VirusHead

Here is a very comprehensive 9/11 timeline.

In New York City, firefighters and first responders at the World Trade Center read the victims’ names for the first time today.

The majority of the 9/11 terrorists were Saudis, but Americans still try to draw some link to Iraq. Meanwhile, al Qaeda is in Iraq now.

This administration has made us less safe, less secure. We could have handled this so differently…

A must read: “The Clash of Civilizations Doesn’t Exist… Yet” by Joshua Holland, AlterNet. Posted September 1, 2006.

The neocons who are pushing a Clash of Civilizations are mirror-images of the terrorists that inspire their hyperbolic fear — they are just as irrational and just as great a threat to our security.

To the extent that some terrorist groups have recently turned their eyes to us, it’s not a matter of hating our freedoms or our women’s bare shoulders. It’s because we’ve supported many of those repressive regimes — often with troops on the ground — from Indonesia to Iran.

Consider this: in the epic struggle between East and West, some of our staunchest allies are the undisputed champs in spreading violent Islamic extremism. Saudi Arabia and Pakistan established fundamentalist, anti-Western madrassas all across the world, funneled gobs of cash to extremist groups, and nurtured and supported them in their infancy. It wasn’t just random individuals within those countries; Saudi Arabia made it a foreign policy priority to spread its brand of Wahhabism, mostly to counter the perceived threat of Pan-Arabism and other anti-colonial ideologies. Pakistan’s intelligence service, the ISI — sometimes called a “state within a state” — not only supported the Taliban in Afghanistan but funded, equipped and helped train some of the most notorious terror groups that grew out of that country in the 1990s. Talk all you want about Syria and Iran supporting Hezbollah, these are the great terror-sponsoring states, and they’re on the side of the Western democracies.

What’s more, the West isn’t all that unified in this great existential struggle to save itself from destruction. A recent poll of citizens in the United Kingdom, our most loyal ally and a country that largely believes the Clash of Civilizations meme, found that — “by a margin of more than five to one — the public wants Tony Blair to split from President George W. Bush and either go it alone in the ‘war on terror’, or work more closely with Europe.” Just 14 per cent believed “Britain should continue to align itself with America.” A Pew Global Attitudes survey in June found that in Spain, supposedly a target of “Islamic Imperialism” and the victim of one of the most spectacular terror attacks ever, “four times as many people oppose the war on terror as support it (76 percent to 19 percent).”

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That’s the number of laws that Bush has claimed authority to disobey.

Among the laws Bush said he can ignore are military rules and regulations, affirmative-action provisions, requirements that Congress be told about immigration services problems, ”whistle-blower” protections for nuclear regulatory officials, and safeguards against political interference in federally funded research.

Legal scholars say the scope and aggression of Bush’s assertions that he can bypass laws represent a concerted effort to expand his power at the expense of Congress, upsetting the balance between the branches of government.

The President’s job is to faithfully execute the laws. In his (or his advisors’) view, the Supreme Court’s job and the Congress’ job is really his job too.

I think that perhaps he’s spent a little too much time with the Royal Family – no, not his own, but the Saud variety. American boots on the ground in Saudi Arabia, protecting the regime of the royal family, acted as one of the first recruiting points for bin Laden’s terrorist network (despite his own ties) there. Our role in the middle east has been unpopular — supporting dictators, establishing military bases, things like that. Our decades-long protection of this family has been documented to some extent already – but I fully expect to see more revelations of just how deep our complicity has been, and how much it has really cost, as time goes on. Meanwhile, they’re raking it in even faster than ExxonMobil.

In any case, the expansion of executive power in this administration has been striking. They must feel very confident in continuing “Republican” power (They’re not really Republicans, are they…).

Here’s how it’s done, the modus operandi: Signing statements. It’s a form of crossing fingers behind your back, if you remember that children’s “loophole on a promise.”

Bush is the first president in modern history who has never vetoed a bill, giving Congress no chance to override his judgments. Instead, he has signed every bill that reached his desk, often inviting the legislation’s sponsors to signing ceremonies at which he lavishes praise upon their work.

Then, after the media and the lawmakers have left the White House, Bush quietly files ‘’signing statements” — official documents in which a president lays out his legal interpretation of a bill for the federal bureaucracy to follow when implementing the new law. The statements are recorded in the federal register.

In his signing statements, Bush has repeatedly asserted that the Constitution gives him the right to ignore numerous sections of the bills — sometimes including provisions that were the subject of negotiations with Congress in order to get lawmakers to pass the bill. He has appended such statements to more than one of every 10 bills he has signed.

”He agrees to a compromise with members of Congress, and all of them are there for a public bill-signing ceremony, but then he takes back those compromises — and more often than not, without the Congress or the press or the public knowing what has happened,” said Christopher Kelley, a Miami University of Ohio political science professor who studies executive power.

Here are a couple of examples:

Dec. 30, 2005: US interrogators cannot torture prisoners or otherwise subject them to cruel, inhuman, and degrading treatment.

Bush’s signing statement: The president, as commander in chief, can waive the torture ban if he decides that harsh interrogation techniques will assist in preventing terrorist attacks.

Oct. 29, 2005: Defense Department personnel are prohibited from interfering with the ability of military lawyers to give independent legal advice to their commanders.

Bush’s signing statement: All military attorneys are bound to follow legal conclusions reached by the administration’s lawyers in the Justice Department and the Pentagon when giving advice to their commanders.

Nov. 6, 2003: US officials in Iraq cannot prevent an inspector general for the Coalition Provisional Authority from carrying out any investigation. The inspector general must tell Congress if officials refuse to cooperate with his inquiries.

Bush’s signing statement: The inspector general ‘’shall refrain” from investigating anything involving sensitive plans, intelligence, national security, or anything already being investigated by the Pentagon. The inspector cannot tell Congress anything if the president decides that disclosing the information would impair foreign relations, national security, or executive branch operations.

The method of “no veto, then ignore with signing statement” is deceitful, especially given the way he does it. A Presidential veto can be overturned by Congress, but this cross your fingers behind your back is just plain infantile – not to mention creepy – and more than 750 examples is rather excessive.

“Ha-ha – take it back! Fooled ya again!”

It’s amazing to me that Congress is handing over its powers like this. It’s got to burn even the most rabid right-wingers a little bit.

It turns out that former Majority Leader and Presidential candidate Bob Dole was hired last year as a legal consultant by Dubai Ports World to shepherd the deal through, courtesy of Alston & Bird.

Wife Sen. Elizabeth Dole says that she is "deeply concerned" about operations at six U.S. ports being controlled by Dubai Ports World (owned, in case you somehow hadn’t heard, by the United Arab Emirates – AUE). Congrats on her "independence" – I guess.

I have several concerns and questions about this whole situation, so I thought I’d weigh in.

I object to any port operations run by non-Americans. This is a national security issue.

The deal would allow Dubai Ports World to operate ports in New York, New Jersey, Baltimore, New Orleans, Miami and Philadelphia. They have been operated by a British company until now – why has no-one objected to that? With that in mind, some of the objections now seem to be to be shadowed by a tinge of racism. That said, and I think it should be acknowledged that it is a possible factor…

Almost 40 percent of the Army cargo deployed in support of military operations in Iraq flows through two of the ports in question. Why isn’t this a matter for military logistics or Homeland Security? Has this always been a private concern? If so, why? If not, how long has it been this way and why are non-Americans in charge at our ports? If this isn’t illegal, it should be.

I thought our policy was to limit dealings with nations that support terrorism. This is actually a state-owned company. They may be allies in some ways, but they do have troubling involvement with international terrorism, including:

– The UAE was one of three countries in the world to recognize the Taliban as the legitimate government of Afghanistan.

– The UAE has been a key transfer point for illegal shipments of nuclear components to Iran, North Korea and Lybia.

– According to the FBI, money was transferred to the 9/11 hijackers through the UAE banking system.

– After 9/11, the Treasury Department reported that the UAE was not cooperating in efforts to track down Osama Bin Laden’s bank accounts.

Former CIA director Tenet told the 9/11 commission that the United States did not target Bin Laden at a camp in Afghanistan in February 1999 because he was meeting with the UAE royal family. What exactly are our ties here? Is there any connection to the royal family of Saudi Arabia that we’ve been protecting for so long?

It seems very suspicious to me that there are two White House ties on this. One is Treasury Secretary John Snow. The Treasury Department runs the Committee on Foreign Investment in the U.S (the federal panel that signed off on the $6.8 billion sale of an English company to government-owned Dubai Ports World – giving it control of Manhattan’s cruise ship terminal and Newark’s container port)and he was also chairman of the CSX railroad company that sold its own international port operations to DP World for $1.15 billion in 2004, the year after Snow left to join Bush’s cabinet. The other is David Sanborn, who runs DP World’s European and Latin American operations and was tapped by Bush last month to head the U.S. Maritime Administration. Conflict of interest, crony capitalism, anyone?

Of course, there is standard documentation of Presidential hypocrisy, this one from February 2004:

Part of doing our duty in the war on terror is to protect the homeland. That’s part of our solemn responsibility. And we are taking unprecedented steps to protect the homeland. In the 2005 budget, as the Secretary mentioned, we proposed increases in homeland security spending. And some of those increases are measures to protect our seaports. And that’s why I’ve come to this vital seaport, to remind people — to remind the American people, as they pay attention to the debates in the halls of Congress, that we have a solemn duty to protect our homeland, including the seaports of America.

Bush admits he had no knowledge of the deal before his administration approved it, but he has also threatened to veto any legislation from Congress to overturn the sale. Why didn’t he know? Why would he veto? What’s at stake here?

In a press briefing on the 21st Donald Rumsfeld also claimed ignorance of the deal, but as Secretary of Defense, he is a member of the Committee on Foreign Investments in the United States – who unanimously approved the sale on February 13. Huh?

Of course one must ask – how is Cheney involved in this? Here’s one connection – Halliburton has used an offshore subsidiary incorporated in the Cayman Islands (where the company has no oil and gas construction or engineering operations) to trade with Iran. Halliburton Products and Services, a Cayman islands firm headquartered in Dubai, the United Arab Emirates, made over $39 million in 2003 (a $10 million increase from 2002) by selling oil-field services to customers in Iran. Offshore money laundering, trade with Iran, avoidance of America’s laws, presumably the usual Cayman Islands tax evasion… Is this just one clue to a much bigger picture? See also "All Roads Lead to Cheney" at Rense for information on a company called Prime Projects International Trading LLC (PPI). By the way, why is Halliburton still working for the US after ripping us off? Why was it awarded multiple no-bid contracts in the first place?

On CNN’s Late Edition (Feb. 19), Homeland Security Secretary Michael Chertoff appeared, only to assert a right to government secrecy.

The discussions are classified. I can’t get into the specifics here…

Why is it ok for Chertoff to refuse to talk about any of this? How can it be "classified"? What information exactly could be entrusted to a foreign government but not shared with the American people?

So my larger question is – who gains from this deal? What is the back story? How could this be classified? It seems to me that this bears a fractal resemblence to numerous other situations this administration has been involved with – The Carlisle Group, Enron, etc.

Homeland Unsecured has a detailed report about how the Bush Administration’s ties to industry and hostility to regulation leave our country vulnerable by failing to secure the most vulnerable, high-impact targets in our country. The report is based on an analysis of five key areas – chemical plants, nuclear plants, hazardous material transport, ports and water systems. citizens who still manage to think that Bush is "strong on security" still haven’t gotten an accurate picture. His comfty appearance as a swaggering little-boy cowboy-wanna-be doesn’t have anything to do with the realities of his policies and priorities.

Some of the Repubicans, every watchful of re-election, are starting to listen to some of their constituents on these topics. What they won’t do for the right reasons, they might do for the wrong ones. I’m not sure how to feel about that exactly, but I do welcome any signs that there might be any no-saying to this increasingly fascistic, heartless war-for-profit administration.

As with many situations involving the Bush administration, we may never know the whole story.

9/11 Theologian Says Controlled Demolition of World Trade Center Is Now a Fact, Not a Theory

In two speeches to overflow crowds in New York last weekend, notable theologian David Ray Griffin argued that recently revealed evidence seals the case that the Twin Towers and WTC-7 were destroyed by controlled demolition with explosives. Despite the many enduring mysteries of the 9/11 attacks, Dr. Griffin concluded, “It is already possible to know, beyond a reasonable doubt, one very important thing: the destruction of the World Trade Center was an inside job, orchestrated by terrorists within our own government.”

Griffin included excerpts from the firemen’s tapes which were recently released as a result of a prolonged court battle led by victim’s families represented by attorney Norman Siegel and reported in the NY Times. He also included statements by many witnesses. These sources gave ample testimony giving evidence of explosions going off in the buildings. A 12 minute film was shown for the audiences, who saw for themselves the undeniable evidence for controlled demolition.

(Thank you for the latest on this, TJJA!)

I’ve read both Griffin’s books on the subject. He does present good arguments and evidence, at least about the Saudi connections and the way the buildings fell.

At election time, a large percentage of Americans had responded to the administration’s Pavlovian association-repetition of Iraq and 9/11 with the belief that Hussein, not Bin Laden, was behind the attacks. This administration has been cited for outright propaganda by one of their own departments. When someone does something wrong, they get praise, promotions, medals. It’s clear that they don’t have a problem with lying and hiding things from the American people. Has any administration been less forthcoming?

Anyone who cares to pay attention and think for themselves should be able to connect enough dots to have to give up the illusion that these are “good guys.” Just a few examples: the outing of a CIA agent working on terrorism to punish a critic and implicitly threaten other whistleblowers (where is the report of how many died as a result of that action?), stealing from the poor to give to the rich, slash-and-burn environmental policy, alienation from most of the rest of the world, noncompliance with signed treaties, invasion of another country, rewriting of torture policies, replacement of soldiers and interrogators with hired employees, tampering with and overriding and circumventing constitutional civil liberties, large-scale corruption and cronyism, possible tampering with voter machines and proven manipulation of voter rosters, conflicts of interest, enabling the unrestrained raiding by corporate interests, and manipulation of voters on so-called “religious” grounds.

So, for me, it’s not such a stretch. Whether or not our government actually had a hand in it, I have become convinced that most of us are… expendable. What few doubts I had remaining were swept away after Katrina.

I’m not sure that I would go so far as to say – yet – that I believe 911 was a plan that was deliberately supported by our own government, but the situation does look a bit murky. If there wasn’t any straightforward involvement, there seems at least to be a string of uncanny coincidences. At the very least, wouldn’t it be interesting to know whether there were explosives planted in the buildings before the planes hit, or why the Bush administration denied flying the Bin Laden family out of the country, among dozens of other fascinating questions?

I’d like to see this film footage, and some of the information that has been withheld until now.The two books are worth a read. Personally, I found The New Pearl Harbor the more interesting of the two. Kudos to David Ray Griffin, a theologian who sees and will not be silent.