Fake News

Presidential Campaign Enters the Silly Season

dlindorff — Mon, 06 Oct 2008 09:12:11 -0400

By Dave Lindorff

I’ve been getting some emails that refer to Barack Obama as a
“Manchurian Candidate,” a guy who is somehow hiding a secret radical
and/or Muslim jihadist agenda that will burst forth if he’s elected
president. There is a certain idiot factor at work here, since if Obama
were a closet Weatherman, who somehow learned of and adopted that 1960s
college dropout organzation’s creed at the tender age of 8, it would
have clashed badly with any Muslim teaching he might have picked up as
a student in an Indonesian public school at the same time (he attended
an Indonesian public schoolfrom the age of 6 to 8 before transferring
to a Catholic-run institution).

But since some low-wattage and conspiracy-minded people seem ready
to believe this kind of stuff, let’s consider John McCain’s early
background, and the possibility of his being a Manchurian Candidate
too. Fair’s fair, right?

Okay. McCain, it turns out, was actually born outside the US, in
the Panama Canal Zone, which in 1936 was territory leased from Panama.
His father, a Navy officer, was stationed there with his wife at the
time of McCain’s birth. Now it’s a safe bet that McCain was largely
raised—fed, diapered, and spoken to—at that age by a local Panamian
woman. That’s what, after all, you do when you are an elite officer and
the wife of an elite officer in a foreign country where low-wage help
is abundant. Who knows what subversive ideologies were poured into the
young McCain’s tender ears at that vulnerable period of his life by his
Panamanian nurse? Maybe that would explain McCain’s support for an
amnesty program for immigrants from Latin America a few years back.
Does he have a secret agenda to throw open the doors of America to
Latin American immigrants once in the White House?

And worse yet, maybe his Panamian amah was a Marxist! Lord knows
that Central America in the mid-1930s was a hotbed of revolution. The
dreaded Augusto Sandino had only just been executed in Nicaragua, just
north of the Zone, two years before McCain’s birth, following a bloody
guerrilla war against US Marines, and the region was full of bitter and
vengeful nationalist and Marxist revolutionaries bent on throwing the
US out of Latin America. Could his nurse have been one of these people,
whispering and implanting the language of liberation into the young
boy’s still unformed mind, ready to spring to life once he assumed high
office in Washington?

Then we turn to McCain’s prisoner of war days in the hands of the
North Vietnamese. Certainly his mind was weak and vulnerable to
control. While many of McCain’s fellow POWs endured five, six or more
years of torture without cracking, he is said to have begun spilling
secrets and agreeing to broadcast anti-American propaganda statements
after only four days of torture shortly after his capture. We also know
that the Communists had a sophisticated system of mind control
developed, which was shared among the Communist nations of the USSR,
China, North Korea and North Vietnam. Were these techniques applied to
the captive McCain, and did they leave him after five long years of
captivity robotically programmed to seek and win the presidency, only
then to launch a campaign of sabotage to soften America up for
Communist takeover?

This prospect seems much more likely than that some Muslim teacher got to Obama in his grammar school in Indonesia.

Actually, I find the Obama Manchurian Candidate theory much weaker
than the McCain Manchurian Candidate theory, just based upon my own
experience. I was, after all, put through some serious indoctrination
by my own family. My parents sent me to Sunday School at the local
Congregational Church, from the age of six to the age of about 11. I
can still remember the earnest parent volunteers teaching us all the
nonsense about the earth being formed in six days, about Adam and Eve,
the burning bush, the parting of the Red Sea, the Virgin birth (What
was a virgin, I wondered? They wouldn’t say…), and the crucifixion and
resurrection. None of it stuck. Despite the indoctrinators’ best
efforts, I left Sunday School an atheist and remain one today. The only
thing I really learned in Sunday School was how to smoke—something a
number of us learned together while skipping class and hiding out in
the church attic. Is Christian dogma that much weaker that it can fail
to impress a young mind while Muslim dogma can take a firm hold in an
even shorter time? What an insult to Christianity!

My daughter too, is testimony to the limits of early childhood
propaganda efforts. At the age of 7, we brought her to Shanghai, China,
where for a year, she attended first grade in a local Chinese public
school. She learned excellent Chinese there, but though there was
considerable indoctrination in Maoist theory, with special focus on the
life of the young Mao and also of the selfless workers’ hero Lei Feng
(they actually had one daily class called “Loving the Country class”
and most other subjects had a propaganda aspect), and though she also
attended a fifth grade Chinese public school when we returned to China
a few years later, for a stay in Xi’an, at 24 she is hardly a Commie or
a Maoist, I’m sure though, that should she someday decide to run for
president, some of the same people who suspect Obama of being a closet
Muslim terrorist will say she harbors secret Communist sentiments from
her early school years.

Such is the state of some American minds.
__________________
DAVE LINDORFF is a Philadelphia-based journalist and columnist. HIs
latest book is "The Case for Impeachment" (St. Martin's Press, 2006 and
now available in paperback edition). His work is available at www.thiscantbehappening.net

digg_url = 'http://www.afterdowningstreet.org/node/36666';
digg_title = "Presidential Campaign Enters the Silly Season";
digg_bodytext = "By Dave Lindorff\r\n\r\n I’ve been getting some emails that refer to Barack Obama as a “Manchurian Candidate,” a guy who is somehow hiding a secret radical and/or Muslim jihadist agenda that will burst forth if he’s elected president. There is a certain idiot factor at work here, since if Obama were a closet Weatherman, who somehow learned of and adopted that 1960s college dropout organzation’s creed at the tender age of 8, it would have clashed badly with any Muslim teaching he might have picked up as a student in an Indonesian public school at the same time (he attended an Indonesian public schoolfrom the age of 6 to 8 before transferring to a Catholic-run institution).\r\n\r\n But since some low-wattage and conspiracy-minded people seem ready to believe this kind of stuff, let’s consider John McCain’s early background, and the possibility of his being a Manchurian Candidate too. Fair’s fair, right? \r\n\r";
digg_skin = 'standard';

McClellan: We Fed Fox News Lies & Talking Points

US_Veteran — Sun, 27 Jul 2008 20:59:24 -0400

We already knew that Fox was nothing but a theater of WH puppets

Fair and Balanced.. I'm trying not to laugh

Media

batchphile — Fri, 21 Mar 2008 09:29:57 -0400

In light of the media’s inability to report responsibly on the most pressing issues of our day – the Iraq war, the economy, illegal activities of the Bush Administration, climate change, etc. – I propose a one-day mass media boycott on April 1st. This includes all television, radio and print media. Economically, this may not impact them much, but it may serve to suggest our unity in dissatisfaction with their efforts and behaviors and – who knows? – if this proves fairly easy, we might consider a longer boycott!

SWIFT BOATING BARACK

mikekohr — Sun, 13 Jan 2008 23:24:57 -0500

It's began.

I received my first e-mail blast claiming Barack Obama is both a radical Muslim and a radical Christain.

This widely distributed E-mail blast has been debunked and discredited by, Newsweek http://www.newsweek.com/id/91424 , NBC MSN, the Urban Legends website, and many other reputable organizations. It is a smear that attempts to claim that Obama is a radical Muslim and a radical Christen at the same time. Both claims can not be right, although both could be and are untrue.

It is unclear as to who or where this has originated. Some have pointed the finger at the Clinton campaign, others at right-wing attempts to :"Swift-Boat," Obama by telling outrageous lies.

"Thou shall not bear false witness against they neighbor." -GOD-

If you receive this message it is imcombant on you, in order to avoid the eternal hellfire of damnation, to immediately "reply to all," that sent you this crap.

Moderator's Note: Donation request removed as it violates the Rules of Democrats.com.

mike kohr
Chairman of the Bureau County ObamaManiacs

Welcome to the Jungle: US Military Psychological Operations and You

Heather Wokusch — Sun, 12 Aug 2007 09:28:41 -0400

"...the people shall become so corrupted as to need despotic Government, being incapable of any other." - Benjamin Franklin, 1787

They say that if you drop a frog into a pot of boiling water it will immediately jump out, but that if you raise the pot's heat gradually, the frog won't react.

The US public has been on a slow boil since 2001. This administration's rollbacks have been so consistent and so egregious that it's no surprise many Americans feel apathetic.

And that begs the question: What exactly would it take to get the US public spurred into action?

Sentient World Simulation (SWS) may have an answer. It's a computer-based project designed to "generate alternative futures" and no surprise, the US Defense Department is actively involved.

According to one of the project's developers, Purdue University professor Alok Chaturvedi, "SWS will consist of a synthetic environment that mirrors the real world in all it key aspects - Political, Military, Economic, Social, Information, and Infrastructure." The goal is to copy each person on earth into the SWS parallel universe, and then see how they respond to external events such as natural disasters or political upheavals.

The concept paper Chaturvedi co-authored additionally notes, "SWS provides an environment for testing Psychological Operations (PSYOP)," to help the military "develop and test multiple courses of action to anticipate and shape behaviors of adversaries, neutrals, and partners."

To anticipate and shape behaviors of adversaries, neutrals, and partners.

Blurring the lines between military and civilian Psychological Operations is nothing new. In 1989, US forces in Panama blasted Guns N' Roses' "Welcome to the Jungle" into the Vatican Embassy during negotiations for the handover of General Manuel Noriega, and from 1998-1999, US military PSYOP personnel interned at both CNN and NPR.

More recently, a 2003 Pentagon document called Information Operations Roadmap detailed the US military's approach to exploiting information in order to "keep pace with warfighter needs and support defense transformation." Personally approved by former Defense Secretary Rumsfeld, the document was declassified in 2006 and covers everything from the Pentagon's plans for Computer Network Attack ("We Must Fight the Net") to beefing up the use of Psychological Operations ("We Must Improve PSYOP") to manipulating information through means including: "Radio/ TV/Print/ Web media designed to directly modify behavior and distributed in theater supporting military endeavors in semi or non-permissive environment."

While The Smith-Mundt Act of 1948 forbids US propaganda intended for foreign audiences from being used domestically, Information Operations Roadmap acknowledges that "information intended for foreign audiences, including public diplomacy and PSYOP, increasingly is consumed by our domestic audience and vice-versa."

The 2003 Pentagon document adds, "the distinction between foreign and domestic audiences becomes more a question of USG [U.S. government] intent rather than information dissemination practices."

Perhaps that's why a top US general ordered public affairs to be joined with combat PSYOP into one "strategic communications office" in Iraq in the summer of 2004.

Domestically, it doesn't help that SWS and other developments in military Psychological Operations are accompanied by rollbacks in the right to dissent and bipartisan support of government surveillance of American citizens.

Makes you wish our cyberspace clones could tell us how best to fight the Matrix.

At the very least, we must become more vigilant about the ongoing use of military PSYOP and misinformation – the Pat Tillman case is a perfect example. Holding the Defense Department and media accountable for every mislead regarding the Bush administration's military adventurism is more important than ever.

Action Ideas:

1. For a great database on the Bush Administration's misleads about Iraq, see Rep. Henry A. Waxman's Iraq on the Record. (http://oversight.house.gov/IraqOnTheRecord).

2. One Defense Department group particularly especially interested in these topics is The Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA). Its Information Exploitation Office, (http://dtsn.darpa.mil/ixo/) for example, is focused on "shaping the battlespace before conflict" and its site is filled with snappy computer graphics reminiscent of militaristic video games. Taxpayer dollars hard at work.

3. For media watchdog groups, check out Fairness & Accuracy in Reporting (http://www.fair.org) and Media Matters for America (http://mediamatters.org)

4. Had enough? E-mail, call or write the White House, Congress or state and local government at http://www.congress.org/congressorg/home/.

Heather Wokusch is the author of The Progressives' Handbook: Get the Facts and Make a Difference Now series. For a linked version of the article or to contact Heather, visit www.heatherwokusch.com.

One death is a tragedy; a million is a statistic.

Chris Elliott — Thu, 22 Mar 2007 22:00:51 -0400

"One death is a tragedy; a million is a statistic."

Joseph Stalin's infamous words.

This certainly seems to reflect corporate media's attitude to the ongoing slaughter in Iraq.

It is the 4th anniversary of Operation Iraqi Liberation (O.I.L) - the invasion was later renamed for PR reasons - and despite the US military's reluctance to 'do body counts' a number of other organizations are aware of the level of carnage. Rather than being described as an 'insurgency' it should more accurately be described as a 'holocaust'.

New estimates at the number of Iraqis killed in the conflict over the last 4 years place the death toll at a little over 1 million lives. With 3.7 million refugees and incalculable numbers of wounded, traumatized, tortured, imprisoned, raped, or contaminated with depleted Uranium. This must be some strange new version of the word 'liberation' that I was not previously aware of.

Add to this another half million infant deaths during the 10 years of ~~medieval siege~~ sanctions that Madeleine Albright assured us 'were worth it'.

If a hundred Americans or Britons were killed in a explosion it would be a media sensation for weeks. Russia announced a day of mourning after over a hundred people were killed in a mine explosion last week. In Iraq they dont have this luxury since every single day is a national day of mourning.

Yet to the corporate media these daily massacres are just statistics that may occasionally get a mention but are otherwise less newsworthy than the daily crossword puzzle. Instead they bombard us with celebrity drug scandals, runaway teenagers, confessions of stick-thin supermodels, or more sickening by far, they lambast other nations for their 'poor human rights records' and 'press censorship'. They condemn democratic countries like Iran for being undemocratic while ignoring the fact the US is spending billions on ~~bribes~~ Aid to some of the nastiest undemocratic regimes in the world (Pakistan, Egypt, Colombia to name but 3 of a long list) not to mention close military ties with Israel and Saudi Arabia whose human rights records must surely rank close to the worst of all.

The English language fails us sometimes, there should be a far bigger word than 'hypocricy'.

A Gay Porn Star is Honored at CPAC

Wed, 07 Mar 2007 19:00:18 -0500

http://news.yahoo.com/s/thenation/20070307/cm_thenation/45172362

A Gay Porn Star is Honored at CPAC

Wed Mar 7, 5:28 AM ET

The Nation -- A former gay porn star and male escort was awarded the Jeanne
Kirkpatrick Freedom award at last weekend's CPAC. He is Cpl. Matt Sanchez, a
Marine, campus culture warrior and Fox News favorite who David Horowitz
introduced me to at CPAC.

Tom Bacchus has a full run-down of the Sanchez saga, along with photos which
you should absolutely NOT view if you are in the presence of minors or in a
crowded workplace. On my blog, I describe my meeting with Sanchez, discuss
his psychological similarities to Ann Coulter, and explain how personally
conflicted figures like him are drawn to the right.

http://tombacchus.blogspot.com/2007/03/dirty-sanchez.html

What to make of Matt Sanchez, the 36 year old Marine who's begun to make the
rightwing gab show circuit by complaining that (what a shocker) fellow
students at Columbia University don't like having a military presence at
their school, a Manhattan university.

Fox News Sponsoring Democratic Debate; Fur Council and PETA Merge

Bob Geiger — Mon, 26 Feb 2007 11:31:39 -0500

When I came back from my two-week vacation on Friday -- the one where I promised my wife and son I would unplug from the news entirely -- and found out that right-wing media outlet Fox News will be hosting a Democratic presidential debate later this year, I felt a bit like Dr. Emmett Brown in Back To The Future when he heard who would be president in 1985 and exclaimed "Ronald Reagan! The actor?"

And, as much as I was sure I was hearing something that was fabricated on, well, Fox News, I have since found out that it's true that the Nevada Democratic Party will indeed allow the network that loves to hate on Democrats to broadcast the state's August Democratic presidential debate.

What are you going to tell me next? That Britney Spears shaved her head while I was gone?

This is the same Fox News that partnered with the Swift Boat Liars in 2004 and did everything they could to destroy John Kerry's presidential bid and that, so far in the fledgling 2008 campaign, have lied about Barack Obama's religious upbringing, made fun of his name and said that he's only a viable candidate because he's black.

Fox management even sends news directives to their "journalists," such as the internal memos instructing them to taint the news by avoiding the 9/11 Commission recommendations, the Abu Ghraib scandal and the entire Iraq war. Almost all of their "news analysis" is provided by Republican politicians and operatives and, although thinking Americans don’t really consider Fox a legitimate news source, the pseudo-network takes even the smallest, most insidious, attempts at smearing Democrats, such as mislabeling Republican pedophile Mark Foley as a Democrat multiple times during their reports on that scandal.

I don't even want to think about what their little scrollbar will be saying at the bottom of the screen during the Democratic debate. "Jeffrey Dahmer was a Democrat," anyone?

But I was so surprised that I had missed something this bizarre while on vacation that I spent some time over the weekend seeing what similar news had surfaced while I was incommunicado. Here's what I found:

General Motors' Hummer division will team with former Vice President Al Gore to sponsor a conference on energy independence and global warming.

People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals (PETA) and the Fur Information Council of America will co-host a spring fling barbecue in May and will illustrate their new spirit of compromise by discouraging fur clothing at the event, but allowing a piñata made to look like a baby harp seal.

The National Rifle Association (NRA) will merge with the Brady Campaign to Prevent Gun Violence and unveil the new motto "Guns don’t kill people -- well, OK, maybe they do."

A revival of the blockbuster musical "Cats" will open on Broadway and will be sponsored by the American Kennel Club.

Tony Perkins' Family Research Council will partner with the San Francisco Gay Men's Chorus to produce a holiday musical titled "Not That There's Anything Wrong With That."

In a bold pairing, Nazi Skinheads will join with the Jewish Defense League to hold the 2007 Passover Latke Feed in Brooklyn

The National Restaurant Association will reverse its longstanding fight against any minimum wage increases by announcing their support for a one-dollar-per-hour yearly wage increase through 2030.

Debuting on the posh Style Television Network: "Pimp My Double-Wide Trailer"

Tom DeLay, Bob Ney and Duke Cunningham will take over "The Ethicist" column in the Sunday New York Times magazine.

As strange as all of that is, it's this bizarro-world thing about Fox News being allowed to broadcast anything bigger than a Democratic softball game that's really thrown me for a loop.

I only hope the good people at the Nevada Democratic Party will come to their senses far sooner than later. Because, by the time, Fox begins promoting this debate as "The Battle of The Democratic Bin Laden Lovers" it's going to be way too late.

You can read more from Bob at BobGeiger.com.

The Eve Of War

Chris Elliott — Wed, 21 Feb 2007 00:45:23 -0500

US / Iranian rhetoric is at fever pitch. Both sides are claiming to have “evidence” of military foul play. Both sides are holding military exercises in each others faces and the Gulf is so full of warships it must be highly dangerous to navigate. Both sides are threatening a massive military response to any use of force. Both presidents have backed themselves into political corners and neither shows the slightest sign of backing down.

A second US carrier strike group has just arrived in the Gulf bringing the total number of US (and allied) warships there to about 50 and a third group, headed by USS Reagan has just been ordered to rendezvous in the Western Pacific with destroyers from Pearl Harbour before sailing to the Gulf.

This is in addition to the large US and allied navies operating in the Eastern Mediterranean off the coast of Syria, purportedly to “keep the peace in Lebanon”, and the numerous military airbases that surround both Iran and Syria on multiple fronts. Not to mention the massive military base that is otherwise known as Israel.

In just a few hours from now the 60-day deadline that the US forced through the United Nations in December, demanding Iran cease all nuclear enrichment and research will expire. The question is what will follow? Threats of yet more economic sanctions are unlikely to achieve anything. China has no reason to cut off their oil supply and Russia has nothing but contempt for Bush’s foreign policy. Even European countries are signing long term energy contracts with Iran.

These dubious reports about Iranian weapons being used in Iraq (the ones conveniently labelled in English and dated using the Western calendar no less) seem to indicate that only a military solution is being considered and Bush is now desperate for his casus belli. If Iran tells the UN to shove it’s 60 day deadline and proceeds with nuclear enrichment then Bush will either have to back down and face international ridicule or force Iran to stop via military means.

Today the Iranian president rejected the Western demands to cease nuclear enrichment unless the West also ceases nuclear enrichment, a reply that was laughingly dismissed in Washington.

Even if the Bush administration lacks the nerve to launch an attack on Iran, the close proximity of so many ships, subs, aircraft and missiles all flexing their muscle is the perfect environment for accidents to happen, staged or otherwise. All the ingredients for a major conflict are in place, only a spark is required to set the whole region ablaze.

Congress does have the power to block a new war with Iran. But congress has already given permission to the armed forces to bring stability to Iraq by any means (the so called ‘surge’) and now suddenly we have all this ‘evidence’ of Iranian activity in Iraq. A possible reason we are seeing this now is that they intend to exploit this congressional loophole and make Iran the reason for the disaster in Iraq and consequently deal with the Iranian 'problem' by any means necessary. The media seem to be pushing this idea already.

Additional related articles:

US Warships to Persian Gulf

The March to War: Naval build-up in the Persian Gulf and the Eastern Mediterranean.

U.S. diplomat tells Iran to back off in Gulf

Syria's terror networks

Venezuela Preparing for 'Asymmetrical' Showdown With U.S.

International Media In Overdrive At Prospect Of War With Iran

Chris Elliott — Wed, 31 Jan 2007 00:07:28 -0500

First I invite you to watch this excellent 10 minute speech by George Galloway to the British Parliament on January 27, 2007 in which he delivers a stark warning that Britain is sleepwalking into a catastrophic war with Iran along with the US and Israel. George Galloway was the man who you may remember lambasting the US Senate over false accusations of oil bribes with Saddam.

George Galloway's speech to the British Parliament, January 2007

Now, if that very sobering speech has got your attention, the following should also be noted.

In the last few days international media have gone into war overdrive, in exactly the same way they did prior to the Iraq invasion in 2003. I was going to write that later this week the Bush Administration will make public it has evidence that Iran is involved in the Iraq insurgency and attacks on US troops, but in fact this is already being touted by CNN.

I include here a sample of the hundreds of international media reports pointing towards a war with Iran, thought to take place in the next few weeks. I have highlighted some significant sentences in the reports.

It should also be noted that Iran has a defensive alliance with Syria and close economic and to some extent military ties to Russia, China and other SCO members (see my blog on Chinese anti-satellite weapons for more on this relationship). Venezuala has also pledged to support Iran in the event of war with the US.

Iran involvement suspected in Karbala compound attack
POSTED: 9:50 p.m. EST, January 30, 2007
NEW: U.S. probing possible Iranian involvement in brazen compound raid

BAGHDAD, Iraq (CNN) -- The Pentagon is investigating whether a recent attack on a military compound in Karbala was carried out by Iranians or Iranian-trained operatives, two officials from separate U.S. government agencies said.

"People are looking at it seriously," one of the officials said.

That official added the Iranian connection was a leading theory in the investigation into the January 20 attack that killed five soldiers.

The second official said: "We believe it's possible the executors of the attack were Iranian or Iranian-trained."

Five U.S. soldiers were killed in the sophisticated attack by men wearing U.S.-style uniforms, according to U.S. military reports.

Both officials stressed the Iranian-involvement theory is a preliminary view, and there is no final conclusion. They agreed this possibility is being looked at because of the sophistication of the attack and the level of coordination.

Bush 'spoiling for a fight' with Iran

Simon Tisdall
Wednesday January 31, 2007
The Guardian

US officials in Baghdad and Washington are expected to unveil a secret intelligence "dossier" this week detailing evidence of Iran's alleged complicity in attacks on American troops in Iraq. The move, uncomfortably echoing Downing Street's dossier debacle in the run-up to the 2003 Iraq invasion, is one more sign that the Bush administration is building a case for war.

Nicholas Burns, the senior US diplomat in charge of Iran policy, says Washington "is not looking for a fight" with Tehran. The official line is that Washington has made a conscious decision to "push back" against Iran on a range of fronts where the two countries' interests clash. Primarily that means Tehran's perceived meddling in Iraq, where its influence with the Shia-led government and Shia majority population appears to be increasing as Washington's weakens.

State department spokesman Sean McCormack claimed this week the administration has a body of evidence implicating Iran in sectarian attacks against Iraq's Sunni minority. "There is a high degree of confidence in the information that we already have and we are constantly accumulating more," he told the New York Times.

CIA and Pentagon officials are also touting intelligence that "Iranians are smuggling into Iraq sophisticated explosive devices, mortars, and detailed plans to wipe out Sunni Arab neighbourhoods," the paper said. Officials would make a "comprehensive case" this week. But President George Bush has already acted on information received. He confirmed yesterday that he has ordered US forces in effect to kill or capture Iranian "agents" targeting Americans in Iraq - as happened earlier this month when five Iranian officials were detained in Irbil.

Tuesday, Jan. 30, 2007 11:00 a.m. EST
Sen. Robert Byrd: Bush Wants War with Iran

Top Democrat Sen. Robert Byrd is warning that the Bush administration is preparing to go to war with Iran.

In a e-mail message sent to activist Democrats, the West Virginia lawmaker – who is now President pro tempore of the Senate and third in line for the presidency after Dick Cheney and Nancy Pelosi – rails against President Bush’s plans for a troop surge in Iraq and declares:

"Not only does Mr. Bush intend to plunge us deeper into what is now clearly a civil war in Iraq, but he is now increasing his belligerence towards Iran and Syria. In his State of the Union address, Mr. Bush called out Iran no less than seven times.

"I fear that what we are seeing now is an administration intent on laying the groundwork for a wider war in the Middle East.

Europeans fear US attack on Iran as nuclear row intensifies
Ian Traynor in Brussels and Jonathan Steele
Wednesday January 31, 2007
The Guardian

"There's anxiety everywhere you turn," said a diplomat familiar with the work of the International Atomic Energy Agency in Vienna. "The Europeans are very concerned the shit could hit the fan."

A US navy battle group of seven vessels was steaming towards the Gulf yesterday from the Red Sea, part of a deployment of 50 US ships, including two aircraft carriers, expected in the area in weeks.

"No path is envisaged by the EU other than the UN path," the EU's foreign policy chief, Javier Solana, told the Guardian yesterday. "The priority for all of us is that Iran complies with UN security council resolutions."

The IAEA chief, Mohamed ElBaradei, called at the weekend for a "timeout" in the worsening confrontation in an attempt to enable both sides to save face and climb down. But the Americans rejected the proposal and European officials involved in the dispute also believe the Iranians cannot be trusted to stick to a deal.

Russia queries US military build-up
Published: Sunday, 28 January, 2007, 08:18 AM Doha Time

MOSCOW: Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov yesterday said he would demand an explanation from the US over its military build-up in the Middle East and criticised Washington for “hardline” policies against Iran.

Lavrov said he would discuss Moscow’s concerns during a meeting of the international Quartet group, which meets in Washington next week to try to revive Israeli-Palestinian peace talks.

“I have not seen any change in the rather aggressive rhetoric from Washington. It continues, as does the growing military presence in the region. This will be one of the questions that we want to clear up in Washington,” he was quoted as saying by state-run news agency RIA Novosti.

Lavrov also criticised what he said were US threats to bypass the UN in taking new measures against Iran’s controversial nuclear power programme.

Washington believes the programme, in which Russia is building the first civilian power station at Bushehr, secretly aims to build an atomic weapon.

“Washington’s hardline policy concerning Iran foresees... much tougher sanctions than those called for in the last UN Security Council resolution,” he was quoted as saying by Itar-Tass. “We would like to get an explanation on what stands behinds this.”

Iran’s strategic proposal to Russia

Tehran Times Political Desk
TEHRAN -- The Islamic Republic of Iran welcomes the development of ties with Russia in all areas and believes that there is great potential for their expansion, Supreme Leader of the Islamic Revolution Ayatollah Ali Khamenei said here on Sunday.

“The two countries can be two complementary partners in the political, economic, regional and international arenas,” Ayatollah Khamenei told Russian Security Council chief Igor Ivanov on Sunday.

The Leader said that both Iran and Russia would benefit from enhanced ties.

He also thanked Russian President Vladimir Putin for sending him a written message, which was delivered by Ivanov. Pointing to the fact that Iran and Russia control about half of the world’s gas reserves, the Leader proposed that “the two countries can jointly establish an organization like OPEC for dealing with gas cooperation.”

Iran and Russia can block Washington’s hegemonistic plans

U.S. Freezes Sales of F-14 Fighter Parts

By AGENCE FRANCE-PRESSE

The Pentagon has frozen the sale of all spare parts for F-14 “Tomcat” fighters because of concerns about their transfer to Iran, a Defense Department spokeswoman said Jan. 30.
The sales of all F-14 parts were suspended on January 26 pending a review, the Defense Logistics Agency said in a statement.

Dawn Dearden, a spokewoman for the agency, told AFP the sales were frozen “given the current situation in Iran.”
Iran bought 79 F-14s from the United States before the fall of Shah Mohammed Reza Pahlavi in 1979.
The move comes amid growing U.S.-Iranian tensions over Tehran’s disputed nuclear program and what Washington sees as Iranian subversion of U.S. efforts to stabilize Iraq.

US must abandon Iraqi cities or face nightmare scenario, say experts

By Rupert Cornwell in Washington
Published: 30 January 2007

The US must draw up plans to deal with an all-out Iraqi civil war that would kill hundreds of thousands, create millions of refugees, and could spill over into a regional catastrophe, disrupting oil supplies and setting up a direct confrontation between Washington and Iran.

This is the central recommendation of a study by the Brookings Institution here, based on the assumption that President Bush's last-ditch troop increase fails to stabilise the country - but also on the reality that Washington cannot simply walk away from the growing disaster unleashed by the 2003 invasion.

Even the US staying to try to contain the fighting, said Kenneth Pollack, one of the report's authors, "would consign Iraqis to a terrible fate. Even if it works, we will have failed to provide the Iraqis with the better future we promised." But it was the "least bad option" open to the US to protect its national interests in the event of full-scale civil war.

US troops, says the study, should withdraw from Iraqi cities. This was "the only rational course of action, horrific though it will be", as America refocused its efforts from preventing civil war to containing its effects.

The unremittingly bleak document, drawing on the experience of civil wars in Lebanon, the former Yugoslavia, Congo and Afghanistan, also offers a remarkably stark assessment of Iraq's "spill-over" potential across the Persian Gulf region.

'US poised to attack,' claims Bulgarian agency
Tuesday, January 30, 2007

ISTANBUL - Turkish Daily News

The United States “could be using its two air force bases in Bulgaria and one at Romania's Black Sea coast to launch an attack on Iran in April," the Bulgarian news agency Novinite claimed. Commenting on the report, The Sunday Herald wrote that the U.S. build-up along the Black Sea, coupled with the recent positioning of two U.S. aircraft carrier battle groups off the Straits of Hormuz “appears to indicate that U.S. President Bush has run out of patience with Tehran's nuclear misrepresentation and non-compliance with the U.N. Security Council's resolution.”

“Whether the Bulgarian news report is a tactical feint or a strategic event is hard to gauge at this stage. But, in conjunction with the beefing up of the America's Italian bases and the acquisition of anti-missile defense bases in the Czech Republic and Poland, the Balkan developments seem to indicate a new phase in Bush's global war on terror,” wrote the Scottish paper.

The Bulgarian agency named Colonel Sam Gardiner, "a U.S. secret service officer stationed in Bulgaria," as the source its story.

Before the end of March, 3,000 U.S. military personnel are scheduled to arrive "on a rotating basis" at the United States' Bulgarian bases. Under the U.S.-Bulgarian military cooperation accord, signed in April, 2006, an airbase at Bezmer, a second airfield at Graf Ignitievo and a shooting range at Novo Selo were leased to the U.S. Army.

Resource Wars
by William K. Tabb

Ted Koppel, writing in the New York Times (February 24, 2006), responded to what he described as the Bush administration’s “touchiness” about the charge that we are in Iraq because of oil by stating the obvious, though often unsaid, truth, “Now that’s curious. Keeping oil flowing out of the Persian Gulf and through the Strait of Hormuz has been bedrock American foreign policy for more than half a century.” Today control over the world’s oil supply is at the forefront of Washington policy makers’ thinking, even if the president and his team deny any such intent and talk publically of reducing dependence on Middle East oil by three-quarters of present levels, an absurdly impossible goal. Two-thirds of the oil in the world is in the Middle East, much of it under Iraq and Iran, the axis of oil, the current targets of the U.S. war on terrorism. Control of oil is integral to Washington’s official goal of world domination, a goal stated this baldly in national security documents.

During the administration of the first President Bush, the Pentagon under then defense secretary Dick Cheney produced a strategy paper stating the mission of “convincing potential competitors that they need not aspire to a greater role or pursue a more aggressive posture to protect their legitimate interests.” The United States would defend their interests for them and so the policy was to “discourage them from challenging our leadership or seeking to overturn the established political and economic order.”6 Control of the world is facilitated through control of essential resources. By controlling the world’s energy, and in the presence of its overwhelming military superiority, the United States is potentially able to deny the lifeblood of any society and intimidate and coerce the world more effectively, a design going back easily to Henry Kissinger, and earlier to the emergence of U.S. global power at the end of the Second World War, but now carried to new heights by the neoconservatives.

Hegemony has always been a bipartisan consensus. With regard specifically to the Middle East we have the Carter Doctrine: “An attempt by any outside force to gain control of the Persian Gulf region will be regarded as an assault on the vital interests of the United States of America, and such an assault will be repelled by any means necessary, including military force.” Since Carter created the Rapid Deployment Force with this intervention in mind the United States has moved to forward positioning, the establishment of a huge permanent military presence in the region, including a number of multi-billion dollar bases in Iraq, huge fortified cities with all the comforts of home, fast food places, video stores, and car rental agencies for the soldiers who garrison the empire along “the arc of instability.” All of this takes place in territories which coincide with the parts of the Global South where oil is found. That the official rationale is now the war on terrorism in place of anticommunism is secondary to the continuation of the basic policy of world domination.