LIES UNCOVERED

by Jeremy Lee
Yesterday (Sunday 8th August) was definitive for me. I saw Michael Moore's film Fahrenheit 9/11. Amongst criticisms of Moore's film, two are most common - that there is no mention of Israel's part in the Middle East crisis; and that the film made no mention of America's 'partners-in-crime' in the Coalition of the Willing, Australia and the U.K. That being said, the film should still be seen by as many Australians as possible. It lifts the lid on an administration which makes the Mafia pale by comparison.
The sheer agony of the war in Iraq, with its harrowing family tragedies among Americans and Iraqis alike, cannot fail to have an effect. The technological dimensions of war have long since eradicated any notion that it offers - if it ever did - a way of resolving human conflict.

The most glaring omission from the film was the story of Depleted Uranium (DU) which is only just beginning to leak into the public domain. Depleted Uranium, a residue from the Nuclear Industry, is now used to coat bullets, shells and rockets. It will instantly penetrate heavy armour, multiplying the impact of conventional ammunition. But it coats the environment in proximity to targets with a dust containing high radiation. The result is a series of diseases and genetic disorders which emerge over subsequent years.
Over half the US troops involved in the first Gulf War, "Desert Storm" have now been struck with "Gulf War Syndrome". A variety of afflictions have appeared, with leukaemia, cancers, tumours, stress disorders and chronic fatigue syndrome. A huge jump in genetic mutations among children of Gulf War veterans has also appeared.

The same ghastly results are appearing among the Iraqi people, now dealing with the victims of the First Gulf War, let alone the Second. In the first, 375 tons of D.U. were used in Iraq. So far, 2,200 tons have been used in the current conflict. It has also been used in Afghanistan and the Balkans with similar health results. Western authorities know this story will break sooner or later. Attempts are being made to clear the environment in Iraq, and bury the evidence - years too late. Thousands of bombed and burnt-out vehicles are massively contaminated - and for every one carried away to "vehicle graveyards" a new one appears from the continual fighting. Contaminated soil is carried away into the desert and blows back into the cities on the desert winds.

Moore's film catalogued in unmistakable fashion the procession of lies, as the story was changed from month to month. It outlined the "state of denial" among many Americans, who preferred to believe the unbelievable sooner than concede the failings of a country they want to believe can do no wrong. The potency of a film such as this will be among the young people who see it, no longer prepared to countenance misplaced patriotism. If you haven't seen it, you should.

Reflecting on what I'd seen, the ABC 7 o'clock News gave reasons for further reflection. Forty distinguished former Australian Ambassadors, consular staff and military leaders, led by former Commander in Chief General Gration, issued a statement deploring the lack of honesty in Australia's government, particularly in committing Australia's troops to war. It was the Australian counterpart to the 50 former British Ambassadors who had chided the Blair government in similar fashion, and the host of prominent former US leaders who have written and spoken in protest against the Bush programme.
If this does not lead to reflective introspection among our elected politicians there is little cause for hope. Our current Prime Minister, who, I believe illegally, took upon himself the personal decision to send Australians to war, has told us he'd "do it all over again". This is the defiance of the incorrigible. But within his own party not one National or Liberal was prepared to risk salary and pension by speaking out on conscience - thus betraying the very responsibility for which each had been entrusted.

Moore's film confirmed, to my mind, the accuracy of the reports On Target has provided on a weekly basis in the period leading up to, during, and since the so-called "end" of the Iraqi war. Much of the material now coming out in the media, in government inquiries and reports, was carried in On Target months, if not years ago. One month ago we reported the remarks of Dr Tom Frame, Anglican Bishop to the Australian Defence Force, who originally supported the commitment of Australians to Iraq. He had the integrity to confess that he had been deceived, concluding: "…Men and women from a country claiming to be civilised have shown that they are just as capable of the barbarism that characterised Saddam's Baathist regime. I continue to seek God's forgiveness for my complicity in creating a world in which this sort of action was ever considered by anyone to be necessary."

It is not weakness to admit to being wrong. It is the beginning of civilised manhood. It is the start of self-respect, which in turn gains the respect of others.
Barbarism? Are we really barbarians? Let's put it another way. Can any of us forego some personal blame for what is happening in the Middle East? Even if we disagreed with what's happening - what did we personally do about it? It's all very well to blame our leaders - the Howards, Bushes, Blairs, Downers of this world. But we put them there and paid the taxes that they used for evil purposes. Repentance is a national, as well as a personal requirement.

Like America, Australia is at the cross-roads. The coming election is important - but our real problem lies deeper. Whoever wins, can the people regain some input into their own future? If not, it will be too late. We have yet to learn that voting for the lesser of two evils is still voting for evil.
In conclusion, perhaps the most haunting scene of all in Farenheit 9/11 was a military patrol in Baghdad, setting out on a Christmas Eve patrol, armed with AK 47s, grenades, walkie-talkies, covered by choppers and artillery using Depleted Uranium shells, to the tune of
"Silent Night, Holy Night, All is calm, all is bright;
Round yon Virgin, Mother and Child -
Holy Infant so tender and mild. Sleep in heavenly Peace!"
That's the supermarket song for selling plastic toys from China, isn't it? Barbarians indeed!

BE ALERT!!! -- BUT NOT ALARMED???

by Francis Elliott
Deputy Political Editor, Independent Digital (UK) 8th August 2004:
Blunkett issues rebuke to Bush on terror alerts: U.K. Home Secretary David Blunkett has issued a barely coded rebuke to President George Bush for issuing a terror alert that resulted in "ridicule". The Home Secretary went on the offensive to explain why Britain did not follow suit when the US administration issued a warning on information that turned out to be four years old.
Ministers and senior figures in the security service are known to have been dismayed at the nakedly political use made of recent intelligence breakthroughs both in the US and in Pakistan.

There was widespread irritation in Whitehall at last Sunday's warnings, repeated by Mr Bush, based on information captured by Pakistani intelligence agencies on al-Qa'eda's preparations for attacks on British and US targets. The British response was markedly more low key, insisting that there was no specific information of an imminent threat: an assessment which looked far more credible as fuller details of the seized information emerged. Mr Blunkett comes close to openly criticising Mr Bush in a newspaper article published today in which he defended his refusal to comment on the latest assessments.

"In the United States there is often high-profile commentary followed, as in the current case by detailed scrutiny, with the potential risk of ridicule," writes Mr Blunkett in The Observer. "Is it really the job of a senior cabinet minister in charge of counter-terrorism? To feed the media? To increase concern? Of course not. This is arrant nonsense."
The remarks follow those made yesterday in which Mr Blunkett drew a contrast between "alerting people to a specific threat and alarming people unnecessarily".

The Home Secretary has clashed with Tom Ridge, the head of the US Department of Homeland Security, before. Mr Ridge is the man who issued last week's warning. He is known to have been furious when Mr Ridge grounded flights around the world causing travel chaos during the Christmas holidays without first warning him.

GRAND JURY HEARS TESTIMONY FROM POWELL

Readers will remember the ground-breaking story of the moves against George Bush and his neo-con cronies by powerful forces in high places by From the Wilderness. It's not that these powerful forces don't agree with the invasion of Iraq, they are just not happy the fools botched the job and in the process 'outed' CIA spy Valerie Plame.
According to the New York Times, 1st August, 2004: The U.S. grand jury investigating the leak of an undercover CIA operative's name has interviewed Secretary of State Colin Powell, but "he is not a subject of the inquiry", reassured State Department spokesman Richard Boucher.
Powell appeared on July 16 at the grand jury's invitation. He is the latest official from the Bush administration to be called.
Both White House counsel Alberto Gonzales and spokesman Scott McClellan have been summoned, and the grand jury investigators have interviewed President Bush and Vice President Dick Cheney.

Readers will remember "the grand jury investigation is to determine who leaked the name of Valerie Plame to syndicated columnist Robert Novak last July. Disclosure of an undercover officer's identity can be a federal crime. Novak revealed Plame's work for the CIA a week after her husband, Joseph Wilson, a former ambassador, criticised Bush's claim in the 2003 State of the Union address that Iraq had tried to obtain uranium from Niger, a major uranium-exporting nation in Africa.
The CIA had sent Wilson to Niger in mid-1992 to check the allegation, and he concluded it was unfounded. The administration has acknowledged that its inclusion in the State of the Union address was a mistake.
In printing Plame's name, Novak wrote that two administration officials said Wilson's wife suggested that he be sent to Niger. Boucher has referred questions about Powell's testimony to the Justice Department because grand jury operations are secret.

ILLUSIONS? NO, JUST THE FOUL SMELL OF THE LIARS

Jon Rappoport -- www.nomorefakenews.com
The game is exposed. The war is exposed. The fighting and dying are exposed. The White House is exposed. The Democrats and Republicans are exposed. The LA Times piece, reprinted below, gives a good idea of what democracy in Iraq and freedom in Iraq will really mean. They will mean what the IMF and WTO have permitted to a number of nations around the world:

Hold 'free' elections, go with a legislature, but don't try to mess with economic (and financial …ed) rules and with outside control of the country.
In other words, everything Bush has been mouthing about bringing democracy to Iraq is a bald sham. There will be no democracy in any significant sense. There was never meant to be a democracy. Bush was lying; Bush is lying; Bush will continue to lie. And Kerry won't make this a campaign issue. He is in the same ballpark as Bush.
No media outlet in the US will pound on this deception. It will sink like a stone. No pundits on the talk shows will raise this issue. It will remain mostly invisible. And young men and women will have fought and died in Iraq for a new freedom there that was never meant to be. This war was, on ground level, about control of Iraq.

"Give us your children; we will send them to Iraq to bring an economic dictatorship to the region."
Imagine an American revolution (1776) that ended with a constitution that was encircled with complete economic control of the new country by the British. Would that have been freedom? This reminds me a bit of the effects of NAFTA (North American Free Trade Agreement..ed) in the last ten years: NO participating nation has benefitted in any significant way. Every nation has lost. The winners have been several transnational corporations, who owe no allegiance to any nation.

The Hand-Over That Wasn't: Illegal Orders give US a Lock on Iraq's Economy
by Antonia Juhasz Los Angeles Times, 6/08/04.
"Officially, the U.S. occupation of Iraq ended on 28th June, 2004. But in reality, the United States is still in charge:
Not only do 138,000 troops remain to control the streets, but the "100 Orders" of L. Paul Bremer III remain to control the economy.
These little noticed orders enacted by Bremer, the now-departed head of the now-defunct Coalition Provisional Authority, go to the heart of Bush administration plans in Iraq. They lock in sweeping advantages to American firms, ensuring long-term U.S. economic advantage while guaranteeing few, if any, benefits to the Iraqi people.
The Bremer orders control every aspect of Iraqi life "from the use of car horns to the privatisation of state-owned enterprises."
Order No. 39 alone does no less than "transition"[Iraq ] from a centrally planned economy to a market economy" virtually overnight and by U.S. fiat.

Although many thought that the "end" of the occupation would also mean the end of the orders, on his last day in Iraq Bremer simply transferred authority for the orders to Prime Minister Iyad Allawi, a 30-year exile with close ties to the CIA and British intelligence.
Further, the interim constitution of Iraq, written by the U.S.-appointed Iraqi Governing Council, solidifies the orders by making them virtually impossible to overturn.

A sampling of the most important orders demonstrates the economic imprint left by the Bush administration:
Order No. 39 allows for:
· Privatisation of Iraq's 200 state-owned enterprises;
· 100% foreign ownership of Iraqi businesses;
· "National treatment" which means no preferences for local over foreign businesses;
· Unrestricted, tax-free remittance of all profits and other funds; and
· 40-year ownership licenses. Thus, it forbids Iraqis from receiving preference in the reconstruction while allowing foreign corporations, Halliburton and Bechtel, for example, to buy up Iraqi businesses, do all of the work and send all of their money home. They cannot be required to hire Iraqis or to reinvest their money in the Iraqi economy. They can take out their investments at any time and in any amount.

Orders No. 57 and No. 77 ensure the implementation of the orders by placing U.S.-appointed auditors and inspector generals in every government ministry, with five-year terms and with sweeping authority over contracts, programs, employees and regulations.

Order No. 17 grants foreign contractors, including private security firms, full immunity from Iraq's laws. Even if they, say, kill someone or cause an environmental disaster, the injured party cannot turn to the Iraqi legal system. Rather, the charges must be brought to U.S. courts.

Order No. 40 allows foreign banks to purchase up to 50% of Iraqi banks.

Order No. 49 drops the tax rate on corporations from a high of 40% to a flat 15%. The income tax rate is also capped at 15%.

Order No. 12 (renewed on Feb. 24) suspends "all tariffs, customs duties, import taxes, licensing fees and similar surcharges for goods entering or leaving Iraq." This led to an immediate and dramatic inflow of cheap foreign consumer products, devastating local producers and sellers who were thoroughly unprepared to meet the challenge of their mammoth global competitors.
Clearly, the Bremer orders fundamentally altered Iraq's existing laws. For this reason, they are also illegal.

Transformation of an occupied country's laws violates the Hague regulations of 1907 (ratified by the United States) and the U.S. Army's Law of Land Warfare. Indeed, in a leaked memo, the British attorney general, Lord Goldsmith, warned Prime Minister Tony Blair that "major structural economic reforms would not be authorized by international law."
With few reconstruction projects underway and with Bremer's rules favouring U.S. corporations, there has been little opportunity for Iraqis to go back to work, leaving nearly 2 million unemployed one and a half years after the invasion and, many believe, greatly fuelling the resistance.
The Bremer orders are immoral and illegal and must be repealed to allow Iraqis to govern their own economic and political future.
Antonia Juhasz is a project director at the "International Forum on Globalization" in San Francisco and a "Foreign Policy in Focus" scholar." (End of Times article.)

· And you think the people of Iraq will accept this system?
· You think they will view this as liberation?
· You think they will feel as if the war has freed them to be independent?
· You think they will paste a fat smile on their faces and accept their new home-grown government as a good thing?

Every piece of rebellion from here on out, of course, will be reported as 'terror attacks' by al Q'aeda and its allies.
Welcome to real politics. As opposed to the **!!**! politics that turns on whether Kerry was a hero on his boat in Vietnam and whether Bush really went AWOL as a soldier and whether Kerry's wife is a weirdo who'll insult foreign dignitaries if she's enscounced in the White House and whether Hillary wants Bush to win so she can run in 2008 before she's too old and whether the people think Kerry or Bush is a stronger leader and whether Bush will get a bigger bounce from the Republican convention than Kerry got out of Boston and whether John Edwards will garner Kerry votes in the south."

Australians are also treated to the same 'rubbish' politics -- just different performers speaking English with different accents. Phoney 'debates'; by phoney 'Australians''; in fact, phoney 'leaders' engaging in phoney 'battles' - all for the consumption and manipulation of the 'sheeple'.

NOT GOOD ENOUGH MR. BUTLER

POLITICAL POWER

BASIC FUND

SENATOR LEN HARRIS' CIRCULAR LETTER

"Once again we face a federal election and there is still no sign of the pro freedom groups uniting to save what little is left of our once great nation
If only the 350 odd groups could forget their differences for long enough to unseat the major parties and then negotiate to resolve their minor conflicts. If we allow the major parties to sign into effect the Free Trade Agreement, the Transnational Firms will be free to farm out Telstra work to Indian and Asian interests. There will be no jobs for our children.
· I ask that we forgive each other for past mistakes and agree to support all individual independents and minor parties who might be loyal to Australia and to Australians.
· I ask that you get your members to agree to put the sitting member of every major party last and to place the other major parties second and third last in order of merit.
· I ask that you contact all independents and ask them to ensure that they allocate preferences along similar lines.
· If your group is not fielding a candidate or supporting a candidate then I ask you to get involved helping any candidate who shows promise. Without help he or she will fail and we will be left with a dismal future.

The mainstream media will give us no voice or denigrate us. One of my constituents has put together ideas to have our say via sticky labels on our vehicles and business. Some of his labels hit home and highlight the problems Australia faces If you take the best of his ideas and add your own labels we can wake Australians to the fact that major parties are not loyal to Australia or to the Australian people."

Editor's comments
It is quite naïve of the smaller groups to think the mainstream media would give them a voice. The mainstream media is but a tool or weapon of the Australian people's real enemies. What make's those small groups think their enemies will let them use their own weapons - turned back upon them?
From what we have seen and heard over the last few years, Senator Len Harris, is actually doing what we expect of our political representatives - serving his people of Queensland.
In South Australia, Richard Deegan, the father of one of the young people who died in the Bali bombing, is putting his money where his mouth is. He is standing for the seat of Mayo against the Liberal's Alexander Downer. I would hope supporters in that electorate will give Richard Deegan all the assistance they can.
Graeme Campbell is running as an Independent candidate for the seat of Kalgoorlie at the next federal election. Supporters in that electorate can also give Graeme the assistance he will need.
What is the limited objective in all of this?
To fragment the two-party power structure of Tweedle Dee and Tweedle Dumber.
The League of Rights does not seek power, but constantly encourages Australians to understand the absolutely fundamental importance of the divisions, separations and balances of Power.

LETTERS TO THE EDITORS

It is NOT the business of the state: Editor, Melbourne Age: Dear Sir,
It is amazing to learn that the Knesset, Israel's parliament, is in the process of passing a law to enable Israel to demand the extradition to its territory of anyone anywhere who "denies the Holocaust".
It is not the business of the state - or of any nation state - to censor public discussion of history or of any aspect of history, the Holocaust included.
Israel's action also involves an attempt to extend Israeli legal jurisdiction beyond reasonable bounds and amounts to an attempt to intrude upon the sovereignty and integrity of other nations.
It is to be hoped that the Prime Minister will publicly state that Australia will never engage in such extraditions as are proposed and that he will rebuke Israel for its overweening presumption.
In the meantime a concern now exists that the Attorney-General's proposed new national defamation laws disallowing truth as a complete defence and allowing the dead to sue may be a step towards enabling such extraditions.
The same concern pertains to peculiarly strong "anti-vilification" law now proposed by the WA Government after a minor series of incidents involving asinine defacement of buildings apparently by a small group of misfits who were easily rounded up and can be easily punished under existing laws, if found guilty. Mr Howard must clear the air in this context without delay. Nigel Jackson, Belgrave, Victoria.

When the Mortgagees demand their pound of flesh: Editor, Ballarat Courier, 2nd August, 2004:
Jane Burke is splitting hairs when she tries to quarantine public debt from private and corporate debt (Letters August 2).
The unpalatable fact is that Australia is in debt to overseas interests to the tune of $400 billion plus. When the mortgagees demand their pound of flesh, as they did in Argentina a couple of years ago, they are not going to care who owes what.
When John Howard took over tenancy of "The Lodge" he was called before the international bankers who told him what was required to ensure that the nation would continue to be bankrolled. The conditions were that a GST be introduced and everything not bolted down be privatised.
When the tenancy is taken over by the Labor leader, whoever that might be, what will be the new demands? Reduce pensions? Cut road funding?
Demands there will be since the dismantling of our tariff wall has ensured that our overseas debt will continue to balloon, a very large proportion of it being interest on the previous debt.
Ron Fischer Ballarat, Victoria.

THE SYDNEY FORUM IS COMING UP

BOOKS, BOOKS, BOOKS

"Howard's War" by Alison Broinowski. Why did John Howard lead Australia into a highly unpopular war with Iraq? The war has cost Australians more than $700 million, so far, but has predictably made Iraq and its neighbours more unstable - and hasn't delivered any of the results our leaders 'promised'. How could it have been 'in Australia's interests' when it has made us a target for terrorism and put us at odds with our Asian neighbours? John Howard mightn't have revealed his real reasons for going to war but this book does.
Price: $23.95 posted.

"Guantanamo: What the World Should Know" by Michael Ratner and Ellen Ray. David Hicks' Australian lawyer Stephen Kenny has written as Introduction to the book. "Make no mistake, Guantanamo is a prison where cruel and inhuman and degrading treatment - even torture as we know - is practised, and it is utterly illegal," writes Michael Ratner. He warns his readers, "Alarm bells should be ringing throughout the West. Liberty, democracy and the right of dissent are at stake. The recently deceased former president Ronald Reagan called the Soviet Union -- "The Evil Empire". Is America turning into a fascist state? It is just incredible the way human beings can justify their own barbaric actions! This is a must read. Price: $30.00 posted.

"Not Happy, John" by Margo Kingston. In the triumphant first-flush of toppling Saddam Hussein, John Howard invited George Bush the President of the United States to visit our shores and speak on the matter which had so bitterly divided the nation. She writes on that presidential visit: "…what I experienced on 23 and 24 October last year made me fear for our democracy's future. I saw a Parliament on its collective knees before a condescending Imperial Caesar, led by a lame provincial governor of a Prime Minister so blind to the duties of his own democratic office, so unmoved by the issues still rending his own people, that he turned what might have been a healing thank-you visit into just another vehicle for his own ambitions. I saw him do so at the expense of Westminster traditions and norms of civilised behaviour that I'd thought were above partisan politics. I saw elected politicians - elected by us, the Australian people - shouted down, physically manhandled and viciously abused."
That day, John Howard, 'conservative imposter disguised in ill-fitting Menzies hand-me-downs' kow-towing to the Imperial Caesar, "had left the public service in ruins -- reduced to mere caterers, lackies, careerists and political stooges." She saw, "The castrated press gallery was largely oblivious to what was happening to our democracy before their very eyes on their own professional beat". $30 posted.