Important news on Mohammed Atta and 9/11

Daniel Hopsicker has uncovered fascinating new details about Mohammed Atta and his pre-9/11 travels and associations. I can recommend without reservation his most recent interview on the For the Record program -- which, sadly, seems to be the only radio venue paying attention to his work.

For the latest interview, go here, then download F-516a and F-516b. (I wish that web site was organized in a more user-friendly fashion, but let's be grateful for what we have.) I can happily report that Hopsicker and his host have, on this occasion, presented the story in a focused, organized and professional manner.

You should also read Hopsicker's latest article on this subject, which you can find here.

So what is he saying that's so damned important?

Much. Here are a few examples:

1. Amanda Keller, the "B-girl" named by a number of local news agencies as Mohammed Atta's one-time live-in girlfriend, was extensively interviewed by Hopsicker. He spent months tracking her down and convincing her to tell her story. In the early news accounts, she was portrayed as "too afraid" to speak openly, perhaps because she reports details which conflict sharply with the official Atta bio.

Now, a Frenchman using a known Atta alias has come forward, claiming that Amanda Keller is mistaken -- that he, not Mohammed Atta, was her boyfriend in 2001! This gentleman does not resemble Atta (he does not even look Egyptian) and is of a very different height.

Obviously, I find it very hard to believe that a woman can be so mistaken about her bedmate -- especially so notorious a bedmate.

Furthermore, this "false Atta" claims -- predictably -- that Amanda is now telling her tale for the sake of publicity. Odd, then, that she proved so difficult to track down. Odd, too, that she was so reticent to speak to legitimate Florida newspapers. Odd that she finally opened up to the relatively down-at-heels Hopsicker -- who, frankly, would not be the first choice of anyone interested in either fame or money.

Obviously, the "second Atta" is a disinformationist. No such attempt would be mounted if the tale of Amanda Keller were not of key importance.

2. Lexis/Nexis is purging its files of important stories about Atta, published by mainstream news journals in those relatively-open first few weeks following the tragedy.

3. Former Iranian SAVAK agent Sam Koutchesfahani, more recently a rather mysterious landlord in San Diego, may also possess ties to the 9/11 catastrophe.

Koutchesfahani was indicted for helping to bring illegal Middle Eastern "students" into this country in the 1990s. A witness has connected him to the same bogus university linked to Abdussattar Shaikh, the mendacious FBI informant who provided aid and shelter to two of the hijackers.

Hopsicker connects these two men (Shaikh and Koutchesfahani) to a long-running, little-known scandal involving a network of fake colleges -- storefront schools based in California and Utah (and perhaps elsewhere). This network first came to light some 15 years ago.

Pete Wilson, then the governor of California, mounted a committee to investigate these fake institutions of higher learning. Wilson named as chairman of this committee a man named Dr. Richard Crews -- an odd choice, for Crews also was the titular head of two of these fake schools.

Crews is a doctor connected with the Special Forces in Fort Bragg, North Carolina. Why (one wonders) would he run phony universities in California?

And why would Wilson invite him to investigate the problem when he seems to have been the problem?

These same bogus schools appear in the resume of Abdussattar Shaikh, the FBI informant who helped two 9/11 plotters find shelter in California. (Shaikh has falsely claimed to be a professor.)

As a moment's thought will tell you, terrorists within our borders had -- and have -- a pressing need for both housing and "student" cover documentation. These requirements may explain why Shaikh would have links to such schools.

But we still have many further questions:

Why isn't Shaikh explaining this tangled situation to interrogators at Gitmo?

Why are "his" schools the same ones formerly run by Richard Crews, a gentleman connected to the American Special Forces?

Why (if Hopsicker's informants are correct) did Sam Koutchesfahani run foreign students into our country? And why is Koutchesfahani connected to at least one of these very same fake schools?

Koutchesfahani is of particular note since his name first appeared in the press in connection with the "Heaven's Gate" suicides. He was the landlord who owned the mansion in which the cultists died. Although I doubt whether he had any further interaction with that bizarre cult, I am open to speculation that he originally purchased the mansion to house overseas "students."

Kotchesfahani later purchase of a motel may have served a similar purpose.

As Hopsicker wrote in a previous story:

"For more than six years in the 1990s, people from the Middle East came to San Diego County on bogus student visas," reported a September 21, 2001 San Diego Union-Tribune story headlined "Terrorists may have exploited student visas."

"Through an underground network led by a Rancho Santa Fe man, nearly 100 Middle Easterners paid local community college teachers and administrators for counterfeit admission papers and grades, which allowed them to get student visas."

(The final figure was "more than 200," according to Sam's plea bargain.)

"At the center of the scam was a Rancho Santa Fe man, Sam Koutchesfahani, whose family roots and wealth were deep in Iran. He pleaded guilty to tax evasion and fraud and was sentenced to a year in prison."

Here's the topper:

Hopsicker uncovered an eyewitness who could put Sam Koutchesfahani and Abdussattar Shaikh together in the same place at the same time. (Shaikh, many believe, remains a key witness in the events leading up to the attack.)

This same witness, Hopsicker now reports, has now received the proverbial middle-of-the-night death threat.

There is more. I strongly urge you to listen to the interview and read the articles.

The events of September 11, 2001, have occasioned many unconvincing theories, and have filled many a plate with a side order of scarlet red herring. Readers interested in the "unconventional wisdom" on 9/11 will, I hope, pay less attention to wild claims of "controlled demolition," jet-shaped missiles, and similarly far-fetched ideas. The "ground level" investigative leads which I have briefly outlined here seem much more promising.

Here's a very telling fact: Well-funded right-wing conspiracy theorists have embraced the "controlled demolition" nonsense. Yet these rightists have studiously ignored the more important tale of Mohammed Atta and the subterranean linkages between the terorrists and various personages within our own national security establishment.

That is where we should focus our attention.

Alternate take on Plame

A Kos diarist has an interesting alternate take on the Plame case. The conventional view holds that Plame's name was leaked to retaliate against Joseph Wilson, who had helped to expose the yellowcake fraud.

The less-conventional view holds that the Valerie Plame case is about Valerie Plame, who was (in her final assignment) a CIA analyst of Saddam's WMD capabilities. The administration wanted her to deliver the Bush Approved Version of the WMD question, but she (the Kos author contends) stubbornly refused.

In other words, Plame was targeted as part of the CIA-neocon "war" that we've discussed in this column many times. The appalling thing about all this is that the administration has managed to convince most of the American people that the CIA is to blame for faulty pre-war intelligence. In fact, Plame was pilloried precisely because she refused to provide phony intelligence.

Of course, there is no over-riding conflict behind the "get Joe" and the "get Valerie" theories of the Plame outrage. Rove no doubt hoped to kill two birds with one stone.

So where's your "political capital" now, Georgie?

Dubya hoped to gain ground after his big speech -- which lasted just 28 minutes instead of the scheduled 40, because the expected applause (from a military audience!) did not materialize. Instead, his approval rating actually dropped, according to Zogby.

Zogby further reports that 42 percent of Americans would support impeachment. Wow! Just when I had lost faith in the American public!

Suddenly, I find myself acknowledging the wisdom of the impeachment movement. Will we actually get proceedings? No. Not while the Republicans control congress and the press. But if we can get the pro-impeachment number to top 50% -- and that's only eight points away! -- we will have accomplished something grand. Bush will be the world's laughingstock.

He already is, in a sense. But soon, they will laugh openly. When he ventures overseas, the crowds won't just give him a "standing boo" of the sort Schwarzenegger received when he spoke at Santa Monica City College. The mob will laugh and laugh and laugh at the very sight of this plutocratic souse trying to form a coherent thought. Heads of state will mock him.

Increased international revulsion toward Bush will eventually have an impact on the foreign investors who fund our debt. And when they start to snub us, we will finally see a political sea-change within this nation. The monied will finally understand the simple fact that Republicans are bad for business.

Echoes of the Plame case

(Note: I hope to finish my piece on the tabloids, the CIA and organized crime soon.)

Pursuant to my research into an odd (very odd) bit of Nixon-era skullduggery, I have been looking into the life and works of an author named Robin Moore, best known for his classic book about the Green Berets.

At age 80, Moore is still writing about military and national security issues. Two years ago, he came out with a book titled The Hunt for Bin Laden: Task Force Dagger On the ground with the Special Forces in Afghanistan. In this work, Moore complains about the CIA's activities in Afghanistan. (Oddly enough, I've heard rumors that Moore himself has had linkages to the American intelligence establishment.) An online review of the book includes a passage worthy of wider attention:

Moore’s treatment of the CIA is nothing short of scathing. He essentially calls them wimps, and harshly criticizes the conduct of "Dave", the CIA officer who worked with Mike Spann, the Agency operative who died in an uprising of Taliban and al Qaeda prisoners. Moore reveals details about the riot and Spann's death that were kept secret at the time. He also reveals that Spann's widow, Shannon, was herself a CIA officer, and that the two had met in 1999 while attending a Clandestine Service Officer’s training course. Whatever Moore's opinion of the Agency, that last revelation, if true, seems unnecessary and irresponsible.

Irresponsible indeed! One cannot read these words without thinking of the name "Valerie Plame."

Plame, of course, was "outed" as a CIA operative by columnist Robert Novak in an exactly similar fashion. The outing of Shannon Spann may be even more troubling since she appears to have functioned as a covert agent overseas.

Which brings us to the obvious question: Why do some writers find themselves able to swim freely through waters that most of us would find scalding hot?

Robin Moore, with his lifelong ties to this nation's special forces, will not see the inside of a jail or a courtroom -- and not just because the Justice Department does not wish to bring charges against an octogenarian with Parkinson's disease. If you or I (at any age) had revealed the identity of a serving undercover CIA officer, we might well have to explain our actions to a prosecutor.

Robert Novak, who has lived by way of the leak since the Watergate era, also seems to possess a "Get out of jail free" card. Yet he faces no charges in the Plame affair.

Nevertheless, the Supreme Court recently ruled that the hapless Judith Miller of the New York Times and Matt Cooper of Time magazine face jail for refusing to disclose their sources on the Plame story. Neither Miller nor Cooper revealed Plame's identity in the first place; Novak did. Miller did not even write about the issue. She simply spoke to a source -- who may or may not have been credible -- while attempting to do research.

The obvious questions:

1. What did Robert Novak and Robin Moore do to merit immunity?

2. Few now deny that a "war" has existed between CIA and the neocon movement. Were the revelations by Moore and Novak intended as skirmishes in that war?

Nothing new under the sun

I've been advised, or reminded, that Randy "Duke" Cunningham's property trick -- receiving a pay-off from a contractor by way of selling a house at a wildly inflated price -- is not new. Art Agnos, at one time the mayor of San Francisco, was accused of it. Various mafiosi have relied on similar gimmicks. One could even argue that the "land flips" prevalent during the grand era of Savings and Loan chicanery amounted to a variation on this theme.

Criminality is like sex. There are only so many ways to pilfer, just as there are only so many apertures to boff. The trick is to make the act seem new.

Nailing it

A philosopher named Peter Ludlow has put together 95 Theses on the Religious Right. As Martin Luther indicted the institutional corruption of the medieval Catholic church, Ludlow offers a list of unanswerable charges against Southern Baptist fundies who learned their false faith by way of the cathode ray tube.

If you have any arrogant fundamentalist relatives who keep attempting to launder you in the blood of the lamb, send 'em a copy of Ludlow's list. Maybe they'll see that they could use a good cleaning themselves.

He's a snake

Google has a new "video search" function. Unfortunately, it's still a bit buggy. One reader typed in the words "Sun Myung Moon" and came up with some rather bizarre results. Note in particular the way the captions match up to the images.

John Conyers is on another crusade

American hero John Conyers, the congressman who did so much to uncover the 2004 vote fraud, now has a plan to draw attention to the Downing Street memos. As you know, these documents prove the fraudulence of the Bush administration's push for war. Unfortunately, not enough people are aware that these documents even exist.

That's why Conyers intends to hold "town hall meetings" on this issue across the country. For updates on when and where, keep checking Conyers' blog. Another "must-click" site is AfterDowningStreet, which should keep readers up to date.

As Brad Friedman notes:

We are told that "at least" 10 U.S. Congressional Members will be holding these Town Hall Meetings, and that -- unlike Bush and Cheney's phony Town Hall Meetings -- the forums will actually be open to the public for discussion. No loyalty pledges to be required before attending.

All of which leaves me wondering: Just when will the daily radio attacks on Conyers begin? I'm stunned that the Rovians have not yet found a way to turn him into the Demon of the Year.

Senator blames pedophilia on "liberalism"

Senator Richard Santorum blames the pedophilia scandals besetting Catholic priests on "liberalism." This, despite the fact that the priests most likely to be caught up in this scandal are not associated with "liberation theology" or any other manifestation of the church's embattled left wing.

How, I wonder, does Santorum account for the avalanche of sex scandals -- rape, pedophilia, and more -- involving Republicans? The afore-linked site will direct the non-squeamish reader toward an astonishing array of news stories documenting the weird things prominent conservatives like to do with their genitals.

Meanwhile -- as I've noted before -- if you type the words "Democratic pedophiles" into Google, the results resemble that famous kids' picture of a cow eating grass.

If Santorum thinks that liberalism causes weird sexual practices, he can bite my ass.

(Strike that last thought. The senator might take me literally.)

Let's get Randy

Think you already know most of the major ways to pay off a politician? A California congressman may have come up with a new trick.

In 2003, Randy "Duke" Cunningham of San Diego sold his house to a defense contractor and contributor named Mitchell Wade -- who paid $1.7 million. At the same time, Wade's business increased its fat federal contracts.

Wade later re-sold the house, taking a $750,000 loss, even though property values had risen considerably. The obvious suggestion: "Duke" sold the property an an inflated price to disguise a pay-off.

Until now, I've always felt that the cleverest way to disguise a pay-off was the book gimmick, wherein the payEE forks over big dough to buy multiple copies of an unreadable tome ghost-written for some pol. Duke seems to have come up with something genuinely new. Congratulations!

Bush and CBS do the Time Warp

(The second part of my "perception management" piece may have to appear tomorrow. Lots of interesting stuff happening today...)

Bush is giving a major address at 8:00 tonight, in front of a group of military personnel assembled at Fort Bragg, North Carolina. Yet, in an astonishing divergence from the known laws of time and space, CBS News has already published an "after the fact" report on Bush's speech. CBS has even provided the Democratic response. Apparently, this "wrap up" piece made its appearance a couple of hours ago.

Baffled by this anomaly, I attempted to contact Professor Stephen Hawking for an explanation. Alas, he was unavailable.

Perception management

Although this is not a story about 9/11, let's begin there.

Specifically, let's begin with Amanda Keller, a name most people will not recognize. The question is: Why don't they recognize it?

She was the girlfriend of Mohammed Atta, mentioned as such in a number of brief news accounts in the weeks following the tragedy. Florida investigative writer Daniel Hopsicker tracked her down, interviewed her, and uncovered details -- some of them downright lurid -- that defy the Authorized Version of Atta's life. You can read those details in Hopsicker's book Welcome to Terrorland.

Keller lives not far from Florida's "tabloid valley," home to the National Enquirer, the Star and similar tabloids, all of which are now owned by the same company, American Media, Inc. One would think that these "news" organs would leap at the chance to speak to Amanda Keller, a woman who could deliver sexy, shocking information about a man correctly detested by all Americans. One would think that such revelations would appeal to the lower-class red-staters who purchase the Enquirer at the supermarket checkout counter.

One would think.

But for some reason, the tabloids steer clear of this story.

Just as they usually steer clear of reports (published in Capitol Hill Blue and elsewhere) that George W. Bush has either gone off the wagon, lost his marbles, or both.

Just as they have steered clear of the Bush "bulge" story, which this blog covered at some length. Everyone understands that if Dubya were a Democrat, the tale of the bulge -- as well as the Bush-as-dry-dunk stories -- would provide the tabs with an endless number of yowling headlines. The New York Times may pretend to be too dignified, august and lofty to mention the bulge -- but the Enquirer can scarcely make similar claims to propriety.

Obviously, someone has a hand on the spigot. Who?

A history of gutter journalism. Intrigued by that question, I have begun to research the tabloid industry. The best place to start is a fascinating book titled "I Watched a Wild Hog Eat My Baby!" -- A Colorful History of Tabloids and Their Cultural Impact by Bill Sloan. (JFK buffs may recognize the author's name, since Sloan covered the assassination for the Dallas Times Herald.)

Although the Enquirer and other tabloids wrap themselves in the flag and the cross, that periodical originated in the cesspools of organized crime. Sloan tells the remarkable story of the modern genre's founder, Generoso Pope, Jr. -- the son of a mob-connected businessman who published Il Progresso Italiano-Americano, New York's leading Italian-language paper. The older Pope was Mussolini's primary American supporter. The younger Pope developed strong links to both the mafia and the CIA.

Which means that anyone who can read about the Pope family and their works without forming a conspiracy theory must possess formidable willpower.

After being graduated from MIT at the age of 19, the brilliant young Generoso Pope joined the CIA circa 1950, operating (by his own later admission) as a specialist in psychological warfare. This period marked the beginning of the CIA's efforts to alter the perception and behavior of groups and individuals -- Projects Artichoke, Bluebird, MKULTRA and so forth.

This was also the period when the CIA funded much American sociological research, as documented in Christopher Simpson's invaluable study, Science of Coercion: Communication Research and Psychological Warfare 1945-1960. The Company's goal was to develop ways to alter the political and social beliefs of large populations.

Nobody knows just how long Pope worked for CIA, or why he left -- or if he left. But a few years later, in a scene that might have been co-directed by Orson Welles and Francis Ford Coppola, Pope decided that it would be fun to run a newspaper. So he hit up his godfather for some start-up capital (estimated at $250,000 -- quite a tidy sum in those days), and purchased a nearly-defunct rag called the New York Enquirer, which had begun life as a pro-Nazi tentacle of the Hearst empire.

Pope's godfather happened to be Frank Costello, the "boss of bosses" in New York, New Jersey, and other points northeast. Costello, a life-long friend of the Pope family, either provided the funds interest-free or as an outright gift. (Accounts differ.)

No-one really knows why Costello was so generous to Generoso. No one, in those days, would have predicted that the Enquirer would prosper.

But prosper it did, once Pope hit upon the gimmick of selling gore-filled crime-scene photos he acquired from his contacts. Although newstands and mom-n-pop shops balked at carrying such a periodical, Costello's "associates" made sure that the Enquirer received prominent display.

(I'm old enough -- barely -- to recall the "gore" era of tabloids. When I was a kid, the headline "Boy trapped in refrigerator eats own foot" gave me nightmares for a week. Sadly, Sloan doesn't mention that classic, although you can see scattered references to it throughout the internet.)

Sloan does not mention the fact that Costello himself had profound connections to the CIA. A brief summary of the origins of this relationship can be found here:

The Office of Strategic Services (OSS) and the Office of Naval Intelligence (ONI), the CIA's parent and sister organizations, cultivate relations with the leaders of the Italian Mafia, recruiting heavily from the New York and Chicago underworlds, whose members, including Charles 'Lucky' Luciano, Meyer Lansky, Joe Adonis, and Frank Costello, help the agencies keep in touch with Sicilian Mafia leaders exiled by Italian dictator Benito Mussolini. Domestically, the aim is to prevent sabotage on East Coast ports, while in Italy the goal is to gain intelligence on Sicily prior to the allied invasions and to suppress the burgeoning Italian Communist Party.

The CIA also formed alliances with Asian gangsters involved with the heroin trade. Costello became one of the primary distributors of this product in the United States.

Although some argue that the CIA did not renew its mafia linkages until the assaults of Cuba, evidence indicates that Costello maintained an ongoing relationship with the CIA throughout the 1950s.

For example: Anthony Summers' respected biography of J. Edgar Hoover, Official and Confidential, discusses the "blackmail photograph" of Hoover and Clyde Tolson engaged in gay sex. Costello and Meyer Lansky had acquired copies of this photo -- which explains why the FBI tended to go easy on the mob. (Hoover denied that the mafia even existed.) But the photograph was taken by the CIA, using a special "spy" camera with an ultra-wide angle lens, which could take photographs through a small hole in the wall. The the CIA's James Jesus Angleton appears to have possessed a first-generation print.

Obviously, Costello acquired the image from the Agency.

(More on the tabloids and "perception management" tomorrow.)

Why you aren't going to the movies tonight

In recent days, the Los Angeles Times has devoted much ink to the question of why movie attendance has plunged. Pundits have knocked Hollywood's product while ignoring the obvious answer.

Let's first make one point clear: Don't blame the films themselves.

Yes, I realize that the previous sentence constitutes heresy. Everyone loves to play film critic, and everyone loves to recite those magic words: "Movies are much worse than they were ten years ago." People have been making that complaint for as long as I can remember, and my memory stretches back further than I prefer to admit.

Many now consider the 1970-75 era Hollywood's silver age -- a time when the studios gave creative freedom to a bright new generation of directors and screenwriters. Believe me: Throughout those years, film-goers and critics incessantly caterwauled that Hollywood had become a dreck factory. Each year was decried as the worst year ever for movies.

A little research reveals that every year since the beginning of the sound era has been the "worst year ever." If you listen to these complaints long enough, you'll come away with the impression that the last good film was made in 1916.

Is 2005 a bad year for movies? Can't really say. The only time I've set foot in a theater this year was to catch the new Star Wars film -- which I enjoyed. Which means that -- in my experience, at least -- the industry has finally managed to bowl a perfect game.

As opposed to (say) 1975. Lots of stinkers that year.

Of course, that was the year I saw over 400 films in theaters.

So don't tell me that audiences boycott Hollywood because the audience hates all of these horrible new releases.

If so, then why do the video stores rely on new releases for most of their rentals? Why don't more people rent classic films? Why are audiences in foreign lands still attending our films, even though they affect to despise all things American?

Other pundits tell us to blame rude audiences who insist on turning each movie into an episode of MST3K. Yes, today's moviegoers are indeed pretty ghastly. But (trust me on this) audiences were worse in 1975. Not only was the mob unruly, you couldn't enter a theater in Los Angeles without swimming through a marijuana fog.

Still others try to convince us that people boycott moviegoing because projection is so poor.

I know something about the art of film presentation. The first-run houses in the 1970s would often put on a superb show, which is why savvy moviegoers traveled miles to see film done right. But in the neighborhood theaters -- in those poorly-designed multiplexes where most people saw most movies -- shoddiness reigned. I recall tiny screens, weatherbeaten prints, monophonic sound, haphazard cropping and uneven lighting. The mark of bad projection is an image with a "hot" center and shadowy sides. This phenomenon happened a lot back then; you rarely see it these days.

Few care to admit it, but today the average film experience is -- on a purely technical level -- much better than the average presentation of twenty or thirty years ago.

Is downloading murdering Hollywood? Downloading has hurt, no question about it. But the process requires many hours and some technical know-how (even if you have broadband), and illegal film prints are often unwatchable.

So why aren't you going to the movies tonight?

Because the landlord (or the bank holding your mortgage) has pocketed your disposable income.

The final two Clinton years were 1999 and 2000. 1999 was an astonishing year for film: The Red Violin, Magnolia, The Sixth Sense, Fight Club, and many more. By comparison, 2000 reeked.

In both the good year and the bad, I went to the movies nearly every weekend. I could afford to do so.

At that time, in Los Angeles, you could still rent a one-bedroom apartment for under $500. You could buy a matinee ticket for under five bucks. And for less than twenty bucks, you could pay for dinner for two at the small family-owned Mexican joint down the street. All in all, a nice, affordable night out.

Today, many have to pay over a thousand bucks a month for a studio apartment, while the average person's transportation costs have topped $9,000.

Have the wages for working people gone up appreciably? You already know the answer.

In the Bush era, the only thing tighter than my belt is, it would seem, Bush himself.

Meanwhile, film ticket prices have more than doubled. And that cute little Mexican place? The bill has crept up to 30 bucks or more.

For me, and for an increasing number of us, a "night out" means eating burritos in the park and taking the pooch for a long walk -- window-shopping at places where we used to do real shopping. This, after a week in which we've worked rather more than forty hours.

A hard truth: A middle class is created by robbing the rich -- at gunpoint, if necessary. Poor workers manage to squirm into the middle realms only when the tax laws force the rich to fork over excess funds that they do not invest in productive enterprises.

In Ike's final year, the top tax rate was 88%. Guess what? America did great. We had the highest standard of living the world had ever seen, we produced the world's finest industrial goods, we were the world's biggest creditor nation (instead of the world's biggest debtor nation), we built freeways a-plenty, we lavishly funded the military, we cackled at Asian-made merchandise, we boycotted the products of totalitarian nations, and we had a national debt that now seems laughably miniscule.

The average worker with a "Fred Flintstone"-type job could afford a two- or three-bedroom house.

Now he feels lucky if he can avoid eviction from his one- or two-bedroom apartment.

I have seen the past and it worked.

I have seen the future, too -- a future of master and slave, of sneering opulence and hopeless poverty. I see a growing number of people with full-time jobs at Wal-Mart who have to sleep in their cars. Cars that don't run.

If Charley and Charlene Anybody don't have a few extra bucks in their pockets, if they must hand three-quarters of their income to the landlord, then they aren't going to go to the movies. And they won't be able to buy any of the other items produced by our few remaining industries.

Hollywood, the answer is simple: Your industry will continue to worsen until the government decides to transfer wealth away from the landlords and into the wallets of working people. Your customer base has disappeared because many of them are -- quite literally -- homeless and hungry.

CIA kidnapping

Italian judges don't often order the arrest of CIA officers. Yet that is precisely what has happened in the aftermath of the kidnapping of Osama Moustafa Hassan Nasr, an Egyptian national. Thirteen CIA officers "escorted" him back to Egypt, there to be interrogated in the rather unsubtle fashion characteristic of the Egyptian justice system.

Is the rest of the world finally telling the Bush administration that they will no longer tolerate the "rendition" system of torture-by-proxy?

Note to Jon Stewart (if he should happen to glance this way): Love the show, but the use of the term "Nazi" is perfectly justifiable when describing such practices.

Interview with the head of Voter News Service

As the vote results in each county are tabulated on election night, the results are transferred over to a group called Voter New Service, which is maintained by all the major media organizations (From Fox to the NYT). VNS is run by a fellow named Bill Headline.

By a strange happenstance, a long-time critic of VNS, Victoria Collier, stumbled into the opportunity to interview Mr. Headline. The results are strange and amusing.

"First, do harm"

In violation of all medical ethics, doctors at Gitmo have been helping interrogators develop torture techniques. (Thanks to a reader for passing this one along.)

How to win the war against vote fraud

Truth is, I'm not sure that vote fraud is a foe we can defeat. But I have a couple of suggestions as to how we might prevail in the verbal battles arising from the controversy.

1. Stop drawing needless distinctions. Don't insist on using "voter suppression" in place of the stronger phrase "vote fraud." As Georgia10 reminds us in her wonderful guide "Eye on Ohio," fraud is defined as "the intentional use of deceit, a trick, or some dishonest means to deprive another of his/her/its money, property, or a legal right." That definition encompasses everything that went on in Ohio, Florida and elsewhere.

"Vote fraud!" Don't be afraid to shout the term, because that's what happened.

The allegedly liberal mainstream press claims that the DNC study demonstrates "problems" or "woes" but not fraud. Keep hammering home this message: The intentional creation of long voter lines in African-American communities IS fraud.

2. Standards of evidence. This is another trap that liberals always fall into -- a liberal being defined as someone who finds his own beliefs endlessly questionable. Many ask if we have uncovered proof of fraud -- "proof" being defined as courtroom-quality legal proof, the search for which can lead into an endless, dull, audience-unfriendly discussion of split hairs.

Of course, I would never advise anyone to give up the search for jury-worthy evidence. But let's be honest: In our daily lives, we often rely on other standards of evidence.

When my brother was a kid, he went through a shoplifting phase. Did Mom have eyewitness testimony? Did she personally see him snatch the goods? Nope. But when she noted that he kept bringing home items that he could not possibly afford, she knew what was up.

That's why, in discussions of vote fraud, I have used tactics similar to the following:

"We all have differing standards of evidence. According to my standards of evidence, we need look no further than the question of paper trails. The voting machine companies and their defenders deliberately lied when they said that they haven't developed the technology to provide a paper receipt. The lie proves the fraud. Why fib if the vote were clean?"

Now, does the above paragraph provide courtroom-quality proof? Arguably not. But it does place the skeptic in a very uncomfortable position: He now has to argue a counter-scenario in which lying about paper trail technology does not indicate fraud. Most people will have a very, very hard time making that argument in a convincing fashion.

Then you can add to your skeptic's woes by piling it on:

"According to my standards of evidence, the 2000/2004 question on the exit polls proves that the Kerry voters were not over-represented in the sampling -- and the exits said that Kerry won."

"According to my standards of evidence, the machines were rigged. We have numerous published reports from across the country that the name "Bush" showed up on the touch-screens after the voter tried to choose Kerry, while we have a near-total lack of Kerry-for-Bush reports. You can't call such reports 'anecdotal' when we get them by the ton."

"According to my standards of evidence, the fact that party chairpersons have functioned as secretaries of state proves that we cannot trust the fairness of the elections held in those states."

"According to my standards of evidence, the fact that a voting machine tech told the Ohio recounters to conform their tallies to the original numbers proves that at least one of those firms is engaged in fraud."

And on and on. If you've read this or similar columns, you know how to construct many such arguments.

They add up. A skeptic might insist on differing standards in any one case -- but if he tries to come up with a counter-argument in all such cases, he starts to look foolish.

So keep using that phrase: "According to my standards of evidence..." Every time you use it, you force the other guy to come up with different standards -- intellectually-gerrymandered standards which, however counter-intuitive, allow him to maintain his preferred beliefs.

And that's the idea: Turn your opponent into the legal hair-splitter.

Make him admit that the only proof he would ever find acceptable would be a confession by one of the bad guys.

One one hand, we have the mother who says to her naughty youngster: "You can't afford all this stuff you keep bringing home; I think you're stealing." On the other hand, there's the kid who tries to weasel out of it: "Nobody saw me steal and you don't have photographs, so you can't really prove it." Who would you rather be? Which of the two is in the stronger position? From the standpoint of common sense (if not from a strictly legal standpoint), which person offers the more persuasive argument?

Everybody's talking about it...

...yet I'm not sure what to say about it. "It" being the alleged 16-day abduction, or seduction, of actress Katie Holmes as performed by the inmates of the infamous insane asylum known as Scientology, and as reported by that equally infamous propaganda machine, Fox News.

Did this event actually occur? I have no idea. But I was amused to learn that the commercializers wasted no time: You can already purchase "Free Katie" t-shirts and buttons.

The Fox News article hints that the Hubbardians first attempted to wrap their talons around Scarlet Johanssen. Personally, I never cared for her work; she always struck me as the kind of ninny-noodle who might buy into L. Ron Hubbard's theory that smoking cures lung cancer. Even so, I'm glad to learn that she did not accept the tale of Xenu the Makrabian at face value.

Incidentally, Tom Cruise -- an actor whose work I much admire -- not long ago sniffily told a reporter that Scientology has no connection to the alien mythos. Is it possible that he has yet to learn of Xenu and his evil ways?

A long time ago, I asked someone in the industry (not a powerful or well-known someone -- just a someone) why no-one had done a biopic on L. Ron Hubbard. "No one would dare," I was told; "They're too powerful in this town." In recent years, Scientology has had a declining influence on members of the general public, yet the cult still represents a major fault line within Hollywood. You can rib Scientology in an oblique fashion (as on that old Simpsons episode), but you can't talk about Hubbard's chicanery directly.

And that may explain why Fox has put some weight behind this story. Conservatives love to bash Hollywood, since red-staters believe that the movie industry engages in a massive conspiracy against all that is holy and decent. Scientology is Hollywood's darkest, silliest secret, and thus provides the reactionary press with a convenient cudgel.

Wake up and smell the fraud

Yesterday, I noted, without much enthusiasm, that the DNC report on the 2004 election in Ohio was due. Today, it's here. Should I have been more enthusiastic? Is the report better than expected?

Yes, it is. This report may not be ideal, but it takes some punches that hit the target hard. Ken Blackwell has already referred to the report as a "bald-faced fabrication" -- and any time Korrupt Kenny says something like that, you know that he's hurting.

The investigation includes a good (though flawed) section on the problems of DRE machines, with a special focus on the issues of hackability and paper trails. Alas, the DNC's Voting Rights Institute (responsible for the report) still suffers from a certain degree of wool-in-eye syndrome: While the writers correctly decry internet-accessible ballot machines, they do not discuss the very real possibility of hacking the systems via the power cords -- an under-recognized means of data-transference. Until this problem receives recognition, the committee's recommendations won't provide safe elections.

We also need greater scrutiny of the voting machine vendors. The Voting Rights Institute, correctly dismissive of the companies' claims of "proprietary information," demands that source code be made available to objective third party overseers. (But how can we know that the scrutinized code is the actual code in use?) However, the report does not demand the boycott of vendors guilty of bribing public officials or offering them cozy post-public-sector employment. A little internet research will uncover a long, evil history of corruption.

The DNC should also have demanded that states avoid machine vendors owned by individuals who have contributed to groups espousing an end to democracy. Surely that is not too much to ask for?

Needless to say, I had hoped that the DNC would take the fraud issue taken out of the realm of the theoretical. Our current state of knowledge allows us to state with confidence not that the machines might be hacked, but that the machines were hacked. Of course, this problem takes us into the familiar realm of standards of evidence. By my standards, the unassailable fact that Diebold and its defenders lied about paper trails ("The technology isn't there yet") provides us with all the evidence of fraud that any sensible person needs. If the vote were clean, why fib?

Donna Brazile, chair of the DNC's Voting Rights Institute, recommended the following goals (among others):

...to adopt legislation which limits identification requirements to first time voters at the time they apply for voter registration or the first time they vote, whichever should first occur, and to adopt and enforce procedures to guarantee that identification requirements are not abused as a voter suppression tactic; to encourage the adoption of precinct-tabulated optical scan voting machines; to abstain from using touchscreen voting machines unless or until they are perfected such that they are no longer vulnerable to fraud---and even then, to discontinue the use of touchscreen voting machines that do not have a reliable voter verifiable audit feature; to discontinue the use of punchcard systems; and to require voting equipment vendors to disclose source codes so that they may be examined by third parties and ensure that voting procedures are transparent at every level of the voting process...

Brazile understands that Republican cries of "voter misidentification" are nothing more than another suppression tactic. I'm grateful for that.

All in all, a good job. Perhaps not a superb one -- Brazile and co. didn't wow us they way John Conyers did -- but you can still recommend this report to your skeptical friends who need an education on this issue.

In other news:

Remember Sherole Eaton?She was the whistleblower who worked for the Hocking County, Ohio Board of Elections. Thanks to her, we learned that Triad Corporation got their grimy mitts on Board's computers during the recount, after learning which precincts were to be recounted. She fingered a Triad techie who told the staff to use a "cheat sheet" which would ensure that the recount results matched the el-fake-o original tallies.

Since no good deed goes unpunished in the Bush era, Sherole was fired for telling the truth.

She had brain surgery recently, due to an aneurism. Her health problems remain a threat, and she desperately needs to keep up her insurance payment. Yeah, I know -- lots of folks can't make an insurance payment these days. But lots of people don't have the courage that Sherole Eaton has displayed, and she doesn't deserve further punishment for doing the right thing. If you want to donate, write here: Michael Eaton, 7157 Addington Road, New Albany, Ohio 43054.

For an interview with Sherole Eaton, check this out.

Correction: Yesterday, I gave the wrong name for the California Secretary of State, who is Bruce McPhereson. (I accidentally typed in the name of his press contact officer.) Apologies; I've re-written the old post.

Schwarzenegger's reform package

There have been (and will be) a number of stories outlining the horrible impact of Schwarzenegger's "reform" package, which will be on the ballot later this year. Right now, you can't ask for a better summary than this editorial in the San Diego Union-Tribune -- usually a rather conservative publication.

Even worse, the initiative endangers virtually every county health program, including trauma centers, public health clinics, childhood immunization programs, infection control and indigent care – one reason the California State Association of Counties has circulated a memo warning of a "severe fiscal impact on counties."

Schwarzenegger's record of vetoes, including bills to facilitate the import of affordable prescription drugs from Canada, require private insurers to cover prenatal and maternity care, protect uninsured patients from exorbitant hospital charges and raise the minimum wage, illustrates the reason for apprehension.

All of which is likely to pass, regardless of the actual vote tallies, now that California seems doomed to become yet another Diebold-friendly state.

Other provisions of this ballot measure indicate that Schwarzenegger operates under the presumption of a continued G.O.P. stranglehold on power, despite his own ebbing popularity. (His disapproval rating has come parlously close to 60%.) For example, the measure would transfer redistricting power from the Legislature to a panel of retired judges -- who all happen to be Republican.

Worse, the measure's proponents engage in familiar rhetorical tricks about campaign reform. Political contributions from unions are considered an infringement of workers' rights, while massive contributions from corporate heads are protected.

Similarly, the union dues initiative is hardly about protecting the rights of individuals; the authors are not asking your phone company or utility to get your written consent for their political contributions.

The initiative ignores the much greater spending by large corporations and extremely wealthy individuals – such as San Diego Chargers owner Alex Spanos, a major donor to Schwarzenegger. The top 100 donors to Schwarzenegger averaged $220,000 each. How many individuals can match that to be heard in Sacramento? Real reform of our corrupted electoral process would remove all money, creating a level playing field, such as the public financing, clean-money programs now in place in Arizona and Maine.

Instead, this proposal is intended solely to shut public employees and their unions – the foremost adversaries of Schwarzenegger and his corporate allies – out of the political process.

The state G.O.P. plans to spend ultra-mega-bucks to get this "reform" package passed. The fix is in.

Well, you know my motto: "If it's fixed, break it." For information on how to do just that, start here.

Vote fraud (corrected)

A few brief notes on the vote fraud controversy...

The DNC reports: Tomorrow, the Democratic National Committee's Voting Rights Institute will present DNC Chairman Howard Dean their report on the conduct of the 2004 presidential election in Ohio. You should be able to find a copy of this report at www.democrats.org. I don't expect kick-ass wording, but the report may include some good, hitherto undiscovered information.

California, here it comes: Why does governor Schwarzenegger insist on governance by special election, despite his plummeting popularity? Because elections can be fixed. First, he used trumped-up charges to get rid of Diebold-unfriendly Secretary of State Ken Shelley. Then he replaced Shelley with Bruce McPhereson -- who seems to have made it his task to computerize the California vote as rapidly as possible.

During a June 16 panel meeting in Sacramento, the California Election Protection Network and other election reformers did everything they could to put a stop to this outrage. There is a continuing effort to flood the new Secretary of State's email with letters of protest. Alas, we have every indicator that he will certify Diebold and ES&S machines in time for the upcoming elections.

In 2004, California residents were treated to a small but steady trickle of stories about the "reddening" of the state's electorate. In 2008, the new machines will insure a Republican victory in the presidential race. One may safely predict that pundits will then point to "long-term" trends, rather than to the replacement of Ken Shelley.

What to do right now? Personally, I see little point in writing to the bad guys and asking them not to be bad. Publicity is key. Most people still do not understand what is happening; Once the electorate loses faith in this corrupt election system, they may take the sort of protest actions (mass rallies; refusal to pay taxes) which can return the state -- and the nation -- to democracy.

Blackwell and the "mother machines": I should have mentioned this earlier, but better late than never. According to a Bob Fitrakis radio interview, Ken Blackwell -- Ohio's corrupt Secretary of State -- had direct access to the central tabulators in the 2004 election. (You may also want to hear this.) Letting the Republican party's state chairman have this sort of access is like giving John Dillinger the keys to a bank vault.

Speaking of Fitrakis: It's not enough to recommend his new book Did George W. Bush Steal America's 2004 Election? Essential Documents. Let's do everything we can to get this work into our libraries. And the best way to accomplish that goal is to ask a librarian to stock the volume. Simple, easy and free!

Moon over PBS?

Two stories we have followed may be linked. The scandalous behavior of Ken Tomlinson -- the head of the Corporation for Public Broadcasting who wants to inject more Coulteresque commentary into NPR and PBS -- has a connection with the Reverend Moon's media empire.

Tomlinson paid an Indiana man some $15,000 to monitor the alleged bias of PBS personality Bill Moyer. (Note that Wall Street Week and Firing Line never received that level of scrutiny.) That's a lot of money just to watch television. We may fairly ask if the recipient performed other services.

The recipient was one Fred Mann. This is the fellow who is so far to the right that he identified Chuck Hagel as a "liberal."

Two other Republican lobbyists were also paid $15,000 as part of Tomlinson's effort. Obviously, something decidedly odd is going on here.

So: Who is Fred Mann?

In 1997-98, reporting in Insight On The News -- the biweekly owned by the Rev. Sun Myung Moon's Unification Church -- senior writer David Webster (now an associate professor of law at Pat Robertson's Regent University) used Mann as a source several times.

Readers will recall that the powers behind GOPUSA (Jeff Gannon's old roost) had similar histories in the Moon orbit.

Mann, like Tomlinson, also has a history with Reader's Digest. (National Review -- founded by a CIA man -- considers Tomlinson the "last great editor" of the Digest.) I suppose it would be impolitic to mention the fact that, some fifteen years ago, Covert Action printed a story linking the Digest to the CIA. That spooky relationship was explored at much greater length in John Heidenry's book Theirs Was the Kingdom: Lila and Dewitt Wallace and the story of the Reader's Digest, and in Peter Canning's American Dreamers -- The Wallaces and Reader's Digest: An Insider's Story. From a review of the latter volume:

Among other things, Canning details how, in the 1940s and 50s, the State Department and CIA fed content to the Digest and helped its international editions thrive. He also notes the magazine's numerous pro-Vietnam War editorials, and the way Nixon speeches found their way into the magazine under the byline "The Editors." Further, Canning dishes a good deal of dirt about founders Dewitt and Lila Wallace's odd sex lives, and he digs into the story behind the sex discrimination suit filed against the Digest in 1976, among the largest ever, in which 2,600 female employees were awarded more than $1.5 million.

Mann does not appear to be just another resident of Indiana. He has overt links to the far-right National Journalism Center and less-overt links to the notorious Young Americans for Freedom. (The acronym "YAF" keeps coming up in the strangest damned places -- even when you look deeply into the JFK assassination!)

Mann was one of Dan Quayle's handlers during the latter's senate run in 1980. The wealthy Quayle/Pulliam family, which owns a chain of newspapers, has long been linked to far-right causes, and even to the CIA and FBI.

This "Fred Mann" may be the same as the Mann who participated heavily in the controversy over the TWA 800 downing. Mann's name came up -- I'm not sure in what context -- during a bizarre conclave on the mystery, described here. This meeting attracted many far-right big-wigs, who tried to paint of picture of Bill Clinton as the conspiratorial mastermind behind the terrorist incident. Attendees included reactionary conspiracy peddler Reed Irvine and Admiral Thomas Moorer. As mentioned in our "Deep Throat" posts, Moorer -- during the Nixon administration -- led a ring of military spies determined to get the goods on Henry Kissinger, whom they viewed as a Soviet penetration agent.

Great new story on Moon

The American Prospect has today's must-read story -- an expose of the Reverend Moon's ties to North Korea.

An American Prospect investigation reveals that The Washington Times offices, housed in an imposing building on a northeast Washington strip otherwise known for tire shops and fast-food joints, serve as the base of operations for Moon’s diplomatic missions to his homeland. Moreover, the paper itself has served as an instrument of Moon’s partnership with the communist regime. Throughout the 1990s, as Western observers predicted that the Kim dynasty that rules North Korea would collapse for lack of hard currency reserves, the Moon organization invested tens of millions of dollars, which apparently included payments made before U.S. sanctions eased in 1999.

The Japanese press has accused Moon of involvement in an arms deal that appears to have enhanced North Korean missile-tube research -- a serious charge, considering recent fears about the advancement of North Korea’s missile-range capabilities. Indeed, Moon’s connections with the Kim regime have long been a matter of active concern for the U.S. Defense Intelligence Agency (DIA).

Yet Moon remains a Washington political powerhouse in his own right, a generous friend of the Bush family, and a patron of religious-right and other conservative causes.

Unreal!

Rightists continually accuse Democrats of being pro-commie -- yet the Bush family has been astonishingly kind to China, and Bush family friend Moon remains close to North Korea!

Tom Delay, Jack Abramoff...and Mohammed Atta?

If you've followed the Tom Delay scandal, you must have encountered the name of his good buddy Jack Abramoff -- the notorious lobbyist and right-wing ideologue who inhabits that strange land where spooks and sleazoid businessmen mingle. As Slate summarized a few months ago:

The Justice Department and the Interior Department are looking into Abramoff's use of charitable foundations as businesses and nonprofit political groups as conduits for foreign money. The Senate Finance Committee is also investigating Abramoff's use of tax-exempt entities; the Senate Indian Affairs Committee is questioning his treatment of the tribes.

In short: A lovely guy.

And now Daniel Hopsicker offers a glimpse of just how lovely Abramoff truly is.

One of the most amazing thing about this most amazing scandal -- hundreds of millions in slush funds beats Oval Office blowjobs by a mile -- is that some of the same names in the Abramoff scandal also surface in connection with Mohammeded Atta's.

Less than a week before the 9.11 attack, for example, Atta and several other hijackers made a still-unexplained visit onboard one of Abramoff's casino boats.

Hopsicker goes on to describe Abramoff's history in the unregulated ship-board gambling history. Yes, Atta and company really did take a trip on a boat owned by Abramov's company, SunCruz -- ostensibly to gamble, although Hopsicker thinks the motivation goes deeper.

Hopsicker, alas, doesn't really prove a link between Atta and the "Soprano"-esque milieu of the gambling ships. But the writer does present some fascinating data-nuggets, sure to please connoisseurs of the seamy:

Two SunCruz executives, Jack Abramoff and Ben Waldman, are walking examples of the strange alliance between the family-values party and the gambling industry. Both men have strong ties to Pat Robertson's Christian Coalition, which is adamantly opposed to gambling; Waldman was Robertson top aide in the televangelist's run for the presidency.

Abramoff, who perhaps wisely only took the title of vice president (less heat) has been connected to the Christian right since a student at Brandeis University, where as head of the College Republicans he enlisted Top Christian Ralph Reed as his top deputy. The two have remained close friends ever since.

A man named Adam Kidan became Sun Cruz's new chairman. Kidan's mother had been murdered in a gangland-style hit in New York. Madonna's one-time boyfriend and South Beach restaurateur Chris Paciello, was eventually convicted in the case.

I urge you to check out Hopsicker's latest. Pursuing this avenue of research may well take us into important areas.

Exploitation

Normally, this is the sort of non-political post I save for the weekends, when readership is light. But in the comments section a couple of articles back, one reader coming to my defense made a presumption that demands correction.

The presumption: That, in the course of earning an alleged living via the evil practice of $ales Illu$tration, I've somehow managed to keep free of "exploitation."

Sadly, friends, 'tis not true.

The wolf has been at my door so long he gets his mail there. Despite his constant threat, I have vowed to provide my lady and pooch with a roof and porridge until she (the lady, not the pooch) acquires her PhD. And that means by any means necessary.

After exiting school, I quickly learned that the galleries of California had little interest in my canvasses, which, at that time, presented deliberately garish expressionist views of the meaninglessness of all human endeavor. On the other hand, I learned that one could earn the rent money overnight by airbrushing "chromed" letters for the video epic Hershee Highway -- a film I cannot recommend as I have not seen it.

In the days before Photoshop, airbrushed title design was a great way to earn one's bread and cheese. You really, really do not want to know who some of my clients were.

Recent advertising assignments may seem more prestigious, but I'm still very much an Art Whore. The last "real" movie I worked on was a horror film which bears an agonizingly close resemblance to a classic from days of yore. Wish I could tell you the premise; suffice it to say that my hitch on this project was nothing to crow about. Despite endless conferences ("Maybe you should show only the adult corpses with their eyes gouged out...?"), the client hated everything he saw. Another designer saved the day at the last moment, and a blessing on her name.

A humbling experience -- but the profession is humbling by nature. Recently, I've been invited to explore the deepest dregs of exploitation.

While the full nature of the project must remain a secret, I can say that it involves illustrating the life of Christ.

Does this subject matter offend me? Nope. Actually, the physical subjects of these illustrations -- people in robes, desert landscapes, dramatic sunsets -- should be a great deal of fun to paint.

Does the religious content annoy me? Nope. Much of the art I like best -- the paintings of Leonardo, the symphonies of Bruckner -- is religious.

But.

While most forms of Christianity do not bother me, all forms of fundamentalism scare the hell out of me. And there is a very good chance that these illustrations might see use in the fundie brainwashing system, which forces young minds to believe in Creationism and the Republican party.

Will I do the project anyways? Yep! It's time that bloody wolf inspected someone else's door.

But after completing this assignment, I may drive into Chatsworth to see if any of the porn companies need video cover design.

You know -- just so I can feel clean again.

Downing Street and hopelessness

A reader offered an interesting response to my previous link to Xymphora's take on the Downing Street memos:

sorry...Joe..but the xymphora article is crap...

he/she doesn't even seem to know which house in congress votes for impeachment.

and those kind of "everything is hopeless" articles aren't even worth reading

The mistake about the house of Congress is trivial in this instance. The issue of hopelessness is not.

Lord knows my predictions have proven wrong before, but I certianly agree that the current flap will not lead to impeachment. It ought to, but it won't happen. Right-wing control is imply too profound, and one must recognise the realities of power.

Is that attitude needlessly pessissmistic, or merely realistic? The latter, I should say. I usually try to counsel readers to look for positive actions we can take. And I certainly advise giving impeachment the proverbial old college try.

Feminist? Moi?

After I wrote a piece denouncing Republican attacks on women, a kind reader asked me to participate in a feminist forum on another site. A very gracious offer. But it did take me by surprise.

You see, I came of age at a time (the 1970s and 1980s) when the feminist movement was controlled largely by women at war with the male Id.

Yes, they also paid lip service to such concepts as equal pay for equal work and the equitable sharing of the household chores and such. I never had a problem with basic fairness. But the feminists of that time seemed particularly concerned that I not look with lust on the female body.

That bit was difficult for me.

As I've mentioned before, I'm an artist. Those who tell artists to draw and paint what they like are sometimes surprised when an artist starts to draw and paint women with large breasts. Gay artists are permitted to fill canvas after canvas with images of muscular males -- but that, I have been informed, is a very different matter. Very different.

What can I say? I'm the guy who -- while the art teacher droned on and on about the virtues of Kandinsky and Mondrian -- kept furtively glancing at reproductions of Frank Frazetta's work. Frazetta understood.

Bottom line: On innumerable occasions, I have been on the receiving end of The Usual Lecture on the horrors of objectifying women's bodies.

I was often admonished, in tones befitting Cotton Mather: Avert your eyes. Do not stare. Even when looking at advertisements, do not notice that lady in the bikini.

Please understand that, during a Los Angeles summer, many lithe young ladies glide and bobble about the shopping malls and the Venice Boardwalk wearing little more than a few wispy hints of cloth. Telling a young man (yes, I was once young) not to look at their bodies is a bit like saying: "When you walk through the Louvre, you can look at anything you like, except for the paintings."

I've always considered that last joke rather cute, but feminists never chuckled at it. In fact, whenever I dared to make that "Louvre" comparison in a feminist's presence, she would invariably deliver The Usual Lecture. As though I had never heard it before.

I also noticed that some women were decidedly raw in their verbal appreciation of a male they considered -- well, is the term "hunky" still used? At any rate, feminists quickly assured me that those displays of appreciation were a very different matter. Very different.

Lesbian acquaintances never seemed to have a problem with my drawings and paintings. They expressed their views in terms that were, to be frank, far cruder than were the remarks offered by males. But that, too, was a very different matter. Very different.

At any rate, the time came when I had to tell myself: If feminism means feeling perpetually ashamed of my own id, I am no feminist. Since then, I've slunk my way through the streets of Los Angeles wearing a perpetual Groucho-esque leer. Remember Terry Jones doing the "Dirty Vicar Sketch"? That was me, during most of 20s and 30s.

You may be interested to learn that I now live in a female-dominated household. As my ladyfriend and I will happily concede, our home has but one final authority and ultimate center of attention -- a small fluffy dog named Bella. We bow before the Bitch Princess, and are content.

Downing Street

Xymphora has written the ultimate piece on the Downing Street memos. All other analyses are superfluous.

Putting the BS into PBS

Kenneth Y. Tomlinson, chairman of PBS, has initiated a project designed to ferret out liberal "bias" at PBS. One wonders why he would bother. According to conservative propagandists, PBS now functions as the counterweight to the admitted far-right bias of cable news.

Trouble is, the conservative propagandists are wrong. Both PBS and and National Public Radio have pushed a center-right agenda for years, if not decades. Of course, conservatives have redefined political reality in such a way that any centrist position is now considered godless Bolshevism.

Tomlinson has now been caught in a lie. Contrary to his claims, he was vetting material with a White House aide, Mary C. Andrews, who was then hired (no doubt at a cushy salary) to act as an "ombudsman" at PBS. Translation: She's being paid to define expressible opinion. Any time the writer of a new book cautiously expresses a view at odds with the Administration, lovely Mary will insure that PBS becomes yet another vehicle for Ann Coulter, Michael Savage and their band of bloodthirsty loons.

You want to know how the Kenny and Mary star chamber will define "liberalism"? Dig this:

In a little-noticed speech on the floor of the Senate this week, Senator Byron L. Dorgan, Democrat of North Dakota, said that in response to his request for the reports on the "Now" program, Mr. Tomlinson provided him with the raw data from reports.

Mr. Dorgan said that Senator Chuck Hagel, Republican of Nebraska, was classified in the data as a "liberal" for an appearance on a segment of a show that questioned the Bush Administration's policies in Iraq.

Hagel is, by any rational standard, a conservative. He was also the chairman of vote-count firm ES&S. Of course, only wacky conspiracy theorists would ever believe that he owed his "stunning upset victory" to the fact that his company counted the ballots.

Yet Kenny and Mary classify Hagel as a liberal.

Another segment about financial waste at the Pentagon was classified as "anti-Defense," Mr. Dorgan said.

So let's get this straight: In order to be considered "pro-Defense" one has to embrace financial waste at the Pentagon?

Nobody who now willingly donates to the Corporation for Public Broadcasting will continue to offer pledges if, when, that institution turns into yet another Coulterism Delivery Vehicle. And so it will die. And it will deserve to die.

Manure from Manjoo: A response

In the "comments" section, Salon writer Farhad Manjoo responded to yesterday's call for a Salon boycott, which I issued in the wake of his piece attacking vote fraud investigators. In the interest of fairness, I'll repeat his words in full here. (Italics indicate when he has quoted me.)

1) Actually, Manjoo replaces the "rBr" nomenclature with a new label: "exuberant Democratic responder."

That's a lie. I never say those words. You just made that up. And it's pretty astonishing that you do so in the context of questioning my ethics.

2) Are any Republicans of your acquaintance shrinking violets? Turn on your radio: Do the voices of reaction sound even slightly embarrassed or cautious? Democrats are the ones who have been cowed into silence by the violent brownshirts of the right.

Saying it's horseshit doesn't refute the studies done by pollsters showing this to be the case (studies cited in my article). Can you offer any response to those studies? And can you explain why exit polls -- not only in 2004 -- consistently show a Democratic tilt? You should be able to support your calling it horsehit. You do none of that here. (And if your response is that you can't believe the pollsters' studies because they're corrupt, tell me why you believe their polls.)

3) And why were exit polls accurate in this country until the ascension of the Bush dynasty? Why are they still considered extremely accurate in Europe?

That's wrong. You're making that up. Exit polls showed Clinton winning bigger than he did in 1992 and 1996. The only reason people didn't cry about it was that those races weren't close, and Clinton still won. As Mark Blumenthal points out, you can see proof of this in the movie "War Room." See how they figured based on the exits Clinton would win a landslide. Of course, he did not.

Don't lie to your readers about the history of exit polling, Joseph. 2004 was not the first year the exits were off.

4) If you look carefully at the work of Mitofsky and Liddle, you will see that their theories accept as a given the proposition that the count was accurate. How can we accept an explanatory scenario from someone who stipulates the very point under dispute?

Again, you're wrong. You're either lying or mistaken. Liddle does not accept this as a given, Joseph. You just made that up.

5)According to Manjoo, anyone who dares to raise these common-sense issues deserves to be damned as a wild-eyed lefty. In the past, Salon itself has been on the receiving end of such derision. How dare they lob similar accusations at those who do the progressive work Salon now prefers to ignore?

That's silly, Joseph -- I never suggest that. My article says only this: The evidence showing that the exit polls were off is pretty good. I say nowhere that Republicans are incapable of fraud; that raising the issue of fraud is crazy; or that we shouldn't reform the election system.

In fact the reason to refute the refutable theories of fraud is precisely to push forward reform. Salon has been pushing for election reform since the 2002 election. Search for "salon diebold" in Google. You'll see were were one of the first major outlets to write about that company and the dangers of electronic voting machines. I'm even one of the good guys in Bev Harris's book, for Pete's sake.

But if you want real reform you need to do it in a bipartisan way; you're not going to get any moderates on board by yelling, without evidence, that the last election was stolen. Which is exactly what you're doing in this post (with, as I've shown, not even the facts to back you up).

Where to start?

Let's begin with Bev Harris -- "Saint Bev," as some call her -- cited by Manjoo as though I should be very, very impressed with her. As indeed I once was. Then she announced that she had found discarded poll tapes in Florida which would prove that fraud had been committed. Quoth Bev: "The pattern was very clear. The anomalies favored George W. Bush. Every single time."

In late November, the Sainted One promised a "major announcement" concerning those tapes. We're still waiting for it. Whenever the topic comes up, she retreats into a Trappist silence -- and she even refused to show the tapes to MSNBC's Keith Olbermann.

Since she refuses to drop the other shoe, forgive me for doubting that she ever had a shoe to begin with. Sorry, Farhad, but I'm no longer impressed by that woman -- just confused.

Manjoo tries to convince his readers that "fraud freaks" have concentrated on exit poll controversies to the exclusion of concerns he considers more vital. That accusation hardly applies to me, to Brad Friedman, to the many Democratic Underground posters, to the writers at Raw Story, to the heroic workers who oversaw the Ohio recount, and to any number of people who have devoted time and energy to the discussion of all aspects of vote fraud.

You ask me to fire up Google, Farhad? Fine.

Let's type in "Manjoo" and "Clint Curtis." Let's type in "Manjoo" and "John Conyers" and "Ohio." Or "Manjoo" and "Katrina Sumner." Or "Manjoo" and "Richard Hayes Phillips." Or "Manjoo" and "Snohomish." Or "Manjoo" and "Georgia10." (Whoever she is, she wrote an invaluable piece on the shennanigans in Ohio.) Or "Manjoo" and "Triad." Or "Manjoo" and "Ahmanson." Or "Manjoo" and "recount" and "Ohio." Or "Manjoo" and "Carter" and "Baker." Or "Manjoo" and "machine" and "switched" and "vote." Or...

Well, why go on? This blog and others have discussed many, many aspects of the vote fraud controversy which Manjoo has left unaddressed. True, the combination of "Manjoo" and "African-American" and "disenfranchise" will bring up one relevant piece by Manjoo -- but it was written before the election.

In fact, Manjoo is the one who has concentrated on exit polls. This isn't a case of the pot calling the kettle black. More like the tomato calling the cucumber a red.

His pathetic cries of "liar liar" are similarly disingenuous.

In my reading, Mitfosky and Liddle have provided no evidence that either Democratic responders were enthusiastic or Bush Responders were reluctant. They have merely indicated that such might be the case -- leaving it for the propagandists to shift "might be" to "is," as Manjoo has done. For all the abstruse arguments over statistical methodology, the argument comes down to this: If we posit that Bush responders were under-represented, then the exit poll disparity is explained. Again, this scenario demands that we stipulate as a given the very point we are trying to determine.

Manjoo presents no real proof that Kerry voters were over-represented. But I have often discussed proof (I'll go so far as to say hard proof -- at least, I've seen no persuasive refutation) that, in fact, the exit polls over-represented Bush supporters. Not only did Kerry win, he won by a larger margin than most would consider possible.

Regular readers will forgive me for repeating one simple, damning fact again, but as the old song says -- if the man don't listen, you got to yell a little louder. Now, I'm fearful that Manjoo might lapse into a "Deiter" impersonation ("Your qvestions haff become tiresome; now is ze time on Shprockets ven ve dahnce!), which is what most people do the moment they are asked to respond to this point, which I consider vital. So let's use boldface letters. That way, even Manjoo can't miss the message:

In 2004, the exit pollsters also asked the voters about their choice in 2000. The majority of respondents said that they had pulled the lever for "Bush" in that election. Yet in 2000, AL GORE WON THE POPULAR VOTE.

Got it?

If you like, I can use larger type. Italics. Maybe upload a sound file. Because I've been making this point for months now. So has "Truth is All" on DU (at great length, and in boggling detail). So have others.

Yet Manjoo and his fellow ostriches refuse to address the issue!

He refuses to explain how, in the known political universe, the exit pollsters might encounter so many people resistant to Bush's charms in 2004 who nevertheless brag about (or confess to) voting for Bush in 2000. If Bush voters are by nature reluctant to speak to those eeee-vil pollsters, why doesn't this reluctance color the question about Bush/Gore?

Elizabeth Liddle, I can happily report, did make a stab at responding (in these pages) to the 2000/2004 problem. I respect her for not pulling a "Deiter." But as my readers know, in this instance, Febble was feeble, offering hazy guesswork where fact was needed.

Good Sir William of Occam remains our most reliable guide: The simplest explanation to cover all the facts is likeliest to be true. In this case, the simplest explanation is that the exits pollsters over-represented the Bush vote, not the Kerry vote. The evidence favoring this idea is a lot stronger than the rBr (or eDr) nonsense peddled by Mitofsky and Manjoo.

Incidentally, Manjoo calls me a liar for seconding the opinion at DU that his argument can be summarized by the sobriquet "enthusiastic Democratic responder." (I've always preferred the term "chatty Dem theory," which almost caught on...!.) But his own cyber-ink proves beyond rational debate that he is, in fact, pushing what we may call the "eDr" scenario. (Granted, in yesterday's post I should have said "Manjoo would have us replace..." instead of "Manjoo replaces..." I do apologise for writing too rapidly. But the basic point still stands.)

Regarding previous exit polls:

Exit polls showed Clinton winning bigger than he did in 1992 and 1996. The only reason people didn't cry about it was that those races weren't close, and Clinton still won. As Mark Blumenthal points out, you can see proof of this in the movie "War Room." See how they figured based on the exits Clinton would win a landslide. Of course, he did not.

In this instance, I was careful in my wording. I said that exits were considered accurate until the ascent of the Bush dynasty. Diebold and ESS have been up to their dirty numbers for a while now. Thank you for helping to buttress my point!

Saying it's horseshit doesn't refute the studies done by pollsters showing this to be the case (studies cited in my article). Can you offer any response to those studies? And can you explain why exit polls -- not only in 2004 -- consistently show a Democratic tilt?

"Cited"? Maybe I'm missing something, but I've been clicking the links in Manjoo's June 15 piece and have yet to find any citation to an exit poll study that goes back before the rise of the Bush dynasty. Yes, I have seen studies which claim to demonstrate a consistent Democratic tilt in the exit polling since 1988. But these studies operate under the presumption that the "actuals" are irrefutable and the exits must therefore be mistaken. Studies that stipulate the very point under question are of little value.

The study Manjoo does cite discusses the display of folders and pens bearing network logos in an experimental situation. This experiment is of no real value to us. As Manjoo himself notes, pollsters in 2004 did not flash logos. Since no evidence indicates any voter reluctance to speak to non-logo-bearing pollsters, his point disappears into the vapor.

And Manjoo still doesn't respond to the question about the accuracy of exit polls in Europe, but not here.

Neither does he mention many other pertinent points, such as the fact that vote tabulation companies have a disturbing history of bribing election officials and offering them comfy sinecures, in order to get their hackable machines into position. Or this administration's efforts to impede international observation of the 2004 vote. Or Leto's study of Snohomish county, where the electronic vote differed substantially from the paper vote -- a difference inexplicable by any theory other than vote fraud.

Neither does Manjoo offer any suggestions as to how we might double-check our highly-questionable paper-free compu-vote. If we blithely toss out any exit polls that conflict with the official story, what else do we have?

(By the way, I'm not the only one to detect the distinct odor of rodent when Manjoo walks into the room. Readers interested in Bob Somerby's take on Manjoo should click here.)

About the larger question of Salon's current value to progressives:

I'm afraid the famed cyber-zine is at a familiar crossroads. Here in Los Angeles, the free (and formerly feisty) L.A. Weekly reached a similar point in the late 1980s. That's when a publication which had done so much to stop Reagan's planned war in Central America presented us with an endless parade of inane cover stories about Madonna's cultural impact or the sexual confessions of that strange lady who later married Elmore Leonard.

Salon, which was once the place to go for those who wanted the truth about the Right's war on Clinton, now prints very little cutting-edge investigative reporting. Lately, I've gone there mostly for the movie reviews. But in the Bush economy, I can't really afford movies. So why read the reviews?

Finally: I don't want this blog to devolve into a pissing match between one Salon writer and myself. Manjoo delivered a cup and I have responded with a quart. If the urine overflows the gallon mark, I'll restrict further emissions to email.

BOYCOTT SALON

In a new Salon piece on the 2004 vote -- find it yourselves; I won't link to it -- Farhad Manjoo calls the "reluctant Bush responder" theory a "persuasive new theory." That phrasing indicates the work of a disinformationist.

Actually, Manjoo replaces the "rBr" nomenclature with a new label: "exuberant Democratic responder." In the past, I have referred to this idea as the "chatty Dem" theory. By whatever name, this nonsense is hardly new -- in fact, it's just another variant on the official explanation of the exit poll disparity which we've been hearing since day 1.

Manjoo is peddling horseshit, of course. Use your common sense: Are any Republicans of your acquaintance shrinking violets? Turn on your radio: Do the voices of reaction sound even slightly embarrassed or cautious?Democrats are the ones who have been cowed into silence by the violent brownshirts of the right.

If the "eDr" theory holds water, then why were Democrats so notably "exuberant" only in "purple" states? And why were exit polls accurate in this country until the ascension of the Bush dynasty? Why are they still considered extremely accurate in Europe?

If you look carefully at the work of Mitofsky and Liddle, you will see that their theories accept as a given the proposition that the count was accurate. How can we accept an explanatory scenario from someone who stipulates the very point under dispute?

If you want links to some good responses to Manjoo, visit this Democratic Underground thread. As one poster notes:

If you've read all the articles that Farahd Manjoo has written on this subject, the 180 Degree turn he's done is enough to make your head explode. First, he writes articles prior to the election on how the black box voting machines are rigged - and then he takes the anti-fraud side to his post election articles. It's ridiculous.

I may respond to Manjoo's spew at greater length later. For now, let us simply remind ourselves of the basics:

The Republicans have done everything in their power to insure that our voting machines have no paper trails. As demonstrated in many previous posts (both on this blog and elsewhere), the vote tabulator companies are run by either crooks or theocratic fanatics. These companies have often bribed officials to use their easily-hacked machines.

Those facts alone prove vote fraud. We need no further evidence. If Republicans do not commit vote fraud, then why do they not allow paper trails? If someone using a fake identity asks for your credit card information, do you need to gather more evidence before you conclude that he hopes to rob you?

According to Manjoo, anyone who dares to raise these common-sense issues deserves to be damned as a wild-eyed lefty. In the past, Salon itself has been on the receiving end of such derision. How dare they lob similar accusations at those who do the progressive work Salon now prefers to ignore?

Why does Salon no longer publish work by investigative writers such as (say) Murray Waas? Why do they waste cyber-ink on frauds like Manjoo?

Ask yourselves: When was the last time Salon published a worthwhile, cutting-edge investigative piece about politics?

I STRONGLY urge Salon readers to unsubscribe.

And do not go gently. Make clear that you will not pay Salon one more dime until they understand that the Republican party has become just as dangerous as the Nazi party circa 1934. (NEVER apologize for making justifiable comparisons to the Nazis.) Inform Salon that their enterprise has no value to you until they agree to fight the neo-con menace, and until they announce that they will cease publishing their propaganda.

Michael Ledeen, at the beginning of his career, used to publish in left-friendly venues. (You can, for example, spot his byline in old issues of Playboy.) I wonder if that history will repeat itself...

The road to Downing Street goes through the basement

John Conyers, American hero, will re-convene hearings on the Downing Street memos. And he'll do so on Capitol Hill -- in a basement of the Capitol building. At least these important hearings will no longer be relegated to DNC headquarters, until recently the only venue available after the G.O.P.'s neo-Stalinists decided that congress could not hear from uncontrolled witnesses.

CSPAN will cover the hearings on Thursday, as will Pacifica. There will also be gatherings around the country, not to mention an overdue rally in support of Conyers himself, which will take place in front of the White House at 5:00 p.m. For more information, go here.

The mainstream press may be running out of reasons to avoid this story. Check out the Minneapolis Star-Tribune: "Editorial: Fig leaf for war/Paper indicates U.N. was misled":

Perhaps readers will recall that Bush's nominee for U.N. ambassador, John Bolton, recently was accused of orchestrating the 2002 ouster of Jose Bustani, head of the Organization for the Prevention of Chemical Weapons, a U.N. agency. Why did Bolton want Bustani replaced? Because Bustani was aggressively seeking to reinsert chemical weapons inspectors into Iraq. The conclusion of many observers is that the United States did not want inspectors in Iraq because it undercut the U.S. case for an invasion.

Many Bush critics accused him of "using" the United Nations to justify war, rather than truly working to avoid military conflict. But they were naturally suspect because they oppose U.S. policy. The British briefing paper is especially significant because it comes from a government that is not only astute, but is also quite friendly to Bush's objective of invading Iraq. The unavoidable conclusion is that both British and American citizens were duped into hoping that the United Nations would make such a conflict unnecessary. In fact, Britain eagerly and the United States reluctantly went to the United Nations to get a fig leaf of respectability for a war on which they had already decided.

In the end, the Security Council refused to play its role, arguing that the weapons inspectors needed more time (actually ample time) to complete their mission. Then the United States threw up its hands, branded Security Council members a bunch of hand-wringing pansies, and went to war. As the British briefing paper makes clear, that was pre-ordained.

Also worthy of note is this piece from the overly-cautious Los Angeles Times:

In one memorandum, dated March 14, 2002, and labeled "secret — strictly personal," Blair's chief foreign policy advisor, David Manning, described to the prime minister a dinner he had had with Rice.

"We spent a long time at dinner on Iraq," wrote Manning, now the British ambassador to the U.S. "It is clear that Bush is grateful for your [Blair's] support and has registered that you are getting flak. I said that you would not budge in your support for regime change but you had to manage a press, a Parliament and a public opinion that was different from anything in the States. And you would not budge either in your insistence that, if we pursued regime change, it must be very carefully done and produce the right result. Failure was not an option."

Damn right the press in Britain differs from anything in the States. The British press has greater freedom, and British journalists understand that they do not address an audience of ninnies.

Another memo, from British Foreign Office political director Peter Ricketts to Foreign Secretary Jack Straw on March 22, 2002, bluntly stated that the case against Hussein was weak because the Iraqi leader was not accelerating his weapons programs and there was scant proof of links to Al Qaeda.

"What has changed is not the pace of Saddam Hussein's WMD programs, but our tolerance of them post-11 September," Ricketts wrote. "Attempts to claim otherwise publicly will increase skepticism about our case….

"U.S. scrambling to establish a link between Iraq and Al Qaeda is so far frankly unconvincing," he said.

And note this:

The paper said the British view was that any invasion for the purpose of regime change "has no basis under international law."

Right now, regime-change-for-the-sake-of-regime-change is the only argument Bush has left.

Hitting girls

Why do Republicans hate women?

Republicans hate lots of people of course, but they seem to direct special enmity toward anyone who has committed the "crime" of possessing a vagina.

In particular, the fury directed toward Hillary Clinton passes all understanding. Just today, the Drudge report printed a headline scoring Hillary for keeping the media away from an event directed toward her supporters. After Bush's "Potemkin village" campaign in 2004, one wonders how any Republican would dare to score any Democrat for stage-managing political appearances.

(Those who link on the actual story learn that the decision to disinvite the press was made by someone other than the Senator.)

David Brock's Blinded by the Right reveals that, after his successful hit piece against Anita Hill, his handlers pressed him to find "another woman" to attack. (I haven't the book to hand, but I can recall this passage accurately enough.) Now, the directive to attack "another Democrat" might be understandable -- but why "another woman"?

The hatred directed against Jane Fonda has recently devolved into subhuman levels, as members of the white underclass use her as a catch-basin for all their resentments. Lost your job? Can't afford a house? Blame Jane Fonda. Don't be surprised if she ends up a murder victim.

Younger people may not realize that she was not always so loathed, even after her trip to Hanoi. I spoke to a number of guys who came home from Vietnam in the early 1970s, and they did not spew venom whenever they heard the name of Fonda; they continued to go to her movies, and some of them even kept that Barbarella poster hanging in the garage. They didn't hate her -- they hated Nixon and Johnson.

Johnson told lies -- outright, deliberate lies -- to involve America in a distant civil war we could never hope to understand. Nixon told more lies to perpetuate that war, and initiated a massive effort to spy on Americans who had committed no crime beyond voicing their disagreement with the administration. Jane Fonda, by contrast, had entertained a generation of young men with a rather fetching zero-gravity strip-tease, and then tried to inform America that our presidents were fabricators. Who ya gonna hate?

Granted, I grew up in California. The vets returning to, say, Arkansas and other primitive cultures may have had more brutish attitudes.

Even so, note that even the hawkish vets seem to bear little grudge against Peter Boyle or Donald Sutherland, who were just as active in the anti-war effort. Better to blame Jane, and not because she was photographed near North Vietnamese anti-Aircraft guns. Her real sin was being born with a vagina.

Look what the Moon press is now saying about 9/11

The Washington Times and UPI --- two news outlet owned by the ultra-reactionary Reverend Sun Myung Moon -- are publicizing a revisionist take on the collapse of the World Trade Center:

A former Bush team member during his first administration is now voicing serious doubts about the collapse of the World Trade Center on 9-11. Former chief economist for the Department of Labor during President George W. Bush's first term Morgan Reynolds comments that the official story about the collapse of the WTC is "bogus" and that it is more likely that a controlled demolition destroyed the Twin Towers and adjacent Building No. 7.

Reynolds, who also served as director of the Criminal Justice Center at the National Center for Policy Analysis in Dallas and is now professor emeritus at Texas A&M University said, "If demolition destroyed three steel skyscrapers at the World Trade Center on 9/11, then the case for an 'inside job' and a government attack on America would be compelling." Reynolds commented from his Texas A&M office, "It is hard to exaggerate the importance of a scientific debate over the cause of the collapse of the twin towers and building 7.

If the official wisdom on the collapses is wrong, as I believe it is, then policy based on such erroneous engineering analysis is not likely to be correct either. The government's collapse theory is highly vulnerable on its own terms. Only professional demolition appears to account for the full range of facts associated with the collapse of the three buildings."

Do I share this view? By no means!

Then why discuss the matter here? Because Moon apparently wants us to believe in this "controlled demolition" nonsense. The question is: Why?

Although I've long felt that many aspects of the 9/11 disaster remain mysterious, my concerns revolve around such issues the movements, associations and funding of the terrorists. Allegations of a controlled demolition always struck me as absurd. How could so many explosive charges be smuggled into buildings teeming with workers? (Bringing down a skyscraper is no covert op!)

What would have been the point of a controlled demolition? The image of jets slamming into the twin towers provided all the necessary cause for war; the presumed master planners of this conspiracy had no need to reduce the buildings to rubble.

Daniel Hopsicker has argued that the 9/11 "truth movement" is a misnomer. This growing movement -- which, in his view, resembles a UFO cult -- focuses on the more outlandish claims while ignoring the subtler, and more provable, irregularities in the official story. In Hopsicker's view, we should concentrate on such matters as Mohammed Atta's links to a "flight school" with clear CIA associations.

Hopsicker has made some charges that I consider overblown; for example, he has issued dark insinuations -- unjustified insinuations, in my view -- about Fred Burks, with whom I've had some cordial correspondence. But Hopsicker is surely on firmer ground when he casts a wary eye toward the notorious Saudi billionaire Adnan Khashoggi, who (Hopsicker claims) has helped to fund this "truth movement."

And now Moon has gotten into the act.

Even in the realm of samizdat, we have to choose wisely: There's the real samizdat, and then there's the "approved" samizdat.