posted on February 21, 2003 02:44:13 PM new
January 15, 2003
>>>>>
>>>>>
>>>>> The United States of America has Gone Mad
>>>>> By John le Carre
>>>>>
>>>>> America has entered one of its periods of historical
>>>>> madness, but this is the worst I can remember: worse
>>>>> than McCarthyism, worse than the Bay of Pigs and in the
>>>>> long term potentially more disastrous than the Vietnam War.
>>>>> The reaction to 9/11 is beyond anything Osama bin Laden
>>>>> could have hoped for in his nastiest dreams. As in
>>>>> McCarthy times, the freedoms that have made America the
>>>>> envy of the world are being systematically eroded. The
>>>>> combination of compliant US media and vested corporate
>>>>> interests is once more ensuring that a debate that
>>>>> should be ringing out in every town square is confined
>>>>> to the loftier columns of the East Coast press.
>>>>>
>>>>> The imminent war was planned years before bin Laden
>>>>> struck, but it was he who made it possible. Without bin
>>>>> Laden, the Bush junta would still be trying to explain
>>>>> such tricky matters as how it came to be elected in the
>>>>> first place; Enron; its shameless favouring of the
>>>>> already-too-rich; its reckless disregard for the
>>>>> world's poor, the ecology and a raft of unilaterally
>>>>> abrogated international treaties. They might also have
>>>>> to be telling us why they support Israel in its
>>>>> continuing disregard for UN resolutions. But bin Laden
>>>>> conveniently swept all that under the carpet. The
>>>>> Bushies are riding high. Now 88 per cent of Americans
>>>>> want the war, we are told. The US defence budget has
>>>>> been raised by another $ 60 billion to around $ 360
>>>>> billion. A splendid new generation of nuclear weapons
>>>>> is in the pipeline, so we can all breathe easy. Quite
>>>>> what war 88 per cent of Americans think they are
>>>>> supporting is a lot less clear. A war for how long,
>>>>> please? At what cost in American lives? At what cost to
>>>>> the American taxpayer's pocket? At what cost - because
>>>>> most of those 88 per cent are thoroughly decent and
>>>>> humane people - in Iraqi lives?
>>>>>
>>>>> How Bush and his junta succeeded in deflecting
>>>>> America's anger from bin Laden to Saddam Hussein is one
>>>>> of the great public relations conjuring tricks of
>>>>> history. But they swung it. A recent poll tells us that
>>>>> one in two Americans now believe Saddam was responsible
>>>>> for the attack on the World Trade Centre. But the
>>>>> American public is not merely being misled. It is being
>>>>> browbeaten and kept in a state of ignorance and fear.
>>>>> The carefully orchestrated neurosis should carry Bush
>>>>> and his fellow conspirators nicely into the next
>>>>> election.
>>>>>
>>>>> Those who are not with Mr Bush are against him. Worse,
>>>>> they are with the enemy. Which is odd, because I'm dead
>>>>> against Bush, but I would love to see Saddam's downfall
>>>>> -just not on Bush's terms and not by his methods. And
>>>>> not under the banner of such outrageous hypocrisy.
>>>>> The religious cant that will send American troops into
>>>>> battle is perhaps the most sickening aspect of this
>>>>> surreal war-to-be. Bush has an arm-lock on God. And God
>>>>> has very particular political opinions. God appointed
>>>>> America to save the world in any way that suits
>>>>> America. God appointed Israel to be the nexus of
>>>>> America's Middle Eastern policy, and anyone who wants
>>>>> to mess with that idea is a) anti-Semitic, b) anti-
>>>>> American, c) with the enemy, and d) a terrorist.
>>>>> God also has pretty scary connections. In America,
>>>>> where all men are equal in His sight, if not in one
>>>>> another's, the Bush family numbers one President, one
>>>>> ex-President, one ex-head of the CIA, the Governor of
>>>>> Florida and the ex Governor of Texas.
>>>>>
>>>>> Care for a few pointers? George W. Bush, 1978-84:
>>>>> senior executive, Arbusto Energy/Bush Exploration, an
>>>>> oil company; 1986-90: senior executive of the Harken
>>>>> oil company. Dick Cheney, 1995-2000: chief executive of
>>>>> the Halliburton oil company. Condoleezza Rice,
>>>>> 1991-2000: senior executive with the Chevron oil
>>>>> company, which named an oil tanker after her. And so
>>>>> on. But none of these trifling associations affects the
>>>>> integrity of God's work.
>>>>>
>>>>> In 1993, while ex-President George Bush was visiting
>>>>> the ever-democratic Kingdom of Kuwait to receive thanks
>>>>> for liberating them, somebody tried to kill him. The
>>>>> CIA believes that "somebody" was Saddam. Hence Bush
>>>>> Jr's cry: "That man tried to kill my Daddy." But it's
>>>>> still not personal, this war. It's still necessary.
>>>>> It's still God's work. It's still about bringing
>>>>> freedom and democracy to oppressed Iraqi people.
>>>>> To be a member of the team you must also believe in
>>>>> Absolute Good and Absolute Evil, and Bush, with a lot
>>>>> of help from his friends, family and God, is there to
>>>>> tell us which is which. What Bush won't tell us is the
>>>>> truth about why we're going to war. What is at stake is
>>>>> not an Axis of Evil -but oil, money and people's lives.
>>>>> Saddam's misfortune is to sit on the second biggest
>>>>> oilfield in the world. Bush wants it, and who helps him
>>>>> get it will receive a piece of the cake. And who
>>>>> doesn't, won't.
>>>>>
>>>>> If Saddam didn't have the oil, he could torture his
>>>>> citizens to his heart's content. Other leaders do it
>>>>> every day -think Saudi Arabia, think Pakistan, think
>>>>> Turkey, think Syria, think Egypt.
>>>>>
>>>>> Baghdad represents no clear and present danger to its
>>>>> neighbours, and none to the US or Britain. Saddam's
>>>>> weapons of mass destruction, if he's still got them,
>>>>> will be peanuts by comparison with the stuff Israel or
>>>>> America could hurl at him at five minutes' notice. What
>>>>> is at stake is not an imminent military or terrorist
>>>>> threat, but the economic imperative of US growth. What
>>>>> is at stake is America's need to demonstrate its
>>>>> military power to all of us -to Europe and Russia and
>>>>> China, and poor mad little North Korea, as well as the
>>>>> Middle East; to show who rules America at home, and who
>>>>> is to be ruled by America abroad.
>>>>>
>>>>> The most charitable interpretation of Tony Blair's part
>>>>> in all this is that he believed that, by riding the
>>>>> tiger, he could steer it. He can't. Instead, he gave it
>>>>> a phoney legitimacy, and a smooth voice. Now I fear,
>>>>> the same tiger has him penned into a corner, and he
>>>>> can't get out.
>>>>>
>>>>> It is utterly laughable that, at a time when Blair has
>>>>> talked himself against the ropes, neither of Britain's
>>>>> opposition leaders can lay a glove on him. But that's
>>>>> Britain's tragedy, as it is America's: as our
>>>>> Governments spin, lie and lose their credibility, the
>>>>> electorate simply shrugs and looks the other way.
>>>>> Blair's best chance of personal survival must be that,
>>>>> at the eleventh hour, world protest and an improbably
>>>>> emboldened UN will force Bush to put his gun back in
>>>>> his holster unfired. But what happens when the world's
>>>>> greatest cowboy rides back into town without a tyrant's
>>>>> head to wave at the boys?
>>>>>
>>>>> Blair's worst chance is that, with or without the UN,
>>>>> he will drag us into a war that, if the will to
>>>>> negotiate energetically had ever been there, could have
>>>>> been avoided; a war that has been no more
>>>>> democratically debated in Britain than it has in
>>>>> America or at the UN. By doing so, Blair will have set
>>>>> back our relations with Europe and the Middle East for
>>>>> decades to come. He will have helped to provoke
>>>>> unforeseeable retaliation, great domestic unrest, and
>>>>> regional chaos in the Middle East. Welcome to the party
>>>>> of the ethical foreign policy.
>>>>>
>>>>> There is a middle way, but it's a tough one: Bush dives
>>>>> in without UN approval and Blair stays on the bank.
>>>>> Goodbye to the special relationship.
>>>>>
>>>>> I cringe when I hear my Prime Minister lend his head
>>>>> prefect's sophistries to this colonialist adventure.
>>>>> His very real anxieties about terror are shared by all
>>>>> sane men. What he can't explain is how he reconciles a
>>>>> global assault on al-Qaeda with a territorial assault
>>>>> on Iraq. We are in this war, if it takes place, to
>>>>> secure the fig leaf of our special relationship, to
>>>>> grab our share of the oil pot, and because, after all
>>>>> the public hand-holding in Washington and Camp David,
>>>>> Blair has to show up at the altar.
>>>>>
>>>>> "But will we win, Daddy?"
>>>>>
>>>>> "Of course, child. It will all be over while you're
>>>>> still in bed."
>>>>>
>>>>> "Why?"
>>>>>
>>>>> "Because otherwise Mr Bush's voters will get terribly
>>>>> impatient and may decide not to vote for him."
>>>>>
>>>>> "But will people be killed, Daddy?"
>>>>>
>>>>> "Nobody you know, darling. Just foreign people."
>>>>>
>>>>> "Can I watch it on television?"
>>>>>
>>>>> "Only if Mr Bush says you can."
>>>>>
>>>>> "And afterwards, will everything be normal again?
>>>>> Nobody will do anything horrid any more?"
>>>>>
>>>>> "Hush child, and go to sleep."
>>>>>
>>>>> Last Friday a friend of mine in California drove to his
>>>>> local supermarket with a sticker on his car saying:
>>>>> "Peace is also Patriotic".
>>>>>
>>>>> It was gone by the time he'd
>>>>> finished shopping.
posted on February 21, 2003 06:38:47 PM new
I've seen that article in several major mainstream world news outlets. LeCarre's is a voice that is recognized and respected world-wide.
Breaking news.....it looks as though we were correct that American media is beginning to free itself from administrative and corporate intimidations.
US media move away from Bush
Patrick Barrett
Friday February 21, 2003
George W Bush: US media is turning towards UN
The US media has begun to turn against President George Bush's hard line on military action against Iraq.
A majority of the country's top newspapers now oppose any attack on Iraq by US and British forces without the full support of the international community.
Influenced by the massive anti-war demonstrations staged around the world last weekend and the growing rift between the US and the less hawkish countries led by France and Germany, American press coverage has seen a substantial shift away from backing an immediate war regardless of international opinion.
A survey of 37 leading US papers publishing editorials between February 15 and 19 found that almost two thirds now called for a "world coalition" to be formed before any military action in the Middle East.
15 newspapers across the US were categorised as "hawkish" in editorial stance, nine as "doves" and 13 as internationalist in positioning by a survey carried out by Editor & Publisher, a weekly magazine covering the north American newspaper industry.
The current press majority against unilateral action is in marked contrast to the findings of a similar survey carried out on February 7, immediately after Secretary of State Colin Powell's presentation of evidence of Iraq's activities involving weapons of mass destruction.
At this stage, those calling for international unity were a distinct minority.
According to the research, the call for UN backing has now become an established theme in most major newspapers, in marked contrast to right leaning TV networks and papers such as Fox news and the New York Post, both owned by Rupert Murdoch's News Corporation.
Papers such as the Detroit Free Press, the Dallas Morning News, Minneapolis-based the Star Tribune, San Francisco Chronicle and Orange County Register represented the prevailing opinion. "If war becomes necessary, it will be better waged by the world than by even a broad 'coalition of the willing. The world remains safer if the peace-seeking United Nations remains intact," thundered the Detroit Free Press.
Several papers such as the Fort Worth (Texas) and the Oregonian in Portland, advised the President to recognise the importance of the weekend's protests. "Heed the voices - peace demonstrations have a point: Bush hasn't made a strong enough case for war now," said the Newsday in Melville, New York on February 18.
However, larger papers with international reach such as the Wall Street Journal and Washington Post were staunchly pro-war.
"The weekend's protests across Europe and elsewhere, impressive as they were in terms of sheer numbers, only provide yet another, if secondary, reason for prompt action," said the Journal this week.
Despite growing calls for international unity, "French bashing" amongst the US press has become a popular theme. Top of the Francophobes were the New York Daily News, and Murdoch owned New York Post, but others joined in:
"Now who's the cowboy?" the Detroit News asked. "French prime minister Jacques Chirac pitched a raging tantrum after several Eastern European countries defied attempts to bully them beneath France's skirts."
The changing views of the US press reflect a recent survey of TV coverage, which found that the British broadcast media is taking a hard line on the US administration with 33% of news stories classed as negative.
posted on February 21, 2003 07:19:12 PM new
Thanks for posting that, antiquary! I see a few newspapers that I want to check out. It's good to know that some are resisting Bush control.
I was just reading a story about corporate control of radio stations. Can you believe that? It's reached the point that war protest songs cannot be aired on most radio stations.
posted on February 21, 2003 07:59:28 PM new
Good article, Helen. I hadn't read that and though I was somewhat aware of the problem, I hadn't fully realized how far the monopolies had progressed and all the dangers associated with them. That may also explain the decline in interest in radio among today's youth, at least that was the situation with my son and his peers.
posted on February 22, 2003 02:56:32 AM new
He's an excellent fiction writer. Do you think George Smiley will be in this one?
Amen,
The start of a new spy novel?,
Reverend Colin
posted on February 22, 2003 04:43:00 AM new
You may want to read this: By Richard Cohen.
I've quoted a couple paragraphs.
The war according to John le Carre
January 29 2003
"John le Carre, the author of some brilliant spy novels, writes in The Times of London that "America has entered one of its periods of historical madness". The present time is "worse than McCarthyism" and even worse than - an odd choice - "the Bay of Pigs". Maybe le Carre means the Cuban missile crisis. It's possible. After all, he gets so much else wrong."
"He comes in from the cold wearing a clown's outfit."
posted on February 22, 2003 09:02:56 AM new
***
colin
from your link above....
It is the same with Iraq. I loathe war and fear the consequences of one with Iraq. But give me the alternative - a realistic one that makes the world safer and better - and not some wish that if, somehow, America backs off, Saddam's scientists will not return to their labs.
Le Carre, like too many others, offers nothing. I am tempted to say he hates Bush more than he does Saddam, but that may not be the case. It seems he's been seized by a "historical madness" and a repugnant anti-Americanism.
Dam, just for you, I will put my scruples on the back burner and quote a Republican! LOL! Dick Armey, a former Republican Congressman stated in Des Moines Iowa the following opinion and solution to the Iraq problem. (August 9, 2002) Although he has some facts wrong, as most Republicans do, he does have good advice about handling Saddam!
"If we try to act against Saddam Hussein, as obnoxious as he is, without proper provocation, we will not have the support of other nation states who might do so," Armey told reporters in Des Moines during a campaign swing for a House candidate.
"I don't believe that America will justifiably make an unprovoked attack on another nation," Armey said. "It would not be consistent with what we have been as a nation or what we should be as a nation."
"My own view would be to let him bluster, let him rant and rave all he wants and let that be a matter between he and his own country. As long as he behaves himself within his own borders, we should not be addressing any attack or resources against him."
posted on February 22, 2003 09:25:08 AM new
Why would the Bay of Pigs Invasion be an "odd choice" given the context Le Carré was using? It was both financed & directed by our government. Here your go:
"An invasion of Cuba had been planned by the U.S. Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) since May 1960. The wisdom of proceeding with the invasion had been debated within the newly inaugurated administration of President John F. Kennedy before it was finally approved and carried out.
On April 15, 1961, three U.S.-made airplanes piloted by Cubans bombed Cuban air bases. Two days later the Cubans trained by the United States and using U.S. equipment landed at several sites. The principal landing took place at the Bay of Pigs on the south-central coast. The invasion force was unequal to the strength of Castro's troops, and by April 19 its last stronghold had been captured, along with more than 1,100 men. In the aftermath of the invasion, critics charged the CIA with supplying faulty information to the new president and also noted that, in spite of Kennedy's orders, supporters of Batista were included in the invasion force, whereas members of the noncommunist People's Revolutionary Movement, considered the most capable anti-Castro group, were excluded.
The captured members of the invasion force were imprisoned. From May 1961 the Kennedy administration unofficially backed attempts to ransom the prisoners, but the efforts of the Tractors for Freedom Committee, headed by Eleanor Roosevelt, failed to raise the $28,000,000 needed for heavy-construction equipment demanded by Castro as reparations. The conditions for the ransom changed several times during the next several months; after painstaking negotiations by James B. Donovan, Castro finally agreed to release the prisoners in exchange for $53,000,000 worth of food and medicine. Between December 1962 and July 1965 the survivors were returned to the United States. Some critics thought that the United States had not been aggressive enough in its support of the Bay of Pigs invasion and had left an impression of irresolution. The incident was crucial to the development of the Cuban missile crisis of October 1962."
Censorship, like charity, should begin at home; but unlike charity, it should end there --Clare Booth Luce
posted on February 24, 2003 03:06:35 AM new
austbounty, You can expect a lot more of the same. It's called WAR. You may not like it but it's the last line of issue settlement, has been for thousands of years.
