outside the box #74

here is the latest episode of "outside the box," hosted by alex ansary.
it was originally broadcast by portland community media on october 19, 2006.

from alex ansary: In this episode Alex covers a large range of world news including the possibility of war with North Korea. Later the debate rages on over whether this movement is peaceful or not. Alex firmly sets far away from anyone and any caller who has a violent plan in the works.

more allegations from EPA whistleblower

from raw story: An Environmental Protection Agency whistleblower who has long argued that her agency failed to issue proper warnings about air quality at the World Trade Center disaster site, has leveled new accusations against the agency...

As Raw Story reported this past August, Cate Jenkins, an EPA biochemist, sent a letter to the New York congressional delegation, alleging that the inconsistent official reports about inhalant alkalinity were part of an intentional cover up by government scientists and officials.

Jenkins' latest sixty-page document, addressed to the acting Inspector General of the EPA, is in large part a compilation of her previous allegations, but also claims to offer new evidence that criminal fraud is to blame.

In the latest report, Jenkins contends that by failing to report that some of the particulates in the air constituted a severe health hazard--and by suppressing the results of tests for the presence of other toxic chemicals--the EPA misled the public about the dire health consequences of remaining near ground zero or participating in the clean-up effort in the days following the attack.

Tens of thousands of cases of lung disease have reportedly resulted from exposure to the smoke and pulverized debris that hovered in the vicinity of the disaster site for months after the towers collapsed.

Earlier this year, federal judge Deborah Batts ruled that then-EPA director Christine Todd Whitman had misled residents and rescuers when she pronounced that the air quality in lower Manhattan met public safety standards and necessitated neither a surgical mask nor a respirator.

John Manibusan, spokesman for the office of the Inspector General, told Raw Story that he had not yet received the complaint, but added, “[Jenkins] has issued a number of complaints to our office, about the World Trade Center and other things. We always take a look at them. In some cases we issue a response. How long that takes depends on a lot of factors.”

Manibusan directed Raw to a 2004 official response to earlier Jenkins allegations of a conflict of interest in the peer review of EPA's assesment of ground-zero health hazards. That investigation found that though the “EPA's Contractor did not inquire whether the three panelists had received funding from industry or had publicly expressed viewpoints on the issues to be reviewed,” they “did not find that the panel's input was biased,” or “that any of the panelists should have been excluded” from participating.

Jenkins' full memorandum may be read here.

german troops in skull photos controversy

from bbc: Photos apparently showing German troops posing with a skull in Afghanistan have caused outrage in Germany.

The tabloid newspaper Bild, which carried the photos, says they show German troops in Afghanistan in 2003.

On one of the pictures, a soldier is seen holding the skull next to his exposed penis, on another - soldiers pose with the skull on their jeep.

German chancellor Angela Merkel expressed disgust at the photos and said there would be full investigation.

Two possible suspects have already been identified and are being questioned, said army chief of staff General Wolfgang Schneiderhan.

One of suspects was still with the armed forces and the other had left the army, the general said.

"We all saw pictures today that are shocking, that are repugnant and that can be excused by nothing," Chancellor Merkel said.

"The government will investigate the soldiers who played a role and act with full severity," she added.

'Criminal measures'

German Defence Minister Franz Josef Jung pledged "disciplinary or even criminal measures" for those involved, if the story was confirmed.

"Anyone who behaves this way has no place in the Bundeswehr [German military]," he added.

The story was given wide coverage on German television on Wednesday.

"We can't use such people in our army," Bernhard Gertz, head of the main organisation representing German troops, said on ARD television channel.

"We must investigate exactly how such degeneration and misbehaviour can happen despite good training and good supervision," he added.

Authenticity?

The Bild newspaper did not say how it had obtained the photographs, nor gave any proof of their authenticity.

It is not clear where the skull in the pictures came from, the newspaper admitted, adding that according to a military source it could have been taken from a mass grave.

Germany has about 2,800 troops stationed in Afghanistan within Nato's International Security Assistance Force (Isaf).

Unlike British, American and Canadian troops, who are fighting the Taleban in the south, the Germans are based in the relative calm of the capital Kabul and in the north of the country.

Last month, the Bundestag, the lower house of the German parliament, voted to extend the mission of the German forces in Afghanistan until October next year because of the worsening security situation there.

cia's travel agent

from new yorker: On the official Web site of Boeing, the world’s largest aerospace company, there is a section devoted to a subsidiary called Jeppesen International Trip Planning, based in San Jose, California. The write-up mentions that the division “offers everything needed for efficient, hassle-free, international flight operations,” spanning the globe “from Aachen to Zhengzhou.” The paragraph concludes, “Jeppesen has done it all.”

Boeing does not mention, either on its Web site or in its annual report, that Jeppesen’s clients include the C.I.A., and that among the international trips that the company plans for the agency are secret “extraordinary rendition” flights for terrorism suspects. Most of the planes used in rendition flights are owned and operated by tiny charter airlines that function as C.I.A. front companies, but it is not widely known that the agency has turned to a division of Boeing, the publicly traded blue-chip behemoth, to handle many of the logistical and navigational details for these trips, including flight plans, clearance to fly over other countries, hotel reservations, and ground-crew arrangements.

The Bush Administration has defended the clandestine rendition program, which began during the Clinton years, as an effective method of transporting terrorists to countries where they can be questioned or held. Human-rights activists and others have said the program’s primary intent is to send suspects to detention centers where they can be interrogated harshly, and have criticized it as an illegal means of “outsourcing torture.”

oregon group to screen 9/11 documentary

from mail tribune: Ken Becker is a bright, educated and progressive fellow who normally scoffs at conspiracy theories.

But the Talent resident isn't scoffing at those who believe the truth has yet to be told about the Sept. 11, 2001 attack on the World Trade Center in New York City and the Pentagon in Washington, D.C.

Becker, 52, is the founder of "9/11 Truth Now," an independent grassroots group demanding an independent criminal investigation into 9/11.

"I'm open-minded but I'm also skeptical — I'm not a conspiracy theorist," said the married father of two. "I have a family. I have my own business. I'm an Eagle Scout.

"But 9/11 raised so many questions that have never been answered by our government," he added. "I don't know what happened. But I do know we need to find out."

The group is sponsoring the Oregon premiere of "9/11: The Myth and The Reality," a documentary film that will be shown Saturday evening in the performing arts center at Crater High School in Central Point...

olbermann on gop fearmongering

from crooks & liars: Keith issued arguably his most powerful Special Comment yet tonight. This time he takes on the GOP's newest fearmongering ad which quotes Osama bin Laden and Ayman al-Zawahiri superimposed over pictures of explosions with the sound of a ticking bomb in the background. As if that wasn't enough, it's topped off with the cryptic message echoing LBJ's 1964 "Daisy" ad that ran just once: These are the stakes.



In my opinion, the most important point Keith makes concerns the recent uproar over the video CNN showed this week of a sniper attack on US troops in Iraq. House Armed Services Chairman Duncan Hunter and Congressman Brian Bilbray have come out strong against it calling it a "terrorist snuff film" yet they seem to have no problem with a RNC ad which is really nothing short of a terrorist propaganda film itself.

pelosi gives neocons get out of jail card

from kurt nimmo: Once again, demonstrating there is essentially no difference between Democrats and Republicans, House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi has told CBS’s 60 Minutes that the war criminal cabal deserves to escape justice. “Wouldn’t they just love it if we came in and our record as Democrats coming forth after 12 years is to talk about George Bush and Dick Cheney? This election is about them. This is a referendum on them. Making them lame ducks is good enough for me.”

According to Pelosi, prosecuting Bush and Cheney for torturing children, killing 650,000 Iraqis, and destroying the United States economy is “off the table.” Of course, this makes sense, as Democrats will continue killing Iraqis and deficit spending the nation into bankruptcy.

Finally, making Bush and Cheney - that is to say, the neocons - lame ducks will add a jolt of adrenalin to the neocon plan to decimate the Muslim and Arab Middle East, lest the neolib faction, under a Democrat president and Congress, go back to its old ways, that is, instead of mass murdering Iranians in one fell swoop, imposing the sort of sanctions levied against Iraq under Clinton, resulting in the slow death of 1.5 million Iraqis, 500,000 of them children.

We can only hope, when the day finally arrives, Nancy Pelosi will be paraded before the world in her stylish orange jumpsuit, along with Bush, Cheney, and the vile neocons.

ex-cia & marine intel officer: 9/11 was an inside job

from infowars: An important story that broke over the weekend and may not have been widely picked up was that another former US intelligence insider has turned whistleblower and concedes that the 9/11 attacks represented a "Neoconservative Neo-Nazi Coup D'etat".

In a review of Webster Tarpley's "9/11 Synthetic Terror: Made in USA", for Amazon, Steele contends that the book is the "strongest of the 770+ books I have reviewed." Steele goes on:

"I am forced to conclude that 9/11 was at a minimum allowed to happen as a pretext for war (see my review of Jim Bamford’s “Pretext for War”), and I am forced to conclude that there is sufficient evidence to indict (not necessarily convict) Dick Cheney, Karl Rove and others of a neo-conservative neo-Nazi coup d’etat and kick-off of the clash of civilizations (see my review of “Crossing the Rubicon” as well as "State of Denial"). Most fascinatingly, the author links Samuel Huntington, author of “Clash of Civilizations” with Leo Strauss, the connecting rod between Nazi fascists and the neo-cons."

Steele's biography is impressive. He was the second-ranking civilian (GS-14) in U.S. Marine Corps Intelligence from 1988-1992. Steele is a former clandestine services case officer for the Central Intelligence Agency.

He is the founder and president of Open Source Solutions, Inc., and is an acknowledged expert on computer and information vulnerabilities. Steele holds graduate degrees in International Relations and Public Administration from Leigh University and the University of Oklahoma. He has also earned certificates in Intelligence Policy from Harvard University and in Defense Studies from the Naval War College.

This is another example of how far the 9/11 truth movement has come over the past year. Before the 2004 election Steele advocated the re-election of George W Bush. Given what he knows now I don't think that would still be the case.

Last month we highlighted how Bill Christison, a 28-year CIA career man, former National Intelligence Officer and the Director of the CIA's Office of Regional and Political Analysis had gone public to say 9/11 was an inside job.

Along with 16 year CIA veteran Ray McGovern, this trio have a combined total of over 65 years in intelligence. It's safe to say they know a covert op when they see one.

Over the past couple of years we have seen a deluge of former government and intelligence agency insiders to boldly go public with their doubts about the official story behind 9/11. This is very encouraging and sets the precedent for future whistleblowers who might be considering the same course of action.

blair quizzed on bilderberg

from infowars: Tony Blair was questioned in the House of Commons yesterday on his involvement with the secretive Bilderberg Group. Liberal Democrat MP, Norman Baker asked Blair to provide a full answer to a previous 12th October question about Bilderberg and whether Mr Blair had had any involvement in Bilderberg Conferences since he became Prime Minister in 1997.

The entry into the House of Commons records is below and can be viewed online here:

Prime Minister
Bilderberg Group
Norman Baker: To ask the Prime Minister pursuant to the answer of 12 October 2006, Official Report, column 862W, on the Bilderberg Group, if he will provide the information requested in respect of himself since 1997. [95308]

The Prime Minister: I have not attended any such meetings.

Is Blair telling the truth? Certainly he has lied about previous attendances to Bilderberg meetings, most notably the 1993 conference which he attended before he'd even become leader of his own party. One year after his attendance Blair became leader of the Labour party and a rapid rise to power ensued, culminating in his election as Prime Minister in 1997, baffling many political analysts.

In 1998 an MP asked Blair the same question to which he gave the same answer, that he had never attended a Bilderberg meeting. However, the evidence clearly shows he was there. A number of mainstream media reports, plus the official Bilderberg attendee list, confirm that Blair attended Bilderberg in Athens in 1993. Furthermore , Parliamentary records prove he was there with long term member, and supposed opposition party stalwart Ken Clarke.

Tony Gosling at Bilderberg.org has tirelessly worked to expose the influence that the Bilderberg group has on world events. Here he analyses the incredible rise to power that other Western leaders have experienced after attending Bilderberg meetings.

Norman Baker, the MP who questioned Blair, has recently made waves in British politics by launching into a private, year-long investigation into the death of Dr David Kelly, the scientist who found himself under siege after apparently accusing the government of 'sexing up' the case for war to a BBC journalist.

Kelly, the UK's leading weapons inspector, was found dead under a tree on Harrowdown Hill in Oxfordshire after telling associates and friends that he feared that's what would happen to him. An inquiry set up under Lord Hutton duly reported that Dr Kelly had committed suicide. In a brave attempt to reveal the truth, Norman Baker disputes this conclusion.

Baker has also recently suggested that he sees inconsistencies in the official story of the 9/11 attacks.

This year's Bilderberg Conference was held in Ottawa Canada and was covered in depth by Alex Jones and the Infowars team who went through hell and high water to protest and raise awareness of the event.

Bilderberg has a proven history of acting in a kingmaker capacity, yet they are unelected and unaccountable to anyone. Their directives are driven towards undermining national sovereignty and establishing a world order that benefits their elite interests. Both Bill Clinton and Tony Blair were "groomed" by Bilderberg before becoming President and Prime Minister and the mainstream media reported that Bilderberg selected John Edwards as John Kerry's running mate in 2004.

Further Parliamentary records indicate that the shadow Chancellor of the Exchequer attended the Bilderberg conference this year. This is interesting given that Gordon Brown, a man on the verge of becoming the next Prime Minister, attended the Bilderberg Conference when he was shadow Chancellor of the Exchequer in 1991.

A House of Lords minute entry dated 11th October also indicates that an answer is awaited on whether any ministers attended this year's Bilderberg Conference:

The Lord Stoddart of Swindon—To ask Her Majesty's Government whether any Ministers attended the Bilderberg Conference in Ottawa between 8th and 11th June; if so, whether they attended in a Ministerial or private capacity; whether they made contributions to debates; and, if so, on which subjects. [CO] (HL7569)

It seems that some members of The Houses want to know exactly who is attending Bilderberg meetings and in what capacity.

US in secret truce talks with insurgency chiefs

from times online: American officials held secret talks with leaders of the Iraqi insurgency last week after admitting that their two-month clampdown on violence in Baghdad had failed.

Few details of the discussions in the Jordanian capital Amman have emerged but an Iraqi source close to the negotiations said the participants had met for at least two days.

They included members of the Islamic Army in Iraq, one of the main Sunni militias behind the insurgency, and American government representatives. The talks were described as “feeler” discussions. The US officials were exploring ways of persuading the Sunni groups to stop attacks on allied forces and to end a cycle of increasingly bloody sectarian clashes with members of the majority Shi’ite groups.

chemical warfare

from reuters: Israel confirmed on Sunday it had used phosphorous shells, a controversial munition condemned by many human rights groups, during its recent war against Hezbollah guerrillas in Lebanon.

The International Red Cross and other human rights organisations have urged an world ban on the munitions, saying that they cause chemical burns and lead to undue suffering.

An Israeli military spokesman confirmed a report in Israel's left-leaning newspaper Haaretz that it has used phosphorous munitions in the 34-day offensive against Hezbollah, which ended in a U.N.-brokered cease-fire on August 14.

"The army made use of phosphorous shells during the recent conflict with Hezbollah in Lebanon for the purpose of attacking military targets located in open areas," the Israeli military said in a statement.

"According to international law, the usage of phosphorous ammunition is permitted and the army conforms to international regulations and standards."

The Pentagon has acknowledged using incendiary white-phosphorus munitions in a 2004 assault against insurgents in the Iraqi city of Falluja. It says using them against enemy fighters is legal and not banned by any convention.

Human Rights Watch has also accused Israel of using cluster bombs in populated areas of southern Lebanon during the war, which killed about 1,200 Lebanese and 157 Israelis.

Hezbollah, which fired nearly 4,000 rockets into northern Israel, was also accused by human rights groups of using cluster munitions, which are small bomblets that remain unexploded on the ground.

simpsons pitch tent in anti-war camp

from radar online: Anyone who thinks Hollywood is run by a liberal cabal won't change his mind after watching The Simpsons' annual Halloween special. The episode, which airs Nov. 5, concludes with an Iraq war satire that may rank as the most pointed political statement the show has ever made. In the segment, aliens invade Springfield to prevent mankind from obtaining "weapons of mass disintegration," but their mission, called "Operation Enduring Occupation," turns into a quagmire. "You said we would be greeted as liberators!" accuses one alien.

"We were looking for an ending to the episode, and it just kind of suggested itself," says Simpsons executive producer Al Jean. "I'd like to take credit for being adventuresome, but I think we're expressing a viewpoint 69 percent of the country agrees with."

Perhaps - but in the past, the show's writers have usually been careful to maintain an ironic distance from the hot-button issues they've tackled, including abortion and evolution. The Halloween segment, in contrast, feels remarkably earnest, right up to its final line: "This sure is a lot like Iraq will be." That line may not make it to the air; some of the writers want it cut, says Jean, though not because it's politically loaded. "The debate is whether people already get it and we're being too obvious," he adds.

Jean makes no apologies for the sobering tone of the segment: "When you read the headlines, it's just so sad for everybody over there."

He says there was little concern about alienating conservative viewers, and no interference from Fox (whose conservative corporate chairman, Rupert Murdoch, has lately been accused of drifting to the left). "They didn't have any objection to this," he says.

In fact, he says, if The Simpsons doesn't weigh in on more political controversies, it's partly because it takes a full year for a script to get filmed and broadcast. "It's actually a good inner check on us."

remember the eisenhower!

from chris floyd: On October 21, a U.S. naval battle group led by the USS Eisenhower will arrive in the Gulf of Hormuz, just off the coast of Iran. There is every good likelihood that such a deliberately provocative act will lead to what will be termed as an Iranian attack on an American vessel. This Tonkin-like incident will be used as the justification for a U.S. military strike against Iran – or alternatively, for a mighty rattling of American sabers at the perfidious Persians that stokes war fever and "rally-round-the-flag" sentiment but falls short of an actual attack at that time. This flashpoint – however it is expoited – will occur some time in the brief interim between the arrival of the Eisenhower group and the U.S. elections on November 5.

Such a scenario is not a sure thing, of course, and this is not a prophecy. It's simply an assessment of the possibilities of the situation, based on the well-established history of the American use of highly convenient "provocations" – of whatever provenance – to launch politically expedient military actions, and on the Bush Administration's record of manipulating the nation into unnecessary wars, along with the highly public calls of some of its most influential members and advisors for a preemptive strike on Iran's nuclear program or a full-blown "regime change" action.

Also not to be discounted is the Administration's proven penchant for initiating stupid, murderous policies that deeply harm the interests and security of the United States – but goose the poll numbers for George W. Bush and fill the coffers of his war-profiteering cronies.

In any event, the Eisenhower group will still be there after the election: a hair-trigger waiting to be pulled whenever the time is ripe.

(Dave Lindorff has been all over this story at The Nation and our own Atlantic Free Press.)

after pat's birthday

from truthdig: (Editor’s note: Kevin Tillman joined the Army with his brother Pat in 2002, and they served together in Iraq and Afghanistan. Pat Tillman was killed in Afghanistan on April 22, 2004. Kevin, who was discharged in 2005, has written a powerful, must-read document.)

It is Pat’s birthday on November 6, and elections are the day after. It gets me thinking about a conversation I had with Pat before we joined the military. He spoke about the risks with signing the papers. How once we committed, we were at the mercy of the American leadership and the American people. How we could be thrown in a direction not of our volition. How fighting as a soldier would leave us without a voice… until we get out.

Much has happened since we handed over our voice:

Somehow we were sent to invade a nation because it was a direct threat to the American people, or to the world, or harbored terrorists, or was involved in the September 11 attacks, or received weapons-grade uranium from Niger, or had mobile weapons labs, or WMD, or had a need to be liberated, or we needed to establish a democracy, or stop an insurgency, or stop a civil war we created that can’t be called a civil war even though it is. Something like that.

Somehow our elected leaders were subverting international law and humanity by setting up secret prisons around the world, secretly kidnapping people, secretly holding them indefinitely, secretly not charging them with anything, secretly torturing them. Somehow that overt policy of torture became the fault of a few “bad apples” in the military.

Somehow back at home, support for the soldiers meant having a five-year-old kindergartener scribble a picture with crayons and send it overseas, or slapping stickers on cars, or lobbying Congress for an extra pad in a helmet. It’s interesting that a soldier on his third or fourth tour should care about a drawing from a five-year-old; or a faded sticker on a car as his friends die around him; or an extra pad in a helmet, as if it will protect him when an IED throws his vehicle 50 feet into the air as his body comes apart and his skin melts to the seat.

Somehow the more soldiers that die, the more legitimate the illegal invasion becomes.

Somehow American leadership, whose only credit is lying to its people and illegally invading a nation, has been allowed to steal the courage, virtue and honor of its soldiers on the ground.

Somehow those afraid to fight an illegal invasion decades ago are allowed to send soldiers to die for an illegal invasion they started.

Somehow faking character, virtue and strength is tolerated.

Somehow profiting from tragedy and horror is tolerated.

Somehow the death of tens, if not hundreds, of thousands of people is tolerated.

Somehow subversion of the Bill of Rights and The Constitution is tolerated.

Somehow suspension of Habeas Corpus is supposed to keep this country safe.

Somehow torture is tolerated.

Somehow lying is tolerated.

Somehow reason is being discarded for faith, dogma, and nonsense.

Somehow American leadership managed to create a more dangerous world.

Somehow a narrative is more important than reality.

Somehow America has become a country that projects everything that it is not and condemns everything that it is.

Somehow the most reasonable, trusted and respected country in the world has become one of the most irrational, belligerent, feared, and distrusted countries in the world.

Somehow being politically informed, diligent, and skeptical has been replaced by apathy through active ignorance.

Somehow the same incompetent, narcissistic, virtueless, vacuous, malicious criminals are still in charge of this country.

Somehow this is tolerated.

Somehow nobody is accountable for this.

In a democracy, the policy of the leaders is the policy of the people. So don’t be shocked when our grandkids bury much of this generation as traitors to the nation, to the world and to humanity. Most likely, they will come to know that “somehow” was nurtured by fear, insecurity and indifference, leaving the country vulnerable to unchecked, unchallenged parasites.

Luckily this country is still a democracy. People still have a voice. People still can take action. It can start after Pat’s birthday.

remains found at WTC

from cnn: Human remains that appear to be from World Trade Center victims were found by utility workers in a manhole at the northern edge of the site, a Port Authority official said Thursday.

A Consolidated Edison crew doing excavation of the manhole at street level found the remains, some as big as arm or leg bones, said Steve Coleman, a spokesman for the Port Authority of New York and New Jersey, which owns the site.

Con Ed said it entered the site Wednesday to remove material from two manholes that had been damaged and abandoned after the 2001 collapse of the twin towers.

Crews hauled the excavated materials Wednesday to a work center more than a mile away, as is customary, Con Edison said. On Thursday morning, a contractor working for the Port Authority realized the materials contained remains, Con Edison spokesman Chris Olert said, and the medical examiner's office was contacted.

Five years after 2,749 people died in the September 11 World Trade Center attacks, families of about 1,150 victims still do not know whether their loved ones' remains were recovered.

During the excavation of the 110-story twin towers, which began the evening of the attacks and lasted for nine months, about 20,000 pieces of human remains were found. The DNA in thousands of those pieces, many small enough to slip into a test tube, was too damaged by heat, humidity and time to yield matches in the many tests forensic scientists have tried over the years.

The city told victims' families last year that it was putting the project of making identifications on hold, possibly for years, until new DNA technology was developed. Last month, the company contracted to work on the bone fragments said advances had been made and new identifications would be forthcoming.

Besides the new remains found by the utility workers, the lab also has recently received hundreds of bone fragments discovered on the roof of a building just south of where the trade center had stood. The building had been condemned since the attacks and was about to be torn down when workers found the bone pieces.

Charles Wolf, whose wife Katherine's remains were never recovered, said he wants an independent party to take over the remains search. He showed up at the Con Edison site after being contacted by television stations Thursday.

"We've got a problem right now," Wolf said. "Where else are we going to find them next?"

state dept's official misinformation

from online journal: The US State Dept.'s “countermisinformation” office headed by Todd Leventhal is the subject of a nationally syndicated article originally published in the Hartford Courant, and reprinted in major papers, including the San Francisco Chronicle.

Leventhal, and the Bush administration’s “truth ministry” (the US State Department "Identifying Misinformation" Web Site) was previously exposed by Wayne Madsen as a shameless attack and cover-up apparatus. Madsen himself is the target of many of Leventhal’s attacks.

Since Madsen’s 1995 expose, Leventhal’s ministry has obviously remained busy.

Among Leventhal's current targets, all of which he concludes (as an official asset of the US government) are myths:

• 9/11 "conspiracy theories"
• US plans to invade Venezuela
• US creation of Osama bin Laden

Historians, investigators, journalists, researchers and academics know full well that a great number of Leventhal’s targeted items, notably the above, are not myths, "urban legends" or "conspiracy theories," but fact, proven by official US government documents and credible mainstream news reports.

The site identifies what issues this administration considers threatening enough to "debunk" - i.e. cover up, deny, and discredit. It identifies groups and individuals that the government wishes to undermine.

It is also no surprise that Leventhal’s office has resorted to a familiar trick: lump genuine facts and real history into one cesspool along with bad, genuinely "crackpot" material, so that the important facts and real history are flushed down the pipe. Anything deemed to be damaging to the image of the US government is fair game. This includes documented facts.

The site goes out of its way, for instance, to label John Perkins' book, Confessions of an Economic Hitman, a work of fiction. The book details how Perkins sabotaged the economies of various nations while in the employ of the National Security Agency.

Perkins responded to the State Department’s web site: "Their mission statement is a lie. So when they use their mission statement to say my book is a lie, I think it speaks for itself."

The very existence of this “truth ministry” speaks volumes about what this country has become, and how low this administration has stooped. Again, see the original expose by Wayne Madsen.

The government has devoted an enormous apparatus (which includes the State Department, the CIA, a corporate media, a corrupted educational system, and more) to control what you think, openly manipulate reality, and cover up its malfeasance.

publishers are so screwed

from ad jab: Ad revenue is down at both Tribune Co. and the New York Times.

Ad revenue is down at the parent company of the Chicago Sun Times.

Ad revenue is down at Scripps and only up due to a technicality at McClatchy.

judge orders cheney visitor logs opened

from ap/my way news: A federal judge has ordered the Bush administration to release information about who visited Vice President Dick Cheney's office and personal residence, an order that could spark a late election season debate over lobbyists' White House access.

The Washington Post asked for two years of White House visitor logs in June but the Secret Service refused to process the request. Government attorneys called it "a fishing expedition into the most sensitive details of the vice presidency."

U.S. District Judge Ricardo M. Urbina ruled Wednesday that, by the end of next week, the Secret Service must produce the records or at least identity them and justify why they are being withheld.

The newspaper sought logs for anyone visiting Cheney, his legal counsel, chief spokesman and other top aides and advisers.

The Secret Service had no comment on the ruling Thursday. In court documents, government attorneys said releasing the documents would infringe on Cheney's ability to seek advice.

"This case is about protecting the effective functioning of the vice presidency under the Constitution," attorneys wrote.

A lawsuit over similar records revealed last month that Republican activists Grover Norquist and Ralph Reed - key figures in the Jack Abramoff lobbying scandal - landed more than 100 meetings inside the Bush White House.

The Post cited those records, which were released to the Democratic Party and Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington, as evidence that the documents should be released.

flashback: papers show bush allies inside access

olbermann: your words are lies, sir

from crooks & liars: Keith Olbermann has been calling it like it is. His "Special Comments" are indeed special because no other talking head outside of Cafferty is willing to step up to the plate and say what needs to be said on 24/7. "Your words are lies, Sir. They are lies, that imperil us all." Sounds about right to me.

read a full transcript here

could an "october surprise" shape the midterm election?

from reuters/yahoo: A last-minute "October surprise" - a dramatic news event that shakes up the U.S. election - could be a big wild card in the final three weeks of the fight for control of Congress.

With Democrats threatening to sweep Republicans out of power in Congress in the November 7 elections, a late-breaking foreign crisis, terrorist attack or a new scandal could change the debate and shape the ultimate outcome.

The possibilities are numerous, as President George W. Bush juggles multiple foreign threats like North Korea's nuclear tests, Iran's nuclear ambitions and civil war in Iraq, along with mushrooming Republican scandals at home.

"There is a huge potential for some sort of October surprise that changes the dynamic, something that reminds everyone just how unstable the world is," pollster John Zogby said.

The October surprise has a long history in U.S. political campaigns, from the collapse of hostage negotiations with Iran before President Jimmy Carter's 1980 loss to Ronald Reagan to the airing of an Osama bin Laden video before President George W. Bush's re-election in 2004.

The phenomenon is not as prevalent in congressional elections, which involve a collection of individual races and are not as focused on a single event. This year, Democrats must pick up 15 seats in the House of Representatives and six Senate seats to win control of Congress.

In the last midterm elections, in 2002, the plane crash death of Democratic Sen. Paul Wellstone of Minnesota little more than a week before the vote threw his Senate race into chaos. Republican Norm Coleman beat replacement Democrat Walter Mondale, the former vice president.

But the potential for a campaign-shaping event in the final weeks remains a topic of intense speculation.

"We are wary of their October surprise," said New York Sen. Chuck Schumer, chairman of the Senate Democratic campaign committee, which he said was keeping campaign money in reserve for late emergencies.

While most late-breaking events are beyond the control of politicians, plenty of conspiracy theorists expect the White House to make a late attempt to halt Democratic momentum.

'NO SURPRISE'

"It should come as no surprise if the Bush administration undertakes a pre-emptive war against Iran sometime before the November election," Gary Hart, a former Democratic senator and presidential candidate, predicted last month on the Huffington Post, an Internet site.

In many scenarios, the man imagined to be pulling the strings on an October surprise is White House political adviser Karl Rove, the architect of Bush's 2004 re-election.

"Karl Rove wouldn't be earning his pay if he didn't try something that would benefit the White House," said Larry Sabato, a political analyst at the University of Virginia.

Early speculation about a late surprise to benefit Republicans focused on troop pullouts in Iraq, but that has been off the table for months. Another favorite, a plunge in gasoline prices, already happened to little apparent effect.

One Web site ran a contest to pick the most likely October surprise, with the winner being "Iran totally had it coming." The capture or death of bin Laden is another favorite.

Democrats already benefited from a sex scandal involving ex-Rep. Mark Foley, a Florida Republican. News of a federal investigation into Republican Rep. Curt Weldon of Pennsylvania will make his re-election more difficult.

The October surprise phenomenon surfaced in 1968, when President Lyndon Johnson halted bombing of North Vietnam a week before the 1968 election. It was not enough to help his vice president, Hubert Humphrey, beat Richard Nixon.

In 2000, Bush's 1976 drunken driving arrest became public days before the election. Bush narrowly lost the popular vote to Democrat Al Gore but won the Electoral College after the U.S. Supreme Court halted a dispute over votes in Florida.

For those running campaigns, though, strategy and voter turnout efforts trump concerns about a late surprise.

"There is nothing you can do. If something happens, then we'll worry about it," said Carl Forti, spokesman for the House Republican campaign committee.