On February 28 Brazilian UN troops, part of the MINUSTAH mission in Haiti, stood by as police opened fire on unarmed demonstrators, killing five and wounding dozens. Following the demonstration UN officials condemned the shooting and for the first time stated that if this happened again they would intervene “with force if necessary”. They also restricted the police from attending several demonstrations later that week.

These bold, and ultimately disingenuous, statements from UN special envoy Juan Gabriel Valdes created a moment of hopefulness and peaceful demonstrations swelled in numbers over the past weeks in response to the heightened security brought about by conspicuous police absence. People felt a new degree of safety and the nonviolent pro-democracy movement was gaining tremendous momentum.

Until last Thursday, March 24, when police once again opened fire on thousands of unarmed demonstrators in Cite Soleil as they courageously took to the streets to demand the return of President Aristide and the release of all political prisoners in Haiti. Reports indicate that between 3 and 5 people were killed. Apparently UN forces were present at the demonstration but not in sight when the shooting took place. They have yet to release a statement about the incident.

Then on Friday evening Father Gerard Jean Juste, beloved priest and pro-democracy activist, was attacked by an assailant as he returned to the church rectory. Friends managed to chase the attacker away and later he was captured and detained by community members. Then the following evening as Father Jean Juste was doing a live interview with Flashpoints radio on KPFA in Berkeley several men in black masks jumped out of a car and began firing at the rectory with machine guns.

These attacks eerily came on the same day that Father Jean Juste delivered a special mass commemorating the life of Archbishop Oscar Romero, a liberation theologian killed by US trained militias in El Salvador on March 24, 1980.

Calls were made to the Brazilian UN following both incidents but as of Saturday morning UN troops had yet to arrive on the ground.

Just last week Father Jean Juste said “As long as MINUSTAH’s position supports the enjoyment of our human rights, we’ll walk along. If they return to their oppressive attitude, we’ll reject them like we did for the killer policemen.”

Why this return to an oppressive attitude? These past weeks marked a critical moment for the MINUSTAH mission in Haiti. UN officials were faced with a choice between two conflicting components of their mandate: to back an illegitimate government and a violent police force infiltrated by the former military or to protect human rights.

In the first year following the overthrow of the democratically elected government UN troops primarily focused on fulfilling the first part of their mandate to the detriment of human rights, and numerous lives were lost as a result of this duplicitous and politically repressive policy. On September 30 MINUSTAH soldiers watched the Haitian National Police provoked a violent incident that left 4 policemen dead by firing into the demonstration.

Then on January 5 UN troops arrested Jimmy Charles, a Lavalas organizer. Community members begged them not to turn him over to the police, fearing for his life. Ignoring these demands the UN turned him over to the police and on January 15 his body was found in the morgue with 6 bullets.

The people of Haiti, particularly the families of those that died, have not forgotten these incidents, nor have they forgotten that it was the UN that trained the police and continues to prop up an illegitimate government in direct violation of their OAS obligations.

Nonetheless there were many who heard Juan Gabrial Valdes say that “the U.N. mandate for the peacekeepers–which requires them to support the police no matter the circumstances–is being reevaluated at the highest levels” and felt a moment of hope.

Was it possible that a combination of international pressure and personal shame would move the UN to change their policy? There seemed to be some recognition that the MINUSTAH mandate, as written, is untenable. It is simply impossible to defend human rights when one is required to back those committing the abuses.

Hope was further bolstered as the UN began to take aggressive steps to dislodge the former military from several towns where they have been terrorizing the populations. Three UN peacekeepers lost their lives last week in violent clashes with the former soldiers. There appeared to be a new willingness to take the necessary risks involved in any serious disarmament plan, unfortunately at the cost of several lives. These acts, though commendable, should not overshadow the return to a fatal UN policy of inaction and duplicity that resulted in the recent civilian casualties in Cite Soliel.

Sadly, though perhaps not surprisingly, the events of March 24 and the incident with Father Jean Juste indicate that the much hoped for shift in UN policy has not occurred. There are larger forces at play that are intent on defending the legitimacy of an unelected and unpopular government at the expense of innocent lives. Troops on the ground are forced to comply with a mandate dictated by the United States, France and Canada and they will have to live with the memory of the lives lost as a result of their inaction and ongoing collaboration with a brutal police force.

On Tuesday March 29 Haitians will once again take to the streets in Port au Prince and Cap Haitien to commemorate the signing of their constitution and to demand that the international community respect that constitution. Human rights groups, international solidarity activists and Haitians ask that the UN troops in Haiti do just that by protecting the demonstrator’s rights to peacefully assemble and ensuring Father Jean Juste’s safety. They have the power to do so and once again the world will be watching.

Spring is in the air.
Time to catch Spring Fever and fall in love–or lust–
and time to worship your concept of God or Goddess.
For Christians, it’s Easter. For Jews, it’s Passover. For many Moslems, it’s New Year’s.
For Buddhists, it’s Buddha’s Birthday.

For Pagans, it’s the Spring Equinox, the rebirth of Mother Earth, when Persephone rises from the Underworld,
where She reigns over the dead with Her bad boy husband Hades,
and enters Eleusis to rejoin Her doting Mother Demeter, Goddess of Agriculture and Fertility,
who is so ecstatic to embrace Her beloved daughter that She showers the world in Spring.
Around springtime, all religions celebrate some sort of vital faith-affirming holiday of resurrection, renewal and return,
both complementing and contradicting the season’s natural blooming eroticism.
Sex and God are quite often at odds, but sexuality and spirituality actually have certain key factors in common.
The mystical and the erotic experience are the most intense in human life;
both connect desire with awe, love, anguish, ecstasy, terror, pain and extreme logic–defying pleasure.

At their most sublime, both religious and sexual feelings are great passions.
Indeed, the word “passion” comes from the Latin “passio” which means “to suffer.”
We suffer for love as we suffer for God.
Religious mystics love God with a passion that can be feverishly erotic,
and to whom do most lovers call out in the throes of erotic passion?
God, baby, God, baby, God!

Even though men are supposedly more sexually driven than women, Goddesses tend to be more “sex-positive” than Gods.
The great Goddesses of ancient times ruled fertility, relationships, and encouraged sexual expression of different kinds,
not just sex within marriage.
Of course, many male pagan Gods, like Jolly Old King Zeus, had prodigious sexual appetites.
But the “all-powerful” ones like the Judeo-Christian-Islamic God,
also called Allah, Holy Father, Lord or Yahweh,
issued and still (apparently) issue commandments to repress human sexuality.
In a sense, the Big Three monotheistic religions…
that have ruled most of the world over the past couple thousand years..
continue to reinforcing the power of the sex-negative God over the sex-positive Goddess.

One of the most damaging sex-negative messages of any religion is the concept of “Original Sin,”
the idea that because we are born sexual beings, we are sinners who deserve to burn in hell,
and if we want to go to heaven, we must only have sex for procreation–and even then, God forbid we should enjoy it.
This ideology was developed by Saint Paul, who seems to have been fighting unwanted homosexual urges,
and was cultivated by Saint Augustine who sought refuge in celibacy after a love affair gone sour
(his wealthy mother disapproved of his low-class lover and made him miserable for it; no wonder he abhorred lust!).
Belief in Original Sin feeds the most violent alienated parts of ourselves.
It tells us that because we are sexual, we are bad..
and God, Allah, Saint Paul or Alberto Gonzales will punish us horribly unless we repress our natural sexual desires.
In the name of God, this belief that sex is dirty has perpetrated rampant cruelty, bigotry, timidity and stupidity,
creating religious sexual abuse in homes, in temples and in churches,
generating intense shame about our bodies and desires,
fueling the belief that parts of our bodies are dirty, fostering hatred and confusion about pleasure.

Why so much repression? What real purpose does it serve?
Simply put, people in power like to keep their power,
and taboos against deviating from the religiously decreed social order help them to do just that.
Individual religions may or may not really serve God,
and we’ll only find out if they do when we pass through the Lord’s Pearly Gates or Mother Nature’s Great Earthy Cunt.
But there’s one thing we know right now:
Religions serve those in charge of the religion.
Taboos help those already in power, keeping those with less power in fear for their souls if they break the taboo
and enjoy greater power (or pleasure), than they “deserve.”

Religious rules against sex for men are generally pretty excessive.
Religious rules against sex for women tend to be considerably harsher, certainly more degrading.
But, when you remember that religions serve those in charge of the religion,
is it any wonder that women’s sexuality is riddled with taboos, covered up,
denigrated and despised by all the major world religions, when there are no women priests or ayatollahs,
and very few female ministers and rabbis?

Of course, the irony of creating a taboo is that, once something is forbidden, it becomes very exciting, kinky and very, very sexy.
Everyone knows that naughty sex is hot sex!
Why is that?
Because Mother Nature always finds a way of asserting and expressing Herself–no matter what.
So, if, according to your religion, sex is bad (and it usually is), then “bad” becomes very sexy.

But is it really so bad? Even according to so-called divine standards?
One of the many odd hypocrisies of those that decry modern culture as obscene
and hold up the Bible as the Word of God is that they rarely actually read the Book itself.
In The X-Rated Bible, Ben Akerley, a “recovering Christian,”
makes his case against pro-censorship fundamentalists by revealing multiple scenes of incest…
rape, homosexuality, exhibitionism, child molestation..child sexual mutilation, bestiality, adultery…
swinging, scatology and more!
that take place (both with and without punishment) in the very book the censors hold most sacred: the Bible.

The Holy Scriptures, a hotbed of sexual activity?
You bet your bottom belief system–from Lot’s incestuous sex with his daughters to God’s anal exhibitionism
(on glorious display when He dramatically reveals His Backside to Moses).
Some of the sex in the Bible is beautiful and very erotic, as in King Solomon’s “Song of Songs.”
Some of it is horrible and sad, as when Amnon rapes his sister Tamar.
But most Bible sex is somewhere in between.

That is, it’s complicated, like the rest of life.

Of course, the Bible contains far too many rules against way too many kinds of sex.
And the punishments tend to be the stuff of Taliban dreams.
For instance, a woman who touches a man’s genitals gets her hand cut off;
and if a man is caught having sex with a sheep, both the man and the sheep are to be executed.
But some of the stories are practical, erotic, insightful lessons in human sexual nature.
Take the tale of Ruth, a young widow who boldly and successfully
seduces her wealthy male cousin-in-law Boaz on the “threshing floor,” at the suggestion of her mother-in-law Naomi.
Then there’s Esther, the teenage beauty queen who uses her powers of sexual seduction to save the Jews of Persia from genocide.
Perhaps the anti-sex religious zealots would learn something about sex if they actually read the Bible instead of thumping it so much.

How about Jesus?
Though the “Holy Father” of traditional Christianity might be even more sex-negative than the original Yahweh of the Jews,
the Jesus of the Gospels is a rather erotic, feminine, even feminist God.
He’s not exactly sex-positive, but neither is he negative. In fact, the Jesus of the Gospels hardly says anything about sex.
Of course, Saints Paul and Augustine more than make up for that later.
But Jesus himself, though he decries adultery, never actually denigrates sex.
In fact, he advocates love, which is certainly related to sex.
Nowhere do the Gospels say that Jesus is celibate or that anyone else should be.

Some Bible scholars (and Da Vinci Code enthusiasts) believe that the “real” Jesus was, in fact, married..
and that the Church vigorously suppressed that marriage for political and economic reasons.
After all, the New Testament never says He isn’t married,
and the great majority of Jewish men, especially rabbis like Jesus, were married.
Perhaps the wedding that Jesus attended and miraculously “catered” was his own.
Without a doubt, Jesus liked women, especially sexual, independent, albeit “repentant” women.
After all, who’s the first person Jesus took a meeting with when He resurrected Himself on Easter Sunday?
His favorite foot rubber, of course, Mary Magdalene: The Original Easter Bunny.

Of course, Jesus also liked guys, being a “fisher of men.”
Terrence McNally’s Broadway play Corpus Christie presents a gay Jesus who has sex with his Apostles.
Outrageous, of course, but no more farfetched than a walk on the water.
It’s not just modern interpretations of the Story of Jesus that uncover the sex angles.
Old and modern paintings and sculptures of Jesus on the Cross are often highly erotic.
After all, the man is practically naked, and though sometimes he looks anorexic,
and all that blood is kind of gross (except to the likes of Saint Mel), basically he’s got a great body.
Usually, his face is beautiful, “beatified,” with his big sorrowful eyes, open sensuous mouth, and long soft wavy hair.
Hanging on a cross displays his nearly naked body in an outstretched, inviting, manner.
Yes, of course, it looks painful, but we all know that suffering (passion/passio) can be sexy.
When the images show Mary Magdalene looking up at him so adoringly, well, little wonder why Jesus is more popular than rock stars.
He’s not just holy; he’s sexy. Which just goes to show: the one has something to do with the other.

Of course, worshipping a sexy guy who’s bleeding to death subliminally encourages violence.
It certainly makes bleeding to death look appealing. And to think His All-Powerful Dad was watching.
It seems like passive-aggressive child abuse..
But then, this is the same God who commanded Abraham to sacrifice his son,
until He stopped him with something like “Ha, ha. Only kidding., Abe. Just wanted to see if you’d do it.”
What a sadist!
No wonder our leaders, when they undertake military aggression or state-sanctioned torture, always assert that “God is on our side.”

So, Sex and God are pretty much at odds.
An ongoing struggle between organized religion and natural human sexuality pervades civilized history.
And though religion is powerful, sometimes seemingly all-powerful, somehow sex always wins.
Because no matter how religiously repressed we are,
no matter how much people like Saint Auggie, Dr. Laura and the Reverend Donald Wildmon try to deny it,
we are born animals–kicking screaming sexual animals–and we die just like animals die.

The secret passion of the erotic is that it puts us in touch with our animal nature.
The secret passion of Dr. Laura, St. Auggie and St. Don is that they’re sexually obsessed
with trying to control the behavior of the rest of us.
Although their efforts to establish sex-negative, racist, intrusive, inhumane taboos as the law of the land are
ultimately futile (sex always wins), they can do considerable damage.
They can drive the peaceful sexy spirit of Eros even deeper into secrecy,
deep into the heart’s recesses of guilt, shame and fear of a wrathful God
who will strike you dead if He catches you so much as thinking about something lustful.
No wonder so many of us love a good spanking…or a mystical journey into the spiritual sexual world of tantric sex.

From Asia to California, Buddhist and Hindu tantric “yogis” incorporate sex into worship,
practicing the various disciplines of tantric sex to achieve the bliss and harmony with God that is “beyond” physical orgasm.
Though much more sex-positive than the Big Three, Tantra has its own taboos.
For instance, men are encouraged to help their female partner to enjoy as many orgasms as possible (which is great!),
but the men are rarely permitted to ejaculate themselves.
Some tantric schools insist that the man not come at all, except when he wants to have children.
Tantra is a great discipline for integrating sexuality with spirituality,
But it’s unfair, irrational and bad for a man’s health to “command” him almost never to ejaculate.

Ancient Goddess-worshipping religions, now revived by moderns disillusioned with paternal monotheism,
feature sex rituals, holy orgies, erotic art, even “sacred prostitutes.”
Perhaps the resurrection of these cults of Isis, Aphrodite, Kali and the rest
is nothing more glorious than an effort to create some kind of belief system
in which people can enjoy sexual pleasure without so much guilt.

Speaking of which, back to those sexy Spring holidays when we do not overtly celebrate sex, except for all that egg symbolism.
But we do drink!
At a traditional Passover Seder, devout Jews guzzle at least four cups of kosher wine.
Drinking the “fruit of the vine” is a sacrament to celebrate birth, freedom and the renewal of life,
so you’re pretty much commanded to get good and shnockered.

In Catholicism, the blood of Jesus is represented by the wine of communion. Blood and wine are ancient pagan symbols of divinity.
Jesus, at that famous Seder he presided over before getting busted, pointed to the wine and said “this is my blood.”
Devout Muslims aren’t supposed to drink any alcohol, not one of the most endearing aspects of Ishmael’s branch of the Big Three.
(which makes citx wonder: does the Sharia Law punishment have any correllation to the euphemism “getting stoned”)
“Wine,” says religious historian Dr. Walter F. Otto,
“has in it something of the spirit of infinity which brings the primeval world to life again.”
The moral of that story is:
Never drink and drive;
however wine is not the drink of the devil, but the blood of the divine.

on that note: to all in WorldWideWeb-land on this Easter Sunday…
from citizen x: “have a drink…and go FUCK YOURSELVES!!”

(if you are offended by that you need to scroll back and read the post AGAIN)

WASHINGTON, 23 March 2005 — Here’s a bit of news that had Washingtonians choking on their coffee this morning: President Bush’s neoconservative hawk Paul Wolfowitz, the Pentagon’s architect of the US invasion of Iraq, is dating a Muslim!

While battle lines have hardened over President Bush’s nomination of Wolfowitz to become president of the World Bank, what many say is really fueling the controversy is concern within the bank over Wolfowitz’s reported romantic relationship with Shaha Ali Riza, an Arab feminist who is the acting manager for External Relations and Outreach for the Middle East and North Africa Region at the World Bank.

Political foes of Wolfowitz portray him as a leader of Washington’s Jewish neo-conservatives driving a blindly pro-Israel policy in the Middle East. Critics have also noted that his sister, Laura, a biologist, lives in Israel and has an Israeli husband.

But Wolfowitz, a married father of three, is said to be so blinded by his relationship with Riza, that influential members of the World Bank believe she played a key role in influencing the Pentagon official to launch the 2003 Iraq war. As his trusted confident, she is said to be one of most influential Muslims in Washington.

What they are said to share is a passion to establish democracy in the Middle East.

Riza, in her mid-fifties, was born in Tunis and grew up in Saudi Arabia. Her childhood is said to have done much to shape her commitment to democracy, equal rights and civil liberties in the Arab world based on her first hand experiences.

She brought those beliefs with her when she joined the World Bank in 1997.

Riza studied at the London School of Economics in the 1970s before taking a master’s degree at St. Anthony’s College, Oxford, where she met her former husband, Turkish Cypriot Bulent Ali Riza, from whom she is now divorced.

After they moved to America, Riza worked for the Iraq Foundation, set up by expatriates to overthrow Saddam Hussein after the first Gulf War. She subsequently joined the National Endowment for Democracy, created by President Ronald Reagan to promote American ideals.

It was this time that Riza, a British citizen eight years younger than Wolfowitz’s wife — started to meet with Wolfowitz about reforming the Middle East. They allegedly began dating two years ago.

Even by the discreet standards of Washington’s powerful inner circle, their relationship is a remarkably closely guarded secret. The Washington Post says the couple rarely goes out together or demonstrates affection publicly, according to friends who are aware of the relationship. They attend low-key Washington social events and visit friends’ homes together and Riza also sometimes goes to official functions and dinners with him, but is not identified as his partner, an acquaintance said.

“His womanizing has come home to roost,” a Washington insider told reporters. “Paul was a foreign policy hawk long before he met Riza but it doesn’t look good to be accused of being under the thumb of your mistress.”

A Wolfowitz opponent at the World Bank told a reporter: “Unless Riza gives up her job, this will be an impossible conflict of interest.”

Wolfowitz married his wife Clare Selgin in 1968. But they have lived separately since 2001, after allegations he had an affair with an employee at the School of Advanced International Studies where he was dean for seven years. They are now believed to be legally separated.

The World Bank’s staff association has told executives it has been swamped with complaints from employees about Wolfowitz.

However, Wolfowitz’s only comment on the complaints has been a terse statement issued through a Pentagon spokesman. He said: “If a personal relationship presents a potential conflict of interest, I will comply with bank policies to resolve the issue.”

goes to show ya..deep down…when you strip away the pretense and rhetoric
these neo-cons just wanna have fun!!

check this TIDBIT
and note the source..

citizen x say..what cover-up?

There are certain human needs that are so basic,
that in a civilized society,
to be deprived of such is nothing less than criminal.
One of these needs is water.
In a democracy, if citizens are deprived of water, then that democracy must be taken back.
Control must be returned to those whom the democracy is intended to serve; the people.
This exact scenario occurred during April 2000 in the city of Cochabamba, Bolivia.
It is a success story, which led to victory for the masses in Cochabamba.
This triumph is now referred to as “The Water War”
and has inspired activists in social movements around the world.

The Water War was a ground-breaking victory against the life-sapping effect of globalization in Latin America.
A recent publication by South End Press entitled: “Cochabamba! – Water War in Bolivia”
by Oscar Olivera in collaboration with Tom Lewis is a first-hand account of that victory.
Featuring perspectives from water activist and prominent labor leader Oscar Olivera,
“Cochabamba” is a four-part work covering various aspects of The Water War,
and its resulting social and political outcomes.

Bolivia is a nation that is land locked and isolated; located in the heart of South America.
Known as the poorest country in South America..
With a population of 8.5 million, about 60% of Bolivians are of indigenous descent,
living within cultural traditions stretching back to the Inca.
Bolivians are intensely proud of their deep historical roots.
Their history; however, also includes an unfortunate pattern of being repressed and exploited by foreign invaders.
This pattern continues today as a result of economic policy changes implemented back in 1985.

In that year, President Victor Paz Estenssoro issued a proclamation known as DS21060.
This proclamation destroyed the unions in Bolivia,
and privatized the nation’s state-owned industries – including water providers, mining companies, petroleum, telecommunications, railroads, and airlines.
Without conferring with the desires of Bolivian citizens,
political elites sold off the best of Bolivia to profiteering transnational corporations.
As Olivera explains in Part One of Water War:
“As a result of corporate globalization, we Bolivians have been stripped of our material inheritance and natural resources.”

The new privatization under the proclamation caused many damaging changes.
Salaries were pushed down. Lay-offs, and temporary employment status became the norm.
Health insurance and pension benefits were steadily reduced and/or eliminated.
For years, the working classes remained powerless and inactive in the face of such declining standards of living.
But in 2000, the tide changed.

One year earlier,
the government had signed an exclusive water contract with transnational corporation: “Aguas del Tunari.”
With a majority interest owned by foreign nationals,
Aguas del Tunari was essentially run by non-Bolivians.
This fact was not problematic.
What did become an issue; however,
was that the government’s contract with Aguas del Tunari
guaranteed a 16% rate of return per year on the corporation’s investment (regardless of how it would be achieved).

What resulted was an increase in water prices at rates as high as 300%.
Moreover, control of other water sources in Cochabamba was seized
under a law stipulating that only the contracted company could distribute water.
As Olivera writes “Water is a right for us, not something to be sold.
The right to water is also tied to traditional beliefs for rural people,
as it has been since the time of the Inca.”

The burdens placed upon Cochabambinos was evidence
of the level of indifference that the Bolivian government and Aguas del Tunari had toward the general populous.
Without any reform in sight, in April 2000 the masses took to the streets.
The protest brought the city to a standstill;
uniting peasants, environmental groups, teachers, and blue-collar workers under a single demand:
the return of water to the people.
The Water War officially ended months later, with the expulsion of Aguas Del Tunari from Cochabamba.
Olivera writes, “This new alliance, which blocked the highway,
took and occupied the main plaza, and recovered our water, points the way forward.”

Aguas del Tunari was replaced by a new model for managing water resources.
Instead of a handful of out-of-touch political elites dictating policy, new representatives were put in place.
These representatives derived from local neighborhood committees, urban and rural organizations, and unions.
Doing so essentially returned decision-making power back to the citizens of Cochabamba.
What emerged – in the case of water management – was an authentic, participatory, and direct democracy.
This victory brought to the surface of Bolivian conscious an alternative to privatization.

Because of The Water War victory,
the working class and rural inhabitants of Bolivia are no longer willing to sit on the side-lines
while profit-engrossed transnationals and compromised politicians exploit national resources.
As most Bolivians now realize,
those resources are the last opportunities that the impoverished masses have for securing a better life.

Since April 2000 there have been hundreds of protests on many social issues.
But most significant is the new struggle for hydrocarbon rights,
or what is described in the second half of Olivera’s work as “The Gas War.”

The conflagration of “The Gas War”
stems from the recent discovery of the second largest gas reserves in South America,
located under Bolivian soil.
The process of extracting this valuable asset has begun.
But in an act against the will of the people,
the political elite has given the green light for rich transnationals to stake out rights to this source of wealth.
What is at stake is an estimated 52.3 trillion cubic feet of gas reserves valued at the conservative figure of $120 billion.

But with the reserves under foreign control, the revenue returned to Bolivia is,
and will continue to be, far below market value.
In addition, this revenue is being channeled into the coffers of corrupt politicians,
and the gas itself to rich first-world nations.
As Olivera describes:
“What could be a source of re-birth for the productive capacity of the nation is, for now,
only a source of profits and private fortunes for a handful of capitalists.
The private ownership of petroleum and natural gas by these businessmen constitutes,
without any doubt,
the strangulation of one of the greatest opportunities the nation has ever had
to finance and to sustain the type of productive growth that can benefit the population,
satisfy our needs, and fulfill our right to a dignified life.”

This new Gas War is a very significant event in Bolivia, and in South America in general.
The privatization of key industries has happened throughout the continent
to the disadvantage of those who are already on the losing end.
On March 7, 2005 Bolivian president Carlos Mesa, resigned from his position
in recognition of being unable to fulfill the central demand for a new hydrocarbon law.
This recent event is one of many developments in a state of upheaval that has erupted in Bolivia since January of this year. In short, there is a nationwide push underway to reclaim hydrocarbon reserve rights
(among other very legitimate demands).

Transport throughout the nation became obstructed due to a nationwide strike over petrol prices.
The petrol issue arose when the government removed a price subsidy.
This subsidy removal caused prices at the pump to spike, and bus fare costs to increase.
With Bolivia’s rural inhabitants existing on very little as it is, any small price increase can be crippling.
As a result, road barricades were set up around many cities, immobilizing traffic,
and bringing much of the nation to a standstill.
During the weeklong protest, La Paz was placed under siege,
with supplies and transport unable to enter or leave the city.

The bits and scraps of images that at first seemed independent of one another
(i.e. substandard agricultural products on sale in the markets with the best of each crop being exported)
can now be categorized and connected into a meaningful statement.
In the words of Olivera, “They can privatize our natural resources and our workplaces.
But they can never privatize our ability to dream of a world with justice.”

do a little web news surfing
then ask yourself

“what am I..what is Congress.. NOT paying attention to..
while this BULLSHIT dominates the headlines?”

hit SNOOZE sucker..go file your 1040

A brutal purge of the senior staff at Popular Mechanics preceded the publication of last month’s scandalous propaganda piece about 9/11.
Pulling the strings is the grand dame of Hearst Magazines and behind the scenes is her obscure husband…
a veteran propaganda expert and former special assistant to the director of the C.I.A.

American newsstands today carry a mainstream magazine dedicated to pushing the government’s truth of 9/11 while viciously smearing independent researchers as extremists who peddle fantasies and make poisonous claims.

The magazine pushing the government’s 9/11 propaganda, Popular Mechanics (PM), is published by the Hearst family.
Its March cover story, “Debunking 9/11 Lies”, has been exposed by credible researchers to contain numerous distortions and flawed conclusions.

Citizen X reveals that Benjamin Chertoff,
the 25-year-old senior researcher who authored the 9/11 article,
is related to Michael Chertoff,
the new Secretary of the Department of Homeland Security (DHS).
The PM article illustrates how a propaganda method,
used by dictatorships,
is now (openly) being employed by the U.S. government:
that being
the seizure of mainstream media outlets to promote the governments version of events.

The actions of Michael Chertoff concerning the events of 9/11,
the non-investigation that followed,
the USA PATRIOT Act,
and the propaganda being disseminated in PM,
are strikingly similar to actions attributed to the Nazi ministers
Joseph Goebbels and Hermann Goehring.

While Chertoff is the czar of DHS, he is not sovereign at PM
or Hearst Magazines, its corporate parent.
The president of Hearst Magazines,
one of the world’s largest publishers of monthly magazines
with 18 U.S. titles and more than 100 international editions,
is Cathleen P. Black,
a 60-year old native of Chicago.
Black oversees the publication of 175 titles around the world including
Cosmopolitan, Harpers Bazaar, Town & Country, Esquire, Good Housekeeping,
and Popular Mechanics.

Black is a former president and publisher of USA Today.
In 1983, Black was made president of the new newspaper published by Gannett.
The following year she was made publisher
and soon became a member of Gannetts board of directors.

Despite her efforts, her biography reads,
USA Today did not show an operating profit in the eight years that Black was there.
The newspaper’s non-profitability notwithstanding,
Gannett paid Black $600,000 a year for her efforts.
USA Today reportedly had a circulation of 1.8 million when Black left in 1991.
USA Today is often given away free of charge.

Black left USA Today
to become president and chief executive of the nascent Newspaper Association of America (NAA),
formed on June 1, 1992. She then became the leading spokesperson and lobbyist for the nation’s newspaper industry.
Black’s position at the NAA carried “considerable political heft,”
Paul Farhi of The Washington Post wrote,
“given that the 1,400 members of her organization control the nations editorial pages”.

In 1995, for an annual salary reported to be “in excess of $1 million,”
Black was hired by Hearst Corp. to head its magazine division.
Named by Fortune magazine as one of the Most Powerful Women in American Business,
Black sits on the boards of Hearst Corp.,
the Advertising Council, IBM, and Coca-Cola.
She is also a member of the Council on Foreign Relations.

It is often said that USA Today is controlled by the CIA, which, like the paper, is based in McLean, Virginia.
The little-known fact that Black is married to Thomas E. Harvey,
an obscure lawyer who became a White House Fellow in 1977
and served as special assistant to the Director of Central Intelligence (DCI),
provides substance to these rumors.
Black’s corporate biography does not mention her husband.

President Jimmy Carter made Harvey a White House Fellow in May 1977.
“In that capacity,” Harvey’s biography reads,
he “served as special assistant to the Director of the C.I.A.
Following that he held senior appointed positions within the Department of Defense.”

The DCI at the time was Stansfield Turner, who had replaced George H.W. Bush.

Prior to serving the CIA, Harvey worked at the New York law office of Milbank, Tweed, Hadley & McCloy.
The international law firm, co-founded by Morris Hadley,
a 1916 member of Yale University’s secret society Skull & Bones,
has ties to the CIA and lists William H. Webster, DCI from 1987-1991, as a senior partner.
Webster also serves on the Homeland Security Advisory Council.

In the 1980s, Harvey served as General Counsel and Congressional Liaison of the U.S. Information Agency,
the former external propaganda arm of the U.S. government.
Harvey also served as Deputy Assistant Secretary for the Army and Navy.
In 1992, Harvey was personnel director for the Bush-Quayle 92 Campaign.

THE COUP AT POPULAR MECHANICS

In the months leading up to the Chertoff article in PM, a brutal take-over occurred at the magazine.
In September 2004,
Joe Oldham, the magazines former editor-in-chief
was replaced by James B. Meigs, who came to PM with a deputy, Jerry Beilinson, from National Geographic Adventure.
In October,
a new creative director replaced PMs 21-year veteran
who was given ninety minutes to clear out of his office.

A former senior editor at PM, who is forbidden from openly discussing the coup at PM,
reports that the former creative director was abruptly told to leave
and given severance pay of two weeks wages for every year spent at PM.
Three or four people have been similarly dismissed every month since, he said.
He said he was astounded that the coup at PM had not been reported in the mainstream media.

PM has long been a supporter of the U.S. military.
The magazine ran a full page ad in support of the troops in Iraq and Afghanistan in May 2003.
Since the purge last September, however, PM readers have noticed that government propaganda has replaced scientific writing.
A letter to the editor in the current issue says,
“I think you guys are just another tool in the governments propaganda machine.”

citizen x says: “hey.. at least they published the letter..right?”

just posted to citizenx from LU5T3R:

it seems that in North Korea…citizen x..and sites like it
ARE BANNED..yes
as a result..
internet users like LU5T3R
have to pay US$47
at a black market internet cafe
JUST TO ACCESS citizenx ONCE!!!
heres the page he sent…

so much for FREEdom

by Greg Palast

The Bush administration made plans for war and for Iraq’s oil before the 9/11 attacks, sparking a policy battle between neo-cons and Big Oil, BBC’s Newsnight has revealed.

Iraqi-born Falah Aljibury says US Neo-Conservatives planned to force a coup d’etat in Iraq

Two years ago today - when President George Bush announced US, British and Allied forces would begin to bomb Baghdad - protesters claimed the US had a secret plan for Iraq’s oil once Saddam had been conquered.

In fact there were two conflicting plans, setting off a hidden policy war between neo-conservatives at the Pentagon, on one side, versus a combination of “Big Oil” executives and US State Department “pragmatists”.

“Big Oil” appears to have won. The latest plan, obtained by Newsnight from the US State Department was, we learned, drafted with the help of American oil industry consultants.

Insiders told Newsnight that planning began “within weeks” of Bush’s first taking office in 2001, long before the September 11th attack on the US.

An Iraqi-born oil industry consultant, Falah Aljibury, says he took part in the secret meetings in California, Washington and the Middle East. He described a State Department plan for a forced coup d’etat.

Mr Aljibury himself told Newsnight that he interviewed potential successors to Saddam Hussein on behalf of the Bush administration.

SECRET SELL-OFF PLAN

The industry-favoured plan was pushed aside by a secret plan, drafted just before the invasion in 2003, which called for the sell-off of all of Iraq’s oil fields. The new plan was crafted by neo-conservatives intent on using Iraq’s oil to destroy the Opec cartel through massive increases in production above Opec quotas.

The sell-off was given the green light in a secret meeting in London headed by Ahmed Chalabi shortly after the US entered Baghdad, according to Robert Ebel.

Former Shell Oil USA chief stalled plans to privatise Iraq’s oil industry

Mr Ebel, a former Energy and CIA oil analyst, now a fellow at the Center for Strategic and International Studies in Washington, told Newsnight he flew to the London meeting at the request of the State Department.

Mr Aljibury, once Ronald Reagan’s “back-channel” to Saddam, claims that plans to sell off Iraq’s oil, pushed by the US-installed Governing Council in 2003, helped instigate the insurgency and attacks on US and British occupying forces.

“Insurgents used this, saying, ‘Look, you’re losing your country, you’re losing your resources to a bunch of wealthy billionaires who want to take you over and make your life miserable,’” said Mr Aljibury from his home near San Francisco.

“We saw an increase in the bombing of oil facilities, pipelines, built on the premise that privatisation is coming.”

PRIVATIZATION BLOCKED BY INDUSTRY

Philip Carroll, the former CEO of Shell Oil USA who took control of Iraq’s oil production for the US Government a month after the invasion, stalled the sell-off scheme.

Mr Carroll told us he made it clear to Paul Bremer, the US occupation chief who arrived in Iraq in May 2003, that: “There was to be no privatisation of Iraqi oil resources or facilities while I was involved.”

Ariel Cohen, of the neo-conservative Heritage Foundation, told Newsnight that an opportunity had been missed to privatise Iraq’s oil fields.

He advocated the plan as a means to help the US defeat Opec, and said America should have gone ahead with what he called a “no-brainer” decision.
Mr Carroll hit back, telling Newsnight, “I would agree with that statement. To privatize would be a no-brainer. It would only be thought about by someone with no brain.”

Amy Jaffee says oil companies fear a privatisation would exclude foreign firms

New plans, obtained from the State Department by Newsnight and Harper’s Magazine under the US Freedom of Information Act, called for creation of a state-owned oil company favoured by the US oil industry. It was completed in January 2004 under the guidance of Amy Jaffe of the James Baker Institute in Texas.

Formerly US Secretary of State, Baker is now an attorney representing Exxon-Mobil and the Saudi Arabian government.

View segments of Iraq oil plans at www.GregPalast.com

Questioned by Newsnight, Ms Jaffe said the oil industry prefers state control of Iraq’s oil over a sell-off because it fears a repeat of Russia’s energy privatisation. In the wake of the collapse of the Soviet Union, US oil companies were barred from bidding for the reserves.

Ms Jaffe says US oil companies are not warm to any plan that would undermine Opec and the current high oil price: “I’m not sure that if I’m the chair of an American company, and you put me on a lie detector test, I would say high oil prices are bad for me or my company.”

The former Shell oil boss agrees. In Houston, he told Newsnight: “Many neo conservatives are people who have certain ideological beliefs about markets, about democracy, about this, that and the other. International oil companies, without exception, are very pragmatic commercial organizations. They don’t have a theology.”

A State Department spokesman told Newsnight they intended “to provide all possibilities to the Oil Ministry of Iraq and advocate none”.

citizenx says: “was’nt i ranting about this in 1996?”

LEGENDARY PUNK CLUB: for rent

WASHINGTON — March 13, 2005 — Photographer Russell E. “Rusty” Nelson was recently arrested two days after journalist Hunter Thompson reportedly committed suicide four weeks ago on February 10, according to two phone interviews with attorney John DeCamp last week.

Nelson was allegedly employed by a former Republican Party activist to take pictures of current or retired U.S. House-Senate members and other prominent government officials engaging in sexual criminality by receiving or committing sodomy and other sex acts on children during the Reagan-Bush 41 administrations. 

Hunter Thompson’s death and the news blackout of Rusty Nelson’s simultaneous arrest raise questions that someone may be attempting to limit Nelson’s freedom or threaten him, since according to testimony, both men had allegedly witnessed homosexual prostitution and pedophile criminal acts in a suppressed but far-reaching child sex-ring probe closely linked to Senate and House members–but also former President George H. W. Bush. [In U.S. District Court testimony, Rusty Nelson told Judge Warren Urbom he took 20,000 to 30,000 pictures, 2-5-1999, p.52]

Pedophile victim Paul Bonacci–kidnapped and forced into sex slavery between the ages of 6 and 17–told U.S. District Court Judge Warren Urbom in sworn testimony [pp.105, 124-126] on February 5, 1999: “Where were the parties?…down in Washington, DC…and that was for sex…There was sex between adult men and other adult men but most of it had to do with young boys and young girls with the older folks…specifically for sex with minors…Also in Washington, DC, there were parties after a party…there were a lot of parties where there would be senators and congressmen who had nothing to do with the sexual stuff. But there were some senators and congressmen who stayed for the [pedophile sex] parties afterwards…on a lot of the trips he took us on he had us, I mean, I met some people that I don’t feel comfortable telling their name because I don’t want to — …Q: Are you scared?…Yes…”

DeCamp, a former Nebraska state senator and decorated Vietnam War vet, stated “there are tons of pictures still left; law enforcement is currently looking for them,” adding, “you can also assume there are senators and congressmen implicated; otherwise this would not be such a big issue.”  But no federal official has stepped forward to protect Rusty Nelson’s life, as Congress would be reluctant to hold hearings or force a federal prosecutor to probe its own members for sex acts with children–still punishable by law.

Sex with minors?

In his testimony before Judge Urbom, Bonacci specifically named Congressman Barney Frank (D-MA) as having participated in the parties–also telling the judge he had “relationships with him” in Washington, DC and was flown to Massachusetts for sex in the basement of Frank’s Boston home.
[2-5-1999, p. 126]

However, Urbom did not subpoena all the photos and did not ask Bonacci to identify photos of specific senators and congressmen, or reveal their names in court transcripts and depositions we examined; nor did Judge Urbom explain why investigations have never commenced regarding which members of congress had sex with children.

The evidence DeCamp presented was so credible and substantial that Urbom awarded Paul Bonacci $1 million for child abuse on February 19, 1999 regarding his lawsuit involving Larry King. This, despite a Nebraska jury having already indicted Bonacci for perjury in 1990, ultimately sending an intentionally damaged, spiritually and physically abused young man to prison for five years–and despite his treatment by King, described in court testimony:

“They put guns up to my head. Had guns put in my mouth…Larry King sent out boys, men, to jump me…he had them pretty well beat the tar out of me from the waist down so nobody would see the marks…I had my fingers broken…I can remember them burning me with hot instruments…placing stuff inside me…almost what I call a cattle prod…But it would be put inside then they’d shock me inside my — …Judge Urbom: Anus?…Yes… And they would — …Judge: You mean electrically heated?…They would put it in and then push a button and it would shock me…Judge Urbom:..done by Larry King at his direction?…At his direction…”

“I threatened to go to the police in California, thought maybe they would listen whereas in Omaha they were in his pocketbook…he had me hung out of an airplane with a rope by my ankles…If they wanted to get something passed through the legislature, he would put some people that were against it in a compromising position. By using us boys and girls…Judge Urbom: Was this by your being the sexual partner of that person?…Yes…Judge Urbom: …Any estimates of how often you participated as the sexual partner of one of these persons that he wanted to get some kind of control over?…There were times when it would be four or five in a night…on probably a couple thousand times…sometimes dozens of times with the same person…” [U.S. District Court testimony, 2-5-1999, pp. 146-151]

Curiously, Paul Bonacci told investigators that the sex ring was based out of Offutt U.S. Air Force Base near Omaha, having been taken there to be abused since he was three years old in 1970. At Offutt, Paul said he was “trained” by tortures, heavy drugging and sexual degradation. [Offutt AFB played a major role immediately following the 9/11 attacks as George W. Bush made the base his post-attack headquarters for a short period.]

So intent upon his physical harm, the government “moved Bonacci to different facilities–despite agreements worked out by DeCamp, purposefully gave him food to which he was allergic while his weight dropped, and denied him a blanket for months…[he was] beaten several times in jail and placed with potentially violent people associated with Larry King,” according to Decamp.

John DeCamp told us last week that “Larry King was released from prison on April 11, 2001 after serving about five years,” adding “he’s back in Washington, DC and now involved in this story again.”  [DeCamp’s book also said “King went to prison for embezzlement, conspiracy and making false financial record entries…there was no trial on any other charges, and the evidence of child prostitution and abuse perpetrated by King was never presented in any court.”  Franklin Cover-up, p. 224]

John DeCamp just released an updated 2005 edition of his original book about the secret White House-linked national child sex-ring entitled The Franklin Cover-up [$12.95 + $4.00 shipping: contact decamplegal@inebraska.com for 2005 edition]. The carefully researched and graphic expose involves convicted [and recently released from prison] GOP operative Lawrence E. “Larry” King Jr. who allegedly hired photographers to capture legislators and high officials in compromising sexual positions with children while he managed the Franklin Federal Credit Union–according to court testimony on 2-5-1999. [Franklin was raided by federal agencies and shut down two days before George H. W. Bush was elected president in 1988.]

Past mysterious deaths, clandestine arrests, court testimony, and credible evidence of FBI and CIA participation in their cover-up also raise questions as to why elderly pedophile priests are removed from their pulpits, prosecuted and imprisoned for sex acts committed 40 years ago and why famous music entertainers are prosecuted for pedophilia; yet elderly pedophile federal legislators may still remain in the U.S. House and Senate–drawing a free pass for past criminal child-sex acts.
 
Regarding his role in taking blackmail photos of government officials, Rusty Nelson confirmed Bonacci’s testimony to Judge Urbom: “Q: Children on the airplane?…yes. Q: How young?…There was one situation went back to Washington, DC…he had probably 10, 12 years old…Q: Boys, girls?…Both…Q: Who attended the parties?…Prominent business people, very prominent high-ranking officials, politicians. The younger people. What would transpire was they would have a party and then a party after the party…after the party was more of a sex-type deal…That’s what Larry [King] would — – Q: These old politicians were having sex with each other?…Or people Larry would bring…some younger people…Did you take pictures of the parties?…I took pictures at some of the parties, yes…” [U.S. District Court testimony, 2-5-1999, pp. 89-91]  

After the Secret Service allowed Paul Bonacci to have access to the White House on July 3, 1988, one of DeCamp’s investigators said the young pedophile victim was able to draw a floor-plan of the presidential inside living quarters of the White House–an area not available to the public–lending stong credence to a June 29, 1989 Washington Times front page story, “Homosexual prostitution inquiry ensnares VIPs with Reagan, Bush,” when reporters Paul Rodriguez and George Archibald said “Call-boys took midnight tour of White House.”

Presidential indiscretions–or criminal acts?

According to a Nebraska state police report, Nebraska Foster Care Review Board letter to the Attorney General, Nebraska Senate’s Franklin committee investigative report, and a 50-page report by Omaha’s Boys Town welfare case officer Mrs. Julie Walters, pedophile victims Nelly and Kimberly Webb detailed a massive child sex, homosexual and pornography operation run out of Nebraska by Larry King–but with close ties directly to the Congress and the White House.

Mrs. Walter’s Nebraska Dept. of Social Services report (3-25-86) revealed: “[14 year-old] Nelly said at these trip parties hosted by Larry King, she sat naked ‘looking pretty and innocent’ and guests could engage in any sexual activity they wanted, but penetration was not allowed…Nelly said she first met V. P. George Bush at the Republican Convention where King sang the national anthem, and saw Bush again at a Washington, DC party Larry hosted…Last year [1985] she met V.P. Bush and saw him at one of the parties Larry gave while on a Washington, DC trip. At some of the parties there are just men (as was the case at the party George Bush attended)…Nelly said she has seen sodomy committed at those parties.”

The Walters report continued: “On December 19, 1988, Nelly was contacted and voluntarily came to the FBI offices on December 30, 1988. She was interviewed by [FBI agents] Brady, Tucker and Phillips…in September or October, 1984 when Lisa was 14 she went to Chicago with Larry King and 15-20 boys from Omaha…She indicates she attended a party in Chicago with King and the male youths. She indicated George Bush was present…she sat at a table at the party wearing nothing but a negligee. She stated George Bush saw her on the table. She stated she saw George Bush pay King money and Bush left the party with a nineteen year old black boy named Brent. Lisa said the party Bush attended was in Chicago in September or October 1984. The Chicago Tribune of October 31, 1984 said Bush was in Illinois campaigning for congressional candidates at the end of October.”

Bush 41 surfaced again in Lowe’s May, 1989 review of reports by Thomas Vlahoulis from the state attorney general’s office: “Sorenson told Vlahoulis that both Kimberly and Nelly [Webb] brought up the name of George Bush and indicated that they had both met him…”

In spite of four polygraph tests administered by a Nebraska state trooper who said he was convinced Nelly was telling the truth, in December, 1990, a Washington country, Nebraska judge ignored Julie Walter’s 50-page report, numerous debriefings of the girls by foster care officials and youth workers stating the sisters told the truth–specifically about George Bush Sr., and dismissed all charges against their foster parents Jarrett and Barbara Webb, who Nelly and Kimberly said had allowed them to be abused.

Gosch to Guckert to Gannon?

Cable television news reports have recently linked an alleged male prostitute to the present White House since George W. Bush permitted James Guckert to use an unprecedented Secret Service-approved alias (Jeff Gannon) while having access to the White House for two years as a pool reporter serving the younger Bush–before which Gannon had advertised himself on internet pornography sites as a male “escort” charging $200 an hour. [Gannon is the subject of independent news reports which have referred to him as the former kidnapped Des Moines, Iowa paperboy Johnny Gosch–forced into child sex-slavery.] John DeCamp told this writer “I believe Johnny Gosch and Jeff Gannon are one and the same person–but I am not in a position to know positively.”

During a recent phone interview, Noreen Gosch reported that she is still not sure whether her missing son Johnny is in fact James Gannon, because she has “not seen enough evidence.” But having been abducted in 1982, Johnny Gosch would now be about 35-36 years old. Gannon claims to be 47 but his “male4male” website escorts profile lists him as 31 in 2000, which would also make him 35-36 years old today.

George W. Bush has not explained how Guckert/Gannon–who had advertised himself as a male escort–could apparently operate in the White House as a reporter for two years using a Secret Service-approved alias and regularly be called upon by George W. Bush and press secretary Scott McClellan during nationally televised presidential press conferences. 

Questions can be raised as to whether Gannon also had access to the White House living quarters as Paul Bonacci and other call-boys did during his father’s administration–as the Washington Times reported.Photos of George W. Bush and Jeff Gannon together ndicate that they have a cordial personal relationship.

Noreen Gosch said her son Johnny is living under an assumed name after being abducted on September 5, 1982 while serving his Sunday morning paper route. During a clandestine visit from her son when he was 27 or 28, Mrs. Gosch said Johnny told her he was taken by a highly organized, very corporate global pedophile/pornography ring–linked to the Washington, DC congressional call-boy scandal during the 1980’s.

Hunter Thompson directed child murder-sex film?

  A controversial author, Hunter Thompson was allegedly linked to Larry King as implicated in Paul Bonacci’s testimony in which the pedophile victim revealed that Thompson directed a graphic ‘snuff’ film [Franklin Cover-up, pp.102-105 & 327] made near Sacramento, California at a location called “Bohemian Grove.”

Bonacci–flown numerous times across state lines for sexual exploitation to Washington, DC and other cities–testified on videotape [5-14-1990] for Nebraska State Police investigator Gary Caradori. Bonacci said that while on a trip to Sacramento, he was forced at gun-point to commit homosexual acts on another boy before he watched other men do the same–after which the boy was shot in the head.

In separate testimony, Decamp said Bonacci told him “Larry King was smiling and laughing the whole time the film was being shown…as the men watched, they passed Nicholas [another victim] and me around as if we were toys, and sexually abused us.” [U.S. District Court, 2-5-1999, pp.115-129]

Bonacci’s testimony has been evaluated as credible and well-informed by leading child abuse experts, psychiatrists, psychologists and polygraph tests; and he has also testified that he was forced to lure Johnny Gosch into being kidnapped–considered by many to be the most notorious U.S. child sex-slavery case.

Protecting legislators at the expense of children

John Decamp stated that Franklin child-abuse witness “Alisha Owen was convicted of lying that as a minor, she had sex with Omaha Chief of Police Robert Wadman. She was placed in solitary confinement for years–the most brutal treatment of a female inmate in Nebraska history for a first-time offense,” to which Decamp added, “it was done to keep her silent and away from other inmates, but also as a warning to the other children.”

21 year-old Alisha Jahn Owen was sentenced on August 8, 1991 to serve nine to twenty-seven years in prison for telling a grand jury that she was sexually abused as a juvenile by a Nebraska District Court judge, by Omaha’s Chief of Police, by the manager of the Franklin Credit Union, and others.

DeCamp said “Alisha witnessed abuse of other children and functioned as an illegal drug courier traveling nationwide for some of Nebraska’s wealthiest, most powerful and prominent businessmen.” But a local and a federal grand jury indicted the victim-witnesses for perjury–throwing the key young people in prison to cover up child-sex and illegal drugs.

The Nebraska State Senate’s primary Franklin Committee investigator Gary Caradori’s March 14, 1990 notes revealed that on the day of the federal agents’ raid on Franklin Credit Union, “a large amount of pornographic material was taken out of the credit union, including videos and photographs depicting sexual acts. I was told that if Friedrichs or any of the other people working for the CPA firm contacted by the government [audit] would say anything, they would automatically lose their jobs.”

That evidence was never made available to the Nebraska Senate’s Franklin Committee, nor was its existence publicly acknowledged by the FBI; and all raid warrants were sealed by United States Magistrate Richard Kopf–the same court official who ordered to have Larry King taken by federal agents to a federal psychiatric facility for “tests,” on February 7, 1990 as President George H. W. Bush was coming to Omaha for a fundraising event.

Alisha Owen testified to the Franklin Committee on June 11, 1990 that the FBI attempted to influence federal witness testimony–that her former lawyer Pam Vuchetich had come to see her in the spring: “giving a proposal from the FBI that if I recanted my story then nothing would happen to me; I could get out of prison and no charges would ever be brought against me…they would write letters to the judge asking for my sentence reduction…”

Her parents, Donna and Alvin Owen told the committee about the incident on June 21, 1990: “Q: You testified that your husband was there?…sitting in the living room, I remember…Q: Did she tell you who in the FBI made that deal, made that offer to her?…Mickey Mott…He works closely with Rick Culver and John Pankonon…

Curiously, state policeman Gary Caradori, died July 11, 1990 in a small-plane explosion, one month after FBI officials attempted to coerce a key child witness to recant her testimony–and even though a deputy sheriff first at the crash site said there was child pornography scattered all over the farmer’s field and the farmer said he witnessed the plane exploding in mid-air before crashing to the ground.

Johnny Gosch’s mother, Noreen, said “undisclosed sources told her the FBI immediately arrived with three flatbed trucks [modus operandi of FBI and Gov. Jeb Bush confiscating 9/11 hijacker documents at Venice, Florida’s Huffman flight school?], grabbed the evidence from the sheriff’s hands, cordoned off the field, walked the field, picked up every piece of evidence, took the plane and all its parts and put it on the flatbed trucks, and told the peace officer, ‘This is confidential information and don’t ever speak of it again.’ The evidence has never surfaced again in Nebraska’s Franklin investigation or any other investigation.” [Ted Gunderson Report, June 28, 2000]

DeCamp’s book reveals more clear evidence of witness tampering and possible accessory to murder: On the evening of July 11, 1990, the day her husband crashed to his death, Sandie Caradori received several phone calls from [key Franklin child-abuse witness] Troy Boner. She wrote in her notes: ”I am familiar with his voice and can be 100% assured that I did in fact receive telephone calls from him…Troy: Gary wasn’t lying. He didn’t tell me what to say. What I told him was the truth. (He spoke rapidly, fighting back tears) They made me take it back. They threatened me…You don’t understand, they threatened me. They made me take it back. I was so scared…” [pp. 186-187]

In 1990, according to DeCamp, “Troy Boner was going to provide the information in open court, under oath, that would blow the lid off the Franklin case and force a new trial for Alisha Owen…As Troy came into the courthouse, he was immediately ushered into a private room by county judicial authorities…the hearing was delayed for one hour…Troy was in the room with a “Special Attorney” and with other officials from the prosecutor’s office–the very same prosecutorial team Troy was about to testify against.”

“…Troy leaned over and whispered to me, “Oh God, forgive me. They guaranteed if I talk here today, they will put me away for twenty years…told me I would be charged with perjury for my original testimony if I opened my mouth today in court…Look what they did to Alisha…Look what they did to my brother.” [found dead after playing “Russian Roulette”]                                    

DeCamp’s 2005 edition incredibly reveals, “In late 2003 [just before the 2004 election campaign started to heat up], Troy Boner [key abused child witness to national sex-ring] walked into a hospital in New Mexico screaming “they’re after me, they’re after me because of this book.” The book Boner was waving was The Franklin Cover-up. Boner was ‘…mildly sedated and calmed down…and put in a private room for observation.’ ”

“When nurses came back to check on him early next morning, Boner was sitting in a chair, bleeding from the mouth and quite dead. Former FBI Los Angeles Bureau Chief Ted Gunderson tried to get autopsy and other information and details that were promised him on Boner’s death, but Gunderson and apparently every other entity, were totally shut out of all information. No news stories were published on Boner’s death despite his “notoriety” in the Franklin case.” (John DeCamp, The Franklin Cover-up) Another witness was gone.
 
DeCamp added that the FBI had also confiscated Larry King’s flight manifests from various airline charter companies, thus helping to cover up proof of sexual exploitation of children and interstate transportation of minors across state lines for sexual purposes.

Washington, DC: child sodomy hotbed?

Rusty Nelson’s quick arrest following on the heels of Hunter Thompson’s ‘suicide’ and alleged assertions that Jeff Gannon could be Johnny Gosch may all have serious criminal implications, as Thompson and Nelson were said to be closely linked to child sexual criminality at the highest levels of government–acts still punishable by law and easily meriting cover-up attempts by powerful forces.

Paul Bonacci, forced to help kidnap Johnny Gosch into sex-slavery, also told Franklin Committee investigators he toured the White House at midnight on July 3, 1988 with Craig Spence–a lobbyist and political operative who arranged male prostitute visits to the White House but who turned up dead himself just three months after the 6-29-89 Washington Times call-boy headline. The police were quick to call Spence’s death a suicide, according to DeCamp.

Spence had “hinted the tours were arranged by ‘top-level’ persons, including Donald Gregg, national security advisor to Vice-President Bush,” according to the Washington Times [8-9-89], adding, “Spence, according to friends, was also carrying out homosexual blackmail operations for the CIA.”

Spence and Gregg were reportedly close friends, as Spence had sponsored a dinner in Gregg’s honor in the spring of 1989 at Washington posh Four Seasons Hotel in Georgetown just before the White House prostitution scandal broke at the beginning of the Bush 41 tenure. [George Bush: The Unauthorized Biography, Webster G. Tarpley & Anton Chaitkin, Chapter 21–Omaha]

A June 30, 1989 Washington Times report said “Rep. Barney Frank, Massachusetts Democrat and a self-proclaimed homosexual who several weeks ago threatened to reveal a list of Republican homosexuals in Congress, said he was ‘not surprised’ by the revelations.”

The Times also said [8-25-1989], “A male prostitute convicted of drug trafficking and sex offenses against a minor used the Chevy Chase Elementary School in late 1987 to run his prostitution operation after the school’s principal began buying sex from him.”

“The call-boy was allowed to sleep and use phones in the school even after the principal left at 5 p.m., while teachers and the children were still involved in after-school activities such as chorus,” said the principal, Gabriel A. Massaro, who also revealed “he had a four-year relationship with the prostitute and provided him with a guidance counselor’s office and telephone at the model ‘magnet school’ even while children were in classes elsewhere in the building.”

Also according to the Times, “Massaro acknowledged that he attended a meeting between Davis and his Alexandria probation officer at the Capitol Hill home of Rep. Barney Frank, Massachusetts Democrat, another client whose home the call-boy used to perform sexual services.” The paper did not reveal the age or name of the call-boy or whether he serviced Congressman Frank.

A clearly unethical and likely illegal presidential appointment was also linked to the White House child sex-ring: “In August, 1990, Bush appointed Ronald Roskens of Nebraska to head the Agency for International Development (AID). Roskens had been fired the previous year as chancellor of the University of Nebraska, where Larry King was a member of his advisory committee.

[State Police “Franklin” investigator] Gary Caradori’s daily notes for February 19, 1989 record: ‘I was informed that Roskens was terminated by the state because of sexual activities reported to the Regents and verified by them. Mr. Roskens was reported to have had young men at his residence for sexual encounters.” [Franklin Cover-up, p.177]

DeCamp added that AID assignments have been used as a “cover” by CIA agents; and in spite of Roskens’ sexual background and termination by Nebraska educators and his clear potential for being blackmailed, President Bush appointed him anyway.

Karl: ‘Rove’ing DC, approving ’special’ WH press passes?

The extent to which White House Senior Domestic Policy Advisor Karl Rove played a part in approving the Gucket/Gannon White House press passes is not known.

However, CBS News spoke of a Rove-Gannon connection, saying  “Gannon’s aggressively partisan work and the ease with which he got day passes for the White House press room the past two years make it hard to believe that he wasn’t at least implicitly sanctioned by the “boy genius.”

Following on the heels of Guckert-Gannon, Walter Storch, editor of the Barnes Review News reported a three weeks ago that “Karl Rove was seen by one of my people entering a private homosexual orgy at a five-star Washington hotel over the Mid-Atlantic Leather (MAL) weekend last year.” [2004]

A Barnes reporter told Storch that “Karl greatly enjoyed the supervision of a certain hairy 350-lb. Leather Dominator who had won the Miss Virginia Daddy Bear title at the MAL festivities.”

Storch wrote, “Karl used to hang out a JR’s, which is on 17th between P & S streets, before he became so well-known. This is a respectable gay bar for discreet people…,” adding, “there is an expensive apartment…over near Dupont Circle that certain powerful senators take turns visiting with their pickups.”

“Bush, via Karl Rove, was projected as a moral man who would return a hedonistic America to the simpler virtues of a bygone era. A large part of the American public, unhappy with what they saw as debilitating liberalism, abortion on demand, gay marriage and other forms of moral decay, put Bush back in office,” said the Barnes editor.

“Now they have to deal with rampant male whores prancing around the White House in consort with a small army of closet queens, all of whom very obviously have the ear, and the confidence, (and hopefully, that’s all they have) of their ‘moral’ choice for President,” said Storch.

Interestingly, TBRNews.org also counts “one Supreme Court Justice, several governors (all Republican) and at least one very prominent televangelist” among those high officials who are saying one thing and doing another with respect to Storch’s closet queen issue.

While American citizens watch, unanswered questions remain as Democrats and Republicans ignore young witnesses with clear and credible evidence–refusing to hold each other’s legislators criminally accountable for their unspeakable crimes against children.

REPRINTED from tomflocco.com

if this posts title sounds like an incitement to riot..read on…

Authored by Robert Hirsch, Roger Bezdek and Robert Wendling and titled The Peaking of World Oil production: Impacts, Mitigation, & Risk Management, the report is an assessment requested by the US Department of Energy (DoE), National Energy Technology Laboratory.

It was prepared by Hirsch, who is a senior energy programme adviser at the private scientific and military company, Science Applications International Corporation (SAIC).

They work extensively on defence and geopolitical issues for clients, including many for the US government.

Among current job openings at SAIC are positions at Fort Benning (formerly School of the Americas) and a private military contract to help retrain the Albanian air force in Tirana.

Hirsch has held a wide variety of positions in the US energy hierarchy including senior energy analyst at the Rand Corporation, through to a presidentially appointed assistant administrator for solar, geothermal and advanced energy systems.

This new report follows on from two presentations by Hirsch last year. One on 1 March to the same National Energy Technology Laboratory and another on 14 June last year at the Annapolis Centre for Science Based Public Policy. Here Hirsch laid down his ideas on the peak of oil production.

The Annapolis Centre for Science-based Public Policy is a group which has received $658,000 in funding from Exxon Mobil since 1998. It openly disputes the idea that global warming is the result of burning fossil fuels.

But this brand new senior-level report on “peak oil” is unprecedented in US government circles. It is not just the existence of the report itself that is such a landmark in the current oil debate. Its conclusions also pull no punches.

“World oil peaking is going to happen,” the report says. Only the “timing is uncertain”.

The effects of any oil peak are similarly not ignored. Specifically, the impact on the economy of the United States. “The development of the US economy and lifestyle has been fundamentally shaped by the availability of abundant, low-cost oil. Oil scarcity and several-fold oil price increases due to world oil production peaking could have dramatic impacts … the economic loss to the United States could be measured on a trillion-dollar scale,” the report says.

The authors of the report also dismiss the power of the markets to solve any oil peak. They call for the intervention of governments. But also they rather worryingly point to a need to exclude public debate and environmental concerns from the process. They say this is needed to speed up decision-making.

“Intervention by governments will be required, because the economic and social implications of oil peaking would otherwise be chaotic. But the process will not be easy. Expediency may require major changes to … lengthy environmental reviews and lengthy public involvement.”

Hirsch notes, despite arguments from the major oil companies and producer nations, that new finds of oil are not replacing oil consumed each year. Despite the advances in technology, reserves are becoming increasingly difficult to replace.

The report sees “a world moving from a long period in which reserves additions were much greater than consumption, to an era in which annual additions are falling increasingly short of annual consumption. This is but one of a number of trends that suggest the world is fast approaching the inevitable peaking of conventional world oil production”.

The report then takes three possible scenarios and outcomes. Firstly that energy replacement solutions, or “mitigation” as the report states, are started 20 years before any “peak”. Secondly that solutions are only enacted 10 years before any peak and, thirdly, that solutions are only put into practice as the peak becomes apparent.

In what some may see as an optimistic assessment, the authors believe 20 years is enough time to limit damage from any peak. However, they point out that “if mitigation were to be too little, too late, world supply/demand balance will be achieved through massive demand destruction”.

Demand destruction is a modern way of saying catastrophic recessions and shortages. But as well as these predictions, the report lays out “signals” it believes will be apparent in the run-up to any peak. This is perhaps the most worrying aspect of the report, as it seems to describe the very events that are taking place at the moment.

“As world oil peaking is approached, excess production capacity … will disappear, so that even minor supply disruptions will cause increased price volatility as traders, speculators, and other market participants react to supply/demand events,” the report says.
 
“Simultaneously, oil storage inventories are likely to decrease, further eroding security of supply, aggravating price volatility, and further stimulating speculation … oil could become the price setter in the broader energy market, in which case other energy prices could well become increasingly volatile and unpredictable.”

The report highlights a series of ways to minimise any impacts. From increased fuel efficiency to technological help in stopping the practice of “oil-left-behind” or non-extractable oil and various forms of new liquid fuels, liquefied coal and gas-to-liquids.

But in its conclusion the report makes troubling reading, noting that “the world has never faced a problem like this. Without massive mitigation more than a decade before the fact, the problem will be pervasive and will not be temporary. Previous energy transitions were gradual and evolutionary. Oil peaking will be abrupt and revolutionary.”

This report is the clearest signal yet that the U.S government is taking the subject of ”peak oil” seriously. Yet it remains to be seen what actions can be taken to stop this potentially “revolutionary” change.

REPRINTED FROM ALJAZEERA.NET
the ONLY internet coverage of this LONG overdue aknowledgement of our “uncertain” future

by Noam Chomsky

Presidential candidate John Kerry’s platform and program were way to the right of popular opinion on just about every issue in the 2004 U.S. elections. To the extent that anybody could even understand the program, people didn’t favor it. People who voted for Kerry are people who were concerned about the economy and about health issues. Do you think those people could tell you what Kerry’s health program was or what he was going to do for the economy? I mean, I couldn’t tell you. You have to do a research project to figure out what the program was. And it’s not that people failed to know it because they’re stupid. It’s because it was not presented as something comprehensible.

Of the people who voted for candidate George Bush, the major categories were people who were concerned about terror and about national security. It’s claimed that people who were concerned about values voted for Bush, but that’s mostly a statistical artifact. When you asked the further question, “What values do you have in mind?” it turned out that the major values were things like, “I don’t like this society because it’s too materialistic,” and “There’s too much oppression.” Those are the values. Is that what Bush stands for? Getting rid of that? As far as terrorism is concerned, the administration very consciously chose actions that it was expected would increase the threat of terror and, in fact, did. It’s not because they want terror, it’s just not much of a priority for them.

People who voted for Bush tended to assume that he was in favor of their views, even if the Republican Party platform was diametrically opposed to them. The same was largely true of Kerry voters.

The reason for this is that the parties try to exclude the population from participation. So they don’t present issues, policies, agendas, and so on. They project imagery, and people either don’t bother or they vote for the image. The Gallup Poll regularly asks, “Why are you voting?” One of the choices is, “I’m voting for the candidate’s stand on issues.” That was 6% for Bush, and 13% for Kerry­and most of those voters were deluded about the positions of the candidates. So what you have is essentially flipping a coin. Each candidate got approximately 30% of the electorate. Bush got 31%, Kerry got 29%.

The party managers know where the public stands on a whole list of issues. Their funders just don’t support them; the interests they represent don’t support them. So they project a different kind of image.

If you listen to the presidential debates, you can’t figure out what they’re saying, and that’s on purpose. The last debate was supposed to be about domestic issues. The New York Times commented that Kerry didn’t make any hint about possible government involvement in health care programs because that position has, in their words, “no political support.” Well, according to the most recent polls, 80% of the population thinks that the government ought to guarantee health care for everyone, and furthermore regard it as a moral obligation. That tells you something about people’s values. But there’s “no political support.”

Why? Because the pharmaceutical industry is opposed, the financial institutions are opposed, the insurance industry is opposed, so there’s “no political support.” It doesn’t matter if 80% of the population regard it as a moral obligation: That doesn’t count as political support. It tells you something about the elite conception. You’re supposed to vote for the image they’re projecting. That’s not surprising really. Just ask yourself, “Who runs the elections?”

The elections are run by the same guys who sell toothpaste. They show you an image of a sports hero, or a sexy model, or a car going up a sheer cliff or something, which has nothing to do with the commodity, but it’s intended to delude you into picking this one rather than another one. Same when they run elections. But they’re assigned that task in order to marginalize the public, and furthermore, people are pretty well aware of it.

For many years, election campaigns here have been run by the public relations industry and each time it’s with increasing sophistication. Quite naturally, the industry uses the same technique to sell candidates that it uses to sell toothpaste or lifestyle drugs. The point is to undermine markets by projecting imagery to delude and suppressing information­and similarly, to undermine democracy by the same method.

In the year 2000, there was a huge fuss afterwards about the stolen election, with the Florida chads and the Supreme Court. But ask yourself who was exorcised about it? It was all among a small group of intellectuals. They were the ones who were upset about it. There was never any public resonance for this. In the current election it’s being reiterated. There’s a big fuss among intellectuals about the vote in Ohio, how the voting machines didn’t work, and other things. But the interesting thing is that nobody cares.

Why don’t people care if the election is stolen? The reason is that they don’t take the election seriously in the first place. They reacted about the way that people react to television ads. It’s a mode of delusion. If the Democrats want to succeed in that game, they’re just going to have to figure out better ways of delusion.

There is an alternative, and that is to try to run a program that’s committed to developing a democratic society in which people’s opinions matter.

Hasta la Victoria Siempre!

“The consumer boycott is the only open door in the dark corridor of nothingness down which farmworkers have had to walk for many years. It is a gate of hope through which they expect to find the sunlight of a better life for themselves and their families” (Cesar Chavez)

On March 8, after nearly four years of struggle and amidst the momentum of the 2005 Taco Bell Truth Tour, farmworkers from the Coalition of Immokalee Workers (CIW scored a decisive victory in their national boycott of Taco Bell. Caving under the weight of an intense grassroots campaign, the fast-food giant has agreed to work with the Florida-based farmworker organization to improve the wages and working conditions of farmworkers in the Florida tomato industry by paying a penny-per-pound surcharge demanded by the workers. The farmworkers’ sub-poverty wages have been stagnant and declining in real terms since 1978.

“This is an important victory for farmworkers, one that establishes a new standard of social responsibility for the fast-food industry and makes an immediate material change in the lives of workers. This sends a clear challenge to other industry leaders,” said Lucas Benitez, a member of the Coalition of Immokalee Workers. The CIW’s precedent-setting victory is also an important step forward for student/youth, global justice, and poor peoples’ movements throughout the U.S. who have worked in solidarity with the farmworkers, forcing the world’s largest restaurant corporation (Yum! Brands, Taco Bell’s parent company) to accept responsibility for conditions in its supply chain.

As planned, farmworkers and their allies will gather in Louisville, KY on March 11th and 12th to celebrate the victory and chart the next steps in the movement to end sweatshops in the fields. The battle is won; the war continues.

DURO..DURO..DURO
SI SE PUEDE!

Ringing in a dark new era of wilderness destruction,
the logging of “protected” old-growth reserves has begun at the Biscuit timber sale, atop Fiddler Mountain.
11 people, including a 72-year old womyn from rural Selma, Oregon were arrested on Monday.
Another 11 were arrested on Wednesday,
including one man who locked down to the rear axle of a police vehicle with a steel lockbox.

The logging takes place on areas set aside for protection of the northern spotted owl during the Clinton administration,
and is directly adacent to a pristine, roadless area.
This is the latest and most egregious logging yet in Southern Oregon,
which has become test site for the Bush administrations worst environmental policies.
Logging of so-called “killer trees” along roadsides in the Biscuit timber sale began early in 2004
under the farce of public safety concerns.
Despite successful summer efforts preventing logging,
cutting on unprotected ancient forests began again in the fall.
Although stalled by roadblockades, the destruction has continued unceasingly over the past months.
Ultimately, this logging project is is slated to log 19,500 acres (30.41 sq. miles) of public National Forest land,
or roughly 70,000 truck-loads of logs.
This logging includes 8,173 acres (12.77 sq. miles) in the Pacific Northwest’s largest untouched, unroaded area and
6,303 acres (9.85 miles) of logging on these “protected” old-growth reserves.

The logging is happening in advance of a March 22nd lawsuit, that is likely to rule the logging operations are illegal.
The goal of the timber companies is to have this forest logged before that can happen.
Forest defenders have vowed to everything in their power to stop them.

tomorrow..the voting in committee begins
the re-nomination of William Myers III..REJECTED CANDIDATE..

a citizenx summary:

William Myers III has never been a judge and spent most of his career as a lobbyist for the cattle and mining industry. He has written that all habitat conservation laws are unconstitutional because they interfere with potential profit. In 2001, Bush appointed him as the chief lawyer for the Department of the Interior. In that role he continued as a champion of corporate interests, setting his agenda in meetings with former employers he promised not to speak with, and even illegally giving away sacred Native American land to be strip mined.

these are lifetime appointments by the way.

are you paying attention?

LEARN MORE

Was the killing by US troops of an Italian security chief and the wounding of the Italian journalist he had helped release hours earlier an unfortunate tragedy? Or was it something more sinister? Either way, Washington has some tough questions to answer. American military sources in Baghdad maintain that the car carrying journalist Giuliana Sgrena and three Italian intelligence officials, including the slain officer, failed to react to repeated instructions to stop at a roadblock just outside the capital’s airport. It seems extraordinary that Italian intelligence professionals who had just rescued the journalist would have been insensitive to the requirements of a security check and the risks of ignoring it.

One possible explanation for the attack on the car carrying the Italians is that trigger-happy US troops, terrified of car bombers, fired the minute they suspected the vehicle was a danger to them. It only takes one nervous soldier to shoot a single bullet and a whole unit then shares the panic and opens up on a target. If this is what happened, then it is a demonstration of the indiscipline and poor training of US soldiers which has in the past resulted in a number of similar attacks, including the slaying of the Iraqi occupants of a car rushing a pregnant woman to a maternity hospital.

The odiously named “friendly fire” has characterized the US military performance in Iraq to the fury of Washington’s allies, not least the British whose troops have discovered that however “friendly,” it can prove as deadly as the unfriendly variety.

There is, however, the more sinister explanation which is that the Americans wanted Sgrena dead. A senior correspondent for the Communist daily, Il Manifesto in Rome, the journalist has been no friend of the US invasion and occupation. US troops have killed journalists before. Two cameramen, a Ukrainian and a Spaniard, were slain in April 2003 when a US shell was fired into the Palestine Hotel, a known base of international journalists opposite the Baghdad Sheraton. Earlier an Al-Jazeera correspondent was killed when the TV station’s local office was struck by a US missile.

The American military has not taken kindly to foreign journalists who refuse to involve themselves in America’s well-oiled media-relations machine. When Sgrena was kidnapped on Feb. 4, other journalists were told by US officials that the event highlighted the danger of working outside their Green Zone-focused loop. There was also apparently grim satisfaction that a journalist who was so opposed to US policy should have become a victim of the insurgents. The conclusion of the sinister explanation must therefore be that the Americans were settling the score with a foreign commentator whose published views infuriated them. Yet it seems incredible that even the American military could be this crass.

In Italy, the incident is provoking a renewed outcry against further Italian involvement in Iraq. An anguished Berlusconi reportedly made an extremely angry phone call to President Bush and was promised that that incident would be fully investigated. The journalists group Reporters Sans Frontiers is demanding, however, that an independent inquiry be mounted by the UN since the group fears that, as with the Palestine Hotel deaths, the US will again exonerate its trigger-happy troops.