‘Two of America's top scholars
have published a searing attack on the role and power of Washington's
pro-Israel lobby in a British journal, warning that its "decisive"
role in fomenting the Iraq war is now being repeated with the threat of action
against Iran. And they say that the Lobby is so strong that they doubt their
article would be accepted in any U.S.-based publication.  

Professor John Mearsheimer of the
University of Chicago, author of "The Tragedy of Great Power
Politics" and Professor Stephen Walt of Harvard's Kenney School, and
author of "Taming American Power: The Global Response to U.S.
Primacy," are leading figures American in academic life. 

‘Readers tell me that Americans don’t live here any more. They ask what responsible American citizenry would put up with the trashing of the Bill of Rights and the separation of powers, with wars based on deception, and with pathological liars in control of their government? One reader recently wrote that he believes that "no element of the U.S. government has been left untainted" by the lies and manipulations that have driven away accountability. So-called leaders, he wrote, "talk a great story of American pride and patriotism," but in their hands patriotism is merely a device for "cynical manipulation and fraud." 

What follows, when you follow it to the other end, makes you wonder
how much infrastructure work is being "disguised" throught the SA
Tourism Budget, and how much of the money will end up in the hands of
Halliburton/KBR. I'm also pondering what funds the current Treasurer,
who was happy to stand on the Assembly floor and accuse the previous
Minister For Transport of using road money "to buy stained glass
windows" (I was there on the day) might be diverting across Cabinet
portfolios to achieve desired objectives.

[extract]

It’s time to resolve “Iemma’s
Dilemma”. 

Why not immediately resume
“Scully’s Gully”, declare it a sacred site & rename it “Gallipoli Heights”:
a multi-purpose public venue dedicated to the promotion, preservation &
veneration of core Australian values, including our contempt for the folly of
war, PPAs & well meaning but incompetent politicians. 

‘The security of Americans has nothing whatsoever to do
with Iraq. Iraq cannot overthrow the US Constitution, the Bill of Rights, the
separation of powers, and American civil liberties. Iraq cannot illegally spy
on American citizens, declare them to be "suspects" and detain them
forever without warrant or charges. Iraq cannot put American critics of the
Bush regime on "no-fly" lists.  

The real dangers to Americans
reside in the neo-con Bush administration. This delusional warmonger
administration believes it has the power and the right to dictate to Muslim
countries their political and social institutions. This extraordinary arrogance
and hubris breeds opposition where there was none. The world is not going to
obey Bush and a handful of stupid neo-cons.’ 

There were movements down in Mayo when the memo got around that the kickbacks, through neglect, had leaked away. Brown trousers? More than likely, Downer lost a thousand pounds, and all of DFAT's cracks began to fray.

And Johnny, full of overflow, came down to lend his hand. It was grand to see a Canberra man astride all the gossip from the media, herding stories left and right, and defending all his ministers with pride.

This hardy little memo had been seen around before... Aussie dollars buying bullets in Iraq, but nobody said they'd seen it, and it safely slid away, to be hidden from the public in the dark.

I had written
him a letter, which I had, for want of better

Knowledge, sent
to where I met him at the wheat board, years ago.

He was chairman
when I knew him, so I sent the letter to him

Just on spec, to
make the point that "Howard doesn't want to know".

‘What possible version of reality could Cheney be
referring to? And they say he wasn't drinking before he blew the old lawyer's
face "clean-off," as Dirty Harry once said. Cheney is a member of
what is, perhaps, the most self-deluded and delusional administration in the
history of human civilization. It is no easy feat that something uttered by any
member of this gaggle of goofballs could ever stand out in comparison to the
rest, but Cheney's insanity is beginning to command attention like a slow-speed
car-chase on a Los Angeles freeway. 

The author of this piece, reprinted from American Free Press,
is an expert on the environment effects of depleted uranium and has
worked at two US nuclear weapons laboritories. The links have been
added by yours truly

By Leuren Moret

 
Fresh from the elections, Premier Rann is now chastising the RAA (our equivalent of NRMA and RACV) of acting like a political party during the election, and questioning the government's relationship with the peak body, in spite of their denials of heavy-handedness.  Rann may well have saved the state from a major Halliburton gambit.

Given the intrinsic nature of roadway infrastructure to urban planning and
thence property development, in some cases the speed of the arrival
involves a helluva lot of money. A good example is to the south of our
town, where the previously tourist based coastline has been subjected
to a whirlwind of purchase and redevelopment ahead of one of the
state's worst-kept secrets, the proposed four-lane road (tollway?)
being re-championed by the RAA and Liberals a couple of weeks back, and planned by "guess which
company". Certainly parts of the road, on which I travel regularly, are
a death-trap, and a road built in the 50's isn't equipped to handle the
transport loads it now carries. However, the cynic in me can't help
wondering if these issues might be of secondary importance to the
profitability levels of new housing being created for the "population
influx" that the new "dormitory distance" to Adelaide that the new road
would create.

‘George Bush said today that the war was going to take
more fighting and more sacrifice. I want to know who is fighting? I want to
know if the members of the executive and legislative branches that are so
willing to leave our troops in the middle of sectarian violence and a
militarily undefeatable resistance are willing to send their children and other
of their relatives over to the dessert to take the place of the at least 72% of
soldiers who want to come home? Are they willing to go over there themselves to
fight? George Bush didn't finish his commitment to the country when he went
AWOL from the Alabama National Guard, why hasn't he been called back up to go
and fight and die in his own "noble cause?" I have heard of other men
and women his age who have been called back up. This is not our children's
fight. As in all war, the only people who benefit are the war profiteers. 

‘Bush says: "I reserve the right as
commander-in-chief to do what I need to do to defend America." He has
given the CIA carte blanche to continue torturing, also coming up with a
"Pacific solution" argument he might have borrowed from his friend
John Howard. For the purpose of the McCain bill, Guantanamo Bay is excised from
US territory. The same applies, of course, to the vast number of "black
sites" the US has arranged for the specific purpose of torture across the
world. 

In front of Alexander Downer's office, we stood with our placard to mark the third anniversary of the Iraq invasion.  We weren't many, sadly on 20 or so,  but in the late afternoon city bustle we were certainly noticed by a few hundred. 

A friend of mine had dressed herself in a shirt covered with blood-oozing bullet holes, and stood near where she's scrawled AWB on the footpath.  A quick-eyed, fast framing photographer snapped a shot of the two of us with the letters in the foreground out our feet I('d love a copy, if you're reading this)and went away.  Perhaps we sent messages in different directions... I hope so.

AWB executives
'expected to spy on Iraqis' 

It is claimed AWB executives were
asked to gather intelligence for the Federal Government in the lead-up to the
war in Iraq.

The Cole inquiry is examining
allegations AWB was paying kickbacks to the regime of Saddam Hussein, in contravention
of United Nations sanctions.