Letter Never Sent Tell me when to go.

FAIR: Attacks on Pledge Ruling Bolster Its Logic

“The pledge, taken as a whole, was not intended to be a coercive prayer, but was designed to promote patriotism, and as such is consistent with the neutrality principle,” wrote Rosen (New York Times, 6/28/02). Editorialized the Daily News (6/17/02): “The two words, viewed in the context of the entire pledge, have nothing whatsoever to do with avowing fealty to God.”

Yet if one can believe President Dwight Eisenhower, who signed the bill that added “under God” to the Pledge, that is precisely what altering the oath was meant to accomplish. “In this way we are reaffirming the transcendence of religious faith in America’s heritage and future,” Eisenhower announced at the time (Columbus Dispatch, 6/28/02). “From this day forward, the millions of our schoolchildren will daily proclaim in every city and town, every village and every rural schoolhouse, the dedication of our nation and our people to the Almighty.”

From World Net Daily:

Non-state actors have adopted their own rules of warfare to justify what they do, even as we justified Nagasaki. To us, Timothy McVeigh is a mass-murderer and a terrorist. To McVeigh, the United States was the enemy on which he had declared war, and he attacked a U.S. command post with unfortunate “collateral damage” – i.e., the kids in that daycare center. Seeing himself as a soldier, McVeigh was no more remorseful than the British bomber pilots who did Dresden.

Of Nagasaki and Dresden, we say, “That was war!” But Osama bin Laden declared war on us, and al-Qaida says it is waging war to drive Americans out of their region, as we once drove the British out of ours. We reply, “You are terrorists!” They reply: Before 9-11, our targets were U.S. embassies, Marine barracks, the USS Cole and Khobar Towers – all political or military command sites.

Regarding the detainment of Joel Mowbray by State Department thugs:

On Friday, after Mr. Mowbray cited the cable and said he had it with him, Mr. Boucher said:

“I do have to point out, sir, that you’ve written a lot of things and said a lot of things recently. You said that visas are decided by travel agents, and that’s not true, is it? You said that this is the only country that we do accept documents from third parties, and that’s not true, is it? You’ve said that performance of Foreign Service officers is measured on courtesy, and that’s not true, is it? So let’s be careful about the facts.”

Mr. Mowbray responded, “I am being careful, and no need to smear the work.”

I’d like to punch Boucher in his smug prep-school face.

The Pentagon wants to weaken congressional oversight, the checks and balances of our system, and wants more ‘freedom’.

The Pentagon has proposed eliminating requirements for filing hundreds of reports on its activities to Congress every year. Pentagon officials also are drafting proposals to ban strikes by contract workers, eliminate federal personnel rules protecting civilian workers at the Pentagon and bypass environmentalists in Congress.

Some proposals are more provocative. They include allowing the Pentagon to send its initiatives directly to Capitol Hill before other agencies could review them. Once there, the legislation would require Congress to vote quickly, with only limited debate.

John Walker Lindh’s lawyers made a deal with prosecutors and Lindh pled guilty to aiding the Taleban effectively ending the trial. This is disappointing since it gives the US propaganda machine an apparent win in case that should have been used to showcase the routine cruelty and bloodthirst of the mercenary American military. Those pictures of Lindh strapped to that cot and bound like some sort of S&M slave were disturbing. This deal means that the US will not be held accountable for the mistreatment of an American citizen. As part of the plea agreement, Lindh withdrew any claims of mistreatment by the military. Stupid. Stupid.

I actually saw this exchange while watching a State Department briefing with that piece of crap, Richard Boucher, on CSPAN. It’s crazy what happened after.

Evidently, the reporter, Joel Mowbray had received a classified directive showing that the State Department had implemented a ‘Visa express’ program for Saudi nationals which means Saudis were able to enter the US without the normal scrutiny given to international visitors. This is a huge fuck up by the State Department since almost all of the 9-11 hijackers were Saudis. Basically, the US opened the backdoor to terrorists who just waltzed in. Anyway, after the briefing Mowbray was detained by State Department thugs no doubt at the behest of Richard Boucher. Crazy.

Mowbray had challenged Boucher on his account of events at State this week, which had to fire its longest-serving career diplomat in response to the congressional uproar created by Mowbray’s reporting on the “Visa Express” program (the program gives the Saudis easy access to U.S. visas — see Mowbray’s reporting here.

Mowbray read from a classified cable that had been leaked to him and that contradicted Boucher’s spin (both Mowbray and the Washington Post quoted from the cable earlier this week). State Department officials were not amused. Very not amused.

When Mowbray was leaving the briefing, a State Department official, accompanied by four guards, asked him to stay to answer a few questions. Mowbray said he could come back later. The official said, no, they wanted him to answer a few questions immediately.

When Mowbray began to get the feeling that he couldn’t leave even if he wanted to, he asked, “Am I being detained?”

When a diplomatic security official — who had showed up on the scene — told him “no,” Mowbray announced that he was leaving.

At which point, the guard stepped in front of Mowbray and said, “Now, you’re being detained.”

Have you seen these videos with cops hitting people with batons and punching them? There’s absolutely no excuse for that. I have spoken.

According to the Columbia Law Survey: Americans’ Knowledge of the U.S. Constitution Condensed Survey Results / May 2002 a majority of Americans believe the famous Marx line “From each according to his ability, to each according to his needs.” appears in the US Constitution. That’s just hilarious.

Article about the CIA University to teach the next generation of elite globalist scumbags:

For four years From The Wilderness has been teaching that the CIA’s primary role, it’s raison d’etre, was to serve the interests of Wall Street and the major banks. In our recent three-country lecture tour, our documentation of the close links between CIA and Wall Street has taken many by surprise. Thirty years ago Professor Peter Dale Scott of Berkeley disclosed that six out of the first seven Deputy Directors of Intelligence (CIA’s number two position) had gone directly from Wall Street into service at the Agency. Since September 11th, FTW’s disclosure that the CIA’s current Executive Director, A.B. “Buzzy” Krongard is a former investment banker has caused deeper rumbles. The firm he once headed, AlexBrown/Deutschebank, has been connected to insider trading on United Air Lines stock just before the September 11th attacks. The NYSE’s current Executive Vice President for Enforcement, David Doherty, is a retired CIA General Counsel.

This new curriculum, as reported by Reuters correspondent T. Zakaria in a May 16 story and by the newsletter of the Association of Former Intelligence Officers (AFIO) dated June 24, 2002, absolutely and clearly establishes the priorities of the agency. Understanding this relationship helps people to rethink their paradigms when trying to understand the real role of secret intelligence operations in today’s world. As described recently by FTW friend Dr. Faiz Khan, M.D. – “A paradigm is what you think about something before you think about it.”

Since the U.S.-led conquest of Afghanistan was completed last November, a fresh opium crop has been planted that has currently put between 3,000 and 4,500 metric tons of opium back on the market after being harvested last month. That equates to an estimated $150 and $200 billion in liquid cash revenues that will enter the world’s banking system and financial markets, mostly in the U.S. In January of 2000 the Taliban destroyed some 96% of the country’s opium crop; an act of economic warfare that took an estimated $200 billion out of the world’s banking system. …

Regarding the drug trade, FTW has been focused for years on the fact that the control of the cash generated by the international drug trade has been one of the CIA’s primary concerns. This was the subject of a lecture given by this writer at the University of Southern California at the invitation of Professor David Andrus in December of 2000 entitled, “Wall Street’s War for Drug Money.” (A video of that lecture is available at www.copvcia.com).

Our government has some serious problems with corruption. Here are the most recent related stories:

• Huge drug ring operating inside the military busted: Authorities said in a news release that 61 active-duty service members were identified as possible distributors and 23 as designer drug users. Military officials said some were brought to court-martial but did not say how many.
• US army colonel charged with bribery: Army investigators found more than $700,000 in $100 notes hidden in the Moran home at Yongsan Army Base, according to the indictment, which was filed in California.
• Cops, FBI lied about probe, juror says
  Woman speaks out on Earth First trial after gag order lifted