AND THE REASON...ONCE AGAIN..

"What is the motivation?" she asked. "We never hear what you find out on why."

Mr. Brennan's reply: "Al-Qaeda is an organization that is dedicated to murder and wanton slaughter of innocents. ... They attract individuals like Mr. [Umar Farouk] Abdulmutallab and use them for these types of attacks. He was motivated by a sense of religious sort of drive. Unfortunately, al-Qaeda has perverted Islam, and has corrupted the concept of Islam, so that he's [sic] able to attract these individuals. But al-Qaeda has the agenda of destruction and death."



"The time has come for you," said the purported voice of Mr. bin Laden,

• "to liberate yourself from fear and the ideological terrorism of neoconservatives and the Israeli lobby;

• the reason for our dispute with you is your support for your ally, Israel, occupying our land in Palestine."

• They included America's support of Israel in its subordination of the Palestinians and

• its attacks on Lebanon;

• the propping up of pro-American kleptocracies in Muslim lands; and

• the presence of U.S. forces on the "sacred soil" of Saudi Arabia after the first Gulf War.

The American people should be given enough credit by its leaders to be told the truth about why we are in this "long war" with Islamic extremists, a war that is hastening our bankruptcy, just as Osama bin Laden dreamed it would.

We proclaim our innate goodness, our pure motives, while decrying "terrorism" and never conceding that to the bulk of the world's Muslims, the greatest terrorism is the destruction of Iraq, a war we started that has seen the deaths of hundreds of thousands of Iraqis and the displacement of more than 4.5 million from their homes. To them, understandably, the bombings from American drones, now killing Afghans and Pakistanis by remote control, are acts of terror. To them, the plight of the Palestinians under siege in Gaza is the result of American-supported Israeli terrorism. This is widely understood around the world, except for the purposefully misled American public.

HAITI BRAZIL AND FRANCE

The US military's takeover of emergency operations in Haiti has triggered a diplomatic row with countries and aid agencies furious at having flights redirected.

Brazil and France lodged an official ­protest with Washington after US military aircraft were given priority at Port-au-Prince's congested airport, forcing many non-US flights to divert to the Dominican Republic.

Brasilia warned it would not ­relinquish command of UN forces in Haiti, and Paris complained the airport had become a US "annexe", exposing a brewing power struggle amid the global relief effort.

OCCUPYING HAITI

Nicaraguan President Daniel Ortega says that the United States has taken advantage of the massive quake in Haiti and deployed troops in the country.

"What is happening in Haiti seriously concerns me as US troops have already taken control of the airport," Ortega said on Saturday.

The Pentagon says it has deployed more than 10,000 soldiers in Haiti to help victims of Tuesday's earthquake.

This is while US paratroopers from the 82nd Airborne Division took control of the main airport in the capital Port-au-Prince on Friday three days after a 7.0 magnitude earthquake brought death and misery to the impoverished nation.

The leftist Nicaraguan president denounced Washington's move in deploying military forces in Haiti, saying "It seems that the bases (on Latin America) are not sufficient."

"There is no logic that US troops landed in Haiti. Haiti seeks humanitarian aid, not troops. It would be madness we all began to send troops to Haiti," said Ortega.

"I hope they will withdraw troops occupying Haiti," he added.

Earlier on Thursday, Nicaragua sent 31 military doctors of the Humanitarian Rescue Unit (URH) and humanitarian aid for the victims of the calamity.

MILITARIZING HAITI

Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez has accused the United States of taking advantage of the deadly earthquake in Haiti to occupy the Caribbean country.

Chavez on Sunday scoffed Washington's move to send thousands of American soldiers to Haiti, describing them as "Marines armed as if they were going to war."

CHAVEZ WANTS TO IMPROVE TIES

Chavez didn't explain what prompted his decision to try to improve relations just weeks after he accused the U.S. of planning to invade his country.

Officials at the U.S. Embassy in Caracas could not be reached for comment Sunday. There was no immediate reaction from the U.S. State Department or the White House.

Chavez has accused the United States and Colombia of spying on Venezuela and conspiring to topple his "revolutionary" government. Tensions have been exacerbated by a recent agreement between Washington and Bogota granting U.S. troops expanded access to Colombian military bases.

THE OBAMA MILITARY BASE TO RETAKE THE SOUTH

http://www.nzherald.co.nz/world/news/article.cfm?c_id=2&objectid=10620595&pnum=0

Patrick Cockburn says:

The US-run aid effort for Haiti is beginning to look chillingly similar to the criminally slow and disorganised US government support for New Orleans after it was devastated by hurricane Katrina in 2005. Five years ago President Bush was famously mute and detached when the levees broke in Louisiana. By way of contrast, President Obama was promising Haitians that everything would be done for survivors within hours of the calamity.

MADDOW FINALLY PAYS OFF THE USG AND PROMOTES USAID

And then there's Obama asking ex-Presidents Clinton and Bush to help Haiti, when Bush destroyed Haiti's democracy in 2004 and Clinton's been trying to turn the country into a sweatshop.

When President Obama gave USAID the lead role in coordinating this response to the disaster in Haiti he handed that agency its biggest humanitarian mission in years. Six days before the earthquake in Haiti Sec. of State Hillary Clinton had just given a major speech about how the Obama administration was going to elevate USAID to a primary position in the government.

[…]

Six days later the earthquake in Haiti and USAID gets put in charge of America’s response to it. They report that as of today USAID is fifty five million dollars into that response. They’re the ones coordinating America’s search and rescue efforts, water and emergency food aid, the way that supplies get into the country, shelter and sanitation and hygiene. At this point the road to being the world’s premier development agency runs through Haiti and we’ll keep reporting it.

Yves will discuss the roles the United States Agency for International Development (USAID) and the Canadian International Development Agency (CIDA) had in the 2004 coup of President Jean Bertrand Aristide of Haiti.

You can view some of Engler's articles at ZNet.

Engler coauthored a book called Canada in Haiti, which you should be able to order from People's Books Cooperative in Milwaukee.

Cosponsored by Third World Action and UWM SDS

See
http://www.nlcnet.org/article.php?id=206

http://www.world-crisis.com/analysis_comments/442_0_15_0_C35/

http://usanewsthatmatters.spaces.live.com/blog/cns!9118791428895678!920.entry

http://globalresearch.ca/index.php?context=va&aid=17000

YVES SMITH AT NAKED CAPITALISM

UPDATE: Along with people like Brad DeLong and Krugman himself, Yves Smith is one of the economics experts whose analysis I trust most on those issues. Today, at her Naked Capitalism blog, Smith notes this exchange with Krugman and observes:

I was completely gobsmacked by Krugman’s evident lack of a moral compass (this is "ends justify the means" in fancy dress), and was glad to see Greenwald do the heavy lifting of taking his argument apart.

I tried very hard to avoid speculating on Krugman's motives in defending Gruber -- I have a lot of respect for Krugman's conduct as a commentator and analyst over the last decade -- but an "ends justify the means" mentality does seem to pervade his arguments in this particular case.

NET NEUTRALITY

AMERICA MEDIA

JOHN PILGER

John Pilger is not part of the corporate owned media apparatus. He is liberal, and the mainstream media isn't liberal. Corporations aren't liberal,corporations OWN the media, the mainstream media isn't liberal but you're supposed to think it is, so you don't know who the real liberals are

Daniel Bensaïd

French philosopher Daniel Bensaïd
In 1968, together with Daniel Cohn-Bendit, he helped to form the Mouvement du 22 Mars
penetrating analysis
never
patronizing
derived from classical Marxism – Marx, Lenin, Trotsky, Rosa Luxemburg
Ligue Communiste Révolutionnaire (LCR)
leader of the LCR and the Fourth International
travelled
Brazil
helping to organize the Workers party (PT) currently in power there under President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva
his Jewishness
never
to follow the path of a blind and unthinking Zionism. He disliked identity politics and his last two books – Fragments Mécréants (An Unbeliever's Discourse, 2005) and Eloge de la Politique Profane (In Praise of Secular Politics, 2008) – explained how this had become a substitute for serious critical thought
a large section of the French intelligentsia
embraced neoliberalism, Bensaïd remained steadfast
memoir, Une Lente Impatience (2004)
"Perhaps not in our lifetimes, but we carry on fighting. What else is there to do?"

Kurt Sonnenfeld: an inconvenient 9/11 witness

There are many who say that the wildest conspiracy theory of all is the theory offered by the United States Government. Do you know that on the weekend prior to the attacks on the WTC, all electricity was cut off for approximately 36 hours, including the security cameras and control systems in a highly irregular “maintenance operation”? Do you know that in the weeks leading up to the attacks there were several unusual evacuations of both towers? Do you know that the company in charge of security at the World Trade Center was directed by Marvin Bush, George Bush’s younger brother, and Wirt Walker III, George Bush’s cousin? Do you know that the same security company also lists as government clients "the U.S. Army, U.S. Navy, U.S Air force, and the Department of Justice," and provides security for classified and high-risk government sites? Do you know that hundreds of government personnel were pre-positioned in New York City on September 10, preparing to do a large scale simulation of a terrorist attack to be carried out on September 12? FEMA officials had already set up their command post at Pier 92 near the World Trade Center one day before the attacks.

Do you know that the 47-story Salomon Smith Barney Building, officially known as Seven World Trade Center, imploded at 5:20 in the afternoon of September 11, 2001, some nine hours after American Airlines Flight 11 struck the North Tower? It took only about 6.5 seconds for the entire structure to fall straight down into itself, a half second more than the amount of time it would have taken a stone to hit the ground if you had dropped it from the roof in a vacuum.

The Secret Service, the Department of Defense, the Federal Bureau of Investigation, the Internal Revenue Service, the Securities and Exchange Commission and the Office of Emergency Management’s “Crisis Center” occupied huge amounts of space there, spanning several floors of the building. Other federal agencies had offices there as well. After September 11, it was discovered that concealed within Building Seven was the largest clandestine domestic station of the Central Intelligence Agency outside of Washington DC, a base of operations from which to spy on diplomats of the United Nations and to conduct counterterrorism and counterintelligence missions.

But the 9/11 Commission Report, supposed to investigate thoroughly all aspects and consequences of the attacks for devising public safety and national security recommandations, does not even mention Building Seven

Do you know that one of George Bush’s top Cabinet Secretaries later said that the conquest of Iraq had been planned since he first took the Office of President and that an invasion had been discussed at the first meeting of the National Security Council? But there had not yet been justification strong enough to invade. Not until September 11, 2001. The attacks on the World Trade Center gave them the justification they had been seeking.

But the first casualty of all war is the truth. The reasons given for attacking Iraq were knowingly fraudulent. Intelligence documents that had been submitted as evidence were deliberately fabricated. There were no Weapons of Mass Destruction and there were no links to al Qaeda. We all know that the U.S. authorities tried to deceive us about the existence of clandestine prisons around the world and the systemic torture of prisoners. The U.S. government lied. International law was violated.

Again the media was manipulated, and some willingly played the role of accomplice. US news crews signed contracts with the military that limited what they were allowed to report, and a few reporters were even paid by the government to write stories favorable to the administration

REAL LIBERALS

Chris Floyd and Glenn Greenwald are not part of the corporate owned mainstream media, what shills like Rush Limbaugh call the "liberal media". They're not in the mainstream media because they're liberals, and the mainstream media isn't liberal. I know I keep repeating this: corporations aren't liberal, corporations OWN the mainstream media (the liberal media, it's called), the mainstream media isn't liberal but you're supposed to think it is, so you don't know who the real liberals are. The real liberals aren't in what is called the "liberal media". You see, if you believe that "liberal" is what Rush Limbaugh says it is, then you don't really know what "liberal" is. That's why they do this. Remember this: real liberals are ignored by the mainstream media. Real liberals don't call themselves "liberal". The mainstream and rightwing media then define a bunch of non-liberals as "liberals", like the Democrats for instance. Real conservatives are ignored by the mainstream media, too, and the mainstream and rightwing media (both controlled and owned by corporations) define a bunch of non-conservatives as "conservative". Real patriots don't call themselves "patriots", they don't dress in red, white, and blue, and wave flags, and they don't publish books with red, white and blue backgrounds.

CONSPIRACY? OR CONSPIRACY THEORIES?

He also proposes that the Government make secret payments to so-called "independent" credible voices to bolster the Government's messaging
The Bush Pentagon employed teams of former Generals to pose as "independent analysts" in the media while secretly coordinating their talking points and messaging about wars and detention policies with the Pentagon.
By covert propaganda, GAO means information which originates from the government but is unattributed and made to appear as though it came from a third party.
necessary to combat "false conspiracy theories" in Iraq -- the same goal Sunstein has for the U.S.
He acknowledges that some "conspiracy theories" previously dismissed as insane and fringe have turned out to be entirely true
Advocating them on the ground that "we will use them well" is every authoritarian's claim
Who is it who relentlessly spread "false conspiracy theories" of Saddam-engineered anthrax attacks and Iraq-created mushroom clouds and a Ba'athist/Al-Qaeda alliance

And who is it who demonized as "conspiracy-mongers" people who warned that the U.S. Government was illegally spying on its citizens, systematically torturing people, attempting to establish permanent bases in the Middle East, or engineering massive bailout plans to transfer extreme wealth to the industries which own the Government?
The reason conspiracy theories resonate so much is precisely that people have learned -- rationally -- to distrust government actions and statements.
That would require, at a bare minumum, a repeal of the First Amendment. Anyone who believes this should, for that reason alone, be barred from any meaningful government position.

JOE SACCO FOOTNOTES IN GAZA

November 1956, The Israeli army conducted two massacres. In Rafah
the 1956 massacres at Rafah and Khan Yunis from oblivion

In 2001, he travelled in Gaza with Chris Hedges, the American journalist, to research an article about the 1956 massacres for an article for Harper’s magazine.

When the article finally appeared, the history of the massacres had been editorially expunged; not all histories are treated equally

http://mondoweiss.net/2009/12/exclusive-excerpt-from-joe-saccos-groundbreaking-new-book-footnotes-in-gaza.html

DAVID HARVEY AND THE CITY

Tues 1.05.10| Harvey on the City and Neoliberalism
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David Harvey, Spaces of Global Capitalism: Towards a Theory of Uneven Geographical Development Verso, 2006
Listen to this Program:

Download program audio (mp3, 49.01 Mbytes)

What role does urbanization play within the surplus-generating dynamics of capitalism? And what part do cities play in fueling or abating economic crises? Pioneering Marxist geographer David Harvey talks about 19th century Paris and New York City in the 1970s and how neoliberalism has shaped the city.

at seven minutes

at eight thirty

What role does urbanization play within the surplus-generating dynamics of capitalism? And what part do cities play in fueling or abating economic crises? Pioneering Marxist geographer David Harvey talks about 19th century Paris and New York City in the 1970s and how neoliberalism has shaped the city.

C.L.R. JAMES

The Black Jacobins: Toussaint L'Ouverture and the San Domingo Revolution (1938)

World Revolution 1917-1936: The Rise and Fall of the Communist International (1937)

Notes on Dialectics: Hegel, Marx and Lenin


http://www.clrjamesinstitute.org/clrlinks.html

http://www.marxists.org/archive/james-clr/works/world/index.htm

http://www.marxists.org/archive/james-clr/index.htm

But none of these explanations seems fully satisfying, perhaps because in an age of totalitarianism the mind, clinging to some last margin of rationality, cannot bring itself to accept what the eye sees. - Irving Howe

HELEN THOMAS

"Why is al-Qaeda at war with us? What is its motivation?"

Helen Thomas at a recent White House press briefing asked this simple question, and it is a simple question, and our national corporate media apparatus goes to a great deal of trouble to bury this question with a non-answer. The question strikes a nerve. Quickly flipping, last night, I heard Bill O'Reilly mention her name. I didn't linger, being a long time "moral equivocator", I've heard the response a thousand times. The mere fact that Bill takes time from his busy schedule to bother with little old Helen Thomas indicates that it is a central question, and a potential problem.

"Why is al-Qaeda at war with us? What is its motivation?"

Now, at some point, the question will be answered. At some point it seems that the American public will stand up and demand an answer to this question, but, apparently, not until, as Glenn Greenwald says, "the Republic is bankrupted and in ruins and its unemployed have to live in tent cities."

And so, the question is answered on the right, and on the left, it is even answered by retired CIA, but the great, unwashed middle remains clueless.