Retraction

Here at LGF Watch, we have, in the past, suggested that the people who post comments at LGF are anti-Muslim.

We now realize that isn't necessarily true.

Here's how some lizards reacted when a New Jersey university employee named "Jihad" was censured for using homophobic language in a campus email (http://littlegreenfootballs.com/weblog/?entry=16886):

• Geez this is a difficult situation to know which side you're on. On the one hand, I beleive in tolerance and equal treatment under the law for gays and lesbians. On the other hand I believe in freedom of speech.


• In this case I agree with the guy named Jihad (oy!). The reprimand is uncalled for.


• Much as I hate to say it, I'm with the Jihad (WTF?)guy on this.


• I'm laughing waaaay to hard to even type! Mawwwwaaaaaaahhaaaaaaa :)


• I agree that Mr. Jihad is within his rights on this matter.


• I never thought I'd be supporting someone named "Jihad" but he's making a valid point.


• I'm hoping for a result to this litigation which piles maximum costs on both sides. I don't want a winner, but two losers.


• If we suppress criticism of gays the next step is suppressing criticism of Mohamedens [sic]


• I actually would not call this "gay-bashing" at all.


• This is one case where I hope the mulsim wins the battle, even if I hope he loses the war.


• I'm with the Muslim [sic] guy on this one.

Clearly we've been wrong to imply that all LGF'ers are virulently anti-Muslim. In fact, some of them are downright supportive of Muslims -- as long as they're expressing anti-gay attitudes.

LGF Watch regrets the error.

Now just imagine if Mr. Daniel had received an email inviting him to a screening of a Jewish-themed film, and had expressed his feelings about Jews in terms similar to those that led to the disciplinary action against him.

Would the lizards have responded by offering a whole-hearted defense of his First Amendment rights?

Threat identification

According to the Times, a number of al-Qaeda websites have gone missing recently, and the British secret services might be responsible.

As a new BBC documentary series explains, the Web is a major battleground in the Global Struggle Against Violent Extremism. Unfortunately:

“Modern technology puts most of the advantages in the hands of the terrorists. That is the bottom line,” says Professor Michael Clarke, of King’s College London, who is director of the International Policy Institute.

Government-sponsored monitoring systems, such as Echelon, can track vast amounts of data but have so far proved of minimal benefit in preventing, or even warning, of attacks. And such systems are vulnerable to manipulation: low-ranking volunteers in terrorist organisations can create background chatter that ties up resources and maintains a threshold of anxiety. There are many tricks of the trade that give terrorists secure digital communication and leave no trace on the host computer.

However:

Ironically, the most readily available sources of accurate online information on bomb-making are the websites of the radical American militia. “I have not seen any Al-Qaeda manuals that look like genuine terrorist training,” claims Clarke.

But of course there's only one kind of terrorist we need to worry about. Right?

[For the record: Charles posted on this same topic 21 minutes after we did. And he left out the bit about the radical American militia. Funny, that.]

Suspect claims attacks not al-Qaeda and motivated by Iraq

According to the bombing suspect in Italian custody his group who partially detonated backpack bombs on the 21st of July had nothing to do with the 7/7 bombers or a larger al-Qaeda operation.

ROME, Italy (CNN) -- The failed July 21 bombings in London were not linked to the lethal attacks of July 7 or al Qaeda, a bombing suspect in Italian custody has told his interrogators, according to Italian media reports.

Hussain Osman, who is also known as Hamdi Issac, said the four men who partially detonated backpack bombs before running from their targets on July 21 were not working with the July 7 bombers who killed themselves and 52 commuters while injuring hundreds more on three London Underground trains and a double-decker bus.

Osman also claimed the July 21 group was not working for al Qaeda, the Islamic terrorist organization behind the September 11, 2001, terror attacks on the United States, last year's Madrid train bombings and numerous atrocities worldwide.

Considering the types of bombs, the amateurish approach and their seemingly trouble free arrests it seems these bombers were inspired by the 7/7 bombs and the situation in Iraq as detailed by the bomber below;

ROME -- A suspect in the failed London transit bombings has admitted a role in the attack but said it was only intended to be an attention-grabbing strike, not a deadly one.

Osman Hussain is said to have told interrogators he wasn't carrying enough explosives even to "harm people nearby."

A daily newspaper in Rome reported Hussain told investigators that the plot was to "sow terror," not to kill and was motivated by anger about the U.S.-led war in Iraq.

Hussain -- one of four suspected bombers in the July 21 attacks -- was arrested Friday in Rome. His lawyer said he may fight extradition.

Jesus akbar

A Harvard professor of history has issued a fatwa against the infidels -- one that is sure to receive a rapturous reception among those who believe that secularism is an enemy more potent than Islam, and that the only possible antidote to the Islamo-fascist threat is a return to the Church.

Lest you think this is an exaggeration, take a look at the penultimate paragraph of Niall Ferguson's latest rant:

Chesterton feared that, if Christianity declined, "superstition" would "drown all your old rationalism and scepticism". When educated friends tell me that they have invited a shaman to investigate their new house for bad ju-ju, I see what Chesterton meant. Yet it is not the spread of such mumbo-jumbo that concerns me half so much as the moral vacuum our dechristianisation has created. I do not deny that sermons are sometimes dull and that British congregations often sing out of tune. But, if nothing else, a weekly dose of Christian doctrine will help to provide an ethical framework for your life. And I certainly do not know where else you are going to get one.

A synagogue, maybe? How about a Sikh or Hindu temple? Or, for that matter, a well-stocked bookstore or library? To state that the Church of England is the only reliable way for British people to acquire a sense of right and wrong -- that there is some exclusive correlation between faith and morality -- is profoundly offensive. To illustrate: suppose someone were to observe that there is a correlation between high rates of church-going and murder in certain parts of the United States. Surely all those devout Americans don't commit mayhem in such great numbers because of their religion, do they? Yet "thinkers" like Ferguson have no qualms about making equally absurd claims about people whose faith, or lack thereof, they happen not to like.

Ferguson's attack on non-believers -- our alleged sins include "turn[ing] this country into a soft target" -- ought to be repudiated by all people of good will, be they Christian, Jewish, Shinto, or Wiccan. Which is precisely why it will undoubtedly be featured and fêted by Charles Johnson in just a few hours' time.

Calvinball

The new Iraqi constitution was supposed to be ready in two weeks' time -- but now the committee writing it has asked for an extra month.

Under the original deadline, the National Assembly had until Aug. 15 to approve the charter and submit it to a national referendum in mid-October. That formula was strongly supported by the Americans. But major differences remain among the ethnic and religious groups represented on the committee.

Before the meeting on Sunday, the committee chairman, Humam Hammoudi, said he would recommend a 30-day extension. After the meeting, one of the framers, Bahaa al-Araji, said the recommendation had been accepted.

Al-Araji said Kurdish delegates wanted a six-month delay but the Shiites and Sunni Arabs decided to ask for 30 more days.

The United States had mounted considerable pressure on the Iraqis to meet the Aug. 15 deadline. U.S. officials believe momentum in the political process is essential to luring away Sunni Arabs from the insurgency so American and other foreign troops can begin withdrawing next year.

The main points in dispute include such issues as federalism, dual nationality and the role of Islam.

So, let's see. On the one hand, we have the Kurds, who don't want to be steamrollered into accepting a constitution drafted under duress. And on the other, we have the coalition forces, who are apparently eager to withdraw from Iraq as soon as possible.

Under the circumstances, a one-month delay is better than no delay at all -- but it still calls the conduct and timing of the entire constitution-drafting process into question. If the delay leads to the removal of some of the objectionable language regarding the role of Islam, so much the better -- but how many additional American and British lives, not to mention Iraqi ones, will be lost in the process of trying to save 'democratic' Iraq from itself?

Liberty and safety

In the immortal words of Benjamin Franklin, "Those who would give up Essential Liberty to purchase a little Temporary Safety, deserve neither Liberty nor Safety."

FOXNews has released a new poll, which makes for some interesting reading.

We learn, among other things, that 85% of the American public would not object to having their bags searched upon entering public transportation (a percentage that far exceeds the number of Americans who actually use public transportation, but that's beside the point).

When asked whether civil liberties or safety against terrorism is more important, 65% of Americans said the latter, while only 13% mentioned the former.

Despite this, Americans are still leery of racial and ethnic profiling. Only 42% of Americans approve of it, while 49% disapprove.

As Franklin remarked in Poor Richard's Almanack (1734), "Without justice, courage is weak."

Don't worry....

...we're all Moonbats to them. Orthodox Anarchist gets the LGF treatment and comes out fighting. Good on him.

A Different Kind of Iraq

Unlike Charles Johnson, who often finds it necessary to delve into left-wing blog comments in search of nutty rhetoric, we at LGF Watch have tended to stay out of the fetid swamp that is the LGF comments section. Because, as Charles so carefully points out, "comments do not necessarily reflect the views of Little Green Footballs."

http://littlegreenfootballs.com/weblog/?entry=16879_The_Next_Real_Battle&only

Fair enough. Nonetheless, we've found some stuff worth sharing in the above thread on the possible inclusion of shari'a law in the draft Iraqi constitution.

Charles -- like us -- is deeply apprehensive about the prospect of Iraq becoming a Shari'a state. And so are many of his readers. Some, though, remain optimistic despite everything. One uncharacteristic burst of sanity comes from 'really grumpy big dog johnson', who writes at #14:

The days of extreme Islam are very numbered. None of those folks want to believe it, but it is the extremism of their positions that dooms their dogma to
failure.

All across the ME, people are starting to understand the connection.

It may take longer in our own country, but the revelation will be real, and will be soon enough. We may see a lot of people killed in the meantime, but no dogma of horror and death has ever perservered across the sands of time.

Radical Islam is on a countdown clock, and there isn't a lot of time left before it's all over.

You can't just tell a world that holds 95% of the power on this planet that your religion will conquer, enslave or kill those who have made society what it is. If you do, it's like standing in front of the Greyhound bus on the interstate and calling the bus an infidel.

We couldn't have said it any better ourselves. But unfortunately, our appreciation of RGBDJ as one of the few sane posters on LGF was short-lived -- here he is at #45:

I've been feeling pretty ill lately, and I think the lies of the left have had major much to do with that. I'd sue, but I'm not stupid enough not to know that the majority of lawyers are in alignment with the social sciences that feed them
their clients, and who are in lockstep with the illusions of the collectivist
left.

Wow... that's nuttier than a really nutty thing covered with nuts.

Getting back to the topic at hand, a poster using the nickname 'cair' observes at #38:

Iraq is now run by extremist shia muslims. What did you all expect? Allawi was our guy. He was voted out in our so-called free elections and we allowed an islamic fundamentalist regime to take root. I have it on good authority that
these people hate America and Americans and are just bidding their time.

And here's 'transferthem' at #51, suggesting that Arab Muslims are congenitally unable to govern themselves democratically -- an opinion that is more usually attributed to the rabid anti-war left:

If iraq actually CHOOSES the death cult in preference to democracy, at least the west will know that arabs and muslims just aren't suited to living as civilised people. This is the big chance for iraq - freedom or barbarism. It's a clear choice which we in the west should observe rather than overtly influence.

This was followed immediately by 'Mich.manatee,' who writes:

LGF has become a shadow of its former self. The same boring old broken record is playing over and over and over lately. No new thoughts, no solutions, no
imagination, very little humor anymore, just a tired chant of "Kill 'em all."

I used to really look forward to reading the comments on this site. Oh well. All good things must come to an end, I guess.

That might be a bit premature, but if the general tenor of the remarks in response to that last post (e.g. our friend RGBDJ at #67 referring to 'Mich.manatee' as a "chickenshit bastard") is any indication, LGF will continue to lose the interest of people like Peter Verkooijen -- repeatedly misidentified by RGBDJ as a 'Scandi' -- who writes at #99:

I was a regular reader of LGF since at least 2002. I stood up for my beliefs by moving from the Netherlands to America and becoming active in Protest Warrior among other things.

I stopped reading LGF after Rathergate when more and more loudmouth morons like you came on the site. The whole thing became increasingly pointless - and I now find out after half an hour and two post that the situation is even worse than six months ago.

And so it goes. As desperately as some blogs claw and grasp for readers and commenters -- not to mention income -- LGF proves that it's possible for a site to be too popular.

PS Charles, don't worry. Pablo/Powderfinger/LGFWW has assured us that there will be no Sharia state. Even going as far as offering a wager. If you're worried ask him about Iraq, we're sure he'll be able to calm your nerves.

Graham crackers

Kudos to right-wing blogger Christopher Fotos for observing that LGF is a haven for "people who think the entire Muslim world can be divided into the following categories: terrorists,collaborators, sympathizers, cowards, or MINOs (murderers in name only)." This in response to a thread about talk-radio host Michael Graham, who came under attack this week for having said on-air that "Islam is a terror organization."

The world, as Fotos' title so aptly states, is a big place. But LGF isn't.

Revenge of the nerds

Gary Brecher confirms what we've known all along: Charles' favorite columnist is a grade-A wanker.

Here's a small taste:

This fool passes himself off as a military historian, writing columns about Iraq and Afghanistan and everything else he feels like babbling about, but he doesn't have a clue about contemporary warfare. Every war nerd on the net knows more about what's happening in Iraq than he does. But that doesn't stop him. He teaches Classics, he's written a half dozen books on ancient warfare, and he never lets you forget that he's a professor and you're not.

Read the whole thing. Or, as Hanson would put it, "legite haec omnia" (or words to that effect -- our Latin is a bit rusty).

Coming to a cinema near you......

Crisis in Niger

Please help Save The Children

Flight to Save Niger's Children

A Save the Children aid plane has arrived in Niger. The flight, funded by the UK Department for International Development, is carrying 41 tonnes of essential supplies - enough food and equipment to support one month of therapeutic feeding for severely malnourished children and those recovering from malnutrition.

A lethal combination of drought and locusts last year decimated the harvest in Niger and has left the country with an estimated 223,000 tonne shortfall of grain to meet the food needs of the local population. Infant mortality and malnutrition rates have increased sharply as a result.

"The clock is ticking for these children. The support of the British Government and British public means we can get this much needed specialist food out to Niger to prevent more vulnerable children falling victim to malnutrition", said Toby Porter, Director of Emergencies, Save the Children UK.

Save the Children teams, including nutritionists and logistics staff, are working to provide nutritional assistance to children under five years old in the Maradi region which is facing acute food shortages. Initial estimates of 15,000 moderately and severely malnourished children in the region have been revised upwards to 40,000.

Please donate here.

Outspoken Sunni Official in Iraq Fired

The Shiite majority in the new 'democratic' Iraq seem very hostile towards the Sunnis role in forming a government. Is this how the freedom and democracy was supposed to work, Undemocratic political maneuvering, arrests, torture and sectarianism?

BAGHDAD, Iraq (AP) - One of the few senior Sunni officials who had urged Sunni Arabs to join Iraq's political process has been fired, the government said Saturday. The death toll from a suicide attack on Iraqi army recruits rose to 44.

Adnan al-Dulaimi was dismissed July 24 as head of the Sunni Endowment, the government agency in charge of the upkeep of Sunni mosques and shrines, Prime Minister Ibrahim al-Jaafari's office said. It declined to speak further on the matter.

Al-Dulaimi told The Associated Press he was fired for defending Sunnis, who dominated Iraqi politics under Saddam Hussein but feel marginalized by the current U.S.-backed, Shiite-dominated government. Drawing Sunnis into the political process is seen as key for legitimizing any Iraqi government.

``I think that the reason behind my dismissal is that they want to silence a voice that is speaking against unjustified practices against Sunnis such as arrests, torture in the prisons, and also for my calls to release innocent detainees and to save Iraq from sectarianism, insecurity and divisions,'' al-Dulaimi told The Associated Press.

``They wanted to keep me away from this important post from which I can defend our Sunni people,'' al-Dulaimi said.

Al-Dulaimi had been among a handful of Sunni Muslim clerics and officials who have urged fellow Sunnis to vote in the constitutional referendum slated for October and the general elections that will follow in December. Most Sunnis boycotted the Jan. 30 balloting.

Sin of omission

This week a prominent world leader made a statement about terrorism in which he condemned the recent attacks in Britain, Egypt, Iraq, and Turkey.

Notice anything missing?

Usually Charles would pounce on a story like this as further evidence of the despicable tendency of the "international community" to ignore terrorist attacks in Israel. But this time, he chose not to.

Here's why:

Even if near-daily shelling of civilians in southern Israel with rocket and mortar fire doesn't count for him, then surely the suicide bombing which took five lives in Netanya earlier this month was no less reprehensible than what happened in the countries the pope did see fit to mention.

The Vatican's response to Israel's official displeasure – its envoy in Israel, Archbishop Pietro Sambi, was summoned to the Foreign Ministry – only adds insult to injury. The Holy See's explanation was that the pope left out Netanya because he was only referring to the latest incidents.

Of course artificial cut-off points don't make the mass-murder of Israelis less objectionable. But even this excuse holds no water, since the Netanya massacre took place July 11, four days after the initial attacks on London's mass transit system. The attacks in Turkey and Egypt followed. Moreover, the human toll in Netanya was greater than the attack in Turkey.

There was no conceivable, let alone moral, rhyme or reason to omit Netanya.

Nor is there any conceivable reason why Charles failed to mention this story -- except perhaps for the fact that he and his minions generally support and admire Pope Benedict XVI, just because of their perception that he annoys TheLeft™.

That might be a conceivable reason, but it certainly isn't a moral one.

Moon over Washington

In his endless jihad against 1.2 billion of his fellow Earthlings who happen to belong to a religion he doesn't like, Charles is now reduced to citing articles from Insight Magazine. (http://littlegreenfootballs.com/weblog/?entry=16868)

He wastes valuable blog space repeating an Insight writer's claim that a signatory to an alleged anti-terrorism fatwa himself supported terrorism a few years ago. To support this allegation, he quotes the religious cult leader in question, who in 2000 remarked:

If you remain on the side of injustice, the wrath of God will come.

Pretty scary stuff!

It's reminiscent of the time back in 1976, when another religious fanatic made the following observation:

Beloved American people, the time has come for us to repent. We must fear the wrath of God.

The man who made that remark is a religious cult leader called Sun Myung Moon. The Rev. Moon runs the Unification Church, whose business holdings include the Washington Times Company, which publishes the eponymous newspaper as well as Insight magazine.

The Washington Times is a Republican paper, and Insight is a Republican magazine.

And LGF is a Republican blog.

The New Constitution

At the request of artist Graeme MacKay, we have removed the image of his cartoon depicting the Iraqi constitutional congress dominated by Shi'ite fundamentalists like those in Iran.

LGF Watch would like to assure Mr. Mackay that we respect his copyright, and furthermore, that we enjoy his work and don't findit the least bit racist -- unlike some of the people who leave comments here. Comments do not necessarily reflect the views of LGF Watch.

Thanks, finally, to faithful reader 'LGF Watch Watcher' for bringing this to our attention. We appreciate your help.

MI5 admits Iraq link to London bombings

Now I don't believe anyone who says the cause of the London bombings was exclusively the war in Iraq. Also, I don't believe anyone who says that Iraq played no part in the bombings either. These two opinions have been all over the place in the last couple of weeks. Therefore I was surprised to find that MI5 of all people were being quite honest about the situation. Far more honest in fact than the politicians, the media, the blogsphere and the your average Mr Joe Public.

Iraq has become a "dominant issue" for Islamic extremists operating in Britain, domestic intelligence agency MI5 said.

In an analysis titled "Threat to the U.K. from International Terrorism" posted on the agency's Web site, a team of MI5 analysts concludes, "Though they have a range of aspirations and 'causes,' Iraq is a dominant issue for a range of extremist groups and individuals in the U.K. and Europe."

In the wake of the July 7 bombings Foreign Secretary Jack Straw and Prime Minister Tony Blair insisted there was no link between Britain's role in the Iraq invasion and the attacks. Their views came in contrast to a leaked assessment by the Joint Terrorism Analysis Center, based at MI5, which claimed three weeks before July 7 that Iraq was continuing to act "as a focus of a range of terrorist related activities in Britain."

Blair has since acknowledged that terrorists may use Iraq for recruitment.

LINK

In praise of lizards

At least they usually keep their clothes on.

An American hero

We at LGF Watch have nothing but the utmost admiration for the American hero who, during the marketing campaign that preceded the war in Iraq, said this:

Going ahead with this war without the support of Europe would be dangerous ... it would be a mistake to engage in war without the backing of the United Nations and Europe. If there's going to be a war then we'll be up against a billion Muslims - so it would be unreasonable for the United States to go it alone against such a huge part of the world.

And who later said this:

I don't like what the war has done to our country, to our economy. My kids will be paying for this war for some time to come.

Not to mention this:

The biggest downside to a war in Iraq is what you could do with that money. What does a war in Iraq cost a week? A billion? Maybe a billion a day? The budget for the National Cancer Institute is four billion. That has to change. Polls say people are much more afraid of cancer than of a plane flying into their house or a bomb or any other form of terrorism.

Who is the American hero who said these things?

Who do you think?

Oh brother

If ever proof was needed that the Lizards have no sense of irony, here it is: http://littlegreenfootballs.com/weblog/?entry=16844#comments.

This one's a classic:

If this is accurate, there may be hope. I do not know one single person who is against profiling of "middle-eastern" 20-30 year old men. Especially those with backpacks or rucksacks.

Maybe you don't know any 20-30 year old 'middle-eastern' men, darling? Maybe you don't, in fact, know anyone outside the LGF message board, which could explain the rather dim, narrow-minded outlook of your acquaintances?

Fresh doubts

Relatives say Met admits that, contrary to reports, electrician did not leap tube station barrier and was not wearing a bulky jacket.

Jean Charles de Menezes, the Brazilian shot dead in the head, was not wearing a heavy jacket that might have concealed a bomb, and did not jump the ticket barrier when challenged by armed plainclothes police, his cousin said yesterday.
Speaking at a press conference after a meeting with the Metropolitan police, Vivien Figueiredo, 22, said that the first reports of how her 27-year-old cousin had come to be killed in mistake for a suicide bomber on Friday at Stockwell tube station were wrong.

"He used a travel card," she said. "He had no bulky jacket, he was wearing a jeans jacket. But even if he was wearing a bulky jacket that wouldn't be an excuse to kill him."

LINK

First reports had him with wires coming out from under puffer jacket which were obviously false. All we can do is wait for the inquiry.

Backscratching

Charles is touting the latest (Summer 2005) issue of City Journal.

"So much excellent writing," sighs Charles. (http://littlegreenfootballs.com/weblog/?entry=16838)

So let's see what's in this Summer 2005 issue, shall we?

• An article by Howard Husock describing Pete Seeger as 'America's most successful Communist' (hey, Howard, the 1950s called -- they want their rhetoric back!)


• An article touting the benefits of Social Security privatization


• Two articles (by the same author) about the evils of campus multiculturalism


• An appreciation of the seminal comic strip Mallard Fillmore

And so on. City Journal, whose website is sporadically unavailable at the moment, due to heavy traffic, is published by the Manhattan Institute, a right-wing "think"-tank on whose board of directors sit such conservative megastars as Bill Kristol and Peggy Noonan, who is also among the voices of praise cited by CJ on its website. Sez Peggy:

"City Journal is the best magazine in America."

What's most striking, though, is what this issue of Peggy's favorite magazine doesn't contain: namely, any significant number of articles about Charles' bêtes noires -- evil Islamist terrorists and the Islamist evil-doers who support them.

Why would Charles Johnson use valuable blog-space to tout this particular issue of this particular magazine, even though it barely mentions any of his pet issues? Could it be payback for CJ's breathless treatment of how CJ's peers (and business partners) are bringing the 'old' media to its knees?

Maybe, but we're more inclined to go with our usual answer to questions like these:

LGF is a Republican blog.

US Openly Supports Iranian Terrorists

LINK: Here's an interesting piece by William Van Wagenen about the kind of partnerships being struck by the US in Iraq. Spreading freedom and democracy by supporting Iranian Marxists?

The U.S. Government is now openly supporting the Mujahideen-e-Khalq, an Iranian resistance movement designated as terrorist organization by the US State Department. On June 20th of this year, the Mujahideen-e-Khalq held a conference at the Palestine Hotel in Baghdad, which is where many foreign journalists stay and is under the full protection of the U.S. Army. I was in the area of the hotel that day, and saw at least 10 U.S. tanks heading in the direction of the hotel to provide additional security. I knew of the conference in advance, because of a report issued to all NGO's working in Iraq, which mentioned that the conference would take place. The report warned of an increased danger of attacks against the hotel, as anti- U.S. insurgents were likely to attempt to disrupt the conference.

The Mujahideen-e-Khalq (MEK) is a Marxist oriented Iranian resistance organization founded in the 1960's to topple the pro- western regime of Reza Shah. Since that time, MEK has carried out scores of attacks and assassinated a number of Iranian government officials. MEK killed several American military and civilian personnel in Iran during the 1970's, and assisted in the occupation of the US embassy in Tehran in 1979 where American civilians were held hostage. Though MEK participated in the 1979 revolution, which toppled the Shah, once the Ayatollah Khomeini consolidated power in Iran, MEK moved their headquarters to Paris and continued resistance activities against the Islamic Republic. In 1981, MEK bombed the offices of the Islamic Republic Party, killing 70 high-ranking Iranian officials. MEK established its military headquarters in Iraq in 1986, where Saddam Hussein became their main source of funding and protection. In return, the MEK fought alongside Iraqi forces during the war against Iran in the 1980's, and assisted Saddam's security forces in putting down the Kurdish and Shiite revolts after the first Gulf War in 1991. The majority of Saddam's recently discovered mass graves are filled with the Shiite and Kurdish dead from this uprising. MEK military operations against Iranian targets continued through the 1990's. The U.S. Department of State added the MEK to its official list of terrorist organizations in 1997, and shut down the organization's Washington, DC office in 2003.

During the U.S. invasion of Iraq, MEK forces in Iraq surrendered to U.S. forces and turned over their military hard wear, including several thousand tanks, armored personnel carriers, anti-aircraft guns, and other vehicles. Despite denying suspected terrorists from Afghanistan and elsewhere prisoner of war status under the Geneva conventions, the US granted this status to detained members of MEK in Iraq.

And.........

So when Paul Wolfowitz promised Iraqis in 2003 that the US would hunt down the "monsters" that assisted Saddam in digging the mass graves in 1991, the Bush administration was in fact just beginning its support for some of the direct perpetrators of these crimes. Also revealing is U.S. criticism of the new Iranian president elect, due to his alleged involvement in holding U.S. embassy personnel hostage in 1979. Though the U.S. admits the MEK was involved in the same incident, White House support for this terrorist organization continues.

The hypocrisy here is absolutely breathtaking.

When is a 'war on terror' not a 'war on terror'?

When President Bush's advisors say so, they now see it as "a global struggle against violent extremism,"! Catchy ain't it.

WASHINGTON, July 26 (UPI) -- The Bush administration has begun downplaying the "war on terror" in favor of "a global struggle against violent extremism," the New York Times reports.

Gen. Richard B. Myers, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, told the National Press Club that if something is a war "then you think of people in uniform as being the solution."

Myers said that while the military may be in the forefront now the long-term solution is more diplomatic, economic and political.

Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld used the new terminology at a retirement ceremony Friday for the naval chief of operations. Rumsfeld said the country "wages the global struggle against the enemies of freedom, the enemies of civilization."

Officials told the Times that the new language is a product of meetings of President Bush's top national security advisers.

The dogmas of war

Ex-nun Karen Armstrong, writing in the Grauniad, examines how shared delusions so often become dogma (emphasis added):

I have become increasingly wary of the assurance with which people express their views. We live in a highly opinionated society. The media bombards us with information, much of it superficial, and the internet makes available a plethora of facts, which are difficult to assess adequately. But we are encouraged to air our views, and are probably exposed to more opinions than at any time in history. Some sound plausible - unless you know a little about the subject.

This became clear to me after 9/11, when I spent a great deal of time discussing Islam and fundamentalism in Europe and the US. I found repeatedly that people took isolated remarks from articles, news reports and talk shows and from these fragments concocted absurd fantasies about "Islam" that bore no relation to the complex reality but to which they were resolutely committed. As they struggled with their fear and confusion they created dogmas that did not help them appraise the situation objectively.

People sometimes identify with their views so deeply that these become part of their sense of self and therefore sacred. My experience of studying and talking about religion has made me cautious of all orthodoxies. Liberal-minded atheists can be just as strident as fundamentalists if their idea of faith is challenged in any way, even if they know next to nothing about religious history or theology. Their opinions seem to have a psychological importance that renders accurate information irrelevant and obscurely threatening.

We need to strike a balance between the kind of repression that I experienced in my convent and the intellectual idolatry that makes ephemeral and ill-founded opinion absolute. People have a right to their views, but some ideas are more valuable than others. In a world where we are facing new dangers, we need clear heads that are not cluttered by dogmatic adherence to beliefs that are often indistinguishable from prejudice.

Opinions change with each generation, but we like to cast our views in stone. It gives us a sense of security in a changing and frightening world. Secular dogmas are no different from religious doctrines. The articles of the creeds were originally personal, subjective opinions about matters that were inexpressible, but because they were essential to the spiritual survival of an influential elite they became obligatory. The Qur'an calls compulsory theology zannah - self-indulgent guesswork about questions that are not verifiable, but which have split the faithful into warring sects.

The best way of countering the clashing dogmatisms of our time is to be suspicious of any idée fixe - including our own. Socrates made it his life's work to compel people to question their most fundamental assumptions. True knowledge was acquired only after an agonising struggle that involved your whole self.

I don't know whether Armstrong is familiar with the oeuvre of Charles Johnson -- but her description of what amounts to a secular cult sounds awfully familiar.

Charles hits bottom, digs

Not content with encouraging his flock to believe that all terrorists are Muslim (which isn't true), or that all Muslims are terrorists (which certainly isn't true), Charles has now hit a new low, by linking to an article that connects the fatal police shooting of Jean Charles de Menezes with the fact that he happens to come from a country in which there are al-Qaeda terrorists. (http://littlegreenfootballs.com/weblog/?entry=16824)

There are al-Qaeda terrorists in Canada too. Are all Canadians therefore automatically suspect?

There are al-Qaeda terrorists in Russia, and Italy, and Britain, and the Netherlands, and Sweden, and Germany, and the United States. Are all Russians, Italians, Brits, Dutch, Swedes, Germans, and Americans therefore automatically suspect?

To their credit, many lizards -- including our friend Powderfinger, a.k.a Pablo, a.k.a. LGF Watch Watcher, who will undoubtedly be joining us presently, are questioning the "logic" behind the post that Charles saw fit to quote.

But the fact remains that he quoted it, which -- to anyone with a shred of integrity -- must call into question Charles' entire M.O.

At the end of the day, as they like to say in Britain, Charles is an intellectual fraud.

Welcome to Baghdad

Despite $2 billion spent, residents say Baghdad is crumbling. Is this winning hearts and minds? Is this progress?

Talib Abu Younes put his lips to a glass of tap water recently and watched worms swimming in the bottom.

Electricity flickers on and off for two hours in Muthana Naim's south Baghdad home then shuts off for four in boiling July heat that shoots above 120 degrees.

Fadhel Hussein boils buckets of sewage-contaminated water from the Tigris River to wash the family's clothes.

The capital is crumbling around angry Baghdadis. Narrow concrete sewage pipes decay underground and water pipes leak out more than half the drinking water before it ever reaches a home, according to the U.S. military.

Over 18 months, American officials spent almost $2 billion to revive the capital ravaged by war and neglect, according to Army Gen. William G. Webster, who heads the 30,000 U.S. and foreign troops and 15,000 Iraqi soldiers known collectively as Task Force Baghdad. But the money goes for long-term projects that yield few visible results and for security to protect the construction sites from sabotage.

As a result, Iraqis have seen scant evidence of improvement in their homes, streets or neighborhoods. They blame American and Iraqi government corruption.

"We thank God that the air we breathe is not in the hands of the government. Otherwise they would have cut it off for a few hours each day," said Nadeem Haki, 39, an electric-goods shop owner in the upscale Karrada district in the east of the capital.

Of the major completed projects in Baghdad, more than $38 million went to sewage projects, $375,000 to a water main and $101.2 million to electricity generation and transmission.

Others are in the works. More than $792 million is being invested in water, sewage and electricity projects across the capital, according to U.S. military documents.

The progress is slow and the rewards incremental. Parts of the city - such as the impoverished Shiite Muslim neighborhood Sadr City, once flooded with green rivers of sewage - now have functioning sewer systems.

"The things that go below the ground and provide enough electricity are incredibly expensive, especially when you have to pay for security for that local job site," Webster said.

As renovations are made, insurgent attacks often undermine the work, leaving the city's residents frustrated that there are days they can't flush their toilets. Over three weeks, three main water lines were attacked, leaving swaths of the city without water for days.

Power generation in the city has increased by about 232 megawatts but the demand has doubled, so the greater supply hasn't resulted in many more hours of service. Three more electricity projects are expected to be complete by the end of the year, including the Dora Power Plant, a $101.5 million project that will supply 428 more megawatts to Iraqi homes, according to U.S. military documents.

Hundreds of thousands of dollars also have been spent to repair and install feeder lines to make sure all parts of the city receive electricity.

A public campaign began in June to build confidence in the Ministry of Electricity. On billboards, TV commercials and radio announcements reminiscent of American-produced public service announcements, messages read:

"Electricity is a blessing, help us protect it,"

"The demand for electricity is growing faster than we can supply it,"

"We ask for your support and understanding."

But understanding wanes when the smell of sewage fills every other block, drinking water is often contaminated and Iraqis resort to sleeping on their roofs to take a break from the sauna-like heat inside their homes, waking up covered in dust.

Electricity production is up to 16 hours a day in Iraqi homes according to U.S. military documents, but most Iraqis say they get eight hours of power a day on average, sometimes as many as 12. In poor areas such as New Baghdad, in the east of the capital, people go days without power, they said.

With about $2 billion already invested, Baghdad should be sparkling, said its mayor, Alaa Mahmoud al Timimi. He hasn't been consulted on American projects, besides signatures for completed developments, and has threatened to resign if he doesn't get a larger budget to solve his city's problems. The $85 million he was allocated can't keep up with the city of 6.5 million, he said.

He's already playing catch-up. Over 12 years the city was allocated about $3 per person per year, he said.

"Baghdad is an ignored city," said Timimi, who's a civil engineer. "The people, they blame me. I need money to rebuild the capacity of water (supply) and ... (for) sewage, garbage collection, power."

Electricity lines are tangled above the streets like strands of spaghetti, supply machinery dates to 1958 and fuse boxes have been ripped from the walls in electricity stations.

"It's too slow. If I had $2 billion I would have done three to five times more," Timimi said. "The Americans told me this is our money and we will spend it towards our plans. They do it their way."

But rebuilding Baghdad can't be done in a day or even two years, apparently. Oil refineries, electricity plants and water plants weren't maintained under Saddam Hussein, and unforeseen expenses often hinder projects.

Sometimes the simple installation of an air conditioner at a school reveals that not enough electricity is being generated to make it work, said Lt. Col. William Duddleston, a spokesman for Task Force Baghdad's Government Support Team.

"People in Baghdad don't understand, because many of them had 24 hours of electricity while people in Basra had five," he said, referring to Iraq's southern port city. Electric power is now distributed more evenly around the country, so Baghdad has suffered.

The capital was ruled with both favoritism and neglect under the past regime, Webster said recently: Those in Saddam's good graces had round-the-clock electricity while others had none.

Lt. Col. Vincent Quarles, the commander of the 4-3 Brigade Troops Battalion, oversees neighborhood reconstruction projects in about one-quarter of Baghdad. He looks at sites in the Karrada district. Some are almost done: Pipes have been renovated, holding tanks for purified water sealed and small water-purification pumps installed.

But it's sometimes a two-steps-forward, one-step-back process. At one sewage plant in east Baghdad, they'd almost finished renovations when a decaying pipe collapsed and the ground caved in. Now the work will begin again.

"It's hard to see all the progress that's been made, but things are getting better," Quarles said.

Knight Ridder special correspondent Mohammed al Awsy contributed to this report.

Welcome to what used to be Baghdad.

A special election

Meet Paul Hackett.

He's a major in the Marine Reserves who volunteered to serve in Iraq. When he returned home, he decided to run for Congress against a member of the local ruling party who is suspected of corruption and cronyism -- her campaign manager was, until recently, a columnist for a local MSM outlet.

Hackett is pro-choice and pro-gun, and he doesn't care about same-sex marriage one way or the other. He's a fiscal conservative who thinks the Terri Schiavo affair was a travesty. His opponent, meanwhile, simply regurgitates the ruling party positions on every issue.

Hackett sounds like the perfect candidate, doesn't he? The sort of candidate who would attract the lavish moral and financial support of America-loving lizards. And banner ads seeking donations. And endless articles about what a hero he is, and what a corrupt imbecile his opponent is.

Except for one thing: He's a Democrat.

So, if Charles mentions the special election on Aug. 2 at all, he and his minions will be rooting for the GOP machine's candidate, against an Iraq veteran who shares most of his opinions on the issues.

LGF is a Republican blog.

Guardsman Pleads Guilty in Killing of Iraqi Officer

This is a story that's bound to be ignored by the right wing blogsphere.

FORT KNOX, Ky., July 25 - A 22-year-old National Guard soldier pleaded guilty today to killing an Iraqi police officer while they were on patrol together, and then shooting himself to cover up the crime.

With his parents and his wife, Amber, looking on, Cpl. Dustin M. Berg of the Indiana National Guard, said he felt "great remorse" about shooting Hussein Kamel Hadi Dawood al-Zubeidi in 2003.

Military prosecutors, who say the fatal shooting sowed a mistrust between Iraqi police officers and American soldiers that continues today, have asked a judge to sentence Corporal Berg to 45 months in prison and to discharge him dishonorably from the Army.

"I should have considered the Iraqi police officer to be an ally and not a threat," Corporal Berg said in court. "I believe I am negligent for the shooting. I should have used reasonable care. I should not have killed Mr. Zubeidi. I acted too quickly."

As he spoke, Corporal Berg held a crumpled tissue in his hand and frequently wiped his eyes and nose. Behind him, sitting in the courtroom's spectator section, his wife, who is seven months pregnant, and his parents wept openly.

The soldier had also been charged with two counts of lying to the military, but those charges were dismissed today.

Corporal Berg, of Ferdinand, Ind., served twice in Iraq with the First Battalion, 152nd Infantry, based in Jasper, Ind.

At least eight other American soldiers have been convicted or have entered guilty pleas related to charges of killing Iraqis.

The shooting occurred in November 2003 while Corporal Berg and Mr. Zubeidi were on patrol outside a flea market. The soldier testified that he had seen a suspected insurgent and moved to retrieve a radio to call his unit for instructions, but that Mr. Zubeidi had pointed a rifle at him and told him not to inform his superiors.

Corporal Berg said he had been in fear for his life, and in a "split-second decision," shot Mr. Zubeidi three times.

The soldier said he then shot himself with Mr. Zubeidi's AK-47 rifle because other soldiers in his unit had faced severe punishment for protecting themselves against suspicious Iraqis and he felt that Army investigators would not believe he killed the police officer in self-defense.

Thinking the unfamiliar weapon would fire only one bullet at a time, Corporal Berg said he accidentally shot himself three times in the abdomen instead of just once - because the weapon had been set on automatic fire. The soldier was hospitalized, but his wounds had not been life-threatening.

The soldier told Army officials that Mr. Zubeidi had shot him, and Corporal Berg was awarded a Purple Heart. Eventually, however, the soldier acknowledged that the wounds had been self-inflicted.

"I shot myself on purpose," Corporal Berg said today. "I didn't want there to be an investigation."

He added, "I'm lucky to be alive today."

Unfortunately the Iraqi Policeman wasn't as lucky was he Corporal Berg? It would be terrible if that's where the story ended, but hey this is Iraq and things always get worse! The recommended sentence for Berg is 45 months. Yep that's right 45 months for murder. Can you imagine if he had committed that crime in the states? Would four years be enough for murder?

Rove and Libby To Face Perjury Charges?

Just when they thought they managed to cover the Rove affair, something else hits the press.

Rove, Libby Accounts in CIA Case Differ With Those of Reporters

July 22 (Bloomberg) — Two top White House aides have given accounts to a special prosecutor about how reporters first told them the identity of a CIA agent that are at odds with what the reporters have said, according to people familiar with the case.

Lewis “Scooter” Libby, Vice President Dick Cheney’s chief of staff, told special prosecutor Patrick Fitzgerald that he first learned from NBC News reporter Tim Russert of the identity of Central Intelligence Agency operative Valerie Plame, the wife of former ambassador and Bush administration critic Joseph Wilson, one person said. Russert has testified before a federal grand jury that he didn’t tell Libby of Plame’s identity, the person said.

White House Deputy Chief of Staff Karl Rove told Fitzgerald that he first learned the identity of the CIA agent from syndicated columnist Robert Novak, according a person familiar with the matter. Novak, who was first to report Plame’s name and connection to Wilson, has given a somewhat different version to the special prosecutor, the person said.

These discrepancies may be important because Fitzgerald is investigating whether Libby, Rove or other administration officials made false statements during the course of the investigation. The Plame case has its genesis in whether any administration officials violated a 1982 law making it illegal to knowingly reveal the name of a covert intelligence agent.

Murray Waas also picks up the story here

White House deputy chief of staff Karl Rove did not disclose that he had ever discussed CIA officer Valerie Plame with Time magazine reporter Matthew Cooper during Rove’s first interview with the FBI, according to legal sources with firsthand knowledge of the matter.

The omission by Rove created doubt for federal investigators, almost from the inception of their criminal probe into who leaked Plame's name to columnist Robert Novak, as to whether Rove was withholding crucial information from them, and perhaps even misleading or lying to them, the sources said.

Also leading to the early skepticism of Rove's accounts was the claim that although he first heard that Plame worked for the CIA from a journalist, he said could not recall the name of the journalist. Later, the sources said, Rove wavered even further, saying he was not sure at all where he first heard the information.

Rove's attorney, Robert Luskin, has said that Rove never knew that Plame was a covert officer when he discussed her CIA employment with reporters, and that he only first learned of her clandestine status when he read about it in the newspaper. Luskin did not return a telephone call today seeking comment for this story.

If recently disclosed press accounts of conversations that Rove had with reporters are correct, Novak and Rove first spoke about Plame on July 8, 2003. It was three days later, on July 11, that Rove also spoke about Plame to Time magazine correspondent Matthew Cooper. Three days after that, on July 14, Novak's column appeared in which he identified Plame as an "agency operative." According to Novak's account, it was he, not Rove, who first broached the issue of Plame's employment with the CIA, and that Rove at most simply said that he, too, had heard much the same information.

Novak's column came during a period of time when senior White House officials were attempting to discredit Plame's husband, former Ambassador Joseph Wilson, who was then asserting that the Bush administration had relied on faulty intelligence to bolster its case to go to war with Iraq. Wilson had only recently led a CIA-sponsored mission to Niger to investigate claims that Saddam Hussein was covertly attempting to buy enriched uranium from the African nation to build a nuclear weapon. Wilson reported back that the claims were most likely the result of a hoax. But President Bush had still cited them during a State of the Union address as evidence that Hussein had an aggressive program to develop weapons of mass destruction.

In the column, Novak called Plame an "agency operative," thus identifying her as a covert CIA agent. But Novak has since claimed that his use of the phrase "agency operative" was a formulation of his own, and that he did not know, or mean to tell his readers, that she had a covert status with the agency.

Rove, too, has told federal investigators he did not know that Plame had a covert status with the CIA when he spoke with Novak, and Cooper, about Plame.

The distinction as to whether Rove specifically knew Plame’s status has been central to the investigation led by special prosecutor Patrick Fitzgerald; under the law, a government official can only be prosecuted if he or she knew of a person's covert status and "that the information disclosed so identifies such covert agent."

But investigators were also skeptical of Novak's claim that his use of the term "operative" was a journalistic miscue because it appeared to provide legal protection for whoever his source or sources were. And although Novak's and Rove's accounts of their conversations regarding Plame were largely consistent, they appeared to be self-serving.

It has been, in large part, for all of these reasons that Fitzgerald so zealously sought the testimony of reporters Cooper and Judith Miller of The New York Times, according to sources sympathetic to Fitzgerald. Cooper testified to Fitzgerald's grand jury last week, after earlier having been found in civil contempt for refusing to do so. In contrast, Miller has refused to testify, and is currently serving a sentence in an Alexandria, Virginia, jail.

Finally, also driving Fitzgerald's investigation has been Rove's assertions that he only found out about Plame's status with the CIA from a journalist -- and one whose name he does not recall. But as The New York Times first disclosed on July 16, senior Bush administration officials first learned that Plame worked for the CIA from a classified briefing paper on July 7, 2003, exactly a week before Novak's column naming Plame appeared and at the time that senior Bush administration officials were devising a strategy to discredit Wilson.

The classified memorandum, dated June 10, 2003, was written for Marc Grossman, then the undersecretary of state for political affairs, and reportedly made claims similar to those made by Wilson: that the Bush administration had relied on faulty intelligence to exaggerate the threat posed by Hussein to make the case to go to war with Iraq. The report was circulated to then-Secretary of State Colin Powell and a slew of other senior administration officials who were then traveling with President Bush to Africa.

Fitzgerald has focused on whether Rove might have learned of Plame's identity from one of the many senior White House officials who read the memo, according to the Times account and attorneys whose clients have testified before the federal grand jury.

Murray Wass is covering the whole saga on his blog Whatever Already.

Where is accountability?

Sacked whistleblower Sibel Edmonds has some really dramatic revelations about here time at the FBI. I wonder if Charles will post this story? What kind of spin would he put on it?

Over four years ago, more than four months prior to the September 11 terrorist attacks, in April 2001, a long-term FBI informant/asset who had been providing the bureau with information since 1990, provided two FBI agents and a translator with specific information regarding a terrorist attack being planned by Osama Bin Laden. This asset/informant was previously a high- level intelligence officer in Iran in charge of intelligence from Afghanistan. Through his contacts in Afghanistan he received information that: 1) Osama Bin Laden was planning a major terrorist attack in the United States targeting 4-5 major cities, 2) the attack was going to involve airplanes, 3) some of the individuals in charge of carrying out this attack were already in place in the United States, 4) the attack was going to be carried out soon, in a few months. The agents who received this information reported it to their superior, Special Agent in Charge of Counterterrorism, Thomas Frields, at the FBI Washington Field Office, by filing “302” forms, and the translator, Mr. Behrooz Sarshar, translated and documented this information. No action was taken by the Special Agent in Charge, Thomas Frields, and after 9/11 the agents and the translators were told to ‘keep quiet’ regarding this issue. The translator who was present during the session with the FBI informant, Mr. Behrooz Sarshar, reported this incident to Director Mueller in writing, and later to the Department of Justice Inspector General. The press reported this incident, and in fact the report in the Chicago Tribune on July 21, 2004 stated that FBI officials had confirmed that this information was received in April 2001, and further, the Chicago Tribune quoted an aide to Director Mueller that he (Mueller) was surprised that the Commission never raised this particular issue with him during the hearing (Please refer to Chicago Tribune article, dated July 21, 2004). Mr. Sarshar reported this issue to the 9/11 Commission on February 12, 2004, and provided them with specific dates, location, witness names, and the contact information for that particular Iranian asset and the two special agents who received the information. I provided the 9/11 Commission with a detailed and specific account of this issue, the names of other witnesses, and documents I had seen. Mr. Sarshar also provided the Department of Justice Inspector General with specific information regarding this case.

For almost four years since September 11, officials refused to admit to having specific information regarding the terrorists’ plans to attack the United States. The Phoenix Memo, received months prior to the 9/11 attacks, specifically warned FBI HQ of pilot training and their possible link to terrorist activities against the United States. Four months prior to the terrorist attacks the Iranian asset provided the FBI with specific information regarding the ‘use of airplanes’, ‘major US cities as targets’, and ‘Osama Bin Laden issuing the order. ’ Coleen Rowley likewise reported that specific information had been provided to FBI HQ. All this information went to the same place: FBI Headquarters in Washington, DC, and the FBI Washington Field Office, in Washington DC.

In October 2001, approximately one month after the September 11 attack, an agent from (city name omitted) field office, re-sent a certain document to the FBI Washington Field Office, so that it could be re-translated. This Special Agent, in light of the 9/11 terrorist attacks, rightfully believed that, considering his target of investigation (the suspect under surveillance), and the issues involved, the original translation might have missed certain information that could prove to be valuable in the investigation of terrorist activities. After this document was received by the FBI Washington Field Office and retranslated verbatim, the field agent’s hunch appeared to be correct. The new translation revealed certain information regarding blueprints, pictures, and building material for skyscrapers being sent overseas (country name omitted). It also revealed certain illegal activities in obtaining visas from certain embassies in the Middle East, through network contacts and bribery. However, after the re-translation was completed and the new significant information was revealed, the unit supervisor in charge of certain Middle Eastern languages, Mike Feghali, decided NOT to send the re-translated information to the Special Agent who had requested it. Instead, this supervisor decided to send this agent a note stating that the translation was reviewed and that the original translation was accurate. This supervisor, Mike Feghali, stated that sending the accurate translation would hurt the original translator and would cause problems for the FBI language department. The FBI agent requesting the retranslation never received the accurate translation of that document. I provided this information to the 9/11 Commission on February 12, 2004, and to the Department of Justice Inspector General in May 2002.

The latest buzz topic regarding intelligence is the problem of sharing information, intelligence, within intelligence agencies and between intelligence agencies. To this date the public has not been told of intentional blocking of intelligence, and has not been told that certain information, despite its direct links, impacts and ties to terrorist related activities, is not given to or shared with Counterterrorism units, their investigations, and countering terrorism related activities. This was the case prior to 9/11, and remains in effect after 9/11. If Counterintelligence receives information that contains money laundering, illegal arms sale, and illegal drug activities, directly linked to terrorist activities; and if that information involves certain nations, certain semi- legit organizations, and ties to certain lucrative or political relations in this country, then, that information is not shared with Counterterrorism, regardless of the possible severe consequences. In certain cases, frustrated FBI agents cited ‘direct pressure by the State Department,’ and in other cases ‘sensitive diplomatic relations’ is cited. I provided the Department of Justice Inspector General and the 9/11 Commission with detailed and specific information and evidence regarding this issue, and the names of other witnesses willing to corroborate this, and the names of certain U.S. officials involved in these transactions and activities.

Now, after almost 4 years, we get to hear new bits & pieces: FBI & Midhar’s Case; FBI & Abdel-Hafiz Case; FBI & Saudi planes leaving just days after 9/11 without having the passengers questioned; FBI & Youssef Case;… and the list goes on.

Today, after nearly four years since 9/11, the American people still do not know that thousands of lives can be jeopardized under the unspoken policy of ‘protecting certain foreign business relations.’ The victims family members still do not realize that information and answers they have sought relentlessly for almost 4 years has been blocked due to the unspoken decisions made and disguised under ‘safeguarding certain diplomatic relations .’

Where is the so-called congressional oversight? Why has the 9/11 Commission intentionally omitted this info; although they’ve had it all along? Where is accountability?

Where indeed?

A Question of Ethics

Shocking news! Charles is reporting that Caribou Coffee won't sell pork, beer or lottery tickets because the owners operate the business according to the Islamic principle known as Shari'ah.

http://littlegreenfootballs.com/weblog/?entry=16806_No_Pork_at_Caribou&only

Wow! I mean that's shocking. Fancy that! Muslims running a business to Islamic principles. I mean, Christians wouldn't do it would they? Or Jews? Those groups have no business principles based on their faith do they Charles?

Christian Business Principles

Basic Principles of Jewish Business Ethics

I wonder if you could buy pork at a Kosher deli or lottery tickets from a Christian bookshop?

The $32,000,000 question

Just how bitter was Charles when he heard about this?

($32 million being the amount he could "expect," based on the quoted sales price and his approximate monthly traffic.)

Reporting from Utopia: Charles Johnson

It seems Charles Johnson is taking an active interest in violent crime in Australia as a sideline to his usual War on Terror content. Charles lives in the utopian city of Los Angeles where as we know there are no rapes, murders or "fourteenth century tribal savagery". Could it be Charles is suggesting that these rapists were undertaking their crimes in the name of Islam?

http://littlegreenfootballs.com/weblog/?entry=16786_Sydneys_Gang_Rape_Trial&only

Worse still, is his closing line (yes, I know hard to believe, Charles wrote some editorial);

This article does not mention that the Sydney rapists had a disquietingly large amount of support from the Australian Muslim community

Any evidence for that Charles? Are you going to back up the claim that there was a 'disquietly large amount of support' from Australian Muslims? Didn't thinks so.

"He should have been captured and then killed as slowly as possible, IMHO"

The "lizardoid minions" on the execution killing of a Brazilian electrician.

#1 noshariaincanada 7/22/2005 07:18AM PDT
Good work!
#2 Americain 7/22/2005 07:19AM PDT
GOOD!
#18 Anant 7/22/2005 07:24AM PDT
#3

I, too, am outraged at the way this man was gunned down like some sort of animal.

He should have been captured and then killed as slowly as possible, IMHO
#19 Tinker 7/22/2005 07:24AM PDT
Why was there only one cop shooting?
#31 Bob's Kid 7/22/2005 07:29AM PDT
Way.to.go.
#35 Kragar (Proud to be kafir) 7/22/2005 07:29AM PDT
I understand the shooting, but wasnt tying his body to the back of the train and dragging it once around London a bit much?

Oh wait, thats just what I would do, nevermind.
#36 I've had a Gutful 7/22/2005 07:30AM PDT
The police deserve medals, the muslim council of britain should put up (the suspects and preachers of hate) or shut the fuck up. If only they spoke up as quickly after the bombings!

All my friends and aquaintances defiantly rejoiced at this news.

Reap the whirlwind islamofascists.

#40 Sarah D. 7/22/2005 07:30AM PDT
#19 Tinker

Why waste bullets? Obviously one shooter was all that was necessary.

May his aim remain true.
#61 Powderfinger 7/22/2005 07:35AM PDT
Ladies and gentlemen, please. Let's be civilized.

5 rounds, point blank to the back of the head is sufficient.
#76 ColoradoJim 7/22/2005 07:38AM PDT
Good on you Metropolitan Police! Nice work. Does the Koranimal get his 72 raisins now?

ALLAHU FUBAR!
#148 BIG 7/22/2005 08:08AM PDT
Complaining about expending five rounds? Let me get my checkbook out to replace the funds used in accomplishing this task. It is money well spent and I'll include a bit extra for the next incident.

To the London cops. Good job. Don't worry about the ammo used. You are worth it!
#155 AmericanGirl 7/22/2005 08:14AM PDT
Good on the London police. Islamofascists reaping what they have sown. They want war? Give it to them.


Then, finally, the truth comes out:

#208 stuiec 7/23/2005 08:49PM PDT
OK, so the guy they iced was a Brazilian, and not carrying a bomb.

Perhaps a misunderstanding and a total cock-up.

What did these celebrating lizards have to say to that?

NOTHING.

(With thanks to IFC)

Supporting our troops

Then:



Now:

When VA Secretary Anthony J. Principi resigned last year it took everyone in the veteran community by surprise. Principi had all the qualifications: he is a staunch Republican, has a background in healthcare, and has the incredible ability to always say “yes” to the Bush Administration.

What happened? Principi stopped saying “yes” and wanted more funding for the VA, and the White House didn't. Insiders say he was forced out to make room for someone who would toe the Administration line. Jim Nicholson replaced Principi as VA Secretary. Nicholson's only qualifications: being Chairman of the Republican National Committee and Ambassador to the Vatican.

The insiders appear to be right, because just a few days before his resignation, Principi gave an interview to his hometown newspaper outlining his plans for the VA for the next four years. Later we learned he asked for $1.2 billion for VA healthcare and didn't get it.

Now come new revelations about what happens when you push for more VA funding. Syndicated columnist Robert Novak gives us an interesting look into the demise of Rep. Chris Smith (R-NJ), former Chairman of the House Committee on Veterans' Affairs.

Novak, by anyone's definition an arch-conservative, has stinging words for the Bush Administration in his column, “GOP: The Price of Being Right.” His basic thesis is: step out of line and pay the price.

Rep. Smith was always considered a friend of veterans, but was known to lock horns with Republican leadership when he pushed for more VA funding. He was unceremoniously removed from his Chairmanship and replaced with Rep. Steve Buyer (R-IN), who has shown himself to be no friend of veterans.

What we now know is that both Principi and Rep. Smith were right. The VA is terribly underfunded, especially the healthcare portion of the budget. And, the Bush Administration has had to do an about-face and deal with that reality.

[...]

Not only does the GOP sacrifice their own who disagree with the Party, they completely ignore legitimate legislative efforts from the opposition. The hard work of Senator Patty Murray (D-WA), Rep. Brian Baird (D-WA) and many other Democrats to fully fund the VA have been consistently voted down on party lines.

The sad part of all of this is that veterans end up paying the price. No matter what compromises are reached on VA healthcare funding, the dollar figure will fall far short of what is needed to treat all qualified veterans.

Every day more veterans come into the VA system. More than one million troops have cycled through Iraq and Afghanistan. Studies show at least 30 percent of those troops will have PTSD issues. Add to that the wounded and injured, and you have a patient load the VA cannot possibly handle without proper funding.

It's time for veterans to realize that partisan politics must be put aside when it comes to VA funding. As the politicians argue about who did what to whom and what amount is the right amount, veterans are waiting for healthcare. Some of those veterans never get the healthcare. Some of those veterans die.

Former VA Secretary Principi, well before he was removed from office, gave all veterans the call to arms. Principi said, "History is littered with governments destabilized by masses of veterans who believed that they had been taken for fools by a society that grew rich and fat at the expense of their hardship and suffering."

Patriotism Lite

If America is truly on a war footing, why is so little sacrifice asked of the nation at large?

There is no serious talk of a draft to share the burden of fighting across the broad citizenry and neither Republicans nor Democrats are pressing for a tax increase to force Americans to cover the $5 billion a month in costs from Iraq, Afghanistan and counter-terrorism missions.

There are not concerted efforts like the savings-bond drives or gasoline rationing that helped to unite the country behind its fighting forces in wars past.

More moonbattery from the hate-America Left&trade?

Nope.

While officers and enlisted personnel say they enjoy symbolic signs of support and the high ratings the military now enjoys in public opinion polls, "that's just not enough," said a one-star officer who served in Iraq. "There has to be more," he added, saying that the absence of a call for broader national sacrifice in a time of war has become a near constant topic of discussion among officers and enlisted personnel.

"For most Americans," said an officer with a year's experience in Iraq, "their role in the war on terror is limited to the slight inconvenience of arriving at the airport a few hours early."

Maj. Gen. Robert Scales Jr., who served as commandant of the Army War College and is now retired, said: "Despite the enormous impact of September 11, it hasn't really translated into a national movement towards fighting the war on terrorism. It's almost as if the politicians want to be able to declare war and, at the same time, maintain a sense of normalcy."

[...]

"We have recognized that and we have tried to sound the alarm," said Rear Adm. Stephen Pietropaoli, retired, the executive director of the Navy League.

"As an organization that is committed to supporting them by ensuring they have the weapons and tools and systems to fight and win, and also at the grass-roots level by providing assistance to families," Pietropaoli said, "we are aware that the burden has fallen almost solely on the shoulders of the uniformed military and security services and their families. We have used that in our calls to action by our members. We have said, 'We are at war. What have you done lately?' "

Good question.

Oops

The man who was shot dead by Metropolitan Police officers yesterday was a Brazilian who had nothing to do with the investigation into Thursday's attempted terrorist attacks in London.

How long till Charles reports this?

Thought exercise

Suppose you were Charles Johnson.

No, c'mon, it's OK. Just pretend for a minute that you're the person responsible for the seminal and fearless blog "Little Green Footballs," whose considerable reputation rests upon an unswerving devotion to the infallible rightness of the United States military; the 'libertarian' doctrines of Personal Responsibility and Freedom of Choice; and the unending glorification of Our Leader and his War on Evil™.

Now suppose you were faced with a news story like this one.

What would you do?

The normal reaction to such a tragic story among the reflexively "anti-idiotarian" right-wing élite would be one of the following:

1. Blame the drug users -- but that's not possible, unless they happen to be Muslim.

2. Shoot the messenger -- but that's not possible, because it's the Telegraph, a Tory paper.

3. Blame the situation in which the drug users find themselves -- but that's not possible, because that would violate the LGF Prime Directive, which goes like this: "Islam is the only source of Evil™ in the world, and thou shalt bloody well not question the wisdom of any policy pursued in the fight against Evil™, no matter how ill-conceived or ultimately counterproductive it might be."

4. Ignore it entirely.

I predict Charles -- the real one -- will go for option 4.

And I won't be wrong.

Thus endeth the exercise.

Tour de Lance

As a public service to those who might be perusing LGF for news of the Tour de France, about which Charles has said nothing since last Saturday, here is a brief update.

To summarize: despite not having won any stages thus far, Lance Armstrong retains the yellow jersey and is on course to win a mind-boggling seventh consecutive Tour de France -- which will also be his last, since he plans to retire after tomorrow's triumphant ride down the Champs-Elysées.

Of course, we'd be remiss in our LGF-watching duties if we failed to offer speculation as to why Charles is paying so little attention to the Tour this year, compared to previous years. Ordinarily he never misses a chance to boost Lance, because doing so usually also means bashing the French or other Europeans; but this time around he's been strangely silent.

One LGFer was kind enough to provide a possible explanation for Charles' cooling ardor:

83 AlexM 7/12/2005 11:30AM PDT

GO LANCE! (for now)

I don't think I'll like him as much when he runs for governor of Texas as a Democrat in a few years, as he's hinted that he wants to. Sheryl Crowe as Texas's first lady--poised, perhaps, to become THE first lady after that. Makes me ill.

Only time will tell if this suspicion is justified. But if Charles & Co. do decide to consign Lance Armstrong -- the greatest cyclist of all time, and arguably the greatest athlete alive today, who has overcome incredible odds and represented his country with immense grace, power, and humility -- to unpersonhood if he actually does become a politically active Democrat, it'll provide further evidence that LGF is little more than a GOP echo chamber.

[UPDATE, 16.19 GMT: Lance won stage 20. Still no word from Charles...]

Fair and balanced

Massive Terror Attack in Egypt, MSM Yawns, sez Charles. (http://littlegreenfootballs.com/weblog/?entry=16769)

And commenter 'LGF Watch Watcher' in the post below accuses LGF Watch of ignoring the story.

Well, consider it un-ignored. And since LGF is apparently the ne plus ultra of hard-hitting, up-to-the-minute international news coverage, let's see what the lizards are saying, shall we? The following is an accurate synopsis of the first 50 comments, along with the number of posts in which each observation is repeated (the total is slightly greater than 50, because some commenters make multiple 'points' within the same post):

See? Islamist terror has nothing to do with Iraq. (4)

The liberal MSM sucks. (12)

We should nuke them.

Blair and Bush aren't doing enough.

I made a typo.

We should be afraid of China too.

All Muslims are extremists who are capable of violence. (7)

Sharm el-Sheik used to be an Israeli town.

The MSM isn't really ignoring the story. (3)

It's interesting that these atrocities all occur during U.S. daylight hours.

People who vacation in Arab countries deserve to be attacked by terrorists. (2)

What a shame. (4)

Muslims behave like animals toward women.

Al-Qaeda seems to be weakening and/or losing support. (2)

"Wasn't there a bombing this past week in the same general location?"

This could happen anywhere. (2)

Some other cultures behave like animals toward women too.

Not all Muslims are evil.

There was a terrorist attack against Westerners in Turkey recently.

It was caused by the Kurds.

Maybe this will be a wake-up call to the Egyptians. (2)

The liberals will probably blame Bush and/or Rove. (2)

Why didn't the MSM mention any Israeli casualties?

Kofi Annan will probably use this as another opportunity to steal money.

Al-Qaeda has claimed responsibility.

So on this issue at least, let there be no accusations of "cherry-picking." The list above represents the entire comments thread (as of half an hour ago) in all its intellectual majesty.

And, for the record, LGF Watch extends its heartfelt condolences to the victims and their loved ones, and its unconditional support for all efforts aimed at bringing those responsible to justice.

Off the Mark

A nice bit of snark in today's Grauniad, courtesy of Smallweed:

The columnist Mark Steyn, rabbit-like, some might say, in his fecundity, has recently been denouncing "media twerps". This is a subject on which he can speak with authority. It has always been my contention that a record of making sound predictions is a mark of one's understanding, so from time to time I make a note of some of those offered by Steyn. Here are a handful: "A year from now Basra will have a lower crime rate than most London boroughs" - April 12 2003 ("Half of Basra's provincial council walked out in protest at the increasing number of assassinations and kidnappings, and poor public service" - the Guardian, the day before yesterday); "By the year's end ... Iraq will be the least ill-governed state in the Middle East" - April 4 2004; and, most characteristic of all in its blend of ignorance and arrogance: "Another six weeks of insurgency sounds about right, after which it will peter out" - December 27 2003. (By my count, 82 weeks have now elapsed since that highly paid insight.) Even in March this year he described the Iraq insurgency as "floundering". The new editor of the Sunday Telegraph seems to have dispensed with Mark Steyn. His column in the Daily, however, has in Steynian terms "petered out"; that's to say, it's still roaring on wholly unchecked.

Heh. Indeed.

Comedy gold

Do you ever get annoyed at tough-talking wingnuts whose immediate response to anyone who disagrees with them is to threaten them with death or serious injury, and whose rhetorical technique consists of accusations of homosexuality laced with frequent and repetitive profanity, but who -- when called on their bullshit -- turn out to have tinier balls than a baby dwarf mouse?

Us too.

Which is why we really enjoyed reading this, and think you will too.

And have a nice weekend, or I'll come and kick your faggot asses, you fucking cocksuckers!

Plus ça change

The ACLU is the latest lucky recipient of the Two Minutes Hate treatment over in lizard-land. The minions have been driven to new heights of eliminationist fury over the ACLU's desire to stop military funding for a civilian organization that discriminates against gay people and atheists, as well as its statement of concern over random searches in the New York subway.

But this raging ACLU-phobia is nothing new; it goes all the way back to the McCarthy era, and indeed beyond. There has always been a certain subset of the American population that is convinced that the ACLU's "real" mission is the destruction of America. These days they call themselves "anti-idiotarians," but they're really just the ideological heirs of the John Birch Society and HUAC.

For an impartial look at the ACLU's past and present, see here. (Don't miss the comments page.)

See also Wikipedia.

The ACLU website.

The LGFizer

Those of you who are cunning linguists (tee-hee) may be familiar with the Dialectizer, a tool that enables users to "translate" online content into various dialects of English, such as "Redneck" or "Elmer Fudd" -- both of which happen to provide very amusing renditions of typical LGF chatter, but I digress.

There's one dialect sorely missing. You guessed it...

So let's see what sort of changes would be applied to a typical CBC news report by the LGFizer. (Changes to the original are in red.)

New terror attacks by terrorists on London transit system

Two men Islamo-fascist terrorists were arrested, and one terrorist splodeydope remains in custody, following the attempted terrorist bombings of three subway trains and one double-decker bus in London Thursday. ROPMA!

No one was injured in the co-ordinated terror attacks, which must have disappointed the hell out of Red Ken and his terror-loving L³ buddies.

One man Islamo-nazi terrorist was arrested ,but unfortunately not strung up by his testicles and sprayed with pig semen, near Tottenham Court Road, which is near the Warren Street subway station where one of the jihadi terror incidents took place. He Due to pressure from appeasing pro-jihadi dhimmi terrorist-coddling groups, the goat-f*cking splodeydope terrorist has since been released. Why isn’t there ever a football hooligan around when you need one?.

The other Islamo-fascist-nazi-zombie-moonbat-splodey-muzzie terrorist swine was arrested near 10 Downing Street, the prime minister's residence of Tony Blair, who is an appeasing dhimmi L³ weasel, except for the Iraq thing. He The terrorist, who tried to carry out a terrorist attack but was unsuccessful in his attempts to spread terror by using terrorism, remains in custody. No 72 raisins for you!

Hate-Everything Lies for Lizards

Charles has today cut-and-pasted a piece written by Alan Dershowitz about a children's book that 'allegedly; lionizes the anti-American hard left (whatever that means).

http://littlegreenfootballs.com/weblog/?entry=16744_Hate-America_Lies_For_Kids&only

In it Dershowitz has this to say about Noam Chomsky and Amy Goodman;

Nor are all of Shetterly’s heroes paragons of truth. A recent book, The Anti-Chomsky Reader, documents the reality that Chomsky chronically “fabricates facts,” fakes figures, misquotes authorities, distorts data, plays “fast and loose with source material,” and engages in “blatant professional mendacity.” No wonder historian Arthur Schlesinger called Chomsky an intellectual crook.” Noam Chomsky is not an “American who tells the truth,” and brainwashing children to believe that he is constitutes a form of literary child abuse.

The same can be said of Amy Goodman, who at least in my experience is among the most dishonest, biased and ideologically blinded radio talk show hosts. She doesn’t tell the truth, unless it happens to comport with the radical left line. Her political correctness is to correctness as military music is to music.

Now it's fair to say that Dershowitz seems to have a little obsession with both Chomsky and Goodman but to accuse them of being dishonest, fabricating facts and distorting data is a tad hypocritical considering his reputation for doing the same. The interview that brings some of these things to light is here and reproduced below;

On MSNBC’s Scarborough Country on 8 September 2003, renowned appellate lawyer, Harvard Law professor, and author Alan Dershowitz said: "I will give $10,000 to the PLO…if you can find a historical fact in my book that you can prove to be false." The book Dershowitz refers to is his latest work The Case For Israel. Author and professor Norman Finkelstein takes him on and charges that Dershowitz makes numerous factual errors in his book. Finkelstein teaches at DePaul University and is the author of four books including The Holocaust Industry: Reflections on the Exploitation of Jewish Suffering.

Listen to: Segment | Watch 128k
stream | Watch 256k stream

TRANSCRIPT

AMY GOODMAN: Why don't we start with you laying out the thesis of your latest book, The Case for Israel.

ALAN DERSHOWITZ: I wanted to write a progressive liberal case for the two-state solution, which I think that most Israelis favor and have favored for a long time. I dedicate the book to Professor Aaron Barak, the president of the Israeli Supreme Court and for a reason. Because I argue in the book that no country in history faced with comparable threats both external and internal has ever triedas hard to comply with the rule of law. I compare Israel favorably to the United States. In this regard: its court intervened actively in support of Palestinian rights. Even during fighting in war time during the Jenin events engaging in certain actions which in its view violated the rule of law, The Israeli Supreme Court had banned the kind of rough interrogation techniques that are now being employed by the United States in Guantanamo Bay. Israel is the only country in modern history that has never deliberately and explicitly retaliated against those who attack its civilian targets. For example, during the Six Day war in 1973 war, the 1948 war, it's own residential areas were bombed by Egypt, Syria, Jordan, 1600 shells lobbed into west Jerusalem. Israel never bombed Amman, Damascus or Cairo, they bombed areas of Beirut, and in the process have killed innocent civilians. That is deliberately targeting civilians and going after the way the United States did in Iraq, of which I am very critical, but nonetheless with the United States did going after military targets, knowing that they're going to kill civilians in the process. And so myself, I oppose the settlements, always opposed the settlement, since 1967 I opposed the occupation. I think Israel made in my view a terrible view in my view what it should have done is made border adjustments pursuant to U.N. resolution 242 which I actually consulted with justice Goldburg, he was the ambassador to the U.N. was involved in the process of that 242 resolution, which presupposed some territorial adjustments. The problem is, Israel should never have occupied people. Land is different from people. And today I think unilaterally what it ought to do eventually is if it can't find the peace partner to make some unilateral changes, small ones. End the settlements, in fact my peace proposal is that Israel ought to have a schedule for ending settlements. That is a schedule for saying on so and so date the settlement ends conditioned on best efforts by the Palestinians to end terrorism. That would create incentive to ending terrorist acts. By the way you never condition anything on the end of terrorism, that gives terrorists a veto. What you condition it is on making good faith efforts and if we can get Israel to end the settlements and occupation and the Palestinian leadership to stop using terrorism as a tactic, I think finally something could have happened in 1917, two-state solution, in 1937 when the commission recommended noncontiguous Jewish homeland and Israelis accepted it and the Arabs rejected it. In 1947 when the U.N. allocated that portion of Palestine that had majority of Jews in it to a Jewish state, and the portion of Palestine that had Palestinian majority in it to an Arab state, could have had a two state solution. Could have had a two state solution in 2001 and 2000 and Barak and president Clinton offered to be sure noncontiguous state on 90% of the west bank and capital and Jerusalem with the 35 billion dollar refugee package. When Arafat responded by violence, came back to the table maybe we'll negotiate for more. The two-state solution is inevitable. It's going to happen. Only question is how long it takes to happen. My hope is that we can have a reasonable serious debate about the future, about the rights and wrongs I think the rights and wrongs on both sides. But I'm nervous because I heard from my debating partner in the beginning what sounded like it was going to be simply an ad hominem attack on me as to whether I'm qualified to teach at Harvard. I would hope we could elevate the discussion, keep it on the merits. I won't attack Mr. Finkelstein on his merits of his position, let people read his book and judge for themselves. And if he would refrain from personal attacks on me, let people judge the book on the merits. I think we can move the ball forward and have a reasonable serious debate. I think it would be interesting to know where we agree and disagree. What facts we share in common, what facts we have different views on and whether they're empirical and could be subjected to reasonable resolution, where we have moral disagreements, I really think that in the end today you read the news about Israel is other good news. There is a prisoner exchanges between Hizbollah and Israel which Israel would get back one person, civilian who was captured by Hezbollah in exchange for Israel giving back 400 or so prisoners. There's movement forward. Let's not destroy that movement forward by getting involved in meaningless ad hominem discussion, let's see if we can elevate the debate see if we can really move forward to the two state solution that I think virtually everybody in the world today wants.

AMY GOODMAN: Professor Alan Dershowitz, author of The Case for Israel. Norman Finkelstein, your response.

NORMAN FINKELSTEIN: I appreciate Alan Dershowitz's seriousness at least in these remarks. I have no intention whatsoever of getting involved in an ad hominem debate with Mr. Dershowitz. I'm interesting in the facts. I was asked to come in and discuss his new book. I went home, purchased one copy, in fact I purchased two copies. I read the book very carefully. I did what someone serious does with a book. I read the text, I went through the footnotes. I went through it very carefully. There's only one conclusion one can reach having read the book. This is a scholarly judgment, not an ad hominem attack. Mr. Dershowitz has concocted a fraud. In fact Mr. Dershowitz has concocted a fraud which, amazingly, in large parts, he plagiarized from another fraud. I found that pretty shocking, shocking coming from a Harvard professor. I find it shocking coming from any professor.

ALAN DERSHOWITZ: We have to cut off I just want to warn everybody here that although I'm not a litigious person when you make allegations . . .

NORMAN FINKELSTEIN: I'm proceeded to . . .

ALAN DERSHOWITZ: When you make allegations of plagiarism that's a . . . It has great legal implications. And I can't obviously sit quietly by and . . .

NORMAN FINKELSTEIN: I agree. Well that's -- Let's look at the evidence.

ALAN DERSHOWITZ: . . . of plagiarism . . .

NORMAN FINKELSTEIN: Let's look at the evidence. In the first two chapters of your book you extensively reproduce all of Joan Peters' pages in her book. I read it carefully. In 1984 . . .

ALAN DERSHOWITZ: Show me one sentence.

NORMAN FINKELSTEIN: I am going to show you I think I have . . .I made available the charts to you.

ALAN DERSHOWITZ: You've shown me nothing. Let's start with that. That's a categorical lie. What you're hearing now on radio is a claim that Mr. Finkelstein made available to me certain charts. That is a lie.

NORMAN FINKELSTEIN: Mr. Dershowitz, I think you had about five minutes' time I wasn't looking at the clock. If we're going to have a civil debate you're going to have to remain . . .

ALAN DERSHOWITZ: It's not going to be about me, let me be very clear about that.

NORMAN FINKELSTEIN: I have no interest in you, Mr. Dershowitz. None at all. I'm interested in the scholarship, I'm interested in the facts, I'm interested in your book. In 1984 one Joan Peters published a book called From Time Immemorial, the book was universally recognized by serious scholars to be a fraud. Without wanting to toot my own horn I'm widely recognized as the person who exposed the fraud. I know that book inside out. I read it at least four times, I went through all 1854 footnotes. I started to read your book, Mr. Dershowitz, I then came to chapter one footnotes 10, footnote 11, footnote 12, footnote 13, footnote 14, footnote 15, footnote 16, all of the quotes are from Joan Peters. They're so from Joan Peters that you have a long quote here from Mark Twain on pages 23 to 24. I turned to Joan Peters page 159 to 60, identical quote from Twain with the ellipses in the . . .

ALAN DERSHOWITZ: Is the Twain quote wrong?

NORMAN FINKELSTEIN: . . . with the ellipses . . . let me finish sir. They're in the same places. The identical quote from Twain with the ellipses in the same places.

ALAN DERSHOWITZ: It's been quoted, as you know.

NORMAN FINKELSTEIN: Mr. Dershowitz, I . . .

ALAN DERSHOWITZ: What's your point?

NORMAN FINKELSTEIN: Let me finish . . .

ALAN DERSHOWITZ: I would ask you a question. Is it a direct quote? Is it an accurate quote of Twain? Did Twain say . . .

AMY GOODMAN: Professor Dershowitz the way we can have a civilized discussion here is that each person will get a chance to make their point and won't be cut off.

NORMAN FINKELSTEIN: You have a nearly full page quote from one William Young, a British consul from May 1839.

ALAN DERSHOWITZ: Is it an accurate quote?

NORMAN FINKELSTEIN: I'm going to finish, sir. On page 18 of your book. I turn to Joan Peters, page 184, the identical quote with the ellipses I'm holding it up for the camera perhaps they can see this is the length of the quote.

ALAN DERSHOWITZ: Is it an accurate quote?

NORMAN FINKELSTEIN: It's in the identical place. Last point. I'm not going to go through chapter two where there are 29 plagiarisms from Joan Peters.

ALAN DERSHOWITZ: To be very clear, it's not plagiarism to quote Mark Twain correctly.

NORMAN FINKELSTEIN: Except that you cite Mark Twain not Joan Peters. I'm a professor, sir. I know what plagiarism is.

ALAN DERSHOWITZ: And plagiarism is . . . What is your definition of plagiarism?

NORMAN FINKELSTEIN: We're not going to get involved in that now.

ALAN DERSHOWITZ: You're using a word you're not going to tell us what you mean by it?

NORMAN FINKELSTEIN: The documentation, you know what we'll let everybody else decide for themselves because documentation one last example. I want to make it very clear, in Joan Peters' book From Time Immemorial she coins a phrase. The phrase is "turn speak”.

ALAN DERSHOWITZ: She borrows it from . . .

NORMAN FINKELSTEIN: Sir, I'm sorry she coins the phrase, you see you don't know what you're talking about that's pretty terrible. She coins the phrase, "turn speak,” she says she's using it as a play off of George Orwell which is, all listeners know, used the phrase “news speak”. She coined her own phrase, "turn speak”. You go to Mr. Dershowitz’s book he got so confused in his massive borrowings from Joan Peters that on two occasions -- I'll cite them for those who have a copy of the book -- on page 57 and on page 153 he uses the phrase, quote, George Orwell's turn speak. Turn speak is not Orwell, Mr. Dershowitz, you're the Felix Frankfurt chair at Harvard, you must know that Orwell would never use such a clunky phrase as turn speak.

ALAN DERSHOWITZ: I like it.

NORMAN FINKELSTEIN: Well, maybe you like it. Evidently Joan Peters liked it. But George Orwell never heard of it to the best of my knowledge.

AMY GOODMAN: We have to break for stations to identify themselves. 60 seconds. When we come back professor Dershowitz can respond. We're talking to professor Alan Dershowitz author of a new book it's called The Case for Israel and debate with Norman Finkelstein. You're listening to Democracy Now! Stay with us.

[Music Break]


AMY GOODMAN: More music here from the late Frank Lowe as we continue our debate on Alan Dershowitz’s new book called The Case for Israel. Alan Dershowitz is professor of law at Harvard law school. In discussion with Norman Finkelstein who teaches at Depaul University in Chicago. His book Image and Reality: The Origins of the Israel Palestinian Conflict, Professor Dershowitz, your response to this very serious charge of plagiarism.

ALAN DERSHOWITZ: It's a frivolous charge, of course. What happened was this. Of course I read the Peters book, anybody writing a book on the Middle East, anybody, would. I also read The Myths and Facts, a book put out originally by AIPAC then published separately and independently probably 30 or 40 other books which use the same quotes, they're very extensively used quotes by Mark Twain because Mark Twain traveled to Palestine, Mark Twain is a very prominent American writer. What he saw in Palestine is very relevant to the debate. He saw barren lands, didn't see a Palestinian community. He saw empty roads and he writes extremely vividly and one scholar is entitled to read a book as I did, Peters' book and to find quotes in the book and check them against the original quotes. And find them to be accurate and then do what I did, I don't know whether or not Mr. Finkelstein read footnote 31 that appears on page 246 which says, the research of French Cartographer Vital relied on for the I may of mispronounced it.

NORMAN FINKELSTEIN: You misspelled it.

ALAN DERSHOWITZ: See Joan Peters From Time Immemorial, then Peters' conclusions and data have been challenged and then I quote from Hitchens, I did not in any way rely on them in this book. In other words, what I did, it's very common for scholars to do that. Is I read her books, I read Mr. Finkelstein's criticism of them I came away from enough doubt about the conclusions that although I don’t regard the Peters' book in any way as a fraud, I think it was well intentioned effort to recreate and very difficult to recreate events that existed in 1890 and 1900. Did I find her quotes which have been as I said used extensively by Facts and Myths and other publications, to be quite compelling. This book and none of my writing, I don't purport to be independent historian who goes back to the Middle East and reads original documents. I'm doing what a lawyer would do and what lawyers do is they find sources, they check the sources, I had a research staff that obviously checked the sources. I haven't heard a word from Mr. Finkelstein suggesting that the quote from Mark Twain is not an accurate quote. If Peters had made up a quote that hadn't existed. Mark Twain had never written it then somebody borrowed the quote without going to check back on whether Mark Twain had said that, obviously that would be a serious charge. I've done nothing like that. The vast majority of my book deals with current situations. In fact I start my book by saying there has to be a statute of limitations on grievances. I don't try to base the case for Israel on the fact that Jews lived in Palestine before the birth of Jesus or the fact that Jews were expelled from what is now Israel in 72 A.D. and I argue that Palestinians can't really make the case against the two state solution based on historic claims that go back 100 years but first couple of chapters which are quite brief, I recount never purporting to be creative or original in the recounting, I recount what has been accepted as traditional history. That includes the fact that the land particularly what is now what would be western Palestine, what was the part of Palestinian allocated to Israel in the 1947 division was land that before the Jews got there in the first 1880 in the beginning of the 20th century was land that was coming into disuse. Now these are controversial, by the way, there are some Palestinians who say you shouldn't trust Mark Twain. Some Palestinians say you shouldn't trust the various English travelers. Reasonable people could disagree about that. I quote those sources, I lay them out there for people to read so that they can evaluate the claims that Israel was established on the basis of colonialism. I make the following argument which I'd love to hear from Finkelstein’s rebuttal. You can't be a colonialist country unless another country sent people there as soldiers to take over that country. For example, France sent its settlers to Algeria. England sent settlers to India. Dutch and other countries sent their settlers to parts of Africa with guns to take over. What did the Jews do during the first and second? They escaped from countries that were persecuting them. They escaped from Russia and Poland, Lithuania. They didn't come at the request of those countries, if you claim people were colonialist you have to say on whose behalf they were working. The Jews weren't working on behalf of Russia or Poland or Lithuania. They came as refugees. Much like American Jews came as refugees to America. The ones who went to Palestine went with rakes and hoes to try to build the land, to try to join collectively with the local population. They did in fact improve the land as the result of work projects in western Palestine many Arabs from eastern Palestine moved there, I cite statistics, Peters cites the same statistics in fact showing in various the fact that I can't remember the exact numbers, Jews moved there attracted 300 or 400, you may disagree with it. But those are the data that I presented and we can reasonably disagree with that. Now I just want to make one point about Mr. Finkelstein’s research. I don't want to get ad hominem into this debate. But for example I do quote Mr. Finkelstein at one point I think only once in the book. That is he makes an argument in the collection that to judge the 1947 partition the only fair way to do it is to look at either all of Palestine, which I don't know whether he needs to include what became Jordan, trans-Jordan or not or you have to look at what became of Israel after the 1948 war. I disagree with that. What I say respectfully in the book is that when you look at the fairness of the 1947 petition, you only look at the land that was allocated to the state of Israel. In that land Jews were clearly a majority according to the U.N. census to be sure once the Arab nations attacked Israel, once the Palestinians attacked Israel there was a war and Israel secured more land which was regularized by a crease fire in 1949. What Mr. Finkelstein does is he counts that land and says, look how much they got and look at the proportion of Jews and Palestinians that's not the correct demographic to look at. So we can have reasonable . . .

AMY GOODMAN: Let's get the response to that.

ALAN DERSHOWITZ: Stay away from the ad hominems and get to the merit of the case.

NORMAN FINKELSTEIN: Professor Dershowitz, I'm not a professor at Harvard but I do . . .

ALAN DERSHOWITZ: You seem to resent that a lot.

NORMAN FINKELSTEIN: I do teach elsewhere. And when we discuss issues like falsifying information, plagiarizing, lifting whole cloth from other books I've never heard that called ad hominem for a serious scholar and a serious academic, those are very fundamental issues.

ALAN DERSHOWITZ: But when they're false . . .

NORMAN FINKELSTEIN: If they're false then you dispute them. To characterize them as ad hominem seems really out of court for a professor . . .

ALAN DERSHOWITZ: You said I don't deserve to teach at Harvard that sounds pretty . . .

AMY GOODMAN: Professor Dershowitz let Norman make his case.

NORMAN FINKELSTEIN: You raise that issue then I'll address it then returning to the substantive issues of your book.

ALAN DERSHOWITZ: First tell me why I shouldn't be teaching at Harvard.

NORMAN FINKELSTEIN: On page 207 of your book you say that to deliberately misinform, miseducate, and misdirect students is a particularly nasty form of educational malpractice.

ALAN DERSHOWITZ: Of which I accuse Noam Chomsky and others.

NORMAN FINKELSTEIN: I consider what you have done in the book to be a paradigmatic illustration of misinforming, miseducating and misdirecting. Allow me to finish.

AMY GOODMAN: Let him make his point.

NORMAN FINKELSTEIN: Allow me to finish, Mr. Dershowitz, I've with very respectful of your time. On page 213 you discussed Holocaust fraud by Robert Soan and you write, quote, "it was their extensive historical research” referring to his book.

ALAN DERSHOWITZ: That's right.

NORMAN FINKELSTEIN: Instead there was the fraudulent manufacturing of false anti-history.

ALAN DERSHOWITZ: That's right. And Chomsky wrote as you . . .

NORMAN FINKELSTEIN: Please don't bring in Mr. Chomsky. He can defend himself. We're talking about you and your book. It was the kind of deception referring to the book that let me quote clearly, for which professors are rightly fired.

ALAN DERSHOWITZ: I stand by that.

NORMAN FINKELSTEIN: Not because their views are controversial, let me underline this again, but because they are violating the most basic canons of historical scholarship.

ALAN DERSHOWITZ: Let me respond to that. You compare me to . . .

NORMAN FINKELSTEIN: I didn't ask . . .

ALAN DERSHOWITZ: You made up the story that the Holocaust . . .

NORMAN FINKELSTEIN: I'm referring to your standards. I have no interested in someone else; I'm talking about your standards. To miseducate, misinform and misdirect to violate the standards of historical scholarship are grounds for expulsion.

ALAN DERSHOWITZ: Absolutely.

NORMAN FINKELSTEIN: It's not an ad hominem argument, it's using your standards.

ALAN DERSHOWITZ: No, it's an ad . . .

AMY GOODMAN: I'm going to interrupt here because I want to get to some of the main points of your book. Also we were intrigued on watching Scarborough Country when you debated, the offer that you made just play it for a moment.

ALAN DERSHOWITZ: Tell you what I will give $10,000 to the P.L.O. in your name if you can find historical fact in my book that you can prove to be false. I issue that challenge, I issue it to you, I issue it to the Palestinian Authority, I issue it to Noam Chomsky to Edward Said, every word in my book is accurate and you can't just simply say it's false without documenting it. Tell me one thing in the book now that is false?

AMY GOODMAN: Okay. Let's go to the book. The Case for Israel -- $10,000.

ALAN DERSHOWITZ: Let me tell you what he came up with this is really fascinating if you show the rest of the clip. He came up he said on television, I saw a photograph or a videotape of Israeli soldiers aiming their guns at that, whatever 12-year-old boy who was caught in the cross fire and killed and I actually upped the offer to $25,000 if he could produce a photograph or if he could produce proof that he had seen that. Why was I so confident? Because German television did a very thorough study of that one particular incident. Let's just spend one minute on that. What happened is when that child was killed in his father's arms, the nation of Israel went into almost universal mourning, it was as if they were sitting shiva on one of their own children. A child had died, it looked as if possibly Israeli soldier might have shot him. When you contrast that to how Palestinians respond to a child dying in Israel from terrorism -- dancing in the streets -- it's a very striking comparison. Then German television did a study they found out that the Israeli soldiers were positioned in a way that it was physically impossible for the bullet from an Israeli soldier to have hit that Palestinian child and it was virtually certain that the bullet had come from a Palestinian gun. In my view that's not particularly relevant when a child is caught in cross fire it's a tragic death resulting from the crossfire. Which bullet actually hit was not relevant. But that was the answer that he came up with.

AMY GOODMAN: Norman Finkelstein.

NORMAN FINKELSTEIN: Well, first of all I want to clarify the monetary issue. Is it now $25,000?

ALAN DERSHOWITZ: $25,000 on that issue.

NORMAN FINKELSTEIN: Just on that issue. In general $10,000.

ALAN DERSHOWITZ: Let me be clear

NORMAN FINKELSTEIN: We just saw the tape. I think it's clear.

ALAN DERSHOWITZ: I made it very clear I said afterward a material willful . . .

NORMAN FINKELSTEIN: I don't want afterwards. Professor Dershowitz it's on tape. We just saw it. We're not talking about a spelling mistake. We're not talking about a minor . . .

ALAN DERSHOWITZ: All right. Let's talk about . . .

NORMAN FINKELSTEIN: Serious material. Let's start. Number one, I'm going to first deal with just concrete facts which are not particularly controversial, which can easily be confirmed. On page 80 of your book you write, according to Benny Morris between . . .

AMY GOODMAN: Benny Morris is an Israeli historian.

NORMAN FINKELSTEIN: I have a copy of his book here, which I'll hold up. 2,000 to 3,000 Palestinians were made refugees during the second stage of the flight. Here is the book. Page 256, do you read what the sentence says.

ALAN DERSHOWITZ: Let me read you what I say, in some areas Arab . . .

NORMAN FINKELSTEIN: Please don't read the whole paragraph.

ALAN DERSHOWITZ: Let me put in the context. Chomsky says that Morris does not believe that any Arab leaders told the Palestinians to leave. I say, in some areas I quote from Morris, in some areas Arab commanders ordered . . .

NORMAN FINKELSTEIN: I'm not pursuing that.

ALAN DERSHOWITZ: . . . to clear the ground for military purposes to prevent surrender. More than half dozen villages, et cetera, were abandoned during these months as result of such orders. Elsewhere in east Jerusalem in many villages, the Arab commanders ordered women, old people and children to be sent away out of harm's way. Indeed psychological preparation for the removal of the dependents had begin in 1947-48 and Arab League periodically endorsed such a move. And I say therefore, Chomsky is simply wrong when he says that there's no evidence, he says again in another point, nobody today believes that any of the refugees were told to leave. I dispute that by quoting Morris himself.

NORMAN FINKELSTEIN: You seem to have obsession with Mr. Chomsky but he's not here. I'm here. Let's look at . . .

ALAN DERSHOWITZ: I was surprised . . .

NORMAN FINKELSTEIN: Let's be serious.

ALAN DERSHOWITZ: I agree with you.

NORMAN FINKELSTEIN: Read the next sentence. Morris estimates in your book I have right in front of me. Next sentence.

ALAN DERSHOWITZ: That between 2,000 and 3,000 Arabs fled their homes.

NORMAN FINKELSTEIN: Can you please what Mr. Morris wrote.

ALAN DERSHOWITZ: You're talking about . . .

NORMAN FINKELSTEIN: Please read what he wrote.

ALAN DERSHOWITZ: If I have the whole book I will find for you if you want to take time. Norm Finkelstein if you want the . . .

AMY GOODMAN: I'm looking at page 256 of Morris book.

NORMAN FINKELSTEIN: Phase two now same one as you. You're talking about . . .

AMY GOODMAN: About 2,000 to 3,000 Arabs fled their homes.

NORMAN FINKELSTEIN: The difference between 2,000 and 3,000 and 200,000 and 300,000. You could check this many times, Mr. Dershowitz. But you are really going to have to pay the $10,000. I hope you allow me to earmark it for Jenin.

ALAN DERSHOWITZ: We're talking about a variety of . . .

NORMAN FINKELSTEIN: It is not the O.J. trial. This is not the O.J. trial. We're not going to play a game.

AMY GOODMAN: Is your point that you're citing that Norm Finkelstein is in Alan Dershowitz's book he says 2,000 to 3,000.

NORMAN FINKELSTEIN: It's 200,000 to 300,000.

So that's dishonesty, plagiarism and lying Mr Dershowitz......well done. No wonder he's got a chip on his shoulder after showing himself up so badly.