Tag: diplomacy

National Security, Anti-Americanism, The “War on Terror” and new methods in public diplomacy

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Pentagon Lies Persist Unchecked

The #8 story on Project Censored‘s list for 2007 is the revelation that the Pentagon is not compelled to comply with the 40-year-old Freedom of Information Act.

According to articles written in 2005, the Pentagon spent much of the year seeking “immunity” from FOIA requests. In November 2005, blogger Michael Petrelis did democracy a favor by submitting an FOIA request for the details of the number of FOIA requests submitted to the Pentagon between 2000 and 2005 from the top news publications. He publicized the results, which are detailed in this Raw Story column. (Bottom line: USA Today, WSJ, and NYT — all with circulations over 1 million, submitted a combined total of 36 requests of the Pentagon over the 5-year period).

In December 2005, according to the non-profit Newspaper Association of America Web site, President Bush authorized full exemption to the Defense Intelligence Agency (DIA).

However, a Lexis search for “pentagon” and “foia” in the full text of all major papers (indexed by Lexis-Nexis) since January 2006 garnered a measly 9 results. Maybe this year we WILL take Project Censored’s leads?

multi-national force iraq slide from press briefingA front-page story in the Sept. 10 L.A. Times does exactly this, in Patrick J. O’Donnell’s disturbing “Why the Numbers Don’t Add Up in Iraq“:

“We typically characterize trends in ways that do not divulge raw data,” explained a military spokesman, Lt. Col. Barry Johnson.

This combination of misinformation and a lack of transparency — even at higher levels — explains exactly how Maj. Gen. William B. Caldwell can report to a room of “Operation Forward Together” officials and the press that sectarian violence and deaths are DEcreasing in Iraq. And, naturally, there are no questions asked or reasons for him to qualify this statement in spite of simultaneous figures from Baghdad morgues revealing that the body count actually tripled during the month of August. (The above graphic was presented by Caldwell Sept. 6).

The Washington Post Sept. 8 headline, “ Baghdad Body Count Nearly Triples comes just a week after the Post marquee: (via AP and citing “preliminary Health Ministry figures”), “Violent Deaths in Iraq Dropped in August.”

Not till well after multiple Pentagon press releases were published nationwide as unquestionable fact, did a spokesman step up and clarify (via McClatchy) numbers in the official tabulation did NOT include the scores of civilians killed in car bombings and mortar attacks — deaths that in fact WERE most likely related to “sectarian violence.”

There are a million different ways to account for — and to count — the dead. But to categorically not count the dead?

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Post-9/11 Xenophobia

Liz Losh and Ann Bartow at Sivacracy point out some impressive artistic displays of the expansion of anti-Arab xenophobia as perpetrated by Hollywood since (and prior to) Sept. 11, ’01. Losh:

…[T]he website of The Path to 9/11 has a sickening clip called “How to Create a Riot” on its video menu.

You can learn about the village in Morocco, Ouarzazate, that Hollywood relies upon to produce its cultural cliches and the three generations of extras who inhabit the place. Its history on celluloid apparently goes back to Lawrence of Arabia! This documentary by Ali Essafi tells you more.

Bartow directs us to Jackie Salloum‘s enlightening (and award-winning) 9-minute “Planet of the Arabs” Check it out:

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ABC’s Controversial Mini-Series

It’s an insult, a pity, and an embarassment that ABC insists on airing “The Path to 9/11.” Despite pleas to pull it from Bill Clinton, Harry Reid, and others, Disney president and CEO Robert A. Iger is not backing down
mohammed atta the mouseketeer via americablog
ThinkProgress is leading the charge in asking readers to Tell ABC to pull “The Path to 9/11.”. Sheldon Rampton scrutinizingly details fiction in this post.

One of the most upsetting twists to this story, is that Scholastic has actually partnered with ABC to present discussion guides and class materials to contribute to the brainwashing of schoolchildren.

John at Americablog has the post of the week right here. “The Path to Mickey” is an historical look at bias and racism at Disney. Just like ABC’s 9/11 “docudrama“, John warns it is strictly a dramatization.

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Why Does President Bush Hate the Cubs?

Not long after repeating statements attributed to Osama bin Laden in an address on the “Global War on Terror,” President Bush welcomed members of the St. Louis Cardinals to the White House.

I was shocked to hear that Bush repeated the name of the still-at-large al Qaeda leader no less than 17 times in a 45 minute speech — apparently losing sight of the fact that bin Laden is only happy as a Hitler to have his rhetoric repeated and disseminated by the man who put a $50 million price tag on his head.

But what really killed me was this: In the thick of all world events, Bush was able to remember that Cardinals backup catcher, Cub-killer and otherwise hack, Gary Bennett, hit a walk-off grand slam last week against the Cubs:

“He’s one of the most powerful men in the world. He’s got a lot more important things on his mind,” Bennett said. “To remember something relatively meaningless in the grand scheme of things … it’s pretty impressive.”

bin laden... Cubs fan???I’m surprised the president didn’t slip during his speech and warn the National League of an imminent threat should Osama bin Laden himself buy out the Cubs from the Tribune and re-stock their pitching staff and lineup accordingly.

While Bush seems to have already forgotten about recent Supreme Court demands on the executive branch to curttail domestic surveillance and examine the use of military tribunals in breach of Geneva Conventions in a more conventional sense, his lord only knows how happy he is to find that the true saviors of the universe — the Chicago Cubs — have fallen into last place.