“Our republic and its press will rise and fall together. A cynical, mercenary, demographic press will produce in time a people as base as itself.

“In the case of Habib, in the end the administration decided they didn’t want to use all of the information they had available to them & that was of course for security reasons. Bearing in mind they weren’t in a position to proceed with a prosecution in the military commission, we thought it appropriate that he should come back to Australia.

Congratulations.

Well done.

It must be truly edifying to know that Weapons Of Mass Destruction have finally been found, not only in Iraq, but in Afghanistan as well.

Corrupt & squalid fear merchants schemed to keep the Cold War alive for two decades, before coming-up with a new, improved scam to prey on our fears: the endless War on Terror.

Bush, Blair & Howard have enhanced their political power by deceitfully capitalizing on this new fear meme. And so our second-rate political leaders, incapable of addressing the real global challenges that confront mankind, have morphed into spiritual warriors who will just keep us safe.

I refer to your press release of May 8, 2005 regarding the 60^th anniversary of VE Day.

“As we commemorate VE Day 2005, we should join to give thanks for the relative peace of the past sixty years and recommit ourselves to the universal values of freedom and democracy.

"Our position is that whatever grievances a nation may have, however objectionable it finds the status quo, aggressive warfare is an illegal means for settling those grievances or for altering those conditions."

Supreme Court Justice Robert Jackson

American Prosecutor at the Nuremberg Trials

I Would Find A Way .....

...Fighting the “pork-barrelling-libbos

"The London Times reports that the British government and the United States government had secretly agreed to attack Iraq in 2002, before authorization was sought for such an attack in Congress, and had discussed creating pretextual justifications for doing so."

US Congressman John Conyers has written to President George Bush seeking his response to these explosive revelations.

Thank God for ‘truth, justice & the American way’.

It is now clear that the diminutive US Private, Lynndie England, aided & abetted by half a dozen of her erstwhile comrades, cunningly perpetrated an obscene reign of terror, torture & murder on unsuspecting US detainees across the globe: all without the knowledge of her chain of command superiors.

Can you imagine the BBC & other major broadcasters apologizing to a rogue regime which practices racism & ethnic cleansing; which has “effectively legalized the use of torture

In this programme, Andrew Gilligan examines the CIA’s practice of abducting terrorist suspects & transferring them to states such as Egypt & Syria, where torture is routine. The programme also exposes the British government’s refusal to condemn the use of torture by the government of Uzbekistan, for the sake of the ‘evidence’ it produces: ‘selling our souls for dross’, in the words of the former British Ambassador.

As we busy ourselves for our traditional ANZAC celebrations, in memory of those servicemen & women who gave their lives on our behalf, perhaps we should reflect on the values imbued in that fine tradition & what they really mean to us today?

On the second anniversary of the Iraq war, Panorama reveals how several of the claims Tony Blair made in public during the build up to the war – and afterwards – conflict with what we now know was going on behind the scenes, as evidenced for instance by government officials and documents.

“The United States is committed to the worldwide elimination of torture and we are leading this fight by example. I call on all governments to join with the United States . . . in prohibiting, investigating, and prosecuting all acts of torture."

George W. Bush

United Nations International Day in Support of Victims of Torture: June 26, 2003

SMH Letters