bin laden videotape not new, monitoring site says from reuters: A videotape of Al Qaeda leader Osama bin Laden released on Friday is the Pashto-language version of a tape released several months ago, said IntelCenter, a U.S.-based terrorism monitoring firm. The tape, titled "To Our People in Pakistan," was broadly released in Arabic and Urdu on July 12, IntelCenter said. Excerpts had been aired by the Al Jazeera television network on June 3, it added. Earlier on Friday, IntelCenter had said al-Qaeda's as-Sahab Media had released a new video from bin Laden.
plans for security bunker at world trade center site still lacking from nydailynews: Eight years after terrorists destroyed the World Trade Center, the Port Authority still hasn't figured out where to put its crucial security bunker, the Daily News has learned. Plans for a central command post to monitor security at Ground Zero are far from complete: The agency has no final design, no set budget, no opening date and no location, officials confirm. Known as the SWOCC, the Site-Wide Operations Coordination Center was supposed to safeguard the public against terror threats and provide day-to-day management for the nation's No.1 terrorist target.
swedish member of parliament: leading politicians support 9/11 truth movement from truthnews: A Swedish Member of Parliament has pledged support for a new investigation into the events of 9/11, adding that prominent political figures support the view that elements of the U.S. government were involved in staging the attacks. An article headlined “The U.S. was part of the attack” in the Swedish newspaper Aftonbladet, highlights comments made by MP Egon Frid of the country’s “Left Party”.
“The U.S. administration knew of the terrorist attack before and was a part of it,” Frid said in an interview with Swedish TV network TV4 on it’s “Kalla Facts” (Hard Facts) programme... Frid also revealed that he has joined the “Political Leaders For 9/11 Truth” group, to which other notables have pledged support, such as Andreas von Buelow, former German State Secretary in the Federal Ministry of Defense, Yukihisa Fujita, Japanese Member of Parliament, Michael Meacher, Minister of the British Parliament, Cynthia McKinney, Jesse Ventura, and many other political luminaries from all corners of the globe. The group was founded earlier this year, joining the growing ranks of professionals calling for a new independent investigation into 9/11, including the groups:
Mr Mohammed has admitted planning the 9/11 attacks, the US military says. The five men have until now been facing prosecution at US military commissions in Guantanamo. But US President Barack Obama has made closing the detention camp a top priority. His administration says it will try some detainees in US courts and repatriate or resettle others who are not perceived as a threat.
However, questions remain over the fate of those assessed as dangerous but who for legal reasons could not be prosecuted in a US court - prompting suggestions that the 22 January closure deadline will slip. According to the reports, Mr Holder will also announce that a suspect in the 2000 bombing of the USS Cole in Yemen will be tried at a military tribunal.
obama to meet victims & relatives of 9/11 attacks from washington post: President Obama will gather tomorrow with victims and families of the 9/11 terrorist attacks and U.S.S. Cole bombing for a face-to-face meeting as his administration struggles to decide how to handle detainees at Guatanamo Bay, Cuba, several of those invited said. The previously undisclosed meeting at the White House tomorrow afternoon will give the new president a chance to explain his decision to close the controversial prison facility where the U.S. has placed many suspected terrorists since the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks. Obama has been assailed by conservative critics who say the decision to close the facility within a year will lead to putting many of those terrorists back on the street. In a recent interview, former vice president Dick Cheney, an architect of the Bush administration's war on terror, criticized the decision as reckless. In an interview with Politico.com, Cheney accused the Obama administration of following "campaign rhetoric" on Guantanamo and warned that the new president's policies could put the country at greater risk of a new attack... One 9/11 activist, who declined to be identified talking about the meeting, said "fireworks" are likely at the gathering because it will include both relatives who oppose and those who support Obama's plan to close Guantanamo Bay. "There's been some noise that some families don't like the idea and others do, so this is a chance to discuss that," the activist said.
'hope is flickering' says aclu from raw story: The American Civil Liberties Union, which has generally been harshly critical of President George W. Bush and praiseworthy of President Barack Obama, has fired a torpedo across the Obama bow... "Hope is flickering," Romero said in a statement. "The Obama administration's position is not change. It is more of the same. This represents a complete turn-around and undermining of the restoration of the rule of law. The new American administration shouldn't be complicit in hiding the abuses of its predecessors."
obama says US can't send protectionist trade message from reuters: President Barack Obama said on Tuesday he did not want to send a protectionist message on world trade and would look at altering "Buy American" language in an economic stimulus bill coming out of Congress. "I think it would be a mistake ... at a time when worldwide trade is declining for us to start sending a message that somehow we're just looking after ourselves and not concerned with world trade," Obama said on the Fox television network.
obama to bring nuke labs to the pentagon? from danger room: The Albuquerque Journal has a real nuke scoop: The Obama administration is considering a plan to fold the U.S. nuclear weapons complex into the Department of Defense.
obama preserved rendition two days after taking office from raw story: Two days after taking the helm of a country ready for change after eight years of George W. Bush, President Obama has allowed one controversial "War on Terror" tactic to remain in place: rendition. Despite frequent condemnation of the practice around the world, rendition - the secret capture, transportation and detention of suspected terrorists to foreign prisons in countries that cooperate with the U.S. - remains in the CIA's playbook, thanks to a Jan. 22 executive order issued by President Obama.
obama abandons ‘war on terror’ catchphrase from thinkprogress: The AP notes that only once since taking office on Jan. 20 has President Obama used the phrase “war on terror,” which was always on the lips of President Bush. Obama has instead more broadly referenced the “enduring struggle against terrorism and extremism.” CSIS national security analyst Anthony Cordesman notes that Bush’s phrase “became associated in the minds of many people outside the Unites States and particularly in places where the countries are largely Islamic and Arab, as being anti-Islam and anti-Arab.” Indeed, a Pentagon-funded study last year recommended that the U.S. do away with the terminology as the strategy behind it was “not successful in undermining al Qai’da’s capabilities.”
video: rahm says if you're on no-fly list, no gun! from youtube: Congressman Rahm Emanuel (D-IL) speaking at DC’s annual Stand Up For a Safe America event sponsored by the Brady Center says if your name is on the terrorist no fly list you should not be allowed to own a gun.
rnc features ominous 9/11 ‘tribute’ from raw replay: The three-minute video, which featured graphic, disturbing images of a plane flying into the World Trade Center and the Twin Towers’ collapse, attempts to conflate all of America’s struggles in the Middle East into a singular crusade against a uniform enemy. “The first attack occurred in Iran,” the narrator says over photos of hostages held there in 1979. According to the video, it was the same enemy who bombed US embassies, the USS Cole and the Twin Towers and Pentagon.
olbermann punished for crying foul at gop exploitation of 9/11 from infowars: Keith Olbermann, well-known critic of terrorism fear-mongering and the Bush administration alike, has apparently lost his election coverage anchor position at MSNBC for his alleged ‘bias’ in reporting. While he has come under fire for ‘leaning left,’ the straw that broke the camel’s backwas not Olbermann’s preference for Obama or for Democrats over Republicans, but the crime of criticizing the blatant exploitation of the September 11th attacks.
video: obama responds to rnc’s graphic 9/11 video from raw story: In an interview with Keith Olbermann, Democratic presidential candidate Barack Obama describes the mindset necessary for Americans to effectively combat global terrorism. Obama also responds to Republican politicizing of 9/11. This video is from MSNBC’s Countdown, broadcast September 9, 2008.
political abuse & misuse of 9/11 from the jack online: The exploitation of 9/11 has been a political tool for the past seven years. It is unjust for any political party or candidate to continue to evoke the memory of 9/11 and use the fear associated with it to sway a political vote. Before we are Republican or Democrat, Green or Independent, we are American and Americans stand up for what is "right." As Americans, we believe that this video, used in this manner, was not right. It's time to practice the justice that we preach. Political parties and their members need to stop desecrating the memory of 9/11 and let the memory of those lost rest in peace. America and the world needs to know that the values that unite us as a nation have not been lost. As a nation we see things differently, but share a commitment to freedom and democracy. Above everything else, we are Americans. Let's not let racism and fear keep us from realizing what 9/11 truly was and continues to be.
families welcome candidates' wtc appearance from ap: Relatives of people killed at the World Trade Center on 9/11 say the decision by Sens. Barack Obama and John McCain to appear together at ground zero on the seventh anniversary of the attacks is a welcome gesture of respect. "I think it's a wonderful thing," Sally Regenhard, whose son, Christian, was killed at the trade center, said Monday. "I assume that they're coming down here to pay respects to the people who lost their lives and to really affirm the fact that this is sacred ground for America." Obama and McCain, the Democratic and Republican presidential nominees, said Saturday they would appear together at ground zero on Thursday "to honor the memory of each and every American who died." The campaigns already had agreed to halt television advertising critical of each other on Sept. 11.
9/11’s accomplices vie for US presidency from global research: In his much-ballyhooed acceptance speech, Barack Obama declared that he would "finish the fight against the terrorists who actually attacked us on 9/11". If Obama wishes to be true to his promise, he could begin with his own running mate, Senator Joe Biden. Biden was one of several top Washington officials who met with Lieutenant General Mahmoud Ahmad, the head of Pakistan’s Inter Services Intelligence (ISI) on and around September 11, 2001.
The ISI is a foreign branch of the CIA. "Al-Qaeda" is a covert operation that is managed by Anglo-American military-intelligence. Ahmad, the "9/11 money man" who delivered funds to alleged lead suicide hijacker Mohammed Atta prior to the attacks, met personally with Biden on September 13, 2001.
This case, detailed in Michel Chossodovsky’s Political Deception: Missing Link Behind 9/11, remains one of hundreds of smoking guns revealing direct US connections to 9/11, for which Biden has never provided a credible explanation.
At the same time that he was meeting with a man directly connected to the alleged hijackers, Biden was among the loudest and most bellicose voices joining Bush-Cheney for the bombing of Afghanistan, in retaliation for 9/11. Biden expressed an interest in "personally shooting Osama bin Laden". Not surprisingly, John McCain expressed the same post-9/11 bloodlust, in his infamous editorial, "War is hell. Let's get on with it"
Biden’s tune has remained unchanged, to this day. He wants to "finish the fight against al-Qaeda and the Taliban", and (in language that appears to be the new neoliberal "talking point") "take out the ones who actually attacked us on 9/11". The fact that Biden and McCain, two major shills for the "war on terrorism" lie, are vying for White House power speaks for itself.
When recently confronted by an independent journalist about his meeting with Mahmoud Ahmad, Biden offered a series of non-sequitors, and then had his security guards escort the inquiring individual away.
bill clinton addresses victims' families on eve of 9/11 anniversary
from guardian: Bill Clinton met with families of the victims of 9/11 on the eve of the seventh anniversary of the attacks on New York and Washington, and called for unity to return to the United States. In the wake of his own bruising encounters on the campaign trail on behalf of his wife Hillary, and amid a presidential contest that is daily growing more ugly and rancorous, the former president bemoaned the current lack of togetherness, contrasting it with the mood that prevailed in the country immediately after the attacks. "I will always remember the way New York and America came together on 9/11," he said. "Every time we fail to do that when our national interest is involved, I wish we could recover it."
bushies proud 9/11 did not recur from washington times: President Bush became a war president on Sept. 11, 2001, and on Thursday he marks the anniversary of terrorist attacks for the last time as commander in chief. Though he is beset by record-low approval ratings and criticism from every side that has not abated for years, the president and his supporters take pride in the fact there has not been another attack like the one seven years ago that killed nearly 3,000 people. Joe Hagin, one of the president's closest aides until he resigned in July, said that in the days after 9/11 the senior staff felt another attack on their watch was inevitable. "People should feel a great sense of pride that here we are all these years later and here's not been another attack," Mr. Hagin said.
election will reveal moral, lessons learned of 9/11 from washington times: Our political leaders, even those who had doubts (and would later apologize for their bandwagon mistake), had to say the word "war" as a sign of how fearful they wanted us to be. All of this activity naturally was accompanied by a lot of flag waving and hymn singing about "the home of the brave." That this orgy of patriotism took place while the stock market was crashing and people were refusing to get aboard airliners passed largely without comment. Before we knew it, we were in Iraq looking for weapons of mass destruction. We all know how far that has gotten us.
What's the moral of this story?
That we turned out to be more easily terrorized than the people of, say, England or Israel?
That fearful people make bad decisions?
That bravery is as bravery does?
That patriotic posturing is a poor substitute for thought?
That fear and hate are the most effective manipulators of human behavior that exist?
Or maybe the moral is simply that we get the political leadership that we deserve. We'll know more about what we have learned after this Nov. 4, another date that might "change the world."
from washington post: Almost eight years after al-Qaeda nearly sank the USS Cole with an explosives-stuffed motorboat, killing 17 sailors, all the defendants convicted in the attack have escaped from prison or been freed by Yemeni officials...
Some officials acknowledged that pursuing the Cole investigation became less of a political priority with the passage of time. A new administration took power three months after the bombing. Then came Sept. 11.
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from reuters: A videotape of Al Qaeda leader Osama bin Laden released on Friday is the Pashto-language version of a tape released several months ago, said IntelCenter, a U.S.-based terrorism monitoring firm. The tape, titled "To Our People in Pakistan," was broadly released in Arabic and Urdu on July 12, IntelCenter said. Excerpts had been aired by the Al Jazeera television network on June 3, it added. Earlier on Friday, IntelCenter had said al-Qaeda's as-Sahab Media had released a new video from bin Laden.
from nydailynews: Eight years after terrorists destroyed the World Trade Center, the Port Authority still hasn't figured out where to put its crucial security bunker, the Daily News has learned. Plans for a central command post to monitor security at Ground Zero are far from complete: The agency has no final design, no set budget, no opening date and no location, officials confirm. Known as the SWOCC, the Site-Wide Operations Coordination Center was supposed to safeguard the public against terror threats and provide day-to-day management for the nation's No.1 terrorist target.
from truthnews: A Swedish Member of Parliament has pledged support for a new investigation into the events of 9/11, adding that prominent political figures support the view that elements of the U.S. government were involved in staging the attacks. An article headlined “The U.S. was part of the attack” in the Swedish newspaper Aftonbladet, highlights comments made by MP Egon Frid of the country’s “Left Party”.
from bbc: Alleged 9/11 mastermind Khalid Sheikh Mohammed will be sent from Guantanamo Bay to New York for trial in a civilian court, reports say. Citing unnamed government officials, the reports said he would be transferred from the US prison camp in Cuba with four other suspects. US Attorney General Eric Holder is expected to announce the decision later, the officials say.
