none for the 100,000 + victims of Bush, Blair, Howard, and others of the 'Coalition of the Willing's' illegal war?
It seems to be a dramatic demonstration of how gullible people can be, and how easily manipulated most are to war propaganda, even when they know it's an illegal unjust war.

Total number of deaths from the Tsunami so far: 150,000
Upper limit of deaths from the Tsunami: 300,000 (assuming massive mortality from disease)
Number of immediate fatalities at Hiroshima: Appx 200,000
Estimated number of fatalities for a SINGLE 15-30Kt warhead strike on Bombay (Mumbai) 150-800,000
Estimated number of fatalities from a 'limited' India/Pakistan nuclear exchange: 15 million
I believe that the Tsunami contains lessons for us all, including lessons in how to remove the mutual distrust of each other that might result in the far grimmer scenarios sketched above...
...What these ghastly diabolical numbers show is that so far the Tsunami has merely managed to equal the Hiroshima body - count.

Pentagon transformation is well underway. The U.S. military is increasingly being converted into a global oil protection service. Secretary of War Donald Rumsfeld has a "strategy guy" whose job is to teach this new way of warfare to high-level military officers from all branches of services and to top level CIA operatives. Thomas Barnett is a professor at the Navy War College in Rhode Island. He is author of the controversial book The Pentagon’s New Map that identifies a "non-integrating gap" in the world that is resisting corporate globalization. Barnett defines the gap as parts of Latin America, Africa, Middle East and Central Asia all of which are key oil-producing regions of the world.

In an age when weapons of mass destruction can be slipped into the United States in a cargo container or even a suitcase, is Ronald Reagan's 1983 dream of building an umbrella against long-range enemy missiles passé? Or is it a necessary screen against the possibility of North Korea or another rogue state tossing a nuclear-tipped rocket our way?
As the US moves ahead with testing and deployment of the system, new questions are swirling about the merits of pursuing such a costly program in a time of war and increased demand for defense dollars.
The debate comes amid enduring skepticism about the technological feasibility of erecting an effective shield. In December, the US missile defense program suffered another test failure when the rocket carrying the "kill vehicle" meant to destroy an incoming mock enemy warhead shut down before launch from the Kwajalein Atoll in the Pacific Ocean.

WAR CRIMINAL FOR US ATTORNEY-GENERAL?

. . . . is that it is an indication to people about the real Bush, and that the domestic legal machinery to authorise torture emanated from Bush himself. US tortures come from the top. That is is no surprise.There are many other reports that Bush and his neocons are using torture as part of their plan to create more hatred of the US, leading to more resistance, which they can call "terrorism". That helps them create another phoney reason to stay and increase their military aggression in Iraq, blame others for "the increase in terrorism", and carry the war to other countries.

Confirming Bush's Appointee is Unthinkable Because Confirming Gonzales Is Confirming Torture
Readers might recall that White House Counsel Alberto Gonzales wrote an infamous "torture memo," dated 25 January 2002, in which he erroneously advised President Bush that he could: (1) use his "commander-in-chief authority" to
override the "quaint and obsolete" Geneva Conventions, the UN Convention Against Torture, and the US War Crimes Act, during his so-called "War on Terror"; and (2) authorize the use of interrogation methods which are tantamount to torture on prisoners held in Guantanamo Bay and other US military prisons.
Mr. Gonzales' legal opinion was meritless but highly consequential, for it ultimately lead to the US military's scandalous use of torture tactics on war prisoners and detainees -- including at least 40 who were tortured to death -- at Abu Ghraib and other prisons. Now the entire world regards Alberto Gonzales as complicit in these war crimes.

Bush Plans Long Escalating Wars

As Robert Parry points out, Bush plans long wars, is purging any doubters like Colin Powell and installing sycophants who will support his every wish. So rather than have a more moderate second term, Bush plans on more wars. I think he will decide to use nuclear weapons and believe that nuclear weapons use has been built into the neocon middle-east plan. Otherwise why would he lower the nuclear barrier in his new preemptive war doctrines, make new nuclear weapons and plan to resume testing?

George W. Bush’s vision for America’s future is coming into clearer focus following Election 2004: For the next generation or more, it appears the American people will be asked to sacrifice their children, their tax dollars and possibly the remnants of their democracy to what a top U.S. commander now candidly calls the “Long War.”

Will Bush Empire Go Nuclear in 2005

The US will not accept defeat in Iraq, and is likely to militarily over extend itself there, and with their other neocon-planned conquests in the Middle East. That will place them in what I believe is a pre-planned position: of either accepting defeat, or using nuclear weapons "to avoid defeat of freedom and democracy". The mass media in the US has demonstrated that it can be relied on to back Bush - and deliver a propagandised US public, that will mainly support nuclear weapons use to avoid defeat in "the war on terrorism".

The Empire in the Year 2005

The Iraqi resistance has proven that the US Empire is not invincible. With over 1500 combat deaths, close to 25,000 disabled soldiers and over 35,000 suffering severe "mental illnesses", the US occupation army is incapable of bringing the colonial war to a victorious conclusion.
...The logic of Washington for 2005 is that the War must continue, victory must be secured – no matter what the cost in human lives, Iraqi or US. The treasury and the budget is hostage to the Logic of War: to defend the image of imperial invincibility, the empire will be brought to its knees.

New Israeli/US Offensives in Mid-East

Uri Avnery is one of the leading Israeli writers opposing Sharon's murderous actions, exposing his lies and real plans. The following is an excellent example of Avnery's work.
See: http://www.globalresearch.ca for more excellent articles by top journalists and writers.

When the fruit sellers at the Tel Aviv market shout "the boss has gone crazy!" they mean that they are selling their merchandise at ridiculously low prices.
In the world’s capitals, a similar cry is now being heard: "The boss has gone crazy!" – but it is not about the price of tomatoes.
It refers to the new situation, after the reelection of George W. Bush for four more years.