As a result of the sedition being broadcast - no thanks to Telstra - on this site, John, you have been promoted to 'enemy combatant' status. Kindly stay where you are until further notice.

It's good to see that other rats are being flushed out of hiding, too.

Take these traitors, for example, Diaspora Jews urged to find collective voice:

... Mr Richter, who lived in Israel until he was 13, said there was no longer a question of whether Israel had a right to exist. But when some of the country's actions meant anti-Semitic sentiment was directed towards those living outside the Jewish state, the diaspora community had the right to criticise, he said. ...

The natural trend to conform cannot be resisted. It's a law of nature. 

From the New York Times

[http://www.nytimes.com/2006/08/29/washington/29cnd-broadcast.html?hp&ex=1156910400&en=4297aef454414ef4&ei=5094&partner=homepage|Inquiry Criticizes] U.S. Broadcasting Official Over Hiring
By STEPHEN LABATON
Published: August 29, 2006
WASHINGTON, Aug. 29 — State Department investigators have concluded that Kenneth Y. Tomlinson, the head of the federal agency that oversees most government broadcasts to foreign countries, improperly hired a friend on the public payroll for nearly $250,000 over two and a half years, according to a summary of their report made public this afternoon by Democratic Congressional staff members.
They also said that Mr. Tomlinson, whose job puts him in charge of the Voice of America and Radio Free Europe, used his government office for personal business, including running a “horse racing operation” in which he supervised a stable of thoroughbreds he named after leaders from Afghanistan, including President Hamid Karzai and the late Ahmed Shah Massoud, that have raced at tracks across the United States. They also said that Mr. Tomlinson repeatedly used government employees to do his personal errands and that he billed the government for more days of work than the rules permit.

Read more at [http://www.nytimes.com/2006/08/29/washington/29cnd-broadcast.html?hp&ex=1156910400&en=4297aef454414ef4&ei=5094&partner=homepage|he New York Times]
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Gus: what will be the punishment? A slap on the wrist or a promotion as an ambassador somewhere posh like Paris?

Let's Bomb Bomb Iran

From the New York Times

Bush Plans Speeches on Terrorism

By ANNE E. KORNBLUT
Published: August 30, 2006
NASHVILLE, Aug. 30 — With the midterm elections coming into view, President Bush is [http://www.nytimes.com/2006/08/30/washington/30cnd-bush.html?hp&ex=1156996800&en=bd09ee7c472d4186&ei=5094&partner=homepage|launching an extended publicity tour] to draw attention back to the threat of terrorism, quickly pivoting to more comfortable political territory for him after the focus in recent days on the anniversary of Hurricane Katrina.
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Gus: How much longer is this imbecile going to terrorise us? Gees... "Comfortable political territory"????? Is that a sofa in the lounge room of the White House? "Threat" of terrorism... ???? Threat??? How much more tight-arsing can we do without dying from constipation??? This moron is preparing to bomb someone somewhere — playing pin the tail on a donkey to choose a target — and he wants us to be afraid of the reactions? Gives us a break! Relentless stupid rubbish! Unfortunately, the silly sabre-rattling of this idiot is not conducive to solving problems, is it? And we've given him the key to the weapons cabinet!!! Comfort???

 

 

from the Centre for American Progress ….. 

"Almost from the beginning of Bush's presidency," two groups within the administration - realists seeking to curb Iran's nuclear ambitions, and ideologues more interested in regime change -- have been "waging an intense struggle over Iran, while the U.S. government went month after month without an official policy." Iran has not sat idly by. "While the U.S. has been playing poker in the region, Iran has been playing chess," says Nadim Shehadi of the British think tank Chatham House, which has issued a report stating there is "little doubt that Iran has been the chief beneficiary of the war on terror in the Middle East." Tomorrow, U.S. policy towards Iran will enter a new phase, as Iran will likely ignore a U.N. Security Council deadline to suspend aspects of its nuclear program, and the Bush administration will begin a press for targeted sanctions. But sanctions will not solve the problem, particularly with oil at $70 per barrel. On the current course, Iran will become a nuclear weapons power if it wants to. The Bush administration urgently needs to commit to harnessing all elements of U.S. power to curb Iran's nuclear ambitions, including tough sustained diplomacy, which Vice President Cheney and others seem determined to avoid. As Sen. Chuck Hagel (R-NE) said recently, the alternative -- a military strike on Iran - would be "disastrous, catastrophic," and "would inflame the Middle East in ways we can’t imagine today.”

Last week, staff on the House Intelligence Committee released a "garishly illustrated and luridly written document" implying that Iran is "developing nuclear weapons a lot faster than intelligence agencies have the guts to admit." The report was not considered by the full committee, but instead released by committee chairman Pete Hoekstra (R-MI), who last June was trumpeting intelligence that he claimed was evidence of the long-sought Iraqi WMD (an assertion that even the Pentagon rejected out of hand). The report's lead author was Frederick Fleitz, "who did his apprenticeship on politicization" beneath then-Under Secretary of State John Bolton during the run-up to war in Iraq, "and became his principal aide and chief enforcer while on loan from the CIA." While serving under Bolton, Fleitz notoriously wrote in a private email that he had "explained" to a State Department intelligence analyst that it was "a political judgment as to how to interpret" data on WMD (in Cuba, in this case) and that the intelligence community "should do as we asked." Fleitz's new report on Iran apparently contains multiple significant factual errors, and seems intended to signal to the intelligence community that congressional leadership "wants scarier assessments that would justify a more confrontational approach to Tehran," even if the facts don't justify it. But it also likely serves a political function; as the New York Times notes, the report is "partly a campaign document" designed to carry out a "strategy of scaring Americans" just two months before the midterm elections.

Sound, comprehensive intelligence is desperately needed on Iran. Senate Intelligence Committee Chairman Pat Roberts (R-KS) has warned that “we have not made the progress on our oversight of Iran intelligence, which is critical,” and Roberts' staff director Bill Duhnke says there is "no organized commit­tee staff effort to look at Iran right now." Rep. Jane Harman (D-CA), the ranking member on the House Intelligence Committee, has said "our sources are stale and our case is thin" on Iran. Nevertheless, neoconservatives continue to loudly beat the drums for war in Iran. Weekly Standard editor William Kristol, who has argued that Iranians would embrace a U.S. attack, predicted recently that "we could be in a military confrontation with Iran much sooner than people expect." The National Review's Stanley Kurtz declares, "The lesson is that we face two choices: preemptive war with Iran, or a nightmare world on the brink of nuclear war and nuclear terror for the foreseeable future." Yet the "consensus among U.S. intelligence agencies" is that Iran is "about a decade away" from acquiring a nuclear weapon, meaning that the situation today is "not a nuclear bomb crisis, it is a nuclear regime crisis." In that case, what is needed is clear, accurate intelligence and the ability to exercise every economic, political, and diplomatic option on the table to persuade Iran that developing nuclear weapons is not in its long-term interest.

It appears increasingly unlikely that the U.N. Security Council will vote to impose sanctions on Iran if it misses its deadline tomorrow. Preparing for this possibility, the Bush administration has reportedly spent several weeks organizing an independent coalition of European and Asian countries "to freeze Iranian assets and restrict trade." This is a positive step that could demonstrate a degree of international solidarity over Iran's nuclear ambitions, and make clear there is at least a minimum price to pay for flaunting the United Nations and the International Atomic Energy Association. But the apparent failure to persuade Russia and China to support initial sanctions against Iran falls directly in the lap of U.N. Ambassador John Bolton, whose diplomatic skills have proved dangerously incompetent. Moreover, the reliance on a "coalition of the willing" highlights "the current weakness of Washington's position because of its controversial role in a series of conflicts in the Middle East."

The UN Nuclear watchdog, the
IAEA, has protested to the US government over a report on Iran’s nuclear
program, calling it “erroneous” & “misleading”.

The US Report was prepared by the
staff of the Permanent Select Committee On Intelligence of the US House of
Representatives. Dated August 23, 2006, the Report is entitled Recognising
Iran As A Strategic Threat: An Intelligence Challenge For The United States.

In its letter of September 12,
2006, the IAEA
said the US Congressional Report contained serious distortions of the agency’s
own findings on Iran’s nuclear activities & that the IAEA took “strong
exception to the incorrect and misleading assertion" that the IAEA removed
senior safeguards inspector Chris Charlier for "allegedly raising concerns
about Iranian deception" over its programme.

It said Mr Charlier had been removed
at the request of Tehran, which has the right to make such an objection under
agreed rules between the agency and all states. He remains head of a section
investigating Iran, the IAEA says.

The letter went on to brand
"outrageous & dishonest" a suggestion in the report that he was
removed for not adhering "to an unstated IAEA policy barring IAEA
officials from telling the whole truth" about Iran.

A Western diplomat called it
"deja vu of the pre-Iraq war period".

The IAEA & the US clashed
over intelligence that Saddam Hussein had weapons of mass destruction in the
lead-up to the war in Iraq in March 2003.

‘Western nations have foiled a bid by Arab and Islamic states to declare Israel's reputed nuclear arsenal a threat that must be removed in a politically charged vote at a UN atomic watchdog meeting. Canada sponsored a 45-29 "no-action" ballot that prevented International Atomic Energy Agency member states from voting on a motion demanding Israel use atomic energy only for peaceful purposes and help set up a Middle East nuclear arms-free zone.

But the gathering voted 89-2 for a milder resolution on Israel, also initiated by Arab states, "affirming the urgent need for all states in the Middle East to accept full-scope IAEA safeguards on all their nuclear activities". Israel neither admits nor denies having atomic weapons but most experts believe it has about 200 nuclear warheads. Feverish negotiations failed to dissuade Arab delegates from pushing the two resolutions to a vote due to heightened resentment over Israel's battering of south Lebanon in war with Iranian-backed Hezbollah guerrillas.

Diplomats said many Arabs were fuming at the West's perceived slowness to stop Israel's heavy bombing of Lebanon that killed mainly civilians before an Aug 14 ceasefire imposed by a UN Security Council resolution.’

Western Nations Foil Bid To Declare Israel Nuke 'Threat'

‘The Bush administration’s current confrontation with Iran over what it claims is that nation’s nuclear weapons development program raises the question: Can the disarmament of one country occur in isolation from the disarmament of others?

That question seemed to be answered by the nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT) of 1968. Signed by almost all countries of the world, including the United States, it provided that the non-nuclear nations would forgo building nuclear weapons, while the nuclear nations would divest themselves of their own nuclear weapons.

But, upon taking office, the Bush administration quickly abandoned the U.S. commitment to the NPT. It withdrew the United States from the Anti-Ballistic Missile Treaty, moved forward with the deployment of a national missile defense system (a revised version of the Reagan administration’s “Star Wars” program), and opposed ratification of the Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty (negotiated and signed by President Clinton). Furthermore, it dropped negotiations for nuclear arms control and disarmament and, instead, pressed Congress to authorize the building of new U.S. nuclear weapons – for example, the nuclear “bunker buster” and “mini-nukes.”’

Disarmament Is a Two-Way Street

‘The aircraft carrier Eisenhower, accompanied by the guided-missile cruiser USS Anzio, guided-missile destroyer USS Ramage, guided-missile destroyer USS Mason and the fast-attack submarine USS Newport News, is, as I write, making its way to the Straits of Hormuz off Iran. The ships will be in place to strike Iran by the end of the month. It may be a bluff. It may be a feint. It may be a simple show of American power. But I doubt it.

War with Iran - a war that would unleash an apocalyptic scenario in the Middle East - is probable by the end of the Bush administration. It could begin in as little as three weeks. This administration, claiming to be anointed by a Christian God to reshape the world, and especially the Middle East, defined three states at the start of its reign as "the Axis of Evil." They were Iraq, now occupied; North Korea, which, because it has nuclear weapons, is untouchable; and Iran.

Those who do not take this apocalyptic rhetoric seriously have ignored the twisted pathology of men like Elliott Abrams, who helped orchestrate the disastrous and illegal contra war in Nicaragua, and who now handles the Middle East for the National Security Council. He knew nothing about Central America. He knows nothing about the Middle East. He sees the world through the childish, binary lens of good and evil, us and them, the forces of darkness and the forces of light. And it is this strange, twilight mentality that now grips most of the civilian planners who are barrelling us towards a crisis of epic proportions.’

Does Bush Think War With Iran Is Preordained?

‘Israel's ambassador to the urged the UN Security Council to take tough measures against "demented" for its nuclear program in the wake of North Korea's declared atomic test.

"The international community should learn the lessons of what occurred in North Korea," Danny Gillerman told army radio. "North Korea was only the preview. Iran will be the feature film, which, if no one takes serious action, will be projected throughout the whole world."’

Israel Calls For Tough UN Action On 'Demented' Iran

meanwhile, on the other side of the world, the hypocritical Zionist pot was busily calling the kettle black …..

‘More than a dozen Arab countries were blocked by a Canadian motion in their bid to have a vote on a resolution labelling Israel's nuclear capabilities a threat on the final day of the International Atomic Energy Agency's annual meeting.

The draft resolution that also called upon Israel to join the Nuclear Non-proliferation Treaty was blocked from going to a vote Friday by the Canadian delegate.

Israel's ambassador to the IAEA said efforts to bring security to the Middle East should be focused on peace efforts, not necessarily arms control.

"The fundamental goal in the Middle East, as in other regions, is obtaining regional peace, security and stability, not arms control per se," Israel Michaeli said.’

Canada Blocks Bid By Arab Countries For Vote Israel's Nuclear Capabilities

‘President Bush reportedly said he would "understand" a pre-emptive Israeli strike against Iran's nuclear sites.  

Maariv, citing diplomatic sources, reported Thursday that French President Jacques Chirac discussed Iran s nuclear program with Bush on the sidelines of the recent UN summit.’

Bush 'Would Understand' Attack On Iran