The Road to the Iraq War Will Happen Again
The power of the corporate media to deceive the people is simply astonishing, but, mind you, it depends on an already distracted, ignorant, semi-passive multitude whose marching values have been carefully cultivated.
In 2003 we went into Iraq under scandalously false pretexts, guns blazing—bragging about our ability to deliver “shock and awe” with impunity (the mark of the bully) and with one goal in mind: to rob and rape that country blind of its riches. The official excuse was that Iraq and Saddam were mortal threats that had to be neutralized.
Within a matter of weeks if not days, the official line—adopted without missing a beat by the entire punditocracy—was that we had gone in “to save Iraq”, “make it a democracy,” and all the rest of the self-serving claptrap we use over and over again to justify our uber-criminal behavior. With a straight face the official voices declared that those who…
Saddam Lookalike Nearly Kidnapped And Forced To Do Porn
Ever feel as though you’re trapped in a waking nightmare? An ordinary Egyptian man’s terrible saga, via Huffington Post:
An Egyptian man who looks like Saddam Hussein says a gang of Iraqi kidnappers tried to force him to act in a pornographic film.
After refusing a $330,000 offer to play Hussein in a sex tape — which was purportedly planned to be sold to the media as an authentic recording of the deceased Iraqi dictator — Mohamed Bishr told al-Ahram that three men in black suits attempted to abduct him as he walked to a cafe in Alexandria on Sunday.
“The three men, who had guns hanging from their belts, forced me out of my car and shoved me into a van, hitting my head,” Bishr told the publication. For some reason, the abductors began arguing with each other and tossed him out of the vehicle, Bishr claims.
While plotting ways to destabilize Hussein before…
Did Saddam Hussein Call Parliament Member Hassan al-Allawi?
Saddam Hussein’s execution in 2006 was quickly publicized all over YouTube. Now the video sharing site has brought us a prank call that fuels the theory of Hussein still being alive. During a dinner party, Hussein supposedly called Hassan al-Allawi, a former Ba’ath Party member and member of Parliament, with a voice that was quite convincing. The entire report can be read at The New York Times. Below is a recording of the phone call along with an English translation:
Iraqi Defector Comes Clean About His WMD Lies
Meet Rafid Ahmed Alwan al-Janabi, CIA codename Curveball. He lied about Saddam Hussein’s having biological weapons, giving the Bush administration the ammunition they needed in their push for an invasion of Iraq. Al-Janabi says he would do it all over again if he could — the lesson being, don’t trust anyone named Curveball.
Saddam Hussein’s Attorney To Represent Charles Manson
CNN reports:
Prominent attorney Giovanni Di Stefano, who has represented former Iraq dictator Saddam Hussein and his right-hand man, “Chemical Ali,” or Ali Hassan al-Majid, is representing Charles Manson in his attempt for a new trial, Di Stefano told CNN.
Di Stefano has filed an application with the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights on behalf of Manson, he said. The petition says Manson didn’t receive a fair trial when he was convicted 40 years ago because, among other things, he was not allowed to represent himself, Di Stefano said.
The prosecutor in the Manson case, however, said Di Stefano’s claim has no merit.
Manson was assigned a public defender after the judge in his case became frustrated with Manson’s behavior while he was acting as his own attorney.
Di Stefano said that was a violation of Manson’s Sixth Amendment rights and is grounds for a new trial.
Pulitzer Prize Winning Photos Capture The War On Terror
Can an army make war on a concept? Tyler Hicks’ photography exhibit Histories Are Mirrors: The Path of Conflict Through Afghanistan and Iraq, doesn’t offer any answers where the contradictions of the War on Terror are concerned, but his images chronicle the soldiers and civilians who’ve been cast in the almost-decade-long tragedy. Hicks’ vivid photos show markets and massacres, heroes and hostages, every image taking its place in a sweeping drama presided over by a smiling villain: Saddam Hussein.
In Histories Are Mirrors, Hicks, a Pulitzer-winning New York Times staff photographer, documents the wreckage of the World Trade Center and the early years of the Iraq and Afghanistan wars, through 2004. Many of the wall labels offer only dates and locations, but the exhibit isn’t merely a timeline. Hicks’ best photographs capture the eternal features that crop up in the emotional landscape of wars everywhere: fear, pain, pride, rage, hubris, hope…
Jon Stewart is the First “Journalist” To Hold Tony Blair Accountable for His Iraq War Position (Video)
Watch the whole thing online (wasn’t aired on TV) and decide. Just because he has a new book out Stewart and The Daily Show are doing the job the American mainstream media should be doing:
Saddam Is Gone, But Tyranny Remains
Amnesty International recently reported that it believes 30,000 people are currently held in Iraqi jails, and the same kinds of abuses that went on under Saddam and American forces are still going on. From Al Jazeera:
Amnesty’s 59-page report, titled “New Order, Same Abuses: Unlawful detentions and torture in Iraq,” highlights the case of several men who were subjected to torture or who died in prison.
Among them was Riad Mohammed Saleh al-Oqaibi, arrested in September 2009 and held in a detention facility in Baghdad’s heavily-fortified Green Zone before being transferred to a secret detention facility elsewhere in the capital.
“During interrogation, he is said to have been beaten so hard on the chest that his ribs were broken and his liver damaged,” the report noted. “He died on 12 or 13 February as a result of internal bleeding.”
According to the rights group, methods of torture used against detainees include beatings with cables…
The CIA’s Plot to Make Osama and Saddam Into Gay Porn Stars
Jeff Stein writes on the Washington Post’s SpyTalk:
During planning for the 2003 invasion of Iraq, the CIA’s Iraq Operations Group kicked around a number of ideas for discrediting Saddam Hussein in the eyes of his people.
One was to create a video purporting to show the Iraqi dictator having sex with a teenage boy, according to two former CIA officials familiar with the project.
“It would look like it was taken by a hidden camera,” said one of the former officials. “Very grainy, like it was a secret videotaping of a sex session.”
The idea was to then “flood Iraq with the videos,” the former official said.
Another idea was to interrupt Iraqi television programming with a fake special news bulletin. An actor playing Hussein would announce that he was stepping down in favor of his (much-reviled) son Uday.
“I’m sure you will throw your support behind His Excellency Uday,” the fake Hussein would intone.
The…
Pentagon Hired ‘Crackpot’ Conspiracy Theorist As Al Qaeda Specialist
Justin Elliott writes on TPM Muckraker:
When the Pentagon’s internal think tank decided in 2004 it needed a better understanding of Al Qaeda, it turned to an unlikely source: the terrorism analyst Laurie Mylroie, who was known as the chief purveyor of the discredited idea that Saddam Hussein was behind Sept. 11 and many other attacks carried out by Al Qaeda.
Mylroie was paid roughly $75,000 to produce a 300-page study, “The History of Al Qaida,” for the Defense Department think tank, known as the Office of Net Assessment, a DOD spokesman tells us. The study, which is dated September 2005, was posted on an intelligence blog last month.
It documents the development of Al Qaeda and spends many pages dancing around the theory that has defined Mylroie’s career — that key Qaeda leaders acted at the behest of the Iraqi regime. She also argues that group-think among U.S. analysts has obscured the true nature of the terrorist group.
Those who know Mylroie’s work are shocked that the Pentagon would hire her.
Mysterious ‘Saddam Channel’ Hits Iraq TV
LARA JAKES writes on the AP via AOL News:
Turning on their TVs during the long holiday weekend, Iraqis were greeted by a familiar if unexpected face from their brutal past: Saddam Hussein. The late Iraqi dictator is lauded on a mysterious satellite channel that began broadcasting on the Islamic calendar’s anniversary of his 2006 execution.
No one seems to know who is bankrolling the so-called Saddam Channel, although the Iraqi government suspects it’s Baathists whose political party Saddam once led. The Associated Press tracked down a man in Damascus, Syria named Mohammed Jarboua, who claimed to be its chairman.
Viewers of al-Lafeta TV on Saturday saw the phrase “Raise your sword” next to a portrait of former Iraqi dictator Saddam Hussein. The channel began broadcasting on Friday, the first day of an important holiday of the Islamic calendar, and the anniversary of Saddam’s execution three years ago.
The Saddam channel, he said, “didn’t…
