|
Sunday, October 22, 2006
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
Saturday, October 21, 2006
|
|
|
|
Friday, October 20, 2006
|
|
|
|
Thursday, October 19, 2006
|
Judge Orders Cheney Visitor Logs Opened
and now let's see all the corrupt lobbyists who visited Cheney....
Salon.com News Wires
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
Wednesday, October 18, 2006
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
Monday, October 16, 2006
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
Friday, October 13, 2006
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
Counting The Iraqi Dead - washingtonpost.com
The new Lancet study that claims 6500000 dead Iraqis was dismissed by Bush as "not credible" before he even looked at it (not that he would or could); whatever the number, Bush's Blunder has been a bloodly and violent US military intervention beyond our imagination; the numbers are now being debated...
Counting The Iraqi Dead - washingtonpost.com
|
|
|
|
|
|
Thursday, October 12, 2006
|
|
|
|
|
Countdown with Keith Olbermann - MSNBC.com
Olbermann has an exclusive on a new book Tempting Faith which shows how Bush-Cheney-Rove Gang play Christian right as suckers, holding them in contempt; this could blow away major christian support for the most unChristian administration ever....
Countdown with Keith Olbermann - MSNBC.com
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
Monday, October 09, 2006
|
|
|
|
Sunday, October 08, 2006
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
Rice's Tour of Mideast Yields Little Progress on Key Issues - washingtonpost.com
Rice is a miserable failure once again; Woodward's State of Denial quotes US weapons inspector David McKay saying the she was the worst national security advisor in the history of the institution, while her mentor Brent Scowcroft deemed her a big disappointment, as did George H.W. Bush who added she was "not up to the job." Chuck Hagel, according to Woody, described her as "weak."
Rice's Tour of Mideast Yields Little Progress on Key Issues - washingtonpost.com
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
It's Time for Him to Go - washingtonpost.com
its clear as hell that Rumsfeld is a miserable failure. Woodward's State of Denial shows how as utterly incompetent as well as petty, arrogant, bullying etc and the only reason he's survived is Bush's demented sense of loyalty and weak ego, unable to stand up to tough guys Cheney and Rummy
It's Time for Him to Go - washingtonpost.com
|
|
|
U.S. Casualties in Iraq Rise Sharply - washingtonpost.com
US troops are targets for insurgents in Iraq; let's face the troop: US troops in Iraq are viewed as Israeli troops would be in Lebanon; its time for a Lebanon solution: US troops out and UN, NATO, Arab League and other troops in; keeping in US troops just helps recruit terrorists, create chaos in Iraq and get people killed
U.S. Casualties in Iraq Rise Sharply - washingtonpost.com
|
|
Saturday, October 07, 2006
|
|
|
|
Thursday, October 05, 2006
|
|
|
|
Wednesday, October 04, 2006
|
|
|
|
|
A GOP propaganda film, The Path to 9/11 and its aftermath
The Path to 9/11 as Rightwing Propaganda Film
Douglas Kellner
As the fifth anniversary of the September 11 terrorist attacks arrived, media culture in the U.S. had a wealth of commemorative events. While image of the fateful attack were clearly inscribed in social memory, the meanings and background of the attack was not. The Bush administration had exploited the spectacle to push through a rightwing agenda, including a highly unpopular war in Iraq, but the origins, meaning, and effects of the initial attacks were not clear and were indeed highly contested by different political factions. While resonant images like the planes hitting the World Trade Center and the traumatic aftermath were burned into social memory, no coherent narrative of the events were able to contextualize, explain, and allow the public to understand them.[i]
Social memory is constructed by historical narratives, political discourses, and media culture, as well as resonant images. In this context, a two-part ABC TV-movie, The Path to 9/11, scheduled to open on the eve of the 5th anniversary of the 9/11 attacks and to conclude on September 11, 2006 became a pivotal event in the construction of the origins, meaning, and story of the 9/11 terror attacks. In this study, I will argue that The Path to 9/11 is a blatantly rightwing piece of political propaganda that blames the 9/11 attacks on deficiencies of the Clinton administration, while presenting the Bush administration as inheritors of a disaster which motivates them to heroic struggle and resolute action. We shall see that this event was orchestrated to present the Bush administration position on 9/11 for the upcoming 2006 Congressional elections, in which the Republicans were doing very poorly in the polls. The Path to 9/11 was part of a Republican effort to counter the bad publicity for the failed Iraq invasion and failures of the Bush administration on multiple fronts and to be part of a campaign that presented the Bush administration as stalwart in the war on terror and the most reliable defender of the American people in a time of trouble.
An earlier TV-movie DC 9/11: Time of Crisis (2003) had also projected the myth that Bush was a strong leader.[ii] As Sheldon Rampton reminds us:
This is not the first time that Hollywood has used 9/11 as a pretext to air pro-Bush propaganda in the guise of a docudrama. On the second anniversary of the terrorist attack, the Showtime cable network broadcast "DC 9/11: Time of Crisis," written by conservative Republican Lionel Chetwynd. Dubbed "a [2004] reelection campaign movie" by Washington Post TV critic Tom Shales, the film starred actor Timothy Bottoms in the role of George W. Bush, depicting him as a leader of Churchillian stature who takes personal charge in the 9/11 aftermath while brushing off worries about his own safety with declarations such as, "If some tinhorn terrorist wants me, tell him to come on over and get me. I'll be home!" In reality, as opposed to the bizarro world of docudrama, Bush's safety on 9/11 was guaranteed by hustling him off to an undisclosed location, while Cheney went into hiding for months.[iii]
Rampton points out that The Path to 9/11 is different from the Showtime potboiler by its claim “to be based on the report of the National Commission on Terrorist Attacks Upon the United States (also known as the 9/11 Commission)” (ibid). Written by a rightwing activist, Cyrus Nowrasteh and directed by David Cunningham, the narrative features FBI agent John O’Neil (Harvey Keitel) and national security advisor in charge of counter terrorism (Richard Clarke). Both are portrayed as heroes, deeply worried about a terrorist attack by the Osama Bin Laden Al Qaeda group who run into constant bureaucratic blockades, when seeking to attack Al Qaeda or Bin Laden. Over 800 DVDs of the two-part TV-movie were pre-released and circulated to conservative groups and media to hype up viewers and publicity for the event, but some got in the hands of former members of the Clinton administration, leftwing activists, and critical members of the media. Probably never has there been such a fierce movement to block release of a TV-movie and in response to specific critiques that the propaganda film demonized Clinton and glorified Bush and his administration, there were some edits showing a slacker Bush and the ending added on statements blaming both administrations.
Max Blumenthal revealed that the director of the TV-movie that exploited 9/11 for political purposes, David Cunningham, was a long-time extreme right Christian-conservative activists and both he and script-writer Cyrus Nowrasteh were connected to David Horowitz’s far-right group that for years has been attacking the mainstream media, trying to establish a rightwing presence in Hollywood, and attempting to blame 9/11 on Bill Clinton. As Max Blumenthal reports:
On this project, a secretive evangelical religious right group long associated with Horowitz, founded by The Path to 9/11's director, David Cunningham, that aims to "transform Hollywood" in line with its messianic vision, has taken the lead.
Before The Path to 9/11 entered the production stage, Disney/ABC signed David Cunningham as the film's director. Cunningham is no ordinary Hollywood journeyman. He is in fact the son of Loren Cunningham, founder of the right-wing evangelical group Youth With A Mission (YWAM). According to Sara Diamond's book Spiritual Warfare, during the 1980's YWAM "sought to gain influence within the Republican party" while assisting authoritarian governments in South Africa and Central America. Cunningham, Diamond noted, was a follower of Christian Reconstructionism, an extreme current of evangelical theology that advocates using stealth political methods to put the United States under the control of Biblical law and jettison the Constitution. Cunningham instilled his radical ideology in young missionaries by sending them to "Discipleship Training School." A former student of Cunningham's school claimed "similarities between cult mind controlling techniques and the [Discipleship Training School] program instituted by YWAM."
When the young Cunningham entered his father's ministry, he helped found an auxiliary group called The Film Institute (TFI). According to its mission statement, TFI is "dedicated to a Godly transformation and revolution TO and THROUGH the Film and Television industry." Cunningham has placed over a dozen interns from Youth With A Mission's Discipleship Training School in film industry jobs "so that they can begin to impact and transform Hollywood from the inside out," according to a YWAM report.
Last June, Cunningham's TFI announced it was producing its first film, mysteriously titled Untitled History Project. "TFI's first project is a doozy," a newsletter to YWAM members read. "Simply being referred to as: The Untitled History Project, it is already being called the television event of the decade and not one second has been put to film yet. Talk about great expectations!" (A web edition of the newsletter was mysteriously deleted last week after its publication by the blogger Digby, but has been cached on Google at the link above).
The following month, on July 28, the New York Post reported that ABC was filming a mini-series "under a shroud of secrecy" about the 9/11 attacks. "At the moment, ABC officials are calling the miniseries 'Untitled Commission Report' and producers refer to it as the 'Untitled History Project,'" the Post noted.
Early on, Cunningham had recruited a young Iranian-American screenwriter named Cyrus Nowrasteh to write the script of his secretive Untitled film. Not only is Nowrasteh an outspoken conservative, he is also a fervent member of the emerging network of right-wing people burrowing into the film industry with ulterior sectarian political and religious agendas, like Cunningham.
Nowrasteh's conservatism was on display when he appeared as a featured speaker at the Liberty Film Festival (LFF), an annual event founded in 2004 to premier and promote conservative-themed films supposedly too "politically incorrect" to gain acceptance at mainstream film festivals. This June, while The Path to 9/11 was being filmed, LFF founders Govindini Murty and Jason Apuzzo--both friends of Nowrasteh-- they were "partnering" with Horowitz. Indeed, the 2006 LFF is listed as "A Program of the David Horowitz Freedom Center."[iv]
As the revelations of the rightwing activists producing the propaganda film unfolded, as rightwing groups began promoting it after receiving the prescreening DVDs, and as former members of the Clinton administration and progressive media activists put pressure on ABC to cancel the event, the Disney network made some edits, but basically aired the rightwing version.[v]
In response to the criticism, ABC first claimed it was objective and then claimed it was a not a documentary, but a “dramatization, drawn from a variety of sources including the 9/11 Commission Report, other published material and personal interviews. As such, for dramatic and narrative purposes, the movie contains fictionalized scenes, composite and representative characters and dialogue and time compression.”[vi] Former Gov. Thomas Kean, who was co-chair of the 9/11 Commission and an adviser to the series, claimed that the TV-movie was truthful: “This is the story of how it happened,” and indicated that he corrected inaccuracies during filming.[vii] As Joe Conason notes, Kean’s involved with the series seriously discredited the former governor, and, I would add, the whole 9/11 Commission which was long under attack for not more vigorously investigating the 9/11 attacks.
There were reports of fights on the production set and over editing as those in the project fought with the rightwing activists constructing a propagandistic version of 9/11. The original FBI advisor quit in disgust because “they were making things up,”[viii] and actor Harvey Keitel reports fierce fights over his own portrayal of FBI Agent John O’Neil and his desire not the misrepresent the facts of 9/11. A New York Post report on the production set notes:
Meanwhile, sources on the set told The Post that during filming there were arguments over the veracity of the content.
That legitimacy problem, they said, was exacerbated by the fact that no experts were on hand to get things straight.
When Oscar nominee Harvey Keitel signed on to play Deputy FBI Director John O'Neill, who perished in the World Trade Center attacks, he thought the film's aim was to be historically correct, he said.
"It turned out not all the facts were correct," which led to "arguments," he said on CNN.
Virtually from Day 1 of shooting, "Keitel put his own researcher on the case," looking to correct historical, character and other inaccuracies he found in the script, said John Dondertman, a production designer on the film.
That led to Keitel rewriting most of his own lines -- which in turn meant almost daily revisions for cast members who had scenes with him.
A particular point of contention was a scene in which O'Neill, observing reams of Arabic documents, asks his assistant, "Do we have Arab translators?" only to be told, "I don't know of any. I'll call around."
"Keitel couldn't understand why the FBI didn't have Arabic translators, so the dialogue was changed on the spot," said a script supervisor.
On one occasion, Keitel holed up in his hotel for an entire day with director David Cunningham revising the script.
Other times, Cunningham would "fumble through the 9/11 Commission book trying to figure out how to correct details Keitel called into question," said the script supervisor.[ix]
Both before and after the broadcasting, several real-life figures portrayed in the movie (Bill Clinton, Richard Clarke, Madeline Albright and Sandy Berger) raised factual objections and in Clinton’s case fiercely defended his administration in an interview with Fox TV where Clinton attacked the interview and Fox for their rightwing hit on him and fiercely defended his attempts to stop Al Qaeda and Bin Laden, while admitting his failure. Richard Clarke, a major advisor on terrorism to both the Clinton and Bush administrations, and a hero in the docudrama, strongly contested a scene which showed U.S. soldiers on the ground in Afghanistan poised to attack and take Bin Laden, and then canceling of the assault because of bureaucratic objections raised by Clinton administration national security advisor Sandy Berger. Clarke insisted that no U.S. military or CIA personnel were on the ground in Afghanistan and saw Bin Laden; likewise, contrary to the docudrama, Afghan Northern Alliance leader and U.S. ally Masood who no where near the Bin Laden camp and never saw him; the CIA cancelled the proposed hit on the Bin Laden camp portrayed in the movie because there was only a single source for the report that Bin Laden was present and a small chance that a cruise missile shot at the area would actually get him. |
