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"I've never heard anyone who has made this stuff as clear as you...     It was  like somebody
had just opened the windows and  the light came pouring in."
                                Keith Morrison - host of CANADA AM, now with Dateline NBC

Mark Bruzonsky's  (Bio)  incisive columns and articles have appeared in major publicatons in 11 countries.  He has lived in Washington for more than 25 years after getting his graduate degrees from Princeton's Woodrow Wilson School of Public Affairs and New York University Law School where he was a Root-Tilden Scholar.  Having lived in Washington for so long Bruzonsky has a special grasp of how the political and legal systems intersect with the vast array of think-tanks, media organizations, lobbyists, and foreign representatives.   Bruzonsky has appeared on NBC, BBC, CBC, FOX, C-Span, CTV, Court TV and many foreign media networks.  Throughout the historic White House Middle East Peace signing ceremony with Yitzhak Rabin and Yasser Arafat Bruzonsky provided the live commentary from Washington on the major CTV Canadian Television Network.                       To contact Mark Bruzonsky  -   Mark@Bruzonsky.com  -  202 Number2 (202 686-2372).                                                                                                                                                                                                  
Fully half of Americans now believe Bush purposefully lied to bring about the Iraq invasion/occupation.
57% believe the Iraq War was 'Not Worth It'.  And 42% believe if the President lied about the war he should be impeached!

"The purpose of good journalism is to comfort the afflicted and to afflict the comfortable" - I.F.Stone
      

Tue - 30 August - CUTTING OFF the PALESTINIANS -- with the continual assistance of Washington of course:    Their lands and livelihoods have already been in large part taken from them.  They are already now on the equivalent of surrounded and separated reservations, Bantustans, ghettos and concentration camps.   Now the Israelis, with American and Arab 'client regime' connivance of course, are taking some new steps to squash, cut off, and cut down, the Palestinians.   The large number of Jewish Washington Neocons in official positions of power are thought to be working closely wih the Israelis to bring about these newest steps at still growing repression and control.
     The biggest step new step is that the Egyptian government -- handsomely paid by the Americans -- is now being brought in to control, to police, and to repress Gaza Ghetto.   Egyptian troops will now for the first time guard the southern fence leading to Gaza and will take over 'security' at the Gaza Airport and seaport in coordination with the Israelis and the CIA.  If they are successful in preventing the Palestinians from further fighting the Israelis from behind the barricades of what is more and more a huge prison and concentration camp the Israelis will thank them and the Americans will pay them for doing the jobs they previously did.   If they are not successful or don't do as the Israeli and Americans dictate the Israelis will step back in and do it themselves.
     One other new economic and communications development has also now been put in place by the Israelis and their 'Palestinian Authority'.   In recent weeks it now costs nearly five times as much to make phone calls tol the West Bank or Gaza as it does to call Israel.  It's the same phone system of course, and the Palestinians are far poorer of course, but still a new arrangement making calls from or to Palestinians has been put in place to further cut off the Palestinian reservations from the outside world and from each other.  Nabil Sha'ath, the long-time corrupt interlocutor with the Israelis and Washington -- now the Deputy Prime Minister and Minister of Communications -- is said to be behind this new plan to further squeeze Palestinians in this new additional way, and he and cronies may be further lining their own pockets with bribes, pay-offs, and commissions.

MON - 29 August - IRAQ, MIDDLE EAST, DEBACLE    Since the era of the Balfour Declaration, the Sykes-Picot Agreement, Lawrence of Arabia, and the duplicitous 'Paris Peace Conference', the consistent policies of the West have always been to divide and fracture, to weaken and plunder, the peoples and resources of the area known as the Middle East.   The end result is today's era of still escalating confrontation and hatreds, suicide bombers and backlash terrorism.   As for the Washington designed and promoted 'Iraqi Constitution', it is already a disaster pregnant with even greater disasters to come for everyone in the Middle East and for the American people as well.  From today's inside pages the following scene as the new Constitution was read in the American guarded Parliament to which the American Ambassador seems the most active lobbyist:

"Vice President Ghazi Mashal Ajil al-Yawer, a Sunni, didn't show up at a Sunday ceremony marking completion of the document. When President Jalal Talabani said Mr. al-Yawer was ill, senior officials including Deputy Prime Minister Ahmad Chalabi howled with laughter."   AP, 29 Aug

The past era was shortly into the 20th century; this one the early years of the 21st.   And so far the Americans, ever-closely connected to the Israelis of course, and in a different way to the Europeans, have still further fractured and tortured the region, in the process destroying both Iraq and Palestine and bringing each to the verge of more major civil war, plus established military and CIA bases throughout the region on top of a system of 'client-regimes' kept in power by and manipulate by Washington. 
     The Americans are now paying considerable sums for vast propaganda operations, on top of the military and CIA operations.  They are paying for some 5 million copies of the new Constitution they have primarily brought into being to be printed and distributed along with food rations, et. al.   But in the end Iraq remains in far worse shape today than it was in the daysof Saddam Hussein in fact; and have you noticed that his trial -- also under American occupation -- just keeps getting put off and off with the hope that something other than a public exposee of all that has happened will come to be.
     By the time 9/11 took place now four years ago the result of nearly a century of Western, and in recent decades  primarily U.S. and Israeli, policies had already become so tragically evident.   Now in view of what has become a convoluted modern day Crusades brought on by a coalition of Christian Evangelical, Jewish Zionist, and Ideological Imperialist Neocons can definitely be expected to be bringing still much worse in the years ahead.

SUN- 28 August - IRAQ, MIDDLE EAST, DEBACLE    What a disastrous expenditure in blood, money, and credibilty the Bush Administration has brought about in Iraq and the Middle East -- nudged on by the Israelis and their powerful cabal of Jewish Zionist Neocons officials and pressure agents who still dominate affairs in Washington these days.   There has yet to be a political and legal accounting of what has happened and who should be held accountable.  A Commission of Investigation about the Iraq invasion/occupation is badly needed, as well as a real one about 9/11 -- but of course this isn't going to happen in Washington anyway and both the U.N. and the international media are too weak and frightened to dare.   Even so much now will depend on just how these already disastrous events play out in the region in the next year or so, whether there will be new attacks on the American homeland, and whether the Bush/Cheney regime still has the power -- it certainly has the desire and is doing the planning and preparations -- to lash out further in the region against Iran, Hezbollah, Hamas and any countries whose American-sponsored client regimes are toppled.  Certainly expect further negative developments for the American Empire in the region, however impossible to predict specifically such are now quite inevitable sooner or later.   The Sunday talk shows today, and the daily Op Ed pages all week, were full of Iraq war dissembling as the county is actually beginning to come apart over the historic tragic blunder the Neocons ignited with such considerable Israeli instigation.  So far the Israelis have escaped more than occasional mention; with anyone daring to speak the truth about what has happened politically gunned down mercilessly -- Ray McGovern of the CIA, Cindy Sheehan when she dared mention Israel, only two of the most visible examples.  Meanwhile, Bush's desperate flag-waving speeches this week disrupting his Texas ranch vacation have done little but further dangerously polarize the country.  The long hot steamy summer may be passing, but expect things to actually become olitically hotter in the weeks and months immediately ahead.  And that includes the still impending and still likely indictments of Whtie House Rove and VP-man Libby for CIAgate.

Sat- 27 August - SHAME ON MONA    The corporate American media just loves it.  Find a few Arabs on the make in the U.S. who speak good English and are properly compliant -- and preferably who have authentic sounding Arab names as well -- and promote them to spokespersons.  Pay them well in speaking fees, book deals, conference invites, and TV/OpEd slots -- as long as they twist and shout according to script of course.  Fouad Ajami has been doing this for years for a number of Jewish/Zionist publications and CBS News.  The PBS News Hour is notorious for such duplicity.   Saad Edin Ibrahim is current in residence at the government-funded and run think-known known as the Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars.  
     Of current note though is Mona Eltahawy, often invited these days to Washington seminars and promoted of late to a quasi-regular for the Washington Post editorial page.  
     Mona's latest musings today do just what her promoters want of course -- a nice Westernized female Arab equating the Israeli settlers with the Palestinian resistance, lumped all together without nuance or distinction as Hamas.  No matter that one group is in continual violation of international law colonizing lands of the Palestinians for decades with a zealotrous racism evident to any and all; while the other group, whatever one thinks of their chosen tactics, is attacking the occupier who has taken their lands by force while torturing and assassinating any and all who resist.  
     No matter that what has been done in the once Holy Land today is far worse than apartheid ever was in South Africa in the days of international sanctions and worldwide ostracism.   Nevertheless, right on que, Mona steps up to bat in effect fronting for Ariel Sharon in fact while saying nothing at all about the half million and still growing fanatical settlers throughout the West Bank, saying nothing at all about the Gaza ghetto prison the Israelis militarily control now as before, and saying nothing at all about the complicity of her own police-state Egyptian government in all that has and is still happening -- well-paid of course to the tune of billions yearly from Washington.   
     Shame, shame Mona.  But then the Washington Post too should be ashamed that at such a crucial moment in history the major newspaper in the modern-day imperial capital lacks the honesty and decency to go to credible Palestinian writers and academics who could honestly put the whole situation in serious historical perspective rather than pursuing such dishonest, misleading, and politically twisted propaganda journalism that only further distorts the realities of the Middle East today.

Fri - 26 August - PLUGGING Money-Entertainment on the 'NEWS'    Ever notice how much of so-called "news" on network news shows are really just plugs for shows on that network's entertainment division?   When the fall season starts and the "reality" shows hit the airwaves for new seasons, networks will devote much of the "newscasts" to people who have nothing to do with real news but have a lot to do with those shows.   Castoffs from the CBS "Survivor" series will be interviewed on that network's morning news program. NBC does the same thing with shows like "The Apprentice," Donald Trump's latest fling. So does ABC and Fox with their shows.   In the coming weeks, all networks will parade stars of their new fall series across the screen for interviews during what is laughingly called "news" segments. Even the flagship evening newscasts are not immune. Each night's newscasts features plugs for the upcoming season.  I watched the NBC Nightly News with Brian Williams the other night and the 30-minute newscasts included plugs, in one form or another, for nine shows on the fall schedule. Only seven of the 30 minutes actually dealt with the day's news.      From Doug Thompson today at CapitalHillBlue.com
     Meanwhile in August doldrums Washington there is growing concern about the mental health and stability of the current White House occupant.    It's enough to actually wish George would stick to his vacation and try to relax rather than having to race around the country making speeches to prop up his still sinking poll numbers and Iraqi war debacle.

Thursday - 25 August - Bolton Strikes as U.S. Demands U.N. Relent or Else:   Bolton and his Neocon team -- pushed forward of course by the Bush/Cheney regime which for the first time ever has sent a U.N. Ambassador to New York without Senate confirmation -- is 'demanding' major changes in next month's anticipated historic Statement from world leaders which was supposed to be near finalization.   The highlight of the document was to be more seriously tackling world poverty -- which by the way has actually increased in the past decade of U.S.-inspired 'globilization'.   But Washington is demanding major changes that will essentially eviscerate the document...'or else' according to Bolton.   It's another huge travesty on world affairs being perpetrated on us all, and forced down the throat of the U.N., by the super-capitalist fat-cats who control the American government as they say 'lock, stock, and barrel.
    And oh yes, the historic Joint Russian-Chinese war games -- first ever -- have ended in 'Victory against the enemy' says the inevitably final communique.   No mention by name of the obvious enemy for this 'Peace 2005' warning from across the Pacific to the Americans.  And on last Sunday's numerous Washington talk-shows, taking place even as this major unprecedented undertaking was underway on the Asian Pacific Coast spanning the Russian and Chinese landmasses hardly a comment while so much other tangential and passing stuff was passed off on the American people as the important news of the week.

Wed - 24 August - Washington Doldrums and Evangelical Terrorism:   Even as the free-falling American President attempts to kept his poll numbers from historical lows...serious planning to take on both Iran and North Korea -- and by extension Syria, Hezbollah (Lebanon) and Hamas (occupied Palestine) continue in Neocon/Evangelical Washington.  They are just awaiting (some would say manipulating or even working to create) another 9/11 to whip up enough political hysteria and opposition neutralization.  There are those in both the military and the intelligence community aware of these major escalation plans, hence the most unusual leaks that have oozed forth in recent weeks; but at the same time the political purges are still escalating hroughout official Washington and the fear factor continues to rise as well.  
    Meanwhile, hanging over the Bush Administration, remains the impending Special Prosecutor investigation targeting both White House guru Karl Rove and the Vice-President's top fix-it man 'Scotter' Libby; and there are rumblings, still very limited from elected officials, that the 9/11 Investigative Commission itself now seems in need of some kind of investigation.  
    As for Evangelist Pat Robertson's outburst that it's time for America's assassination squads to hit Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez, the tragic reality is that Robertson has been both a Republican insider as well as Presidential candidiate for some time, and he actually knows of what he speaks.  Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld's forced statement that "Our department doesn't do that kind of thing" rings falsely hollow, though it is interesting he felt the need to even speak about such darkly classified matters -- CIA/Pentagon-inspired coups, regime changes, and assassination hit-squads (usually of lesser known figures than Chavez).   Interesting as well that none of the Pentagon reporters dared ask the obvious question:  "Mr. Rumsfeld, you said 'Our Department' doesn't do such things...  Do you have any knowledge of any Departments associated wih the U.S. government that do?  Mr. Robertson who has run for President and is head of the Christian Coalition sounded very sure that he does."
    Just imagine now all the star-wars-clad feds who would have been banging down doors and hauling people off if someone who headed up something called the Muslim Coalition (Robertson by the way is head of the Christian Coalition) had gotten on radio or TV to call for the assassassination of Bush or Blair!   But in this case Rumsfeld says about Robertson "he's a private citizen and private citizens say many things."   There's "terrorism" and there's "terrorism" -- seems the major distinction is which side you are on in so far as the American Neocon/Evangelical Christian/Jewish regime in Washington is concerned.

Tue - 23 August - Imperial Follies:    Such fumbling and bumbling on the part of the American Empire.  So much would just be dismissed as simplistic, uninformed, misguided, inappropriate -- but that it is all so horribly bloody, so terribly deadly, so maddeningly draining, and quite possibly leading to a far more dangerous and far more conflicted world.  
   The Americans love analogies to their own history, however unfitting, however much they know so pittifully little about most of the rest of the world.   What's happening in Iraq is hardly like the creation of the American Constitution.  Indeed little about American history is analogous to what's happening now in the ancient world of Babylon; in addition to the fact that it's now a world of instant worldwide communications quite unlike days of yore. 
    If anything the Washington-pushed 'Iraqi Constitution' being forceably mid-wifed by the Americans is more akin to what would have been if after burning the White House the British had won the war of 1812, captured the American President, and then cobbled together a convention, under military occupation, of acceptible personalities -- all with brigades of British Redcoat Soldiers guarding the capital -- in order to create a new American Constitution under English tutelage and auspices (to use the most benign terms imaginable under the circumstances).   Meanwhile, to continue the admittedly contorted analogy, American patriots fighting to regain the capital, and their country, would have been branded 'terrorists', hunted down and 'liquidated' or 'detained' (i.e, Abu Ghraib, Gitmo, etc.), much as in Mel Gibson's powerful movie The Patriot. 
     But far too many Americans just don't get it!  These days they are the once-hated Redcoats -- others use terms like Crusaders or Legionnaires, Storm Troopers or Darth Vader's 'Star Wars' Centurions -- and for many the 'insurgents' and 'terrorists' are the brave patriots however outgunned fanatically fighting to expel the invader from their lands.   And this reality, by the way, explains why the 'insurgency' keeps growing, even with the American kill this year alone said to be as many as 50,000!  There are not only more and more Iraqis and Arabs and Muslims willing to fight to the death, there is also quite clearly a populace that is providing them considerable support and encouragement, no matter what kind of 'freedom' and 'democracy' gobbledigook rhetoric keeps coming from official Washington. "There will be no central government like before," Humam Hamoudi, the Iraqi constitutional committee chairman workign closely with the Americans, declared yesterday.   And so the Americans, and the West -- with Israel pushing and cheering at crucial moments -- have now brought one more Arab-Muslim country down, fractured it for the foreseeable future, savagely murdered it's citizens in great numbers, and will further plunder its oil, resources, and geography for some time to come.  
     This Western era in the region began with the breakup of the Ottoman Empire in the days of Lawrence of Arabia, with the infamous Paris 'Peace Conference' of 1918 -- 'the peace to end all peace' -- and then proceeded through the World War II years to the imposition of Israel on top of weak, unpopular, and repressive 'client regimes' -- established and kept in power initially by the U.K. and France, and then in 'modern times' by the U.S., all designed to keep the Arab peoples everywhere divided, repressed, and in geo-political check.

Mon - 22 August - Gaza indeed:    Now let's be serious and honest about this. What's all this great big fuss about 9000 mostly fanatical 'settlers', too many with American accents by the way, who never should have been in Gaza in the first place and who so crazily have been demonstrating their zealous religious fanaticism for all the world to see.  The Palestinians have had to live with all of this in their midst, on their land, protected by their soldiers -- not to mention all of the terrible results including so much death, destruction, and torture -- for over a generation now!  Each 'Jewish settler' family is getting alot of 'resettlement money' -- even those who fought down to the last scream, shout and kick  Add to this that the Israelis are holding up the Americans for another $2.2 billion (yes that's with a 'b' and it's additional to all the other monies and arms) to remove these few thousand fanatics who shouldn't have ever been there...rather than compensating their victims!   With all the American culpability for decades in what has happened and all the Palestinian suffering there should be many times this amount coming from the Americans -- call it aid, call it reparations, call it whatever you will. 
     Now you'd think based on all the TV and pundit coverage that something unthinkable was happening last week, when in fact way back in 1978 Sharon's cohort, Menachem Begin (with Sharon in the wings even then), repeatedly tried very hard to get the Egyptians to take Gaza along with Sinai -- they balked then, the U.S.-Israeli sponsored and financed PA had little choice now.   But by creating such a big hubbub about it all Sharon and the Israelis (remember his #2 these days is Shimon Peres) are playing an old 'Gaza first' card that has been in the Israeli bag of tricks for quite some time actually.  Meanwhile with the fortified Gaza Fence in addition to the great new 400-mile Wall (declared illegal by the International Court), the worse-than-apartheid realities, and the still continuing expansion of the major settlements, the Israelis have no intention of ever leaving the key parts of the West Bank and 'Greater Jerusalem" that are humming up and away more than ever in fact.  
      So lets get real and serious about this.  Just as so many times before -- Camp David in 1978, Madrid in 1991, the White House lawn in 1993 -- the Israelis and their American financier/arms provider patron are trying to pull a fast one.   Before last week Gaza inside the fence was 99% Palestinian, now it is approaching 100%.  Those are the people who have been terribly wronged -- not to mention impoverished, slaughtered, and radicalized -- and the guilty parties in order of responsibility are Israel, the U.S., the American Jewish community, Arab 'client regimes' (especially Jordan, Egypt, and Saudi Arabia), and the international community that allowed it all to happen without serious sustained protest and sanctions.  Those are the people the billions and billions should be really going to -- BUT not at the price of their having to accept the Israeli plot to still further fragment them from the rest of the Palestinian people, having to give up their basic and inalienable national rights, having to give up their struggle for true independence, or allowing themselves to be used once again in another grossly chutzpatic attempt to legitimize the apartheid realities, their de jure imprisonment in such a  'strip' of land, the big bad wall arising everywhere in the once Holy Land, and all the major 'for keep' settlements and illegal confiscations the Israelis really do care about and plan not only to sustain but to further expand.      
    Meanwhile, anyone who read the lead article in the Washington Post Sunday about Iraq (and the accompanying front-page Outlook Section article) now knows better than ever the Americans have botched this war big-time.  And all those Neocons, so many of them for so long interconnected with the Israelis and Jewish, who are primarily responsible for what has been done -- including Perle, Feith, Wolfowitz, Abrams, Frum, Ledeen, and quite a few others -- should be held to account for what they have done.  They should be held to account not only for their terrible policies and miscalculations that have caused so much awful death and destruction while squandering so much of the treasure and influence of the United States, but for the motivations that lead them to advocate what they did and for all the financial and political rewards that have flowed in such abundance to them and their friends.   Where is the Commission to Investigate Who Advocated and Created This War and Why?  
     By the way, no mention at all of the Neocons, the Israeli-connection, and all these serious considerations of motivations and influences and lobby groups in the Washington Post articles.  As usual key pieces of the puzzle too hot to handle are so conveniently just left out.

Sun - 21 August - 'Constitution' and ''Peace Process' at any cost:    The Americans have destroyed a once thriving Iraq, now have pushed it to the verge of Civil War, and are rushing hard to impose a 'constitution' at any cost primarily designed to allow an arguably 'successful exit strategy' before the civil war escalates.   And in occupied Palestine the Americans are pushing another false and deceptive 'peace process', pretending that a bantustan Gaza everywhere surrounded and controlled by the Israeli military -- on top of a new Great Wall as Israeli settlements continue growing in the crucial areas especially now 'Greater Jerusalem'.   The mostly likely result for the Palestinians, on top of the U.S. and Israel attempting to legitimize a new Apartheid, is also Civil War.  Meanwhile the regional and international arms race continues to escalate as preparations to take down Iran, Syria, Hezbollah and Hamas continue and as the Chinese and Russians for the first time in history are conducting major military war games along the Pacific coast in East Asia.  As usual the Sunday Washington talk shows reflected nearly totally the immense propaganda crusade which has itself been greatly escalated in recent years.   And as far as I can tell this morning not a single mention of how everything with regard to the 'peace process' is designed to prepare the joint U.S./Israeli 'New World Order', next targets Iran and Syria, and that the Russians and Chinese are so worried and provoked they are joining forces and sending their own counter-warnings as never before.

Sat - 20 August - THE SHARON GAZA SIDESHOW - THE MILITARY REAL SHOW!    First he let in to Gaza many hundreds maybe thousands of the most fanatical non-Gaza 'settlers' and extremist 'religionists', then he encouraged and facilitated Gaza passage for every TV network and cameraman from far and wide, and then he had his gunless military put on quite a show for all to see in the most spectacular and visible way possible.  
      Sharon the military commander, the invader, the killer, the Prime Minister now with none other than Shimon Peres at his side, has additionally become a political cinemographic choreographer worthy of Hollywood and Tom Clancey.   But Sharon's Gaza exit is hardly an end in itself; and soon all will realize that the settlers and military may be gone from inside Gaza but all the tools of occupation including the electronic fences and checkpoints are not, indeed they have been considerably enhanced with technology and money from the Americans essentially making Gaza even more of a prison, ghetto, bantustan, apartheid structure....take your chioce of words.
      The Gaza extravaganza will soon enough prove to be the transient passing sideshow that it is, though a spectacular and memorable one because of the all TV images -- which of course is just what Sharon has had in mind from the start.  In a sense the TV images from Gaza in 2005 are the equivalent of the White House Show of 13 September 1993 -- both designed to fix in the public mind and imagination what the crafty politicians want people to think and imagine, rather than the underlying realities of the actual situaiton.  Meanwhile, you can bet there is much more to come from Sharon, et. al.; and the likelihood if the past is any guide is that
it's going to be far more repressive and bloody than anything we've seen so far.
      Meanwhile the real show this week was without many cameras and without much serious media attention in Washington anyway.  Spurred on by such rampant American militarism and imperialism, even the Russians and the Chinese are feeling they have to together make a joint show of force.  The first ever joint Russian Chinese war games are underway in fact on the Pacific coast in the areas of Korea, Japan, and Taiwan.  Many thousands of troops from both countries are involved, none other than President Putin himself put on a flight suit and flew in one of the Russian supersonic bombers, and the message has been sent loud and clear to the Americans don't think of meddling further in the affairs of the Asian region.   The great bear and the once sleeping tiger are on the march together; fearing any further American encroachments against them.   And to make their point the two former adversaries now joining forces in view of overwhelming American military superiority and threats specifically did not accept the request by the Americans, granted to other nations, to 'observe' the war games
     While so much of the corporate mass media is lulled and seduced and co-opted into flashing the images and stories the government propagandists work so hard and spend so much to achieve, the real story out of camera view is about the considerably escalating and expanding arms race that has so many key countries and associated forces arming and preparing forthe battles that now seem ahead.   And the Gaza repositioning, just like the American repositioning of forces in Asia coupled with the new policies being urged on Japan and India, are all part of this far larger world chessboard which could very well lead to a clash that in the history books become known as World War III. 

Wen - Fri   17 -19 August - SHARON Loving It!    All the cameras, all the TV and media time, in effect all the free political chutzpah.   Ariel Sharon -- The nicknamed Bulldozer for some, the long-time War Criminal for many, the man who never again to serve in high office according to the 1983 official Israeli government investigative commission -- is running for another term as Prime Minister with getting so much unexpected help.  Even Uri Avneri,  who has promoted his way to international notoriety as Israel's self-proclaimed elder peacenic, has endorsed Sharon to stay as Prime Minister and 'complete the job' (whatever that is), even against all of Sharon's sordid personal history as well as against the long and tragic history of Israeli deceptions when it comes to basic Palestinian freedoms and aspirations.   The current Gaza 'disengagement' wouldn't have been necessary at all but for all the horrendous Israelis, Sharon and the Israeli establishment all quite culpable, these past fourty plus years.  And the reality that will become evident soon enough is that the so-called 'Gaza 'disengagement' is not now about reversing those policies, it is rather about expanding and consolidating them!

Tue - 16 August - Washington Warriors Thriving, Profiting and Planning for more and more!    With the Iraq debacle still unfolding -- cost in blood all around horrendous, cost in money over $300 billion, cost in liberties and government credibility enormous, and all resulting in a destroyed country and in the throes of civil war -- and with the Middle East 'peace process' now more frozen in Apartheid stalemate than analysts dare openly discuss, the American War Merchants are cashing in from every angle and direction.  Just a few of the latest tidbits:  The Navy is now planning a dozen or so new high-tech battleships to cost each $3 billion+ and which will be able to bombard from a hundred miles offshore -- though of course the Air Force and Army already have planes and artillery to do the job...but then 'redundancy' is the name of the game for the military and associated contractors.   And a new generation of super-spy satellites is now about to be commissioned, total cost some $35 billion+ known publicly, God only knows how much is black-budgeted..   Meanwhile the formerly independent Peace Corps is now being promoted and infiltrated by the U.S. Army; and amazing as it sounds no less than former NBC anchorman Tom Brokaw is promoting a super propaganda Peace Corps tied to the 'new diplomacy' supposedly about to emerge from the Karen Hughes State Department..  It's all in the fine-print, not in the headlines.  Thanks to the Washington warriors any and all Americans going abroad from now on will be treated and targeted by many as CIA operatives and military-manipulated appendages -- and in all too many cases this will in fact be the case.   And then when the expanded military destruction capabilities come on line in a few years you can bet the Washington warriors will find ways to put them to use as the American empire continues its still expanding worldwide crusade -- all in the name of 'freedom' and 'democracy' and 'anti-terrorism', all designed in reality to control modern-day world affairs just as the Romans did with pro-consuls and crucifixtions in the Biblical days so many evangelical Americans seem so eager to recreate, Armageddon welcome it seems to bring it all on.

Mon - 15 August - WASHINGTON BATTLE OVER IRAQ and IRAN!   From "Bring Them On, To Bring Them Home"...   Everyone in Washington -- including senior officials of the Bush/Cheney regime itself -- is fighting now in a most confusing cacaphony over both Iraq and Iran and the 'New World Order' crusade.   Top Senators from both parties, Biden and McCain in the lead getting themselves lots of TV and media exposure as they both prepare to run for the White House again, keep calling for more troops, not less.   Top Pentagon officials have been pressured by their own to hint quite publicly about 'withdrawing forces' from Iraq, even while Henry Kissinger and the superhawk Neocons including McCain keep insisting that the Iraq War must be won or else.  Among other things Pentagon planners are well aware that U.S. forces are now so stretched that the current deployment is militarily unmaintainable beyond mid next year; and they are trying hard to prepare.  Even Donald Rumsfeld himself has been loudly declared a 'defeatist' by leading Neocon Bill Kristol, and repeated assailed in public with 'no confidence' votes, again with Biden and McCain in the lead.  This extraordinarily confused situation is what accounts for the essentially contradictory to Presidential statements that have been made in public this month by the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs, the Commander in Iraq, even the Defense Secretary -- only to have the President call a photo op a few days ago at his Texas ranch, with all his subordinates lined up behind him for the event, using declarations rather different from those he commands.  Furthermore the purge of the CIA and other intelligence agencies has not yet been totally successful -- the remaining leakers are more than ever attempting to maintain their own dignity regularly letting it be known that Bush/Cheney war-mongering is not matched by the actual facts.   Earlier this month there was the leaked front page story that Iran is no where near having nuclear weapons.  And Sunday's front-page Washington Post  story explains how the twisting and turning is being contorted into some new 'Exit Strategy'  more likely to degenerate into a fractured country and greater civil war than into anything that could be recognized as 'freedom' and 'democracy'.   Yet the bigger story of what is now being planned and prepared for was buried away on page A15 in a small story shown above -- Bush, fulfilling his promise to Sharon, declaring on Israeli TV that he is committed together with Israel to take down Iran one way or another.

Sun - 14 August - The First and Longest Neocons - Kissinger and Podhoretz!    Labels are needed shorthand but too often far too simplistic and thus seriously deficient and misleading.  When it comes to the Washington Neocons there are the more hardline less disguised among them -- Perle, Wolfowitz, Feith, Frum, Ledeen, Abrams, et. al. -- and there are the older more 'seasoned' Neocons -- Rumsfeld, Cheney, oh so many in Congress, and truth be told old Henry Kissinger.   Indeed, in retrospect, once 'Professor' Kissinger, along with former Editor of the American Jewish Committee's Commentary Magazine, Norman Podhoretz, whom Bush recently presented the Medal of Freedom at the White House, are two in their twilight years who have to now be
By the way, hardly any questions from the corporate media, or comments from the political guests, on any of the many Washington Sunday talk shows about the unprecedented arrests of Israeli-Jewish lobby officials for spying.   Now just imagine if Muslim Americans, or say Chinese Americans, connected with a powerful organization or  lobbying group had been so arrested for spying.  One of the major panel programs even had an ongoing discussion of the Gaza 'Withdrawal' and the $2.2 billion additional Israel wants to pay for it (with all five panelists voting for the additional money), with not one word about AIPAC, spies, arrests, and the extraordinary power and clout of the Israeli-Jewish lobby.
considered the godfathers of today's oh-so-dangerous oh-so-bloody oh-so-repressive Neocon revolution.    And let's not shy away from mentioning again that nearly all of those above-mentioned are Jewish and all are long-time deeply involved with the Israelis and various front-organizations that make up the extended Israeli-Jewish lobby that still has Washington so cornered even as some of its top operatives are under indictment as 'spies'.   Podhoretz has been a long-time warrior for Israel, a la Ariel Sharon, and these days is touting World War IV and the necessity to win it bigtime.   Kissinger is still rapping away bigtime in the pages of the Washington Post still explaining how his Vietnam policies that brought so much death and destruction would have been victorious but for public opinion that undermined him; and urging today's neocons to tough-it-out and pursue victory in Iraq rather than 'cut and run'.  And behind the scenes Kissinger, also long connected with the Israelis, is today a vociferous hawk about Iran, urging Washington to bring Iran into line or down one way or another and sooner rather than later.  And meanwhile, in its own editorials, somewhat restrained in its news pages, the Washington Post, Kissinger, Israel, and the more 'liberal' neocons, are all working overtime to keep up the drumbeat for more American military action to secure the 'New World Order' (now renamed 'freedom and democracy') and though less publicly mentioned 'Israel'.   The next targets are no secret:  Iran and Syria, Hezbollah (Lebanon) and Hamas (Palestine), while at the same time working harder than ever to preserve and harden the key American 'client regimes' in Riyadh, Amman, Cairo, Ramallah, et. al.   Is D-day closing in on us all as a result of  the neocon revolution now still peaking?  Yes....I think it is...  Can it still be prevented?  Yes...but not with the current face off and juxtaposition of political and media forces...  

Sat - 13 August - WASHINGTON REBELLION:    Except in novels - like Tom Clancy's Op Center series for instance - no one can remember a Washington so driven by ideological plots, multi-level conspiracies, government subturfuge, and so full of rebellion in the senior ranks.  It's the rebellion that is startling insiders at the moment, major dissention and major leaks all because what is now at stake is not just turf battles or even who governs in Washington, but rather actual fear of the very real possibility that a new World War is about to be ignited.   Read prior days here this week at BlogWashington for more details and links to stories.
    No less a personality than Walter Cronkite publicly warned of WWIII nearly three years ago now; but as usual the corporate 'mainstream' media often refuses to seriously report to the public what the experts and old Washington hands seriously talk about once they are out of the power and money loops.   This month alone senior players in the 'intelligence community', terribly worried that the Bush/Cheney regime is about to strike out against Iran and others in the Middle East -- especially if Iraq continues to explode and/or descend into civil war -- leaked to the Washington Post a major intelligence study concluding that Iran is actually ten years away from having useable nuclear weapons.  Add to that that something quite unusual seems to be up with at least some of the top senior commanders in the U.S. military.  The startling abrupt removal form command of one of the Army's 4-star Generals this week, just months before his retirement in fact, is a story deserving much more investigation; but everyone in the know seems to have been forcefully warned and ordered to shut up or else.
    As for novels by Tom Clancy...  First of all, though the then National Security Adviser, Ms. Rice, insisted in front of the cameras shortly after 9/11 that "no one had ever imagined" airplanes could be used "as missiles" to attack buildings, a Clancy novel published just a few years earlier prominently featured a Boeing jet doing just that -- crashing into the Congress during a State of the Union speech killing most of the government.   That little 'intelligence' info would have cost the government $9.95 and wasn't even classifed!    As for rebellion and coup in Washington ponder this from a Clancy novel Divide And Conquer published just a year before 9/11, a novel in fact in which the Vice-President, Chief of Staff, and NSA Director were operating in a cabal behind the back of the President to themselves instigate terrorism designed to give them the excuse needed to justify 'regime change' in Tehran and grasping firmer control of the region's oil:
 
  "They were the reason the vice president had conceived of this plan....  The fact was, the United States was at risk.  Not just from terrorist attacks, though more and more those were becoming a very real threat.  The danger facing the United States was that it was on the verge of becoming irrelevant.  Our military could destroy the world many times over.  But other nations knew that we would never do that, so they did not fear us.  Our economy was relatively strong.  But so were the economies of many other nations and alliances....  America was a giant everyone wanted to see brought down...  They simply wanted us humbled and humiliated.  We were a meddling thug to our enemies and an overbearing big brother to our supposed allies...
     "We were not respected, and we were not feared.  That had to change...  When he was in the Senate, Vice-President Cotten had felt that there needed to be a United States that was better integrated with the world.  The one that Teddy Roosevelt had described.  The one that carried a big stick and was not afraid to use it....  One that had the resolve to use quiet assassination and blackmail instead of mounting very public and unpopular miniwars....  Cotten left the mansion and slid into the car...  He was not going to enjoy what he and his allies were about to do..."    


Fri - 12 August - SLIPPERY SLOPE to Police State, Thought Monitoring/Control, and Big Brother Neo-Facism.   Strong dangerous frightening terms and concepts, I know.  One is always hesitant to use them - I sure have been.  And yet the political poisons that once ozzed from the more limited Israeli-Palestinian conflict have now become more of a poisonous flood of new slogans, doctrines, and flag-waving deceptions now threatening the very constitutional structures and protections the Anglo-American jurisprudential world once took so much pride in upholding.  Just this week we've learned that the American military is formally preparing for martial law control at home as never before, and that the British government is defying its own Law Lords "changing the rules of the game" says the Prime Minister boldly, taking the decision to now decide whose speech is "hateful" and "not conducive to the public good" rather than whose actions are illegal.  It is precisely things of this kind that the term "slippery slope" was coined to warn about.  Indeed there are important reasons the laws have all these years prevented the very kinds of things the American and British governments are now insisting they must do, both abroad and at home.    So ends another bloody week as preparations for escalating world conflict race ahead with Americans primarily concerned, so their media tells them, with gasoline prices,  interest rates, and the shopping addiction that has the mall stores actually selling 10% more than last year...

Thurs - 11 August - Lord Bishop of Jamaica Takes on American Imperialism + Evangelical Christian Ethos Permeates Washington:    Evangelical ethos and excess are seeping out all over today's Washington, just as is Neocon chutzpa and crusading zeal.   When a Four-Star General with an unblemished 36-year Pentagon career, about to retire in just a few months in fact, is relieved of command for having a simple discreet relationship with a non-military non-government 'other' woman -- other than his wife that is whom he is divorcing by the way -- one really has to wonder just what has come over official Washington.   Is it another manifestation of Evangelical Biblical Influence?   No one can ever remember a matter of this kind involving such a ranking officer being handled in such a way -- but no doubt the bible-thumpers are shaking and chanting away.    Ahha...upon further checking it seems there may be much more to this after all.   It seems the 4-star has been one of those not so compliant with the Neocons, challenging them at various times and in various ways from the inside.  And his removal within months of retirement could well be a Neocon message designed to further instill fear and intimidation to any and all others thinking of trying to block or leak when it comes to both what the Neocons have already done and what they have planned.
     Last Sunday a visitor at a church service at Dunbarton Chapel at Howard University put it to the American empire with eloquence and grace.   The occasion was Jamaica's 43rd Independence Day and the sermon was delivered by the Lord Bishop of Jamaica and the Cayman Islands, the Right Rev. Dr. Alfred C. Reid.    Among his eloquent comments as he reflected back on the days of official slavery and colonialism:  "Globlization is a new name for an old obscenity".  "We have seen hegemonic powers come and go.  And I emphasize GO."   "A holy nation is one where blood is more valuable than oil..."  "The measure of a man's greatness is not the number of servants he has but the number of people he serves."  "...false gods of materialism, hedonism, and power."   One simply doesn't hear such stark truths  at the official largely white pulpits of Washington including the National Cathedral on Wisconsin Avenue and the National Shrine at Catholic University.

Wed - 10 August - ISRAEL + JEWISH LOBBY SPY SCANDAL STILL EXPANDING - No VISA for New Iranian Pres for U.N. visit?:    The ISRAEL SPY scandal is headed toward further revelations and maybe indictments.  Furious behind-the-scenes efforts are underway at many levels to 'contain' the scandal and move on, as had been done quite a few times before actually though few in the corporate media dare remember/report.   But even so, when both Pentagon officials and top leaders of the Israeli-Jewish lobby are under arrest or indictment a little more is seeping into print...as for instance this limited article on one of the 'liberal' (read left circles of the Democratic party) sponsored websites.   But 'patriotic' flag-waving FOX news is holding back remembering what happened a few years ago when they broadcast after 9-11 a sui generis 4-part story about 'Israeli Spying' but then quickly pulled it from their website and rarely if ever mention it again, not to mention broadcast it again.   Even so, on top of the Pollard affair now years ago, this is the most major Israeli spy scandal ever in Washington, especially as it involves the network of interconnected groups and personalities stretching from Capitol Hill to think-tanks to journalists to the Pentagon and other government agencies.    By why so much relative corporate media silence about this Israeli/AIPAC/Jewish Spy Scandal on the one hand, yet so much attention to the Plame/CIA story on the other?   "Can it be true." asks Robert Dreyfuss "that reporters are more courageous about pursuing a story that involves the White House than they are about plunging into a scandal that involves Israel, our No. 1 Middle East ally? "
     As for target Iran, the knives are out and they aren't all wielded by those classified as 'neocon'.   For years now the Washington Post, feeling the 'right' political heat no doubt as well as long known as a bastion of 'liberal' sentiments that just happen to nearly always overlap with the Shimon Peres/wing of Israeli politics, has further joined the crusade.  Just as with the Wall Street Journal the WP's news and editorial divisions are separated; so even as the news pages report more mildly about Iran (by American standards that is) the editorials are on the warpath along with the Israelis, the Evangelicals, and the neocons.   And just as the WP editorial hit the White House and State Department dropped a trial balloon that the new Iranian President may not get a visa to visit the U.S.  It's not an unprecedented threat, but it would be an unprecedented act against a Head of State -- other than the fact that Yasser Arafat was so mistreated years ago before he signed on to American 'peace' efforts.

Tuesday - 9 August - HOW WASHINGTON WORKS:    Information, Publicity, and newspaper/TV Editorials are powerful tools of governing in Washington and quite often things are not as they seem.  Take for instance the Op Ed in the Wash Post Monday complimenting the Bush Administration for it's Africa policy.   Most readers would probably assume that this Op Ed, written by the President of Africare, noted as "a Washington-based humanitarian organization that supports development and relief throughout Africa," would be representing an independent, objective, non-government opinion.  Well...not quite.   You see as with so many other organizations, think-tanks, and even academic sounding institutes, if you trace the money and the personnel you end up not with truly independent and objective groups and individuals but rather with persons closely connected to and indeed dependent on the very government they are 'complimenting'.  Africares for instance gets the majority of its budget from the U.S. Agency for International Development (AID), for all practical purposes an appendage of the State Department and the White House; and its current President who wrote or at least signed the Op Ed is a former long-time AID official whose primary fund-raising job, and thus his own, is dependent on keeping the flow of government funds coming his way.    If there were really truth in journalism such insights would be required disclosure when such 'opinion' pieces are published....but of course there is not.      But it's the front-page Wash Post article yesterday that is really scary -- the Pentagon is now racing ahead with 'war planning' for the home front -- read carefully and realize what a change this represents from anything American society has had to deal with in the past.

Monday - 8 August - EXPECT MORE OF THE ISRAELI SPY SCANDAL + PUSHING JAPAN NUCLEAR:    How ironic, how sad, how dangerous.  Just 60 years after the Americans used the first nuclear bombs to devastate Japanese cities, and then imposed a pacifist Constitution which the Japanese actually came to appreciate, the Americans are now nudging Japan to the east of China to start building up its military forces including future nuclear weapons, as well as India to the west to do the same carefully coordinated with Washington.   It is a major escalation of an Asian arms race whose benefits will go largely to American arms makers and geostrategic partnerships, and whose future ramifications could be devastating.   Meanwhile in Washington the ISRAELI SPYING SCANDAL of 2005 is not yet over.  The indictment of two of the most senior former Israeli-Jewish Lobby (AIPAC) officials on considerably watered-down spying charges is not the end of the matter.   The feds have enough on AIPAC to actually close down the whole organization if they wanted to; but they won't in view not only of AIPAC's powerful backers on Capitol Hill but the many money-giving and well-connected American Jews with important connections to both AIPAC and ISRAEL and who are among the senior players in both the Republican and Democratic Parties.   Meanwhile, check today's Wash Times article for how the top AIPAC guys worked feverishly to try to place their man "by the elbow of the president."  Actually this time they failed and got caught, unlike in the past.    Meanwhile, the IRAN crisis continues to dangerously escalate and the U.S. and Israel keep preparing.

Sunday - 7 August - Containing China in Deed not Name:    The Washington power elite haven't named their new China policy 'containment', and they won't...for China is already too important to American economic and monetary concerns to rattle too much.   But even so the new vigorous attempts by crusading Washington to push Japan to essentially abrogate it's pacifist constitution and to push India to being a counterweight to China, coupled with the recent insistance that the legitimate bid by a Chinese company to buy an American oil company be reversed, have set the stage for heightened 'competition' that could degenerate all-too-easily into something more.   With the Taiwan issue always lurking, with the Chinese military quite understandably fast improving, with manuevering over oil and energy becoming more strident, and with China already holding considerable influence in financial capital markets, managing the U.S.-China relationship is crucial to world peace yet not going so well at the moment.  Even Henry Kissinger, the man who opened up relations with China back in the Nixon years, has taken to publicly warning Washington not to move in the 'containment' direction, realizing of course that this is precisely what is happening.   The Chinese leadership is well aware of the potential problems ahead, thus ordering its own media last week not to 'independently' cover the oil company purchase reversal and not to play it up in any big way, worried about creating a further anti-American climate among its own.   That climate however, even if usually under the surface, is already very real in China...as is a growing anxiety and fear attitude especially among Neocon/Evangelicals in Washington about the new rapidly developing and arming China.

Saturday - 6 August - Slippery Slope To Repression, Thought Control, and Underground:    Front-page in both of Washington's papers today -- how the Brits, Tony Blair in the lead of course, are moving to curtail speech in the name of 'anti-terrorism'.     Wash Post - Wash Times - New York Times   There are mighty good reasons 'new' laws are needed to do what Blair wants to do; for there are mighty good reasons this hasn't been done before.   For it's a very slippery slope when the government now gets to decide whose speech is ok and whose speech is supportive of or aiding 'terrorism'.   And this is all the more worrisome when we are all asked to trust the very same governments that brought us the misbegotten and disingenuous Iraq war -- and so much other prevarication.   When it comes to civil liberties and traditional free speech the British constitutional system is weaker than the American, even though traditionally Britiain has been much more open to diversity and foreign exiles of many stripes going back beyond Karl Marx.   But just as the Israelis before them, the Brits and the Americans now use every happening and every excuse to eat away at traditional civil liberties and free speech concepts, all of course in the name of the very 'terrorism' their own policies have so considerably nurtured and escalated.   But there's not much of this broader context discussion in the front-page articles in both of today's Washington newspapers.  Nor much realization that when repression of this kind occurs it forces those involved -- not in terrorism but rather in outspoken talk and discussion -- underground and that in turn has further ramifications.   Furthermore, in the age of the internet, the dvd, and the microdrive we are in the age of information globilization; and unless the powers that be are intending to bring all that too under their control (which they well may be) they simply aren't going to be able to contain the spread of ideas, information, and advocacy.   Oh yes, make no mistake about it, things are very much coordinated these days not only between London and Washington but also through a variety of channels wiith the Israelis.   Once the results of Blair's 'new' laws become more clear, expect the Americans too to move in this direction as soon as they have the excuse they need and even though the difficulties will be considerable.

Friday - 5 August - Israel, Jews, Spies:   Bottom Line:  Never ever before have top officials of the leading and most public Israeli-Jewish pressure group -- the American Israel Public Affairs Committee (AIPAC) -- been indicted for spying; even if the charge language has been considerably watered down in months of behind-the-scenes 'negotiations'.  (NYTimes - Wash Post - Wash Times).   Of course the perpetrators and their abundant associate organizations will threaten and scream 'anti-semitism' against any and all who even now try to connect the culpability dots and fill in the corporate media's critical gaps.   In most cases it's a rubbish smokescreen term, especially these days when Israel has become a worse than Apartheid State, the Israeli-Jewish lobby is closely linked to both bringing about the Iraq invasion/occupation and a long pattern of spying and pressuring, and American Jews collectively have allowed themselves to be targeted by not coherently standing against Israeli policies and by letting Jewish organizations so viciously vilify all who do.  Indeed, today's situation in which so much of Jewish identify and values have been co-opted by the hardline Zionists has indeed opened up American Jews as a class to the 'dual loyalty' charge -- and, to repeat, pointing out such things is hardly a manifestation of anti-semitism no matter how many times and how loudly they scream it.   As the lawyers know so well, if the facts aren't on your side argue the law; similarly the Jewish operatives know if the facts are too damning condemn the messingers and their supposed bad motives ad infinitum.
     In the end though don't expect a public trial that would be headlined 'Jewish Spies' or 'Israeli Spy Trial' -- for far too much dark and shady would then come out in public.  The charges have already been much watered down and the game will now become to make all this fade away with as much kept in the closet behind-closed-doors as possible, even if a few 'former' top officials have to take the fall and maybe end up spending a few years in the clink.   It's happened before in lesser ways though the corporate 'mainstream' media and programs like PBS News Hour always work overtime to never remind.   In the 80s there was the case of Congressional Aide Stephen Bryen on top of that of Jonathan Pollard (which couldn't be covered up as he not only pleaded guilty but is still in prison after having attempted to seek asylum at the front gates of the Israeli Embassy).  In the 90s there was the AIPAC President who had to resign after bragging about infiltrating Presidential campaigns so Israel could have another White House occupant owing big time -- which in the end is in fact what happened, minus the promised 'kosher kitchen' of those days. 
      And one more little tidbit few are recalling.  The first inkling of the scandal which yesterday resulted in indictments of two of the leading AIPAC officials was first broken in public on CBS Evening News last year.  It was an unusually hard gutsy story that got everyone else scampering about wondering just what was going on and thinking they too could report it, CBS News having provided a kind of legitimacy and cover-from-attack to do so.   It was within weeks however that the knives seemed to be out for anchorman Dan Rather, and the poor fellow never quite seemed to realize that what was happening to him may well have been partly about pay-back and intimidation of all who might be thinking of following in his footsteps.
      Oh yes....another 'little' associated matter before calling it a day.  Larry Franklin, the Pentagon analyst Iran expert arrested some months ago in advance of the AIPAC officials he conspired with, wasn't on his own after all.   Franklin in fact was hired by, and worked for, the #3 civilian official in the Pentagon, who himself had been hired by and worked for the #2 official and remains then as now a big buddy of Richard Perle, Chairman at the time of the powerful Defense Policy Board that meets right in the office of the Secretary of Defense.   How interesting that just as the spying scandal further explodes into public view both #2 and #3, both known for their long-time super-close association with the most hardline pro-Israeli groups in Washington, have recently left the Pentagon -- Douglas Feith 'resigned' to pursue lucrative business deals along with his former law partner now well-connected in Israel; and Paul Wolfowitz pushed by Bush/Cheney into the top job at the World Bank.   Perle too is gone from official power; as is his close comrade David Frum, the White House speech writer who penned the words 'Axis of Evil' and then wrote a scary book on the subject along with Perle at the notorious American Enterprise Institute (AEI).  It's a very close-knit group -- and truth be told, all Jewish, all hard-line Zionist, all with exceptionally close ties to the regime in Israel of Ariel Sharon, all with substantial business interests in the Middle East and elsewhere making them personal multi-millions.   They've done their job; in a sense setting the world on fire in a 'Clash of Civilizations' they had advocated for years and that greatly benefits most of all little Israel it seems...as well as them personally.   So where are the investigative journalists on this really serious and important big mega story?

Thursday - 4 August - More Judith Miller Outing:    In a rare journalistic association reversal Judith Miller's realities were exposed again yesterday, more this time by ommission than by any additional 'outing' of the Oriana Huffington kind which I endorsed and complimented last month on the 30th (see below).  The following is from a resignation letter protesting an award to Judith Miller that has now been cancelled:
 "The First Amendment is designed to prevent government interference with a free press. Miller, by shielding a government
official or officials who attempted to use the press to retaliate against a whistleblower, and scare off other would-be whistleblowers, has allied herself with government interference with, and censorship of, whistleblowers. When your source IS the government, and the government is attempting to use you to target a whistleblower, the notion of shielding a source must be reconsidered. To apply standard practices regarding sources to hiding wrongdoing at the highest levels of government perverts the intent of the First Amendment.”

Read more about how the full board of The American Society of Journalists and Authors (ASJA) voted unanimously a few days ago to agree with the sentiments of the resigner and to reverse the earlier decision to give its annual Conscience in Media award to jailed New York Times reporter Judith Miller.

Wednesday - 3 August - IRAN WARRING IN WASHINGTON:   It's an intelligence insiders truth and propaganda war in Washington now, this time about Iran.  A major blow against Bush/Cheney and the Neocons was struck yesterday through the leaked front-page Washington Post story that had dissident and troubled 'intelligence community' anonymous sources written all over it.  With constant rumorings that the Pentagon has been ordered to prepare to bombard Iran, and with the warrior Israelis and the armageddon Evangelicals constantly whipping up the tensions to get 'Mullah' Iran (see July 28th in fact), policy warfare is being fought out on many fronts, including major leaks of this kind. 
Seems just yesterday the Israelis were hard pushing articles and leaks insisting the Iranians were just months away from going irreversibly nuclear.   And some even remember that none other than Ariel Sharon himself went public back at the time of the Iraq invasion insisting that it had to be quickly followed by taking down Iran as well.  Now there are many reasons things of this kind are now happening in Washington, but at the top of the list is heightened anxiety that as soon as they get the next big excuse, or as soon as they can manufacture it, Bush/Cheney and the Neocons and Israelis have it in for 'Mullah' Iran as never before.   There's much more that needs to be said about all this in the days and weeks ahead...   Meanwhile, suffice it to say that FOX News et. al. immediately set out that same evening to water down, cloud over, and obfuscate as much as possible with other far less credible voices, the front-page Wash Post intelligence bombshell.  Meanwhile read more with this Wash Post Discussion stimulated by the front-page article.

Tuesday  - 2 August - King Fahd Dies as Bin Laden Fights On:   When Cheney (then Defense Secretary) and Powell (then Chairman of the Joint Chiefs) aided and abetted by Bandar (then Saudi U.S. Ambassador) crash visited Riyadh in 1990 to 'convince' King Fahd et. al. that the Iraqis had them in their sights and U.S. troops were imperative and on the way to save 'the Kingdom', they set in motion the events that led to 9/11.  Fahd sat there rather stunned by it all, helpless like a deer caught in the headlights, and the Saudi Royals never knew then what hit them.   In retrospect we now know much more about how back then it was another big-time historical scam the Americans, always closely allied in such things with the Israelis, were perpetrating. This time the Americans had manuevered to essentially trick the Iraqis into taking over Kuwait, historically their "19th province".  Then, with much help from Bandar, they further tricked and threatened the Saudi Royals in order to put to use the hundreds of billions of pre-built military bases and vast amount of pre-positioned military equipment the Kingdom had already paid for -- all making possible the easy 'welcoming' of this modern-day American armada.   Now remember, back then the fellow by the name of Osama Bin-Laden was a man very much on the inside with Fahd, et. al., very much at home in the corridors of power and money in Riyadh.   And we'll leave it here for the moment; though there's so much more that needs to be remembered and put in historical context now that what has happened since 1990 has set our world on fire...

Monday  - 1 August -  This Week and Coming:   Expect soon a very major magazine exposee to break open further the stories about the FBI and 9/11 and efforts to muzzle/gag Washington insiders who have come forward to speak truth to power and so much more in the next few days.  You'll be hearing about it from everywhere when the magazine finally comes out; and that's all I can say now.   But do check back in a few days at the end of the week for more....much more.   And then in the weeks ahead, next month seems the likely timing at this point, expect the Special Counsel to quite possibly actually indict, rather than just 'report' about, Karl Rove in the Bush White House, Scooter Libby in the V-P's office, and possibly others as well in a hodgepodge of conspiracy/perjury charges all swirling from the gross lies and deceptions surrounding the Iraq war that then led to the Ambassador Wilson and Wife Valerie CIA matter.

Monday  - 1 August - Billions to Save Thousands, but little to Save Millions + Wash Post Whitewashes Condi:   If the scientists are right sometime soon there may be millions of dead not from terrorism but from flu -- the pandemic kind that has a history of coming about every 40 years.  Now in the era of modern medicine as well as jet travel something could and should be done about it.    And though the Wash Post can't be counted on for exposing the real workings and the underside of Washington -- Watergate was a long time ago and we now finally know it was really coming from the #2 man in the FBI, right from the bowells of government itself -- the front page article on Sunday warning that millions will die because the 'weapons' to combat pandemic flu are not only not in place but they are not being seriously funded and pursued as the experts are clamoring for.   Now just think about it.  Billions and billions are being spent and everyday we are bombarded with 'preventing terrorism' -- which has killed some thousands total.   And yet...the scourge of AIDS was allowed to get out of control to a great extent because those with power didn't address it quickly with enough money and urgency.   And in the years ahead when it comes to global warming and the catastrophic effects it is already beginning to have, and to pandemic flu which may well kill millions because we didn't properly prepare for it as we say we are preparing for 'terrorism', today's politicians will likely be condemned and their unforgiveable negligence will be seen as extraordinarily culpable.  But there just isn't anyone who can call them to account now when it would really matter it seems, not to mention anyone to bring them before a court of justice for gross negligence.   Read about it...  And yes, it's another case where the United Nations should have stepped up to the plate and taken charge of dealing with global warming as well as with the predicted and looming international threat of pandemic flue.   But sadly, those who have been entrusted with the institutions of the U.N. have simply lacked the guts, the determination, and the means (largely because of  U.S. policies to control and undermine it) to do what should be have been done, and what now needs to be done.
    Just before her Senate confirmation, shortly after the Bush/Cheney 'Re'election, one of the most astute and credible Washington journalists did a major TV feature about Ms. Condi Rice exposing not only her many failings and limitations but detailing her outright fabrications and deceitful political manueverings.   It was no less than Bill Moyers, long ago White House Press Secretary for LBJ, on what was then the premier PBS News Weekly Program, a program since castrated and Moyers gone.  Over the weekend, true to its real tradition of cozying up to power, the Washington Post published a front-page feature suggesting Ms. Condi has seriously taken over U.S. Foreign Policy and is a major figure to be trusted and respected.  Oh my!   Read about it...
o cower the CIA with accussations of coverup rather than with accolades for desperately trying to keep 'intelligence' real and factual, which of course means very much separate from contemporary Washington politics and propaganda.
 


Washington, modern-day Rome, has evolved since World War II into an amazingly hubristic, nationalistic, militaristic, and politically incestuous corporate  town.   The two parties that control the capital continually hand out considerable favors and financial rewards to themselves and partners -- dealing ostracism, vilification, and punishment to everyone else who won't sing the same jingoistic tunes.  When it comes to foreign policy issues the two parties can now be considered in reality a fairly unified Imperial Party pursuing with crusading zealotry a worldwide Manifest Destiny-inspired  ideology.    BlogWashington's daunting task is to dissect, unravel, and indeed just plain explain to non-Washingtonians crucial bits and pieces of what's really going on this world capital -- realities you certainly will not find dealt with candidly and honestly by the big corporate newspapers or commercial Television Networks.

Mark A. Bruzonsky
NYU Law School - JD, Root-Tilden Scholar  / Woodrow Wilson School of International Affairs, Princeton University - MPA

Past Associations:
  Washington Rep World Jewish Congress  /   Ed Worldview Magazine (New York)  /   Ed Middle East Magazine (London)
  Middle East Consultant - Woodrow Wilson Inter Center for Scholars Smithsonian., National Geographic, Congressional Quarterly
Full bio and publication list                Mark@Bruzonsky.com           202 Number2 (202 686-2372)


 
                             
  With President Anwar Sadat                                      MiddleEast.Org                                  With President Yasser Arafat

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