2002 q2

April

• FTW does Q&A with Vreeland.
• 1: Dan Rocco, exec VP of infamous ChoicePoint, dies in plane crash in Gainesville GA. BK
• 2: GWB (Washington): `Sometimes when I sleep at night I think of [Dr. Seuss's] Hop on Pop. ' PH

  US rejects UN's idea to send observers to Palestine [CD quoting InterPress] just about the time Israel is committing a real nasty, mowing down and plowing under a refugee camp in Jenin. IN · IN They'll compound this war crime with another—blocking relief work. IN Senior UN official: `The bottom line is that they kept out humanitarian aid for days and that in itself is a war crime. There is no other way to look at it than as an attempt to hide another war crime.' IN Israel's Foreign Minister will call it a massacre (although his worry seems to be Israel's image, not the carnage per sé). H Red Cross will call it `horrendous.' BBC It's hard to see how this qualifies as legitimate counterterrorism. FT · IN · FPP (I've had a hint Canada may have stood with the US on this one. Bleah. Anyhow…given how much the US foments about Iraq having something to hide for refusing UN obervers/inspectors, WTF is the US hiding in the Mideast? And why is the US so antithetical to Robinson being UN High Commissioner for Human Rights? Why exactly did the US get kicked out of the Human RIghts Commission it helped found in 1947 in the first place? Is it WRH's theory, a Pearl Harbour variant, that GWB needs to attack the Arabs for the oil, but is making them so resentful that they'll strike the US `first' and that'll justify `everything?' And they need to keep the lid on just long enough for it all to start?)

  Treasury Sec'y O'Neill puts into motion a plan to avert an unprecedented default on the US nat'l debt (pegged here at neary T$6). He does a slightly fancier version of using one credit card to pay off another. Without shifting the federal retirement funds to non-interest acc'ts, the Treasury couldn't borrow what it needs to keep the government operating, including making payments on debt that is coming due. G

  It's discovered Microsoft was running its Unix-bashing site on a Unix derivative.&ggrief; /.

• 2?: Frontier Airlines 819 out of Reagan misses the steep turn that is needed when departing this misplaced airport and flies ±300 m over the Whitehouse. BBC (Why dun Wushinton move some these airports? It's not an access issue. Nixon's Interior Sec'y noted that most overall travel times would be improved with high-speed rail links amongst cities and airports. Has it been tried? Noooooo. Bilyuns of tax revnoo keep getting dumped on the airlines and not on Amtrak.)

• Johnson County's [Kansas] new Diebold touchr-screen machines, proclaimed a success on election night, did not work as well as originally believed. Incorrect vote totals were discovered in six races, three of them contested, leaving county election officials scrambling to make sure the unofficial results were accurate. Johnson County Election Commissioner Connie Schmidt checked the machines and found that the computers had under- and over-reported hundreds of votes. The machines performed terrifically, said Bob Urosevich, CEO of Diebold Election Systems. The anomaly showed up on the reporting part.

  The problem, however, was so perplexing that Schmidt asked the Board of Canvassers to order a hand re-count to make sure the results were accurate. Unfortunately, the touch screen machines did away with the ballots, so the only way to do a hand recount is to have the machine print its internal data page by page. Diebold tried to re-create the error in hopes of correcting it. I wish I had an answer, Urosevich said. In some cases, vote totals changed dramatically. SNZ

• ExxonMobil tells Whitehouse to chuck a global-warming scientist, Whitehouse sez how high on the way up sir. Pretty much. NRDC
• 3: GWB (Four Seasons, Philadelphia PA, Fisher for Governor Reception): I remember campaigning in Chicago one time, and the guy said, would you ever deficit spend? I said, well, only if we were at war, or the country was in recession, or there was a national emergency. [laughter] I didn't realize we were going to get the trifecta. [laughter] WH

  GWB pays M$95 to North Korea, of `Axis of Evil' fame. Plus waives certain inspection requirements. BBC (Some of the nuclear stuff NK's buying is made by `global power and automation technology group' ABB on whose board sits/sat Rumsfeld. Credit WRH pointing out that connexion.) Israel kills Suraida Saleh, a young American woman. DN Unlike the Pearl case, the US utters not a peep. (Because it was a she? Because it was Israel? Because she had a name ambiguous re ancestry? Because she wasn't a spy? Because she's an unknown and thus not useful for stirring outrage? [WRH look for `pearl'])

• USAF is stretched so thin it needs material help from the Norwegians. Rumsfeld blames the `run down' state in which Clinton left things. (BS. It's from the US stripping its own forces to supply Israel.) `The Norwegian pilots would have the same authority as US pilots to shoot down commercial airliners that posed a terrorist threat.' NM (Interesting. I didn't think the US pilot had any by default. Intercept, yes; shoot down, no. Are they still trying to confuse that issue? In general I'd trust shoot-down choices to a Norwegian over a Mercan anyway. And somehow it got all this run-down while the US spends 1/3 of the planet's military budget?)
• The EU Foreign Minister figures Sharon and Arafet should both quit. [JVIM quoting JP]
• 4: Scores of US special forces may have died in new Afghan fight. [JR quoting PN citing IANS, possibly this] North Korea calls US `most wicked sworn enemy.' [JVIM quoting AZC Israel `desperately' tries to prove Arafat's (ir)responsibility by presenting an alleged 2001 Sep 16 bill to the PA finance chief for memorial services for seven Palestinians. (Asked about claims by Palestinians that Israel is fabricating such documents, IDF Col. Miri Eisen/Eisine sniffs `We're a democratic state and we do not fabricate lies.' Very droll. It is to laugh. See, for one, 1972, Mordecai Bentov) CNN Israel claims this proves they were suicide bombers; but at least five of them died by Israeli violence: Thabet Thabet (2000 Dec 31), Yasser Badawi (2001 Aug 21), Ahed Faris (2001 Aug), Shadi Afuri (2001 Aug 15), and Usama Jawabreh. The explosives listed in the alleged bill could also be for resistance against violent military invasion, legal under internat'l law. Furthermore, Al Aqsa was not active in suicide bombings at that time. EI
• Harris poll shows support for increased high-tech privacy invasion has slipped `modestly.' NB
• Orlando Sentinel runs a `pop quiz' on the Mideast. Among the pairs: `Q: Which country in the Middle East refuses to sign the nuclear non-proliferation treaty and bars international inspections? A: Israel.' [CB quoting OS] (And so again, see GWB complaining about Iraq having things to hide. Israel's hiding them too; pick on them for a change.)
• It's believed the US plans an attack on Iraq between July and Spetember. [JVIM quoting MENL]
• I have a line that the US is now trying to blame the attack on the Cole on Iraq instead of Osama. Didn't Osama claim that one?
• 5:

  [On 2001 Aug 6 German] Ambassador Ischinger personally notified [GWB] that information developed by the Bundesamt für Verfassungsschutz [German domestic secret service] as well as the BND [Bundesnachrichtendienst, German foreign secret service] indicated clearly that an attack by a radical Arab group partially based in Germany was to occur on Sept 10–11…Our Ambassador was acting in direct response to instructions from Foreign Minister Fischer…The information was `gratefully received' by [GWB] who stated at the time that he was also aware of the same pending assaults…Subsequent to these attacks, the office of the US President, through the US Department of State, made an urgent request to the Federal Government [of Germany] that no reference whatsoever should be made to the official warnings given by Ambassador Ischinger.

  It also appears from confidential sources that Bush's plans to attack Iraq are based mainly on a desire on the part of Israel to remove Saddam Hussein…There is also evidence that if Hussein is toppled by American military force, the oil resources of Iraq would be put under the control of a consortium of the American oil interests that so avidly support the Bush Administration. [TBR translating German intel brief]

  It is very evident from surveillance conducted against Mossad agents in the Federal Republic as well as interceptions of Israeli diplomatic communication from the Federal Republic to Tel Aviv, that the Mossad has successfully penetrated various extremist Arab groups in both the Federal Republic and the US.

  These investigations disclosed in late May of 2001 that an attack was to be made against certain specified targets in the American cities of Washington and New York. But it was apparent that the Mossad was not only fully aware of these attacks well in advance but actually, though their own agents inside these Arab groups, assisted in the planning and the eventual execution of the attacks.

  That the Israeli government was fully aware of these attack is absolutely certain and proven. Diplomatic traffic between the Israeli Embassy in the Federal Republic and the Israeli Foreign Office made it very clear that Minister President Sharon was fully aware of this pending attack and urgently wished that no attempt was made to prevent the attacks. [PM translating another alleged brief]

  MP Svend Robinson (usually misspelled `Sven,' if you go a-searching) visits Israel and the occupied areas. JIM Later McDonough takes him off the Mideast portion of the NDP's Foreign-Affairs shadow because he `sided' with the Palestinians. NDP · NDP · NDP (`sided' is more-less how it was reported in the media. The Party says it's to redress a perceived imbalance in their position. It made them look too pro-Israel to me.) Iran joins call for OPEC embargo against Israel and allies. [JVIM quoting WP] Bill Moyers repeats the lie that Arabs started the Six-Day War. USAF announces it will resume training with DU weaponry. They had stopped in '93 because of health and environmental concerns, but the stuff was still used in combat. [TBO quoting AssocPress] (How is it a 30-mm cannon fires rounds as `wide as an adult's pinky?' I yet await an answer from Eggleton whether our troops are adequately trained and provisioned to be safe from this stuff.)

• Global protests against Israeli aggression. NYDN, IM, R, TI, TA
• Egypt severs relations with Israel unless they want to talk help for Palestine. [JVIM quoting G]
• That the Saudi people and the Saudi government don't see eye–eye (the theory being for some time that Saudi has one of many oppressive US puppet gov'ts) is becoming abundantly clear (perhaps because Saudi–US relations have cooled the last few weeks and it's now `okay' for us in the West to know what's really going on over there). [JVIM quoting MENL and MENL]
• 6: Cub Scouts and other volunteers give Rock Creek Park a thorough cleaning. WND Israeli soldiers illegally block Sven Robinson from seeing Arafat. CBC ±15000 Israelis protest Sharon's war. WSWS (These must be the first anti-semitic Jews in history.) (Later I send an email introducing Michele and Sarah to each other =) GWB: `Saddam needs to go.' [JVIM quoting G] (So point him to the washroom.)
• 7: Syrian restauranteur Majd Tabbaa gives US consul Roberto Powers the boot; becomes heroine all over Arabia. UPI · CD · SF

  Iran and Libya call for antiUS oil embargo. Chávez promises not to take part…and yet…

  It has been reported that in the weeks leading up to the coup, military advisor section at the US Embassy in Caracas was greatly enlarged. The aircraft carrier George Washington violated Venezuela's territorial waters to possible rescue Americans trapped in the fighting which is classic cover for an outright invasion, and gives clear indication of foreknowledge by the Bush government. GM

• 8: `Superbug' (methicillin-resistant Staphylococcus aureus) outbreak `contained.' [JVIM quoting BBC and BBC]
• 9: Osama `safe and well' according to a letter in Al Hayat. [JVIM quoting HT quoting PTI]

  The oh-so-wonderful US Patent Office grants a patent for lateral swinging. USPO (They ought to patent their own URLs. My God what a joke that place is. My father must work there now; if there was ever a hypercomplex way to do something he'd find it.)

  GWB (Bridgeport CT): `And so, in my State of the—my State of the Union—or state—my speech to the nation, whatever you want to call it, speech to the nation—I asked Americans to give 4000 years—4000 hours over the next—the rest of your life—of service to America. That's what I asked—4000 hours.' PH

• 10: North Korea on brink of starvation. [JVIM quoting BBC] Israel in near diplomatic isolation. [JVIM quoting G] Sharon continues to defy GWB. [JVIM quoting WP] Netanyahu tries to compare Israel's aggression with counterterrorism. [JVIM quoting CNN]
• HIV/AIDS is getting worse in Asia. [JVIM quoting [Y! quoting R] and [Y! probably quoting AssocPress]] (I believe that Washington loves it. This is a `great' way to reduce the world's population (see 1972). Then recall whether Washington has been shortening or lengthening the terms of drug patents.)
• 11: Register points out that Windows XP reports your WWW searches to Microsoft. (see Feb 21)
• Pilots of the 183rd Air Nat'l Guard on Afghan duty complain to their commanders about lack of rest (less than regulation). They're told to shut up and get some uppers from the sawbones (cf Performance Maintenance). VS (The CS Monitor will confirm drug use in US pilots over Afghanistan CSM)
• 12: Sen. Bob Smith R NH: `Why don't we just take [Saddam's] oil? Why buy it? Take it!' ET (Sununu's a Palestinian? I thought he was Hawai'ian.)

  The last ten countries needed to create the Internat'l Criminal Court sign on. `Hailed by many as a landmark human-rights achievement…rejected by the US.' [JVIM quoting Y! quoting R] AI (I like to think they did it now just because the US had recently been so vocal agin it.)

• Rep. McKinney: `We hold thorough public inquiries into rail disasters, plane crashes, even natural disasters. Why does the administration remain steadfast in its opposition to an investigation into the biggest terrorism attack in history?' She is roundly attacked for such simple logic. JR [AA quoting Washington Post] (And the `poll' on AA's page seems to be frozen just a bit pro-Washington, at 12112/341/10692!! That poll itself will make news and its host dismiss it as a mechanical problem. Much like the whole election in 2000.)

  FTW takes up the challenge: `A dispassionate examination of existing reliable, open-source evidence on advance warnings of the 9/11 attacks provides strong and sustainable grounds to conclude the Bush Administration was in possession of sufficient advance intelligence to have prevented the attacks, had it wished to do so.' He points out that the US is openly known to have had lots of warning of an attack by aircraft on prominent landmarks narrowed to a timeframe of a week; couple that with the blatently suspicious trading in two specific airlines and there is no excuse for the flagrant lack of action by air force that day.

• Oregonian parents charged with rescuing their children from the state. NBC's Dateline jockeys for national coverage. LN (I'm reminded of the recent Pennsylvania case where a father got a suspended sentence for using the school's free period to improve his son's marks.)
• 12–14: The Venezuelan yo-yo coup. It's theorised Chávez was kicked out by the CIA for not being sufficiently subservient. It's not explained how he managed to get back in. [JR quoting CP] [WRH mirroring HR2506 Andean Counterdrug Initiative containing M$2 for `democracy-building activities in Venezuela.'] SOAW Two high Venezuelan military in the coup had each got $100000 from a Miami account for denouncing Chávez [TP quoting WP] and flee to Miami when it goes sour. LT Investors are delighted by the departure and disappointed in the return. [TI quoting AFP] Unlike a certain Shrub, Chávez had been elected with clear majority, and then appointed as leaders of the state-owned oil company people that were loyal to his administration rather than to Chevron Oil. ENC (Venezuela is the world's 4th-largest oil exporter, US' 3rd-largest oil supplier. Chávez will investigate a US presence. M$NBC [NYP quoting Reuters?] BBC) Rice, past boss of Chevron, said of Chávez's return: `We do hope that Mr. Chávez…takes advantage of this opportunity to right his own ship which has, quite frankly, been moving in the wrong direction for some time.' An unemployed man in a tattered shirt: `The people want him back. He works for the poor.' BBC Washington admits it recently met with the opposition R and agreed Chávez had to go. SMH Iran congratulates the Venezuelan people for their `victory against the American conspiracy.' `Using force and illegal methods for changing legal and popular regimes is condemned in the present world.' The US will `fail not only in Venezuela but in all parts of the world.' R (Seems to me the replacement resigned because Venezuelans got uppity R, which would make this snip [JR/CP above] extra pointed: `So what happens when a coup occurs which they want to support? Simple. They don't call it a coup. They call it a change of government and say that Chávez was ousted as a result of the message of the Venezuelan people. Veritable grass-roots democracy it was.') More comments here and here, including a `promise' the CIA will try assassination next. This claims the Washington Post said the coup had been in planning six months and in contact with the US embassy. (Cripes I wish such claims would point back to the article…) More here. `Pentagon sources gleefully revealed that the US provided critical military and intelligence support' to the coup. IB

  most people assume that OPEC is located entirely in the middle east, but that is not true. Though the top oil producing states are in the middle east, a significant amount of OPEC oil is located elsewhere, in Central/South America and in Africa. Venezuela, for instance, which is the 4th largest oil producer in the world and 6th largest proven reserves of oil in the world. They supply 8% of the US's oil imports, a not insignificant amount market-wise. (Unfortunately they also sell oil to Cuba, that beleaguered "regime" that has been under total US embargo for 40 some odd years because…well I forget. Probably because we don't like him I guess. Not because he's communist, because China is also communist and we gave them Most Favored Nation trading status days after 9-11) More than the US and the UK. In 1973 when the mostly Arab OPEC leaders implemented an oil embargo on the US to protest its support of Israeli aggression against Arabs, it was Venezuela who broke the embargo and provided the US with badly needed oil. And with another Arab-Israeli conflict possibly on the horizon, Venezuela could once again figure prominently into the US strategic energy plan…

  Chavez was overthrown by a group of oilmen led by Pedro Carmona and Carlos Ortega. The whole mess began when the state owned oil company, PDVSA, decided to call a general strike throughout the country. Showing complete support for the strike was the Confederation of Venezuelan Workers, a sort of Venezuelan oil industry's labor union, headed by Carlos Ortega. Also supporting the general strike was the employers' association (Fedec�maras) headed by Pedro Carmona. Now think about the significance of that. A general strike called by the bigwigs of the country's official oil company, supported by the employer's association and the oil labor union. Imagine Major League Baseball's Player's Association going on strike in full cooperation with the MLB Owner's association. When is the last time Labor and Management agreed on anything, let alone went on strike together for a common cause???…

  It was later learned that Chavez was arrested by treasonous Army troops loyal to Carmona, but at the time it was reported universally in the Venezuelan press that president Chavez had resigned from guilt and disgrace over the event and had fled the country, despite his wife's fervent denial that he had not resigned. For 2 days this was the official party line, even in the international press.…Left unasked among the many unanswered questions surrounding the strange turn of events is If the president has resigned, why was the vice president not rightfully considered the new president, as opposed to the oil-man Carmona?…

  Now ultimately I don't really care what happens in some far-off God-forsaken part of the world, but if you've read all my essays up to now I want you to seriously think about this idea: If the US mass media, with its almost total monopoly on the truth, can make it appear as though everyone likes Milli Vanilli, or some other flavor of the month, and can generate such events as Potter-mania, how hard would it be for the Venezuelan press, also a monopoly owned by the elite few, to conjure up a popular uprising, making it appear that a man of the people, elected by a landslide, was in fact ousted by a human tidal wave of dissent, and not a backroom coup by oilmen? GM

• 12: Lebanese ambassador to US points out that Arafat has publicly condemned terrorism in Arabic, on al Jazeera; and that it's a little silly to expect him to control his people when he's totally disconnected from them under the Israeli seige. FOX cuts him off as soon as minimally polite to do so. Note also the in-absentia attacks on McKinney, and the view that student expression of thought needs stricter limits. H&C (I've never seen this show. It sounds amazingly vacuous to me. Worse than Charlie Rose.) There's another `transcript' floating around, which may be a lampoon of this one, but it's spot-on anyway.
• 13: Lebanese start grassroots anti-US economic sanctions. DS The meme finds fertile ground, as it were. CD · AA
  
• 14: Canada kowtows to US energy interests. R
• 15: AI sends the US a dossier of complaints over the Afghan detainees. AI Orthodox Jews and Palestinians protest Israel together in Washington. CNSN Another alleged Osama tape surfaces via al Jazeera; this time the media seem a little more skeptical about its origins. (Did the CIA do a more convincing job this go-round? Rumsfeld seems quite blasé about it all.) R The `sermon-like style made it unclear whether he [Osama aide Ayman al-Zawahri] was admitting to al Qaeda's involvement in the September attacks or referring to the attacks as a victory for Muslims in general.' R Also on the tape is an alleged hijacker's farewell address. But its backdrop is a WTC fireball photo, immediately proving the tape is some sort of post-9/11 video tomfoolery. `In view of the numerous and obviously deliberate visual [(the headdress and beard are wrong)] and textual [(overemphasis of Palestinian cause, the two parts of the tape almost entirely unrelated)] associations in the tape, one cannot but doubt its authenticity.' AA US warplanes strike an air-defense site in Iraq after aircraft patrolling the southern no-fly zone encounter hostile fire. R (The no-fly zones are US-UK creations not internationally recognised. TI)

  The US and UK charge Africa's ISPs top dollar for service. BBC (This is a great covert way to slow the spread of the democracy cancer. For one thing, it actually earns money—M$500 a year.)

  `GWB did us all a favour when he slapped tariffs on imported steel. He shed light on the west's dirty little secret: free trade is a myth, a confidence trick, a grand illusion. The duties were evidence that the US, like the EU, Japan, and Canada, [but not the UK of course] are avid supporters of the ideas of Adam Smith and David Ricardo, but only when it means liberalising the markets of smaller and weaker countries, not their own.' G (Some small bias detectable in this UK article: there's the hint the UK would never have such duties; and we waits until the US is tariffing against the UK's steel, not jumping in when they started tariffing our softwood lumber in probable defiance of NAFTA. Pretty much like they thew out Reciprocity as soon as it became inconvenient. But at least someone says it! I'll give him that.)

• The GWB administration fears that a go-ahead by Saddam for weapons inspections could delay and possibly fatally undermine the overall goal to launch a military campaign against Iraq. Wolfowitz had had the CIA investigate the UN chief weapons inspector and according to one official `hit the ceiling' when it was reported the guy had done his job properly. Another said he didn't react so, because he figured the CIA had done a `lukewarm assesssment.' WP The US is also working over the head chemical-weapons inspector with allegations, and again threatening not to pay its dues unless other countries knuckle under. [MB quoting Guardian]
• UK publishes an atom-bomb DIY. R (Batteries and fissionable material available separately.)
• UN CHR condemns Israel's mass killings of Palestinians. R Canada (shame!) was one of only five votes against.
• Israeli troops plant evidence of recover their look for bombs in mowed-down refugee camp. It's admitted the number of militants killed is lesser than first thought. R (Which can mean the number of nonmilitants killed is greater.)
• 16: GWB (D. D. Eisenhower Executive Office Bldg, Leaders of the Fiscal Responsibility Coalition): [I was asked while campaigning] would you ever deficit spend? And I said, yes, only if there were a time of war, or recession, or a national emergency. Never thought we'd get—[laughter and applause] And so we have a temporary deficit in our budget, because we are at war, we're recovering, our economy is recovering, and we've had a national emergency. Never did I dream we'd have the trifecta. [laughter] WH

  The Dutch gov't quits for its 1995 shortcomings in Bosnian peacekeeping. R

• After giving Israel an average of G$3/a since 1987 P!W, Washington wants other countries to pony up to repair the damage the Israelis caused. Some things that need rebuilding were funded by those same countries in the first place. WP
• 17: Rumsfeld admits the US has never had any good knowledge of Osama's whereabouts. [Y! quoting AssocPress] Some ask `then why the hell are we starving and bombing Afghanistan?' XOB (And Canadians—see tomorrow.)
• A Wheel of Fortune contestant who has worked his way up to $3800 and down to `CA*BERRA AUSTRALIA'S CAPITAL CITY', spins the wheel and asks for an H. He has seven children. (Fill in your own joke.) Does the US have any idea how stupid it looks when it feeds the world that?
• 18: Newsmax gives the Venezuelan coup shameless spin therapy. NM The Afghan King returns after nearly 3 decades. C

  EU's External Affairs minister accuses Sharon of starting an `insane cycle' and his forces of `trampling over the Geneva convention.' BBC

  Pilot from the 183rd Air Nat'l Guard (see above) drops 500# laser-guided bomb on Canadian troops, killing four (including two Nova Scotians). R · VS These are our first combat-zone losses since Korea. Update which demands some retoning of the following: it appears the pilots were cleared as acting in self-defense, and the failure was a SNAFU in information flow higher up the system. [TS citing Washington Times] Update Maybe th that tack didn't take, so they go back to the amphetamines story. TS · BBC Watch for `limited hangouts' along the lines of `this is the very first time it ever caused a problem, honest.' The reflective tape meant to identify `friendlies' was ineffective. Another jetjockey confused us with al Qaeda in Op. Harpoon last month. TS All GWB says about it publicly is to snappishly reply that he gave condolences to our PM after a reporter asks him about it while he's departing a gathering. (He looked irritated at having to bother with such trivia; like people should be glad to die at US hands in US proxy service. But he did actually contact Chrétien. R Love that headline. He `erred' in bombing us. Duh. I'd hope it was an err.) The US media pay no attention either. G&M (This is particularly vexing given the oversight of the autumn. Yet even normally intelligent Canadian pundits like Duffy make excuses for Shrubya. Whoopefukindoo. When you kill an ally's people there's no excuse for a response only minimally distinct from `kiss my ass.') Canadians start to get a little irritated at the US G · JR; most of us figure the US forces just don't give a damn. G&M (Someone in village here has a son in Afghanistan. He says one night the Canadians were left to keep shop while the US boys were off playing volleyball.) The US can't decide if the pilot had orders R or if he didn't. M

  Another space tourist goes up. They're about the only funding left for the space program. Don't hold your breath for manned space expeditions. O I long ago figured that the space program was just dividing the human species into those that can afford to survive in space and those poor sods that'll have to make do with the wreck of a planet left behind…

• Europeans wanna ask Kissinger about the 1970s dictator-terrorist network in Latin America, Pinochet in particular. TI [SMH quoting Guardian] CNN The ever-US-lovin' British scuttle the idea. CNN But Judge Evans' `comments leave open the possibility that he might issue a warrant in the future—if I can produce stronger evidence of Kissinger's culpability in the killing, maiming, torture, and forced relocation of civilian populations in Vietnam, Laos, and Cambodia in the late 60s and early 70s.' G
• Human Rights Watch accuses Israeli forces of using civilians as shields and forcing them at gunpoint to do various nasty jobs like opening suspected letterbombs. HRW · JT [CBC Newsworld on Apr 20 reports on such goings-on in Bethlehem.]
• US made the G8 aid to Africa contingent on them making themselves more democratic and humane. Why isn't the US's biggest suckling by far, Israel TI, made to meet the same standards? Jimmy Carter thinks that, pretty much. TI
• Someone's now trying again to pin OKC on Arabs…Saddam and Osama…now that the prime scapegoat is out of reach…and with hearsay. IM This is all tied to Philipine venues and personages; the Philipines have been under US control for a century. (Recall the Guatemala-type land reforms that were going to take place just before Aquino took power. Reforms which have never happened. And, I prophesy, will not so long as the US has a shred of influence.) Again I ask, what would Arabs care about OKC? What would terrorists care about OKC? This was one reason Keating couldn't sell his (alleged) manuscript in the first place, implausibility. SHS suggests a motive, on `facts' I've seen elsewhere—transplanted Iraqi Gulf-War `defectors' settled near OKC miffed about the US war crimes in Iraq.
• US teams up with Cuba, Syria, and Libya to prevent the UN further limiting their use of torture. CSM They disagree with prison inspection. `People with something to hide scare us.' Feb 16
• 19: FBI Director Müller admits (but doesn't recognise) the alleged hijackers were just ordinary people with nothing to do with 9/11.

  What emerged from our massive investigation was a sobering portrait of 19 hijackers who carried out their attacks with meticulous planning, extraordinary secrecy, and extensive knowledge of how America works.

  The plans were hatched and financed overseas, beginning as long as five years ago. Each of the hijackers came from abroad: fifteen from Saudi Arabia, two from the United Arab Emirates, and one each from Lebanon and Egypt. All 19 entered our country legally, and only three had overstayed the legal limits of their visas on the day of the attacks.

  While here, the hijackers did all they could to stay below our radar. They contacted no known terrorist sympathizers. They committed no egregious crimes. They dressed and acted like Americans, shopping and eating at places like Wal-Mart and Pizza Hut, blending into the woodwork all the while. When four got speeding tickets in the days leading up to September 11th, they remained calm and aroused no suspicion. Since none were known terrorists, law enforcement had no reason to question or detain them.

  The hijackers also left no paper trail. In our investigation, we have not uncovered a single piece of paper—either here in the US or in the treasure trove of information that has turned up in Afghanistan and elsewhere—that mentioned any aspect of the September 11th plot. The hijackers had no computers, no laptops, no storage media of any kind. They used hundreds of different pay phones and cell phones, often with prepaid calling cards that are extremely difficult to trace. And they made sure that all the money sent to them to fund their attacks was wired in small amounts to avoid detection.

  In short, the terrorists had managed to exploit loopholes and vulnerabilities in our systems, to stay out of sight, and to not let anyone know what they were up to beyond a very closed circle. FBI

  (Yeah. Suuure. Don't you see what this speech is really about—a control freak promoting Megabigbrother, and how it'll protect us from ordinary things done by ordinary people whom we still, somehow, magically, know to be terrorists 'cause Dubya's little voices or Ashcroft's special chorus said so?) Mueller seems to forget that early government and media reports loudly hyped discoveries—letters and other documents—in the luggage and personal belongings of the presumed hijackers which proved that they were on a mission for Allah, etc etc. Now Mueller's comments seem to contradict everything that's been said. AFP · G · M · SMH

  Days after being promoted to the job, Chávez' air-force boss and three of his generals die in a helicopter crash. BBC Perhaps this is the CIA preparing for a second try. VH Sharon's chief of staff walks. IT Carter's Ambassador to Iraq says Saddam is relatively harmless—that one can hide neither the refinery nor the missiles for a nuclear-weapons system. He also reminds us that the US arranged things the last decade so sewage from one Iraq city becomes the water supply for the next, in violation of the Geneva Conventions. LO (I've encountered similar points elsewhere, that maybe the UN didn't find nukes after repeated inspections because there are none. Well, maybe you can't hide the missiles; but what if Iraq is buying the fissile metal? On the other hand, Iraq is so browbeaten from the last ±12 years, could it afford the M$1/g mentioned on History Channel? And that question applies just as well to a U/P refinery.) US and British planes patrolling their northern-Iraq no-fly zone bombed Iraqi air defense systems in retaliation to alleged antiaircraft fire. `Washington has hinted it could launch a military campaign to overthrow Saddam if the Iraqi leader continues to deny admission to UN weapons inspectors.' WP (Compare `The inspection issue has become a surrogate for a debate about whether we go after Saddam, said Richard N. Perle' from a few days ago. WP)

  GWB calls Sharon a man of peace. [Y! quoting AFP] (What happened to Stop that. Stop that right now. I mean it! of a few days ago? Why ask for an investigation tomorrow? Later, to Sharon: I said you were a man of peace. I want you to know I took immense crap for that. E citing Washington Post 2003 Jun 3]

  CNN: `A massive federal investigation' into a train wreck that kills six. As McKinney asked a few days ago, why no massive investigation into, say, the military quiescence on 9/11, when nearly 3000 die?

• Contemplative ex-Marine, understanding why billions really do hate the US, defines `un-American' as `the interests of the people of the world…weigh heavier than my self-interest.' YT · WT (aka `The needs of the many outweigh the needs of the few, or the one.' aka socialism.)
• CNN's Lou Dobb's Moneyline has a report on the unmanned aircraft used in Afghanistan. For some reason the military craft are surveillance-only, while the CIA's craft carry weapons. Doesn't that sound exactly backwards? It also mentioned that `three al Qaeda' (which I'll take as `about three non-Western persons') were taken out awhile back by a weapon-bearing remote-operated aircraft. That's about as much sophistication as needed to satisfy the remote-piloting theories of 9/11.
• Japan claims the world's fastest computer. [/. citing NYT] It's interesting that /. mentions `climate modeling, global warming prediction, and other non-weapons' applications while the US' fastest recently completed a nuclear-bomb simulation. (Test ban and all.) Not that I'd rather they tested in real life, it just underlines the difference in mentality.
• 20: 100000–200000 show up for a protest in Washington. There would have been more; many `just happened' to run afoul of the federal `no-fly list.' P The media will persistently underestimate the number. CP · AS · Arab News: `What is the difference between Ariel Sharon and Slobodan Milosevic, now on trial for war crimes? Apart from the fact that one killed Bosnians and Albanians while the other kills Palestinians, the answer is none whatsoever.' UAE calls for UN war-crimes investigation of Jenin, Nablus, etc. GN GWB calls for an investigation of Jenin. G I hope he remembers to tell Niggerbridge at the UN, who's gonna veto it. AB
• Ashcroft gets `Worst Gov't Official' award from Privacy International for attacking privacy and freedom of information. R · PI
• Peru calls off joint military training with the US, saying that it did not want a foreign military base. BBC
• Key Floridians upset about overhead military experiments. MH
• 21: Peres confirms Sharon wants to annex half the West Bank, stressing it's not a permanent solution. WT (What would be? Annexing the other half?) Terry Jones points out GWB's absurd ideas of democracy: `although Chávez was democratically elected one had to bear in mind that legitimacy is something that is conferred not just by a majority of the voters, however [sic].' G · Observer is confident enough to say `The failed coup in Venezuela was closely tied to senior officials in the US government.' This `deepens doubts about policy in the region being made by appointees to the Bush administration, all of whom owe their careers to serving in the dirty wars under President Reagan.' O Israelis shoot 3-year-old for throwing stones at bulldozers. Brave, brave Israel. TI Israel uses armoured bulldozers. UPI
• Arab media believe it's time to stop thinking of the US as friendly. JT Duh.
• US trying to figure out how to charge its detainees without evidence since they've refused to confess to any atrocities and are just playing mind games with their captors. LDT · CNN
• 22: Annan names the Jenin fact-finding group. Israel is disappointed it didn't get to do it AB so it refuses its permission R and has the United `strip our own military to supply Israel' `Highway of Death' `Nuke the Japs' `half a million dead Iraqi children are worth it' States send `fact-finders' instead. UPI Then they try to claim Palestinians planted bodies (doubtless dodging the post-curfew sniping) to make Israel look bad (as if it needed help). JP (Cunning! `Yeah. Ok. The kid's dead. But prove we killed him.') Annan shows some backbone and refuses to change or delay the mission. [JR quoting AP]

  I email the PM. Had I waited a few hours I would have cited also this article: `recriminations were flying in Washington after the Washington Post claimed Osama bin Laden had escaped last fall from the besieged Tora Bora mountain complex because the administration had refused to commit American troops to the battle' (ie they deliberately goofed up one of their few real goes for Osama); `The king's return had been engineered by the US government in an urgent effort to try to cobble together a pro-American regime capable of running fragmented Afghanistan, which has dissolved into semi-chaos…The pipelines that America's petro-geopoliticians have long sought to build through Afghanistan to export Central Asia's oil and gas riches cannot be laid until there is relative security there.' I also forgot to write `less expensive' in the postscript.

  I also reply to ATV's outrageous attempt at having an American (Vietnam vet', now dual-citizen, and undead µbiologist) tell us how we should feel. I left out one point: he speculated we feel inferior to the US. Well, thus far the US is the only nation-state convicted of international terrorism. How can one feel inferior to that?

• 23: Israeli police intend to question Sharon about various straw companies set up to funnel foreign money into his campaign. H `GWB has ulterior motives.' D Some Jews seem angry at the idea that starving children is bad. RMN

  GWB: This foreign-policy stuff is a little frustrating. [S citing NY Daily News]

• GWB: `Just to show you how insidious these terrorists are, they oftentimes use nice-sounding, non-governmental organizations as fronts for their activities.' WH Hmm. Nice-sounding NGOs like, say, the so-called Heritage Foundation, busily selling the Missile (lynchpin to the 4th Reich) Shield to foreigners.
• US lists Colombia as a target in the `war on terror.' For this year, Congress authorized M$343 in military and police `aid;' M$538 is wanted for next year. USAT
• 24: Powell denies seeing any mass graves in Jenin (and seems to imply that killing a few terrorists justifies killing many civilians). CNN He left enough mass graves in Iraq (1991) to be qualified to recognise them; however, he didn't visit Jenin during his little Sharon-guided tour. JP British judge denies, for lack of evidence, a US extradition request on a man suspected of training the alleged 9/11 hijackers. [Lehrer News hour] IN
• Apparently Israel paints even antiSharon Jews with the `antiSemite' lie. LAT Thing is, since Arabs are also Semites, it's Israel that's being antiSemitic.
• MI removes public access to search warrants and affidavits. OP
• 25: NV rules that unwarranted electronic monitoring of motor vehicles is legal. LVS Jenin survivors would rather starve than take US aid. TI
• The Coup Failed—And The Fallout Goes On MSNBC
• Indications are the world is noticing the US is in fiscal doodoo. [FOX quoting Reuters]
• 26: L. Britt Schneider quits job heading what little 9/11 inquiry the Whitehouse allowed (see Jan 29). LAT A gunman dressed all over in black, only eyes visible, enters Erfurt's Gutenburg high school and starts shooting. Later expelled student Robert Steinhäuser is found shot, dead, and similarly dressed. Robert was mentally and physically frail, yet 17 or 18 were killed and 7 wounded, a suspiciously high ratio even for a trained and fit military man. The school is in Germany's only state which grants diplomas only for completing Grade 12—others start issuing lesser diplomas at earlier graduations. The same day, German gun-control laws which had stalled in debate, passed. The usual evils of the Internet and violent video games are blamed. [heard on DW english service Apr 30] CNN · JV · FT · SMH (Why do these `lone nuts' only pick on schools now? What happened to McDonald's shootings?) Supposedly all indoor victims were killed with an 11.4-cm Glock, accurate for thorax shots up to 23 m. But the first policeman on the scene was supposedly killed with a travelling headshot from 30 m while the supposed shooter was in the midst of terrorising the other students; a literally incredible theory. JV Germans suspect not all is what ihre Führer say: Ist dies womöglich Teil einer gesellschaftlichen Schocktherapie mittels allgegenwärtigem Psycho-Terror, die mit dem 11.09. begann? WA[]

  Sydney Morning Herald points out money went to Venezuelan coupsters from `National Endowment for Democracy.' SMH `Venezuela has State Dep't Concerned' [Y! quoting AP] (I'm sure it's a mutual feeling.)

• EU and Japan are preparing tariffs in retaliation for the US' steel tariffs. The US whinges about international rules. WP Compare Great Depression.
• Israel provides FOX with `documents' of payments from the Saudi gov't to Palestinians. The dates, curiously, are US-style Gregorian (M/D/Y), not sensible European Gregorian (Y/M/D) or Hijri (where the year would be 14 or 15 hundred-something). This could merely mean someone uses too much American software… FOX
• The Chernobyl `sarcophagus' is in danger of collapse. `Ukraine is dependent on Western financial aid to maintain the sarcophagus and has complained that is does not have enough to do the job properly.' BBC (Could the US be hoping it falls apart and reduces the world population, a goal expressed since the 70s?) Not mentioned here, but heard elsewhere; the reactor sits on a 100-year floodplain.
• Former director of the CIA and FBI urges the use of `truth' serum on the detainees—`not for prosecution,' just national security. SMH
• Saudi people in the mood to cut off the oil and kick the US off those newish military bases built for the Gulf War. IN
• Sharon's plan is to drive Palestinians across the Jordan T (A leopard can't change its spots; compare 1982.)
• 28: Israeli cabinet votes to refuse coöperation with UN's Jenin fact-finders, and warned it would try to block any visit by the team. [TI quoting AFP] The US bombed and sanctioned Iraq for (allegedly) doing that.
• Will Hutton: `It is not just foreign critics who believe the US has not solved the age-old question about how to construct a just economic and social order or operate an effective democracy. A growing number of Americans share the same view.' G
• 29: GWB (Crowne Plaza Pyramid Hotel, Albuquerque NM, Heather Wilson for Congress Luncheon): You know, when I was campaigning in Chicago one time, they said, would you ever have a deficit? I said, I hope not. I said, I think it's important for us to make—to work hard to have a balanced budget. But I said, yes, I'd have a deficit if I were the President only if we were at war, or in a recession, or in times of emergency. I didn't think I was going to draw the trifecta. [laughter] WH

  Five Israelis—Yarden Morag, Shlomo Dvir (Zelliger), Ofer Gamliel, Yosef Ben-Baruch, Noam Federman—arrested planting bomb at Palestinian A-Tur girls' school. First 3 will claim it was just a publicity stunt, no harm intended. JP (Well, gee. Since the 9/11 terrorists chose one of the year's slowest air-travel days and hit the WTC high up instead of Indian Pt. low down before it had filled up for the day and the emptiest portion of the Pentagon, they meant no harm either, and we should just forget this whole thing.)

  No idea where all the money went. I

  US reädmitted to UN Human Rights Commission. TI

• Tony Blair may be the most rabid interventionist Europe's known in decades, even keener than the Pentagon to trample Iraq; playing right into the US' hands. G (Must find that whiny-poodle thing.)
• 30: US authorities are beginning to admit they have no substantial tie between al Qaeda and 9/11. FBI · MH (That tends to happen when the tie was imaginary from the getgo.) They're also not too worried about attacks on dams and locks. Y! (They know perfectly well when and where the attacks are going to be, and dams aren't on the agenda.) Defense minister Arthole Egghead has the gall to be still assuring us the US is going to follow the Geneva Convention—this time.

May

• Treasury Sec'y talks, greenback shrivels. BBC
• The US is going to nuke Ukraine for stealing the US' overpriced CDs. (They topped the list of IP violators; the US will impose economic sanctions if they don't do something; the Ukraine is desperately poor already (one reason they steal) and relies on Western aid to keep Chernobyl from falling to dust; thus…) A
• 1: GWB (Santa Clara CA Convention Center, Simon for Governor Luncheon): I remember in Chicago they said to me, would you ever have deficit spending. I said, only if there was a war, or a national emergency, or a recession. Never did I realize we'd get the trifecta. [laughter] WH

  Annan regrets letting the Jenin fact-finders get scuttled; Security Council gets somewhat pissed off at Israel. AN US bombs Iraq for `targeting' them while `enforcing' the no-fly zones. NM (`He looked at me!' Those zones are nothing to do with the UN. TI) Iraq and Kuwait begin settling their differences peacefully. AN Sharon's chief spy quits. AB Israel `trust[s] in the US and its commitments vis-a-vis Israel to oppose' any UN move to formally inquire into Jenin. IT (`We run America and they know it.') Church of the Nativity is set ablaze. `Israeli soldiers firing flares and throwing smoke bombs' ND `the ones inside started it' FOX (Got bored with starving to death I guess. And FOX has changed that story twice in the last hour that I know of, so if what you see is something about Irish washerwomen starting it… Arafat cannot understand the world's silence; neither can I. We were more upset when the Taliban blew up Buddha. M) Iraq accuses UN of a double standard. IT (Couldn't argue it if I wanted to, except that the US may be more deserving. Annan may just be nipping Israel's cycle of stonewalling.) US business begins to feel the grassroots embargoes. PC Senator for Louisiana passes on the US Senate's condolences for killing four Canadians (and I will say, she did a credible job…but two bits were interesting; Louisiana, almost as far as one can get from Canada within the US, feels `very close' to Canada; and reference to the `centuries-old bond' between us. Centuries-old since, when, we burnt Washington in 1814? Since we harboured their Civil-war refugees and slaves (and even some terrorists, I think) in the 1860s? Since we harboured the Vietnam draft dodgers? Since we became a terrorist staging area? Well…perhaps I'm misinterpreting. There's a bond all right. Just maybe not a loving one.)

  GWB: `The public education system…is where children from all over America…learn to have the skills necessary to take advantage of our fantastic opportunistic society.' PH

• 2: House majority leader Rep. Armey (R TX) roundly and repeatedly calls publicly for the ethnic cleansing of Palestine—a war crime. MM · CP Can't imagine why Arabs are outraged. CNS

  Tehran knows what's what: `the US is seeking to impose an international dictatorship on all countries, particularly on the justice-seeking nations.' TT I concur entirely. Look at their history of flaunting treaties. Taunting the World Court. Threatening invasions if the ICC ever operates. This is the true goal behind their `missile shield'—it will make them exactly what they taught us to fear the SU would become if we ignored the Sputnik launch, global dictators.

  GWB: `After all, a week ago, there were—Yasser Arafat was boarded up in his building in Ramallah, a building full of, evidently, German peace protestors and all kinds of people. They're now out. He's now free to show leadership, to lead the world.' PH

• 3:

  Human Rights Watch (whom I more or less trust, so far), having taken a look at Jenin, say there's nothing to back up the claims of hundreds killed. But they explicitly leave open the war-crimes question. [CBC Newsworld] (My trust of HRW is slipping. `In February, the Wall Street Journal announced that Human Rights Watch was sending three researchers to Afghanistan—headed by William Arkin, a supporter of the war—to produce the correct tally of Afghan dead. HRW officials, it was widely reported, had said privately that they estimated the civilian death toll at between 100 and 350 in December, figures consistent with the group's record of severe undercounting in the 1999 NATO campaign in Yugoslavia. The HRW study has never appeared, though it has—absurdly—had some influence: the number 350 is still bandied about as if it had some scientific basis.' [emphasis added] CD

  An airport is shut down until the security guys can track down where went a piece of carry-on luggage which set off alarms they didn't notice until the carrier was long gone. [CBC Newsworld]

• 4: Globe & Mail notices the dying µbiologists. G&M Kent State holds an antiwar protest. (planned) KSAWC (Let's see if the Nat'l Guard shows up like forty years ago.)
• Operation Snipe [Hunt] is failing to turn up any enemy. CT Yet for some reason it's `successful.' T
• Chávez figures the US wanted and/or still wants him dead. [HC citing Washington Post]
• Israeli reserve-battallion commander LtCol Yoram Rubinfeld announces to his officers that he would not be commanding them into the Occupied Territories. JR At about the same time one of Rumsfeld's, LtGen Gregory Newbold, decides he'd rather sell power tools in a hardware store. T
• US is gonna invade Iraq pretty much no matter what. Weapons inspections was just a handy excuse, now clearly gone. Commonsleeze Rice said that Saddam Hussein `is not likely to ever convince the world, in a reliable way, that he is going to live at peace with his neighbours, that he will not seek weapons of mass destruction, and that he will not repress his own people.' G Did she ever try s/Saddam Hussein/Ariel Sharon/? Or s/Saddam Hussein/Jarge Dubya/?
• `Pakistan' bomb kills 14 French. Y! Germans were target of bomb in Karachi. TI Is someone (*coughrubdubya*) trying to recruit France and Germany into an `antiterror' coalition?
• Another bombing convenient for Sharon, in a pool hall. Hamas claims responsibility. Hamas is run by Shin-Bet (Israeli) M from Gaza, on which Israel has not been `retaliating.' C
• Congress is getting miffed at the stonewalling the DoJ and CIA are doing in what little 9/11 investigation the Whitehouse `allows.' LAT
• MO halts tax refunds. LAT
• 7: Mary Robinson, UN High Commissioner on Human Rights, unhappy about the US' posturing and tantrums over the ICC. MSNBC (I think I see why the US hates her, now. She has some scruples. She freakishly expects the US to play by the same morals it claims to expect of others.)
• May 8: Abdullah Al-Mujahir, an American known as Jose Padilla before his conversion to Islam, is arrested at O'Hare airport (see June 10) YT Salomon Smith Barney incites Venezuelan insurrection: `hopes that the opposition in Venezuela will increase pressure against President Chávez Frias in the short term to get him out of the presidential seat.' VH
• Microsoft admits its code is flawed; and thus it must be kept secret as a matter of national security. [/. citing EW] (The option of not relying on M$ in the first place is not discussed.)
• A glimpse of light: Blair decides to wait for UN resolution before attacking Iraq. I
• The terrorising of the Netherlands takes another step. IHT
• Leaflet circulates among GIs at Okinawa, explaining likely reason the US wants out of the ICC—planned war of aggression on Iraq—and their obligations to disobey orders violating international law. ZM
• US schools are preparing the next generation for the New World Order by operating as police states. PP
• 10: GWB (Hyatt Regency, Columbus OH, Taft for Governor Luncheon): You know, when I was running for President, in Chicago, somebody said, would you ever have deficit spending? I said, only if we were at war, or only if we had a recession, or only if we had a national emergency. Never did I dream we'd get the trifecta. [laughter] WH
• 12: Likud `outmaneuvers' Sharon on a `key' foreign-policy vote. 59% of the 2600 voting members elected to defy Sharon and proceed with a vote on Netanyahu's proposal that Likud re-affirm its opposition to a Palestinian state. The policy statement then passed by a show of hands. Peres calls the vote `tragic for Israel.' (I'm not clear which vote is the tragedy.) CNN · CNN
• 13: About 20 protestors storm the Israeli embassy in London. The embassy tries to keep it hushed up. H (Notice the gratuitous `left-wing' labelling. It comes up again in this article also from Ha'aretz)
• 15: Denver County CO judge repeals US Constitution. S
• 16: Michael Meiring blows his own legs off when a terror bomb he was building for the CIA in the Philippines goes off prematurely. VF · JR
• 18: Having admitted a little too much about what it knew pre-9/11, the GWB admin is backed into a serious corner. Another terror attack right now would be very helpful to them. And sure enough, threats are announced; one news source (MA's ch 5) described `an increase in intra-al Qaeda communications `just like before 9/11.' Which is two things: another admission of warning signs that were ignored, and very like the increase in traffic Israel generated to draw the US into attacking Libya. X Dan Rather figures it's a diversion! NM
• Bahrainis beat up US tars. `It is the Americans who started the fight,' Yousif said. `They owed us money and they wanted us to pay them. This is unbelievable.' C
• 20: US again attacks Iraq without UN mandate. Y!
• Cheney fears leaks from 9/11 inquiry. R (Isn't that the effin' point of an inquiry???)
• Israel gets terrorist-state label. P (Although not from people about whom the US gives a flying f*k.)
• European Intel figure the `war on terror' is a lie. JR
• Suspicion grows that Mossad had fine hand in 9/11. WM · ETY · PTR · FPP
• SF att'y Stanley Hilton sues Bush for G$7 for failing his duties on 9/11. BI · DR
• Dog-walker stumbles over remains in an area that been thoroughly searched months ago (and cleaned just last month); they're alleged to be Chandra Levy's. Another just-in-time distraction. CNN · WP · JR (Skolnick thinks she found out too much about the OKC bombing. SR · SR That would make a marvellous distraction; `look how Clinton screwed you over!')
• INS renews visas for two 9/11 designated bad guys, Atta and al-Shehhi. (In March?) BBC
• Berliners biff bottles at Bush. (The Germans have some clue what happens when you leave unilateralist idiots in control of huge arsenals.) `Bush is a criminal and we must show what we think of him.' `Bush should take all his policies and go home.' `Bush is a warmonger, Bush is a terrorist.' Banner: `If you can read this you're not the president.' T · Y! (`But even then [days after 9/11] there were signs of uneasiness about how Mr. Bush would react.' Pfft. I had that unease on 9/11, within minutes of hearing the news. `Oh sweet Lord, what's Bush gonna do about this?' I thought.)
• USPS comes out with distinctly Nazi-looking stamps. 57¢ 55¢ TIM
• John Ashcroft, Kappelmeister-General. (CNN may be hiding a recording of it here—need evil-Wintel-axis?)
• Adolf Bush proclaims that he will no longer tolerate second-guessing about who knew what when. Hermann Rumsfeld threatens those who ask questions with government charges (under USA PATRIOT). `Zere ist uns Congressional investigazion unt zat ist more zan enuff!' AMR
• Au takes a hiccup as the Russians announce they're going to sell some reserves. But they'd meant greenback reserves. GL
• 22: Antony Sutton America's Secret Establishment an introduction to the Order of Skull & Bones

  During the past one hundred years any theory of history or historical evidence that falls outside a pattern established by the American Historical Association and the major foundations with their grant making power has been attacked or rejected?not on the basis of any evidence presented, but on the basis of the acceptability of the argument of the so-called Eastern Liberal Establishment and its official historical line. There is an Establishment history, an official history, which dominates history textbooks, trade publishing, the media and library shelves. The official line always assumes that events such as wars, revolutions, scandals, assassinations are more or less random unconnected events. By definition events can never be the result of a conspiracy. They can never result from premeditated planned group action. An excellent example is the Kennedy assassination when, within 9 hours of the Dallas tragedy, TV networks announced the shooting was not a conspiracy regardless of the fact that a negative proposition can never be proven and that the investigation had barely begun.

  BN

  Nabil Almarabh, after ±240 days in solitary (see Sep 18), is formally charged. WP

• GWB astonishes Brazil by asking `Do you have blacks, too?' DS (tr)
• 23 `3:37 pm': Ex-Marine wounds two in airport for fun being made of his turban. NOLA
• 83-year old in wheelchair hospitalises six airport security. LR
• Experiment confirms what the statisticians knew all along: face-recognition machinery still makes too many errors to be useful for nabbing terrorists. TR
• 26: USAF Lt Col Steve Butler:

  Of course President Bush knew about the impending attacks on America. He did nothing to warn the American people because he needed this war on terrorism. His daddy had Saddam and he needed Osama. His presidency was going nowhere. He wasn't elected by the American people, but placed in the Oval Office by a conservative supreme court. The economy was sliding into the usual Republican pits and he needed something on which to hang his presidency…This guy is a joke. What is sleazy and contemptible is the President of the US not telling the American people what he knows for political gain. [S quoting WSWS citing Monterey County Herald]

  Butler is suspended, but the issue is resolved without court martial.
• 28: Last piece of WTC removed. ABC Medical examiner determines Levy was killed. (Not gonna try for `suicide' on this one.) FBI spins story about the hijackers sneaking photos of cockpits as part of their research MJS although you can get great pix off the 'net. 747CP Eggleton dropped from Defense, supposedly for giving his ex-GF a k$30 contract. (They'd never admit to his bald lies about how well the US treats POWs. Now we gotta watch the new minister, that he doesn't decide to keep us in Afghanistan.) John McCollum gets the job.
• Vietnam accuses Senator of war crimes. `We gotta get beyond this stuff' sez the Senator `and get on with our lives.' Those of the Vietnamese that still have lives. N Clue, nitwit: this is why the US is hated the world over. According to Washington, when the US commits a crime, the world should just `get over it;' anyone else commits it, we should be standin' them against the wall. Sen. Kerrey was on Charlie Rose t'other night (May 30 or 31); he's supposedly expected to go for Prez. Bjeesh.
• Anthony Shadid, Boston Globe `reporter' rounded up and shot by Israelis and treated by Palestinians, still says nothing bad about Israel and nothing good about Palestine. YT
• 29-Jun 2: Westfields Marriott of Chantilly VA is closed and guarded. It is believed the Bilderbergs are meeting there.

June

• US locks up Ontarian Mohammed Jabarah withou charge for at least 4 months. G&M
• 1: GWB at West Point: `America has, and intends to keep, military strengths beyond challenge, thereby making the destabilizing arms races of other eras pointles and limiting rivalries to trade and other pursuits of peace.' WH · G · CN Ya. I told you. They want global dictatorship. D'you think if the US, currently only about T$7 in debt, comes up a little short to trade for something it wants real bad—oil, water, food—it's going to pursue peaceful means? When has it ever pursued peaceful means?
• Canadian government, as usual, is riding the US' wake and dismantling its own freedom-of-info laws. Funny how the `Just Watch Me' Liberals are the ones who've been fastest to remove the rights they worked to `patriate.' G&M (I'm now three months looking for an answer to our troops' readiness for dU. Or is it four? I better ask again, anyway, since Eggleton got booted from Defense…)
• The American people may finally be waking up to the ugly reality of the unfettered capitalism that's been preached to them for decades. CD It's only a quarter-century since `I'm mad as hell and not gonna take it anymore'
• New York state has been rewriting the guts out of the classics and then examining students to ensure they have the `acceptable' version in mind. Wasn't this in Brave New World?? BBC
• We start getting reports the US did have moles other than Osama in al Qaeda. Still claiming nothing specific was gleaned, but nevertheless it's obvious al Qaeda did it and didn't just know about it like the whole damn rest of the world (eg Germany, Egypt, Russia, Brazil [damn where did I read that?]) did. USAT · ditto Bang goes the claim al Qaeda was impenetrable. A claim I had swallowed :(
• `Prominent Washington attorney' Nathan Lewin calls for judicial murder of the families of terrorists. F Whom does he suggest killing? The parents? first cousins? siblings? children? nieces n nephews? And if the terrorist is an orphan, the foster families? the adoptive families? While the civilised world has disposed of the death penalty as the expensive atrocity it is in most cases, `prominent' Americans are now advocating `kill 'em all and let God sort it out.' And the US claims it can't understand why the world hates them?
• 4: CHiPpers gun down six cows grazing `near' highway. SB It reads like they got bored and a little gunhappy.
• palestinechronicle.com running out of money; will shut at the end of July. PC
• 5: Rep. Ron Paul warns about the collapsing greenback. LR
• The US is moving to a strike-first policy WRT to nuclear weapons. WP · LT This confirms the global-dictatorship theory. The missile shield does not have to be `perfect;' only good enough to hold off most of what little could be scraped together to fling at the US. Then the US simply glasses someone over (not necessarily the shooters) and it'll be a long time before anyone tries again. Meanwhile, a policy of nuclear attack on anyone collecting WMD (which the BMD surveillance satelites would easily see and the BMD weapons systems could probably destroy on their own) ensures no effective arsenal could ever be collected against the US. Hence, they have global hegemony; no more piecemeal democracy-destruction.

  Always keep in mind: The US remains to this time the only country with a demonstrated will to use nukes; furthermore, that use did not shorten WW2; we now know the US extended the war in order to demonstrate its new weapons.

  The US is going for the mother of all brass rings this time.

• A legbone is found at the Levy site after 16 dogs had combed the area. Even the police chief thinks this is getting ridiculous. CNN
• 6: Hiroshima-size energy burst over the Mediterranean, probably one of the semimonthly car-size asteroids. Had this occurred over Pakistan-India it could've triggered a big nuclear mess. Y! (I'm semi-amused by the way these guys talk about `a few hours earlier' in apparent ignorance of Earth's orbital motion. I recall a report of a similar event at Persian Gulf latitude in the Pacific in the early '90s.)
• For those bored by the Riemann hypothesis, or too late for the Fermat Theorem, the advertising industry is offering a challenge: `Sell America as a decent, benevolent country to foreign consumers.' TP (the theory on this page runs that this will be turned into an actual effort; and indeed June 11 I see a piece on ATV Evening News about the US trying to launch its own satellite propaganda channel to improve its image in the world, run by a former advertising executive.)
• 7: GWB (Iowa State Fairgrounds, DesMoines, 14th Annual World Pork Expo) I remember campaigning in Chicago, and one of the reporters said, would you ever deficit spend? I said only—only in times of war, in times of economic insecurity as a result of a recession, or in times of national emergency. Never did I dream we'd have a trifecta. [laughter] WH

  US botches rescue of Abu Sayyaf hostages, killing hostages and freeing the evildoers. SMH · ST

• Applied Digital Solutions finds out people aren't so keen to be tracked in real time as they thought. WND
• Israel runs a lightning raid on Arafat's HQ. PC
• Sharon rejects the latest peace plan during a pass through Washington. I Bush gives green light to cleansing Palestine.
• Israel attacks Reuters (with guns). GN · AN · JT
• 9: Carbomb attack on Saddam's son Qusay? WT Coca-Cola extracts India's groundwater with police protection from the people whose wells are going dry; in the 49th day of their protest 130 are violently arrested. CWI
• The Dutch parliament seems suddenly to notice the US plans to invade. EP There's one upside: The Hague is on the coast, so the US won't have to carve a swath through the Netherlands to pull off their `rescue.' The downside: the US will carve a swath just for the helluvit. They know it, and we know it. CNN will just spend a month painting the Dutch as the vilest people on earth, then on the day mislabel their map and The People will believe the appropriate action was taken by an appropriate route.
• 10: Probably to divert attention from the hostage nonrescue (above), Sharon's visit, the tail end of Rowley's testimony CP (dang, I 'most fo'got 'bout her meself), the investigation's heap of inconvenient heavydense [CD ¶4], and to fan the terror fires, Ashcroft announces that Jose Padilla (see May 8) was in the early stages of some nefarious plot, maybe even `dirtybombing' (speading nuclear waste around with conventional explosives, what the US did to southern Iraq). CBS Although `dirtybomb' materials are relatively simple to find L (thanks in no small part to the burn-it-out cancer racket), assembling them without lethally irradiating oneself is quite difficult. Only one military (Iraq's) is believed to have tried it, and they failed. CBS Thus, where people still think (and even at USA Today), this story is going over like a lead balloon. DS · SMH · I The Whitehouse eventually tries to save face by saying Ashcroft exaggerated from the start. USAT · T (Looks like the cornered crooks are about to turn on each other.) The twist is, Padillo looks an awful lot like OKC John Doe #2—much more than McVeigh looked like JD1. CT (Probably meaningless, but Terry Nichols' first wife was a Lana Padilla. VV Apparently she was married to a Leonard—sometimes Robert—Padilla with no known connection. IW As of 2004 Jan, Intelwire's been unable to make anything out of that resemblance one way or the other.)

  However: if you really want a `dirtybomb' and aren't overly picky about where, TMIA explains how to do it.

  PS: `dirtybomb' is a term also used in reference to true nuclear weapons. Most supposed H-bombs are actually deliberately `dirtied' with significant amounts of fission elements to produce more radioactive waste.

• The US demands Holbrooke's testimony in the Milosevic trial be kept secret. They claim to be leery of setting a precedent for the new ICC, but I think they'd like to screw things up to the point Milosevic walks keeping their own rôle in the failure out of their domestic media, and hold it all up as an example of how the UN fumbles justice. FT
• 11: `100s of 9/11 survivors' protest at the Capitol for independent investigation. `We must ask the tough questions.' `This is no time for shortcuts.' NYP Federal jury awards M$4.4 to Darryl Cherney and the estate of Judi Bari against the FBI and Oakland police for conspiracy, amongst other things. G (`But—but—there are no conspiracies! :p ) (Aha. In another article, the conspiracy charge didn't hold up. I)
• Some Baptists are more enlightened than others.
• New ICC may take a crack at those illegal Zionist settlers. HA
• 12: Docco Massacre At Mazar (shown at the Reichstag, of all places) on US torture, murder, and dissappearing of Afghan prisoners raises call for investigation. IOL · SM `So seien jeweils bis zu 200 Gefangene in luftdichte Container gepfercht worden und drohten darin in der Hitze zu ersticken. Daraufhin hätten Soldaten Löcher in die Container geschossen ohne Rücksicht darauf, dass dabei auch Personen im Innern getroffen wurden.' DS Eat that, Arthur Eggleton.

  Fatal gun battle erupts over unfinished paperwork. FLN

• 58% of Mexicans think the US stole northern Mexico from them, and 57% that they ought to be allowed free movement there. (Hey, if the logic works for Israel…) (±3½%) Bush's attitude is that goods and the well-to-do should move freely and the rest can p*s up a rope. CNS
• Yemenis are being subjected to thorough searches. NYP (Some of the alleged hijackers were allegedly Yemeni, the Cole was attacked in Yemen, Yemen failed to approve the Gulf War, and yet the assault on Afghanistan continues. Not to say Yemen should be pummeled, just that Afghanistan should not.) (aha. It's because of the oil, again. IRNA)
• SF Chronicle opinion piece re the `strike-first' policy. `if there was any doubt about how flagrantly this current administration intends to leverage the horror and sadness of 9/11 to turn America from a place of nonpanicky relatively calm defense into a seething pit-bull death squad of desultory military aggression, this announcement killed it for good.' SFC Wow. If this guy thinks what the US did to Iraq in '91 wasn't already at `seething pit-bull death squad of desultory military aggression' degree, batten down dem hatches ye dogs, we're in fer rough seas.
• Arab boycotts of US continue. I (I boycott Microsoft, personally. Djew hear the `trustworthy computing' company shipped virus-riddled software?)
• US gov't orders 350 000 potassium-iodide tablets, 20% more than the company made in all of 2000. `This is not directly related to the dirty-bomb incident.' CFN (Of course it isn't; `dirty' bombs have been pretty well debunked as a practical threat. But nuclear attacks remain real, and the US's new first-strike policy raises the risk all 'round. FYI IIRC, the tablets work on this theory: I is an element the body needs in some quantity (hence iodized table salt), but there is a radioactive isotope of I that is a common product of nuclear reactions, so to prevent that isotope being taken up the tablets are used to `flood' the body's I supply with stable isotope(s).
• 13? GWB speaks at OH State U, promoting `culture of service'—a combo of `do what we say' and `work for nothing.' The crowd was warned that protestors would be expelled and arrested, and `urged' to give a `thunderous' greeting. Y! It was said `expulsion' would include `denial of diploma' but the speaker's official capacity is unknown. There was a group (large?) that had agreed to turn their backs on GWB; at least some of those that did were hustled out and handed over to the SS for `disturbing the peace.' The crowd appears to have been planted with busloads of Shrub support (`fertiliser?'). DU (The Supertramp quote brought back memories—one of my teachers, Gr.—6 I bleeve, had us `study' some pop culture, and that song was one. I now wonder what her goal was…)
• 13: GWB (D. D. Eisenhawer Executive Office Bldg, 21st Century High Tech Forum): I remember campaigning and somebody said, would you ever deficit spend? I said, only if there was a war, or a recession, or a national emergency. [laughter] I didn't think we were going to get the trifecta. [laughter] WH
• Another `nice-sounding NGO,' the `Defense of Civilisation Fund,' is cranking out hatelit like this (PDF). Does this document make anyone else think of bookburnings, antiïntellectualism, etc. as promoted by most `totalitarians', the Nazis, China's 1st emperor, etc.?
• 14: GWB (Hyatt Regency, Houston TX, Texans for Rick Perry): You know, when I was one time campaigning in Chicago, a reporter said, would you ever have a deficit? And I said, I can't imagine it, but there would be one if we had a war, or a national emergency, or a recession. [laughter] Never did I dream we'd get the trifecta. [laughter] WH

  US bombs Iraq again. This article even owns up that the no-fly zones have nothing to do with the UN. BBC As was predictable, VHS begins to disappear. VB · WP (This isn't about Washington per sé but just a general US attitude. DVD wasn't created to improve the viewing experience, but to regain copy control; the improved quality and outlandish features were simply bait. Now that `consumers want DVD,' VHS will be killed off. Once HDTV is forced into every home, and a digital signal path established as far as the back of the CRT (if one is still used), analogue equipment will disappear—I figure inside five years.)

• US embassy in Karachi carbombed. India has motive, and can't be ruled out. BBC Neither can the US; although it's also possible they just can't stop thoroughly determined terrorists and need to rethink their strategy—ie remove the motivation for terrorism by ceasing to f*k around with other people's countries.
• Silly Powell misses the point. So what if the world demands evidence to justify a US preëmptive strike? The US is above the law. (Which is good for him, convicted of but never punished for war crimes.) And once the US has its missile shield up, noöne will be able to bring the US to justice. See also TI, which, incredibly, claims GWB admitted the world would want heavydense! And are we really to think the use of nukes is justified to stop someone carbombing a US embassy? Maybe I'm confusing the nuclear first-strike doctrine with this one; even so, the US feels it's justified attacking another country to stop someone within that country doing something to a US embassy in that country? Hello? It's US territory only to the embassy fence, bucko.
• GWB issues orders to `topple' Saddam. IHT · G · NYP · MSN · WP This gets quite a lot of coverage. (Although the US has never worried much about `toppling' people they didn't like, to be this open about it is scary. Who's next on the list? What kind of example does it set? This is one reason Shrubya rides around in a missile-proof luxury sedan-tank; his master were going to open the season on world heads and they need to keep their puppet alive as long as he's useful—up to 8 years, assuming he doesn't simply order away FDR's limits. (Another reason is that the military were planning a coup against Bush-crony Clinton to restore the Republic.))
• Things get nasty in Germany, Jews create Israel. Things get nasty in Israel, Jews return to Germany. G
• The US tries to get `peacekeepers' exempted from the ICC. ABC Why in the world should anyone, but especially peacekeepers, be exempt? (There's an interesting comment therein about the US `raising the ante' by refusing to participate in peacekeeping (PK) without this exemption. Chomsky commented once—I forget where, for now—that the US was never much wanted by the UN for PK anyway, possibly because of its (unique?) military rule of responding with overwhelming force to any attack. Furthermore, contrary to US claims of being the largest PK contributor, the US has long been way in arrears on UN dues. G&M So this may not be much of a raise. Nothing like a bunch of crooks used to writing their own rules wetting their pants about suddenly becoming subject to someone else's rules.)
• Tulare Co. CA is paying the unemployed to leave. WP I think they better take the offer before it changes to `march to a labour camp.'
• US gov't becomes emptor non grata at Home Depot. STL (I have no idea if that's Latin or not :)
• 15: Scott Shuger dies in `scuba-diving accident.' He `was the only mainstream or alternative media writer, beside [Mark Elsis], who had the courage to write about the elementary mathematical facts' that the USAF flew at about ¼ top speed on 9/11. 911T
• 16: Russell Mills, publisher of Ottawa Citizen, fired for an anti-Chrétien editorial. He'd refused an `offer' to resign and sign a confidentiality agreement. CanWest Global owns the Citizen. OS John O'Reilly: `No one here is responsible for the firing of any newspaper editor.' (Mills was publisher.) OS (I'm a bit confused; does Southam own CWG, or vice-versa?) Federal judge orders SC governor to permit the passage of `federal' P. She wrote `The harm that a blockade of plutonium shipments might present is obvious…An arguably peaceful blockade, therefore, presents a target of opportunity for those with less peaceful intentions.' X (Ya. So don't leave the s*t parked at the border if there's a blockade; or don't send it through SC. 'course that would set a bad example, woodnit—all the `federal' P would end up in DC since no state would pass it. Maybe it'd just be better not to accumulate the stuff?)
• 17: Antony Sutton dies. AS

  Someone contacts the FBI press office re The Nineteen, wanting to confirm that the names and faces have not been changed even though 7 are still alive and protesting innocence (and getting official apologies—see earlier). The operator gets `really pissed off' over this `extraneous stuff.' TRT Doreen Miller is correct about adding `just like us' to what the US says about `rogue' states. Saddam supposedly gassed his own people; Clinton did gas his own people. Saddam wants weapons of mass destruction; the US has heaps of WMD. Saddam blocks weapons inspections; the US blocks weapons inspections. The Nazis killed 60,000 in England in all WWII; the Allies killed 138,000 in Dresden in one day in WWII. Cuba has universal health care; the US tells you to empty your wallet then go home and die. (Okay, so her idea doesn't work in every case.)

• Mayor of Beijing uses an internet café fire as excuse to shut all internet café in his city. Only about 8% will be allowed to reopen. /.
• 18: My mother takes her first batch of Americans on tour for this season. She described them as `scared to death' of the situation at home—the state of education, the perpetual vague terror warnings, the likelihood of Washington's complicity in 9/11, their evaporating rights and freedoms, Shrubya's antagonistic foreign policy, etc. Hallelujah! Some are noticing the little man behind the curtain despite the media instruction and distraction!
• The EPA argues that toxic watse is good for fish; it drives them away from being caught by fishemen. No I'm not making this up. Rep. Radanovich (R CA): `[It's] like suggesting that we club baby seals to death to prevent them from being eaten by sharks. It's ludicrous.' WT
• Saddam may be thinking of handing over to son Qusay/Qusai. That'd put a wee spoke in the US' wheel. WND (The point of attacking Iraq is getting the oil; Saddam is just the excuse.) This would explain the possible carbombing on the 9th.
• Washington Post pulls a web fast one and invalidates NewsBytes URLs. Fortunately I have only three; unfortunately WebArchive's last recording was Jan 24. WA
• 19: `Lucy' gets 16 new items.

  Rep. Dan Burton: You mean to tell me since 1929 we've been using thimerosal and the only test that you know of is the one that was done in 1929, and every one of those people got meningitis and they all died? DW

• Another attempt to pin OKC on Arabs. 7 years on, and a year after the original prime scapegoat's been put out of reach, we're supposed to believe there're grand new revelations to be made of the case. None of this stuff was brought up at McVeigh's trial; at the very least, they're admitting capital justice in the US is a complete joke. MSNBC The last paragraph is almost an admission of extra devices. There were some, of course; there's compelling testimony WRH of fulminating-Hg residues and olive-drab canisters, consistent with military explosives, being removed from the building. (Furthermore, there's no testimony consistent with a huge ANFO bomb; no nitrates, no stench.)

  Interesting that they're trying to blame it on Iranians; how much oil does Iran have compared to Iraq? The Iraqis theory would be more convenient for going after the Ramaillah oil, but perhaps would be too embarassing to Bush crony Clinton, or too big a hint things aren't what The People have been told they are. The theory itself doesn't quite jibe with the military explosives and the Ryder truck at the nearby military base shortly before. Unless, there was a plot amongst these Iraqi transplants, and the US found out and decided to beat 'em to it planning to blame it on them, and it went somehow awry, and they had to content theyselfs with McVeigh. *shrug*

• FIrst 9/11 divorce filed. A guy with an office on a 103rd floor of the WTC spent the morning at his GF's apartment with his phone switched off, and he wasn't watching TV either. When he turned his phone back on at about 11am, it immediately rang and his hysterical wife asked, `Are you OK? Where are you?' He said, `Whaddya mean? I'm in my office!' [WRH, unspecified paper]
• 20: Small plane from MA, eventually announced to have simply been lost, circles restricted DC airspace and causes the Whitehouse to be evacuated…except for GWB, who bravely stayed at his post. BBC Sounds like a publicity stunt.
• The Homeland Security bill has a clause denying the `whistleblower' protections to those who'd point out gov't snafus and fubars. WT
• Hallelujah! There are some brave souls down there with the scientific honesty to face and the guts to teach how things really are. FTW
• US start collecting troops in Turkey for moving on Iraq. Turkey expects to be hosting 27000 US troops by August. US has decided on military ops by September. [FPP citing Yeni Safak]
• Ottawa authorises the military and RCMP to jam radio (incl cellphone) during the G8 summit and the Pope's visit. G&M Probably to disrupt protestors and reporters as much as anything. As /. asked, when someone dies 'cause the emergency radio was knocked out, who's gonna take the fall?
• Mike Batt is sued for copyright violation of Cage's 4'33". The track of silence on Planets' album is only 60" long; which movement of 4'33" is he alleged to have nicked? Are the rest of us now in trouble if we have a minute's silence on Remembrance Day?
• 21: Jihad Unspun tallies up coalition losses in Afghanistan since Oct 21 as, at minumum, 968 dead and 676 injured. JU Israel mows down a crowd at a Jenin bread line with machine guns and tank shells. Y! They found a great way to deal with those `ten-year-olds strapped with dynamite;' blow 'em away with US tanks. LT Israeli spokesperson says it was a booboo, so sowwy. BBC (Yokay. Talk's cheep. Put yer money where yer mouth is; pay reparations. Fact is, disposing of the children is what Sharon planned for half a century.)

  Federal judge Robert M. Takasugi rules 1996 antiterror law that underpins the Lindh case `unconstitutional on its face.' MH

  Babwa takes a bweak from The View to wedwess the Iswaeli spies that won't go away. AW · ABC · WRH

  FBI debunks the Nevada man's claim that his cell phone picked up Arabic plans for a terror attack. ABC Duh. He just happens to pick up a signal which just happens to be this plotting by terrorists so fool as to use broadcast instead of private communications, and he just happens to speak Arabic to boot.

• Blair gov't scandalously refuses to give any support to fuel-cell vehicles—even though the initiative is from a mainstream carmaker, BMW; even though the `Royal Commission on Environmental Pollution wants a 60% reduction in Britain's carbon emissions by 2050' and the `Carbon Trust, a government-funded body that promotes low-carbon technology, has advised ministers that to meet this target they should ensure that hydrogen is widely used to power cars by 2025' and February advice from Blair's chief science advisor to ban the sale of fossil-fueled cars à la Lombardy, Italy. [X quoting London Times Apr 22] I
• Iran, insulted at the `axis of evil' BS even though it quietly supported anti-Taliban movements in Afghanistan, is opposed to a US move agin Iraq but plans to remain `neutral.' FT
• Brazil's economy seems to be coming apart. FT Mexico's isn't too good either; thie finance minister compared it to Argentina. FT
• It's becoming obvious why women `had to' be kept subservient for so long: they're smarter. Or more ambitious. More than half this year's US college graduates are female. WP (Some female Canadian politician had a comment that went like, `for a woman to get ahead, she has to be twice as capable as a man; fortunately this is not difficult.')
• 7 min to midnight. Right back where we started. BAS
• `Noted' Royal Bank analyst puts his suspicions of Au-price fixing in print. GATA loves him for it; Royal disavows the report. Globe & Mail tries to spin it as an X-File, perhaps ignoring that the US may be running out of Au to dump to do the fixing. G&M · M Purported copy of the report.
• The US is running out of Ag.
• Fanning the terror fires may be backfiring: even with likely loaded questions and fiddled figures, polls show only 1/3 of Americans think the war is being won; half think it's a stalemate. USAT
• GWB claims to be `very pleased' with the `positive response' of world leaders to his `plan' for the Mideast. FT Say what? the only one he didn't piss off was Israel.
• 25: Ruppert and Chossudovski make presentation at U of Calgary event sponsored by the Canadian gov't. Even though there are supposedly no visa requirements for Americans in Canada, Ruppert's passport was checked on entry and marked that he has to leave tomorrow. FTW

  China condemns 14 and promptly executes 9 for drug trafficking. NCAU Now ponder this. The US is one of the top nations/states for capital punishment/judicial murder. It executes child criminals; it executes the mentally incompetent; it executes accomplices while releasing the trigger-pullers. GWB himself holds the record as Guber of the Most Executions. Yet the US has not made drug trafficking a capital offense. If you still have doubts powers-that-be in the US are funding themselves on drugs, chew that one over. (Do not construe this as a pro-capital-punishment argument on my part. Too many mistakes are made in `justice' systems, and saying `whoops, sorry' to a judicial murder victim just doesn't cut it. The next innocent person strapped down could be you.)

• 26: FBI raids 13 Toledo-area residences and steals 23 computers. The accused had allegedly `stolen' something that was sent to their house—bandwidth that had been limited only by software in the modems in their posession. They had figured out how to remove the limit. This is like prosecuting people who use 90A of a 100A electric service. What's worse, since the heavydense is a software patch, who can prove the FBI didn't apply the change after they stole your modem as a face-saver? TB (Um, come to think of it, whence got I this `software patch' idea? That may not be true—nevertheless, it's obviously a change that's relatively easy to do, and thus an undue temptation.) (And why steal the computers if the alterations are to the modems? If not merely 'cause they were there for the grabbing, is it because the change has to be applied every time the connection is established? That would mean a software alteration. And that would mean the modem was built to trust the client; what kind of fool builds a vending machine that dispenses goods on the client's word that the money went in? These things should check with the office before accelerating. If this service was built as an on-your-honour system, they should not be able to call in the taxpayers' police when it backfires.)

  A federal appeals court rules the present Pledge of Allegiance unconstitutional. There is general apparent outrage although the problematic two words were added less than 50 years ago. CNN · CBS It's probably another manufactured hubbub. There're the obvious squawks about `what about the money?' Well, the founding fathers didn't put `In God we Trust' on the money; it was added to the coin during the Civil War. And the currency used now is a fiat paper scam created in 1913 for the benefit of foreigners, (which didn't bear the claim until 1957) and unlikely to be much good in a year or two. (Some figure it won't last the week but I'm hedging the bet a bit.) Trust in God is about the only thing backing it, so pulling it off the money might be a bad thing after all.

  WorldCom `uncovers suspected G$3.8 fraud in its books', fires CFO, loses 88% of stock value; other stocks, markets, and the buck slips despite, for instance, the Japanese effort to weaken the yen. FT · FT · NCAU Shrub vows to investigate—it's not an oil company after all, but evil communications, and people are obviously doing far too much of that. G&M When one company has this much effect, it's time to get outta stocks, people. Go buy Au; as garontees go in this racket, it's the one thing garonteed not to lose in the long run. (Wildass Prediction: we'll find out this revelation was deliberately timed to distract from the G8 summit.) Arthur Anderson also did WorldCom's books. [ATV] There are fears WorldCom's demise will damage the Internet; `±40% of internet traffic uses WorldCom at some point.' BBC So what happened to the network that supposed to be able to route around such holes? I said years ago a commercialised 'net was a fragile 'net, since you can only route around a hole if there are redundant routes, and redundancy eats into profits, and thus anathema to commercial mentality. The BBC article: `worst-case scenario could include major hold-ups for manufacturing around the world, thanks to today's just in time stockkeeping.' JITing is one form of this redundancy reduction. It works fine when everything else works fine; but everything else works fine very little of the time. See some of James Burke's pieces—Day the Universe Changed; Connections—that show what a wobbly house of cards is our modern world.

  Kushner addressing Vasser: `If you meant to invite me, and let's proceed from that assumption, then you wanted a playwright; and I have to say what a strange choice, what with Gabriel blowing his trumpet and the Book of Revelation unfolding seal by seal and all. It's as if you'd been warned of years of calamity and famine ahead and in response you anxiously stuffed an after-dinner mint in your pocket. You should have gotten the British Tony Kushner, or maybe Condoleezza Rice, who is I believe actually mentioned in the Book of Revelation—I know Stanford University is mentioned, I know her boss is mentioned, I know John Ashcroft features prominently, and not pleasantly, with batwings and horns, really, you can look it up…evil will sit there, carefully chewing pretzels and fondly flipping through the scrapbook reminiscing about the 131 people he executed when he was governor…' V

• US Justice is toe-to-toe with a chunk of rock in plastic. Seriously. `Lucite ball containing lunar material' is the official defendant. CNN They can waste time with this crap, but an investigation into 9/11 would be a drain of resources from the `War on Terror'?
• Seems there're now eight of the alleged hijackers known to still be alive. Müller even publicly admitted in Sept, twice, that there's no legal case. WM
• Amazon.ca opens for bizniz. There is much toodoo that the Canadian retail-book sector is already jammed; but that's not the real problem. Amazon is a great way to spy on people's reading habits—even better than the existing online bookstores, because Amazon is well-stocked and feature-rich yet standards-compliant.* Amazon.com has (almost certainly) been doing that job for Washington, and Ottawa wants in.

  *Chapters, for instance, would always dump me to a page saying I must enable cookies, even when my cookies were enabled. Chapters would not even test for cookies until—swear to God—it had decided I couldn't handle 'em. It went by the user-agent string. On the other hand, Amazon properly tests for cookies and uses them if available, yet does not insist on them.

  Amazon reported a loss of M$24 last quarter, less than expected. No word on whether it's been inflating its books. CBC

• Trading in Martha Stewart is almost to IPO levels; value is lowest ever. CBC
• Ramp to the Cat ferry in Yarmouth NS drops 30m. Apparently the damn thing was held up with a couple of cables and no counterweight. You can't even build a simple elevator that way anymore! The very cables that failed had undergone `maintenance' the day before.
• The Wintel axis of evil has come up with a devilishly clever way to kill the GPL (and thus Linux) and regain a lot of control of the 'net. FAQ I'm gonna have to buy up a bunch of old PCs. `Palladium transforms Internet from Wild West to suburban neighborhood' WTT complete with gov't spies, `mild urban warfare,' gangland shootouts, date rape, door–door salescritturs and evangelists…traffic lights…surveillance cameras… Rivero contends that the `Wild' West is actually an erroneous meme; that things like the gunfight at the OK corral are remembered because of their rarity. The meme was created by western industrialists such as Edison (of the first `movie' cameras and movie studios, in NJ; and who drove independant filmmakers right out of the east to `Hollywoodland' with his iron fist) who wanted to scare their labourers and tenants out of moving west (`Go west, young man'—Greely) to the fresh air and their own homes. (A plausible theory.)
• 27: Scaremongers warn that Islamics are gonna hit a nuke plant on Jooly 4th. AB (Maybe they'll fool everyone and hit two days early on the true anniversary.) The target named is Three-Mile Island. Rivero suggests that's because it's an old, crippled plant due for demolition anyway. I suggest it's because TMI already has a scary meme attached, whereas the names of the other hundred US nuke plants (eg Idaho Falls, Lagoona Beach, Brown's Ferry, TVA Sequoya I) have a meme of `huh? where?' If it was Canada, they'd use Chalk River. Besides, Oyster Creek near Atlantic City NJ has released 3–5× as much badstuff as TMI. GSP

  In fact, it's Israelis that have been caught with plans of nuclear plants. HA · G · NC2k · MHS

• GWB ignores the advice of those who actually know what they're talking about—people who've been there, done that—and ordered up an Iraq invasion for August. London's horrified. `If the Americans go in August or September they'll be stuffed because of the heat. The minimum temperatures are around 40°[C]' The Brits want to know the justification and at the moment it looks as though it's purely down to settling an old score for Daddy. [JR quoting GT]
• 28: Xerox finds a G$2 overstatement. Or is it G$6? TIL · FT

  The report on the bombing of four Canadians decides to lay the blame on the pilots, even though they had been ordered to dope up and shut up. The public version of the report is censored. McCollum says he thinks Canadians will agree we don't want information released that would put our people in danger. Hello? We've already been put in and suffered danger, and we're supposed to be getting out in a few weeks. Will we get an uncensored version then? Or are will the truth continue to hide from the people who are paying for all this?

  The [ream of unprintables] pissant petty pawnbrokers of power, the Utility Review Board of Nova Scotia—in the persons of David Almon, Roland Deveau, and Wayne Cochrane—completely ignore the evidence, common sense, and the people's will and convert the village of Chester into a town. This is now in its own section.

• Speed of Dollar's fall is worrying. R
• George Soros, who made his billions running a hedge fund which speculated against weak currencies, warns that the US$ could lose 1/3 its value the next few years. `Soros has been an increasingly vocal critic of global capitalism, calling for more regulation and warning that the greatest dangers now came from the US.' He has a low opinion of what he calls `market fundamentalism,' the US attitude that markets are best left alone. He contends that markets are unstable, skating among `excesses' rather than heading to an equilibrium. BBC Rex Murphy, who makes his thousands scowling for CBC, says globalisation's a wonderful thing and the US is okay. CBC Now, who ya gonna believe?
• 30: The Scottish Sunday Mail tries out a very feeble story of a Royal Scot poisoned by an Iraq dirtybomb in the Gulf War. `A government-backed laboratory discovered the [uranium] in Shaun's blood and confirmed it could only have come from tyrant Saddam Hussein's nuclear arsenal.' SM U atoms do not come stamped with a makers' mark. 12 years on there is no way to distinguish this U coming from an alleged Iraqi dirty bomb or from the up to 800 Gg of U known to have been used in that war by the US and UK.

  This poor sod—assuming he's not a fiction—is as likely to have been poisoned by Britain's own shoddy nuke-waste storage. Remember Feynman's story about finding Oak Ridge storing its carboys of U-oxide solutions in big piles in adjacent rooms, risking a runaway reaction? (Imagine the irradiation the workers must've been getting.) Apparently Britian is storing its nuclear waste just about the same way. G

• The Land of the Free 2.1 million adult prisoners, 2.8% more than one year ago. The report did not count all juvenile offenders, which if included in the past would have driven the nation's inmate population over the 2-million mark years ago. (That's 4¾ per thousand population.) [CNN citing Bureau of Justice Statistics]

Odds & Ends

World Union of Jewish Students: `People tend to believe the first thing they hear about a certain issue, and filter subsequent information they hear based on their current beliefs. Once people believe something, it is hard to convince them that they were wrong in the first place.'

DU: Which is easier to believe: That the laws of physics which have governed objects in motion since the big bang were suspended for a few seconds on a single afternoon in Dallas 39 years ago to allow a single, mediocre marksman to kill a president? Or that there was another rifleman? … Which is easier to believe: That the world's mightiest military power, along with an unparalleled national security and intelligence apparatus, failed to predict, interdict or even put up a decent fight against the most deadly attack in this country's modern history? Or that people in high places put out the word to stand down and let it happen?

Scathing commentary on Enron et al. Enron intends to scrape up M$140 to retain `key' employees, probably the bookcookers and shredder jocks.

Yesh Gvul

Israel tortures children. [original PDF; bandwidth- and lowtech-friendly HTML] See also DCI's A Generation Denied

There is proof that Manifest Destiny never died, and that those who squall against global government actually squall only against non-US global government. United States International

1994 and 2001: Iraq twice offers Abdul Rahman Yasin to the US; the FBI has him on their most-wanted-terrorists list. The US refuses. The FBI drove him home after his questioning and he fled to Iraq, who locked him up without charge. BBC

Jewish antiZionists: Neturei Karta; Central Rabbinical Congress of the USA & Canada.

Jews not too keen on the bloodlust of Zionism: Shalom Achshav Jews for Justice for Palestinians

Zionist `pamphlet' on dealing with the media

[note to self: look into Long Term Capital Management] [ditto: IO re IM] [and Schumann Resonance 0.o] [read and possibly HTMLise this PDF] [look up Western State Terrorism, edited by Alex George (Routledge, 1991)] [read Whiteout: the CIA, Drugs and the Press] [translate]

Enron had 692 Cayman subsidiaries. What, were they diversifying to coconut oil? `We have a situation where an offshore tax haven is being more transparent and accountable to the American people than the very man whom the American people approximately elected president.' NS