The truth at any cost lowers all other costs — curated by former US spy Robert David Steele.
Exclusive: Petraeus biography ghostwriter breaks silence
Post local editor Vernon Loeb, who ghostwrote Paula Broadwell’s David Petraeus biography, offers his impressions of Broadwell and thoughts on the scandal.
The one question I never answered was why General Patraeus was granting such extraordinary access to a reporter. She was the only one with access to Petraeus, I never ever spoke to Petraeus. My job was to craft the narrative. I always thought she was acting with the best of intentions.
NOVEMBER 12, 2012
An Era of Conflicts
The New Political Map of the Middle East
by PATRICK COCKBURN, Counterpunch
http://www.counterpunch.org/
President Obama is lucky in his opponents, particularly when it comes to explaining why America’s influence is waning in the Middle East. The issue was hardly mentioned in the election, aside from a botched attempt by Mitt Romney to blame the administration for the death of Chris Stevens, the US ambassador to Libya, and for the burning of the US consulate in Benghazi.
Romney soon steered away from his initial posture of attacking Obama for “apologising for America” and failing to assert US power. He recognised that the one thing the US electorate does not want is another war in the Middle East. By beating the patriotic drum too hard, Romney risked voters remembering that it was the Republicans who, not so long ago, led them into failed wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. On a more prosaic level, Romney may have sensed he would be vulnerable on topics he knew nothing about.
This near immunity from effective criticism during the campaign does not mean that Obama is not facing dangers across the region with which he has previously failed to grapple successfully.
Afghanistan is a good example. The “surge”, which preoccupied the White House when Obama first took office in 2009, led to an extra 33,000 soldiers being sent to Afghanistan, where they wholly failed to eliminate the Taliban. The remaining 112,000 Nato troops will be withdrawn by the end of 2014, bringing to an end one of the more disastrously unproductive wars in American history. The US and its allies are supposedly training up Afghan security forces to take their place, but so many American and British soldiers have been killed by Afghan soldiers and police that the transition is turning into a debacle.
Holds individuals and groups accountable for violence.
“Bearing witness” with modern technological tools.
TED2011 Fellow Sanjana Hattotuwa passionately describes his work with Groundviews — a citizen journalism website that sheds light on Sri Lankan narratives that aren't typically covered in mainstream media.
A Covert Affair: Petraeus Caught in the Honeypot?
Justin Raimondo has uncovered the connection that Petraeus' lover, Paula Blackwell [nee Kranz], has to neocon and Zionist entities, which may explain who really brought Petreaus down:
“While Broadwell’s current academic affiliation is with Harvard’s Kennedy School of Government, her previous post was deputy director of the Jebsen Center for Counter-Terrorism Studies at Tufts University’s Fletcher School. The Center, according to its self-description, “distinguishes itself by a philosophy that maintains counter-terrorism should be predictive, preventive and preemptive, with the latter being a last resort.” Founded in 2005, the Jebsen Center was made possible by the generous donation of one Jan Henrik Jebsen, heir to the Norwegian shipping fortune, who gave $1.3 million to set it up. Jebsen, a former investment banker with Lazard Freres, is the principal of Gamma Applied Visions Group, an international octopus with tentacles all over the place: part arms dealer and weapons developer, part “green” energy company. As one might expect from someone who has so much of his multi-billion dollar fortune invested in making and selling armaments, Jebsen is on the board of directors of the distinctly warlike Hudson Institute, where Scooter Libby, Douglas Feith, Michael Ledeen, and practically every neocon you’ve ever heard of have found refuge.”
Raimondo goes on at length documenting the Jebsen Center's pro-Zionist and anti-Arab sensibility and activities, as well as that of certain neocons associated with Jebsen, and then notes:
The story line that General Petraeus is being forced to resign because the FBI uncovered an affair he was having with his former biographer is classic Washington DC theater. The story is a way of removing the politically popular General Petraeus from CIA without raising a political uproar. The real question is why?
This is just guess work, but I think there is a convergence of reasons for the newly elected administration to ease the General out. I think the administration does not particularly like the general and especially dislikes his political clout with congress. Also General Petraeus may have approved of some CIA operations or positions that have exacerbated the Benghazi tragedy and the administration does not want him before congress talking about this under oath. Finally Michael Vickers has developed a reputation based on nothing of being an intelligence wiz kid, yet he is politically harmless.
Great concept — did not exist but your phrase is now adopted.
Robert Steele: Post-Benghazi — Open Season on CIA?
Mini-Me: CIA Bimbo Eruption or Hit Job with Vickers Replacing Patreaus? Great Photos
Graphic: Benghazi Fiasco UPDATED w/ Marines (FAST Yes, MEU/MSG No) & 173rd Airborne ( – ) + RECAP
See Also:
Does anybody in the federal government actually read and think anymore?
Wall Street's Plan to Push Obama to Betray Those Who Elected Him
The safety net is the glory of America and the unending nightmare of Wall Street. That's why Wall Street’s leading “false flag” group, the Third Way (which calls itself a “leading moderate think tank”), has responded to the warnings that Robert Kuttner, AFL-CIO President Trumka, and I have made that if President Obama is re-elected our immediate task will be to prevent the Great Betrayal – the adoption of self-destructive austerity programs and the opening wedge of the effort to unravel the safety net (including Social Security, Medicare, and Medicaid).
Here's what you need to know about this plan to rob Americans of their future.
Phi Beta Iota: A clever well-informed President intent on making the most of his last four years would–unless he aspires to being a Wall Street shill after retirement from the White House–be putting The Chicago Plan Revisited front and center along with the Automated Payment Transaction Tax. Wall Street–and Peter Peterson and David Walker in particular–needs to shut up and disappear into its box while ethical adults (hard to find, we know) sort this out. What we can say with certainty is that both Congress and the White House are betraying the public trust as this time by not being clever or well-informed — they continue to focus on doing the wrong things righter instead of the right thing.
