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Recent
Stories
April
9, 2003
Doug
Lummis
Saving Private Lynch: Hollywood and
War
Susan
Davis
The New York Times and the Peace Movement
David Vest
Smoking Gun? You're Watching It
John
Chuckman
America's Sovereign Right to Do
as It Damn Well Pleases
Akiva
Eldar
Gary Bauer and AIPAC: an Unholy Alliance
with the Christian Right
Ray
Hanania
Suicide Bombers without the Suicide:
Racism, Hypocrisy and the War on Iraq
David Lindorff
Secret Bechtel Docs Reveal: Yes,
the War Is About Oil
Steve
Perry
War Web Log 4/9
April
8, 2003
David
Lindorff
Killing the Messengers: It Doesn't
Matter If It's Deliberate or Accidental
Richard
Lichtman
Dr. Phil in the Trenches
John
Brown
Why Uncle Ben Hasn't Sold Uncle Sam:
a Former Foreign Service Staffer on Bush's Policy Failures
Ben
Terrall
Report from the Oakland Docks: "The
Cops Had No Reason to Open Up on Them"
Jason Leopold
FERC and Wall Street: Conversations
May Have Violated Federal Law
Anthony
Gancarski
Conyers Heeds the Call on Perle
Linda Heard
Journalists Die, the Networks Lie, Iraqis Ask "Why?"
Ahmad
Faruqui
Wallowing in Hypocrisy
Wallace
Gagne
Baghdad Babble
Harry
Browne
Report from the Protests at the Bush/Blair
Summit
Larry Kearney
I Understand There's a Boy in
a Baghdad Hospital
Steve
Perry
War Web Log 4/8
M. Shahid
Alam
The Israelization of America
April
7, 2003
Todd
Chretien
Wooden Bullets & Grenades: Oakland
Cops Attack Peace Protesters and Dock Workers
David
N. Gibbs
Spying, Secrecy and the University:
The CIA is Back on Campus
Harry Browne
War and Peace Summit a Royal Farce
Gideon
Levy
America is Not a Role Model
Diane
Christian
A Scene from an Obscene War
Jules
Rabin
Remembering Deir Yassin
James Davis
Oddsmaking in Dublin: Will Bush
Shake Gerry's Hand?
Robert
Fisk
The Twisted Language of War
Patrick
Cockburn
Slaughter on the Road to Dibagah
John
Mackay
War and Art
Seth Sandronsky
Wars and the Color Line
Steve
Perry
War Web Log 4/7
April
5, 2003
Alexander
Cockburn
The Iraqi Humanitarian Relief is
in Shambles
Anne
Gwynne
A Drowning in Salem
Uri
Avnery
Roadmap to Nowhere
Chris
Floyd
Hell for Leather: Bombs, Bullets, Bibles and Bush
William
Cook
Would You Have Sent Your Son (or Daughter) Off to War If...
Gila
Svirsky
A Busy Day for Bulldozers
Mike Ferner
Back from Baghdad: What Next for the Peace Movement?
Joanne
Mariner
Civilian Deaths and Official Apologies
John Stanton
Bush Takes His Killing Orders
from the Lord
Romi
Mahajan
Learning to Count the Dead
Aluf Benn
After Iraq, US Vows to Deal with
Other Mideast Regimes
Mary
Ellen Peterson
Gay Marine Refuses to Fight
William
MacDougall
Country Music and the Crimes of Patriotism
Ron
Jacobs
War and Occupation
Bernie
Pattison
Aborigines and the Different God
Mark
Engler
Iraq War as Arms Expo
Adam Engel
Li'l Box of Love: a Novelini
Poets'
Basement
Tripp, Albert, Katz
Jeffrey
St. Clair
Flesh and Its Discontents: the Paintings of Lucian Freud
Norman
Madarasz
Canada and the War
April
4, 2003
Anthony
Gancarski
Colin Powell's Shame
John
Chuckman
Was Einstein Right About Israel?
David
Krieger
The Meaning of Victory
Tom
Gorman
The Mantra of the Troops: Support
or Treason?
Adam
Federman
The Absence of War
Vijay
Prashad
There Are No More Arguments
Tom
Stephens
The End of the Innocence
Mickey
Z.
Makes Me Sic (Sic): Copy Editing
Bush Speak
Pierre
Tristam
War Coverage: a Dishonest Reality
Show
Hammond
Guthrie
The Deadly Mihrab
Steve
Perry
War Web Log 04/04
April
3, 2003
Uri
Avnery
A Crooked Mirror: Presstitution and
the Theater of Operations
David
Vest
Can You Hear the Silence?
Anthony
Gancarski
Colin Powell Telemarketer
David
Lindorff
Takoma: the Dolphin Who Refused
to Fight
Michael
Roberts
War, Debts and Deficits
Ramzy
Baroud
Now That Iraqis Are Being Killed Is Israel Any More Secure?
Jo Wilding
From Baghdad with Tears
Anton
Antonowicz
Cluster Bombs on Babylon
Alison
Weir
Israel, We Won't Forget Rachel Corrie
Bruce
Jackson
Hating Wolf Blitzer's Voice
Eliot Katz
War's First Week
Steve
Perry
War Web Log 04/03
Hot Stories
Paul de Rooij
Arrogant
Propaganda
Gore Vidal
The
Erosion of the American Dream
Francis Boyle
Impeach
Bush: A Draft Resolution
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April 10,
2003
Bush's Napoleonic Complex
The
Telltale Signs of World Empire
By WAYNE MADSEN
A veteran journalist friend of mine recently remarked
that, in many ways, George W. Bush's lust for war reminded him
of Napoleon Bonaparte. The French emperor dreamt of a world under
his domination. Although many of Bush's domestic policies closely
resemble those of Adolf Hitler, the comparison of Bush to Napoleon
has merit. Napoleon wanted to restore the Holy Roman Empire of
Charlemagne. In his first military incursions into the Middle
East, Napoleon believed he was another Alexander the Great.
Bush obviously wants to create some sort
of neo-Crusader American empire in the Middle East and beyond.
Bush's constant linking of his war policies to God indicates
that he possesses the same sort of megalomania as Napoleon.
Napoleon wrecked the peace brought about
by the Treaty of Amiens of 1802 and plunged the world back into
war. Bush has trashed international treaties by the truckload
and has returned the world to a nascent Cold War--and  like the Soviet Union during the prior
Cold War the United States is now considered the primary threat
to world peace by governments and peoples alike.
The telltale signs of empire creation
begins with perception management. Napoleon accomplished this
by convincing the French masses that he was re-creating the glory
of France after years of revolution and civil war. No amount
of French blood was too much to pay and the French were happy
to support Napoleon's numerous wars.
The American public is now convinced
that Bush achieved a tremendous victory over Saddam Hussein.
They are willing to disregard all the reasons Bush used to invade
Iraq. No weapons of mass destruction have been discovered in
Iraq and a number of people in America and abroad now believe
if such weapons are found, they would have been planted in Iraq
by the United States.
Americans are also being told by the
Bush-controlled corporate media that the residents of Baghdad
and Basra were jubilant that the Americans had arrived. Never
mind the fact that both cities had been under constant bombardment
for weeks and that water and electricity had been cut off. After
that kind of ordeal, anyone would welcome a lull in bombing and
restoration of basic services. It does not mean Iraqis necessarily
welcome an invading force. Independent journalists, not embedded
by Pentagon handlers, report that a number of Iraqis have expressed
fears that their country will come under the control of the Israelis.
In addition, a CIA report states that most Iraqis abhor Ahmed
Chalabi, America's designated leader for post-Saddam Iraq.
Iraqis know Chalabi as a crook. He defrauded
depositors out of $300 million when his Petra Bank in Jordan
collapsed in the late 1980s. In 1992, after Chalabi escaped Jordan,
reportedly with the help of then-Crown Prince Hassan, the brother
of King Hussein, a Jordanian court found Chalabi guilty of fraud
and sentenced him to 22 years at hard labor. Jordan has an Interpol
red notice out for Chalabi's arrest. But Chalabi will not face
a Jordanian jail cell. Instead, his patrons, George W. Bush,
Dick Cheney, Richard Perle, Paul Wolfowitz, Elliott Abrams, Jay
Garner, Scooter Libby, Michael Ledeen, and James Woolsey are
pushing him as the new prime minister of Iraq. And for good measure,
Chalabi's old friend, Hassan of Jordan, is being mentioned as
the person to head up a restored Hashemite monarchy in Baghdad.
But none of this is being mentioned by
the American media, which is under the tight control of Bush
political operatives and right-wing policy launderers like the
American Enterprise Institute (home of Lynne Cheney who reportedly
sits on a fellowship grant provided to the think tank from Israeli
sources) and the Heritage Foundation.
With Fox News and Clear Communications
and their sordid commentators spouting forth the most jingoistic
propaganda billed as news, the American people are not being
told the truth about Iraq. The fact that the U.S. military purposefully
targeted Al Jazeera offices near the Mansour Hotel and Abu Dhabi
TV and Reuters offices at the Palestine Hotel in Baghdad that
were previously declared by the US Central Command as no-fire
zones is being widely reported around the world but not in the
United States. CNN's veteran journalist Christiane Amanpour rejected
the observation by her colleague, Wolf Blitzer, that war is a
dangerous business (he was parroting Pentagon press spokeswoman
Torie Clarke). Amanpour, who insisted that all the journalists
knew more about the Baghdad war zone than government press officers,
should have reminded CNN's audience that Blitzer is far from
a seasoned unbiased war correspondent he claims to be. The fact
that Blitzer was once the Washington correspondent for The Jerusalem
Post, a leading advocate of the war on Iraq, should be known
by every CNN viewer. However, CNN viewers can probably be excused
for not knowing Blitzer's background -- a number of journalists
are not even aware of his ingrained bias on the Middle East.
The whole world is talking about the
virtual news blackout imposed by the Bush administration on the
United States. The BBC, France 2, CBC, Deutsche Welle, and TV
Espana are all reporting that what Americans are being fed by
their media is pure propaganda. European TV is carrying images
of hundreds of dead Iraqi civilians while U.S. television concentrates
on American military doctors tending to "sick" (not
wounded) Iraqi children and Iraqis pulling down statues of Saddam
and defacing his portraits.
American cable news trollops continue
to lament the non-combat deaths of NBC's David Bloom and The
Atlantic Monthly's Michael Kelly but ignore the killing of Al
Jazeera's Tariq Ayoub from a hail of American tank fire directed
at the satellite news channel's Baghdad offices. Ayoub was as
familiar to millions of Arab viewers as David Bloom was to Americans.
But hardly a peep about Ayoub's death came from the 24 x 7 purveyors
of Bush regime pabulum. No mention is made of ITN's British correspondent
Terry Lloyd who was reportedly killed by U.S. Marine gunfire
outside of Basra late last month.
Instead, the cable propagandists began
interviewing U.S. military law experts about the need for war
crimes trials for Iraqi political and military leaders. No mention
is made of courts martial for U.S. troops who deliberately targeted
journalists or civilians. It is the disinformation policy that
the Bush regime has adopted that is most amazing and worrisome
to people the world over. The Bush regime does not want bad news,
only good news. The Soviet Union was known for a similar policy
-- there was no bad news in the old Soviet Empire. Airplane crashes,
earthquakes, epidemics, and severe storms were never covered
by the Soviet media. The U.S. media, under the thumb of government
media manipulators, is gradually adopting the same policy --
only one U.S. fixed wing aircraft was shot down by the Iraqis,
the rest of aircraft losses were all "accidents," the
killing of civilians and journalists were "accidents,"
the bombing of a refugee bus heading to Syria was an "accident."
In other words, the U.S. war on Iraq has been a prefect "10."
Just look at the Iraqis celebrating that their cities are no
longer being bombed. They see the Americans and British as liberators,
not conquerors. The Orwellian disinformation campaign marches
on. George W. Bush has stuck it to the anti-war movement and
his political detractors. He is assured of re-election. Doubters
like Tom Daschle will pay with their Senate seats next year.
There is no economic recession. There is no high unemployment.
Tax cuts can pay for the war. Washington, DC kids from poor families
are barred from this year's White House Easter egg hunt -- only
military dependents are invited. Barbara Bush says she doesn't
watch TV because seeing those coffins coming back to Dover Air
Force Base upsets her and her husband. A message for "Babs"
-- I understand your angst, perhaps you should rent a good movie,
like "Nicholas and Alexandra" or "Marie Antoinette."
Meanwhile, the neo-conservative hawks
use the TV and radio airwaves, editorial and op-ed columns, and
the floors of the Senate and House to demand a final accounting
for all those who demean the motives of the Bush administration
(which has become synonymous with the United States in a replay
of Louis XIV's "L'etat c'est moi" concept).
Meanwhile, Americans and legal residents
of the United States continue to be rounded up by the thugs of
John Ashcroft and Tom Ridge. Muslim residents of the United States,
fearful that their "papers are not in order" continue
to put a strain on churches and social welfare agencies in small
towns in upstate New York and Vermont. Canadian immigration authorities
cannot keep up with the flow of refugees out of the United States.
Bush allies on Congress want to drop
the sunset provisions of the Patriot Act and make the government's
new powers permanent. The leading proponent of such legislation,
Senator Orrin Hatch, recently said on a radio show that Paris
is a "nice city . . . if it weren't for the French who live
there." Get ready for more of such xenophobia and hate speech
for the Republicans and their Democratic barnacles. By the way
Mr. Hatch, I've noticed Utah is a pretty nice state-- if it weren't
for all the Mormons who live there.
A victorious George Bush is as dangerous
as was a victorious Napoleon. The whiff of an American world
empire is in the air. Already the Bush administration is threatening
small nations like Barbados, Jamaica, and Chile if they support
a Uniting for Peace Resolution to move the international debate
about America's occupation of Iraq from the Security Council
to the General Assembly where the U.S. has no veto. Knowing the
mindset of the Bush administration, there are probably already
plans in effect to "shock and awe" Bridgetown, Kingston,
and Santiago. After all, if you already have experience blowing
up hotels like the Al Rashid and Palestine Hotels in Baghdad,
the thoughts of taking a swipe at the seaside hotels of Barbados
and Jamaica must really stir the libido of the chickenhawks.
Ron Jacobs
is author of The
Way the Wind Blew: a history of the Weather Underground.
He can be reached at: rjacobs@zoo.uvm.edu
Today's
Features
Doug
Lummis
Saving Private Lynch: Hollywood and
War
Susan
Davis
The New York Times and the Peace Movement
David Vest
Smoking Gun? You're Watching It
John
Chuckman
America's Sovereign Right to Do
as It Damn Well Pleases
Akiva
Eldar
Gary Bauer and AIPAC: an Unholy Alliance
with the Christian Right
Ray
Hanania
Suicide Bombers without the Suicide:
Racism, Hypocrisy and the War on Iraq
David Lindorff
Secret Bechtel Docs Reveal: Yes,
the War Is About Oil
Steve
Perry
War Web Log 4/9
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