Bush Disinformation • •
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WfJRNERS 'ANfiIJARIJ 50¢ No. 856 , €<§::>C-701 14 October 2005 Judith Miller and Bush Disinformation • • I~~' --I!aJ. - AFP Ig les DPA an mperia isl ar Iraq today threatens to completely unr,l\el under the hlood) L.S. llL'Cupa Down With tion. More than -l-.()OO ci\ilians hale been killed in Baghdad alone since April. The U.S. Occupation number of American dead in Iraq is clo\ ing in on 2,O()(). \Vith the approal'h of tht' of Iraq! October 15 "'referendum" on the Iraqi constitution, the daily toll of car bomh OCTOBER 7-,\;,1'\\ }(II-A: Ji"IlIC,1 repl)rter ings and other deadly attacks i, inneas Judith ;'.,Jilkr \\~dked out of pri~on laq ing, as i~ the terror campaign carried out \Ieek after being held for nearly three hy C.S. forces in predominantl) Sunni months for refusing to testify before a areas. Illustrating the farcical nature nf grand jury ime,tigating the outing orCIA the "referendum:' earlier this \\ eek thc clgent Valerie Plame. The entire time, her prm isional Iraqi parliament rell rotl' ho,ses at the Tillles portra~ed -'filler as a the rules to make it all but impos<;ihle for martyr in the CIlI,C of the "frl'e pre,ss." the Sunni population, whose inten:sl'> the But in Lcd, ~hller was freed because she document makes deCided I) secondary til had promised that she would immediately those of the Shi' ites and Kurd,. to \ ok it te,tify before the grand jury. down. Thl' mO\e was quickly scuttled as \fany liberals and leftists took up U.S. and UN officials worried that it l'.li1ler's cause on the ground of freedom would hlow up in the face of the U.S. of the press. But what the Miller affair and its Iraqi puppeb. Mearmhile, occu is about is not such a First Amendment AP pation authorities are preparing the show right. It is about the U.S. government lies u.s. troops brutalize Iraqis, April 2003. Top left: Colin Powell at UN pushing lie trial of Saddam Hussein, Rest assured of Saddam Hussein's "weapons of mass of "weapons of mass destruction," February 2003. Top right: Bush beating that his rise to power through the killing destruction" that were a pretext for the war drums at UN, September 2002. of Iraqi Communists and his collabora hloody U.S. war and occupation of Iraq, tion \\ ith Donald Rumsfeld during tht' \Ihich Miller and the TillieI' shamelessly the way for the Iraq \var through eight other key administration figures. Reagan administration will not be among pun eyed. years of bombing attacks and a star\'ation In a transparent attempt to divert atten the evidence used against him. It is today a cOl1lmonplace that George embargo. And the Democratic Party-the tion from these problems, and from his Such is the ""democracy" that the Amer Bush and his cronies are contemptible other party of U.S. imperialism-largely plummeting poll figures. Bush stirred the ican imperialist statc, already a prison liars on a \ ast scale. From the myth that \'oted to grant Bush a blank check to pot of the "war on terror" in a major house for the black population at home, Saddam Hu,sein \\orked hand in glo\T wage lIar against Iraq. But then the impe speech on October 0. The same day, New declares it has brought to Iraq. One rea \Iith AI Qaeda in carrying out the crimi rialist occupation got into deep trouble. York City imposed a "terror alert" in the son that liberal politicians and newspapers nal World Trade Center attack to the last year. the John Kerry campaign sub\lay s) stem. Typically, Democratic such as the N('\\' Yurk Tililes are today h<lnkrupt as\ertion that Iraq possessed argued that the Democrats could carry out Senate leader Harry Reid responded to more openly critical of the Bush admin 'lllckpiles of "\\ eapon, of mass destruc the occupation in a more "r~,ponsiblc" Bush's speech by saying that "the admin istration is that the Iraq dcbacle and tiun" ~Ind the LlI1tastic notion that it lIas \\ay by looking for more support from istration', mishandling of the lIar in Iraq the re\ elations of torture of prisoners at ,)[1 the \ erge of de,,:ll)ping nuclear \". eap- other impcrialist pOllers as well a\ the has made us less \afe." This is the standard 'Abu Ghraib, Guantanamo and othcr L.S. 1l1l'-IlO fal,ificatilln \\ as too outrageous CN and deploy ing more troops to Iraq. complaint rai,ed b) the Democrats mer militar) prison camps arc undermining for the,e cynics and their lackey s in the Toda) the Democrats, even as the) con Bush's Iraq policy: that it has encouraged thl' global "'\1 ar on terror" h) shredding l'~lpilali,t press if it could \el'\e the pur tinue to \ote for funciing measures fur the "terrorists" as \\ell as di\ ertcd re.,ources the notion that Washington is pur,uing plhe llj preparing the LS. population for m:cupation, smell opportunitie\ 0\ er the alIa) from the "\\ ar on terroL" The repres "cll'mocracy" in Iraq and Afghanistan. the \1 ~Ir. George Bush probahly ne\er mounting troubles uf the Bush adminis ,il e mL'asures enactcd after the Septem In the Afghani,wn and Traq \\<11'<;. rl'~ld ,\f(ill Kumpf. hut hc dearly \\ mild tration: popular outrage O\er if'; handling ber I I terror attacks arc the gO\ erIlment"s the Sparlacist league took a side I'or apprel'iate Hitler's l'"planation that the of the Gulf Coast disaster: financial 'L'an attempt to carr) out a qualitati\ l' diminu the military defense of these COUll tries "hig lie" can he so etlecti\(: because, for dais embroiling Tom Delay and other tion of democratic rights, aimed not only again\t imperialist attack. At the same thc common folk, "it would ne\ er come leading Republicans: the Plame imestiga at immigrants hut at blal'k Pl'Ople and the time, \\e stood in irreconcilable political il1lo their hcads to fabricate colossal tion that has 'pread to Karl ROle and \lurking cla" as a \1 hole. COl/filiI/cd 01/ fl({gc 8 untruth,. and the\' \\ould not b~lie\e that other, L'lllild haIL' the impudence to elis tort the truth ,0 infamously." Dcmocratic Pelrt) politician<; cOlllplain ahout hOIl thc) II ere duped b) BLhh into From Berlin to Moscow supporting the \1 ar. But the administra tit'n', fahrications \\cre tran'parent as the \Iar \\a\ approaching. It lIas the Demo LTatiL' Clinton administratiun that pa\cd The ICL's Fight Against 4 1 Capitalist Co~nterrevolution Page 4 7 2527411810301 7 Editorial Note William Bennett: A Swine for All Seasons Republican bigwig William Bennett he "ventured into this area glibly and fool VjrtI..les. His high-toned "cultural" facade expressed the deep racist contempt for and said on his September 28 "Morning in ishly. Big mistake." Mistake? Is "oops" an notwithstanding. upholding racial oppres cruelty toward black people that defines America" radio show: "If you wanted to acceptable response to a bourgeois politi sion is the real motive behind Bennett's the American capitalist order. whether reduce crime. you could-if that were cal insider's expression of a Ku Klux Klan constant plugging of anti-scientific bio under Republican or Democratic rule. your sole purpose. you could abort every and Nazi genocidal fantasy? logical determinism. which originated as "Genocide U.S.A." (WV No. -1-63. 2 I Octo black baby in this country. and your crime Bennett's all-sided reactionary views are a justification for slavery. Ifs known as ber 1988) is how we headlined a 1988 arti rate would go down." Bennett hypo matched by his deeds on behalf of the the 'American school" of anthropology. cle addressing bipartisan plans to gut wel critically intoned that thi s would be "an U.S. gmernment.In the 19805, as Ronald The scientist Stephen Jay Gould exposed fare that \\ ere promoted particularly by impossible, ridiculous. and morally rep Reagan's Secretary of Education. the this fallacious theory, by which black peo New York Democratic Senator Daniel Moy rehensible thing to do." But the murder Catholic anti-abortion bigot Bennett was a ple are continually denounced as "inher nihan. And welfare was giwn its death ous racism of Bennett's statement was crusading general in the "culture wars." ently" criminal or inferior. "while the cor blow by Democrat Bill Clinton. the great obvious-and it was unusual only for its whipping up opprobrium against people ruption and violence of some congressmen pretender to partisanship of black people. brazen nakedness. with AIDS as sinners who deserved what and presidents provoke no similar theory" As Labor Black League spokesman To the extent that the capitalist media they got. As "drug czar" under George (The MislIleaslire 01 Man, 1981). Don Cane stated at a Bay Area October I has wagged a finger at Bennett. it was Bush Sr., he presided over the drive to In 2002. former Senate Republican rally initiated by the Partisan Defense mainly for his audacity. He openly blurted send thousands of black and Latino youth majority leader Trent Lott got caught hail Committee against government repres out what many in the ruling class and its to prison. ing Strom Thurmond's 1948 "Dixiecrat" sion: "We live in a class society ruled by political establishment usually say only in Bennett pulls dmvn hefty speaking fees presidential run. an open stand by South criminals who talk absurdities as they private.