In the Months Before 9/11, Justice Department Curtailed Highly Classified Program to Monitor Al Qaeda Suspects in the U.S
Newsweek Press Release- 3/21/04
Newsweek has learned that in the months before 9/11, the U.S. Justice Department curtailed a highly classified program called "Catcher's Mitt" to monitor Al Qaeda suspects in the United States, after a federal judge severely chastised the FBI for improperly seeking permission to wiretap terrorists. During the Bush administration's first few months in office, Attorney General John Ashcroft downgraded terrorism as a priority, choosing to place more emphasis on drug trafficking and gun violence, report Investigative Correspondent Michael Isikoff and Assistant Managing Editor Evan Thomas in the March 29 issue of Newsweek (on newsstands Monday, March 22).
The Sins of September 11
By William Rivers Pitt, t r u t h o u t - 10/13/03
Clinton wanted to attack the financial underpinnings of the al-Qaeda network by banning American companies and individuals from dealing with foreign banks and financial institutions that al Qaeda was using for its money-laundering operations. Texas Senator Phil Gramm, chairman of the Banking Committee, killed Clinton's bill on this matter and called it "totalitarian." In fact, he was compelled to kill the bill because his most devoted patrons, the Enron Corporation and its criminal executives in Houston, were using those same terrorist financial networks to launder their own dirty money and rip off the Enron stockholders.
White House Approved Departure of Saudis After Sept. 11, Ex-Aide Says
By Eric Lichtblau, New york Times - 10/4/03
Top White House officials personally approved the evacuation of dozens of influential Saudis, including relatives of Osama bin Laden, from the United States in the days after the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks when most flights were still grounded, a former White House adviser said today.
This War on Terrorism is Bogus
By Michael Meacher, The Guardian - 9/6/03
The 9/11 attacks gave the US an ideal pretext to use force to secure its global domination
Massive attention has now been given - and rightly so - to the reasons why Britain went to war against Iraq. But far too little attention has focused on why the US went to war, and that throws light on British motives too. The conventional explanation is that after the Twin Towers were hit, retaliation against al-Qaida bases in Afghanistan was a natural first step in launching a global war against terrorism. Then, because Saddam Hussein was alleged by the US and UK governments to retain weapons of mass destruction, the war could be extended to Iraq as well. However this theory does not fit all the facts. The truth may be a great deal murkier.
Republican Enviros Blast Bush for Withholding Information
Environment News Service (ENS) - 7/3/03
Withholding of vital environmental information is getting to be a bad habit with the Bush administration, REP America, the national grassroots organization of Republicans for environmental protection, said today.
Bush Lauds Michigan Power Plant As Model of Clean Air Policy
By Dana Milbank, Washington Post Staff Writer - 10/16/03
But Opponents Say It's a Polluter Excused by 'Clear Skies' Plan. Everyone agrees the Detroit Edison power plant here, which President Bush visited today, is a model -- but of what? Bush came to demonstrate how, under his policies, power plants could be expanded and upgraded without any increase in air pollution. He said Monroe is a "living example" of why the administration this summer eased clean-air rules for the nation's oldest, coal-fired power plants -- allowing the plant to modernize and "continue doing a good job of protecting the quality of the air."
9/11 Commission Says U.S. Agencies Slow Its Inquiry
By Philip Shenon, The New York Times
The federal commission investigating the Sept. 11 terror attacks said today that its work was being hampered by the failure of executive branch agencies, especially the Pentagon and the Justice Department, to respond quickly to requests for documents and testimony.
Bombings Bring U.S. 'Executive Mercenaries' Into the Light
By William D. Hartung, LA Times - 5/16/03
The shrouded history of Vinnell Corp. raises questions about its role in privatization of U.S. foreign policy. You had probably never heard of the Vinnell Corp. before the brutal bombing that killed at least nine of its employees in Saudi Arabia this week, but you should have.
Undercutting the 9/11 Inquiry
By Editorial/Op-Ed, The New York Times - 3/31 2003
It's hard to believe that everything related to the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks will not get the most thorough public scrutiny possible. But the federal investigative committee so reluctantly supported by the White House now seems in danger of being undermined. As the first hearings open in Manhattan today, committee members are chagrined to be going hat in hand to Congress for adequate financing. White House assurances led them to believe needed funds would be included in the supplemental war budget sent to the Capitol last week. But the commission's $11 million request was not there.
Soldiers of Fortune 500
By John Powers, Los Angeles Weekly - 4/4/03
Several days after Fox News began accusing anti-war protesters of betraying our troops, yet before that network's Geraldo Rivera got bounced by the 101st Airborne for revealing its movements, a friend called from the East Coast. He began ranting about how the war coverage was being distorted by military analysts — from lucid ABC zombie Tony Cordesman to CNN's politically ambitious General Wesley Clark — who would never talk honestly about U.S. policy. "Watching TV," he growled, "you'd think that everybody in America worked for the Defense Department."
US Arms Group Heads for Lisbon
By Carolyn Koo, The Portugal News - 4/4/03
Directors of one of the world’s largest armament companies are planning on meeting in Lisbon in three weeks time. The American based Carlyle Group is heavily involved in supplying arms to the Coalition forces fighting in the Iraqi war. It also holds a majority of shares in the Seven Up company and Federal Data Corporation, supplier of air traffic control surveillance systems to the US Federal Aviation Authority. The 12 billion dollar company has recently signed contracts with United Defense Industries to equip the Turkish and Saudi Arabian armies with aviation Defense systems.
A Note From Hunter S. Thompson
From "Kingdom Of Fear " 2003
Let's face it, the yo-yo president of the U.S.A. knows nothing. He is a dunce. He does what he is told to do, says what he is told to say, poses the way he is told to pose. He is a fool.
Cheney & Halliburton: Go Where the Oil Is
By Kenny Bruno and Jim Valette, Multinational Monitor magazine - May 2001
Probably the most entertaining exchange in the vice-presidential debate last year occurred when Joe Lieberman, referring to the millions of dollars Dick Cheney had made as CEO of Halliburton Co., noted that Cheney was considerably "better off" than he had been eight years earlier.
Halliburton, Dick Cheney, and Wartime Spoils
By Lee Drutman and Charlie Cray, CommonDreams.org - 4/3/03
When Defense Policy Board chairman Richard Perle revealed that he was getting $725,000 to help Global Crossing navigate the national security issues surrounding the sale of its assets, the press jumped all over Perle, and rightly so. There was indeed something fishy about the chairman of a board that advises the Pentagon making that kind of money to help a company that was having problems with national security issues. Perle is also on the board of Onset Technology, the leading provider of message conversion technology and a major supplier to Bechtel - one of the leading candidates for rebuilding the Iraqi infrastructure.
NYC pensions target Halliburton, Conoco business in Iran
Houston Business Journal - 4/4/03
New York City's pension fund chief said on he wants a review of Halliburton Co., ConocoPhillips and General Electric Co. operations in countries that sponsor "terror," such as Iran and Syria, Reuters reported on Monday.
War Could Be Big Business for Halliburton
By Carolyn Koo, Reuters - 3/23/03
When it comes to making money from awar in Iraq, few can match the firepower of the company once headed by Vice President Dick Cheney.
Opium Trade Thriving in Democratic Afghanistan - U.N.
By Thalif Deen, Inter Press Service, 2/4/2003
UNITED NATIONS - Despite the establishment of a democratic government and the presence of a 4,800-strong international peacekeeping force in Kabul, the cultivation of opium is continuing unabated in Afghanistan, a new U.N. study concludes.
Meet the New Boss
By Matthew Callan, FreezerBox.com - 1/17/2003
On the surface, Kean is everything Kissinger is not. Surface is all that really matters, of course, since Bush shows little interest in going any deeper than that in his 9/11 probe. The administration waited well over a year to begin convening its investigation, and it has placed prohibitive and arcane strictures on the commission, such as requiring that any criminal subpoenas must be approved by six of the ten committee members. And when the time came to appoint a committee chair, a wanted war criminal was Bush's first choice: a man who will no longer leave the country for fear of being whisked off to the Hague, Milosevic-style.
Sean Penn's Open Letter to President Bush
By Sean Penn, Published in the Washington Post - 1/19/2003
The following article was written by actor Sean Penn as an open letter to President Bush.
The United States of America has Gone Mad
By John le Carre, TimesOnline UK - 1/15/2003
America has entered one of its periods of historical madness, but this is the worst I can remember: worse than McCarthyism, worse than the Bay of Pigs and in the long term potentially more disastrous than the Vietnam War.
Why I'm Fighting Federal Drug Laws From City Hall
By Christopher Krohn, Mayor of Santa Cruz, California - 9/21/2002
How did I, a mayor of a small town in California, wind up in a tug of war with the Drug Enforcement Agency? This week, I stood in front of Santa Cruz's city hall as a local group that provides medical marijuana went about its weekly task of distributing the drug to the sick and dying.
World Bank's New Poverty Strategy Assessed
By Jim Lobe, OneWorld US - 9/27/2002
While the World Bank's three-year-old anti-poverty strategy has prompted low-income countries to pay more attention to the problems faced by their impoverished populations, it has so far failed to permit a broader questioning of the economic policies long favored by the Bank and its sister institution, the International Monetary Fund (IMF), according to a new report by a prominent development think-tank.
The Pot War Boiling
By William F. Buckley Jr. - 10/29/02
As often as not, democracy sucks. But on the question of marijuana laws, the good sense of the people is doing yeoman work. Time magazine explores the marijuana question in a cover story, which ends by saying that in America, "politics has leaped well ahead of the science, meaning voters will decide long before physicians whether medical marijuana is an oxymoron."
The Enemy Within
By Gore Vidal - 10/27/02
Gore Vidal is America’s most controversial writer and a ferocious, often isolated, critic of the Bush administration. Here, against a backdrop of spreading unease about America’s response to the events of 11 September 2001 and their aftermath, we publish Vidal’s remarkable personal polemic urging a shocking new interpretation of who was to blame.
The Bin Ladens’ Great Escape:
How the U.S. helped Osama's family leave the country after 9/11.
By Byron York, National Review Online - 9/11/02
Bill Carter, the FBI spokesman, is adamant. "We were given full access to the individuals on that plane," he says, "and we were satisfied that we did not believe any of those individuals had anything to do with the 9/11 plots."
The plane to which Carter refers was an aircraft chartered by the Saudi government in the days after the terrorist attacks. The individuals were two dozen members of Osama bin Laden's extended family who had been living in the United States. Saying they were afraid that family members might suffer retribution in the U.S., the Saudis asked for American assistance in getting them out of the country.
Iraq Report Cited by Bush Does Not Exist:
Agency Disavows Report on Iraq Arms
By Joseph Curl, The Washington Times - 9/27/02
The International Atomic Energy Agency says that a report cited by President Bush as evidence that Iraq in 1998 was "six months away" from developing a nuclear weapon does not exist. "There's never been a report like that issued from this agency," Mark Gwozdecky, the IAEA's chief spokesman, said yesterday in a telephone interview from the agency's headquarters in Vienna, Austria.
Mad ambitions: Why Bush's "National Security Strategy" is wrong, wrong, wrong
By Ann Rose Thomas, The Online Journal - 10/3/02
It's called "The National Security Strategy of the United States," but a more appropriate name would be "The National Security Strategy of the United States Empire." The document detailing the Bush administration's national security policy may well be the single most frightening document I have ever read. It is, as Geov Parrish of WorkingforChange puts it, "28 pages of arrogance that answer better than Osama himself ever could the question of Why They Hate Us."
The Troubling New Face of America
By President Jimmy Carter - 9/5/02
Fundamental changes are taking place in the historical policies of the United States with regard to human rights, our role in the community of nations and the Middle East peace process -- largely without definitive debates (except, at times, within the administration). Some new approaches have understandably evolved from quick and well-advised reactions by President Bush to the tragedy of Sept. 11, but others seem to be developing from a core group of conservatives who are trying to realize long-pent-up ambitions under the cover of the proclaimed war against terrorism.
War is a Racket
By Major General Smedley Butler, Forum magazine, September, 1934
WAR is a racket. It always has been. It is possibly the oldest, easily the most profitable, surely the most vicious. It is the only one international in scope. It is the only one in which the profits are reckoned in dollars and the losses in lives.
The Last Defender of the American Republic?: An interview with Gore Vidal
By Marc Cooper, LA Weekly - 7/3/02
He might be America's last small-r republican. Gore Vidal, now 76, has made a lifetime out of critiquing America's imperial impulses and has -- through two dozen novels and hundreds of essays -- argued tempestuously that the U.S. should retreat back to its more Jeffersonian roots, that it should stop meddling in the affairs of other nations and the private affairs of its own citizens.
