Friday, February 27, 2004
"Steady Leadership in Times of Change."- Bush-Cheney ’04 Campaign theme
Bugging
Several stories of American-British eavesdropping, capturing the Blair-Bush collusion in marginalizing the UN in the rush to invade Iraq. A focal point is Katharine Gun, the 29 year ld Briton who worked for British electronic intelligence center. She had leaked a memo a year ago that revealing the bugging of UN delegations during efforts to broker a compromise so as to avoid war. She was charged under the Official Secrets Act, was scheduled to go on trial, but has now had charges dropped. Gun told the AP she had leaked the document because it "exposed serious illegality and wrongdoing on the part of the U.S. government." The Observer reported that the revelations revealed that despite the US agreeing to more time to find a resolution, it secretly used intelligence from spying on those negotiations to kill the last hope of a UN resolution."
But so little coverage here, at least till now.
From the New York Times (Patrick Tyler)
In a sudden reversal, Britain said Wednesday that it would not prosecute a 29-year-old government linguist who admitted leaking a top secret American request for assistance in bugging United Nations diplomats.
The request was made by the United States National Security Agency during the debate over the Iraq war a year ago, according to the linguist, Katharine Gun, and her lawyers. http://www.nytimes.com/2004/02/26/international/europe/26BRIT.html
Guardian reports: (George Wright, Martin Nicholls and Matthew Tempest/ Mark Oliver)
Former minister Clare Short's claim that Britain spied on the UN secretary general, Kofi Annan, ahead of the Iraq war, have been described as "deeply irresponsible" by the prime minister, Tony Blair.
The UN responded to Ms Short's claim that, during her time in government, she had read transcripts of some of Mr Annan's telephone calls, by saying that any such spying would be illegal.
Mr Blair refused to confirm or deny the claim, but insisted that intelligence officers always acted within the bounds of national and international law. http://politics.guardian.co.uk/print/0,3858,4867304-111381,00.html
Ms Gun, of Cheltenham, Gloucestershire, had been accused of disclosing a request allegedly from a US national security agency official for help from British intelligence to tap the telephones of UN security council delegates during the period of fraught diplomacy before the war.
She argued the alleged disclosures exposed serious wrongdoing by the US and could have helped to prevent the deaths of Iraqis and British forces in an "illegal war". http://www.guardian.co.uk/Iraq/Story/0,2763,1155681,00.html
Trashing of Dean: A report (Ciro Scotti)
In the background, the Democratic powerbrokers shivered and quivered, and huddled together -- much like the Republicans in 1992, when the Buchanan Brigade momentarily threatened the GOP status quo. The man had to be stopped.
As The Washington Post reported on Feb. 11, a group called Americans for Jobs & Healthcare spent $500,000 on ads attacking Dean in the run-up to the primaries. The Post said the group was headed by David Jones, a longtime adviser to Gephardt. It said the group's spokesman was Robert Gibbs, who had previously been working for the Kerry campaign. And where did the money come from? According to the Post, disgraced former Senator Robert Torricelli of New Jersey, a Kerry supporter, gave $50,000..…
Other money, according to the Post, came from Alan Patricof, a Clark fund-raiser, and Bernard Schwartz, chairman of Loral Corp. Schwartz is a longtime moneybag for the Democratic Establishment who had close ties to the Clinton Administration. One ad the group ran questioned Dean's foreign policy expertise and used an image of Osama bin Laden.
By the time the Iowa caucuses arrived, the attacks and the spendthrift Mr. Trippi had taken their toll. http://msnbc.msn.com/id/4371381/
Marriage Amendment:
The hoped for distraction may not pan out for Bush. As supermajorities in both house are required, eight Republicans have made that seem impossible to attain.
9/11 The charade is that Bush wants to grant the Commission an extension to finish its work, and Speaker Hastert has not cooperated with the White House in refusing the extension. Please. Since when does Denny Hastert call the shots?
Greenspan:
Wrote on this before, but for emphasis, I again mention his call for cutting Social security payments to bring down the deficit the Administration created. Kerry did well by immediately saying ‘not if I’m president; instead we’ll cancel the tax cuts for the wealthy.’
Pentagon’s Climate Disaster Report Hits (Some) U.S. Newspapers (not the Times/Globe)
Knight Ridder papers are noting it (Seth Borenstein), if more reservedly.
U.S.: Climate change could cause global woe
A dramatic climate change could suddenly become a global security nightmare, warns a worst-case scenario assembled by professional futurists at the behest of the Pentagon.
In a report released to Knight Ridder on Monday, they write that while a drastic climate change is unlikely, it ''would challenge United States national security in ways that should be considered immediately.'' The ''plausible'' consequences include famine in Europe and nuclear showdowns over who controls what's left of the world's water, the futurists concluded.
The report, commissioned by the Department of Defense's Office of Net Assessment, its internal think tank, reflects the Pentagon's policy of planning for the worst, said author and long-time Pentagon consultant Peter Schwartz.
Schwartz said in a Knight Ridder interview that while the climate change envisioned is drastic, it's as worthy of advance planning as several other ''high-impact scenarios'' that came true, such as planning in 1983 for the end of the Soviet Union or in 1995 for the possibility that terrorists might crash planes into the World Trade Center/
While the Bush administration generally has not considered global warming much of an immediate threat, ''I did not write an impossible scenario,'' Schwartz said. It could play out, he said, in the next five to 15 years. http://www.miami.com/mld/miamiherald/news/nation/8025845.htm?template=contentModules/printstory.jsp
Ronnie Dugger on Kucinich : The Texas populist, in The Nation:
Social Security must not be privatized, Kucinich vows. He would retain the estate tax. He would repeal Bush's tax cuts for the wealthy and put that money into universal public education, age 3 through college. "Investing $500 billion to rebuild schools, roads, bridges, ports and sewage, water and environmental systems," he says, "will do more to stimulate our economy than tax breaks for the wealthy." He would cut the military budget 15 percent, $60 billion a year, and invest that money in universal childcare. He has an ingenious plan to use one-sixth of Treasury securities, $50 billion, to make zero-interest loans to localities for infrastructure projects, cutting the cost of those projects in half for the taxpayers of the cities and towns of the country. Kucinich is the only candidate who sued Bush to stop him from attacking Iraq without a declaration of war. He is the only one who voted against the Patriot Act. The only one who will withdraw the United States from NAFTA and the WTO. The only one who has spoken out against the takeover of our water supply by multinational corporations. The only one pledged to lead the country to 20 percent renewable energy in six years. The only one with major New Deal-like investment programs for schools, roads, ports, sewage, water and environmental systems. The only one with a 98 percent lifetime pro-union voting record. The only one who has introduced legislation to repeal the federal death penalty. In short, Kucinich is the only one who is proposing a profound reconsideration of our governmental priorities and the rejection of our degeneration into imperial warmaking. http://www.thenation.com/docprint.mhtml?i=20040301&s=dugger
James Ridgeway (Village Voice) on Nader:
It's been Nader and his groups, not the Democrats, who've spearheaded universal health care ever since Hillary Clinton botched the chance for health reform in the early 90s. It's been Nader and his troops who've kept the searchlight on corporate crime, who raised the hue and cry on Enron, when Democrats were smoothing the counterpane for Lay in the Lincoln Bedroom.
Just as Michael Moore ignited the issue of Bush's National Guard service with his "deserter" joke at a Wesley Clark rally in New Hampshire last month, Nader could bring attention to bear on another damaging angle: On Sunday, during his Meet the Press interview, he raised the question of whether Bush should be impeached for high crimes and misdemeanors—lying the nation into war in Iraq.
From both within and outside a presidential run, Nader has the ability to push issues into the limelight when they are ignored by other politicians. For example: Universal health care has been spearheaded by the Nader groups since Hillary Clinton made her famous flop. Likewise corporate crime—it was the Nader groups in Washington and their allies in California who were most responsible for exposing Enron. It wasn't anybody in the Democratic Party, that's for sure.
The mainstream Democratic insiders in Washington, maintaining camaraderie with Republicans who are shredding the Constitution, have attacked Nader over the past four years as the man who cost Al Gore the election. Meanwhile, Nader has been developing and handing them the real political issues for the campaign. http://www.villagevoice.com/issues/0408/mondo1.php
-R
Bugging
Several stories of American-British eavesdropping, capturing the Blair-Bush collusion in marginalizing the UN in the rush to invade Iraq. A focal point is Katharine Gun, the 29 year ld Briton who worked for British electronic intelligence center. She had leaked a memo a year ago that revealing the bugging of UN delegations during efforts to broker a compromise so as to avoid war. She was charged under the Official Secrets Act, was scheduled to go on trial, but has now had charges dropped. Gun told the AP she had leaked the document because it "exposed serious illegality and wrongdoing on the part of the U.S. government." The Observer reported that the revelations revealed that despite the US agreeing to more time to find a resolution, it secretly used intelligence from spying on those negotiations to kill the last hope of a UN resolution."
But so little coverage here, at least till now.
From the New York Times (Patrick Tyler)
In a sudden reversal, Britain said Wednesday that it would not prosecute a 29-year-old government linguist who admitted leaking a top secret American request for assistance in bugging United Nations diplomats.
The request was made by the United States National Security Agency during the debate over the Iraq war a year ago, according to the linguist, Katharine Gun, and her lawyers. http://www.nytimes.com/2004/02/26/international/europe/26BRIT.html
Guardian reports: (George Wright, Martin Nicholls and Matthew Tempest/ Mark Oliver)
Former minister Clare Short's claim that Britain spied on the UN secretary general, Kofi Annan, ahead of the Iraq war, have been described as "deeply irresponsible" by the prime minister, Tony Blair.
The UN responded to Ms Short's claim that, during her time in government, she had read transcripts of some of Mr Annan's telephone calls, by saying that any such spying would be illegal.
Mr Blair refused to confirm or deny the claim, but insisted that intelligence officers always acted within the bounds of national and international law. http://politics.guardian.co.uk/print/0,3858,4867304-111381,00.html
Ms Gun, of Cheltenham, Gloucestershire, had been accused of disclosing a request allegedly from a US national security agency official for help from British intelligence to tap the telephones of UN security council delegates during the period of fraught diplomacy before the war.
She argued the alleged disclosures exposed serious wrongdoing by the US and could have helped to prevent the deaths of Iraqis and British forces in an "illegal war". http://www.guardian.co.uk/Iraq/Story/0,2763,1155681,00.html
Trashing of Dean: A report (Ciro Scotti)
In the background, the Democratic powerbrokers shivered and quivered, and huddled together -- much like the Republicans in 1992, when the Buchanan Brigade momentarily threatened the GOP status quo. The man had to be stopped.
As The Washington Post reported on Feb. 11, a group called Americans for Jobs & Healthcare spent $500,000 on ads attacking Dean in the run-up to the primaries. The Post said the group was headed by David Jones, a longtime adviser to Gephardt. It said the group's spokesman was Robert Gibbs, who had previously been working for the Kerry campaign. And where did the money come from? According to the Post, disgraced former Senator Robert Torricelli of New Jersey, a Kerry supporter, gave $50,000..…
Other money, according to the Post, came from Alan Patricof, a Clark fund-raiser, and Bernard Schwartz, chairman of Loral Corp. Schwartz is a longtime moneybag for the Democratic Establishment who had close ties to the Clinton Administration. One ad the group ran questioned Dean's foreign policy expertise and used an image of Osama bin Laden.
By the time the Iowa caucuses arrived, the attacks and the spendthrift Mr. Trippi had taken their toll. http://msnbc.msn.com/id/4371381/
Marriage Amendment:
The hoped for distraction may not pan out for Bush. As supermajorities in both house are required, eight Republicans have made that seem impossible to attain.
9/11 The charade is that Bush wants to grant the Commission an extension to finish its work, and Speaker Hastert has not cooperated with the White House in refusing the extension. Please. Since when does Denny Hastert call the shots?
Greenspan:
Wrote on this before, but for emphasis, I again mention his call for cutting Social security payments to bring down the deficit the Administration created. Kerry did well by immediately saying ‘not if I’m president; instead we’ll cancel the tax cuts for the wealthy.’
Pentagon’s Climate Disaster Report Hits (Some) U.S. Newspapers (not the Times/Globe)
Knight Ridder papers are noting it (Seth Borenstein), if more reservedly.
U.S.: Climate change could cause global woe
A dramatic climate change could suddenly become a global security nightmare, warns a worst-case scenario assembled by professional futurists at the behest of the Pentagon.
In a report released to Knight Ridder on Monday, they write that while a drastic climate change is unlikely, it ''would challenge United States national security in ways that should be considered immediately.'' The ''plausible'' consequences include famine in Europe and nuclear showdowns over who controls what's left of the world's water, the futurists concluded.
The report, commissioned by the Department of Defense's Office of Net Assessment, its internal think tank, reflects the Pentagon's policy of planning for the worst, said author and long-time Pentagon consultant Peter Schwartz.
Schwartz said in a Knight Ridder interview that while the climate change envisioned is drastic, it's as worthy of advance planning as several other ''high-impact scenarios'' that came true, such as planning in 1983 for the end of the Soviet Union or in 1995 for the possibility that terrorists might crash planes into the World Trade Center/
While the Bush administration generally has not considered global warming much of an immediate threat, ''I did not write an impossible scenario,'' Schwartz said. It could play out, he said, in the next five to 15 years. http://www.miami.com/mld/miamiherald/news/nation/8025845.htm?template=contentModules/printstory.jsp
Ronnie Dugger on Kucinich : The Texas populist, in The Nation:
Social Security must not be privatized, Kucinich vows. He would retain the estate tax. He would repeal Bush's tax cuts for the wealthy and put that money into universal public education, age 3 through college. "Investing $500 billion to rebuild schools, roads, bridges, ports and sewage, water and environmental systems," he says, "will do more to stimulate our economy than tax breaks for the wealthy." He would cut the military budget 15 percent, $60 billion a year, and invest that money in universal childcare. He has an ingenious plan to use one-sixth of Treasury securities, $50 billion, to make zero-interest loans to localities for infrastructure projects, cutting the cost of those projects in half for the taxpayers of the cities and towns of the country. Kucinich is the only candidate who sued Bush to stop him from attacking Iraq without a declaration of war. He is the only one who voted against the Patriot Act. The only one who will withdraw the United States from NAFTA and the WTO. The only one who has spoken out against the takeover of our water supply by multinational corporations. The only one pledged to lead the country to 20 percent renewable energy in six years. The only one with major New Deal-like investment programs for schools, roads, ports, sewage, water and environmental systems. The only one with a 98 percent lifetime pro-union voting record. The only one who has introduced legislation to repeal the federal death penalty. In short, Kucinich is the only one who is proposing a profound reconsideration of our governmental priorities and the rejection of our degeneration into imperial warmaking. http://www.thenation.com/docprint.mhtml?i=20040301&s=dugger
James Ridgeway (Village Voice) on Nader:
It's been Nader and his groups, not the Democrats, who've spearheaded universal health care ever since Hillary Clinton botched the chance for health reform in the early 90s. It's been Nader and his troops who've kept the searchlight on corporate crime, who raised the hue and cry on Enron, when Democrats were smoothing the counterpane for Lay in the Lincoln Bedroom.
Just as Michael Moore ignited the issue of Bush's National Guard service with his "deserter" joke at a Wesley Clark rally in New Hampshire last month, Nader could bring attention to bear on another damaging angle: On Sunday, during his Meet the Press interview, he raised the question of whether Bush should be impeached for high crimes and misdemeanors—lying the nation into war in Iraq.
From both within and outside a presidential run, Nader has the ability to push issues into the limelight when they are ignored by other politicians. For example: Universal health care has been spearheaded by the Nader groups since Hillary Clinton made her famous flop. Likewise corporate crime—it was the Nader groups in Washington and their allies in California who were most responsible for exposing Enron. It wasn't anybody in the Democratic Party, that's for sure.
The mainstream Democratic insiders in Washington, maintaining camaraderie with Republicans who are shredding the Constitution, have attacked Nader over the past four years as the man who cost Al Gore the election. Meanwhile, Nader has been developing and handing them the real political issues for the campaign. http://www.villagevoice.com/issues/0408/mondo1.php
-R
