by Larry Chin
Global Research, May 20, 2009

A red herring is a fallacy in which an irrelevant topic is used to divert attention from the original issue. The furor over House Speaker Nancy Pelosi’s knowledge of the Bush/Cheney administration’s use of torture is the latest Washington noise that conveniently diverts attention from the illegitimate “war on terrorism” that continues to serve as the justification for torture, murder and war.

Nancy’s clumsy tap dance

In a series of bumbling statements, Pelosi has denied her knowledge of the extent of the Bush/Cheney administration’s use of torture and other “enhanced interrogation techniques”.

Pelosi admits that she was aware, as early as September 2002, that “enhanced interrogation” techniques were being explored by the Bush/Cheney’s Office of Legal Counsel as legal options, but that she was not told that they were being used. A timeline from the CIA and statements from well-placed (but unnamed) Democratic Party sources refute Pelosi’s claim.

Continue reading →

April 15, 2009 by dandelionsalad

Bailouts and Manipulations: Save Wall Street, at the Expense of Main Street by Larry Chin

Dandelion Salad

by Larry Chin
Global Research, April 14, 2009
Online Journal

Wall Street is in the midst of a huge rally, primarily sparked by two recent occurrences.

The first was the “surprising” announcement that Citigroup, JP Morgan Chase and Bank of America — major “zombie” banks laden with “toxic assets,” on the verge of collapse, and the recipients of billions in government (US taxpayer) bailout money — mysteriously posted profits this year. Wells Fargo, regarded as one of the healthier big banks, and a recipient of $25 billion, also reported a profit last week, rallying the stock markets again before the Easter holiday.

We now know, based on insider reports from securities traders, that a massive fraud and manipulation by AIG funneled “bailout” funds (US taxpayer money) to AIG’s counterparties, the very same big “toxic” banks that are now posting profits: Exclusive: Big Banks’ Recent Profitability Due to AIG Scam?

Continue reading →

September 7, 2008 by dandelionsalad

9/11’s Accomplices vie for US Presidency by Larry Chin

Dandelion Salad

by Larry Chin
Global Research, September 7, 2008

Obama and McCain campaigns fan “war on terrorism” hysteria

In his much-ballyhooed acceptance speech, Barack Obama declared that he would “finish the fight against the terrorists who actually attacked us on 9/11”. If Obama wishes to be true to his promise, he could begin with his own running mate, Senator Joe Biden.

Continue reading →

July 13, 2008 by dandelionsalad

Police State USA: Spying as Law of the Land

Dandelion Salad

by Larry Chin
Global Research
July 11, 2008

FISA “Compromise” Completes Transformation of US into Full Police State

On July 9, 2008, the US Congress overwhelmingly passed legislation permitting government spying, including immunity to telecommunications companies involved in secret domestic surveillance programs. With the stroke of George W. Bush’s pen, the US is now a police state by definition.

The extent of the spying program, and its larger implications, have been revealed by Mark Klein, who blew the whistle on secret domestic spying program of Bush/Cheney’s National Security Agency (NSA) and AT&T:

AT&T whistleblower: spy bill creates infrastructure for police state

The update of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act, called the “FISA compromise”, or more appropriately, the “spy bill”, largely completes the triumph of the Bush/Cheney administration and a bipartisan criminal consensus. By convenient design, the FISA revision derails pending law suits filed against the Bush administration’s corporate spying partners (AT&T, Sprint Nextel, and Verizon), silences (the largely empty-to-begin-with) congressional investigations into Bush administration’s illegal domestic spying program. Presidential nominee Barack Obama and the Democrats have now moved to silence all discussion about the issue.

Fear itself, a.k.a. spying itself

Between the false flag mass murder of 9/11 and the creation of the “war on terrorism”, the USA Patriot Act and this new FISA revision, the Bush-Cheney administration and its enthusiastically complicit congressional partners, have achieved total victory–world war, open criminality, and the end of law itself.

It gives the US government unprecedented new spying powers and sweeping new legal cover for spying that goes well beyond even the original FISA law—which itself was an abomination that already permitted the US president broad surveillance powers.

Given the fact that the US government is a wholly corrupted criminal organization by definition, the political spin over “oversight”, warrants, the involvement of the Inspector General, etc. is all the more transparently ridiculous: the operatives of such apparatuses do not investigate or punish their own. Nor do they voluntarily stop the lucrative and intoxicating criminal activity that is their lifeblood.

In fact, the debate over the spy bill is a red herring, clouding the larger central (purposely unaddressed) issue: the “war on terrorism” lie itself.

The mass murder of 9/11 was a false flag operation, orchestrated and executed by the Bush administration. The “war on terrorism” is a perpetual covert operation, an endless pretext for war and murder, supported by a bipartisan consensus. (See “Who is Osama bin Laden?” and “Al-Qaeda:the database”.) No 9/11, no “war on terrorism”, no war in the Middle East. No “war on terrorism” lie, no dictatorial powers for the White House, and no beefed-up FISA.

Given that the “war on terrorism” is a lie, the need for unprecedented spying is also a lie. Just as 9/11 remains the endless pretext for endless war and terrorism, it also remains, in its countless propaganda manifestations, the justification for open totalitarian rule of force and intimidation within US borders.

The totalitarian criminal agenda is fully endorsed by neoliberal Democrats, including Barack Obama. According to the Obama campaign, “Senator Obama has said before that the compromise bill is not perfect. Given the choice between voting for an improved yet imperfect bill, and losing important surveillance tools, Senator Obama chose to support the FISA compromise.”

The pro-surveillance Democrats, led by Senator Jay Rockefeller and Obama (whose lame hemming-hawing justifications can be read here) are repeating asinine lies, and groundless excuses.

In calling criminal spying and covert operations “important surveillance tools”, Obama is showing his truest colors. Obama, whose politics and rhetoric have been consistently in line with the Bush/Cheney agenda on all of the most telling issues (war in Afghanistan, war on Iran, “terrorism”, “homeland security”, globalization, and most recently, other right-wing positions), is a smooth-talking and appealing front for the Bush-Cheney status quo. Obama and McCain, like Bush-Cheney, will continue to push the endless “war on terrorism” lie, and embrace every single criminal act conducted in the name of this propaganda construct.

All “homeland security”/Big Brother measures such as FISA, in any form, provides political cover for the US government to engage in criminal activity. Any politician, be it Bush/Cheney or Obama, who approve of any sort of “surveillance” is guilty of committing a criminal act, and of raping the Constitution along the way.

Cynical posturing and election-year flatulence from Obama’s legion of defenders and fans cannot hide what has happened, or who is responsible. The rape of the US Constitution is so overt and so egregious that it has set off a wave of outrage and backlash, spawning unusual new grassroots coalitions.

Clearly, however, the powers that be, including the Obama camp, has casually dismissed this relatively small portion of the US public out of its election-year calculations, regardless of how stridently they organize, blog, blow whistles or file law suits.

Senator Russ Feingold (whose own record on opposing the Bush administration is less than stellar) warned that the FISA revision “could mean millions upon millions of communications between innocent Americans and their friends, families or business associates overseas could now be legally collected.”

It means much more than Feingold states, and it has for many years—perhaps decades.

Spying: the pre- and post-9/11 norm

Returning again to the expose by whistleblower Mark Klein, his detailed and stomach-turning expose, which includes materials from the key court cases, exposes the fact that the NSA began breaking into local telephone circuits in 2001. As pointed out by Robert Parry, the current program may have been in place before 2001.

In other words, the spying program never had anything to do with international “terrorists”, and everything to do with a larger police state agenda, including the power to identify, designate and destroy individuals whose opinions run counter to those of whichever Big Brother is “in charge”. This is a long-planned program that 9/11 allowed to push to full fruition.

It is a well-documented fact that the US government’s spying capabilities are overwhelming, and that continuous illegal surveillance has always trumped congressional oversight, and the law itself. Obviously, the light reigning-in of criminal covert operations in the post-Watergate 1970s has been completely undone in the decades since.

Investigators such as former NSA operative James Bamford (author of the expose of the NSA, Body of Secrets) and Mike Ruppert’s Crossing the Rubicon: The Decline of the American Empire at the End of the Age of Oil have thoroughly detailed the pervasiveness and effectiveness of a wide range of spying and intelligence programs used by intelligence and law enforcement agencies. These include Echelon and PROMIS, which are used by operatives in criminal fashion, as ordered by high-level officials, specifically to get around all oversight.

Completely unaddressed throughout the years of noise over spying and FISA, the Total Information Awareness Program (formerly known as DARPA, and spearheaded by Iran-Contra participant John Poindexter) has found new life as the IARPA program.

Nobody is talking about IARPA. Nobody will.

Welcome to hell, again

The George W. Bush administration seized the White House in 2000 by way of an openly stolen election, then cemented its criminal power into place with the unprecedented 9/11 mass murder, and its two resulting abominations: the fabricated “war on terrorism” (the pretext for endless global war), and the USA Patriot Act (the full-scale destruction of the Constitution, and the militarization of the US homeland).

These continuing atrocities were the works of a bipartisan “war on terrorism” consensus, a full partnership at the top echelons, whose overriding agenda is the survival of the criminal racket known as the Anglo-American empire.

The deepening of the war and security state has continued unabated. Under a US congress with a Democratic Party majority, nothing been done to stop, reverse or undo the world war, boundless US government criminality, open corruption, or the absolute and systematic rape of law itself. Now, particularly with a looming US presidential election, leading members of both political parties have shown their true colors: as flagrant proponents of military-intelligence/”homeland security”, and enthusiastic destroyers of the Constitution.

In The CIA and the Cult of Intelligence, Victor Marchetti and John Marks wrote in 1974:

“The clandestine mentality is a mind-set that thrives on secrecy and deception. It encourages professional amorality—the belief that righteous goals can be achieved through the use of unprincipled and normally unacceptable means….”

Today, exemplified by actions of the bipartisan US consensus, assisted by an acquiescent and dumbed-down populace, the clandestine mentality is not clandestine. “Professional amorality” is the norm—celebrated openly, and opposed by few.

In other words, your life and all of your communications—from your emails, your web searches, medical records, and financial information, to your reading this article and clicking this web site—has been “hoovered up” by the US government’s spying machine, to be used against you at some future time, if the powers that be so choose.

If 9/11, the Patriot Act, and the relentless destruction of law since 2000 have not already make abundantly clear, a “Homeland Security” police state within US borders, courtesy of the spy bill, is now complete. Not even the trappings of a democracy remain.

The url address of this article is: www.globalresearch.ca/index.php?context=va&aid=9565

see

Democrats lose on FISA

1984 Knocking On Your Door – FISA – Telecom Immunity Bill

Max and the Marginalized: Free Evenings and Weekends (FISA)

Fear and Petitioning in Las Vegas (Nader)

Senate Approves HR6304: 4th Amendment Abolished

Nader: Telecoms and Bush Above the Law

AT&T Whistleblower: Spy Bill Creates ‘Infrastructure for a Police State’

The two winners of the 2008 presidential election: fear and war by Larry Chin

“Keeping America Safe”- from the Constitution

Domestic Spying

Police State

FISA

***

May 5, 2008 by dandelionsalad

Pandemic response plan: let the elderly, the sick, and the poor die

Dandelion Salad

by Larry Chin
Global Research, May 5, 2008

The Bush-Cheney administration’s Department of Homeland Security, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), and the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) have collectively set guidelines that recommend—in the event of a “pandemic” or mass crisis—that the elderly, the sick, the severely injured, and the poor will be denied life-saving medical treatment.

Continue reading →

April 1, 2008 by dandelionsalad

Attorney General Mukasey lies about 9/11 & international spying

Dandelion Salad

by Larry Chin
Global Research, March 31, 2008
Online Journal

In a recent speech at San Francisco’s Commonwealth Club, Attorney General Michael Mukasey defended the Bush-Cheney administration’s illegal domestic spying agenda by proclaiming that the 9/11 attacks could have been prevented if the government had been able to monitor overseas phone calls to the United States.

Like every other member of the Bush-Cheney administration, Mukasey is lying. Lying about the fact that the “war on terrorism” is a fabrication. Lying about the pervasive worldwide eavesdropping capabilities of US intelligence agencies. Lying about the fact that 9/11 was a long-planned Anglo-American false flag covert operation.

According to Mukasey’s spin on the now-classic 9/11 fiction, Bush-Cheney “knew there had been a call from some place that was known to be a safe house in Afghanistan and we knew that it came to the United States. We didn’t know precisely where it went. We’ve got 3,000 people who went to work that day, and didn’t come home, to show for that.”

In typically wide-eyed fashion, the San Franciso Chronicle report proceeds to add more red herrings to the proceedings, noting that “Mukasey did not specify the call to which he referred. He also did not explain why the government, if it knew of telephone calls from suspected foreign terrorists, hadn’t sought a wiretapping warrant from a court established by the Congress to authorize terrorist surveillance, or hadn’t monitored all such calls without a warrant for 72 hours as allowed by law.”

Mukasey did not bother to mention any of these things, because he knows that the US government’s spying capabilities are overwhelming, and that their continuous (illegal) use trumps congressional oversight, and the law itself.

As written by Ruppert: “Echelon is a highly secret technical intelligence gathering system used to monitor worldwide communications and coordinated in the U.S. by the National Security Agency. Participating countries, who eavesdrop on the citizens of the other member countries — to avoid civil restrictions preventing governments from spying on their own citizens — then pool and share their information. Participating countries include the U.S., Australia, Canada, New Zealand, Great Britain and Germany. The eavesdropping covers both telephone and email communications.

“According to a Feb 13, 2001, UPI story detailing Echelon’s use against bin Laden and other terrorist organizations, ‘The targets of Echelon center on the penetration of the major components of most of the world’s telephone and telecommunications systems. This could cover conversations NSA targets. Also included are all the telexes carried over the world’s telecommunications networks, along with financial dealings: money transfers, airline destinations, stock information, data on demonstrations or international conferences and much more.’”

In Crossing the Rubicon, and in his many investigations for From The Wilderness, Mike Ruppert exposed the fact that intelligence agency penetration and foreknowledge leading up to 9/11 was complete: “Long before 9/11, US and foreign intelligence had achieved penetrations of al-Qaeda by human, signal and electronic intelligence,” and that “there was very little that al Qaeda did that the Bush administration and many other governments were not aware of.”

Furthermore, Ruppert noted that “based upon what is known about successful intelligence penetrations for years prior to the attacks of 9/11, Osama bin Laden could not have sneezed without the CIA or the NSA knowing about it.”

“Al-Qaeda,” an Anglo-American covert operation, was not only thoroughly penetrated, but guided and manipulated into fulfilling their roles.

As exposed by Michel Chossudovsky in his book, America’s “War on Terrorism”: “The foreknowledge issue is a red herring. The ‘Militant Islamic Network’ is a creation of the CIA. In standard CIA jargon, Al Qaeda is categorized as an ‘intelligence asset’ . . . support to terrorist organizations is an integral part of US foreign policy. Al Qaeda continues to participate in CIA covert operations in different parts of the world.”

Anglo-American involvement with “the terrorists,” and the Bush-Cheney administration’s role behind 9/11 are, of course, the focus of a gargantuan cover-up at the highest levels of world governments. “Al-Qaeda” is a perpetual covert operation, supported by a bipartisan consensus. (See “Who is Osama bin Laden?” and “Al-Qaeda: the database”.)

It is no surprise that Mukasey (who was installed specifically to continue Bush-Cheney’s torture, domestic spying and world war agendas) and other members of the Bush-Cheney criminal syndicate will never stop lying about the overwhelming and complete surveillance that agencies such as the CIA and NSA have enjoyed over the US population (and, indeed, the entire world, including pinpoint real-time penetration of terrorist and intelligence-supported “terrorist” groups) for decades.

Mukasey and others continue to wield the fear-based 9/11 fabrication to expand the endless “war on terrorism,” justify carrying out brutal criminal activities out in the open, and to fully install a “Homeland Security” police state within US borders.

The CRG grants permission to cross-post original Global Research articles on community internet sites as long as the text & title are not modified. The source and the author’s copyright must be displayed. For publication of Global Research articles in print or other forms including commercial internet sites, contact: crgeditor@yahoo.com

www.globalresearch.ca contains copyrighted material the use of which has not always been specifically authorized by the copyright owner. We are making such material available to our readers under the provisions of “fair use” in an effort to advance a better understanding of political, economic and social issues. The material on this site is distributed without profit to those who have expressed a prior interest in receiving it for research and educational purposes. If you wish to use copyrighted material for purposes other than “fair use” you must request permission from the copyright owner.

For media inquiries: crgeditor@yahoo.com
© Copyright Larry Chin, Online Journal, 2008
The url address of this article is: www.globalresearch.ca/index.php?context=va&aid=8500
see

Olbermann: Sadr State of Affairs + Gore More Years? + Worst + Bushed! (9/11)

Countdown: Mukasey’s FISA Fables – Lies or Admissions?

Telecom Immunity: Playing the “9/11 Card” … Again

Dir C.I.A Gen Hayden on Torture & Iran’s nuclear program (videos)

The Torture Tape Cover-up: How High Does It Go? by Prof. Marjorie Cohn

Bush invokes 9/11 to justify torture, domestic spying and war by Patrick Martin

March 6, 2008 by dandelionsalad

The two winners of the 2008 presidential election: fear and war by Larry Chin

Dandelion Salad

By Larry Chin
Global Research, March 7, 2008
Online Journal Associate Editor
Mar 6, 2008

The 2008 US presidential charade has already been decided. Come November, the next White House occupant (who will be installed via political malfeasance, computer vote theft and other election “irregularities”) will be the puppet who proves to be the most effective in echoing Bush-Cheney’s “war on terrorism” lies, and expanding the Bush-Cheney “national security” agenda.

The American populace will bow to the “next Bush” who will “keep them safe” from “Islamic jihadists.” Facing a new and increasingly brutal regime (probably under McCain), many brain-addled Americans will be stunned that “it is happening all over again,” oblivious to the fact that their own acquiescence helped make it possible.

Washington’s bipartisan consensus “war on terrorism” deception

Amply demonstrated by the rhetoric of each of the prospective US presidential candidates, the “terrorism” lie is also the key to the election. The candidates know that the ill-informed US population remains petrified, and still thoroughly manipulated by fear of “another 9/11.”

As exhaustively detailed by Michel Chossudovsky, author of America’s “War on Terrorism,” and in “Washington’s consensus al-Qaeda deception”, the “war on terrorism” deception is a manipulation supported by an elite consensus, and a cover-up promoted equally by Washington’s political factions and both Republican and Democratic parties.

This myth, which rests on the perpetual fabricated threat of an outside enemy, has been the key to the power wielded by Bush-Cheney. It remains at the core of every official and unofficial decision made by this criminal regime, and its complicit bipartisan Washington partners. The “terrorist” threat to the US homeland, and its many propaganda variations, are now embedded fixations in the American psyche, reinforced by endless corporate media bombast.

The Washington consensus has remained united behind the lies and cover-up of 1) the atrocities of 9/11, a US-led false flag operation, 2) the fact that “Al-Qaeda” is an Anglo-American military-intelligence covert operation, and 3) the use of “anti-terrorism” as a pretext to invade and conquer Afghanistan and Iraq, and its use as the justification for future war across the Middle East and Central Asia, Africa, and other vital geostrategic regions.

Which candidate will be the most effective mass murderer?

Clinton, McCain and Obama are backed by hawkish national security teams headed by some of the world’s master war criminals (Kissinger, Brzezinski, Albright, etc.). These elite connections, and their ramifications, which promise the deepening of the war, remain unaddressed and ignored.

John McCain is deeply corrupt and ruthless — the perfect extension of Bush-Cheney. McCain’s participation in the 1980s savings and loan scandal, as a member of the infamous Keating Five, is a matter of historical fact. Also a matter of record are McCain’s brutal views on war and killing, which are best exemplified by his 2001 op-ed, War is Hell. Now Let’s Get On With It.

Despite their inexplicable reputations as liberals, Democratic presidential hopefuls Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama, are now locked in a bitter and destructive struggle over who is the more Bush/Cheney-esque; who is the superior “anti-terrorist” and protector of “American security.”

Clinton and Obama have both repeated the same slippery and all too familiar “war on terrorism” deceptions favored by the elite neoliberal faction:

“The Bush administration has failed to fight the ‘real war on terrorism’ begun after 9/11.”
“Mismanagement and blunders of the war in Iraq have created radical jihadist insurgencies that will the destroy the United States.”
“The Iraq mistake has distracted us from fighting the ‘real’ war on terrorism.”
“We should declare war on Saudi Arabia and Pakistan, which harbor the real ‘terrorists’ who attacked us on 9/11.”
“The Iraq distraction has prevented us from capturing Osama.”
“The world was united after 9/11, but Bush squandered it all.”

Other variations popular with the Clinton and Obama camps include:

“Al-Qaeda is reforming in Afghanistan, because of Bush policy failures, and must be dealt with.”
“Iran has become increasingly radical and dangerous because of Bush’s Iraq policy, and now must be dealt with.”

Both Clinton and Obama repeat bald-faced lies about “bringing troops home,” when it is clear that their agenda will do neither. US bases in Iraq are permanent. Some troops could be redeployed, but the US geostrategic foothold in the region is permanent — and they know it.

Both enthusiastically support war waged under the NATO banner, the US-backed Kosovo criminal apparatus (created by the Bill Clinton administration), and other atrocities.

In a telling exchange during a recent debate, Clinton and Obama each kissed the feet (and other body parts) of the powerful AIPAC war lobby, declaring Israel and Israeli security “sacrosanct,” leaving no doubt that a presidency under either of them promises a continuation of genocidal Middle East policy.

The gutter tactics of Hillary Clinton

Hillary Clinton’s recent primary victories in Texas and Ohio were the result of gutter politics directly out of the Karl Rove playbook. Clinton has stooped to every trick in this book, and the most below-belt attacks and open lies in recent memory.

Clinton’s penchant for fear-mongering is exemplified by the now-infamous “Red Phone” Ad. In this malodorous work, endorsed by the right wing and hailed as a smashing success by venal Clinton strategists, Obama’s ability to deal with a 3 a.m. “international security” crisis is called into question.

Here again, the 9/11 “terrorism” lie is placed front and center, obliterating every other issue.

The peevish Clintons are so hungry for power, that they destroy the Democratic Party, and hand the White House to the Republicans and Bush-Cheney-McCain, to achieve their objective. Clearly, the beneficiaries are the Republicans, and Bush-Cheney-McCain.

It is also no surprise that Clinton’s Texas and Ohio success was assisted by orchestrated conniving by right-wing radio host Rush Limbaugh. Armed with the certainty that McCain is already the Republican nominee, Limbaugh and other fanatical right-wingers swarmed to cast votes for Clinton in “cross-over” states. Limbaugh’s stated goal was to “bloody up” Obama (perceived by the right wing to be more liberal and more dangerous), force the Democrats deeper into self-destruction “for fun,” making a McCain victory that much more certain.

This is not the first time Clinton has benefited from shenanigans (and Republican help), nor will it be the last. Her New Hampshire primary results were manipulated, giving her a surprise victory despite exit polls favoring Obama by big margins. Clinton has continued to bully and intimidate her peers in the Congress (her “super delegates”), and force the Democratic Party into giving her delegates from Florida and Michigan, despite the party’s rules that do not permit delegates from those uncontested states.

Of course, it is no coincidence that criminal activity saves a Clinton or a Bush every time one faces political defeat. The political and criminal connection that the Clinton faction shares with the Bushes is a matter of historical fact, going back to their criminal activities in Arkansas. The Bush-Clinton milieu has cooperatively ruled the United States for decades.

In fact, a McCain-Clinton ticket, with Jeb Bush and other intelligence-connected neocons in their administration, would offer the most honest representation of what the American empire really is.

Obama’s support for war and death squads

Despite his stirring rhetoric, razor sharp intellect and immensely appealing persona, Barack Obama’s foreign policy agenda is virtually identical to that of Bush-Cheney-McCain and Clinton, including his approach to the “war on terrorism.” The differences in nuance, over which a bitter campaign is being fought, are slight.

Obama has repeated his earlier promise to take unilateral military action to “take out terrorists” anywhere in the world, where “actionable intelligence” identifies terrorists, and governments (where these terrorists are found) fail to act. This is no different than existing Bush-Cheney policy. In a recent debate, Obama stated that he would send troops back into Iraq (after a hypothetical pullout) if, hypothetically, “Al-Qaeda reforms in Iraq.”

As reported by Jeremy Scahill, author of Blackwater: The Rise of the World’s Largest Mercenary Army, Obama has even expressed support for continuing to outsource war-related activities to Blackwater USA. This itself should eliminate any notion that Obama is in any way “antiwar,” or anti-criminality.

An Obama presidency would offer a soothing and momentary illusion of false hope to many Americans.

But if recent events are any indication, even false hopes will be squashed, well before a national election contest begins.

Every election in modern US history has been a criminal manipulation, choreographed and rigged by political elites and performed by handpicked elite puppets, each backed by their teams of corrupt war criminals, intelligence/security “advisors” and think tank assets. The 2008 affair will be no different.

It is still a fact that corporations (primarily connected to the Republican political apparatus) control the American vote, and with increasing technological sophistication: Diebold, ESS, Sequoia, and SAIC. In fact, new generations of their machines will be used in 2008.

Democratic Party “war on terrorism” complicity in Congress

In activities paralleling the red herrings bandied about by the presidential campaigns, the bipartisan consensus in the US Congress is demonstrating (again) that it is will not act to stop Bush-Cheney on domestic surveillance. Congressional Democrats are also unable to muster meager opposition of any kind to Bush-Cheney’s Iraq war.

The Iraq Redeployment Act, pushed by Senator Russ Feingold, is a perfect example of Democratic Party ignorance and complicity. Feingold’s bill limits funding, except for “hunting Al-Qaeda terrorists,” and for “training Iraqi troops to fight Al-Qaeda.”

Given that the “hunt for Al-Qaeda” has been the eternal bipartisan consensus pretext for US geostrategy, and given that “Al-Qaeda” is blamed for the host of Iraq problems (including, but not limited to, “insurgencies”), the Feingold bill essentially accommodates continued funding for eternal war.

The Feingold bill, like the rest of Democratic Party’s “war on terrorism” rhetoric is the definition of a zero-sum charade.

The presidential campaign to hell

Without an end to the “terrorism” lie, there will be no end to the “war on terrorism.”

Given the intensity with which this lie is being wielded by Clinton, McCain and Obama, and with the Anglo-American empire’s very survival at stake, clearly there will be no end to war, no matter who is the next White House occupant.

For media inquiries: crgeditor@yahoo.com
© Copyright Larry Chin, Online Journal, 2008
The url address of this article is: www.globalresearch.ca/index.php?context=va&aid=8262

see

The Election That Might Not Happen

2008 election charade: White House bought by big money by Larry Chin

2008 presidential charade promises deepening of government criminality and expansion of war by Larry Chin

Kosovo: The US and the EU support a Political Process linked to Organized Crime by Michel Chossudovsky

Obama & Clinton both support Blackwater!!!! (videos)

Washington’s Consensus Al Qaeda Deception by Larry Chin

Chossudovsky-Michel

Chin-Larry

January 15, 2008 by dandelionsalad

2008 election charade: White House bought by big money by Larry Chin

Dandelion Salad

by Larry Chin
Global Research, January 15, 2008
Online Journal

Part 2

As previously written, the 2008 election is a manipulation, rigged by political elites working behind sock puppet candidates. This fact is even more obvious when one follows the money.

What big money interests want

OpenSecrets.org is one vital resource that tracks campaign money flows in detail, and virtually in real time. Not surprisingly, both the mainstream corporate and so-called alternative media have devoted scant attention to this corruption.

As culled from the OpenSecrets.org list, here are some of the prominent corporate contributors behind leading candidates (as of 1/11/08):

Republicans

John McCain

Blank Rome LLP
Citigroup
Bank of New York Mellon
Merrill Lynch
Goldman Sachs
JP Morgan Chase
Credit Suisse
Lehman Brothers
Morgan Stanley
MGM Mirage
Univision

Mitt Romney

Bain Capital (note: Romney’s own company)
Goldman Sachs
Merrill Lynch
Citigroup
Marriott
Kirkland & Ellis
Morgan Stanley
PriceWaterhouse
JP Morgan
UBS
Lehman Brothers

Rudy Giuliani

Ernst & Young
Credit Suisse
Merrill Lynch
Citigroup
Bear Stearns
Lehman Brothers
Bracewell & Guiliani (Guiliani’s own firm)
Morgan Stanley
UBS
Milbank Tweed
Goldman Sachs
JP Morgan
Bank of America

Mike Huckabee

State of Arkansas
Wal-Mart
Tyson Foods
Morgan Stanley

Democrats

Hillary Clinton

DLA Piper
Goldman Sachs
Morgan Stanley
Citigroup
National Amusements
Emily’s List
JP Morgan
Kirkland & Ellis
Skadden Arps
Merrill Lynch
Time Warner
Lehman Brothers
Bear Stearns
Ernst & Young
Blank Rome LLP

Barack Obama

Goldman Sachs
Lehman Brothers
National Amusements
JP Morgan
Exelon Energy (parent of Commonwealth Edison)
Citigroup
Citadel Investments
Credit Suisse
Skadden Arps
Morgan Stanley
Time Warner
UBS
Harvard University

John Edwards

Fortress Investment Group
Act Blue
Goldman Sachs
Skadden Arps
Deutsche Bank
Citigroup

This is the bare tip of the iceberg that OpenSecrets.org’s database exposes. The site also tracks the money coming from lobbyists, wealthy individuals, and industries, cross-references money flows by industry, and updates the financial status of every campaign — for those who bother to look it up. There is dirty money that is not even being reported.

What is clear is the fact that major corporations are collectively hedging their bets, financing both sides. For example, Citigroup, JP Morgan Chase, Goldman Sachs and Morgan Stanley have money behind every leading candidate. Lehman Brothers, Merrill Lynch, Bear Stearns, and UBS are also prominent players, in virtually all of the camps.

Corporate law and accounting firms, many of which are not household names (not all of them mentioned in this article), but well known in Washington and on Wall Street, are heavily involved with the campaigns — assuring that the laws and the books will be cooked.

Look up the upper management of the companies, and the pattern is clear.

There is no illusion what the “election” really is, and whose hands are manipulating the sock puppets. Each sock puppet serves the world’s upper management, and uses the populace as cannon fodder.

All the talk of “campaign finance reform,” “fighting special interests,” particularly from the corrupt John McCain (who is enthusiastically mainlining funding as you read this), is just that: talk.

The candidates are lying. The prospective puppets with the real chances of being selected are career liars to begin with.

Cultural abyss reflected in celebrity support

Election insanity also breeds a cultural sickness that worsens by the day.

The ignorant, acquiescent, uninformed and often painfully stupid mass US populace not only marches to the beat set by a blatantly corrupt corporate media, it further adds to its self-destruction by aping the political views of wealthy Hollywood celebrities — who are themselves painfully ignorant and misguided individuals, making asinine decisions with their celebrity power and mega-fortunes.

Here are some of the Hollywood celebrities behind the leading candidates, from the article Candidates hoping star power shines on them [San Francisco Chronicle, 1/11/08]:

Hillary Clinton

Barbra Streisand
Steven Spielberg

Barack Obama

Oprah Winfrey
David Geffen
Stevie Wonder

Mitt Romney

Pat Boone
Robert Bork (not a celebrity, but a notorious Republican)
Donnie Osmond
Marie Osmond

Rudy Giuliani

Dennis Miller
Adam Sandler

John McCain

Curt Schilling
Wilford Brimley
Rip Torn

John Edwards

Danny Glover
Kevin Bacon

Mike Huckabee

Chuck Norris
Ron Jeremy
Ted Nugent

Celebrities — whose fame is known around the world, and who possess the cultural power to shape mass consciousness — are helping the darkest forces drive the American empire deeper into the abyss. The average American, who doesn’t read and won’t bother to understand reality, simply follows Oprah, Steven Spielberg and Donnie & Marie, straight into hell.

Is it any wonder that, in this celebrity gossip-driven culture, a laughable crying act by the mega-corrupt Hillary Clinton successfully convinces some people that she is “genuine,” therefore “presidential”?

Here’s another example of shenanigans that few seem to understand: the Clinton’s open insult of Martin Luther King, Jr., was a calculated move, not a gaffe. It’s the old southern strategy, which Bill Clinton used successfully before. Piss off African-Americans (who are disenfranchised anyway), pick up some “cracker” votes and support, particularly with the reference to LBJ, garnering enough support to beat out Obama.

Against this total dearth of critical faculties, people are largely ignoring evidence that the New Hampshire primary results were manipulated, in outright Bush-Cheney 2000 fashion, right in front of their faces. And the average American still believes in elections and “democracy.”

The election has not “just begun.” It’s been over for a long time.

It is literally insane to spend one cent on any of the candidates, or their machines. It is insane to engage in beyond-ridiculous campaign nonsense that exhausts energy, in pursuit of illusions and false hopes.

Ignore the rhetoric and follow the money. Look up the corporations and, in particular, at the names on the boards of directors of each one. Look up the elites who are managing the sock puppets.

Ask Henry Kissinger who will “win.” He knows.

© Copyright Larry Chin, Online Journal, 2008
The url address of this article is: www.globalresearch.ca/index.php?context=va&aid=7808

see

2008 presidential charade promises deepening of government criminality and expansion of war by Larry Chin

January 10, 2008 by dandelionsalad

2008 presidential charade promises deepening of government criminality and expansion of war by Larry Chin

Dandelion Saladby Larry Chin

Global Research, January 10, 2008

Online Journal

Every election in modern US history has been a criminal manipulation, choreographed and rigged by political elites and performed by hand-picked elite puppets, each backed by their teams of corrupt war criminals, intelligence/security “advisors” and think tank assets. The 2008 affair will be no different.

It is time once again to dispel the mass insanity and unfounded hopes as another fresh election hell ensues. There will be no savior, no end to the continuing world crisis, and absolutely no “change.”

The monsters behind each candidate

As the American public once again gets swept up into another beyond, ridiculous carnival over which “presidential personality” is most “likeable,” which preselected puppet makes a better speech, etc., there is little or no attention paid to the individuals behind each candidate; the forces that are pulling the strings, and actually setting the geopolitical agenda.

The Washington Post has provided a complete list of each puppet’s respective “masters,” which must be studied line by line:

The War Over The Wonks: A list of national security and foreign policy advisors to the leading presidential candidates from both parties

This list holds the key to the central issue: war.

As the names reveal, every major candidate (the favored puppets with any real chance of being selected) fronts for agendas set by current and former neoconservative and neoliberal “security” officers and politicos, members of the Bilderberg Group, the Trilateral Commission and the Council on Foreign Relations, and apparatuses such as the Heritage Foundation, the Center for Strategic and International Studies, the Brookings Institution, AIPAC, the Hoover Institution, the American Enterprise Institute, and others.

Some of the most nightmarish individuals who walk the earth today can be found behind the candidates, as follows:

John McCain

Henry Kissinger

Richard Armitage, former deputy secretary of state, covert operative and lifelong Bush ally

Robert “Bud” McFarlane, Reagan/Bush national security adviser, Iran, Contra

William Kristol, editor of The Weekly Standard (neocon)

Alexander Haig, Reagan/Bush secretary of state

George Shultz, Reagan/Bush secretary of state, Hoover Institution, Bechtel

Brent Scowcroft, Ford, George H.W. Bush national security adviser
James Woolsey, former CIA director

Lawrence Eagleburger, George H.W. Bush secretary of state

William Ball, Reagan administration Navy secretary

Colin Powell

Barack Obama

Zbigniew Brzezinski

Anthony Lake, Clinton administration national security adviser

Sarah Sewall, Clinton administration deputy secretary of defense, counter, insurgency czar

Richard Clarke, Clinton and Bush administration counter, terrorism czar

Susan Rice, Clinton administration Africa specialist and NSC member, Brookings

Bruce Riedel, former CIA officer, NSC Near East and Asian affairs, Brookings

Hillary Clinton

Bill Clinton

Madeline Albright, Clinton administration secretary of state

Sandy Berger, Clinton administration national security adviser

Richard Holbrooke, Clinton administration UN ambassador

Gen. Wesley Clark, Clinton era Kosovo commander

Leslie Gelb, Council on Foreign Relations, former State and Defense Department official

Martin Indyk, Clinton administration Israel ambassador, Brookings

Strobe Talbott, Clinton administration deputy secretary of state, co, creator of Caspian oil “6+2” group, Brookings

Jeffrey Smith, former CIA general counsel

Rudy Giuliani

Kim Holmes, former George W. Bush assistant secretary of state, Heritage Foundation

Louis Freeh, former FBI director

Stephen Yates, former deputy assistant to Dick Cheney

Norman Podhoretz, Hudson Institute (neocon)

Kenneth Weinstein, Hudson Institute

Numerous individuals connected to the neocon Hoover Institution and Heritage Foundation

Mike Huckabee

Huckabee has been secretive about his team. Among the names floated so far:

Ed Rollins, Republican operative

Frank Gaffney, neocon

John Bolton, George W. Bush U.N. ambassador (as of this writing, Bolton’s participation is a strong rumor)

John Edwards

Edwards boasts a large team of career military/intelligence officers, most of whom are “rank and file.” Among the more notable names:

Barry Blechman, Jimmy Carter assistant director of US Arms Control and Disarmament Agency, founder and chairman of the Henry L. Stimson Center

Irving Blickstein, former assistant deputy chief of Naval operations, RAND Corporation

Mitt Romney

Cofer Black, former CIA and George W. Bush state department counter, terrorism officer, vice president of Blackwater USA

Alberto Cardenas, lobbyist and former chairman of Florida Republican party

Roger Noriega, George W. Bush assistant secretary for Western hemisphere affairs

Rep. Pete Hoekstra (R, Mich.), ranking member, House Intelligence Committee

The choice of the puppet masters

As noted by Daniel Estulin in The True Story of the Bilderberg Group, the masters of “one world government,” whose members manipulate all elections, seek the following main objectives: 1) one international identity, or “internationalism,” 2) centralized control of people, 3) a zero growth, post industrial society, 3) a state of perpetual world imbalance, 4) centralized control of all foreign and domestic policies, 5) empowerment of the United Nations and NATO, and 6) Anglo, American, controlled trading bloc.

While it is still too early to ascertain the final choice of the leading world-shaping groups (Bilderberg, Trilateral Commission, Council on Foreign Relations, etc.), it is clear, from the above lists, that the approved White House puppets are already the “front runners.”

While true representatives of “change” such as Dennis Kucinich, Cynthia McKinney and Ron Paul, stand no chance (and whose “votes” would be systematically erased in any case), the only remaining puppets, and their respective teams, are proven supplicants of the existing war and industrial elite.

It goes without saying that the Republican candidates, particularly John McCain, is deeply connected to the worst elements, most prominently, Henry Kissinger. Barack Obama’s elite connection speaks for itself: Zbigniew Brzezinski.

McCain’s participation in the 1980s savings and loan scandal, as a member of the infamous Keating Five, is a matter of historical fact.

Also a matter of record are McCain’s brutal views on war and killing, which are best exemplified by his 2001 op, ed, War is Hell. Now Let’s Get On With It.

There is no better crystallization of McCain than his own blood, soaked words.

It is well known that both of the Clintons are long time members of Bilderberg. As noted by Daniel Estulin, John Edwards, who currently postures as a “populist,” was handpicked by Henry Kissinger (who now works behind John McCain) to be John Kerry’s vice presidential candidate in 2004. Now, four years later, his connections must have certainly increased.

Here comes the “even more aggressive ‘war on terrorism’”

It’s clear from the chosen “candidates,” there will be no end to the war, or the continuing decline of the American empire.

The “war on terrorism” will not only continue but likely intensify and expand under “new management.” The only question is whether the bias will be towards a neoliberal brand, , , the “more nuanced” multinational New World Order, a “bipartisan consensus” in Washington, more orderly economic and political declines, etc. . . . .or a continuation of the open brutality and criminality of Bush-Cheney.

Violent events, including the assassination of Bhutto in Pakistan, and other such “9/11s,” stack the deck towards the latter . . . McCain and Giuliani.

The Republican candidates have uniformly and consistently echoed the Bush/Cheney/neocon war agenda and 9/11/“terrorism” lies. Huckabee, the bizarre dark horse of the Republican side, has voiced criticism of some Bush-Cheney policies, but not the “war on terrorism” in general.

The Democratic candidates have each declared themselves the champion “anti-terrorist,” or the “real” anti-terrorist that George W. Bush is not.

Obama’s murderous views on war are well documented, and similar to those of Bush-Cheney. In addition to war on Iran, Obama has declared that he would attack Pakistan if his administration possessed “actionable intelligence” that Osama bin Laden was hiding in Pakistan, and the government there did not act.

Edwards, who squealed during his 2004 vice presidential debate with Dick Cheney that he would “kill the terrorists,” recently reiterated: “If I, as president, know where Osama bin Laden is, I would go get him.”

Clinton went even further into details about her particular war fantasy: “At some point, probably when the missiles have launched, the Pakistani government has to know they are on the way.”

In the end, McCain’s War is Hell. Now Let’s Get On With It is the voice of the consensus . . . the 9/11 lie exemplified.

The vote count and other illusions

As noted repeatedly in this publication, every aspect of the American vote has been, and continues to be, manipulated.

It is still a fact is that corporations (primarily connected to the Republican political apparatus) control the American vote, and with increasing technological sophistication: Diebold, ESS, Sequoia, and SAIC. In fact, new generations of their machines will be used in 2008.

Beyond the courageous whistle-blowing and activism by the likes of Black Box Voting and others, the same democracy destroying criminal juggernaut that has been in place for generations remains in control.

The winner of the 2008 election: crime

As Mike Ruppert wrote in Crossing The Rubicon: “That profits of crime and war, which are destructive of human life, of labor, of happy, healthy neighborhoods (whether in the US or in Afghanistan, Africa and Iraq) are in effect a keystone of the global economy and a determinant of the success in a ruthless competition, is a compass needle for human civilization. One cannot expect to follow the recipe for roadkill stew and produce a crème brulee.”

Criminals do not obey laws. Criminals do not believe in “democracy.”

Criminals do not “permit” elections.

They will not permit an election in 2008. They will impose another one.

Larry Chin is a frequent contributor to Global Research. Global Research Articles by Larry Chin

For media inquiries: crgeditor@yahoo.com
© Copyright Larry Chin, Online Journal, 2008
The url address of this article is: www.globalresearch.ca/index.php?context=va&aid=7766

see

Vote for Change? Atrocity-Linked US Officials Advising Dem, GOP Pres Frontrunners (videos)

The Bilderberg Group: Rulers of the World (must listen audio link; Daniel Estulin)

The Integrity of Hillary Clinton by Jennifer

If You Vote For Hillary… by Josh Sidman

Alarms Should Go Off Whenever the Discrepancies Between the “Official” Results and the Polls Can’t Be Explained by andi novick (2006)

Silvestro the cat & the NH election (video; voter fraud) + Polls Wildly Different Than Results

December 29, 2007 by dandelionsalad

Anglo-American Ambitions behind the Assassination of Benazir Bhutto and the Destabilization of Pakistan by Larry Chin

Dandelion Salad

by Larry Chin
Global Research, December 29, 2007

It has been known for months that the Bush-Cheney administration and its allies have been maneuvering to strengthen their political control over Pakistan, paving the way for the expansion and deepening of the “war on terrorism” across the region. The assassination of Benazir Bhutto does not change this agenda. In fact, it simplifies Bush-Cheney’s options.

Seeding chaos with a pretext

Continue reading →

November 19, 2007 by dandelionsalad

The Empire’s Operatives exposed: The Krongards, 9/11 & Blackwater/Iraq by Larry Chin

Dandelion Salad

by Larry Chin

Global Research, November 19, 2007

Online Journal

New bombshell testimony before Congress has revealed that Alvin B. “Buzzy” Krongard, the former CIA executive director connected to 9/11 insider trading, is a consultant and advisory board member of Blackwater USA, the New World Order’s leading intelligence-related corporate mercenary death squad now under investigation for war crimes, murder, arms smuggling, and fraud in Iraq.

“Buzzy” Krongard’s Blackwater role was confirmed by “Buzzy”’s brother, Howard “Cookie” Krongard, who (not ironically) is the Bush/Cheney administration’s State Department’s inspector general, and the official under fire for stonewalling and quashing attempted probes of Blackwater’s operations.

It was during the last Wednesday’s hearing before the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee, chaired by Henry Waxman (D-CA), that “Cookie” Krongard denied, then confirmed later in the same testimony, the fact that his own brother was a Blackwater advisory board member throughout the period in which “Cookie” engaged in the cover-up of Blackwater. It is not known if “Cookie” Krongard lied, or was lied to, but he has now recused himself from “all matters having to do with Blackwater.”

As thoroughly documented by Michael C. Ruppert in Crossing the Rubicon: The Decline of the American Empire at the End of the Age of Oil, until 1997, A.B. “Buzzy” Krongard was the vice chairman of investment bank A.B.Brown (Alex. Brown). A.B. Brown and its previous incarnations have been involved with Bush family business ventures for generations, including deals with the Carlyle Group. It was also one of many major investment houses implicated for money laundering in congressional probes.

Brothers in illegal arms

Krongard joined the CIA in 1998 as the counsel to CIA Director George Tenet, and was named CIA executive director (the CIA’s #3 position) by George W. Bush in March 2001. The Deutsche Bank/Alex.Brown private banking operation headed by Krongard through 1998, and taken over by Krongard’s colleague Mayo Shattuck III, was one of the major hubs of 9/11 insider trading, where put options were purchased on United Airlines and other 9/11-related stocks. As written by Ruppert, “the trades could only have been made by people high enough in the US, Israeli and European intelligence community (including Russia) to know about the attacks and — more importantly — which of the many planned attacks were going to be successful.”

It is no surprise that Howard “Cookie” Krongard has, along with brother “Buzzy,” enjoyed high official Bush/Cheney positions, and profits, from the “war on terrorism” — apparently continuously from 9/11 all the way to the present Iraq occupation and quagmire.

These and other damning facts add to the multitude of direct lines leading from 9/11 to Iraq and beyond, and have been exposed piecemeal in recent years and months (in media reports that are largely ignored and misunderstood by the masses). They confirm and underscore years of exhaustive existing evidence about the true nature of the “war on terrorism,” its imperial architects from across the international political spectrum, and its multinational universe of “soldiers” (exemplified by the Krongards), and intelligence proprietaries, cut-outs, and political and media fronts.

The New World Order’s “above the law” criminals — from the Krongards and the entire Blackwater apparatus, to Bush, Cheney, Blair, and the entire membership of the Bilderberg Group — have committed unprecedented atrocities out in the open, and have more than earned the kind of “interrogations” that they and their armed-to-the-teeth functionaries continue to inflict on political adversaries and innocent patsies in CIA prisons all over the world.

Tragically, particularly in the present milieu, it is more than likely that the Krongards will not be touched, any more than Bush, Cheney, et al will receive the punishment they deserve.

Not only have no “heads rolled” since 9/11, but virtually all of the 9/11/ “war on terrorism” criminals continue to hold the highest offices of power, brazenly committing new crimes in the open, while holding the people of world in contempt. The criminals, and their crimes, are on television, every hour on the hour. Witness the fact that Rudolf Guiliani, who was thoroughly exposed as a hands-on participant in the 9/11 operation in Mike Ruppert’s Crossing the Rubicon, is a leading 2008 presidential candidate. Senator Joe Biden, one of many members of Congress who enjoyed breakfast on 9/11 with Pakistani ISI chief and 9/11 “money man” Mahmoud Ahmad, is also running for president.

Given the bipartisan complicity of the US Congress, it is likely that the Blackwater probes, like all congressional “investigations” in modern history, are simply more limited hangouts, designed to strengthen, not expose, what remains a massive ongoing cover-up of imperial crimes.

In a time of open and unprecedented political lawlessness and corruption, and mass public ignorance and acquiescence, true investigation remains the bitter and tragic duty of a minority of courageous individuals willing to seek the facts. They are contained on the pages of this publication, and the following list of sources on the Krongards:

Michael C. Ruppert, Crossing the Rubicon: The Decline of the American Empire at the End of the Age of Oil, Chapter 14: 9/11 Insider Trading, or “You Didn’t Really See That, Even Though We Saw It”

Suppressed Details of Criminal Insider Trading Lead Directly Into CIA’s Highest Ranks

(Mike Ruppert, From the Wilderness, October 15, 2001

Profits of Death: Insider Trading and 9/11 (Tom Flocco, From the Wilderness, December 27, 2001)

Jeremy Scahill, Blackwater:The Rise of the World’s Most Powerful Mercenary Army

Larry Chin is a frequent contributor to Global Research. Global Research Articles by Larry Chin

see

Olbermann: Free Speech Monte + Thicker Than Blackwater + Fox & Friend + Worst Person (videos)

September 28, 2007 by dandelionsalad

International narcotics agenda behind Myanmar instability by Larry Chin

Dandelion Salad

by Larry Chin
Global Research, September 28, 2007

For the past month, the military government of Myanmar has been the focus of increasingly strident demonstrations, resulting in violent military crackdowns in recent days.

What must be noted is the Bush administration’s open support for the dissidents, in conjunction with growing international (Western) support behind a coup attempt, and the likely parapolitical goals behind this agenda.

The demise of the Golden Triangle: bad for business

According to a report by Thomas Fuller of the International Herald Tribune, the Golden Triangle has, in recent years, lost its prominence as a narco-region. In fact, the legendary Triangle now accounts for as little as 5% of world opium supply, according to some estimates.

Notorious Golden Triangle loses sway in opium trade

Thomas Fuller, International Herald Tribune, September 11, 2007

Not surprisingly, the Golden Crescent and Afghanistan now under control of the US and its drug-intelligence proxies, is by far and away the world’s number one opium supplier, as well as the top overall drug producing region, dwarfing Colombia and the Golden Triangle.
(See http://www.globalresearch.ca/index.php?context=va&aid=6178 )

In fact, the demise of the Golden Triangle in recent years can be traced to geostrategic developments that run counter to the agenda of international interests whose financial and banking system depends on the multi-billion dollar cash flows of the criminal drug trade.

As noted by Fuller:

1. The United Nations credits Myanmar’s central government for leading opium eradication.

2. Militias with long-standing ties to the heroin business have also pushed eradication.

3. China has played a major role pressing opium growers to eradicate.

4. The Laotian government has led its own opium eradication campaign. Officials see the link between poverty and opium, and the fact that “it is mostly organized crime syndicates that profit”.

These narco-developments, parallel with

1) other financial and political reasons why a new Mynamar government would be preferred,

2) a fragile and teetering world economy facing numerous financial bubbles and insolvency, and

3) continued failure to control either the Middle East or contain the rising political and economic power of China, cast a different light on the sudden burst of interest on the part of the Bush administration to back a coup or regime change in Myanmar.

The Bush administration, the epitome of criminal political power, does not support “human rights”. It will utilize every means, including overt military force, to protect geostrategic interests that depend on the world drug trade.

The revitalization of the Golden Triangle drug trade, and the installation or support for an openly pro-US regime in Myanmar, benefits Western financial interests. Any geostrategic foothold in Southeast Asia also benefits efforts to contain China.

Larry Chin is a frequent contributor to Global Research. Global Research Articles by Larry Chin

Disclaimer: The views expressed in this article are the sole responsibility of the author and do not necessarily reflect those of the Centre for Research on Globalization.

To become a Member of Global Research

September 27, 2007 by dandelionsalad

Ahmadinejad, the toast of the Big Apple by Larry Chin

Dandelion Salad

by Larry Chin
Global Research, September 27, 2007
Online Journal

That’s toast, as in burned to a crisp.

It’s clear from the way in which Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad was treated on his visit to New York that not only will he remain the target of massive scapegoating as a “terrorist,” but the US fully intends to attack Iran, and the American public will enthusiastically support it, if and when it happens.

Ahmadinejad, whose visit was “decried” by scores of US politicians and “civic leaders,” has spent the length of Monday, September 24, being sandbagged and openly blasted and baited endlessly at both Columbia University, and at the National Press Club, where the questions from so-called reporters and journalists consisted of nothing but waves of attacks, character assassinations, and accusations. The US media is clearly, openly, and aggressively serving as the propaganda weapon of the CIA and Bush/Cheney and hawkish neoliberals.

The Iranian president was in the ultimate no-win situation, the ultimate Orwellian trap. When he attempted to answer impossible questions reasonably, he was attacked. When he stated (correctly) that anti-Iran reporting was the result of US government distortions, he was attacked, and made to sound like a nutcase.

The centerpiece of the propaganda campaign against the current number one strawman, Ahmadinejad, was authorities refusing to allow him to visit Ground Zero. This proved, once again, that the original mass propaganda effect of 9/11 remains fully in effect. Iran had nothing to do with 9/11. No connection whatsoever, even if one completely accepts the Bush administration’s official story. Yet in the minds of so many brain-addled Americans, Iran is the ultimate “terrorist.”

Of course, only those watching this unfold minute-by-minute on C-SPAN will ever know how rudely Ahmadinejad was treated. Corporate media sound bites will certainly frame him the way Dick Cheney wants him framed.

Whichever figure the White House chooses as its boogeyman is accepted as such, without question. Criminality on the part of the US government never enters the thought process.

The Iranian president, of course, knows that his visit will be seen differently, everywhere outside the fiercely protected bubble of the United States. But that won’t matter.

At the same time Ahmadinejad was defending himself, Senator Joe Lieberman was on the floor of Congress demanding action against Iran, spewing lies, pushing legislation that paves the way for military action against Iran .

Is it any wonder that as America tunes in to PBS to get patriotic and riled up about Ken Burns’ corporate-financed World War II documentary, The War, the US government is systematically setting up another atrocity right under their noses?

Larry Chin is a frequent contributor to Global Research. Global Research Articles by Larry Chin

see

Columbia President Bollinger Introduces Ahmadinejad (video)

Mahmoud Ahmadinejad speaks at Columbia University (video link)

Disclaimer: The views expressed in this article are the sole responsibility of the author and do not necessarily reflect those of the Centre for Research on Globalization.

To become a Member of Global Research

September 12, 2007 by dandelionsalad

Bipartisan consensus pushes for Iran attack by Larry Chin

Dandelion Salad

by Larry Chin

Global Research, September 12, 2007

Online Journal

The 2008 US presidential dance has already been decided: the winner will be a corrupt elite warmonger who will intensify and expand Bush-Cheney’s criminal “war on terrorism” into Iran and beyond, and with the full support of an acquiescent US populace. The latest rhetoric from Bush, and the candidates, spells this out in black and white.

“First Afghanistan, then Iraq, then Iran”

Covert destabilization and increasing military escalation towards a full-scale Iran attack have been underway for months. In recent weeks, the bellicose, cocky and certifiably insane George W. Bush named Iran as the “world’s leading supporter of terrorism.” His administration is openly constructing an attack plan against Tehran.

As astutely noted by Patrick Buchanan in “Phase III of Bush’s War,” “those who hoped that . . . America was headed out of Iraq got a rude awakening. They are about to get another.” Remarking on the “astonishing” rhetoric from a Bush who is “brimming with self-assurance,” Buchanan notes, “Confident of victory this fall on The Hill, Bush is now moving into Phase III in his ‘War on Terror’: First, Afghanistan, then Iraq, then Iran . . .” and that “U.S. forces may already be engaged in combat operations against Iranians. Who or what can stop this drive to war? . . . What is to prevent Bush from attacking Iran and widening the war, sooner than we think? Nothing and no one.”

The virtual certainty of an attack on Iran, and the absence of any resistance to such a war, is echoed by the analysis of former CIA analysts Kathleen and Bill Christison, and many other observers.

The only remaining debate is if an attack will take place during Bush-Cheney’s final months in power, or after, led by their successors. In fact, the successors seem even more eager to do Bush-Cheney one better by fighting the “real war on terrorism” that was, according to the now infamous deception, “squandered” by the mismanagement of the occupation of Iraq.

Presidential candidates fight for place at Iran/war feeding trough

From the start, candidates from both Democratic and Republican factions have fallen over themselves, and each other, to proclaim their “tough on terrorism and security” credentials, and their eagerness to “confront Tehran.” From Mitt Romney, Rudy Guiliani (thoroughly exposed as a 9/11 insider in Mike Ruppert’s Crossing The Rubicon and here) and just announced candidate Fred Thompson, to the slippery Democrats, the war rhetoric is the same.

The Democrats have been particularly hawkish in recent weeks. See:

“If Bush doesn’t force Iran to back down, then his successors will”

Barack Obama: “Hit Iran where it hurts”

“Obama and Clinton go nuclear” (William Arkin, Washington Post)

“Welcome to Hillary’s wars” (Pepe Escobar, Asia Times)

“Hillary Clinton: clear and present danger”

Bipartisan “war on terrorism” consensus

With increasing frequency, the myriad of Iran “terrorism” red herrings and lies have been irrevocably fused on to the larger 9/11 “war on terrorism” deception that has justified every criminal activity since 2001. The wealth of these deceptions has been detailed by Scott Ritter, author of the book Target: Iran, who has tracked the impending Iran war for years. The same template that led to the attack and occupation of Iraq is being applied to Iran.

As this writer previously noted in “Washington’s consensus Al-Qaeda deception“: “The ‘war on terrorism’ is a foreign policy weapon favored by an elite and ironclad Anglo-American consensus, supported equally by Washington’s political factions. The surge of “Al-Qaeda” covert operations and “terrorism” propaganda over the past three weeks, and reports of “renewed Al-Qaeda power,” marks the beginning of intensified false flag deception . . .

“Neocons, neoliberals, and “antiwar progressives” continue to enthusiastically embrace and reinforce the myth of the “ever-more powerful, ever-more cunning outside ‘terrorist’ threat to America” — and will continue to do so ad nauseum, as they have for nearly six years since 9/11. Meanwhile, the long-standing and enduring relationship between Islamic ‘terrorists,’ ‘Al-Qaeda,’ Osama bin Laden, etc. and Anglo-American and US-allied intelligence agencies (CIA, FBI, MI-6, Pakistani ISI, Mossad, etc.) and their ongoing use and manipulation of these ‘terrorist’ groups on behalf of Anglo-Anerican geostrategy remains completely ignored, and the focus of ongoing cover-up, media silence and academic obfuscation . . .

” . . . Slippery variations on the “war on terrorism” theme include (but are not limited to) the following:

“The Bush administration has failed to fight the ‘real war on terrorism’ begun after 9/11
“Mismanagement and blunders of the war in Iraq have created radical jihadist insurgencies that wish to destroy the United States
“The Iraq mistake has distracted us from fighting the ‘real’ war on terrorism
“We should declare war on Saudi Arabia and Pakistan, which harbor the real ‘terrorists’ who attacked us on 9/11
“The Iraq distraction has prevented us from capturing Osama
“The world was united after 9/11, but Bush squandered it all”

“As pointed out by Michel Chossudovsky, the “Al-Qaeda” deception is central to Anglo-American foreign policy, which rests squarely on the perpetual threat of a fabricated outside enemy, and fear of a “new 9/11.” This deception provides the ongoing pretext used to justify endless warfare and endless criminality.”

The presidential candidates have continued to feast on “Al-Qaeda” propaganda meat, and its most recent incarnation, the “Iran-as-leading-terrorist-nation” rhetoric now being spearheaded by Bush himself.

It goes without saying that a Hillary Clinton presidency would continue the Bush-Cheney agenda, and return Anglo-American criminality to its 1990s glory. Not surprisingly, Hillary Clinton’s advisors include legendary war criminals Madeline Albright, Sandy Berger, Richard Holbrooke, Strobe Talbott and, of course, Bill Clinton himself. The “Al-Qaeda” war politics blossomed during the Bill Clinton administration with the use of Al-Qaeda/militant Islamic mercenaries in Kosovo and Bosnia, and what is arguably the true start of today’s “war on terror” — the identification of Osama bin Laden as “enemy number one” in 1998, followed by the bombing of Sudan. The cooperative role that the deeply corrupt Clinton faction played alongside the Bush “crime family,” in virtually all of the major US government crimes from the 1980s to the present, can fill several libraries.

Other former Clinton security hands, such as former National Security Advisor Anthony Lake and former Assistant Secretary of State Susan Rice can be found in the Obama camp.

Despite his inexplicable popularity among liberals and “progressives” who are easily fooled by his smooth style and projections inspired by his dark complexion, Obama’s foreign policy agenda is identical to that of the Bush administration, including his approach to the “war on terrorism.” Obama virtually promises to be a worldwide mass murderer, justifying his crimes with “blowback” deceptions. Like other members of Congress, Obama has access to classified material. He and others are complicit in hiding the fact of Anglo-American intelligence connections behind both the “terrorism” and the “insurgencies” . . .

John Edwards, desperate to gain ground on the clear front-runner, recently blasted Clinton as the candidate of a process “rigged by the elites.” This deceptive rhetoric hides the fact that Edwards himself is an elite, supported by Jimmy Carter, and backed by equally powerful and unsavory financial and political interests. Edwards has never stopped proclaiming his intention, should be become president (or vice president) to “kill terrorists.”

The election is, of course, rigged, but not in the red herring manner that Edwards suggests. All modern US elections have been rigged, as grotesquely evidenced by the open theft of every election since 2000, and the still-unaddressed electronic control and scripting of the entire voting process.

The elite forces in control of the rigging of the world political power are amply documented. According to investigative journalists such as Daniel Estulin, author of a soon-to-be released book on Bilderberg, the leading US presidential candidates (who stand any realistic chance of being selected) share extensive Bilderberger connections, including the Clintons (members of long standing), and Edwards.

With the exception of Democrats Dennis Kucinich and Mike Gravel, Republican Ron Paul (all of whom continue to be routinely shut out by the political establishment, and dismissed by their own party apparatuses), and even more marginal names, the war and “anti-terror” platforms of the leading candidates are malodorously pure fascism, straight out of the Bush-Cheney’s playbook.

What is clear is that the next US president will not only continue but also expand the “war on terrorism” and the “war against radical extremists” into Iran, and beyond. If Bush-Cheney engineer a “next 9/11,” crushing political and popular resistance, the war will come even sooner. Both Republican and Democratic Party factions are hell-bent on pushing the same post-Peak Oil geostrategic control agenda, the same false flag terror, and the same propaganda.

With an empire and its survival at stake, the most “unthinkable,” apocalyptic and criminal options are “on the table.” And the table is getting smaller.

Larry Chin is a frequent contributor to Global Research. Global Research Articles by Larry Chin

Disclaimer: The views expressed in this article are the sole responsibility of the author and do not necessarily reflect those of the Centre for Research on Globalization.

To become a Member of Global Research

July 20, 2007 by dandelionsalad

Washington’s Consensus Al Qaeda Deception by Larry Chin

Dandelion Salad

by Larry Chin
Global Research, July 19, 2007

The “war on terrorism” is a foreign policy weapon favored by an elite and ironclad Anglo-American consensus, supported equally by Washington’s political factions. The surge of “Al-Qaeda” covert operations and “terrorism” propaganda over the past three weeks, and reports of “renewed Al-Qaeda power”, marks the beginning of intensified false flag deception.

Al-Qaeda: “stronger than ever”— or not?

It is not clear if the new crescendo of “Al-Qaeda” signals intent by the Bush-Cheney covert operations machine to inflict their long-planned “next 9/11” before relinquishing power in 2008, or if this noise is routine political maneuvering by rival Washington factions engaged in election-year posturing. Nevertheless, a most perfect of perfect storms is being whipped up, with major players on all sides regurgitating and reinforcing the same bombastic assertions.

The initial wave of US fear mongering was triggered by the latest National Intelligence Estimate (produced by Bush-Cheney intelligence) declaring that “Al-Qaeda” has regrouped to “pre-9/11 levels”. This was quickly followed by new “terror” tapes of “Al-Qaeda” masterminds Osama bin Laden and il-Zawahiri, each demonstrating, according to Bush-Cheney, that “Al-Qaeda is even more high-tech and sophisticated than ever imagined”.

The initial “Al-Qaeda stronger than ever” blast was then followed by rounds of equivocation and backpedaling. Reports from Washington reporters, such as Rowan Scarborough, quoted “unnamed counterterrorism officials” who say that Al-Qaeda has rebuilt cells in the tribal areas of Pakistan (an old and familiar claim), but “is not at the same strength exhibited in Afghanistan before Sept.11”—and taking issue with how the National Intelligence Estimate was initially spun.

Homeland Security “czar” Michael Chertoff declared that “Al-Qaeda” was not at pre-9/11 strength, boasting about the Bush administration’s success killing or capturing two-thirds of “Al-Qaeda” leaders, then adding that he has a “gut feeling” that “Al-Qaeda” will strike the US again, perhaps this summer.

The most inconvenient truth

Neocons, neoliberals, and “anti-war progressives” continue to enthusiastically embrace and reinforce the myth of the “ever-more powerful, ever-more cunning outside ‘terrorist’ threat to America”—and will continue to do so ad nauseum, as they have for nearly six years since 9/11. Meanwhile, the long-standing and enduring relationship between Islamic “terrorists”, “Al-Qaeda”, Osama bin Laden, etc. and Anglo-American and US-allied intelligence agencies (CIA, FBI, MI-6, Pakistani ISI, Mossad, etc.) and their ongoing use and manipulation of these “terrorist” groups on behalf of Anglo-Anerican geostrategy remains completely ignored, and the focus of ongoing cover-up, media silence and academic obfuscation.

Ignorant distortions about “terrorism” are now routine and deeply embedded fixations in news coverage, and in pop culture monstrosities such the television series 24, as well as the film The Mighty Heart, which the Daniel Pearl murder gloss-over starring the Council on Foreign Relation’s newest member, Angelina Jolie. Esquire magazine’s Al-Qaeda:The Global Brand by Thomas Barnett is a perfect example of how the Washington consensus deception is swallowed without question, and reiterated compliantly.

There is no better example of Washington’s consensus than the bipartisan Capitol Hill complicity behind 9/11, including the still-unaddressed meetings between high-level Republicans and Democrats, and Pakistani ISI chief Mahmoud Ahmad prior to, and on the morning of, 9/11, and the unanimous and enthusiastic support for the “war on terrorism” lie since the day.

Bush-Cheney’s supposed critics have complained about the administration’s “squandered opportunity” and Iraq blunders, but have never wavered in their support for the “war on terrorism”. Slippery variations on the “war on terrorism” theme include (but are not limited to) the following:

“The Bush administration has failed to fight the ‘real war on terrorism’ begun after 9/11”
“Mismanagement and blunders of the war in Iraq have created radical jihadist insurgencies that wish to destroy the United States”
“The Iraq mistake has distracted us from fighting the ‘real’ war on terrorism”
“We should declare war on Saudi Arabia and Pakistan, which harbor the real ‘terrorists’ who attacked us on 9/11”
“The Iraq distraction has prevented us from capturing Osama ”
“The world was united after 9/11, but Bush squandered it all”

There is obvious disillusion with the Bush administration, but the widespread call for a “change in strategy” does not include any letup of the “war on terrorism”. In fact, the voices most stridently demanding “change” are cementing years of criminal lies under new layers of deception. They want to ramp up Bush’s false flag wars, not end them.

US presidential candidates feast on “Al-Qaeda” propaganda meat

The latest “Al-Qaeda” headlines have prompted each of the 2008 US presidential candidates have fall over each other to push the “tough on terrorism” card.

“Al-Qaeda” war politics blossomed during the Bill Clinton adminstration with the use of Al-Qaeda/militant Islamic mercenaries in Kosovo and Bosnia, and what is arguably the true start of today’s “war on terror”—the identification of Osama bin Laden as “enemy number one” (at the height of the Monica Lewinsky scandal) in 1998, followed by the bombing of Sudan. The cooperative role that the deeply corrupt Clinton faction played alongside the Bush “crime family”, in virtually all of the major US government crimes from the 1980s to the present, can fill several libraries. It goes without saying that a Hillary Clinton presidency would continue the Bush-Cheney agenda, and return Anglo-American criminality to its 1990s glory.

What about the others? Contrary to his image as a “progressive”, Barack Obama’s foreign policy agenda is virtually identical to that of the Bush administration, including his approach to the “war on terrorism”. Obama has promised a robust US military-intelligence presence in Iraq and the Middle East to “root out Al-Qaeda”. To defeat Al-Qaeda, Obama will build a “twenty-first-century military and twenty-first-century alliances” in order to “stay on the offensive everywhere from Djibouti to Kandahar”, and “revamp intelligence agencies far beyond post-September 11 reforms”. Another analysis of Obama’s aggressive war policy can be found here.

Obama promotes the false notion of “blowback”. Like other members of Congress, Obama has access to classified material. He and others are complicit in hiding the fact of Anglo-American intelligence connectons behind both the “terrorism” and the “insurgencies”.

The “anti-terror” platform of John Edwards is equally malodorous. It was Edwards who promised on national television, during the 2004 vice presidential debate with Dick Cheney, that he would “kill the terrorists”. So would Joe Biden (one of the many who met with the ISI “money man” before 9/11), Chris Dodd, Bill Richardson, and other longtime Democratic Party fossils. (Two Democratic Party candidates who are more stridently critical of Bush-Cheney’s agenda, Dennis Kucinich and Mike Gravel are routinely shut out by the Democratic Party apparatus, and stand no chance of nomination.)

It goes without saying that the Republican candidates fully support Bush-Cheney’s geostrategy and war policies, from Mitt Romney to Sam Brownback (the lone critic of Bush policy, Ron Paul, stands no chance). Given the fact that these “loyal Bushies” have been instrumental in making the global slaughter possible, and covering up the rampant criminality led by the Bush administration, it is no surprise to find these candidates aggressively peddling the “terrorism” propaganda. Rudy Guiliani, whose active criminal role on 9/11 was exhaustively exposed in Michael Ruppert’s Crossing the Rubicon, is essentially an extension of Dick Cheney. Mitt Romney promises to “combat radical Islam” with a war agenda identical to Obama’s (which is identical to Bush-Cheney’s). Romney’s provocative speech at the Herzliya Conference speaks for itself.

The bloodthirsty John McCain has routinely fronted for Bush-Cheney. There is no better crystallization of McCain’s depravity than his post-9/11 Wall Street Journal op-ed, “War is Hell. Now Let’s Get On With It”, in which McCain openly calls for “ruthless” murder. The piece is also a perfect presentation of Bush-Cheney’s lie.

What is clear is that the next US president will not only continue but also expand the “war on terrorism” and the “war against radical extremists”. Both Republican and Democratic Party factions stand to gain from false flag terror and propaganda. Anglo-American geostrategy, and the expansion of the war and global resource conquest, would not be possible without them.

Al-Qaeda: perpetual covert operation and cover-up

As previously noted in “Al-Qaeda:the eternal covert operation”, “Islamic terrorism” is a Anglo-American geostrategy, and “Al-Qaeda” is military-intelligence asset and a leading brand of war propaganda.

Official “war on terrorism” disinformation is repeated ad nauseum, accepted as fact by the mass populace, and used as the justification for ever-expanding Anglo-American war and ever-deepening criminality, virtually no attention is paid to the Anglo-American support and management of “Al-Qaeda” and other “terror” groups, or the criminally fabricated nature of modern “terrorism”. Every major “terrorism” event in recent times has been a US or US-allied covert operation, followed by political manipulation and cover-up. No credible proof has been provided to prove any official assertion made about the true nature of “Al-Qaeda”, Osama bin Laden, 9/11, etc.

Whereas it is a documented fact that Washington’s support and management of “Militant Islamic Network”, including “Al-Qaeda”, has been continuous since the Carter administration. A recently declassified French intelligence report details the extent to which “Al-Qaeda” and Osama bin Laden ran operations for the CIA. “Al-Qaeda” as well as Al-Qaeda “foreign fighter hordes” propaganda is a key component of the Pentagon’s Iraq occupation and pacification program. Also see “Who is Osama bin Laden?” and “Al-Qaeda:the database”.

Planned covert operations and false flag operations using “terrorists” in direct and indirect military-intelligence roles are of imperial design. Such operations (exemplified by 9/11), and their predictable propaganda results (“the war on terrorism”) are now routine events.

Even though the notion of false flag terror has more recently been supported by the likes of activist Cindy Sheehan, the vast majority of Americans remains in absolute denial and ignorance, or fully endorse violent “anti-terrorism” agendas.

The idea of “blowback”, the notion that terrorist assets have turned on their sponsors, is embraced by many, but it is bogus: Western intelligence has not severed its ties to “terrorists”, and, in fact, continues to selectively guide these groups. The true “root cause” of “Islamic terrorism” remains Anglo-American control and guidance of “terror”.

As pointed out by Michel Chossudovsky, the “Al-Qaeda” deception is central to Anglo-American foreign policy, which rests squarely on the perpetual threat of a fabricated outside enemy, and fear of a “new 9/11”. This deception provides the ongoing pretext used to justify endless warfare and endless criminality.

“Al-Qaeda” is indeed a “global brand”: the pre-eminent brand of Anglo-American covert operation and propaganda apparatus, created, funded, guided and manipulated by leading government powers and intelligence agencies.

Without an end to the “terrorism” lie, there can be no end to the “war on terrorism”.

Larry Chin is a frequent contributor to Global Research. Global Research Articles by Larry Chin

Disclaimer: The views expressed in this article are the sole responsibility of the author and do not necessarily reflect those of the Centre for Research on Globalization.

To become a Member of Global Research

For media inquiries: crgeditor@yahoo.com

The url address of this article is: www.globalresearch.ca/index.php?context=va&aid=6370

	U.S. Army: 0 — Inter… on Memorial Day Myths, by David…
	U.S. Army: 0 — Inter… on David Swanson and Charles Lenc…
	U.S. Army: 0 — Inter… on The Military to American Youth…
	U.S. Army: 0 — Inter… on Tell the Truth: Veterans Day I…
	U.S. Army: 0 — Inter… on How The War Machine ‘Recruits’…