AntiWar.Com
by Justin Raimondo
(12/05/05

The War Party certainly has its party line down pat. In response to allegations that he had deliberately misinformed the Americans about Iraq's 'weapons of mass destruction' and alleged links to al-Qaeda, Ahmed Chalabi recently declared: 'The fact that I misled the U.S. is an urban myth.' The same phrase popped up when an aide to Vice President Dick Cheney denied that his boss was the recipient of bogus 'intelligence' in the run-up to war, or is in any way beholden to the neocons: ''That's an urban myth,' said this aide, who declined to be identified.' This is a longtime favorite theme song sung by government officials who would rather not even discuss an inconvenient issue, and it often works, but not so well these days. The stench of fraud -- and worse -- is rising over Washington so that the whole city seems permeated by a permanent miasma, a poisonous cloud so thick that denials seem to stick in the throat even before they are uttered...

http://www.antiwar.com/justin/?articleid=8209


Informant: Thomas L. Knapp

The Nation
by Jeremy Scahill

12/01/05

Nothing puts the lie to the Bush Administration's absurd claim that it invaded Iraq to spread democracy throughout the Middle East more decisively than its ceaseless attacks on Al Jazeera, the institution that has done more than any other to break the stranglehold over information previously held by authoritarian forces, whether monarchs, military strongmen, occupiers or ayatollahs. The United States bombed its offices in Afghanistan in 2001, shelled the Basra hotel where Al Jazeera journalists were the only guests in April 2003, killed Iraq correspondent Tareq Ayoub a few days later in Baghdad and imprisoned several Al Jazeera reporters (including at Guantánamo), some of whom say they were tortured. In addition to the military attacks, the US-backed Iraqi government banned the network from reporting in Iraq. Then in late November came a startling development: Britain's Daily Mirror reported that during an April 2004 White House meeting with British Prime Minister Tony Blair, George W. Bush floated the idea of bombing Al Jazeera's international headquarters in Qatar...

http://www.thenation.com/doc/20051219/scahill


Informant: Thomas L. Knapp

MSNBC

12/04/05

As Hurricane Katrina roared ashore and thousands of people waited days amid the floodwater for rescue, a series of letters passed between the governor and the White House that reveal delays, claims that requests for federal help weren't received, and concerns on both sides about public relations. Gov. Kathleen Blanco late Friday released 100,000 pages of memos, handwritten notes, e-mails, phone logs and other documents requested by congressional committees that are now investigating what happened behind the scenes in the frantic days surrounding the deadly Aug. 29 storm...

http://msnbc.msn.com/id/9969769/


Informant: Thomas L. Knapp

Las Vegas Review-Journal

12/04/05

The U.S. is at great risk for more terrorist attacks because Congress and the White House have failed to enact several strong security measures, members of the former Sept. 11 commission said Sunday. 'It's not a priority for the government right now,' said the former chairman, Thomas Kean, ahead of the group's release of a report Monday assessing how well its recommendations have been followed...

http://tinyurl.com/2xwm7


Informant: Thomas L. Knapp

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/10313763/


Informant: Milo

David Cole criticizes the indictment of Jose Padilla, saying his charges had virtually nothing to do with what the United States government had been saying about him during his three years in military custody as an "enemy combatant."

http://www.truthout.org/docs_2005/120405G.shtml

Jason Leopold analyzes attorney Robert Luskin, who is representing Karl Rove in the federal investigation into the outing of covert CIA agent Valerie Plame Wilson. According to Leopold, Luskin has made a desperate attempt to ensure Rove avoids becoming the subject of a criminal indictment.

http://www.truthout.org/docs_2005/120405A.shtml

The Pentagon's accounting methods make it difficult to monitor how the armed services have spent more than $300 billion since the war on terror began.

http://tinyurl.com/bn874


From Information Clearing House

Zbigniew Brzezinski: Do These Two Have Anything in Common?

President Bush has equated Islamic radicalism with communism. Is the comparison sound? Is it wise?

http://tinyurl.com/ac4k7



The next holocaust: Islamophobia is not a uniquely British disease:

Across Europe, liberals openly express prejudice against Muslims. Do new pogroms beckon?

http://www.newstatesman.com/200512050006


From Information Clearing House

Officials at the FBI mishandled a Florida terror investigation, falsified documents in an effort to cover repeated missteps and retaliated against an agent who first complained about the problems, Justice Department investigators have concluded.

http://www.iht.com/articles/2005/12/04/news/terror.php#


From Information Clearing House