SUBWAY HOAX
WAR ON IRAN?
‘MY SON IS DYING’

Returning from a shoot in Washington, D.C., for a film I am doing on the Credit Squeeze, I found myself back underground, back on the New York subway, wondering again about that big terror plot I had been so skeptical about.

There were no cops in sight, no palpable anxiety. Was I right to have been so suspicious that we had been misled again? I was still not 100% sure.

Back home, and back on line, I would soon be singing that old “I told you so” refrain, and I wasn’t alone. I must admit, though, that the baby-carriage component of this plot smacked of Hollywood-inspired creativity.

BREAKING NEWS

Informant in Iraq admits information about a terror plot against New York subway was a hoax, sources tell CNN. Details soon”

And then, NBC reported:

NEW YORK — The informant who sparked last week’s New York City subway threat alert has admitted it was a hoax, CNN reported Tuesday.

The network reported that the informant admitted providing false information.

The informant had claimed that al-Qaeda operatives in Iraq were plotting to attack the city’s subways using baby strollers packed with remote-controlled explosives. The reported threat said the attacks could occur as early as last Friday.

Authorities said earlier the interrogation of three suspects arrested by U.S. forces in Iraq has so far produced no information to corroborate a possible threat.

http://www.nbc11.com/print/5083949/detail.html

The lack of corroboration was reported the same evening the attack was announced — days after it was received.

WHOM ARE WE FIGHTING?

How do we assess and understand what is actually happening in Iraq? Whom are we fighting? Why all these threats, day after day? I found this blog entry of interest:

VAN CREVELD’S PREDICTION

Iraq’s insurgency is made up of dozens of different groups, each with their own motivation for fighting. Under this big tent, no one group is dominant. Even the foreign Jihadis under Zarqawi are but a single digit percentage of the total insurgency.

Despite this fragmentation, the insurgency appears to act as a single entity: it probes for weakness, improves its methods, and mounts campaigns. The major reason for this is that Iraq, unlike most of the places we have fought insurgencies, is a relatively modern urbanized environment. It has a cell phone grid, a modern highway system, and Internet connectivity. People have the ability to both communicate and travel quickly throughout the entire country. This high level of connectivity makes possible for the insurgency to combine and recombine into new organizational networks that are similar to what we only see in advanced western settings.

This infrastructure has allowed the insurgents to leapfrog to a new organizational form that is more survivable, inclusive, and innovative than traditional hierarchies (I call this open source insurgency).

http://globalguerrillas.typepad.com/

CNN reports this morning:

Senior U.S. intelligence officials call a letter from al-Qaeda’s No. 2 man to its leader in Iraq, Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, “chilling” because of how “calm, clear and well argued” it is in urging preparation for a U.S. departure from Iraq.

THE WAR CAN BE COVERED

Frank Meagher writes from Paris:

Danny, get a copy of Liberation Tuesday, Oct 11, 2005 The first ever actual photo reportage of the war. 4 pages of explicit photos and commentary. What courage for Serge July to publish this. I’m sure it’s a first worldwide. Greatest anti war campaign ever, in my opinion.

NEW WAR IN THE OFFING, SAY EXPERTS IN THE U.K.

Experts Predict U.S. Attack on Iran

Scott Ritter — ex of the U.S. Marine Corps and former chief U.N. Weapons Inspector in Iraq — was unequivocal. Plans for an attack on Iran are being drawn up and acted upon “right now… as we speak.” In preparation, the U.S. is “already committing acts of war on a daily basis,” including reconnaissance missions and other cross-border operations, some of which are being carried out on its behalf by the terrorist group, the Mojahedin-e Khalq. All of these activities are violations of Iran’s national sovereignty.

Ritter was speaking in London last week on the subject of whether a U.S. attack on Iran is in prospect, on the same evening that the UK Foreign Office accused Iran of being behind all the British troop deaths in Iraq this year. Alongside him were Dan Plesch, a former Senior Research Fellow at the Royal United Services Institute for Defence and Security Studies, and Fred Halliday, Professor of International Relations at LSE. Neither dissented from Ritter’s view.

According to Ritter, events will unfold in a familiar pattern. First, the deception, based around talk of the security threat posed by Iran’s non-existent nuclear weapons. Second, confrontation in the field of international diplomacy. The “EU3″ (Britain, France, Germany) have involved themselves in negotiations with Iran on its nascent civilian nuclear capability that the US has no intention of allowing to succeed. Dan Plesch described one of the offers made to the Iranians that he had been told about by officials involved in the discussions. In return for Iran promising never to pursue any nuclear capability, civilian or military, the U.K. and France alone would promise not to use nuclear weapons against Iran in any conflict. Hardly a sign of serious dialogue taking place.

When the impasse reaches the U.N. Security Council the U.S. will challenge the international community to act, the fraudulent case for war will of course be rejected, at which point unilateral military action will commence. This had been originally planned for June 2005 but was postponed when John Bolton’s nomination to the post of UN ambassador to the U.N. stumbled in Congress. Bolton is central to the diplomatic side of the strategy.

For a full account of the talk given by Ritter, Plesch and Halliday, see:
http://www.democratsdiary.co.uk/

FROM GLOBAL VOICES ONLINE ON GUATEMALA

Hurricane Stan Update from Oscar Mota, by David Sasaki:

I just got done instant messaging with Oscar Mota who has been covering hurricane Stan’s destruction on Guatemala at Guate360 as well as his personal blog, DesdeGuate.com. What follows are translated excerpts from our conversation:

OM: I haven’t personally been affected, but already there are millions out there who are… and look at the approaching weather. One of our biggest
problems is that we’re already a poor country and so many victims have very few resources. 3.5 million victims! They say that so far there have been 600
deaths, but unofficially it’s more like 1,800 to 2,000, but the government still won’t say it. And the financial damages are big — already one billion dollars.

IS IMPEACHMENT ON THE AGENDA?

Poll: Americans Favor Bush’s Impeachment If He Lied about Iraq

By a margin of 50% to 44%, Americans say that President Bush should be impeached if he lied about the war in Iraq, according to a new poll commissioned by AfterDowningStreet.org, a grassroots coalition that supports a Congressional investigation of President Bush’s decision to invade Iraq in 2003.

The poll was conducted by Ipsos Public Affairs, the highly-regarded non-partisan polling company. The poll interviewed 1,001 U.S. adults on October 8-9.

http://www.afterdowningstreet.org/?q=node/3528

HARRIET MIERS — SHE IS SO ‘COOL’

Julian Borger reports in the Guardian:

George Bush’s already uphill struggle to put his nominee, Harriet Miers, in the supreme court got harder yesterday with the publication of personal correspondence that added weight to charges of cronyism. Notes that Ms Miers sent to Mr. Bush in the late 1990s, when he was Texas governor and she was his personal lawyer and the head of the state lottery commission, range from deferential to fawning.

In a typical example, she wrote: “You are the best governor ever — deserving of great respect. All I hear is how great you and Laura are doing. Texas is blessed.”

After an engagement at which Mr. Bush signed an autograph for a girl, Ms Miers gushed: “I was struck by the tremendous impact you have on the children whose lives you touch.” She said he was “cool”.

“I appreciate your friendship and candor,” Mr. Bush wrote back.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/usa/story/0,12271,1590196,00.html

WHO IS MAKING MONEY IN LOUISIANA POST-KATRINA?

See Mike Davis in Le Monde Diplomatique (Paris):
http://MondeDiplo.com/2005/10/02katrina

THE BANKS ARE MADE OF MARBLE

Reuters reports:

Ruling allows Spitzer’s probe of banks

NEW YORK — A federal judge handed New York Attorney General Eliot Spitzer a victory on Monday when he refused to grant a temporary restraining order that would have stopped Spitzer from investigating large U.S. banks for their lending practices to minorities.

The order was sought by eight members of The Clearing House Association of 11 banks and the Office of the Comptroller of the Currency (OCC), which are suing Spitzer’s office on grounds that states do not have jurisdiction over national banks.

But Judge Sidney Stein in the Southern District of New York allowed Spitzer to continue his probe despite the suits.

COMPANIES ON THE WAY DOWN

Houston Chronicle.com reports corporate junk is on the rise, and Clear Channel may be going down. The headline:

“Companies have not been in such shape since the Depression: $88 billion in debt may become junk:”

More than $88 billion of U.S. corporate debt is teetering on the edge of investment grade and soon may join the record amount of bonds downgraded to junk this year.

Hertz Corp., the world’s largest car rental firm, and radio broadcaster Clear Channel Communications are among 46 companies that probably will be categorized as noninvestment grade, according to credit-rating company Standard & Poor’s.

http://gadflyer.com/flytrap/index.php?Week=200541#2262

FEINGOLD ON DEMOCRATS ON WAR

Sen. Russ Feingold speaks to Salon:

There is a real timidity and weakness in terms of Democrats being willing to stand up to this error of American foreign policy. I think one of the greatest errors in American foreign policy in our modern lives is the divergence into Iraq that was done by the president. It is not sufficient for Democrats to point out the dishonest way we were taken into war. Nor is it sufficient for Democrats to simply point out that what is being done now is extremely mistaken. Democrats have to talk in terms of a strategy that, if they were in the White House, they would implement to successfully finish this particular mission, but more importantly, to get back to the real focus on the terrorist networks that attacked us on 9/11.