Patrick’s Notebook

Since coming into office in 2001 the Bush administration has advocated and implemented the use of regime change as a means of spreading democracy in the world while at the same time overthrowing democratically elected governments in the process. To add to this list, earlier this week the Venezuelan counterintelligence agency exposed a CIA operation meant to destabilize the Chávez government by manipulating the political process of the upcoming December 2, constitutional referendum. More on this later.

Abundant evidence has shown that from the earliest days of the Bush administration, planning was already in place to facilitate a regime change and preemptive invasion of Iraq. But prior to the Iraq invasion, under the guise of the war-on-terror, was the 2001 US invasion of Afghanistan, in which the ruling Taliban government was toppled and the puppet Karzai government was installed.

Following this success was the 2002 Venezuelan coup d’état attempt against Hugo Chávez which was orchestrated by then assistant Secretary for Western Affairs, Otto Reich and long time administration official Elliot Abrams. Although short lived, the White House installed right wing sympathizer and confidant Pedro Carmona as president, but after two days Chávez was once again restored to power.

The next in line, of course is the infamous Iraq invasion and regime change of Saddam Hussein in 2003. Amid fabricated intelligence, fear mongering and deliberate false accusations of weapons of mass destruction, the US military was unleashed against the Iraqi people who already had suffered under the cruel and repressive sanctions of the US for the past 10 years but now faced the militaries road-rage road-race from Kuwait to Baghdad, in which tens of thousands of innocent men, women and children were shot, bombed or deliberately run over by the convoys of the coalition of the killing. Following the ouster of the Hussein government, the Coalition Provisional Authority headed by Paul Bremer seized power for 14 months and looted the Iraqi people of billions of dollars of wealth and natural resources until an Iraqi based complicit puppet regime lead by Nouri al-Maliki was ultimately installed.

Continue reading ‘Bush-Cheney Regime Change Machine’ »

Neoconservative champions of war and militarism often use terms and adjectives such as fascist or Hitler to characterize opponents of US-Israeli policies in the Middle East in order to justify their agenda of ‘regime change’ in the region.

By Ismael Hossein-zadeh, Middle East Online — 28 November 2007

– In their frantic drive to pave the way for a military strike against Iran, leading figures in the neoconservative pro-Israel lobby have embarked on a vicious campaign of demonizing that country by comparing it with the early years of Nazi Germany and its President, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, with Hitler.

These champions of war and militarism are the same trigger happy characters who helped orchestrate the criminal war against Iraq on the basis of ghastly lies and criminal fabrications of evidence. Instead of being held responsible for all of the grisly lies and evidence manufacturing, they are let loose to once again beat the drums of war—this time against Iran.

Top among these civilian militarists are Norm Podhoretz, a senior foreign policy adviser to the Republican frontrunner Rudy Giuliani, Connecticut Senator Joseph Lieberman, and the leader of Israel’s Likud Party Benjamin Netanyahu. These are part of the leading members of the “war party” that include, among others, Vice President Dick Cheney in the White House and Elliot Abrams in the State Department.

Continue reading ‘Distorting Fascism to Demonize Iran’ »

Iraq’s sovereignty was tested on September 16, 2007 when Blackwater mercenaries murdered more than 17 Iraqi civilians and injured many more in a deliberate and unprovoked act of international terrorism. The puppet government barked, but it was ignored and told to apologise. As usual, the murderers were whisked out of the country by U.S. authorities. And although U.S. Federal agents (the F.B.I.) found the killing of Iraqi civilians was unjustified murderous act, Blackwater mercenaries continue to terrorise the Iraqi population.

If Iraq is sovereign, Blackwater criminals would not have walked out of Iraq free; they would have been on trial to answer for their crimes. A sovereign Iraqi government would have the power to arrest and charge all those who are committing crimes against the Iraqi people. That is what a democratic, sovereign government will do to protect its people.

The above is an except from an article by Ghali Hassan, Iraq’s Sovereignty Revisited. Read it in its entirety HERE.

By Marjorie Cohn, marjoriecohn.com — 19 November 2007

– Pakistan’s President General Pervez Musharraf declared a state of emergency on November 3rd after the Pakistani Supreme Court indicated it would overturn the results of an illegitimate election that would have extended Musharraf’s term as president. Musharraf quickly fired the Supreme Court justices who planned to rule against him. And his declaration of emergency attacked the entire population of Pakistan by suspending fundamental constitutional rights to life and liberty, freedom of speech, assembly and association, and equal protection of the law.

As a result of Musharraf’s action, Pakistani Chief Justice Iftikhar Mohammed Chaudhry is being held under house arrest, and over 2500 lawyers in different parts of Pakistan have been detained. The detainees include the President of the Supreme Court Bar Association and officials of the Democratic Lawyers Association of Pakistan. The government also ordered that journalists who brought “ridicule or disrepute” to Musharraf could face three years in prison.

The real motivation for Musharraf’s declared emergency is not to defend the country against “Islamic extremists,” as he claims, but to maintain Musharraf in power. He acted to prevent public protests that lawyers and political parties were organizing. And his scheme is working. Musharraf’s brand-new, handpicked Supreme Court ruled on Monday that Musharraf can remain in power for five more years.

Meanwhile, the Bush Administration is scurrying around in damage control mode. Musharraf’s actions would be very embarrassing for Bush — if Bush were the type of guy to get embarrassed. After all, Bush has been claiming for the past several years that he wants to spread democracy throughout the Islamic world. Somehow, Musharraf’s declared state of emergency, followed by mass arrests of his political opponents, doesn’t seem very democratic.

Continue reading ‘Bush is Musharraf’s Fool’ »

– The Middle East Has Had a Secretive Nuclear Power in Its Midst for Years

– When will the US and the UK tell the truth about Israeli weapons?

– Iran isn’t starting an atomic arms race, it’s joining one

By George Monbiot, The Guardian — 20 November 2007

– George Bush and Gordon Brown are right: there should be no nuclear weapons in the Middle East. The risk of a nuclear conflagration could be greater there than anywhere else. Any nation developing them should expect a firm diplomatic response. So when will they impose sanctions on Israel?

Like them, I believe that Iran is trying to acquire the bomb. I also believe it should be discouraged, by a combination of economic pressure and bribery, from doing so (a military response would, of course, be disastrous). I believe that Bush and Brown – who maintain their nuclear arsenals in defiance of the non-proliferation treaty – are in no position to lecture anyone else. But if, as Bush claims, the proliferation of such weapons “would be a dangerous threat to world peace”, why does neither man mention the fact that Israel, according to a secret briefing by the US Defence Intelligence Agency, possesses between 60 and 80 of them?

Officially, the Israeli government maintains a position of “nuclear ambiguity”: neither confirming nor denying its possession of nuclear weapons. But everyone who has studied the issue knows that this is a formula with a simple purpose: to give the United States an excuse to keep breaking its own laws, which forbid it to grant aid to a country with unauthorised weapons of mass destruction. The fiction of ambiguity is fiercely guarded. In 1986, when the nuclear technician Mordechai Vanunu handed photographs of Israel’s bomb factory to the Sunday Times, he was lured from Britain to Rome, drugged and kidnapped by Mossad agents, tried in secret, and sentenced to 18 years in prison. He served 12 of them in solitary confinement and was banged up again – for six months – soon after he was released.

However, in December last year, the Israeli prime minister, Ehud Olmert, accidentally let slip that Israel, like “America, France and Russia”, had nuclear weapons. Opposition politicians were furious. They attacked Olmert for “a lack of caution bordering on irresponsibility”. But US aid continues to flow without impediment.

Continue reading ‘Ban the Bomb – But Only in Iran’ »

– Some of Hillary Clinton’s US presidential campaign contributors received presidential pardons granted by husband Bill in 2001.

In Washington, you get what you pay for

ABC News said Thursday three people who were pardoned by President Clinton have since donated funds to the New York Democrat’s war chest.

The contributors include former CIA Director John Deutch, who received a ‘preemptive‘ pardon for mishandling agency documents before he was formally charged with a crime. The other contributors were Alfredo Regalado, who failed to report a $10,000 currency transfer, and former Arkansas prosecutor David Herlinger, who pleaded guilty to taking bribes from drunken-driving defendants.

Most of the shots fired by US para-military death squad Blackwater that killed 17 civilians in Baghdad 16 September were unwarranted, a preliminary FBI report says.

“I wouldn’t call it a massacre, but to say it was unwarranted is an understatement,” one official who asked not to be identified told the New York Times.

A separate US military review of the shootings concluded all of the killings were unjustified and potentially criminal.

Now the hard part comes. Will the new attorney general Michael Muskasey justifiably bring indictments against the Blackwater murderers, or will he roll over and protect the administrations death squad? 

Mukasey during his confirmation hearings would not state with assurance that the interrogation technique of water-boarding was in fact torture, thus leaving open his willingness to capitulate to the Bush administrations ongoing illegal misadventures in foreign policy. Is it now possible that cold-blooded murder will be added to that growing list of crimes?

How much longer can the illegal activities of the Bush administration go on before congress will finally impeach the bastards?

This week testifying before the senate judiciary committee, Mark Klein a former AT&T technician who disclosed that the tele-communications giant provided a room in its San Francisco facilities for the NSA, stated that the governments surveillance agency was wiretapping all internet and voice traffic routed through the facility. Klein said, “I know this physical equipment. It copies everything. There’s no selection of anything, at all — the splitter copies entire data streams from the internet, phone conversations, e-mail, web-browsing. Everything.”

This is quite contrary to what the administration would have the US public believe as it continually states that only communications traffic originating from outside the country or being sent from the US to foreign countries is being intercepted, and then only traffic of a ‘terrorist’ nature is pursued. Now we learn that everything is being intercepted — that every US citizen is under surveillance, without a warrant, without judicial oversight. What’s worse is that despite these crimes and violations of every citizens constitutional rights, President Bush has promised to veto any surveillance bill that does not protect telecommunications companies from lawsuits for alleged violations of wiretapping and privacy laws.

President Bush should not have the ability to veto any legislation or be allowed any longer to administer the office of President of the United States. He rightfully should be bound and confined for his crimes and summarily removed from office. It’s difficult to believe that nothing is being done to stop these continuing illegal activities. Nixon was forced to step down from office for authorizing the break-in of a campaign office. Clinton was hounded for years by a special prosecutor for lying about a private consensual affair. These are school yard pranks compared to what the Bush administration has been doing, yet congress refuses to exercise its authority and remove these criminals from the Federal government.

The list of crimes keeps growing: unwarranted military invasion of a sovereign nation, extraordinary rendition, illegal confinement, perjury, torture, warrant-less wiretaps — crimes every one — when will the crooks be put behind bars?

An article today from the Washington Post details the events of another shooting incident in Iraq that occurred on February 7, of this year involving the administrations para-military death squad, Blackwater. Although far fewer Iraqis were murdered in this shooting than the highly publicized September 16, incident that resulted in the murder of some 17 Iraqi civilians and scores of injuries, it is troubling to realize how quick the administration is to cover up these murders and absolve Blackwater of any wrong doing.

A congressional report issued the first of October was also highly critical of the US State Department for failing to restrain Blackwater’s activities while helping cover up some of its murderous incidents — even protecting a drunken Blackwater employee who murderd a guard of the Iraqi Vice president. The report also noted that Blackwater has covered up fatal shootings involving its staff, is the first to shoot in most incidents, and has joined in US military tactical operations.

The congressional report also quoted US military commanders as saying that Blackwater staff, “act like cowboys” with “very quick trigger fingers”. It went on to say that Blackwater, the largest private security firm operating in Iraq, has received more than one billion dollars in US government contracts since 2001.

Coupled with CPA Order Number 17, which deals with the status of coalition personnel and subcontractors, one can only surmise that the continued use of para-military squads such as Blackwater, allows the US to engage in murders of Iraqi civilians and extra-judicial assassinations that could otherwise result in prosecutions of its military personnel. Using ‘private contractors’ for its dirty work the US can absolve itself of any responsibility while Order 17 grants the subcontractors immunity from local criminal, civil, and administrative jurisdiction and from any form of arrest or detention.

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Obviously the strain of more than six years of lying to congress and the American people is taking its toll on the President. Just less than a month ago 2 secret justice department memorandum were revealed by the New York Times which showed the DOJ authorized the use of torture. Today, however Bush, in defense of Michael Mukasey his nominee for attorney general, keeps saying that the US doesn’t torture, conveniently forgetting that its already common knowledge that the US does employ torture techniques.

A 4 October 2007 New York Times article unveiled the details of DOJ legal opinions written in 2005 that authorized the CIA to torture terror suspects with painful physical and psychological tactics, including head-slapping, simulated drowning, better known as water-boarding, the use of frigid temperatures, electro-shock and sleep deprivation. At that time the administration admitted the existence of the classified information, and going further stated that they approved the techniques as “tough, safe, necessary and lawful.”

What is even more ironic is that these torture authorizations written in 2005 came shortly after a DOJ opinion in December 2004, that declared torture “abhorrent.” It now seems that a veritable epidemic of “selective amnesia” is apparently sweeping the Bush administration.

Continue reading ‘Is Bush suffering from selective amnesia?’ »

President Bush today tried to cajole the senate to confirm Michael Mukasey as attorney general despite the fact that many senators were reluctant to do so because Mukasey was unwilling to say that the interrogation technique of water-boarding is illegal torture. Bush went so far as to say that “Mukasey is not being treated fairly” because “He doesn’t know whether we use that technique or not.”

It sounds like Bush is saying that if water-boarding is used, then it would be necessary for a compliant attorney general to agree that the technique isn’t illegal.  Therefore Mukasey can’t yet speak his mind because the administration hasn’t “read him in,” or told him what to think yet.

Water-boarding, a torture technique that has been used for centuries, causes the victim to experience drowning by pouring water into the breathing passages. This form of torture has been outlawed internationally, and implicitly in the US as cruel, immoral, inhuman and degrading treatment. Bush’s suggestion that water-boarding is acceptable, because as he puts it, “the techniques used are within the law,” is indicative of his persistent slide towards fascism. If the US actually didn’t use water-boarding, this wouldn’t even have come up as a topic of discussion.

Once again, Bush is trying to shame congress into subjugating the law, the US constitution, and the values of US democratic principals to further his administrations unilateral excesses of power. The congress seemingly more concerned with their careers than their oath to uphold the constitution, continually refuse to restrict the Presidents ever expanding powers for fear of being seen as “soft on terror,” or not “supporting our troops.”  These two meaningless slogans have immobilized congress to the point that they fear for their re-election prospects if one of these two slogans should be levied at them. Playing politics appears to matter more than accepting the fact that one can be opposed to terror and supportive of US military personnel while at the same time disagreeing with the administrations failed and illegal policies. Its time the US congress stood up to the administration and upheld the values and ethics that most Americans believe their country represents. All forms of torture are illegal. Water-boarding is torture.