Hope you enjoy having the latest Buzzflash headlines on this page -- and many, many thanks to the good folks at Buzzflash, who deserve our support.
If you came here looking for the latest on "promptergate" (as I am wont to call it) or vote fraud, scroll down. Much has happened...
Saturday, April 30, 2005
The Pope, Neil Bush, and a mysterious Swiss foundation
Previously, I argued that the Pope has nowhere near the political power many ascribe to him. I have also argued that, instead of whining about the Pope's conservative stances on sexual issues, Democratic activists should capitalize on Protestant fundamentalism's ineradicable tendency toward anti-Catholic bigotry. (See, for example, Reverend Dobson's recent remarks, as well as Tim LaHaye's loathsome legacy.)
Dems need the Catholic vote. We must remind American Catholics that Bush's primary supporters -- theocratic fundamentalists -- view the Pope as the Antichrist.
Now, I don't think Benedict XVI is the Antichrist. But to be frank, I haven't much reason to like him.
This Newsday story draws our attention to an enigmatic aspect of the Pope's history: In 1999, he joined with the current president's brother, Neil Bush, in the creation of a little-known Swiss ecumenical group called The Foundation for Interreligious and Intercultural Research.
The Foundation lists wide-ranging participants -- France's chief rabbi Rene Samuel Sirat, the late Prince Sadruddin Aga Khan, Jordan's Prince Hassan and others.
We have conflicting reports as to just what this foundation does. Supposedly, their big project is to publish the Old Testament in the original Hebrew. An odd goal, that -- one can find such Bibles in any good university library. On the other hand, the foundation "is listed by Dun & Bradstreet business credit reports as a management trust for purposes other than education, religion, charity or research." Which means...what, precisely?
Some may suspect that the organization is something of a front. How else to account for the presence of Neil Bush, a notorious financial fraudster? His Silverado Savings and Loan scandal ripped off the taxpayers to the tune of many, many millions.
(Some will also recall that he was scheduled to have dinner with Scott Hinckley, scion of a Bush-supporting family, on March 31, 1981 -- the day Scott's brother John shot Reagan. Coincidence, of course.)
At no other time in his life has Neil Bush displayed any interest in religion or the international ecumenical movement. Although Bush is no longer active in the foundation, Syrian-born "Orthodox lay person" Jamal Daniel -- Bush's close friend and business partner -- remains heavily involved.
Daniel's primary company, Crest Investment, pays Neil $60,000 a year for a do-nothing "consulting" job. (Nice work if you can get it!) The Financial Times offered this quote from an unnamed Neil Bush confidant: "Jamal likes to ingratiate himself with family members of whoever's in power." The quid pro quo should be familiar to anyone who knows W's history: A member of the Bush family lends his all-powerful name, and Daniel manages to secure high-paying government contracts for his firm.
Bush and Daniel are also partners in a Swiss company called Silvermat, which supplies the hospitality industry, and in New Bridge Strategies, which helps clients win contracts in Iraq.
So we have good reason to ask: Just what is this Geneva-based ecumenical foundation really getting up to? Ratzinger has never been a notable friend to the ecumenical movement, while the American "born again" contingent (the Bush dynasty's power base) despises anything that smacks of ecumenism.
I do note that Ratzinger did his level best to unsettle Catholic support for Kerry in 2004. Is there a connection between the new Pope and the Bush family?
Perhaps we should take brief note of the other worthies involved with this Foundation for Interreligious and Intercultural Research.
Prince Sadruddin Aga Khan, who died in 2003, was the head of the Ismailis. (They can be traced back to the Crusader-era "Assassin" sect, a colorful history which has no impact on our current study.) This handy page-o-dirt on the Bush family includes this fascinating paragraph:
In 1991, the first President Bush backed the Prince to become the Secretary General of the United Nations, a post that went instead to Boutros Boutros-Ghali. Obviously, Khan was close to the Bush family -- although one should mention that the Prince sharply disagreed with Bush the elder on the issue of sanctions against Saddam's Iraq.
Prince El Hassan bin Talal of Jordan may be the most pro-American and pro-Israel figure in his country. Interestingly enough, he is a good friend of the disgraced Ahmed Chalabi. When Chalabi's Petra bank corruption led to an indictment in that country, the Prince personally drove Chalabi out of the country -- in the trunk of his car, it is said. (Incidentally, there has been some wild talk of elevating the Hashemite clan to the throne in Saudi Arabia, should the Saudis fall. There was also once speculation that Hasan would rule Jordan and Iraq as a united Hashemite state.)
Hassan is also the president of the Club of Rome, which figures into a number of over-the-top right-wing conspiracy theories. All that aside, the Prince has some very reasonable things to say in a BBC interview here.
I've found nothing at all on Sirat, beyond the fact that he attended a conference in Jerusalem with Ratzinger.
Keep an eye on this story. Sometimes a foundation isn't just a foundation.
Dems need the Catholic vote. We must remind American Catholics that Bush's primary supporters -- theocratic fundamentalists -- view the Pope as the Antichrist.
Now, I don't think Benedict XVI is the Antichrist. But to be frank, I haven't much reason to like him.
This Newsday story draws our attention to an enigmatic aspect of the Pope's history: In 1999, he joined with the current president's brother, Neil Bush, in the creation of a little-known Swiss ecumenical group called The Foundation for Interreligious and Intercultural Research.
The Foundation lists wide-ranging participants -- France's chief rabbi Rene Samuel Sirat, the late Prince Sadruddin Aga Khan, Jordan's Prince Hassan and others.
We have conflicting reports as to just what this foundation does. Supposedly, their big project is to publish the Old Testament in the original Hebrew. An odd goal, that -- one can find such Bibles in any good university library. On the other hand, the foundation "is listed by Dun & Bradstreet business credit reports as a management trust for purposes other than education, religion, charity or research." Which means...what, precisely?
Some may suspect that the organization is something of a front. How else to account for the presence of Neil Bush, a notorious financial fraudster? His Silverado Savings and Loan scandal ripped off the taxpayers to the tune of many, many millions.
(Some will also recall that he was scheduled to have dinner with Scott Hinckley, scion of a Bush-supporting family, on March 31, 1981 -- the day Scott's brother John shot Reagan. Coincidence, of course.)
At no other time in his life has Neil Bush displayed any interest in religion or the international ecumenical movement. Although Bush is no longer active in the foundation, Syrian-born "Orthodox lay person" Jamal Daniel -- Bush's close friend and business partner -- remains heavily involved.
Daniel's primary company, Crest Investment, pays Neil $60,000 a year for a do-nothing "consulting" job. (Nice work if you can get it!) The Financial Times offered this quote from an unnamed Neil Bush confidant: "Jamal likes to ingratiate himself with family members of whoever's in power." The quid pro quo should be familiar to anyone who knows W's history: A member of the Bush family lends his all-powerful name, and Daniel manages to secure high-paying government contracts for his firm.
Bush and Daniel are also partners in a Swiss company called Silvermat, which supplies the hospitality industry, and in New Bridge Strategies, which helps clients win contracts in Iraq.
So we have good reason to ask: Just what is this Geneva-based ecumenical foundation really getting up to? Ratzinger has never been a notable friend to the ecumenical movement, while the American "born again" contingent (the Bush dynasty's power base) despises anything that smacks of ecumenism.
I do note that Ratzinger did his level best to unsettle Catholic support for Kerry in 2004. Is there a connection between the new Pope and the Bush family?
Perhaps we should take brief note of the other worthies involved with this Foundation for Interreligious and Intercultural Research.
Prince Sadruddin Aga Khan, who died in 2003, was the head of the Ismailis. (They can be traced back to the Crusader-era "Assassin" sect, a colorful history which has no impact on our current study.) This handy page-o-dirt on the Bush family includes this fascinating paragraph:
In 1984 Vice President Bush and his appointments secretary, Jennifer Fitzgerald, enjoyed adjoining bedrooms in a Swiss chateau on Lake Geneva belonging to the Aga Khan's son, Prince Sadruddin Aga Khan, a classmate of Bush at Yale. Ambassador Fields said there was no household staff for the couple and "that' s why I had to help make certain arrangements for the laundry, that sort of thing." He said it "became clear to me that the Vice President and Ms. Fitzgerald were romantically involved and this was not a business visit...(The reference is, of course, to Bush the elder. Reports of an affair with Ms. Fitzgerald received some circulation in 1988 and 1992.)
In 1991, the first President Bush backed the Prince to become the Secretary General of the United Nations, a post that went instead to Boutros Boutros-Ghali. Obviously, Khan was close to the Bush family -- although one should mention that the Prince sharply disagreed with Bush the elder on the issue of sanctions against Saddam's Iraq.
Prince El Hassan bin Talal of Jordan may be the most pro-American and pro-Israel figure in his country. Interestingly enough, he is a good friend of the disgraced Ahmed Chalabi. When Chalabi's Petra bank corruption led to an indictment in that country, the Prince personally drove Chalabi out of the country -- in the trunk of his car, it is said. (Incidentally, there has been some wild talk of elevating the Hashemite clan to the throne in Saudi Arabia, should the Saudis fall. There was also once speculation that Hasan would rule Jordan and Iraq as a united Hashemite state.)
Hassan is also the president of the Club of Rome, which figures into a number of over-the-top right-wing conspiracy theories. All that aside, the Prince has some very reasonable things to say in a BBC interview here.
I've found nothing at all on Sirat, beyond the fact that he attended a conference in Jerusalem with Ratzinger.
Keep an eye on this story. Sometimes a foundation isn't just a foundation.
Vote notes
(Incidentally, I tried to publish a vote fraud update a couple of days ago, but the cyber gods decided to kill it before delivery.)
Explaining the exits: A Kos diarist named Elizabeth Liddle, who writes under the nick "Febble," is a Scottish psychology specialist who, although initially a supporter of the fraud thesis, claims to have come up with a computational model which explains away the exit poll disparity. She offers her study as a response to the US Count Votes analysis, which is finally starting to acquire some attention.
I have not yet truly studied her paper -- and to be frank, from the looks of the thing, I'm not sure whether I would understand the math even after a close reading. However, a skimming indicates that she has not yet addressed what seems, to me, to be the most damning argument: The exit polls asked whether the responders had voted for Bush or Gore in 2000. Even though Gore won the popular vote, the 2004 exit polls indicated a strong pro-Bush 2000 tilt. This oddity provides us with prima facie evidence that the exit pollsters favored Bush, not Kerry.
This anomaly demolishes Mitofsky's beloved "reluctant Bush responder" thesis, which is, in the end, Liddle's bottom line. Everything comes down to this:
As one observer noted, a proper hypothesis should be (if it can be) put to the test. The "2000 question" provides one way to test the presumed 56%-50% response differential -- and that test does not support Liddle or Mitofsky. Once we toss out the "chatty Dem/tight-lipped Rep" scenario -- a scenario which, I might add, does not conform with real-life experience -- what have we left?
On Democratic Underground, "Truth Is All" provides a dizzying number of links which refute both Liddle and the "reluctant responder" hypothesis. Many of these links lead back to TIA's own writings, of which perhaps the most immediately relevant is this:
Sequoia: A good article on Paul Lehto's lawsuit against Sequoia appears in Real Change News, a journal largely devoted to advocacy for the homeless.
Why hide it? The major voting machine companies all claim that their software is a trade secret. Why the secrecy? Australian law insists on open software. Insisting on transparency has not caused that nation to fall into the sea -- in fact, their elections have fewer problems.
Given the incestuous linkages between the major voting machine companies, secrecy has little purpose. It's not as though these guys are competing with each other. I advise the reader to check out this Democratic Underground page.
Fitrakis says it all. Sorry I didn't mention this earlier: Bob Fitrakis has a killer article on Blackwell's perfidy in Ohio. The most noteworthy section:
Josh Mittledorff, of the Philadelphia Inquirer, wrote a column on the Nashville conference that deserves your attention:
Explaining the exits: A Kos diarist named Elizabeth Liddle, who writes under the nick "Febble," is a Scottish psychology specialist who, although initially a supporter of the fraud thesis, claims to have come up with a computational model which explains away the exit poll disparity. She offers her study as a response to the US Count Votes analysis, which is finally starting to acquire some attention.
I have not yet truly studied her paper -- and to be frank, from the looks of the thing, I'm not sure whether I would understand the math even after a close reading. However, a skimming indicates that she has not yet addressed what seems, to me, to be the most damning argument: The exit polls asked whether the responders had voted for Bush or Gore in 2000. Even though Gore won the popular vote, the 2004 exit polls indicated a strong pro-Bush 2000 tilt. This oddity provides us with prima facie evidence that the exit pollsters favored Bush, not Kerry.
This anomaly demolishes Mitofsky's beloved "reluctant Bush responder" thesis, which is, in the end, Liddle's bottom line. Everything comes down to this:
While we cannot measure the completion rate by Democratic and Republican voters, hypothetical completion rates of 56% among Kerry voters and 50% among Bush voters overall would account for the entire Within Precinct Error that we observed in 2004."And if we accept malign elves as a hypothetical, then we can ascribe the disparity to their mischievous handiwork.
As one observer noted, a proper hypothesis should be (if it can be) put to the test. The "2000 question" provides one way to test the presumed 56%-50% response differential -- and that test does not support Liddle or Mitofsky. Once we toss out the "chatty Dem/tight-lipped Rep" scenario -- a scenario which, I might add, does not conform with real-life experience -- what have we left?
On Democratic Underground, "Truth Is All" provides a dizzying number of links which refute both Liddle and the "reluctant responder" hypothesis. Many of these links lead back to TIA's own writings, of which perhaps the most immediately relevant is this:
How can Mitofsky push a "Reluctant Bush Responder" theory, especially when analysis of the data in his own report AND THE NATIONAL EXIT POLL reveals just the opposite?I do not question Liddle's expertise or sincerity. But this is an issue she must address.
According the USCountVote.com, Bush responders in Republican precincts were MORE inclined to speak to the exit pollsters.
Sequoia: A good article on Paul Lehto's lawsuit against Sequoia appears in Real Change News, a journal largely devoted to advocacy for the homeless.
In what's being hailed as a simple but brilliant argument that could serve as a national model for legal action, Gordon's lawsuit, which was filed in King County, argues that it's unconstitutional to outsource voting to a company that keeps the process secret the way Sequoia and other makers of electronic voting equipment do.Lehto will be appearing with Bev Harris at Seattle's College Club on May 4. Although I've had my problems with Harris, I urge anyone in that area to attend. (And maybe someone can ask Bev about those election tapes she picked up in Florida.)
Makers of touch-screen voting machines claim their software is a "trade secret" to protect. In the contract between Sequoia and Snohomish County, which purchased 1,000 machines for $5 million in 2002, the county auditor even agreed to defend California-based Sequoia from any subpoenas seeking information that, with any other voting method, are a matter of public record under the state Constitution, the Open Meetings Act, and the Public Disclosure Act.
Gordon, a Bellevue tort attorney known for his work in civil rights and labor cases, says that particular paragraph of the Sequoia contract that will go down in infamy as an "unholy alliance between government and a private corporation."
"We think there's a problem with a county entering into a contract with a private company which has the effect of letting the private company conduct elections."
As a result, Gordon, Lehto and a second plaintiff, John Wells, are asking the court to void Sequoia's contract and make the company give back Snohomish County's $5 million.
"A contract between two parties can't take away the rights of a third party, and that's what's happened in this case" and across the nation, says Ellen Theisen, executive director of Port Ludlow-based Voters Unite, a one-year-old voter advocacy organization. "It's taken away rights of citizens to an observable election."
Why hide it? The major voting machine companies all claim that their software is a trade secret. Why the secrecy? Australian law insists on open software. Insisting on transparency has not caused that nation to fall into the sea -- in fact, their elections have fewer problems.
Given the incestuous linkages between the major voting machine companies, secrecy has little purpose. It's not as though these guys are competing with each other. I advise the reader to check out this Democratic Underground page.
Fitrakis says it all. Sorry I didn't mention this earlier: Bob Fitrakis has a killer article on Blackwell's perfidy in Ohio. The most noteworthy section:
The Free Press is printing for the first time a hand-drawn map from an employee of the Warren County government. The employee, who wishes to remain anonymous for fear of retaliation, communicated to the Free Press thoughts on what happened on Election Day in the county that received national attention by declaring a "homeland security alert" while the votes were being counted.Koehler: The Chicago Tribune (a notoriously reactionary paper) refused to run columnist Bob Koehler's powerhouse piece on vote fraud (available on the web -- here.) But the paper did see fit to print a piece which attempts to debunk Koehler. The article, by Don Wycliff, does not even begin to address the many outrages detailed by John Conyers' committee.
With the media and independent election observers "walled off," as the Cincinnati Enquirer described, the employee claims that "some ballot boxes were taken to the holding area" where they were not monitored by election officials. The Warren County employee referred to the person supervising the unauthorized warehouse as a "Republican Party hack."
The employee is concerned that it would have been easy to "stuff" the ballot boxes or that "signatures could have been forged in the unauthorized holding area."
The anonymous employee told the Free Press that testimony would be provided if subpoenaed. A list of questions that remain unanswered in Warren County was also supplied: Which precinct ballot boxes were taken to the unauthorized holding area? Were officials from the Board of Elections present in the holding area? When were the ballots taken from the holding area to the check-in tent that was erected temporarily to count ballots? If Warren County was under a state of emergency, then why weren't any metal detectors engaged? The FBI has denied that there was any homeland security threat on Election Day.
Josh Mittledorff, of the Philadelphia Inquirer, wrote a column on the Nashville conference that deserves your attention:
I met David Griscom, a retired physics prof who spent months with colleague John Brakey poring over election tapes, signature rosters and "consecutive number registers" from Brakey's Tucson home precinct.
They audited and verified, one by one, the 895 votes in the precinct and found: 12 innocent and unsuspecting voters who had their names duplicated on the roster and their votes for Bush counted twice. Twenty-two "undervotes" where the machine had failed to register a preference for president, and these had been dutifully and meticulously converted to 22 votes for Bush.
The "Republican" and "Democratic" co-directors of the polling place were a local fundamentalist preacher and his wife. Thirty-nine of their parishioners from another precinct had cast provisional ballots, which were (illegally) converted to regular ballots and passed through, all 39 for Bush.
I met Richard Hayes Phillips, a geologist from New Hampshire who was invited to Ohio to study the integrity of the vote, and realized that a complete inventory of lost and miscounted votes was needed. To date, Phillips has analyzed 15 of Ohio's 88 counties, and by his most conservative estimate has found 101,000 uncounted Kerry votes - 136,000 is the margin by which Bush officially defeated Kerry.
Evidence that Bush is wired?
Many wags claim that Bush's latest press conference offers evidence that he is still taking instructions from an offstage handler. This clip is the moment most often fingered.
I'm afraid Bush's actions here aren't nearly so telling as his "Let me finish!" outburst during the first debate. First, Suzanne Malveaux of CNN asks him a difficult question about Vladimir Putin's expressed willingness to send short-range missiles to Syria and nuclear materials to Iran. Bush responds:
"Yeah, we have, uh...first on a...just on a broader..."
Then he closes his eyes and looks down. It is an odd moment, almost as though his mind has hyperlinked to a new web page which isn't loading swiftly enough.
"Wait a minute...A broader sense of..." This seems to continue the previous thought, but the "Wait a minute" is oddly placed. Suddenly, the 'new web page' (figuratively speaking) appears:
"I had a long talk with Vladimir there in Slovakia about..."
After watching this clip a few times, I must categorize it as a "maybe." It certainly isn't as telling as a couple of other well-known 'gotcha" moments. Even so, the clip is worth a watch, because you don't have to be an utter paranoid to find something a bit odd in the president's behavior.
The full press conference can be found on C-SPAN, here. The full video offers a startling degree of odd pauses -- really odd. They are at striking variance with the fairly fluid (by Bushian standards) responses to preceding questions. Sentences seem to reach the period in the strangest places...and then they pick up again.
"I had a long talk with Vladimir there in Slovakia about..." LONG pause. "Democracy!"
Well, as I said: This one is a "maybe." Partisans will interpret the same material in very different ways. Dubya's other answers, while not impressively articulate, do seem to come from a man speaking his own thoughts.
At least one Democratic Underground participant claims to have heard a low voice during the above-cited pause. I didn't hear it.
I'm afraid Bush's actions here aren't nearly so telling as his "Let me finish!" outburst during the first debate. First, Suzanne Malveaux of CNN asks him a difficult question about Vladimir Putin's expressed willingness to send short-range missiles to Syria and nuclear materials to Iran. Bush responds:
"Yeah, we have, uh...first on a...just on a broader..."
Then he closes his eyes and looks down. It is an odd moment, almost as though his mind has hyperlinked to a new web page which isn't loading swiftly enough.
"Wait a minute...A broader sense of..." This seems to continue the previous thought, but the "Wait a minute" is oddly placed. Suddenly, the 'new web page' (figuratively speaking) appears:
"I had a long talk with Vladimir there in Slovakia about..."
After watching this clip a few times, I must categorize it as a "maybe." It certainly isn't as telling as a couple of other well-known 'gotcha" moments. Even so, the clip is worth a watch, because you don't have to be an utter paranoid to find something a bit odd in the president's behavior.
The full press conference can be found on C-SPAN, here. The full video offers a startling degree of odd pauses -- really odd. They are at striking variance with the fairly fluid (by Bushian standards) responses to preceding questions. Sentences seem to reach the period in the strangest places...and then they pick up again.
"I had a long talk with Vladimir there in Slovakia about..." LONG pause. "Democracy!"
Well, as I said: This one is a "maybe." Partisans will interpret the same material in very different ways. Dubya's other answers, while not impressively articulate, do seem to come from a man speaking his own thoughts.
At least one Democratic Underground participant claims to have heard a low voice during the above-cited pause. I didn't hear it.
Quick notes
Yes, I'm aware that some aver that W's recent speech offers fresh evidence that he receives prompting via radio. I should have something to say about all that later tonight, as soon as I finish up a spot of work.
In the meantime: Advance word has it that John Kerry will appear at a rally for Antonio Villaraigosa, who is almost certain to be the next mayor of Los Angeles. I plan to be there. The rally will be held at Los Angeles Valley College in the northern San Fernando Valley, starting at noon tomorrow (Saturday). Just in case I can't make it...and just in case you can...and just case you get a chance to speak to Senator Kerry...please note that he patted George W. Bush on the back at the close of debate #2. You might want to ask him about that.
In the meantime: Advance word has it that John Kerry will appear at a rally for Antonio Villaraigosa, who is almost certain to be the next mayor of Los Angeles. I plan to be there. The rally will be held at Los Angeles Valley College in the northern San Fernando Valley, starting at noon tomorrow (Saturday). Just in case I can't make it...and just in case you can...and just case you get a chance to speak to Senator Kerry...please note that he patted George W. Bush on the back at the close of debate #2. You might want to ask him about that.
Thursday, April 28, 2005
Virus?
While attempting to clean up my clogged mailbox today, I discovered a problem. Some folks have received correspondence from my address -- cannonfiremail@yahoo.com -- which I did not send. The mail had attachments, and those attachments no doubt contained nasty surprises. A couple of these mailings have "bounced back" to me.
Yahoo has a good virus scanner, so it is not likely that someone has been using my account using Yahoo's interface. Apparently, some miscreant is spoofing my address.
I never have, and never will, send a message with any sort of attachment using that email address. Never open any attachment from that address -- or from any other, if you do not know the sender well. I may have to open up a new email account.
Yahoo has a good virus scanner, so it is not likely that someone has been using my account using Yahoo's interface. Apparently, some miscreant is spoofing my address.
I never have, and never will, send a message with any sort of attachment using that email address. Never open any attachment from that address -- or from any other, if you do not know the sender well. I may have to open up a new email account.
Zodiac, Jack the Ripper, Aleister Crowley, and L. Ron Hubbard
Some of you were amused, and some annoyed, when I dared to discuss the odd suggestion that L. Ron Hubbard masterminded the Zodiac murders.
Years ago, I heard a couple of would-be Zodiac sleuths kick around that notion; it's the sort of wild idea usually discussed only after the second round of brewskis. Perhaps immortalizing the theory in cyber-ink was a naughty decision. But you folks should know my sense of fun by now.
Steve Huff's favored theory -- the theory which perhaps now deserves pride of place -- holds that the Zodiac crimes were committed by Joseph Chandler -- or rather, by the mystery man who moved to Ohio and took that name. Huff now addresses Xymphora's suggestion that Chandler may also have been responsible for another series of unsolved murders in Ohio, between 1979 and 1982. (Xymphora has a few more words on the subject today.)
Count me as a very tentative Chandlerite. Even so, a sense of mischief compels me to add a few more observations on the Hubbard theory:
1. Yes, Hubbard was fairly old at the time of the killing spree. I never said Hubbard committed the actual murders. He had associates. Years ago, Harry Martin (a Northern California newsman with an affection for oddities) published a fairly persuasive series devoted to the proposition that the Zodiac killings were a team effort -- an idea which may explain some of the conflicting testimony.
2. The ominous mystery man at Darlene Ferrin's painting party -- the one who (like Hubbard) loved strawberry shortcake -- was (like Hubbard) too old to fit later descriptions of the killer. Yet Ferrin's associates believed him to be linked with the slaying. Xymphora, who questions whether author Robert Graysmith concocted the party (or at least the details concerning same), links to a page which confirms that witness Pam Hukaby did attend this event and did see a mystery man. If this older man helped to engineer Ferrin's fate, then we have further reason to believe that the Zodiac crimes had more than one author.
3. Huff reminds us that "Zodiac was thought to have been former navy, possibly a native Californian, and to have a background in engineering." All of which fits Hubbard fairly well. He (badly) commanded three ships during World War II, and remained obsessed with naval matters thereafter. He was not born in California, but he spent many years in this state. He took courses in engineering, although he was a poor student.
4. Huff also argues that Zodiac was an "anglophile." This also fits Hubbard, who spent time in England.
5. Zodiac's letters had occult overtones. I need not recount here the famed story of Hubbard's interactions with Jack Parsons.
6. Zodiac quoted from Gilbert and Sullivan. This page (written, I am sorry to report, by a die-hard Hubbardian) offers a brief first-hand account of Hubbard attending a G&S performance in England. (As a side note, this page offers a hilarious anti-Hubbardian G&S parody.)
7. (Okay, this one is really stretching it, but what the hell...in for a penny, in for a pound...) Huff, like other Zodiac buffs, argues that Zodiac modeled himself on Jack the Ripper. Hubbard was fascinated by the works of Aleister Crowley; in a recorded speech, Hubbard once referred to Crowley as "my old friend," even though the two never actually met. Crowley once wrote an article which claimed to offer an occultist solution to the Ripper murders. The article was not formally published, but copies of the manuscript circulated in "fringe" circles, and Hubbard may well have stumbled across it. (The story of Crowley's involvement with the Ripper saga represents another long, strange trip, which we must save for another time.)
Best to stop here -- any further, and I might actually talk myself into this idea. For now, I offer it simply as mordant entertainment.
Years ago, I heard a couple of would-be Zodiac sleuths kick around that notion; it's the sort of wild idea usually discussed only after the second round of brewskis. Perhaps immortalizing the theory in cyber-ink was a naughty decision. But you folks should know my sense of fun by now.
Steve Huff's favored theory -- the theory which perhaps now deserves pride of place -- holds that the Zodiac crimes were committed by Joseph Chandler -- or rather, by the mystery man who moved to Ohio and took that name. Huff now addresses Xymphora's suggestion that Chandler may also have been responsible for another series of unsolved murders in Ohio, between 1979 and 1982. (Xymphora has a few more words on the subject today.)
Count me as a very tentative Chandlerite. Even so, a sense of mischief compels me to add a few more observations on the Hubbard theory:
1. Yes, Hubbard was fairly old at the time of the killing spree. I never said Hubbard committed the actual murders. He had associates. Years ago, Harry Martin (a Northern California newsman with an affection for oddities) published a fairly persuasive series devoted to the proposition that the Zodiac killings were a team effort -- an idea which may explain some of the conflicting testimony.
2. The ominous mystery man at Darlene Ferrin's painting party -- the one who (like Hubbard) loved strawberry shortcake -- was (like Hubbard) too old to fit later descriptions of the killer. Yet Ferrin's associates believed him to be linked with the slaying. Xymphora, who questions whether author Robert Graysmith concocted the party (or at least the details concerning same), links to a page which confirms that witness Pam Hukaby did attend this event and did see a mystery man. If this older man helped to engineer Ferrin's fate, then we have further reason to believe that the Zodiac crimes had more than one author.
3. Huff reminds us that "Zodiac was thought to have been former navy, possibly a native Californian, and to have a background in engineering." All of which fits Hubbard fairly well. He (badly) commanded three ships during World War II, and remained obsessed with naval matters thereafter. He was not born in California, but he spent many years in this state. He took courses in engineering, although he was a poor student.
4. Huff also argues that Zodiac was an "anglophile." This also fits Hubbard, who spent time in England.
5. Zodiac's letters had occult overtones. I need not recount here the famed story of Hubbard's interactions with Jack Parsons.
6. Zodiac quoted from Gilbert and Sullivan. This page (written, I am sorry to report, by a die-hard Hubbardian) offers a brief first-hand account of Hubbard attending a G&S performance in England. (As a side note, this page offers a hilarious anti-Hubbardian G&S parody.)
7. (Okay, this one is really stretching it, but what the hell...in for a penny, in for a pound...) Huff, like other Zodiac buffs, argues that Zodiac modeled himself on Jack the Ripper. Hubbard was fascinated by the works of Aleister Crowley; in a recorded speech, Hubbard once referred to Crowley as "my old friend," even though the two never actually met. Crowley once wrote an article which claimed to offer an occultist solution to the Ripper murders. The article was not formally published, but copies of the manuscript circulated in "fringe" circles, and Hubbard may well have stumbled across it. (The story of Crowley's involvement with the Ripper saga represents another long, strange trip, which we must save for another time.)
Best to stop here -- any further, and I might actually talk myself into this idea. For now, I offer it simply as mordant entertainment.
Wednesday, April 27, 2005
Gannon: The old in-out in-out
The Kos folk, the Nashua Advocate and the Democratic Underground have offered some interesting studies of he-ho newsfaker Jeff Gannon and his mysterious interactions with the Secret Service.
Secret entrance? News footage proves that Jeff Gannon was in the White House on at least five occasions without letting the Secret Service know of his comings and goings. How (we may rightly ask) can such a thing be in the post-9/11 era, when even Abraham Lincoln's ghost needs a day pass?
In a previous post, I offered the tongue-in-cheek suggestion that Gannon/Guckert made use of the fabled secret White House tunnel (as seen in the film Dave). I now repeat the suggestion, this time more seriously. On a right-wing site, devoted to a review of an infamous anti-Clinton screed by former FBI agent Gary Aldrich, we are told that
(Amusingly enough, the same secret tunnel shows up in some of the wilder theories about Vince Foster. The paranoid pronouncements of right-wingers can now be used against them. Cute, eh?)
So far, the tunnel remains conjectural. But common sense tells us not to dismiss the idea. Consider: Many 9/11 news stories confirmed the existence of a secret bunker beneath the White House. Suppose a bomb had flattened the building while Cheney remained holed up in that bunker. He would need some means of escape, right?
Bottom line: Someone felt the need to sneak in Jeff Gannon, male escort. Being a romantic at heart, I'm reminded of those early West Wing episodes in which reporter Danny Concannon would slip in to kiss CJ...
Gannon and the National Guard papers: Many have wondered whether Karl Rove engineered the (allegedly) faked National Guard document fiasco which helped bring down Dan Rather. One sidelight of the Gannon story offers a further clue.
On September 10, 2004 -- two days after Rather aired his report -- Gannon was scurrying around the White House, even though the press gaggle was held aboard Air Force One on that day. Gannon stayed from 11:19 to 12:55. Two hours later, he sent an email to Sean Hannity, offering a "scoop" about the origin of the Texas Air National Guard documents. This scoop alleged that the documents had been provided by CBS News producer Mary Mapes, who was also a key figure in uncovering the Abu Ghraib scandal.
Since his journalism amounted to little more than plagiarism and propaganda, Gannon obviously did not go "digging" for this information; someone handed it to him. One need not be Sherlock Holmes to deduce that he received the Mapes story from someone in the White House.
All of which leads to a couple of obvious questions: Who in the WH used Gannon as a cut-out to Hannity? And how did this Bush administration source know about Mapes?
The scenario lends weight to the suggestion that the whole "phony documents" scandal was engineered by the Team Bush.
Secret entrance? News footage proves that Jeff Gannon was in the White House on at least five occasions without letting the Secret Service know of his comings and goings. How (we may rightly ask) can such a thing be in the post-9/11 era, when even Abraham Lincoln's ghost needs a day pass?
In a previous post, I offered the tongue-in-cheek suggestion that Gannon/Guckert made use of the fabled secret White House tunnel (as seen in the film Dave). I now repeat the suggestion, this time more seriously. On a right-wing site, devoted to a review of an infamous anti-Clinton screed by former FBI agent Gary Aldrich, we are told that
A spokesman for the Secret Service insists that the president could not possibly leave the White House without the knowledge of his bodyguards. U.S. News reports, however, that a secret tunnel, constructed during the Reagan administration, connects the Oval Office to the president's living quarters in the East Wing. The tunnel was to provide an escape route in case of a terrorist attack. (There is also said to be an older tunnel connecting the White House to the State Department building by way of an underground garage). Reagan is said to have used the tunnel to sneak Richard Nixon into the White House for consultation on foreign policy. The article suggests that the president could use the tunnel to leave the White House with minimal chance of detection.Take all that with a grain of salt, and always consider the source. But that's not the only source. For example, here is an entire web page devoted to reports and rumors of secret presidential tunnels. Read, follow the links, and come to your own conclusions.
(Amusingly enough, the same secret tunnel shows up in some of the wilder theories about Vince Foster. The paranoid pronouncements of right-wingers can now be used against them. Cute, eh?)
So far, the tunnel remains conjectural. But common sense tells us not to dismiss the idea. Consider: Many 9/11 news stories confirmed the existence of a secret bunker beneath the White House. Suppose a bomb had flattened the building while Cheney remained holed up in that bunker. He would need some means of escape, right?
Bottom line: Someone felt the need to sneak in Jeff Gannon, male escort. Being a romantic at heart, I'm reminded of those early West Wing episodes in which reporter Danny Concannon would slip in to kiss CJ...
Gannon and the National Guard papers: Many have wondered whether Karl Rove engineered the (allegedly) faked National Guard document fiasco which helped bring down Dan Rather. One sidelight of the Gannon story offers a further clue.
On September 10, 2004 -- two days after Rather aired his report -- Gannon was scurrying around the White House, even though the press gaggle was held aboard Air Force One on that day. Gannon stayed from 11:19 to 12:55. Two hours later, he sent an email to Sean Hannity, offering a "scoop" about the origin of the Texas Air National Guard documents. This scoop alleged that the documents had been provided by CBS News producer Mary Mapes, who was also a key figure in uncovering the Abu Ghraib scandal.
Since his journalism amounted to little more than plagiarism and propaganda, Gannon obviously did not go "digging" for this information; someone handed it to him. One need not be Sherlock Holmes to deduce that he received the Mapes story from someone in the White House.
All of which leads to a couple of obvious questions: Who in the WH used Gannon as a cut-out to Hannity? And how did this Bush administration source know about Mapes?
The scenario lends weight to the suggestion that the whole "phony documents" scandal was engineered by the Team Bush.
Tuesday, April 26, 2005
Not the lie, but the myth (Slightly revised)
As a sage once put it: The enemy of truth is not the lie, but the myth.
Each day, we face anew a familiar question: How do we engage in a dialogue with political adversaries entranced by an utterly addled view of political reality -- or should I say all reality?
To summarize a situation we all know: When Republicans filibustered Clinton's judicial appointees, no-one on the religious right uttered any sighs of dismay. Now rightist politicians want to do away with the filibuster -- but only when this device is used to fight Bush-appointed nominees. Filibusters are still considered fine when used for legislative purposes.
Framed in that fashion, the issue obviously comes down to a matter of Machiavellian tactics. But the rightists prefer to frame the situation differently. Democrats, they say, want to stop Bush's appointees not because we think the President has made some crummy, ill-qualified choices, but because liberals hate religion.
The powerful pastor James Dobson -- displaying his usual "flexible" interpretation of the commandment against false witness -- told a cable news audience that the Republicans had never filibustered a Democratic nominee. A lie. But what else can we expect from a fundamentalist preacher?
Not long ago, the GOP hatemongers mounted a campaign aginst the AARP -- the A-freaking-ARP -- in order to create support for Bush's disastrous Social Security reform effort. The ads did not even discuss the actual issue of Social Security. Instead, a respected advocacy group for the elderly was pictured as a quasi-Marxist "cell" devoted to supporting gay marriage and undermining our troops.
During the election, radio rightist relentlessly conveyed the impression that John Kerry supported gay marriage. He did not and does not. But that didn't stop our pious brethren from buying into the myth.
One of Bush's appointees, California Supreme Court Justice Janice Rogers Brown, has recently declared that people of faith are engaged in a "war" against (oh no, not this again!) secular humanists.
(A side note: This is the same woman who called the New Deal the "triumph of our socialist revolution." Here's a history lesson, Justice Brown: That "revolution" led to this country's most prosperous period, 1940-1970. During that time, the average person's living standards kept rising, and Communism was consistently opposed. Since the Reagan revolution, living standards have sharply declined and the work week has lengthened -- and China now controls a large chunk of our economy.)
Ah yes. The threat of secular humanism. That brings back memories...
If you're over 30, you may recall the religious right's weird hate campaign against this particular straw man. The meme was quite popular in the 1980s and early '90s. Basically, this wacky notion holds that anyone not of the fundamentalist persuasion must be a card-carrying member of an alternate religion -- recognised as such by the Supreme Court, no less! -- called "Secular Humanism." This religion is supposedly devoted to the deification of Man and the denigration of Jesus.
The 80s-era preachers who fed their flocks dire warnings of the "secular humanist" conspiracy usually veered into ultra-bizarro territory: Marxism...gnosticism...Satanism...the Illuminati. Beware, brethren! The Secular Humanists are coming! They're going to burn all the churches any DAY now!!
Now we have a Bush-appointed judge reviving this nonsense. Once more, we will face the annoying task of educating the public: Liberals who want to keep church and state separate are not part of a conspiracy. We just want the theocrats to leave us alone.
Much of the problem comes down to the fact that rural voters and evangelical church-goers refuse to read objective journalism, and thus do not understand the issues. Their nescience leaves the propagandists free to re-frame those issues in the most outlandish, supernaturalistic, conspiratorial and fear-filled terms.
Thus, a debate over Social Security gives way to the crankish myth that the AARP hates our soldiers. Thus, judges like Brown, who want to impose one religious ideology on the entire nation, are held up as the antidote to a (supposedly) ideological judiciary. Thus, a judge addressing the issue of church and state gives voice to a notoriously nutty conspiracy theory.
Alas, these tactics work. Because ill-educated people are naturally insecure, they present ripe targets for any sharpie who appeals to their fears. That's why false claims of persecution always sway gullible evangelicals.
Some of you may recall some of the other "scare stories" circulating in televangelistic circles during the 1980s and 1990s. For example: According to a rumor popular at the time, the liberal elites had drawn up plans to round up all Bible-believing Christians and herd them into concentration camps. I've met people who sincerely believed this nonsense.
Such camps are now a fact of post-9/11 life. Of course, they do not -- and never will -- house fundamentalist Christians. (Will they soon house progressives? We've all seen the ominous signs...)
A little web-surfing reveals that many fundamentalists still hold to this "Christian concentration camp" fable. Fundies love to picture themselves in the "false underdog" position. They have a psychological need to play the victim. They cannot conceive of themselves as victimizers.
How can we get through to the indoctrinated? Is that task even possible? Do we still possess a shared vocabulary, or a common frame of reference sufficient to permit dialogue?
Each day, we face anew a familiar question: How do we engage in a dialogue with political adversaries entranced by an utterly addled view of political reality -- or should I say all reality?
To summarize a situation we all know: When Republicans filibustered Clinton's judicial appointees, no-one on the religious right uttered any sighs of dismay. Now rightist politicians want to do away with the filibuster -- but only when this device is used to fight Bush-appointed nominees. Filibusters are still considered fine when used for legislative purposes.
Framed in that fashion, the issue obviously comes down to a matter of Machiavellian tactics. But the rightists prefer to frame the situation differently. Democrats, they say, want to stop Bush's appointees not because we think the President has made some crummy, ill-qualified choices, but because liberals hate religion.
The powerful pastor James Dobson -- displaying his usual "flexible" interpretation of the commandment against false witness -- told a cable news audience that the Republicans had never filibustered a Democratic nominee. A lie. But what else can we expect from a fundamentalist preacher?
Not long ago, the GOP hatemongers mounted a campaign aginst the AARP -- the A-freaking-ARP -- in order to create support for Bush's disastrous Social Security reform effort. The ads did not even discuss the actual issue of Social Security. Instead, a respected advocacy group for the elderly was pictured as a quasi-Marxist "cell" devoted to supporting gay marriage and undermining our troops.
During the election, radio rightist relentlessly conveyed the impression that John Kerry supported gay marriage. He did not and does not. But that didn't stop our pious brethren from buying into the myth.
One of Bush's appointees, California Supreme Court Justice Janice Rogers Brown, has recently declared that people of faith are engaged in a "war" against (oh no, not this again!) secular humanists.
(A side note: This is the same woman who called the New Deal the "triumph of our socialist revolution." Here's a history lesson, Justice Brown: That "revolution" led to this country's most prosperous period, 1940-1970. During that time, the average person's living standards kept rising, and Communism was consistently opposed. Since the Reagan revolution, living standards have sharply declined and the work week has lengthened -- and China now controls a large chunk of our economy.)
Ah yes. The threat of secular humanism. That brings back memories...
If you're over 30, you may recall the religious right's weird hate campaign against this particular straw man. The meme was quite popular in the 1980s and early '90s. Basically, this wacky notion holds that anyone not of the fundamentalist persuasion must be a card-carrying member of an alternate religion -- recognised as such by the Supreme Court, no less! -- called "Secular Humanism." This religion is supposedly devoted to the deification of Man and the denigration of Jesus.
The 80s-era preachers who fed their flocks dire warnings of the "secular humanist" conspiracy usually veered into ultra-bizarro territory: Marxism...gnosticism...Satanism...the Illuminati. Beware, brethren! The Secular Humanists are coming! They're going to burn all the churches any DAY now!!
Now we have a Bush-appointed judge reviving this nonsense. Once more, we will face the annoying task of educating the public: Liberals who want to keep church and state separate are not part of a conspiracy. We just want the theocrats to leave us alone.
Much of the problem comes down to the fact that rural voters and evangelical church-goers refuse to read objective journalism, and thus do not understand the issues. Their nescience leaves the propagandists free to re-frame those issues in the most outlandish, supernaturalistic, conspiratorial and fear-filled terms.
Thus, a debate over Social Security gives way to the crankish myth that the AARP hates our soldiers. Thus, judges like Brown, who want to impose one religious ideology on the entire nation, are held up as the antidote to a (supposedly) ideological judiciary. Thus, a judge addressing the issue of church and state gives voice to a notoriously nutty conspiracy theory.
Alas, these tactics work. Because ill-educated people are naturally insecure, they present ripe targets for any sharpie who appeals to their fears. That's why false claims of persecution always sway gullible evangelicals.
Some of you may recall some of the other "scare stories" circulating in televangelistic circles during the 1980s and 1990s. For example: According to a rumor popular at the time, the liberal elites had drawn up plans to round up all Bible-believing Christians and herd them into concentration camps. I've met people who sincerely believed this nonsense.
Such camps are now a fact of post-9/11 life. Of course, they do not -- and never will -- house fundamentalist Christians. (Will they soon house progressives? We've all seen the ominous signs...)
A little web-surfing reveals that many fundamentalists still hold to this "Christian concentration camp" fable. Fundies love to picture themselves in the "false underdog" position. They have a psychological need to play the victim. They cannot conceive of themselves as victimizers.
How can we get through to the indoctrinated? Is that task even possible? Do we still possess a shared vocabulary, or a common frame of reference sufficient to permit dialogue?
Vote fraud: We won one!
The Los Angeles Times reports the welcome news that the unpopular Republican mayor of San Diego, Dick Murphy -- who won a very controversial onionskin-thin victory over write-in challenger Donna Frye -- has resigned.
Frye would have won the November, 2004 election if several thousand write-in ballots, in which voter intent was clearly indicated, had not been tossed out by a court ruling in December. On those disputed ballots, the voters had written in Frye's name but had neglected to darken the nearby oval.
One can imagine how the radio rightists would have howled if the courts ruled against a Republican who lost under such circumstances.
Murphy's resignation comes in the wake of an SEC investigation of a $2 billion pension deficit. Although he has not been charged with any wrongdoing, he faced the likelihood of a recall.
Question: Was Murphy's election legitimate to begin with?
We learned from the Lehto study of Snohomish County, Washington, that paper ballots (absentee votes, provisionals) tend to agree with exit poll results, while electronic votes display a greater disparity. The "error," of course, always favors the Republican party.
San Diego is an optical scan county. The scantron-style ballots are fed into a central tabulator -- the "mother machine," as the should-have-been First Lady once called it. And who engineered that centralized counter?
You guessed it: Diebold.
This site offers an interesting view of Diebold's performance in San Diego during the primaries:
Frye was a write-in candidate; one presumes that her ballot count was more-or-less accurate, since her vote had a paper trail. But only Diebold knows whether Murphy's count was inflated.
At any rate: Good riddance.
Frye would have won the November, 2004 election if several thousand write-in ballots, in which voter intent was clearly indicated, had not been tossed out by a court ruling in December. On those disputed ballots, the voters had written in Frye's name but had neglected to darken the nearby oval.
One can imagine how the radio rightists would have howled if the courts ruled against a Republican who lost under such circumstances.
Murphy's resignation comes in the wake of an SEC investigation of a $2 billion pension deficit. Although he has not been charged with any wrongdoing, he faced the likelihood of a recall.
Question: Was Murphy's election legitimate to begin with?
We learned from the Lehto study of Snohomish County, Washington, that paper ballots (absentee votes, provisionals) tend to agree with exit poll results, while electronic votes display a greater disparity. The "error," of course, always favors the Republican party.
San Diego is an optical scan county. The scantron-style ballots are fed into a central tabulator -- the "mother machine," as the should-have-been First Lady once called it. And who engineered that centralized counter?
You guessed it: Diebold.
This site offers an interesting view of Diebold's performance in San Diego during the primaries:
Also, after the Oct. 7, 2003 recall election, when Diebold's vote-tabulating software wrongly awarded 9,000 Democratic absentee votes to a Southern California Socialist, Diebold decided its computer was overwhelmed and replaced it. In the March primary, Alameda County workers eased the load on Diebold's computer by scanning absentee ballots one party at a time. But San Diego County fed its absentee ballots in as a mix, and Diebold's software misreported almost 3,000 votes. In the worst case, it switched 2,747 Democratic presidential primary votes for U.S. Sen. John Kerry to U.S. Rep. Dick Gephardt, who had dropped out of the race. Diebold's latest explanation says its vote-tabulation software apparently could not handle results from multiple optical-scanning machines, processing ballots with large numbers of candidates and precincts.Well, jeez. In November 2004, the ballots had a large number of candidates and precincts.
Frye was a write-in candidate; one presumes that her ballot count was more-or-less accurate, since her vote had a paper trail. But only Diebold knows whether Murphy's count was inflated.
At any rate: Good riddance.
Monday, April 25, 2005
And on the 9/11 front...
I don't pay enough attention to the oddball facts and theories surrounding 9/11, in part because the research community that has coalesced around this event annoys the hell out of me. One should remain wary of any involvement with that crowd. But some noteworthy developments demand our attention...
Protecting Osama's privacy. Before we proceed, please note that this story comes to us by way of Judicial Watch, an organization I don't much like. They were a major part of the propaganda effort against Clinton, although in recent years they seem to have gone off script. (G.O.P. activists now treat Judicial Watch as though it were the proverbial crazy uncle living in the attic.)
All caveats aside, we should express gratitude for this story. In essence: Judicial Watch filed a FOIA request for an FBI report dealing, in part, with Osama Bin Laden. Information was redacted, as one might expect. The FBI, as is always the case, had to list reasons for the redactions.
According to JW, data relevant to Osama Bin Laden was blacked out to protect his privacy rights.
Can this be true? Does the leader of Al Qaeda really have a right to privacy?
Well...I suppose it's nice to know that someone still does these days. You and I sure don't. Pretty soon, we won't even be able to make a day-trip to Tijuana or Vancouver island without carrying a passport equipped with an RFID electronic tracking device. But Osama Bin Laden...he has a right to privacy...
Odd doings in San Diego: Those of you following the hijacker trails may recall that two of the evildoers lodged with an FBI informant in San Diego. The name of this informant was "Professor" Abdussattar Shaikh. This living arrangement has always raised eyebrows: Is it really possible that an FBI informant did not know the true nature of the men living under his roof?
Daniel Hopsicker has uncovered evidence indicating that this "professor" may have had a very elastic view of the truth.
(Hopsicker also discusses this story in a radio interview, which I cannot recommend -- the guest and host interrupt each other incessantly and the material is presented in a very disorganized fashion. If you have the fortitude for it, go here and scroll down to FTR-507a and b.)
Here's one of the most interesting sidelights to come out of Hopsicker's investigation: "Shaikh" (or whatever his real name may be) is a long-time associate of an Iranian arms dealer named Sam Koutchesfahani. This fellow came to our (well, my attention) attention some years back in a very strange way: Koutchesfahani owned the house that the Heaven's Gate cultists lived and died in.
Coincidence? Probably. Even so, I'm going to keep an eye on this tale.
I followed the doings of Marshall Applewhite for years -- well before the mass suicide. A friend of mine had a bizarre encounter with the cult about a year before the tragedy; therein lies an anecdote which I may one day relate. I've never shaken the impression that an untold story lurks beneath the mainstream media accounts of the suicide.
Protecting Osama's privacy. Before we proceed, please note that this story comes to us by way of Judicial Watch, an organization I don't much like. They were a major part of the propaganda effort against Clinton, although in recent years they seem to have gone off script. (G.O.P. activists now treat Judicial Watch as though it were the proverbial crazy uncle living in the attic.)
All caveats aside, we should express gratitude for this story. In essence: Judicial Watch filed a FOIA request for an FBI report dealing, in part, with Osama Bin Laden. Information was redacted, as one might expect. The FBI, as is always the case, had to list reasons for the redactions.
According to JW, data relevant to Osama Bin Laden was blacked out to protect his privacy rights.
Can this be true? Does the leader of Al Qaeda really have a right to privacy?
Well...I suppose it's nice to know that someone still does these days. You and I sure don't. Pretty soon, we won't even be able to make a day-trip to Tijuana or Vancouver island without carrying a passport equipped with an RFID electronic tracking device. But Osama Bin Laden...he has a right to privacy...
Odd doings in San Diego: Those of you following the hijacker trails may recall that two of the evildoers lodged with an FBI informant in San Diego. The name of this informant was "Professor" Abdussattar Shaikh. This living arrangement has always raised eyebrows: Is it really possible that an FBI informant did not know the true nature of the men living under his roof?
Daniel Hopsicker has uncovered evidence indicating that this "professor" may have had a very elastic view of the truth.
Yet a visit to the various locations around San Diego where he was said to have worked reveals that Abdussattar Shaikh never taught at San Diego State, has never been a Professor of English, and possesses a phony PhD from a bogus diploma mill run by people with U.S. military and intelligence connections.There's much more, and you can read it here.
The "University" for which he was said to be Vice President for International Projects does not, in fact, exist.
Also: "Abdussattar Shaikh" is not his real name.
(Hopsicker also discusses this story in a radio interview, which I cannot recommend -- the guest and host interrupt each other incessantly and the material is presented in a very disorganized fashion. If you have the fortitude for it, go here and scroll down to FTR-507a and b.)
Here's one of the most interesting sidelights to come out of Hopsicker's investigation: "Shaikh" (or whatever his real name may be) is a long-time associate of an Iranian arms dealer named Sam Koutchesfahani. This fellow came to our (well, my attention) attention some years back in a very strange way: Koutchesfahani owned the house that the Heaven's Gate cultists lived and died in.
Coincidence? Probably. Even so, I'm going to keep an eye on this tale.
I followed the doings of Marshall Applewhite for years -- well before the mass suicide. A friend of mine had a bizarre encounter with the cult about a year before the tragedy; therein lies an anecdote which I may one day relate. I've never shaken the impression that an untold story lurks beneath the mainstream media accounts of the suicide.
Gannon: Conyers steps in
John Conyers is an American hero. I'm no sculptor, but this guy deserves a statue somewhere...
He has written a powerhouse formal letter to White House press secretary Scott McClellan on the Gannon affair:
I'm wondering -- is there any truth to the long-standing rumors that the White House has a secret underground exit? We've all heard the stories. As you may recall, such a tunnel appears in the movie Dave. But has anyone confirmed that it really exists?
Raw Story also offers up a very strange exchange with the Secret Service on the Gannon affair. Strange, because the Service reveals who made the temporary appointments for Gannon starting in December of 2004 -- yet they don't seem to have a clue as to how the arrangements were made for the many visits that occurred prior to that date.
He has written a powerhouse formal letter to White House press secretary Scott McClellan on the Gannon affair:
We write to ask you to identify who in your office, or in the White House generally, gave Mr. James Guckert a.k.a. "Jeff Gannon" virtually unfettered access to the White House. In reviewing the response to our Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) to the Department of Homeland Security several of our specific concerns were validated. While your office and the White House have claimed Gannon was treated as just another reporter, the records we have obtained affirm that Gannon was granted access to the White House which appears to be unusual for any reporter. Out of concern for not only security, but also avoiding White House dissemination of propaganda, we request an explanation to the following:Some wags will look at point 3 above and mutter: "An overnight stay, perhaps?"
1. The Department of Homeland Security's records indicate that Mr. "Gannon" entered the White House Complex 196 times in the past two years. He attended 155 of the 196 press conferences held at the White House in the two year period. This is disconcerting considering that your office and "Mr. Gannon" have maintained that his access was sporadic. At what point is a "hard pass" required?
2. The records show that Mr. "Gannon" was allowed access to the White House 38 times when no public press events occurred. He also spent hours in the White House both before and after press events took place. With whom did he meet on those occasions and what was the subject matter of those meetings?
3. On 13 occasions there is a record where he checked in with security, but is never registered as leaving the White House complex. How do you explain this?
4. Your Media Assistant, Lois Cassano, requested a total of 48 day passes for Mr. "Gannon" which helped facilitate his access for nearly 200 times over the last two years. It is nearly impossible that she would have made Gannon such a priority without direction from a supervisor. Would you like to revise your claim that, "I don't involve myself in that process, it's handled at a staff level."[1]
These records appear to confirm our concern that Gannon was treated in a manner that deviated from standard White House procedure for determining who receives press credentials, and to what degree members of the press and public are granted access to the White House complex. In fact, these entry and exit records only raise more questions, as your office has issued conflicting statements about his activities and apparently abused the press pass policy to avoid a full-fledged background investigation and allow Republican propaganda to be disseminated through a counterfeit media operation and a fake reporter.
Mr. McClellan, we have yet to receive any direct communication from your office in response to our repeated requests for information. The American people deserve to know what is happening in the White House Briefing room. It is unacceptable that you continue to deny them this information.
I'm wondering -- is there any truth to the long-standing rumors that the White House has a secret underground exit? We've all heard the stories. As you may recall, such a tunnel appears in the movie Dave. But has anyone confirmed that it really exists?
Raw Story also offers up a very strange exchange with the Secret Service on the Gannon affair. Strange, because the Service reveals who made the temporary appointments for Gannon starting in December of 2004 -- yet they don't seem to have a clue as to how the arrangements were made for the many visits that occurred prior to that date.
What to do
There's a reasonably interesting discussion on Democratic Underground right now: "What are the low-hanging fruit dems should grasp when we regain power?" The readers offer some fine responses (such as paper trails for voting), but I ask: Why stop at the easy fruit? Aim high.
A modest suggestion: Define the Reverend Moon and all (ALL) Dominionists as individuals devoted to the overthrow of the United States of America -- because, once you cut past their casuistry, that is precisely what they are. They do not differ from Osama Bin Laden.
Arguably, our home-grown theocrats pose a greater long-term threat than does Osama. After all, Bin Laden does not want to see this country overthrown so much as weakened and cowed. The Dominionists want to "modify" our present understanding of the Constitution -- that is, they want to chuck out freedom and turn this nation into a theocracy.
Once our government properly equates Moon and the Dominionists with the Nazis, the Soviets and other past menaces to liberty, we must arrest every politician and business leader who has received money from, or formed an alliance with, these anti-democratic forces.
The charge: Treason.
Arrest them. Try them. And if they are found guilty -- execute them.
(In general, I am an opponent of the death penalty. But for traitors of this sort, an exception may be warranted...)
A modest suggestion: Define the Reverend Moon and all (ALL) Dominionists as individuals devoted to the overthrow of the United States of America -- because, once you cut past their casuistry, that is precisely what they are. They do not differ from Osama Bin Laden.
Arguably, our home-grown theocrats pose a greater long-term threat than does Osama. After all, Bin Laden does not want to see this country overthrown so much as weakened and cowed. The Dominionists want to "modify" our present understanding of the Constitution -- that is, they want to chuck out freedom and turn this nation into a theocracy.
Once our government properly equates Moon and the Dominionists with the Nazis, the Soviets and other past menaces to liberty, we must arrest every politician and business leader who has received money from, or formed an alliance with, these anti-democratic forces.
The charge: Treason.
Arrest them. Try them. And if they are found guilty -- execute them.
(In general, I am an opponent of the death penalty. But for traitors of this sort, an exception may be warranted...)
Dominion
Just a link, but an important one: If you haven't read it yet, check out Bob Moser's expose (in Rolling Stone) "The Crusaders," which relays heretofore little-known details of the Dominionist plot to turn America into a theocracy.
To implement their sweeping agenda, the Dominionists are working to remake the federal courts in God's image. In their view, the Founding Fathers never intended to erect a barrier between politics and religion. "The First Amendment does not say there should be a separation of church and state," declares Alan Sears, president and CEO of the Alliance Defense Fund, a team of 750 attorneys trained by the Dominionists to fight abortion and gay marriage. Sears argues that the constitutional guarantee against state-sponsored religion is actually designed to "shield" the church from federal interference -- allowing Christians to take their rightful place at the head of the government. "We have a right, indeed an obligation, to govern," says David Limbaugh, brother of Rush and author of Persecution: How Liberals Are Waging War Against Christianity. Nothing gets the Dominionists to their feet faster than ringing condemnations of judicial tyranny. "Activist judges have systematically deconstructed the Constitution," roars Rick Scarborough, author of Mixing Church and State. "A God-free society is their goal!"The current battle over the filibuster must be seen in light of this goal.
Sunday, April 24, 2005
Gannon-gate continueth...
RAW story has an important new article (with more promised in the near future) on pseudo-journalist Jeff Gannon's mysterious White House access. Editor John Byrne has gained access to Secret Service records which show that Gannon did apply under his real name (Jim Guckert) for his 200-odd visits.
Oddly, he often did not check out with the Secret Service. Apparently, he seems to found a way to enter the White House on several occasions without formally informing the President's protectors. Nice (you should pardon the expression) trick!
Here's the real puzzler: "Gannon" would show up at the White House at times when there was no press conference, or when the press gaggle was convened aboard Air Force One -- "which raises questions about what Guckert was doing at the White House."
Lots of folks have wondered whether Gannon/Guckert's access had anything to do with his "other life" as a male hooker. The Raw Story piece forces us to consider that angle anew. Who was he seeing in the White House when the press conferences were held aloft?
Oddly, he often did not check out with the Secret Service. Apparently, he seems to found a way to enter the White House on several occasions without formally informing the President's protectors. Nice (you should pardon the expression) trick!
Here's the real puzzler: "Gannon" would show up at the White House at times when there was no press conference, or when the press gaggle was convened aboard Air Force One -- "which raises questions about what Guckert was doing at the White House."
Lots of folks have wondered whether Gannon/Guckert's access had anything to do with his "other life" as a male hooker. The Raw Story piece forces us to consider that angle anew. Who was he seeing in the White House when the press conferences were held aloft?
It's all about the oil
A couple of articles about "peak oil" and our current involvement in the Middle East (also the focus of the post below) have come to my attention, and they deserve far greater scrutiny than I can here give. The first is James Howard Kunster's Rolling Stone piece, "The Long Emergency," about the belief (the fact?) that the planet is running out of dead dinosaur juice. The second is Michael Klare's very incisive "Oil, Geopolitics, and the Coming War with Iran."
Kunster's overview discusses peak oil theory, as well as the rival abiotic theory, which alleges that oil derives from non-organic sources and is therefore plentiful, provided one digs deep enough. There is also much derisory discussion of energy alternatives, including biomass energy and hydrogen. One alternative receives insufficient attention:
Indeed, there are a few wags who posit that "peak oil" is itself something of a deception operation -- many of this theory's key proponents have ties to the oil industry.
But if (as some believe) a concerted research and development effort can get the price of synthetic oil down to a reasonable level -- then why are we (as professor Klare rightly insists) so intent on invading Iran?
Kunster's overview discusses peak oil theory, as well as the rival abiotic theory, which alleges that oil derives from non-organic sources and is therefore plentiful, provided one digs deep enough. There is also much derisory discussion of energy alternatives, including biomass energy and hydrogen. One alternative receives insufficient attention:
You can make synthetic oil from coal, but the only time this was tried on a large scale was by the Nazis under wartime conditions, using impressive amounts of slave labor.True enough, but the Nazis ran one hell of a large war machine without access to the Middle Eastern oil reserves. Their facility at Leuna pioneered the hydrogenization process, and there has already been some talk of gearing up once more. 60 years of technological progress has occurred since the end of World War II, and one would think that, in all that time, some bright person might have thought of a way to make synthetic oil practical without resort to slavery.
Indeed, there are a few wags who posit that "peak oil" is itself something of a deception operation -- many of this theory's key proponents have ties to the oil industry.
But if (as some believe) a concerted research and development effort can get the price of synthetic oil down to a reasonable level -- then why are we (as professor Klare rightly insists) so intent on invading Iran?
Between the lines
Xymphora brings to our attention a long, intriguing and frustrating essay, published in Haaretz, on the current and future situation in the Middle East. The author is Efraim Halevy, formerly the head of Mossad and currently the National Security advisor to Ariel Sharon.
Halevy deserves our attention for many reasons -- not least among them being the behind-the-scenes role he played in the life and writings of Victor Ostrovsky, the renegade Mossad agent who left the service, moved to Canada, sidestepped the assassins, and wrote a couple of tell-all books: By Way of Deception and The Other Side of Deception.
(Ostrovsky, whom I admire, is now an artist in Arizona. Fine work. I recognized one image that he cribbed from another artist, but only because I used the same source in one of my own pilfering expeditions. As Jules Feiffer once noted, good swiping is an art in itself.)
The Other Side of Deception describes how Ostrovsky, having found himself on Mossad's bad side and fearful for his life, fell under the protection of a Mossad bigwig referred to only as "Ephraim." This is obviously Efraim Halevy; the physical description is spot on. For reasons which I still don't understand, Halevy rescued and protected Ostrovsky, then engineered the latter's covert post-Mossad approaches to the KGB, the Egyptians, the Jordanians, the British, and god knows who else.
Halevy also appears to have given Ostrovsky the go-ahead to publish his books of revelation, which exposed many an embarrassing fact (the most explosive of which may have been Israel's responsibility for the murder of Robert Maxwell). The purpose? I'm not sure, but Halevy seems to have wanted to shake up his nation's intelligence apparat in order to grease his own way to power.
Halevy is usually classified as a Mossad "liberal," a term that requires some flexibility of definition if it must be stretched to include a key Sharon advisor.
Among the key exposes in Other Side: The Mossad planned to assassinate George Bush the elder in 1991, during a peace conference in Madrid; false evidence would have cast the blame on the Palestinians. The Israelis, it seems, had become disenchanted with the senior Bush after the president cut off loans to force negotiations. The book offers only hazy details as to how and why this operation was cancelled; there is some indication that Halevy's was the cooler head that prevailed.
The 1991 murder-that-almost-was puts our current situation into a fascinating perspective. Note the use of the "false flag" (or "fall goy") scenario, often considerd a Mossad specialty. Note the willingness to apply such a tactic to a truly spectacular target. Note, especially, the latter-day kowtowing of George the younger to Ariel Sharon; one cannot help suspecting that the current president fears meeting the same end that almost overtook his father.
I mention all of this because Halevy's current piece -- which touches on many points -- ends with a discussion of whether the United States will continue to do Israel's bidding in the region. As you scan the following, keep in mind that Halevy is the sort of writer who requires some reading between the lines:
Earlier in the piece, Halevy offers some surprising words about the United States and Saudi Arabia. This is the section Xymphora quoted, and it bears repeating:
This fact offers grounds for interesting speculation. Let us suppose that America attacks Iran (and I'm betting that we will, following a massive staged provocation), and let us further suppose that the Saudi dynasty falls. The Shi'ites of Saudi Arabia, angry over the fate of their brothers in Iran, will not follow the lead of the Shi'ites in Iraq -- that is, they will not cooperate with American invaders.
Finally, a word from one of our nation's real rulers:
American troops in Iraq...Iran...Afghanistan...Saudi Arabia...and even Israel? We will soon have the motive (in the form of an unprecedented strike by "terrorists") for such a commitment, but we haven't the money or the manpower. What then?
Halevy deserves our attention for many reasons -- not least among them being the behind-the-scenes role he played in the life and writings of Victor Ostrovsky, the renegade Mossad agent who left the service, moved to Canada, sidestepped the assassins, and wrote a couple of tell-all books: By Way of Deception and The Other Side of Deception.
(Ostrovsky, whom I admire, is now an artist in Arizona. Fine work. I recognized one image that he cribbed from another artist, but only because I used the same source in one of my own pilfering expeditions. As Jules Feiffer once noted, good swiping is an art in itself.)
The Other Side of Deception describes how Ostrovsky, having found himself on Mossad's bad side and fearful for his life, fell under the protection of a Mossad bigwig referred to only as "Ephraim." This is obviously Efraim Halevy; the physical description is spot on. For reasons which I still don't understand, Halevy rescued and protected Ostrovsky, then engineered the latter's covert post-Mossad approaches to the KGB, the Egyptians, the Jordanians, the British, and god knows who else.
Halevy also appears to have given Ostrovsky the go-ahead to publish his books of revelation, which exposed many an embarrassing fact (the most explosive of which may have been Israel's responsibility for the murder of Robert Maxwell). The purpose? I'm not sure, but Halevy seems to have wanted to shake up his nation's intelligence apparat in order to grease his own way to power.
Halevy is usually classified as a Mossad "liberal," a term that requires some flexibility of definition if it must be stretched to include a key Sharon advisor.
Among the key exposes in Other Side: The Mossad planned to assassinate George Bush the elder in 1991, during a peace conference in Madrid; false evidence would have cast the blame on the Palestinians. The Israelis, it seems, had become disenchanted with the senior Bush after the president cut off loans to force negotiations. The book offers only hazy details as to how and why this operation was cancelled; there is some indication that Halevy's was the cooler head that prevailed.
The 1991 murder-that-almost-was puts our current situation into a fascinating perspective. Note the use of the "false flag" (or "fall goy") scenario, often considerd a Mossad specialty. Note the willingness to apply such a tactic to a truly spectacular target. Note, especially, the latter-day kowtowing of George the younger to Ariel Sharon; one cannot help suspecting that the current president fears meeting the same end that almost overtook his father.
I mention all of this because Halevy's current piece -- which touches on many points -- ends with a discussion of whether the United States will continue to do Israel's bidding in the region. As you scan the following, keep in mind that Halevy is the sort of writer who requires some reading between the lines:
The assumption that the United States will always reject Saudi or Egyptian or Palestinian approaches that are not acceptable to Israel requires proof. If there are developments in the region that adversely affect the situation of the United States to the point where it must repay one of the countries of the Arab world, or if the United States is asked to intervene in Saudi Arabia or in the northern system and feels it must prove that it is not facing off frontally against the Arab world, there are clauses in the road map that will make it possible for Washington to accept a particular Arab position without departing from the road map.Perhaps we may take this as Halevy's way of warning his readers: The United States will play a major role in this region for the next generation. Right now, they act in our interests, but they may not always do so.
The final and binding judgment about the implementation of the road map by the sides rests exclusively with the "Quartet" - the United States, Russia, the European Union and the United Nations - and Israel agreed to let them have the final word. What is emerging is that Israel and the United States have created the framework for an imposed resolution of the conflict, as it will not be the result of negotiations between the sides but of negotiations between each of them and the United States.
Earlier in the piece, Halevy offers some surprising words about the United States and Saudi Arabia. This is the section Xymphora quoted, and it bears repeating:
Some believe that there is a real danger that extremist religious figures will seize power in Saudi Arabia and establish an "Al-Qaida state" in Riyadh. Others note that the national identification of large numbers of the country's population with the Saudi entity is feeble and that their main attachment is tribal or local-regional. Thus, a revolutionary situation might cause the disintegration of the state and the creation of parallel regimes in various regions of the kingdom.Halevy notes that no-one has counted the number of Shi'ites in Saudi Arabia; they may now constitute a very substantial minority.
In a visit to the United States two weeks ago, I was told by several well-informed observers that should one of the more severe scenarios come to pass, the United States will have no choice but to deepen its presence in the Middle East. To that end, it will have to renew the draft, to ensure that there are enough forces to deal with developing situations in countries like Saudi Arabia.
This fact offers grounds for interesting speculation. Let us suppose that America attacks Iran (and I'm betting that we will, following a massive staged provocation), and let us further suppose that the Saudi dynasty falls. The Shi'ites of Saudi Arabia, angry over the fate of their brothers in Iran, will not follow the lead of the Shi'ites in Iraq -- that is, they will not cooperate with American invaders.
There is a good possibility that Iraq will not be the last country in the region that will require a lengthy American military presence.No shit, Effy.
The U.S. campaign in Iraq was perceived as a signal of long-term American commitment to do whatever is required and to stay in the "neighborhood" for as long as needed. It was none other than Martin Indyk, the former U.S. ambassador to Israel, who not long ago raised the idea of establishing an American trusteeship regime in the areas of the Palestinian Authority, if it should turn out that the Palestinians are not ripe for self-rule. That arrangement would require an American operational military presence along Israel's border with the Palestinian territories.If Israel manages to pass off to the U.S. the job of keeping those pesky natives pacified, we have not even begun to see what terrorism looks like.
Finally, a word from one of our nation's real rulers:
Speaking in a semi-closed forum during a visit to Israel a few months ago, Bill Kristol, one of the most influential "neocons" (neoconservatives) in the United States, noted in this connection that the American presence in Europe after World War II lasted for nearly 60 years. Israelis who are trying to promote a role for NATO in the region, in one form or another, are actually promoting a generation-long American presence.So there you have it. Saudi instability will force America to keep troops in the region more or less permanently. Halevy is, in effect, asking his countrymen whether that arrangement is necessarily such a good thing for Israel.
American troops in Iraq...Iran...Afghanistan...Saudi Arabia...and even Israel? We will soon have the motive (in the form of an unprecedented strike by "terrorists") for such a commitment, but we haven't the money or the manpower. What then?
Saturday, April 23, 2005
Letters...we get letters... (Responses to various readers)
I owe everyone an apology. Due to a couple of bad decisions (NEVER sign up for a mailing list of any sort), I now have about 1500 unread pieces of mail in my in-box. For the past few days, I haven't even had the courage to open up my mailbox.
Since work will soon let me have a bit more free time -- finally -- I'll be able to winnow through that backlog.
I really should not have been writing at all for the past two weeks or so, since the business of keeping a roof overhead in Southern CA has proven particularly murderous. The blog is an indulgence. But having sworn off train derailments (the twelve-step meetings were a godsend), I have very few vices left. Blogging, pizza, vampirism...and not much else, really....
Let me here respond to some feedback in the comments section:
Those awful, awful Catholics. I stand by my assertion that the Pope has far less power than many prefer to believe.
For one thing, Americans tend to think that the rest of the world accepts supernaturalistic claims as readily as we do. Most denizens of the United States somnabulate through a hallucinatory, metaphysical haze -- a weltanschauung derived from Hal Lindsey and the Weekly World News. That's why polls reveal that roughly half of our countrymen disbelieve in the reality of both evolution and project Apollo. That's why the majority of your fellow citizens remain convinced that Saddam and Osama were bosom buddies. That's why so many people scried the devil's face in photographs of smoke billowing out of the World Trade Center.
Outside our borders, people are more sensible -- especially in Europe, which is, for the most part, a post-Christian culture. No religious figure there has anything like the power exercized here by James Dobson, Pat Robertson or the Reverend Moon. In civilized nations, the citizenry simply does not tolerate the admixture of church and politics.
In Germany (for example), everyone pays the church tax because they presume that the money goes toward charitable works and the upkeep of historic buildings. But how many actually go to church? How many would let fantasists steeped in Apocalypse porn grab hold of supreme political authority?
Even within this country, the religious fanatics scurrying for power all operate within the Southern Baptist tradition -- with the exception of Moon, who exists within a tradition of his own, and must therefore function covertly. Neither mainstream Protestants nor the Catholic clergy exercise much temporal influence. Pro-theocracy voices speak with a southern accent.
Nevertheless, many Americans -- even those progressives who despise the current march toward theocracy -- refrain from bashing the Southern Baptists. Instead, in a process psychologists call "transference," we re-direct our antipathy toward the RCs, a tradition we've upheld since the heyday of the Know-Nothing party. Why? Because anti-Catholicism is the acceptable analogue to anti-Semitism; it allows us to blame a culture which seems greasily foreign, rather than healthfully home-grown.
The Pope is the Other. The Crouches are, god help us, Us.
That's why, to use a pop-culture example, the ultimate villain in Sin City is a Cardinal. In real life, no American Catholic clergyman holds that level of power. The audience would never have accepted a scene in which Mickey Rourke sliced up the face of (say) a lightly-fictionalized version of Jerry Falwell. But torturing an uppity mick? Yeah, that's fine.
The truth: Once you get away from below-the waist issues -- the only issues most people seem to care about, alas -- RC clergymen are often far more humane than their southern evangelical counterparts. Even the conservative John Paul II (and Ratzinger, his latter-day amanuensis) opposed the death penalty and supported social justice in Third World nations. Our Southern-fried fundies invariably view "social justice" as a code term for Marxism, while the RCs tend to have a better understanding of nuance. To that degree, I wish the Catholic church did have more influence.
Yes, there is a fundamentalist, pro-theocracy wing of the RC church, best exemplified by the Opus Dei movement and the Tradition Family & Property sect. This tendency must be watched and opposed. But here we encounter an automatic braking system: Those American Catholics attracted to such far-right splinter groups often decide that they cannot reconcile themselves to the Vatican II reforms. And so they follow Mel Gibson's lead and scuttle off toward breakaway churches.
Outsiders erroneously call these churches Catholic, even though they really aren't -- they denounce all popes since John XXIII as "anti-popes." These groups are tiny. True, their members would impose the most horrendous theocracy imaginable if given the chance, but that chance will never come.
As for the RC church's insanely retrograde stance on those dreaded below-the-waist issues: Most American Catholics scoff at the strict principles of the church. Trust me, fellows: Lots of Catholic girls are easy, and they use the pill.
Many priests privately do not accept Vatican teachings on birth control and abortion, although they cannot so admit in public. And as for those few laymen (pardon the term) who do choose to follow those teachings -- so what? As long as no guns are held to heads, it's all a matter of personal choice, just as it is the personal choice of some Jews to follow certain dietary restrictions which strike the rest of us as silly.
None of my business. None of your business. End of story.
Since work will soon let me have a bit more free time -- finally -- I'll be able to winnow through that backlog.
I really should not have been writing at all for the past two weeks or so, since the business of keeping a roof overhead in Southern CA has proven particularly murderous. The blog is an indulgence. But having sworn off train derailments (the twelve-step meetings were a godsend), I have very few vices left. Blogging, pizza, vampirism...and not much else, really....
Let me here respond to some feedback in the comments section:
Those awful, awful Catholics. I stand by my assertion that the Pope has far less power than many prefer to believe.
For one thing, Americans tend to think that the rest of the world accepts supernaturalistic claims as readily as we do. Most denizens of the United States somnabulate through a hallucinatory, metaphysical haze -- a weltanschauung derived from Hal Lindsey and the Weekly World News. That's why polls reveal that roughly half of our countrymen disbelieve in the reality of both evolution and project Apollo. That's why the majority of your fellow citizens remain convinced that Saddam and Osama were bosom buddies. That's why so many people scried the devil's face in photographs of smoke billowing out of the World Trade Center.
Outside our borders, people are more sensible -- especially in Europe, which is, for the most part, a post-Christian culture. No religious figure there has anything like the power exercized here by James Dobson, Pat Robertson or the Reverend Moon. In civilized nations, the citizenry simply does not tolerate the admixture of church and politics.
In Germany (for example), everyone pays the church tax because they presume that the money goes toward charitable works and the upkeep of historic buildings. But how many actually go to church? How many would let fantasists steeped in Apocalypse porn grab hold of supreme political authority?
Even within this country, the religious fanatics scurrying for power all operate within the Southern Baptist tradition -- with the exception of Moon, who exists within a tradition of his own, and must therefore function covertly. Neither mainstream Protestants nor the Catholic clergy exercise much temporal influence. Pro-theocracy voices speak with a southern accent.
Nevertheless, many Americans -- even those progressives who despise the current march toward theocracy -- refrain from bashing the Southern Baptists. Instead, in a process psychologists call "transference," we re-direct our antipathy toward the RCs, a tradition we've upheld since the heyday of the Know-Nothing party. Why? Because anti-Catholicism is the acceptable analogue to anti-Semitism; it allows us to blame a culture which seems greasily foreign, rather than healthfully home-grown.
The Pope is the Other. The Crouches are, god help us, Us.
That's why, to use a pop-culture example, the ultimate villain in Sin City is a Cardinal. In real life, no American Catholic clergyman holds that level of power. The audience would never have accepted a scene in which Mickey Rourke sliced up the face of (say) a lightly-fictionalized version of Jerry Falwell. But torturing an uppity mick? Yeah, that's fine.
The truth: Once you get away from below-the waist issues -- the only issues most people seem to care about, alas -- RC clergymen are often far more humane than their southern evangelical counterparts. Even the conservative John Paul II (and Ratzinger, his latter-day amanuensis) opposed the death penalty and supported social justice in Third World nations. Our Southern-fried fundies invariably view "social justice" as a code term for Marxism, while the RCs tend to have a better understanding of nuance. To that degree, I wish the Catholic church did have more influence.
Yes, there is a fundamentalist, pro-theocracy wing of the RC church, best exemplified by the Opus Dei movement and the Tradition Family & Property sect. This tendency must be watched and opposed. But here we encounter an automatic braking system: Those American Catholics attracted to such far-right splinter groups often decide that they cannot reconcile themselves to the Vatican II reforms. And so they follow Mel Gibson's lead and scuttle off toward breakaway churches.
Outsiders erroneously call these churches Catholic, even though they really aren't -- they denounce all popes since John XXIII as "anti-popes." These groups are tiny. True, their members would impose the most horrendous theocracy imaginable if given the chance, but that chance will never come.
As for the RC church's insanely retrograde stance on those dreaded below-the-waist issues: Most American Catholics scoff at the strict principles of the church. Trust me, fellows: Lots of Catholic girls are easy, and they use the pill.
Many priests privately do not accept Vatican teachings on birth control and abortion, although they cannot so admit in public. And as for those few laymen (pardon the term) who do choose to follow those teachings -- so what? As long as no guns are held to heads, it's all a matter of personal choice, just as it is the personal choice of some Jews to follow certain dietary restrictions which strike the rest of us as silly.
None of my business. None of your business. End of story.
Wednesday, April 20, 2005
Mann of the year
Ann Coulter apparently does not like the photograph of her now adorning the front cover of Time magazine. She shouldn't complain. The photo shows no trace of the alleged "five o'clock shadow" which some cite as evidence for the thesis that she was born male.
However, Time deserves criticism for not confronting Coulter directly about the "Ann's-a-man" accusation, unfounded though it may be. Until she addresses the issue directly, until she issues an on-the-record denial, this country will continue to wallow in speculations which may, in fact, prove groundless.
Reporters have a duty to force Ann to speak up. It's the only way to get this sordid matter behind us.
However, Time deserves criticism for not confronting Coulter directly about the "Ann's-a-man" accusation, unfounded though it may be. Until she addresses the issue directly, until she issues an on-the-record denial, this country will continue to wallow in speculations which may, in fact, prove groundless.
Reporters have a duty to force Ann to speak up. It's the only way to get this sordid matter behind us.
Predictions
Tom DeLay isn't going to leave any time soon. He will gain greater power than ever before. Bush's Social Security privatization plan will go into effect. There will be a pogrom against all non-reactionary judges. Even Republicans will become the targets of hate campaigns -- indeed, to some extent, this has already happened. (Note the cases of Arlen Spector and now Justice Kennedy.) The minimum wage will end. Theocracy will become overt.
IT will happen soon. After it does, this country will lurch so far to the right as to make the present day look like socialism.
The reactionaries -- or, as George Seldes once called them, the plutogogues -- will get what they want: Hitlerism with a Jesus mask. But what will happen the day after? They cannot run an economy; the fascist state they create will be inherently weak and unstable.
IT will happen soon. After it does, this country will lurch so far to the right as to make the present day look like socialism.
The reactionaries -- or, as George Seldes once called them, the plutogogues -- will get what they want: Hitlerism with a Jesus mask. But what will happen the day after? They cannot run an economy; the fascist state they create will be inherently weak and unstable.
Zodiac killer theories
Xymphora directs our attention to Steve Huff's fascinating new theory concerning the Zodiac killer, the "onlie begettor" of history's second-most baffling series of unsolved murders. (Saucy Jack maintains his hammerlock on the #1 position.)
Zodiac may have been a man who called himself Joseph Newton Chandler III, who committed suicide in Eastlake, Ohio in June of 2002. The man's real name remains unknown; investigators discovered that he had filched the identity of a boy killed in an accident in 1945. Chandler arrived in Eastlake in 1978, not too long after the Zodiac killer stopped sending taunting communications to the San Francisco media. Before moving to Ohio, "Chandler" apparently had been in California -- and, like the Zodiac killer, he may have had connections to the Navy.
Xymphora's most intriguing contribution to this scenario is his suggestion that "Chandler" may also have committed another series of killings which took place in Ohio between 1978 and 1982 -- murders similar in many respects to the Zodiac crimes.
The healthy (or maybe not so healthy) subculture of Zodiac researchers has offered a number of competing theories, some of which are rather bizarre. The best-known suspect is the late Arthur Leigh Allen, the subject of Robert Graysmith's second book, Zodiac Unmasked. Allen is not a universally popular candidate, and the evidence presented by Graysmith is badly-organized and less than convincing.
The more outre speculators try to tie the Zodiac crimes to the extended Manson family. In this light, I would note that the horn-rim glasses which became something of a Zodiac trademark also make an appearance in Manson lore.
Yes, yes, I know: That "connection" may be a bit of a stretch. Still, keep it in mind as you read on.
I'd like to mention a scenario so unusual, so outlandish -- and, to be frank, so speculative -- that no-one, so far as I know, has yet committed it to print, although buffs have kicked the idea around in private conversation. This theory holds that the Zodiac killer (or rather, his puppetmaster) was actually another cult leader known to be lurking around San Francisco in the 1960s:
L. Ron Hubbard.
The evidence centers on Zodiac victim Darlene Ferrin, the Laura Palmer-esque young lady who seems to have known her killer before she met her fate. The details can be found here. The killer, some allege, was a stocky man wearing horn-rimmed glasses who showed up at a "painting party" held by Ferrin. As her sister Linda later noted:
Hubbard's hair was wavy and red (at least in his younger days), but dye might have taken care of that. He was, by the 1960s, a voracious drug user. His ship could have taken him to the Virgin Islands. Hubbard's mania for all things nautical could explain the Zodiac/Navy linkage.
Perhaps that short nickname was actually "Ron"?
Hubbard was a sociopath. One can easily imagine him engineering a killing spree -- replete with taunting letters and ciphers and odd, quasi-occult symbols -- just to prove that he could get away with such a thing. Fanatically loyal followers could have carried out the actual crimes (surviving witnesses described a man younger than Hubbard), or aided Hubbard in doing so. Some have made fairly persuasive arguments that the sobriquet "Zodiac killer" may be a misnomer; perhaps we should be thinking in terms of Killers -- plural.
Interestingly, this timeline of Scientology history includes the following entry for 1975:
Charlie Manson himself had subterranean links to the Hubbardian sect. One author has suggested that Manson follower Bruce Davis -- also linked to Scientology -- may have been the Zodiac killer. This idea brings us parlously close to what may be termed a "unified field theory" of 60s-era California weirdness.
Were Gaul and Sharp killed because they knew too much about something Hubbard preferred to keep secret? Over the years, many have suspected as much, but no-one has offered proof. I'll have to confess that I've met other former Scientology "insiders" who remained among the living after leaving the cult (although they do describe serious harassment). However, their defections occurred after Hubbard's death.
I must also confess that the evidence favoring the Ron-as-Zodiac theory remains thinner than pencil lead. Even so...admit it. The idea is fascinating, isn't it?
As Ed Sanders might have put it: "Oooo-EEEE-Ooooooo..."
Zodiac may have been a man who called himself Joseph Newton Chandler III, who committed suicide in Eastlake, Ohio in June of 2002. The man's real name remains unknown; investigators discovered that he had filched the identity of a boy killed in an accident in 1945. Chandler arrived in Eastlake in 1978, not too long after the Zodiac killer stopped sending taunting communications to the San Francisco media. Before moving to Ohio, "Chandler" apparently had been in California -- and, like the Zodiac killer, he may have had connections to the Navy.
Xymphora's most intriguing contribution to this scenario is his suggestion that "Chandler" may also have committed another series of killings which took place in Ohio between 1978 and 1982 -- murders similar in many respects to the Zodiac crimes.
The healthy (or maybe not so healthy) subculture of Zodiac researchers has offered a number of competing theories, some of which are rather bizarre. The best-known suspect is the late Arthur Leigh Allen, the subject of Robert Graysmith's second book, Zodiac Unmasked. Allen is not a universally popular candidate, and the evidence presented by Graysmith is badly-organized and less than convincing.
The more outre speculators try to tie the Zodiac crimes to the extended Manson family. In this light, I would note that the horn-rim glasses which became something of a Zodiac trademark also make an appearance in Manson lore.
Yes, yes, I know: That "connection" may be a bit of a stretch. Still, keep it in mind as you read on.
I'd like to mention a scenario so unusual, so outlandish -- and, to be frank, so speculative -- that no-one, so far as I know, has yet committed it to print, although buffs have kicked the idea around in private conversation. This theory holds that the Zodiac killer (or rather, his puppetmaster) was actually another cult leader known to be lurking around San Francisco in the 1960s:
L. Ron Hubbard.
The evidence centers on Zodiac victim Darlene Ferrin, the Laura Palmer-esque young lady who seems to have known her killer before she met her fate. The details can be found here. The killer, some allege, was a stocky man wearing horn-rimmed glasses who showed up at a "painting party" held by Ferrin. As her sister Linda later noted:
"At the painting party," Linda later said, "(Darlene) was so scared. This guy at the party had no business being at her house and she told me to stay away from him. He was the only one dressed neat. Everyone else had old jeans on and was painting . . . She didn't expect him to show up. I can see him sitting there in the chair. The dark-rim glasses, the hair curly, wavy, an older-type man, he did have the dark-rim glasses like Superman wears. Overweight . . . he was five feet eight inches tall or so. Of course he was sitting down most of the time. I remember going in a little bedroom with Darlene and I asked, 'Darlene, what's wrong with you?' She was so nervous. This guy was scaring the heck out of her. She wasn't being the Darlene I knew."Few men are so fond of strawberry shortcake that they would spend two and a half hours eating the stuff. But Hubbard was crazy about strawberry shortcake. (So, at least, I have been told by former Scientologists. Readers may know of printed confirmation.)
Pam, Darlene's younger sister, arrived at the painting party shortly after Linda left and recognized the stocky man as the same man who had been leaving packages on Darlene's doorstep. "He was a very well-dressed guy with glasses," she recalled. "He had dark hair. He had a wart on his thumb. For some reason, I think Darlene met this man in the Virgin Islands. She mentioned a little bit about drugs."
Some of the guests at the party had heard the well-dressed man badgering Darlene about her sources of income. The stranger had a common, short nickname. Pam thought it was "Bob." (This name has been changed.)
Sunday, June 22, 1969
Linda walked into Terry's restaurant and saw the man from the party sitting in there watching Darlene constantly. The stranger gave Linda a "cold stare" and then went over to Darlene, said something to her, and left. Pam also saw the man. "He wore a leather jacket," she said. "He always smelled of leather, even the time he came to the house to deliver that package . . . I was there for two and one half hours sitting at that counter and he sat there the whole time eating strawberry shortcake.
Hubbard's hair was wavy and red (at least in his younger days), but dye might have taken care of that. He was, by the 1960s, a voracious drug user. His ship could have taken him to the Virgin Islands. Hubbard's mania for all things nautical could explain the Zodiac/Navy linkage.
Perhaps that short nickname was actually "Ron"?
Hubbard was a sociopath. One can easily imagine him engineering a killing spree -- replete with taunting letters and ciphers and odd, quasi-occult symbols -- just to prove that he could get away with such a thing. Fanatically loyal followers could have carried out the actual crimes (surviving witnesses described a man younger than Hubbard), or aided Hubbard in doing so. Some have made fairly persuasive arguments that the sobriquet "Zodiac killer" may be a misnomer; perhaps we should be thinking in terms of Killers -- plural.
Interestingly, this timeline of Scientology history includes the following entry for 1975:
A Scientology memo summarizes the contents of some "LA Intel Files," including information about Scientology links to the Process, references to the "Scientology murders" (Doreen Gaul and James Sharp, teenage Scientologists who were murdered, possibly by the Zodiac killer or someone associated with Charles Manson), an allusion to LRH being arrested in 1968 for counterfeiting, and FBI information on Scientology.(Emphasis added by me.) This site indicates that Doreen Gaul was deeply involved with Scientology but had become disillusioned at the time of her murder.
Charlie Manson himself had subterranean links to the Hubbardian sect. One author has suggested that Manson follower Bruce Davis -- also linked to Scientology -- may have been the Zodiac killer. This idea brings us parlously close to what may be termed a "unified field theory" of 60s-era California weirdness.
Were Gaul and Sharp killed because they knew too much about something Hubbard preferred to keep secret? Over the years, many have suspected as much, but no-one has offered proof. I'll have to confess that I've met other former Scientology "insiders" who remained among the living after leaving the cult (although they do describe serious harassment). However, their defections occurred after Hubbard's death.
I must also confess that the evidence favoring the Ron-as-Zodiac theory remains thinner than pencil lead. Even so...admit it. The idea is fascinating, isn't it?
As Ed Sanders might have put it: "Oooo-EEEE-Ooooooo..."
Tuesday, April 19, 2005
Pope Benedict XVI
No evidence backs the rumor that the college of Cardinals used Diebold machines. And don't be too quick to believe the report that Cardinal Francis Arinze had to wait in an unusually long line.
Yes, Joseph Ratzinger was once a member of the Hitler Youth. Conspiracy buffs of a certain type (the type I used to hang out with) are going to repeat that fact with an insistence reminiscent of a Philip Glass score. Personally, I'm not worried about what Ratizinger did when he was 18.
A potentially more worrisome factor: His experiences during the student protests of the late 1960s may have left him with -- how to put it? -- certain psychological scars. Confronting the excesses of inflamed youth can turn a decent man into a lifelong reactionary.
The important point to recall is this: The Pope has little power.
He makes no laws that affect anyone outside of Vatican City. Unless you get a paycheck directly from his church, he cannot compel you to do anything. If he wants the faithful to hop up and down on one leg for five minutes, they will do so only if they feel like doing so.
Stalin once asked: "How many divisions does the Pope have?" Damned good question!
Even though the Catholic Church lost all vestiges of temporal rule many years ago (except within a small area of Rome roughly one-third the size of the Los Angeles Zoo), everyone still loves to operate under the hallucination that the Pope wields enormous worldly power. Catholics maintain the hallucination for obvious reasons. Fundamentalist Protestants maintain the hallucination because they adore anti-Catholic conspiracy theories, and all such theories rest on the postulate of an all-powerful Vatican. Atheists and pagans -- as well as some Jews and Moslems -- maintain the hallucination for pretty much the same reason. Who fears a toothless bête noir?
Believe whatever you wish. But the fact remains: In the modern era, the Pope can rarely do more than run an idea up the flagpole and hope that people salute.
If you find his ideas on gays or the ordination of women offensive, then do as I do and refrain from attending services at a Catholic church. Simple, no? No need for hysterics or outrage.
If a guy in Rome says something with which you do not agree -- no problemo. You are still free to say things he doesn't like.
I do not expect to see a new John XXXIII in my lifetime. If Benedict XVI were suddenly to announce himself a liberal reformer, Protestant evangelicals would scoop up large numbers of disaffected Catholics in Spanish-speaking countries. Conversely, if the new Pope takes too conservative a stance, then those few Europeans paying attention to the church will turn their attentions elsewhere. The church's automatic braking mechanism kicks in whenever the steering wheel moves.
Ratzinger does have a few items in his resume which even I find bothersome. During the 2004 American election, he suggested that priests deny communion to politicians who do not toe the Vatican line on abortion. This message was intended for John Kerry. If Benedict XVI transforms that suggestion into a decree, he will have exercised a malign power in one of the few ways still available to him.
On the other hand, he opposed the Iraq war, and is no fan of unfettered capitalism. So we have some room for optimism.
On the weird front: The new Pope has already fulfilled the alleged "Prophecy of Malachy," a text of dubious provenance first mentioned in a book by a Benedictine historian, published in 1595. The Latin motto associated with this Pope is Gloria Olivae, or "the glory of the olive." Wikipedia (boy, do those guys work fast!) notes that the name "Benedict" relates to the Benedictine order, which uses the olive branch as a symbol.
Of course, the olive branch is also a general symbol for peace.
If Benedict XVI can help this groaning world achieve that goal, I'll happily forgive (or ignore) his conservative views on below-the-waist issues.
Yes, Joseph Ratzinger was once a member of the Hitler Youth. Conspiracy buffs of a certain type (the type I used to hang out with) are going to repeat that fact with an insistence reminiscent of a Philip Glass score. Personally, I'm not worried about what Ratizinger did when he was 18.
A potentially more worrisome factor: His experiences during the student protests of the late 1960s may have left him with -- how to put it? -- certain psychological scars. Confronting the excesses of inflamed youth can turn a decent man into a lifelong reactionary.
The important point to recall is this: The Pope has little power.
He makes no laws that affect anyone outside of Vatican City. Unless you get a paycheck directly from his church, he cannot compel you to do anything. If he wants the faithful to hop up and down on one leg for five minutes, they will do so only if they feel like doing so.
Stalin once asked: "How many divisions does the Pope have?" Damned good question!
Even though the Catholic Church lost all vestiges of temporal rule many years ago (except within a small area of Rome roughly one-third the size of the Los Angeles Zoo), everyone still loves to operate under the hallucination that the Pope wields enormous worldly power. Catholics maintain the hallucination for obvious reasons. Fundamentalist Protestants maintain the hallucination because they adore anti-Catholic conspiracy theories, and all such theories rest on the postulate of an all-powerful Vatican. Atheists and pagans -- as well as some Jews and Moslems -- maintain the hallucination for pretty much the same reason. Who fears a toothless bête noir?
Believe whatever you wish. But the fact remains: In the modern era, the Pope can rarely do more than run an idea up the flagpole and hope that people salute.
If you find his ideas on gays or the ordination of women offensive, then do as I do and refrain from attending services at a Catholic church. Simple, no? No need for hysterics or outrage.
If a guy in Rome says something with which you do not agree -- no problemo. You are still free to say things he doesn't like.
I do not expect to see a new John XXXIII in my lifetime. If Benedict XVI were suddenly to announce himself a liberal reformer, Protestant evangelicals would scoop up large numbers of disaffected Catholics in Spanish-speaking countries. Conversely, if the new Pope takes too conservative a stance, then those few Europeans paying attention to the church will turn their attentions elsewhere. The church's automatic braking mechanism kicks in whenever the steering wheel moves.
Ratzinger does have a few items in his resume which even I find bothersome. During the 2004 American election, he suggested that priests deny communion to politicians who do not toe the Vatican line on abortion. This message was intended for John Kerry. If Benedict XVI transforms that suggestion into a decree, he will have exercised a malign power in one of the few ways still available to him.
On the other hand, he opposed the Iraq war, and is no fan of unfettered capitalism. So we have some room for optimism.
On the weird front: The new Pope has already fulfilled the alleged "Prophecy of Malachy," a text of dubious provenance first mentioned in a book by a Benedictine historian, published in 1595. The Latin motto associated with this Pope is Gloria Olivae, or "the glory of the olive." Wikipedia (boy, do those guys work fast!) notes that the name "Benedict" relates to the Benedictine order, which uses the olive branch as a symbol.
Of course, the olive branch is also a general symbol for peace.
If Benedict XVI can help this groaning world achieve that goal, I'll happily forgive (or ignore) his conservative views on below-the-waist issues.
Monday, April 18, 2005
A last word on art, nudity and such
The response to my last post was surprising. According to statcounter, few readers showed up -- yet the piece received a large number of comments. Lesson: More people care about politics than about art, but those who DO care are vocal.
Sorry about the pop-ups on the Serpieri site; my computer has a good pop-up blocker. I still say the guy's a genius -- his line is so alive, you almost feel that his figures are moving. That's a quality I'm trying to capture in my own work.
He is the only artist I know who has applied that level of craftsmanship and talent to (arguably) pornographic material. I refuse to believe that he traces photographs (as some have suggested), if only because no real woman looks like that -- or could maintain that look for all the years that Serpeiri has been working.
As for the comparison to Leonardo -- first, keep in mind that I went through a "Leonardo" phase as a youth, obsessively copying his drawings, even reaching the point where I instinctively made "left-handed" hatch marks despite being right-handed. He was an unparalleled genius, yes -- but not without shortcomings. For one thing, his attempts at foreshortening were awkward. (The same could be said of every other artist before Caravaggio.)
Admittedly, I've always had a subversive fondness for the lowbrow as well as the highbrow. In a History of Drawing class at UCLA, when the professor insisted on showing Pollaiuolo's "Battle of Ten Nudes" for the umpteenth time, he did not appreciate the comparison I made between Pollaiuolo and Neal Adams. (Adams is on the short list of really top-rank comic book artists. At least Adams would have indicated the light direction -- and his linework would have been more economical.)
Some background on Serpieri: One story (which may or may not be true) holds that, many years ago, while visiting the beach, he saw a goddess-like woman arise nude from the sea -- a Dante-sees-Beatrice moment seared forever in his memory. Ever since, he has tried to recapture that transcendent vision -- a perfectly valid motive for creating art. (And yes, he can draw lots of stuff other than women.)
In the earlier post, I should have clarified my stance on the erotic in art. I maintain (as have generations of artists before our current era of neo-Puritanism) that the nude is not necessarily erotic. Robert Graham's work isn't much of a turn on, although it IS quite beautiful. (On the other hand, I thought Graham's wife Angelica Houston was rather alluring as Morticia. Maybe he should drape those "decapitated" torsos in black evening gowns.)
But eroticism is, of course, a perfectly legitimate motive for creating art. One of my all-time favorite paintings is a portrait of a woman; the painting hangs in the National Gallery. The work has been ascribed to David, although we will never know for sure: The work first showed up in the 1930s, and has no provenance. It sure looks like a David. Whoever did it obviously wanted to make love to the girl -- indeed, painting her was his way of making love to her. This is a factor invisible to those who see the work reproduced in books, but it is quite apparent when you see the work in the paint.
I'm going to go back to politics now, since I don't want to lose all of my readers.
Sorry about the pop-ups on the Serpieri site; my computer has a good pop-up blocker. I still say the guy's a genius -- his line is so alive, you almost feel that his figures are moving. That's a quality I'm trying to capture in my own work.
He is the only artist I know who has applied that level of craftsmanship and talent to (arguably) pornographic material. I refuse to believe that he traces photographs (as some have suggested), if only because no real woman looks like that -- or could maintain that look for all the years that Serpeiri has been working.
As for the comparison to Leonardo -- first, keep in mind that I went through a "Leonardo" phase as a youth, obsessively copying his drawings, even reaching the point where I instinctively made "left-handed" hatch marks despite being right-handed. He was an unparalleled genius, yes -- but not without shortcomings. For one thing, his attempts at foreshortening were awkward. (The same could be said of every other artist before Caravaggio.)
Admittedly, I've always had a subversive fondness for the lowbrow as well as the highbrow. In a History of Drawing class at UCLA, when the professor insisted on showing Pollaiuolo's "Battle of Ten Nudes" for the umpteenth time, he did not appreciate the comparison I made between Pollaiuolo and Neal Adams. (Adams is on the short list of really top-rank comic book artists. At least Adams would have indicated the light direction -- and his linework would have been more economical.)
Some background on Serpieri: One story (which may or may not be true) holds that, many years ago, while visiting the beach, he saw a goddess-like woman arise nude from the sea -- a Dante-sees-Beatrice moment seared forever in his memory. Ever since, he has tried to recapture that transcendent vision -- a perfectly valid motive for creating art. (And yes, he can draw lots of stuff other than women.)
In the earlier post, I should have clarified my stance on the erotic in art. I maintain (as have generations of artists before our current era of neo-Puritanism) that the nude is not necessarily erotic. Robert Graham's work isn't much of a turn on, although it IS quite beautiful. (On the other hand, I thought Graham's wife Angelica Houston was rather alluring as Morticia. Maybe he should drape those "decapitated" torsos in black evening gowns.)
But eroticism is, of course, a perfectly legitimate motive for creating art. One of my all-time favorite paintings is a portrait of a woman; the painting hangs in the National Gallery. The work has been ascribed to David, although we will never know for sure: The work first showed up in the 1930s, and has no provenance. It sure looks like a David. Whoever did it obviously wanted to make love to the girl -- indeed, painting her was his way of making love to her. This is a factor invisible to those who see the work reproduced in books, but it is quite apparent when you see the work in the paint.
I'm going to go back to politics now, since I don't want to lose all of my readers.
Saturday, April 16, 2005
Art
This site primarily deals with politics, but since few show up on the weekends, and since this is MY blog, I'm going to rant at length about a personal matter.
Art. I'm an artist. Perhaps I did not mention that fact in previous posts. Now you know.
(Warning: Although I usually avoid profanity, I may slip a bit here. Just a bit.)
Any young person learning to draw encounters a huge problem: People love to watch artists at work. Unfortunately, most of those onlookers are annoying idiots -- especially if a young would-be craftsman is trying to teach himself the basics of human anatomy.
The moronic kids at school who watched me sketch all held to one basic theory of art: If you draw it, that means you want to fuck it.
If you draw a picture of a woman (even a clothed woman), you are considered guilty of creating a dirty picture. If you draw a man, you are guilty of creating a gay picture.
If you draw it, you must want to fuck it. Every school-aged moron in the world makes that presumption.
I shudder to think of how those morons must have tormented Audubon.
Of course, every young artist ought to spend at least one hour each and every day drawing naked people of both sexes. This practice has nothing to do with heterosexuality or homosexuality. You must draw lots and lots of naked people. Lean people. Muscular people. Also fat, blobby people. Short people. Tall people. Beautiful people. Ugly people. Parts of people. Heads. Feet. Breasts. Hands.
Why? Because that is how you learn.
If you want to be a great pianist, you have to spend many a youthful hour practicing scales. Same principle.
But the young artist -- unlike, say, the young baseball player -- soon learns that he must never allow anyone to watch him practice. The young artist learns that art, like masturbation, is something one has to do in secret. Drawing becomes a covert operation because the world is filled with jelly-headed morons who "know" only one thing about art: If you draw it, you must want to fuck it.
Alas, although those jelly-headed morons in school have all grown up by now, they refuse to progress beyond moron-hood. Some of these adult morons call themselves fundamentalists. Some consider themselves feminists. They're really just morons.
If I recall my art history, the earliest nude sculpture of the Renaissance was Donatello's David, created in the 1430s. Before that time, the morons of the Middle Ages equated nudity with sexuality. Before Donatello, the last time anyone had dared to display nudity in art was when the Roman empire still ruled.
I am sorry to report that we've returned to the bad old days of the Middle Ages.
This is true even in the rarified world of "high art." Paint a naked human male in any context, in any style, and I guarantee you -- I GUARANTEE you -- any art critic who describes the piece will include the word "homoerotic" in the first paragraph.
If you draw or paint a nude female, take care not to do so realistically. And make sure she is unattractive. Otherwise, moron critics will make dismissive references to your "Playboy mentality," and feminists will blather on about the objectification of women and how sad it is that little girls must grow up with unrealistic standards of feminine beauty. And so on. You know the drill.
That sort of moronic critique was not heard in the so-called "Victorian" age. But it is now inescapable.
All such critics are morons, even if they have degrees in Art History. Anyone who insists on viewing a nude figure purely in sexual terms is just a grown-up version of those annoying jelly-headed pseudo-humanoids who made my life in school hellish while I was trying to practice my craft.
Today, I read an infuriating, just INFURIATING article in the Los Angeles Times about an artistic brouhaha in Venice, California -- an L.A. beachside suburb known as a home for artists and avant-garde thinkers. This is also the home of "Muscle Beach." When I was young, this city was where you would find California's most famous nude beach.
I was astonished to learn that such a community could house a sufficient number nasally-blue morons to endanger the installation of a new public sculpture. The work, by Robert Graham, is a stainless steel female torso.
A publicly-displayed nude sculpture wouldn't bother Europeans, of course -- just look at the fountains in Italy and France. And there are plenty of nudes adorning various temples in India. Hell, the Sun Temple of Konark in Orissa is famous for is sculptures of people (or divinities) fucking. Fortunately, the creators of those lovely, large-breasted goddesses did not have to deal with feminists, or with art critics who make snide references to Hugh Hefner.
But Americans are not so civilized:
Oh, but it gets worse:
Robert Graham is an extremely gifted artist. (From a web page devoted to his work: "Robert Graham is known for his sculptures of women, which convey not only physical strength and beauty but also individuality, intelligence, and grace.") This fine talent creates a female torso -- a traditional subject for art -- and Walker, instead of being gratified, moronically wonders where the arms are.
My god. Does she really think that if an artist chooses not to sculpt the arms or feet, that those limbs have been cut off?
Are some people SO FUCKING STUPID that they believe the traditional bust to be a depiction of a decapitated head?
(Flashback to sixth grade: The jelly-headed moron looking over my shoulder while I'm trying to draw asks -- as I KNOW he will ask -- "Where're the legs?" I answer, as I always do: "I haven't drawn them yet." If I had started with the legs, the same moron would have asked where the torso and head were. I'm tempted to shoot back: "What if I don't draw the legs at all? Do I have to draw a complete figure every damn time? Who made that rule?")
Question for Alice Walker: Your novel "The Color Purple" is set in the 1930s. Why don't you talk about Adolf Hitler in that book? Why doesn't your novel describe the rise of Mao? Why no chapters devoted to the Spanish civil war? Huh? Why'd you cut all that important stuff out? Why the censorship?
The answer is obvious: The artist must be free to narrow his or her focus. Otherwise, the only acceptable sculpture would be a full-scale duplicate of planet Earth.
I once visited the studio of a wood sculptor in Big Sur. A genius. He happens to be gay. His works included a large statue of an erect penis. Would Alice Walker consider this piece a "dismemberment"? I fear she would!
I don't care how many awards that woman has won. She's just another moron.
So there we have it. I like to draw nudes, particularly female nudes. I often paint realistically. I think it would be fun to paint a female torso.
But how can anyone create work of that sort in an age when everyone -- EVERYONE -- highbrow and lowbrow -- defines the nude purely in terms of sexuality? How can we escape the tyranny of the presumption that "If you draw it, you must want to fuck it"?
Here's a little test for you. On this page, you will be able to click on a couple of colored drawings. One of them depicts a large-breasted female being taken anally. Another depicts her bound and giving head. These drawings are by a brilliant Italian draftsman named Paolo Serpieri.
If you look at these pictures and see them only in terms of pornography, please go away and never visit my site again. I do not wish to speak to you.
On the other hand: If you recognize that Serpieri (and never mind his subject matter) has a talent akin to Leonardo's...if you can appreciate the work of a rare individual who knows how to draw the way Placido Domingo knows how to sing -- then you are my brother, you are my sister, you are my friend, you are welcome.
Art. I'm an artist. Perhaps I did not mention that fact in previous posts. Now you know.
(Warning: Although I usually avoid profanity, I may slip a bit here. Just a bit.)
Any young person learning to draw encounters a huge problem: People love to watch artists at work. Unfortunately, most of those onlookers are annoying idiots -- especially if a young would-be craftsman is trying to teach himself the basics of human anatomy.
The moronic kids at school who watched me sketch all held to one basic theory of art: If you draw it, that means you want to fuck it.
If you draw a picture of a woman (even a clothed woman), you are considered guilty of creating a dirty picture. If you draw a man, you are guilty of creating a gay picture.
If you draw it, you must want to fuck it. Every school-aged moron in the world makes that presumption.
I shudder to think of how those morons must have tormented Audubon.
Of course, every young artist ought to spend at least one hour each and every day drawing naked people of both sexes. This practice has nothing to do with heterosexuality or homosexuality. You must draw lots and lots of naked people. Lean people. Muscular people. Also fat, blobby people. Short people. Tall people. Beautiful people. Ugly people. Parts of people. Heads. Feet. Breasts. Hands.
Why? Because that is how you learn.
If you want to be a great pianist, you have to spend many a youthful hour practicing scales. Same principle.
But the young artist -- unlike, say, the young baseball player -- soon learns that he must never allow anyone to watch him practice. The young artist learns that art, like masturbation, is something one has to do in secret. Drawing becomes a covert operation because the world is filled with jelly-headed morons who "know" only one thing about art: If you draw it, you must want to fuck it.
Alas, although those jelly-headed morons in school have all grown up by now, they refuse to progress beyond moron-hood. Some of these adult morons call themselves fundamentalists. Some consider themselves feminists. They're really just morons.
If I recall my art history, the earliest nude sculpture of the Renaissance was Donatello's David, created in the 1430s. Before that time, the morons of the Middle Ages equated nudity with sexuality. Before Donatello, the last time anyone had dared to display nudity in art was when the Roman empire still ruled.
I am sorry to report that we've returned to the bad old days of the Middle Ages.
This is true even in the rarified world of "high art." Paint a naked human male in any context, in any style, and I guarantee you -- I GUARANTEE you -- any art critic who describes the piece will include the word "homoerotic" in the first paragraph.
If you draw or paint a nude female, take care not to do so realistically. And make sure she is unattractive. Otherwise, moron critics will make dismissive references to your "Playboy mentality," and feminists will blather on about the objectification of women and how sad it is that little girls must grow up with unrealistic standards of feminine beauty. And so on. You know the drill.
That sort of moronic critique was not heard in the so-called "Victorian" age. But it is now inescapable.
All such critics are morons, even if they have degrees in Art History. Anyone who insists on viewing a nude figure purely in sexual terms is just a grown-up version of those annoying jelly-headed pseudo-humanoids who made my life in school hellish while I was trying to practice my craft.
Today, I read an infuriating, just INFURIATING article in the Los Angeles Times about an artistic brouhaha in Venice, California -- an L.A. beachside suburb known as a home for artists and avant-garde thinkers. This is also the home of "Muscle Beach." When I was young, this city was where you would find California's most famous nude beach.
I was astonished to learn that such a community could house a sufficient number nasally-blue morons to endanger the installation of a new public sculpture. The work, by Robert Graham, is a stainless steel female torso.
A publicly-displayed nude sculpture wouldn't bother Europeans, of course -- just look at the fountains in Italy and France. And there are plenty of nudes adorning various temples in India. Hell, the Sun Temple of Konark in Orissa is famous for is sculptures of people (or divinities) fucking. Fortunately, the creators of those lovely, large-breasted goddesses did not have to deal with feminists, or with art critics who make snide references to Hugh Hefner.
But Americans are not so civilized:
Regina Weller, Venice Foursquare Church administrator and the pastor's wife, complained that from the office window of the church on Riviera Avenue "we would see her backside. I work with women in recovery, and no matter what, it's a naked torso of a woman."Dig it: The bluenoses are using the argot of "recovery" to justify mindless puritanism.
Oh, but it gets worse:
The objectors are not the first to charge Graham with degrading women. In 1994, Pulitzer Prize-winning author Alice Walker was awarded a Graham-designed statuette of a nude female torso for being a California "state treasure."YARRRGH!
Walker, who had just completed a book and a film about female genital mutilation, was outraged. "Imagine my horror when...I was presented with a decapitated, armless, legless woman on which my name hung from a chain," she told the San Francisco Chronicle.
Robert Graham is an extremely gifted artist. (From a web page devoted to his work: "Robert Graham is known for his sculptures of women, which convey not only physical strength and beauty but also individuality, intelligence, and grace.") This fine talent creates a female torso -- a traditional subject for art -- and Walker, instead of being gratified, moronically wonders where the arms are.
My god. Does she really think that if an artist chooses not to sculpt the arms or feet, that those limbs have been cut off?
Are some people SO FUCKING STUPID that they believe the traditional bust to be a depiction of a decapitated head?
(Flashback to sixth grade: The jelly-headed moron looking over my shoulder while I'm trying to draw asks -- as I KNOW he will ask -- "Where're the legs?" I answer, as I always do: "I haven't drawn them yet." If I had started with the legs, the same moron would have asked where the torso and head were. I'm tempted to shoot back: "What if I don't draw the legs at all? Do I have to draw a complete figure every damn time? Who made that rule?")
Question for Alice Walker: Your novel "The Color Purple" is set in the 1930s. Why don't you talk about Adolf Hitler in that book? Why doesn't your novel describe the rise of Mao? Why no chapters devoted to the Spanish civil war? Huh? Why'd you cut all that important stuff out? Why the censorship?
The answer is obvious: The artist must be free to narrow his or her focus. Otherwise, the only acceptable sculpture would be a full-scale duplicate of planet Earth.
I once visited the studio of a wood sculptor in Big Sur. A genius. He happens to be gay. His works included a large statue of an erect penis. Would Alice Walker consider this piece a "dismemberment"? I fear she would!
I don't care how many awards that woman has won. She's just another moron.
So there we have it. I like to draw nudes, particularly female nudes. I often paint realistically. I think it would be fun to paint a female torso.
But how can anyone create work of that sort in an age when everyone -- EVERYONE -- highbrow and lowbrow -- defines the nude purely in terms of sexuality? How can we escape the tyranny of the presumption that "If you draw it, you must want to fuck it"?
Here's a little test for you. On this page, you will be able to click on a couple of colored drawings. One of them depicts a large-breasted female being taken anally. Another depicts her bound and giving head. These drawings are by a brilliant Italian draftsman named Paolo Serpieri.
If you look at these pictures and see them only in terms of pornography, please go away and never visit my site again. I do not wish to speak to you.
On the other hand: If you recognize that Serpieri (and never mind his subject matter) has a talent akin to Leonardo's...if you can appreciate the work of a rare individual who knows how to draw the way Placido Domingo knows how to sing -- then you are my brother, you are my sister, you are my friend, you are welcome.
Friday, April 15, 2005
Oil for food scandal
I presume you've heard by now that the oil-for-food scandal, previously a much beloved topic on rightist blogs, has now taken a turn which may prove decidedly embarrassing to the Bush dynasty. Charges have been brought against Houston oilman David Chalmers, who has not yet been tied directly to Our Favorite Family. Not yet.
More interesting are the parallel charges brought against South Korean businessman Tongsun Park, indicted for acting as an unregistered agent. (The same charge was brought against Susan Lindauer -- remember her? -- although in Park's case, I imagine the accusation has more weight.) Park can be linked, not tenuously, to the Bushes and the conservative establishment.
Specifically: Park was the key figure in the Koreagate scandal of the mid-to-late 1970s. This affair revolved around a series of bribes and other "favors" by which South Korea's CIA hoped to influence the United States Congress. (In those days, there was some talk that Jimmy Carter might reduce the number of American troops stationed in Korea.)
The favors included providing politicians with sexual partners at the swank Georgetown Club. A number of sources have reported that Park acquired willing female "labor" from his chum, the Reverend Sun Myung Moon.
Moon, as we all know, is the crazed religious cultist who proclaims his allegiance to America in public, yet derides this country as "Satanic" in private. He also pretends to be a Christian, even though inner disciples learn that he actually views Jesus as "pathetic."
Moon and Park were close business partners for years. In more recent times, Moon has become an unofficial member of the Bush family. No-one quite knows just how many millions Moon has funneled to Bush the elder -- just as no-one quite knows where Moon gets his money (although nearly everyone suspects the involvement of organized crime).
Not only that. We have good reason to believe that Bush, Moon and Park were working together during the Koreagate scandal.
As mentioned, the scandal was, to a large degree, a sex scandal. The Korean CIA was heavily involved. But the KCIA was a creature of the American CIA -- indeed, one could never be sure just where one agency began and the other ended.
Therefore, it is not over-the-top to suggest that Park's real job went rather beyond the acquiring of votes favorable to South Korean causes. He was digging up dirt. He was finding out which pols could be blackmailed. That info went directly to the KCIA -- and from there, we can be sure that it went on the our own CIA. Which means that the CIA may well have been the primary instigator of this whole sordid business.
And who was the head of the CIA in those days? George H. W. Bush.
Watch this story. It could turn out to be huge.
Moon, incidentally, is still playing a behind-the-scenes role in international relations. Check out this story: There are indications that the mad "Messiah" has been acting as a middleman between Bush the younger and North Korean dictator Kim Jong-Il.
Although Moon has a habit of denouncing anyone he does not like as a "communist," he has, in recent years, had rather cozy business dealings with the North Korean potentate. I suppose their shared predilections for meglomania and psychopathology makes them feel a fraternal bond.
More interesting are the parallel charges brought against South Korean businessman Tongsun Park, indicted for acting as an unregistered agent. (The same charge was brought against Susan Lindauer -- remember her? -- although in Park's case, I imagine the accusation has more weight.) Park can be linked, not tenuously, to the Bushes and the conservative establishment.
Specifically: Park was the key figure in the Koreagate scandal of the mid-to-late 1970s. This affair revolved around a series of bribes and other "favors" by which South Korea's CIA hoped to influence the United States Congress. (In those days, there was some talk that Jimmy Carter might reduce the number of American troops stationed in Korea.)
The favors included providing politicians with sexual partners at the swank Georgetown Club. A number of sources have reported that Park acquired willing female "labor" from his chum, the Reverend Sun Myung Moon.
Moon, as we all know, is the crazed religious cultist who proclaims his allegiance to America in public, yet derides this country as "Satanic" in private. He also pretends to be a Christian, even though inner disciples learn that he actually views Jesus as "pathetic."
Moon and Park were close business partners for years. In more recent times, Moon has become an unofficial member of the Bush family. No-one quite knows just how many millions Moon has funneled to Bush the elder -- just as no-one quite knows where Moon gets his money (although nearly everyone suspects the involvement of organized crime).
Not only that. We have good reason to believe that Bush, Moon and Park were working together during the Koreagate scandal.
As mentioned, the scandal was, to a large degree, a sex scandal. The Korean CIA was heavily involved. But the KCIA was a creature of the American CIA -- indeed, one could never be sure just where one agency began and the other ended.
Therefore, it is not over-the-top to suggest that Park's real job went rather beyond the acquiring of votes favorable to South Korean causes. He was digging up dirt. He was finding out which pols could be blackmailed. That info went directly to the KCIA -- and from there, we can be sure that it went on the our own CIA. Which means that the CIA may well have been the primary instigator of this whole sordid business.
And who was the head of the CIA in those days? George H. W. Bush.
Watch this story. It could turn out to be huge.
Moon, incidentally, is still playing a behind-the-scenes role in international relations. Check out this story: There are indications that the mad "Messiah" has been acting as a middleman between Bush the younger and North Korean dictator Kim Jong-Il.
Although Moon has a habit of denouncing anyone he does not like as a "communist," he has, in recent years, had rather cozy business dealings with the North Korean potentate. I suppose their shared predilections for meglomania and psychopathology makes them feel a fraternal bond.
Thursday, April 14, 2005
Vote fraud: The word is getting out
For some reason, this has been a terrific day for stories on the vote fraud scandal. I hope you have all seen Robert Koehler's outstanding piece arising out of the Nashville conference.
Raw Story also has a breakthrough expose of the Baker/Carter inquiry, including even more devastating news about everyone's unfavorite "non-partisan" pressure group, the American Center for Voting Rights. We learn that the Baker/Carter Commission will have input from such luminaries as the Wall Street Journal's John Fund:
Was the G.O.P. decredibilized? Did they suffer at the polls?
Nope.
Now we are dealing with something real -- a genuine, provable, honest-to-god conspiracy. As we spread the news, we had best be every bit as forthright and unapologetic as the conservatives were in the 1990s, when they had nothing but horseshit to peddle. Fortune favors the bold, as they say.
One of the boldest writers on this topic is Chris Floyd. Here's his "The Big Fix," from a few days ago. This is the kind of in-your-face writing style we should emulate:
Raw Story also has a breakthrough expose of the Baker/Carter inquiry, including even more devastating news about everyone's unfavorite "non-partisan" pressure group, the American Center for Voting Rights. We learn that the Baker/Carter Commission will have input from such luminaries as the Wall Street Journal's John Fund:
John Fund is a highly partisan Wall Street Journal editorial board member who has repeatedly attacked election reform activists as conspiracy theorists, stating "When it comes to electronic voting, most liberals are just plain old-fashioned nuts."Sure, the Republicans are calling us "conspiracy theorists." So what? Throughout the Clinton years, Republicans (not least among them members of the Wall Street Journal's editorial board) did nothing but shout conspiracy theories -- wild theories, unverified theories, stupid theories, inane theories, utterly mendacious theories -- and they did so ad nauseum, hoping that sheer repetition would compensate for their lack of facts.
Was the G.O.P. decredibilized? Did they suffer at the polls?
Nope.
Now we are dealing with something real -- a genuine, provable, honest-to-god conspiracy. As we spread the news, we had best be every bit as forthright and unapologetic as the conservatives were in the 1990s, when they had nothing but horseshit to peddle. Fortune favors the bold, as they say.
One of the boldest writers on this topic is Chris Floyd. Here's his "The Big Fix," from a few days ago. This is the kind of in-your-face writing style we should emulate:
Let's face the facts. The game is over and we -- the "reality-based community," the believers in genuine democracy and law, the heirs of Jefferson and Madison, Emerson and Thoreau, the toilers and dreamers, all those who seek to rise above the beast within and shape the brutal chaos of existence into something higher, richer and imbued with meaning -- have lost. The better world we thought had been won out of the blood and horror of history -- a realm of enlightenment that often found its best embodiment in the ideals and aspirations of the American Republic -- is gone. It's been swallowed by darkness, by ravening greed, by bestial spirits and by willful primitives who now possess overwhelming instruments of power and dominion.
A gang of such spirits seized control of the U.S. government by illicit means in 2000 and maintained that control through rampant electoral corruption in 2004. The re-election of President George W. Bush last November was a deliberately shambolic process that saw massive lockouts of opposition voters; unverifiable returns compiled by easily hackable machines operated by avowed corporate partisans of the ruling party; and vast discrepancies between exit polls and final results - gaps much larger than those that led elections in Ukraine and Georgia to be condemned as manipulated frauds. Indeed, a panel of statisticians said last week that the odds of such a discrepancy occurring naturally were 959,000 to 1, the Akron Beacon-Journal reported.
The copious documentation of the Bush fraud keeps growing. Last month, experts using actual machines and returns from the 2004 election showed Congress how a lone hacker could skew a precinct's results by 100,000 votes without leaving a trace. More than 40 million votes in 30 states were cast on such computer systems, BlackBoxVoting noted.
Late last year, Congress heard sworn testimony from Florida programmer Clint Curtis, who created vote-rigging software in 2000 at the request of Tom Feeny, a Bush Family factotum. Feeny wanted Curtis (a fellow Republican) and his employer, Yang Enterprises, to produce untraceable programs that could "control the vote" as needed, investigator Brad Friedman reported. Feeny also told Curtis of Bush plans to "suppress the black vote" with "exclusion lists." This is exactly what happened. BBC investigator Greg Palast has shown that tens of thousands of legitimate African-American voters were deliberately "purged" from the rolls by a private Republican-controlled corporation hired by Florida Governor Jeb Bush. Afterwards, Feeny -- who had been Jeb's running mate in his first gubernatorial campaign -- was rewarded for his dutiful service with a plum congressional seat.
In 2002, Raymond Lemme, a Florida state government inspector, took up Curtis' charges, which included other corruption allegations involving Feeny, Yang Enterprises and a Yang employee charged with peddling military technology to the Chinese. In June 2003, Lemme told Curtis he had "tracked the corruption all the way to the top" and that "the story would break in a few weeks." On July 1, 2003, Lemme was found dead in a Georgia hotel room, just across the Florida border.
Local police ruled that Lemme, a happily married man eagerly planning his daughter's wedding, had suddenly decided to slash his wrists. At first they said there were no photos of the death scene; but then the pictures turned up on the Internet and were confirmed as authentic by the embarrassed police. The photos clearly contradicted the original suicide report on several points -- presenting evidence, for example, that Lemme had been beaten before his death. The investigation was reopened after Curtis' Congressional testimony -- and then abruptly shut down after local police spoke to a never-identified "someone" in the Florida state government.
Needless to say, nothing has been done to clarify the murk surrounding Lemme's convenient death. Nor has there been any action toward rectifying the highly profitable degradation of the American electoral process -- beyond the appointment of yet another "blue-ribbon panel" of Establishment worthies to oversee "election reform." The seriousness of this endeavor can be seen in the man appointed to co-chair the effort: James Baker, the notorious Bush family fixer (and Saudi bagman) who spearheaded the sabotage of the 2000 vote in Florida. Baker's presence on the panel ensures that nothing will be done to lessen the ruling clique's chokehold on power.
So let's have no illusions about where we are. Gangsters are in charge, and nothing and no one will be allowed to challenge their dominion. They are waging aggressive war to cement their position and that of their allies: the energy barons, the arms merchants, the construction and services cartels, the investment bankers. These power blocs now command monstrous resources and unfathomable profits; they can buy out, buy off or bury any force that opposes them. Meanwhile, they use the loot of the stolen Republic -- its blood and treasure -- as fuel for their ever-expanding war machine: Bush now has a "secret watch-list" of 25 more countries ripe for military intervention, the Financial Times reported.
With more war crimes afoot, last month Bush issued an official "National Defense Strategy" that openly declares "judicial processes" as one of the enemies confronting the United States, actually equating them with terrorism, The Associated Press reported. Law is "a strategy of the weak," says the Bush Doctrine, in a chilling echo of Hitlerian machtpolitik: Might makes right. The judicial process must not be allowed to "constrain or shape" American behavior in any way, the gangsters declared.
Think of it: Law is now the enemy. Democracy, as we've seen above, is the enemy. This, the demented code of criminals and tyrants, has become the ruling doctrine of the United States -- replacing the Constitution, replacing the noble struggle for liberty and enlightenment with the howl of the beast, with a freak show of avarice and death.
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