Author: sybil

Christiane Amanpour, who is she?

She has been described as the most well-known journalist in the world.


Her CNN BIO as Chief Correspondent for CNN International does not include the personal details listed in her reporter’s biography below the fold. Note to CNN, update this bio, Amanpour no longer works for “60 Minutes.”
Christiane Amanpour (born January 12, 1958) is a reporter for CNN.
Shortly after her birth in London, her father, an Iranian airline executive, moved the family to Tehran, where the Amanpours led a privileged life. At age 11 she was sent back to England where she attended first the Holy Cross Convent School in Buckinghamshire and then the New Hall School , an exclusive Roman Catholic girls’ school. Her family had to leave Iran after the Islamic revolution of 1979. Christiane moved to the United States to study journalism at the University of Rhode Island. After graduation she worked for NBC affiliate WJAR in Providence, Rhode Island, and in 1983 she was hired by CNN. In 1989 she was posted to Frankfurt, West Germany, and reported on the democratic revolutions sweeping Eastern Europe at the time. But it was her coverage of the Gulf War that followed Iraq’s occupation of Kuwait in 1990 that made her famous. Thereafter she reported from the Bosnian war and many other conflict zones. Although contracted with CNN, she also occasionally appears on CBS’s 60 Minutes.

She speaks English and Persian fluently.

In 1998 she married James Rubin, who at the time was spokesman for the US State Department. A son, Darius, was born in 2002. CNN biography

In a recent Yale Bulletin interview Christine Amanpour says that unbiased reporting is not always noble.

“The tragic reality is that the leading cause of death among journalists is deliberate targeting — assassination and murder,” she asserted. She and other foreign journalists often wear bulletproof vests, have bodyguards and travel in armored cars, she said, noting that while these precautions “hamper our ability to tell news, kidnapping hampers our ability more.”

Amanpour also discussed the concern that television news reporting has become sensational and narrowly focused on one issue, citing the Terry Shiavo case and the pope’s death as examples of what some might call “excessive” coverage. She expressed her own chagrin over the fact that corporate-owned television networks’ “first duty is to the shareholder,” and asserted, “the desire to eke out maximum profit from the news is immoral.” She contended that in this era of more emotional news reporting, “We in our profession are getting lazy about reporting facts.”

Equally alarming, Amanpour said, is that “lines are being blurred” between the news and politics. She decried both “paid shills who spout government programs and pass themselves off as independent analysts” as well as “various arms of the government producing their own news.”

More recently Amanpour has been in the news for quitting CBS television’s “60 Minutes.”

Link
[…]She had been contributing to “60 Minutes” since 1996, usually four or five stories a year.[…]
Reached in London, Amanpour would not elaborate on her statement. People close to her have said she’s concerned that the type of hard-hitting international stories she’s done are not valued as much at “60 Minutes” as they were under founding executive producer Don Hewitt. […]Hewitt said that he’d never worked with a better reporter than Amanpour, “and I’ve worked with Edward R. Murrow, Walter Cronkite and Eric Sevareid.”

[Hewitt went on to say that she was brave and if he were still at CBS she would still be there.]

Amanpour is generally hated by the right wing, she was called a Clinton shill during his administration. From the blogs: They also hated her when she reported during the Iraqi election that she heard explosions but could not identify them immediately. They hated her when she said the new Pope was not catholic. When six months after the invasion of Iraq, in September 2003 she dared to comment on the position of reporters on the ground in Iraq.

“I think the press was muzzled and I think the press self-muzzled,” she [Amanpour] told the former editor of Talk and Vanity Fair, Tina Brown, on her talkshow on US network CNBC.

“I’m sorry to say that, but certainly television – and perhaps to a certain extent my station – was intimidated by the administration and its foot soldiers at Fox News. And it did, in fact, put a climate of fear and self-censorship in terms of the kind of broadcast work we did.”

Asked by Brown if there had been any story during the war that she had been unable to report, Amanpour said: “It’s not a question of couldn’t do it, it’s a question of tone. It’s a question of being rigorous. It’s a question of really asking the questions.

“All of the entire body politic in my view – whether it’s the administration, the intelligence, the journalists, whoever – did not ask enough questions, for instance, about weapons of mass destruction. I mean, it looks like this was disinformation at the highest levels.”

For those comments, Amanpour was reportedly summoned to a “private conversation” with CNN news chief Jim Walton. A FOX News spokeswoman responded to Amanpour’s charges — apparently in all seriousness — with this creepy soundbite: “It’s better to be viewed as a foot soldier for Bush than [as a] spokeswoman for al-Qaeda.”
http://www.buzzflash.com/editorial/03/09/18.html

Recently she said this about reporting from Iraq:
“Behind the backs of the field reporters, field producers and crews on the ground our bosses made a deal with the establishment to create `pools’, what I call `ball and chain’, handcuffed, managed news reporting.” (There was a 12 page contract signed by those bosses on the behavour of journalists.) It appears that rarely do journalists voluntarily leave “60 minutes” – the last time it was done was in 1991. So the story of why Amanpour has quit is continuing. It seems that CNN international does not come under the intense scrutiny from “bosses” or advertisers that the home version does. What’s ahead for Amanpour if the US invades Iran? We live in interesting times.

Galloway: Did he have any impact?

This article from The Independent gives a good comparison between British debating style,
their interaction with their politicians and American lack of debate
along with deference to Senators.

Galloway: The man who took on America
How did one maverick MP manage to outgun a committee of senior US politicians so successfully? And did he make any lasting impact? Rupert Cornwell reports from Washington, 19 May 2005 […]
We tend to see politics as a public bloodsport. In the US politics is as brutal as anywhere. But the violence usually takes place off-stage, in the lobbying process, in the money game, in the ruthless manipulation of scandal. True, every four years there are presidential election candidates’ “debates”. But – with the exception of Bill Clinton – every recent American president would have been slaughtered weekly if he had to face Prime Minister’s Questions. On the public stage, US politicians are not accustomed to serious challenge.[…]

more below…

Perhaps he [Coleman] believed that a smooth ride would be ensured by the traditional deference accorded the Senate (which is fond of referring to itself, with barely a trace of irony, as “the world’s greatest deliberative body”). In fact, proceedings only served to underline the average senator or congressman’s ignorance of the world beyond America, be it the underlying realities of the Middle East, or the polemical ways of British public life.

Oops, touché – does that mean that you think the Senate is NOT the “world’s greatest
deliberative body?”
How could you say that, you cruel Brit writer! Actually it was a great ‘body’
when Galloway was speaking. Unfortunately most of the great deliberators/Senators
left the room long before Galloway finished his speech.

But anyone expecting such colour in the more august broadsheets will have been severely disappointed. The Washington Post and The New York Times devoted only inside-page coverage. The Times noted that Mr Coleman, despite being a former prosecutor, seemed “flummoxed” by Mr Galloway’s “aggressive posture and tone”. Both singled out the MP’s debating skill. It is a skill on which, alas, American politics place little premium.

The New York Post’s Andrea Peyser called Galloway a thug, a bully, a left-lackey and a viper.
Guess she didn’t like him. I thought he was a Don Quixote throwing
aside the US rules for the Senate and using his visit to slam the US
for the military action in Iraq. He didn’t forget to say “I told you so” either.

Galloway:
“Now, Senator, I gave my heart and soul to oppose the policy that you promoted. I gave my political life’s blood to try to stop the mass killing of Iraqis by the sanctions on Iraq which killed one million Iraqis, most of them children, most of them died before they even knew that they were Iraqis, but they died for no other reason other than that they were Iraqis with the misfortune to born at that time. I gave my heart and soul to stop you committing the disaster that you did commit in invading Iraq. And I told the world that your case for the war was a pack of lies.

“I told the world that Iraq, contrary to your claims did not have weapons of mass destruction. I told the world, contrary to your claims, that Iraq had no connection to al-Qaeda. I told the world, contrary to your claims, that Iraq had no connection to the atrocity on 9/11 2001. I told the world, contrary to your claims, that the Iraqi people would resist a British and American invasion of their country and that the fall of Baghdad would not be the beginning of the end, but merely the end of the beginning.

 “Senator, in everything I said about Iraq, I turned out to be right and you turned out to be wrong and 100,000 people paid with their lives; 1600 of them American soldiers sent to their deaths on a pack of lies; 15,000 of them wounded, many of them disabled forever on a pack of lies.

Full text of Galloway’s historic speech.

A Love Story and a Human Rights Victory

From the diaries by susanhbu. Last night, Nightline presented a documentary on human rights violations in Burma. “The Giant Slayers” is the story of a young lawyer, Katie Redford, and a Burmese human rights activist, Ka Hsaw Wa, who fell in love but waited to get married until they filed suit against UNOCAL on behalf of the people in Burma who had suffered at the hands of demonstrable collusion between the transnational corporation and the Burmese military. They formed a group, Earth Rights International, and filed Doe v. Unocal. The suit was based on an arcane 18th century law that would hold US companies accountable for human rights violations committed overseas. While one wrote a law school paper on the arcane law, the other gathered evidence against UNOCAL.

Below, the Bolton connection:

It all began 10 years ago, deep in the heart of the Burmese jungle. A consortium of oil companies, which included U.S. based Unocal, was building a gas pipeline across Burma. To help get the job done, human rights activists claim the notorious Burmese military did what ever it felt was necessary. This included burning down villages along the pipeline’s path, forcing people to work on it for no pay and jailing, torturing, even killing those who refused. At the same time, a young, idealistic American law student, Katie Redford, decided to spend her summers documenting human rights abuses in Burma. She soon met, Ka Hsaw Wa, a local hero and the only known Burmese human rights worker known to be sneaking into his country and informing international organizations about his findings.

They thought the law suit would take only a couple of years but it took 10. During those years they built a family, (they have two children, a boy and a girl) and a non-profit organization. Just before the settlement in March 2005, UNOCO was bought by Chevron Texaco and many think there is a direct connection between the sale and the settlement. —

Since the settlement, the USA (with Australia, and South Africa) voted against this April 20, 2005 UN resolution

In a resolution (E/CN.4/2005/L.87) on human rights and transnational corporations and other business enterprises, adopted by a roll-call vote of 49 in favour to three against, with one abstention, the Commission requested the Secretary-General to appoint a Special Representative on the issue of human rights and transnational corporations and other business enterprises[…] to identify and clarify standards of corporate responsibility and accountability for transnational corporations and other business enterprises with regard to human rights;

The full resolution is here.

You might be interested to know why the US voted against the resolution. This is the USA Explanation of Position on UN Resolution E/CN.4/2005/L.87:

Item 17 PDF  
Transnational Corporations, April 20, 2005
The United States has the strongest business regulatory environment in the world. U.S. corporations, whether working at home or abroad, are held to the highest standards of ethical behavior and respect for human rights. Corporations have an absolute and unambiguous responsibility to obey the law, and in so doing to honor the human rights of all individuals with whom they have contact.
[…]
We have been down this path many times in the UN, and it is both sad and undeniable that the anti-business agenda pursued by many in this organization over the years has held back the economic and social advancement of developing countries.[…]

The settlement, the UN resolution and the US explanation lead me to understand why the White House is insisting on John Bolton as Ambassador to the UN. I imagine the huddle of Karl Rove, and the three oil magnates, Bush, Cheney and Condi. They are saying “This  kind of lawsuit must never happen again! We will get our man in the UN to prevent it.” But the die is cast, the precedent set for the future regarding transnationals and how they treat people, thanks to this wonderful couple.

More Pundits than Journalists

Fresh from re-watching Bush’s lame press conference through the eyes of The Daily Show, I found this journalist
who has been tracking the US media in recent years.

Danny Schechter, a media veteran of almost 40 years says:
“You have three times more pundits on air as opposed to journalists. That’s another sign of the post-journalism era.” And we have newscasters, who are neither reporters or pundits who give their commentary on the news that they are only hired to read.

He has made a documentary on the subject of the failure of the American mainstream media:
Academy Award Winner Tim Robbins narrates the trailer for Globalvision’s WMD (Weapons of Mass Deception).

Three questions from a recent interview:

What are you trying to do in this film?

I try to offer some fresh insights. I also try to speak to journalists about what this means in terms of our responsibilities to challenge and what this means in terms of democracy.

In the film, I make the suggestion that the Bush administration practices deception as part of its strategy and military strategy.[…]
Now, with study after study they say it was “group think” in the intelligence community. That’s why they screwed up.

If there was group think in the intelligence community, what about the journalistic community? There was group think there, too.

more…

What do you mean when you use the term post-journalism era?

Journalism is at a crossroads. There are many journalists today who still believe in the values of journalism but who are frustrated by the difficulty of practicing it because the companies they work for do not really respect journalistic principles. What they are there to do is satisfy their bottom line concerns, they have closed bureau after bureau.

There has been a pattern of dumbing down, and by dumbing it down it means people inside media are dumbing themselves down. They are not asking good questions, they are not challenging official narratives the way they should be.

Are blogs an alternative to mainstream media sources?

There are now 10 million blogs. Of those, maybe 10% claim to be journalistic. Some of the bloggers are very responsible, really challenging and doing investigative digging that mainstream media are not.

Some are motivated just by ideological concerns. Recently, for example, Eason Jordan, the former chief of news at CNN – when he said at Davos 12 journalists had been killed by US soldiers there was a big shock and he was forced to resign. In that case, a blogger took an off-the-record meeting and just blasted it out there with out having a full record of what was said.
[…]

Danny Schechter has a blog where he takes the top stories and covers what is not being reported.

He asks this question:

How many people in the American media protested the killing of Tariq Ayub [Aljazeera’s correspondent slain in Baghdad by US fire on 8 April 2003]? That was blatant, a completely blatant assassination and yet nobody said a word. We need to challenge that and show more solidarity with other media workers.

http://tinyurl.com/b23dj

In memoriam for all the journalists killed in the line of duty.

SGRENA-NYT Whitewashes the Italian Report on the US Whitewash

Italy Rebuts U.S. Report That Cleared G.I.’s in Killing

A 52 page exhaustive report on the shooting of Sgrena’s car, released today rebuts the US report released Saturday. But the article gives more space to the American report and its conclusion appears to back up the American report.

“It is clear that while the hostage recovery operation may have otherwise been a success, prior coordination might have prevented this tragedy,” the American report said.

The report said that tensions along the expressway had been heightened by 135 insurgent attacks on the road in the previous four months, and that the platoon had been informed that two suspected suicide car bombers, one in a white car and the other in a black vehicle, had been spotted in the area. The Toyota involved in the shooting of the Italian was white.”

more…
The Italian report says this:

“It is not clear how the eventual knowledge of the contents of the operation would have favorably affected the course of events,” it said.

in response to the American report saying this:

“It is clear that while the hostage recovery operation may have otherwise been a success, prior coordination might have prevented this tragedy,” the American report said.”

The article gives the Americans the last word which I guess is only natural chauvinism.

Where are you Gilgamesh?

Update [2005-5-3 5:58:59 by sybil]:
There’s a diary by DuctapeFatwa on DKos reporting that Berlusconi edited the Italian Report!

Bush talks with Pastor Ted every Monday

Pastor Ted Haggard

George W. Bush

Allow me to introduce Pastor Tom Haggard. He is a 48 year old Indianian,  equally as powerful as Dr. James Dobson. His flock at New Life Church in Colorado Springs numbers 11,000  and he is also in charge of National Assembly of Evangelicals whose 30 million members make up the nation’s most powerful religious lobbying group.

Below the fold, his personal manifesto:

I want my finances to be in order, my kids trained, and my wife to love life. [can you catch the codes in that sentence?][…] I want the Church to help me live life well, not exhaust me with endless ‘worthwhile’ projects.

‘Worthwhile’ projects are building funds and soup kitchens. “He knows that for Christianity to propsper in the free market, it needs more than ‘moral values’ – it needs customer value.”

And where did Pastor Ted learn his spiritual economics or economic spirituality? from one of his favourite authors:

Tom Friedman.

In fact, Pastor Ted “learned that everything, including spirituality, can be understood as a commodity” and “unregulated trade was the key to achieving worldly freedom” from Friedman. Friedman’s book The Lexus and the Olive Tree is required reading for hundreds of Ted’s pastors.

Pastor Ted is militant like Tom Friedman. He believes “spiritual war requires a virile, worldly counterpart” and that the Bible justifies pre-emptive war.
From SOLDIERS OF CHRIST by Jeff Sharlet, Harpers Magazine, May 2005

_______________________

Chris Hedges’ article Feeling the hate with the National Religious Broadcasters in the same Report recalls the words of his ethics prof at Harvard Divinity School.

[…][Dr. James Luther Adams] told us that when we were his age, and he was then close to eighty, we would all be fighting the “Christian fascists.”

He gave that warning twenty-five years ago, when Pat Robertson and other prominent evangelists began speaking of a new political religion that would direct its efforts at taking control of all major American institutions, including mainstream denominations and the government, so as to transform the United States into a global Christian empire. […]
Adams said, too many liberals failed to understand the allure of evil, and when the radical Christians came, these people would undoubtedly play by the old rules of democracy long after those in power had begun to dismantle the democratic state. […]

Homosexuals and lesbians, Adams said, would be the first “deviants” singled out by the Christian right. We would be the next.

“We” that’s us, the writers, intellectuals, artists, poets, bloggers. Are you scared yet?

This report gave me the shivers, especially after learning that the president of the USA is being fed Friedman’s ideas by an evangelist pastor
EVERY WEEK.
Read more in this month’s Harper’s Magazine.

Lest we forget: The Agony of War


Baghdad girl weeps
after her home is destroyed.

From Bob Herbert in the New York Times

The vast amount of suffering and death endured by civilians as a result of the U.S.-led invasion of Iraq has, for the most part, been carefully kept out of the consciousness of the average American. I can’t think of anything the Bush administration would like to talk about less. You can’t put a positive spin on dead children.

More…

There’s been hardly any media interest in the unrelieved agony of tens of thousands of innocent civilians in Iraq. It’s an ugly subject, and the idea has taken hold that Americans need to be protected from stories or images of the war that might be disturbing. As a nation we can wage war, but we don’t want the public to be too upset by it.

The Iraq body count:
Civilians reported killed by military intervention in Iraq
Min = 21,218, Max = 24,082

Consider also those made homeless like the little girl above. She lives in the dangerous city of Baghdad and it is likely that she was kept inside her home for protection. Now that her home is destroyed where will she go for safety? There is almost no citizen of Iraq who has not been affected by the slaughter brought on by the invasion of Iraq in March 2003.

Will we seek out the truth of what is going on in that beleagured country or will we be seduced by the smoke screen that most of the North American media is putting up to blind us from that truth?

Bob Herbert wonders

As for the press, it has better things to cover than the suffering of civilians in war. The aversion to this topic is at the opposite extreme from the ecstatic journalistic embrace of the death of one pope and the election of another, and the media’s manic obsession with the comings and goings of Martha, Jacko, et al.


from al Jazeera
Baghdad is the worst city
in the world in which to live.

Two Reporters Shot by US Military

Reporters Without Borders reports:

24 April 2005

AP cameraman killed and a photographer wounded

Cameraman Saleh Ibrahim and photographer Mohammed Ibrahim, both Iraqi, came under fire from unidentified gunmen as they arrived on the scene of the explosion on 23 April near Al-Yarmook square, said an AP colleague who requested anonymity for security reasons.

Both men were very badly injured and their colleague drove them to Al-Jumhuri Hospital in Mosul but Saleh Ibrahim, who had three bullets wounds to the chest, died shortly after being admitted. A doctor at the hospital, Rabei Yassin said that Mohammed Ibrahim, who had shrapnel wounds to the head, was treated there before being transferred to an undisclosed destination under US military escort.

continued below

“We are appalled at the death of Saleh Ibrahim, which brings to 55 the number of journalists and media assistants killed in Iraq since the start of the war, in March 2003,” said Reporters Without Borders, adding, that it was “extremely worried about the condition of Mohammed Ibrahim.” […]

Here’s another story that disappeared quickly. I thought I was unable to put together a diary due to a busy day, so little time, so much outrage. But this story pushed my outrage meter over the edge.

The Washington Post article below was not headlined, it was buried under the story of the arrest of suspects in the helicopter shoot down. The story of yet another reporter’s death is important because without these courageous individuals we will never know the truth of the Iraq situation.

The circumstances surrounding the death of Ibrahim, the cameraman for the Associated Press Television News, remain unclear, the news agency reported. Col. Wathiq Ali, deputy police chief in Mosul, said the explosion in the Yarmouk area of Mosul had targeted a U.S. patrol and injured two Iraqi civilians, according to the Associated Press.

“The police did not interfere in that incident because the U.S. troops were there,” Ali said.

Saleh Ibrahim died soon after arriving at al-Jumhouri Educational Hospital with three bullet wounds to the chest, Rabei Yassin, a doctor, told the Associated Press. Mohammed Ibrahim was treated for shrapnel wounds to the back of the head, Yassin added.

The U.S. military in Mosul did not respond to a request for information about the incident.

A special correspondent for The Washington Post in Mosul, Dlovan Brwary, reported that U.S. forces had surrounded the Yarmouk area in Mosul when the two men went to the scene and photographer Ibrahim got out of the car to take photos.

When the Americans began shooting in the air, the wounded photographer later told Brwary, he “ran immediately to the car, but the Americans shot toward the car.”

The correspondent reported that the car’s windows were broken and that Saleh Ibrahim had been sitting in the back seat. Brwary and four other Iraqi journalists were later briefly detained by U.S. soldiers at the hospital, he said.

Ibrahim’s “fervent dedication to reporting the complete story of Iraq at this historic moment inspired all who knew and worked with him,” said Curley of the Associated Press. “Our deepest sympathy goes to his family.” Ibrahim had five children.

Looks like the press car was shot from behind, similar to Sgrena’s car. My hope is that this story will not be swept away and reporters will not be forgotten. Reporters Without Borders lists all the reporters who have disappeared as well as those who are in jail.

We need these guys. They are risking their lives to give us ‘the story.’
Do not forget them.

Update [2005-4-24 13:5:15 by sybil]:
Another article about the reporters on Yahoo needs some votes to rate it up.

[Survivor] Mohammed Ibrahim said U.S. forces escorted him and his brother, Wamidh, who contributes to European Pressphoto Agency, from the hospital hours after the shooting and released them after nearly 24 hours in detention.

Mohammed’s brother-in-law Saleh Ibrahim was shot and killed. The only information coming from the military is from anonymous sources.

Update [2005-4-24 13:28:40 by sybil]:

Another story from April 8, 2005 U.S. Holds CBS Cameraman In Iraq (CBS/AP) A cameraman carrying CBS press credentials was detained in Iraq earlier this week on suspicion of insurgent activity, the U.S. military said Friday.

The cameraman suffered minor injuries Tuesday during a battle between U.S. soldiers and suspected insurgents, the military said. He was standing next to an alleged insurgent who was killed during the shootout, the statement said.

The military issued a statement then saying the cameraman was shot because his equipment was mistaken for a weapon.

But on Friday, the military said the cameraman was detained because there was probable cause to believe he posed “an imperative threat to coalition forces.”
[…]

Here is the Reporters Without Borders report on the same incident.

6 April 2005

CBS freelance cameraman shot and wounded by US soldiers

Reporters Without Borders today called for a thorough and transparent investigation into an incident yesterday near the northern city of Mosul in which US soldiers shot and wounded a freelance cameraman working for the US television network CBS News.

“Once again the US forces have targeted a journalist just doing his job,” the press freedom organization said. Reporters Without Borders pointed out that this was not the first time that US soldiers shot a cameraman after mistaking his camera for a gun. Mazen Dana, a Palestinian working for the British news agency Reuters, was killed in a similar fashion on 17 August 2003 in Baghdad. The US army claimed that the US soldiers involved had acted according to the rules of engagement. […]
During the incident, “an individual that appeared to have a weapon who was standing near the insurgent was shot and injured. This individual turned out to be a reporter who was pointing a video camera. Regretfully, the reporter was injured during the complex and volatile situation,” the statement said, adding that the incident was being investigated.

The journalist, who CBS News said should not be named for his own protection, was taken to a US military hospital for treatment. The US army described his injuries as minor.

At least 52 journalists and media assistants have been killed in Iraq since the start of the war in March 2003, Reporters Without Borders said. […]

Update [2005-4-24 18:33:30 by sybil]:

Saleh Ibrahim, slain AP Cameraman

Get Delay to Church on Time! Frank Rich

Elegant article in the New York Times. Nothing below the fold, I don’t think Frank Rich needs analysis or my commentary.

Get Tom DeLay to the Church on Time
By FRANK RICH

Published: April 17, 2005

A scandal is like any other melodrama: It can’t be a crowd pleaser unless the audience can follow the plot. That’s why Monica Lewinsky trumped Whitewater, and that’s why of all the story lines ensnaring Tom DeLay, the one with legs is the one with the craps tables. It’s not just easy to follow, but it also has a combustive cultural element that makes it as representative of its political era as Monicagate was of the Clinton years. As the lies and subterfuge of the go-go 1990’s coalesced around sex, so the scandal of our new “moral values” decade comes cloaked in religion. The hair shirt is the new thong.

[…]

You can see why Dick Cheney and President Bush in rapid succession distanced themselves from Mr. DeLay’s threats of retribution against judges who presided in the Schiavo case. If an Eric Rudolph murders a judge in close chronological proximity to that kind of rhetoric, they’ve got a political Armageddon on their hands. Mr. DeLay got the message, sort of. At his Wednesday news conference, he tried to dial back some of his words, if only as a way of changing the subject from Indians and his own potential outings in a court of law. Unlike Bill Frist, he has yet to sign on to next Sunday’s national Christian right telecast bashing what its organizer, the Family Research Council, calls “out-of-control courts. […]

WAR with Iran

Washington post reported in February 2005

The Bush administration has been flying surveillance drones over Iran for nearly a year to seek evidence of nuclear weapons programs and detect weaknesses in air defenses, according to three U.S. officials with detailed knowledge of the secret effort.

And yes, it is about oil, but that is not the only reason.
Check Oil, Geopolitics, and the Coming War with Iran By Michael T. Klare

As the United States gears up for an attack on Iran, one thing is certain: the Bush administration will never mention oil as a reason for going to war.[…]
More important, any serious assessment of Iran’s strategic importance to the United States should focus on its role in the global energy equation.

more…

When talking about oil’s importance in American strategic thinking about Iran, it is important to go beyond the obvious question of Iran’s potential role in satisfying our country’s future energy requirements. Because Iran occupies a strategic location on the north side of the Persian Gulf, it is in a position to threaten oil fields in Saudi Arabia, Kuwait, Iraq, and the United Arab Emirates, which together possess more than half of the world’s known oil reserves. Iran also sits athwart the Strait of Hormuz, the narrow waterway through which, daily, 40% of the world’s oil exports pass. In addition, Iran is becoming a major supplier of oil and natural gas to China, India, and Japan, thereby giving Tehran additional clout in world affairs. It is these geopolitical dimensions of energy, as much as Iran’s potential to export significant quantities of oil to the United States, that undoubtedly govern the administration’s strategic calculations.

I don’t have much deep analysis of this article to offer, it is written with great clarity. It occured to me that this ‘story’ is not much in the news and I am deeply worried that the Bush Administration is keeping the population busy with trivia all the while planning an ‘explosion’ in the Middle East. They are not going to give the public the long preamble they gave the invasion of Iraq and there will be no time for the opposition to this war to mobilize and be effective.