Sobering Info from The Command Post: CIA has 11 Al-Qaida suspects in Jordan facility

The Central Intelligence Agency runs a top secret interrogation facility in Jordan, where at least 11 detainees who are considered Al-Qaida's most senior cadre are being held, Haaretz has learned from international intelligence sources.

A report on these prisoners issued Tuesday by the Human Rights Watch organization claims they are being held somewhere so secret that U.S. President George Bush asked the CIA heads not to report it to him.

"Plausible Deniability," where have I heard that term before?

"Oh Dude"

That was the pilot's reaction after his precision-guided bomb hit the target -- a group of about 20 or so people walking across a downtown street in Fallujah. It is unclear whether they were armed insurgents or civilians but proper protocals were met according to the military, a ground controller confirmed with the pilot to "take them out."(WMV) He does in spectacular fasion.

The British point out this defines the difference between our rules of engagement and theirs. We shoot anything that moves, particularly in Fallujah. Even the wounded and unarmed.(RealPlayer)

Seymour Hersh spoke at Berkeley last Friday, October 8th. He told a story about recently receiving a call from an American lieutenant in Iraq who'd just witnessed other American soldiers massacring Iraqis.

We've put our most honorable men and women in a position where dishonorable accusations are unavoidable. I've no doubt that 30 years from now, there will be a presidential campaign where this century's version of the Swift Boaters will do battle over the holographic "Interlynk" in your living room with today's whistlblowers. And the line between Vietnam and Iraq and the definition of atrocities will again inflame our souls.

Hersh Story from A Tiny Revolution: Uh Oh [Via Eschaton] CNN carried the videos which are out there if you and Google get along.

(Note. The Fallujah cockpit video is from April but only surfaced last week in the UK. It is being "investigated" according to UK media)

UPDATE: A commentor at A Tiny Revolution (Martina) provides this link from U.C.Berkeley News on Sy Hersch's lecture. Only fitting that the man credited with exposing My Lai Massacre and the abu Ghraib prisoner abuse scandal should know even more than we ever wanted to know.

ADDENDUM: On Bruce's Mind has the RealAudio of Hersh's Berkeley appearance.

toledoblade.com

The Lucas County Democratic Headquarters was burglarized overnight, and three computers, including the party's main system, were stolen.

The computers contained highly sensitive information, including the party's financial information, names and personal phone numbers of hundreds of party members, candidates, and volunteers.

The computers also stored e-mails from candidates that included discussion about campaign strategy.

Somebody check Howard Hunt's alibi...

I haven't weighed in on Sinclair Broadcasting's decision to pre-empt regular television programing to air their anti-Kerry propaganda piece mainly because I am ambivalent, and so it seems is the WingNuttistan.  I do respect the "freedom to speak one's mind" above all else.  If you need to catch up, Josh Marshall is (as always) all over this.  Start Here and keep scrolling up.

Besides, from the account I have heard/read about the "documentary," Stolen Honor, its effectiveness should not hold that much weight.  It merely sounds like the Swift Boat screed writ large.  Nothing new here, nothing to see. But as close as this election is, maybe it's best not to be so glib.  Columbus, among others regions, is a swing city in a swing State, and has two Sinclair outlets.

Since I don't believe I live in one of Sinclair's markets it won't effect us here in Toledo, and with the volume of TV ads we are subjected to here, it would be impossible to tell this show from any other -- a commercial interrupted by programming or visa-versa, who cares, who can tell?

Another reason is that if it is perfectly permissible to broadcast this film, it should open the door for Fahrenheit 9/11 to be seen on a nationally broadcast network within the same time-frame.  Since I haven't seen Michael Moore's film (yet -- being inherently cheap and part of the choir anyway), this looks like the perfect opportunity to witness that little bit of history. 

And why not.  Surely F-9/11 would cream the Swifties in the ratings -- put 'em on head to head and let the pundits make sense of Neilson versus Gallup rankings. 

Mind you, except for the occasionally shrill Holocaust Deniers accusation, I haven't seen too much support for Sinclair from the usual suspects in Blogtopia who were also remarkably quiet on Kerry's nuanced "nuisance" quote.  Maybe the lynch mob looking for Dan Rather's head are hearing footsteps on their "six."  Is it possible that today's talking point from the GOP said "back off, you're not helping?"  Nope, that's not it.

Except for a few exceptions, many on the right are at least making the attempt to find what's left of their objectivity.  After blasting F-9/11 so voraciously and having fought the Vietnam thing to a draw, they know their guy's number is up -- if only because after they watched his miserable performance at the debates, (made all the worse if microwaved answers had been beamed into his skull, yet Bush still looked the fool -- even as they were accusing Kerry of cheating) and watched as their every defense of Bush's Iraq policy crumble to dust in the last 10 days, they just know the only hope they have is to rig another election -- and don't have the stones to try it again with everybody watching -- or do they?

ADDENDUM: Even Command Post recognizes Bush's rhetoric from Shinola, wondering if Bush's plan really is perpetual war.

Last week Ara Rubyan pointed me to a nostalgic article in Slate featuring an interview with Watergate figure E. Howard Hunt.  One of Howard's most interesting if not humorous quotes was when he told us the reason he left the CIA:


Maybe it still is.  From the London Daily Telegraph:


POTUS's Father, an ex-CIA chief, knew better than to piss off the spooks. Yet another lesson unlearned by Shrub.

Hat Tip Neil Rogers

Absolutely desparate to maintain their thin edge in the Senate, thus securring their trifecta of deceit on all three branches of the federal government, the GOP is proping up a mentally diseased old man who should be at home with his nurse and hiding his ailment until after November -- or so it would seem.

Big rumor making the rounds in Kentucky -- Republican Sen. Bunning is increasingly ill and unable to carry out the duties of his office. As soon as he is reelected (assuming he is reelected), he will resign office, and KY's unpopular Republican governor, Ernie Fletcher, will appoint himself to the seat.

Do read the rest of this at Daily Kos :: Ky-Sen: Bunning is losing his mind.

Not only does President Bush play politics with our military, he lies about it too.  When field commanders in Iraq have requested additional troops, contrary to what Bush has said in the past, the request was denied.  Ezra Klein reminded us of Bush's most recent promise to give our troops everything, including required manpower, that they ask for.

QUESTION: ...what's your answer to General John Abizaid's statement that, "I think we will need more troops than we currently have"? BUSH: "If that's what he says -- he was in my office this morning; he didn't say that to me, but if he were to say that, I'd listen to him, just like I've said all along, that when our commanders say that they need support, they'll get support, because we're going to succeed in this mission." (Bush Remarks, Rose Garden Press Conference with Interim Iraqi Prime Minister Allawi, 9/23/04)

He never listens.  That or it is already understood that no such request should be made.  According to the soldiers of LSA Anaconds who are under constant attack, "there is no indication the soldiers will get the help they want to deal with their nagging and deadly problem."

Pandagon and Talk Left alerts us to the interview Brig. Gen. Oscar B. Hilman, commander of the 81st Brigade Combat Team as reported in Baltimore Sun, 10/11/04:

“Because the enemy is persistent, we need additional forces. We asked twice."
...
“But Hilman said he was told that "there are no additional forces," and that U.S. soldiers are needed elsewhere, particularly to battle insurgents and cover a large area to the north that includes the rebellious cities of Tikrit and Samarra.” .
...
"Hilman said he requested additional forces in the spring and again in the summer from 13th Corps Support Command, which is responsible for LSA Anaconda and all other multinational supply and transportation facilities in Iraq.  Maj. Richard W. Spiegel, a spokesman for the 13th Corps, confirmed that Hilman put in the request and that it was endorsed by the command's top officer, Brig. Gen. James E. Chambers. The request was forwarded to Multi-National Corps Iraq headquarters, which assesses troop requirements and makes the final decision, Spiegel said. The request was denied, he said, declining to provide details. Sharon Walker, a spokeswoman for the U.S. military headquarters in Baghdad, said officials had no comment on why the request was not approved.

I find it absolutely unbelievable that even though a majority of those polled by a USA TODAY/CNN/Gallup believe that the Iraq war wasn't worth the cost in blood and treasure (54%), Bush still commands a 17 point edge on Kerry when it comes to handling the War on Terror.

My god people, pay attention.  This stuff is not funny.  Well, maybe it is if I just lightened up a bit.

I wonder how America will feel after Bush and the corporate board of directors he calls a cabinet are indicted for war crimes and malfeasance in office.  If your local school board superintendent had behaved as this crowd does, s/he wouldn't be thinking how to stay our of jail, rather s/he'd be wondering about just how much time s/he'd do. 

One way or another, Bush has got to go.  Rejecting his reelection bid is the easy way, but if they insist on stealing another election, impeachment will do.  The quality and quantity of the mendacity of this administration surpasses George Orwells worst nighmare.  Epistemological Relativism.  (Sigh) Don't bother looking it up, just follow the links and you will gather a bit more insight as to why the left is so absolutely furious with Bush and why everybody else should be too.

Hat Tip: Talk Left and Pandagon and of course Josh.

The bloviating Bush campaign adviser, Rush Limbaugh, had a final today caller who expressed her unspecific but very real fear of a world with John Kerry as President,  Instead of comforting her, he actually said:

"Fear is a great motivator. I want you afraid"

His Snydley Whiplash chuckle could be heard softly as he closed his show on that note.

Sick freak.

These guys know better, but the depth of their cynicism is boundless. The wholesale manipulation of the American public by the Orwellian tactics of the GOP through a complicit media is staggering at times.

For example, devoid of a moral core, Bush attacks Kerry for desiring a reduction in the amount of terrorists incidents to where they are no more than annoying, and not the all consuming fear inducing tool of conservative politicians.

Oh no cry brain-benders who beam slogans into Bush's skull from some grassy knoll. That would be like some pansy-assed law enforcement approach, unfathomable to the cro-magnons who prefer more subtle, more "lets blow everything up." more "shoot first" tactics.

Reactionaries like Gary Bauer insist that is the same as waiting until after a school gets bombed and then going after the bad guys -- the bad old days of Clinton's alleged ineffectiveness.  Dick Cheney calls it a pre-9/11 mindset.

However, this twisted logic illicits the same false dichotomy presented by Dave Pell when he says that Bush and Cheney's attacks prove that instead of a desire to reduce terror, their goal is to maintain the fear factor at its current levels in order to cow a frightened electorate into foolishly keeping them in office, hoping that paralysis will set in making us incapable of moving away from their Machiavellian schemes. 

Dave of course was being transparently facetious.  I'm not.

Bush/Cheney'04 has reached a new level of stubborn and willful ignorance today in their juvenile attempt to portray John Kerry as out of touch and equating terrorism with prostitution, deliberately failing to grasp the idea that terrorism may in all likelyhood never be completely erradicated, but the goal, the objective of the "War on Terrorism" would be  sufficiently satisfied if terrorism were no more troubling than prostitution and not the overwhelming concern it is today.

 Jesse Taylor also has the termerity to suggest that victory in this so-called war might be something less than total erradication of the muslim world, but he's really tired of explaining simple concepts to moraons.

The Kerry campaign is specifically chastised for "claiming the war on terror isn't really a war."  Well, it isn't, so bite me.

Toledo Tube War: 14,273 Ads and Counting (washingtonpost.com)

Toledo ranks as the most advertised-to market of any in the big battleground states.

Despite the "cacophony" of TV ads here in the Glass City for the Presidential Candidates, they get completely undermined by local non-television media outlets which swarm the area's electorate.

Noteworthy is the Toledo Blade which leans towards Bush bashing by merely reportintg the news (how dare they) and blankets the area with bird cage liners, versus the Clear Channel Radio affiliate WSPD which not only features the usual line-up of fascists: Limbaugh, Hannity, Savage, etc., but home-grown drive-time guys who know diidly squat about politics, but spend their time between political commercials (yes of course) and traffic/weather/news updates, distorting everything that comes out of John Kerry's mouth.

These two area media giants reach more voters every day than all the TV ads combined. My biased fur gets especially ruffled when a 60 second ad is run by the Democratic challenger on the 50,000 watt mega talker, which is immediately followed by ten minutes of filibustering lies about Kerry's positions and statements beamed into the skulls of anyone wondering if it will rain, or if the latest construction will force them to change their rush hour commute. It never stops.

I did have some hope when a new talk radio station recently popped up,

WTOD, but naturally their idea of "balance" is running Laura Ingram against Rush and putting Bush Apologist Bill Bennet's show on in the mornings. Arrgggghhh! Bill Bennet: The Moral Hooker of the Right Wing.

Conservative Talk Radio: It's cheap, it's powerful, and it's everywhere.