Riding The Juggernaut

Sunday, August 3, 2008

Bruce Ivins' Daily Diary, July 10 2008

Just another day at the office:

9:00 am - 12:00 am

Work on athrax spores and other deadly material at U.S. Army Medical Research Institute for Infectious Diseases.

12:00 am - 1:00 pm

Lunch.

1:30 pm - 3:00 pm

Attend sensitive briefing on a new bubonic plague vaccine under development at the Army's elite biological weapons testing center.

3:30 pm - 5:00 pm

Undergo major psychological assessment as part of FBI murder investigation in which I am the prime suspect.

6:30 pm - 8:30 pm

Tenpin bowling with Dr. Zack and the other Arab-hating lab guys.

From this Wapo story: Researcher Kept Security Clearance as FBI Closed In.

The Inmates Are Still Running The Asylum

That's all I can think after reading more stories about this anthrax case.

I mean, if Ivins did it, then how the f*** does a psychopath run free for seven years with all the Feds running around the place (actually taking "expert" advice from him) etc? I mean, this guy was right under their noses all along, and yet they chased one red herring after another, at the behest of some very "usual suspect" types (like Nicholas Kristol, who said he knew who did it).

And if Ivins didn't do it, why the f*** are the Feds fingering the wrong guy again, and letting the real killer(s) remain free, unless it's yet another massive cover-up (one lie leading to another)? And if that's the case, well, this case is a lot clumsier than the others. Is the thread unravelling?

Either way, the FBI investigation has been a f***ing disaster. Heads should roll.

The latest reports suggest greed was Ivins' motive: he stood to make "tens of thousands" if the US government aggressively produced his experimental anthrax vaccine (it was dropped after a 2 year study with no deal cemented). But while a social worked and an estranged brother take that "batshit crazy" line, friends and associates insist Ivins was innocent. So does his lawyer.

In cases like this, you have to accept that the Feds have access to a lot more info that you do, and until they make it public there is only so far you can go with speculation. But I'd like to know that Philip Zack is doing these days (strange how none of the media reports even mention him this week), and why Ivins - of all those who worked in his lab - was fingered.

Another big issue here is Qui Custodiat Custos? Is the USA's massive stockpile of weapons actually endangering its citizens more than the allegedly critical issue of foreign terrorists? The links above explore this (thanks antiwar.com again).

UPDATE: Glenn Greenwald has more today, including demands for a 9-11 Commission style (oh no!) investigation. Among Greenwald's list of questions:

If it's really the case -- as principal Ivins antagonist Jean Duley claims -- that Ivins, as far back as 2000, had "actually attempted to murder several other people, [including] through poisoning" and had threatened to kill his co-workers at his Fort Detrick lab, then why did he continue to maintain clearance to work on biological weapons, and why are his co-workers and friends, with virtual unanimity, insisting that he never displayed any behavior suggestive of being the anthrax attacker?

I noted (again) that Daschle and Leahy were targetted after media reports saying they were holding up passage of the Patriot Act, which was passed just a few weeks after the attacks.

Saturday, August 2, 2008

You Still There, Frank?

Nice to see the ATO's audit of Lowy staying in the news:

Labor MP Sharon Grierson, who chairs the Joint Committee of Public Accounts and Audit, said she would be seeking reassurance from the tax commissioner that any deliberate tax evasion emerging from money stashed in Liechtenstein would be pursued.

The report has more on Lowy's 1995 ATO deal:

The year before that, Mr Lowy had settled a disputed assessment with the Tax Office with a payment of $25million, which outraged auditors.

Part of that investigation had centred on Mr Lowy's $110 million super yacht, Ilona, which has 18 guest bedrooms, a gym, massage room and a helicopter. It is understood much of the investigation focused on the boat's log book.

The Tax Office calculated that about $50 million was owed based on outstanding tax, penalties and interest for undeclared payments to a Lowy family company, Cordera, in 1997 and 1998.

Because it was unclear which director of Cordera was responsible, auditors drafted assessments, reportedly totalling $300 million, against all Lowy family directors and Cordera. The Tax Office intended to pursue $50 million but accepted $25 million. Details of the settlement have only just been made public.

Ms Grierson does not want any future settlement with Mr Lowy to be shrouded in such secrecy.

"If there is any talk of a settlement we would want the tax commissioner to adhere to our recommendations [of transparency]," she said.

Friday, August 1, 2008

Another Can Of Worms

Glenn Greenwald is all over this anthrax story. As well as slamming ABC News for telling lies in the wake of the attacks and never acknowledging their errors, he dishes up this quote from Dr Bruce Ivins (pic above) to his local paper:

Rabbi Morris Kosman is entirely correct in summarily rejecting the demands of the Frederick Imam for a "dialogue."

By blood and faith, Jews are God's chosen, and have no need for "dialogue" with any gentile. End of "dialogue."

Given that Ivins was a pracitising Catholic, this letters seems to expose him as a likely Christian Zionist. And it will be interesting how the media deal with that, given that Ivins had no other apparent motive for the attacks.

The DoJ have confirmed they were about to charge Ivins (but are not saying more till they have talked with families of those who died in the attacks). So if Ivins didn't do it, he was probably being framed (which might be enough reason to go mad and suicide).

Despite a fair bit of reading I never even heard Ivin's name before in all this - Zack and another member of the Camel Club got attention because they quit, which looked suspicious. All the more reason it will be interesting to see what DoJ dish up: if they think Ivins did it, there's no reason not to publish all details of the case, right?

Meanwhile, the rabbit hole just keeps getting deeper. One of the biggest mysteries of these anthrax attacks (aside from the FBI's apparent and repeated incompetence) is how and why the media have ignored them for so long. Meanwhile, the information vacuum and assorted red herrings have spurned all kinds of speculation elsewhere. As the Palm Beach Post points out:

Entering the search words "anthrax" and "conspiracy" on the internet search engine Google produces nearly 1.5 million pages.

The Post covers some of the major conspiracy-related issues, including this:

The Hartford Courant, quoting an internal Army inquiry, reported in 2002 that lab specimens of anthrax spores, Ebola virus and other pathogens disappeared from Fort Detrick in the early 1990s, during a time of labor complaints and spats among rival scientists.

And this:

The FBI has said 15 of the 19 Sept. 11 hijackers lived in South Florida, and as many as 12 had links to Palm Beach County. Several lived in Delray Beach or Boynton Beach, not far from the AMI building in Boca Raton.

In 2003, Leonard Cole, author of the book The Anthrax Letters: A Medical Detective Story, pointed out several other links between the Sept. 11 hijackers and the anthrax attacks:

Ahmed Al Haznawi was treated at a Fort Lauderdale hospital for a leg ulcer.

The doctor later said the ulcer was probably cutaneous anthrax. Gloria Irish, a real estate agent who is the wife of Mike Irish, editor-in-chief of AMI's The Sun, helped two of the hijackers, Hamza Alghamdi and Marwan Al-Shehhi, rent apartments in Delray.

In addition to Cole's contentions, Gregg Chatterton, co-owner of Huber Drugs in Delray Beach, has said a man came in during the summer of 2001 seeking an ointment for his irritated and red hands. Chatterton later identified the man as Mohamed Atta, believed to be the ringleader of the hijackers. Chatterton said he also sold Al-Shehhi a bottle of Robitussin for a chest cold and directed him to a nearby clinic.

So you have these leads pointing towards the Muslim hijackers, but then you have a pro-Jewish US scientist (who presumably wouldn't have anything to do with such fanatical Islamists) facing charges. Hmmn.

Something certainly doesn't add up, unless somebody is deliberately spreading lies. And why would anyone do that?

The ball is in DoJ's court.

Was This Really The Anthrax Killer?

The LA Times broke the story, headlined Apparent suicide in anthrax case. Here's that breaking story in full:

By David Willman, Los Angeles Times Staff Writer, August 1, 2008

A top government scientist who helped the FBI analyze samples from the 2001 anthrax attacks has died in Maryland from an apparent suicide, just as the Justice Department was about to file criminal charges against him for the attacks, the Los Angeles Times has learned.

Bruce E. Ivins, 62, who for the last 18 years worked at the government's elite biodefense research laboratories at Ft. Detrick, Md., had been informed of his impending prosecution, said people familiar with Ivins, his suspicious death and the FBI investigation.

Ivins, whose name had not been disclosed publicly as a suspect in the case, played a central role in research to improve anthrax vaccines by preparing anthrax formulations used in experiments on animals.

Regarded as a skilled microbiologist, Ivins also helped the FBI analyze the powdery material recovered from one of the anthrax-tainted envelopes sent to a U.S. senator's office in Washington.

Ivins died Tuesday at Frederick Memorial Hospital after ingesting a massive dose of prescription Tylenol mixed with codeine, said a friend and colleague, who declined to be identified out of concern that he would be harassed by the FBI.

The death -- without any mention of suicide -- was announced to Ivins' colleagues at the U.S. Army Medical Research Institute of Infectious Diseases, or USAMRIID, through a staffwide e-mail.

"People here are pretty shook up about it," said Caree Vander Linden, a spokeswoman for USAMRIID, who said she was not at liberty to discuss details surrounding the death.

The anthrax mailings killed five people, crippled national mail service, shut down a Senate office building and spread fear of further terrorism after the Sept. 11 attacks.

The extraordinary turn of events followed the government's payment in June of a settlement valued at $5.82 million to a former government scientist, Steven J. Hatfill, who was long targeted as the FBI's chief suspect despite a lack of any evidence that he had ever possessed anthrax.

The payout to Hatfill, a highly unusual development that all but exonerated him in the mailings, was an essential step to clear the way for prosecuting Ivins, according to lawyers familiar with the matter.

Federal investigators moved away from Hatfill -- for years the only publicly identified "person of interest" -- and ultimately concluded that Ivins was the culprit after FBI Director Robert S. Mueller III changed leadership of the investigation in late 2006.

The FBI's new top investigators -- Vincent B. Lisi and Edward W. Montooth -- instructed agents to reexamine leads or potential suspects that may have received insufficient attention. Moreover, significant progress was made in analyzing genetic properties of the anthrax powder recovered from letters addressed to two senators.

The renewed efforts led the FBI back to USAMRIID, where agents first questioned scientists in December 2001, a few weeks after the fatal mailings.

By spring of this year, FBI agents were still contacting Ivins' present and former colleagues. At USAMRIID and elsewhere, scientists acquainted with Ivins were asked to sign confidentiality agreements in order to prevent leaks of new investigative details.

Ivins, employed as a civilian at Ft. Detrick, earlier had attracted the attention of Army officials because of anthrax contaminations that Ivins failed to report for five months. In sworn oral and written statements to an Army investigator, Ivins said that he had erred by keeping the episodes secret -- from December 2001 to late April 2002. He said he had swabbed and bleached more than 20 areas that he suspected were contaminated by a sloppy lab technician.

"In retrospect, although my concern for biosafety was honest and my desire to refrain from crying 'Wolf!' . . . was sincere, I should have notified my supervisor ahead of time of my worries about a possible breach in biocontainment," Ivins told the Army. "I thought that quietly and diligently cleaning the dirty desk area would both eliminate any possible [anthrax] contamination as well as prevent unintended anxiety at the institute."

The Army chose not to discipline Ivins regarding his failure to report the contamination. Officials said that penalizing Ivins might discourage other employees from voluntarily reporting accidental spills of "hot" agents.

But Ivins' recollections should have raised serious questions about his veracity and his intentions, according to some of those familiar with the investigation. For instance, although Ivins said that he swabbed areas near and within his personal office, and bleached surfaces to kill any spores, and that some of the swabs tested positive, he was vague about what should have been an essential next step:

Reswabbing to check whether any spores remained.

"I honestly do not recall if follow-up swabs were taken of the area," Ivins said. "I may have done so, but I do not now remember reswabbing."

"That's bull----," said one former senior USAMRIID official. "If there's contamination, you always reswab. And you would remember doing it."

The former official told The Times that Ivins might have hedged regarding reswabbing out of fear that investigators would find more of the spores inside or near his office.

Ivins' statements were contained within a May 2002 Army report on the contamination at USAMRIID and was obtained by The Times under the Freedom of Information Act.

Soon after the government's settlement with Hatfill was announced June 27, Ivins began showing signs of serious strain.

One of his longtime colleagues told The Times that Ivins, who was being treated for depression, indicated to a therapist that he was considering suicide.

Soon thereafter, family members and local police officers escorted Ivins from USAMRIID, where his access to sensitive areas was curtailed, the colleague said.

Ivins was committed to a facility in Frederick for treatment of his depression. On July 24, he was released from the facility, operated by Sheppard Pratt Health System. A telephone call that same day by The Times verified that Ivins' government voice mail was still functioning at the bacteriology division of USAMRIID.

The scientist faced forced retirement, planned for September, said his longtime colleague, who described Ivins as emotionally fractured by the federal scrutiny.

"He didn't have any more money to spend on legal fees. He was much more emotionally labile, in terms of sensitivity to things, than most scientists. . . . He was very thin-skinned."

FBI spokeswoman Debra J. Weierman said Thursday that the bureau would not comment on the death of Ivins.

Last week, FBI Director Mueller told CNN that "in some sense, there have been breakthroughs" in the case.

"I'll tell you we made great progress in the investigation," Mueller added.

"And it's in no way dormant."

Ivins, the son of a Princeton-educated pharmacist, was born and raised in Lebanon, Ohio, and received undergraduate and graduate degrees, including a doctorate in microbiology, from the University of Cincinnati.

The eldest of his two brothers, Thomas Ivins, said he was not surprised by the events that have unfolded.

"He buckled under the pressure from the federal government," Thomas Ivins said, adding that FBI agents came to Ohio last year to question him about his brother.

"I was questioned by the feds, and I sung like a canary" about Bruce Ivins' personality and tendencies, Thomas Ivins said.

"He had in his mind that he was omnipotent."

Ivins' widow declined to be interviewed when reached Thursday at her home in Frederick. The couple raised twins, now 24.

The family's home is 198 miles -- about a 3 1/2 -hour drive -- from a mailbox in Princeton, N.J., where anthrax spores were found by investigators.

All of the recovered anthrax letters were postmarked in that vicinity.

So was this man, Bruce E. Ivins, 62, really the man who mailed out the anthrax letters in 2001? Personally, based on my prior investigations, I was inclined to think that Ivin's fellow scientist Philip Zack was a more likely culprit. OTOH I never even heard the name Bruce Ivins mentioned on any website I visited, even though he worked in the same lab as Dr Zack.

It's interesting that Ed Lake, whose anthraxinvestigation.com website has a lot of information, just updated his site two weeks ago with a post defending Zack from mounting online suspicion:

On the morning of April 11, 2008, someone who truly believes that al Qaeda sent the anthrax letters sent me a clipping from the July 28, 1974, issue of The Zanesville, Ohio, Times Recorder. Here is the section of that clipping which refers to Dr. Zack:

Lake suggests that the article proves that Zack was not Jewish, which means any Zionist-influenced conspiracy theories (like mine) should be put to rest. OTOH Lake's credibility takes a blow when he calls Justin Raimondo a "conservative"!

But why does Mr. Raimondo point at Dr. Zack? Why not point at others who belonged to "The Camel Club" at Ft. Detrick? Why ignore the fact that Dr. Zack lived in Colorado at the time of the attacks? Why ignore the fact that the incident with Dr. Assaad took place ten years before the attacks? Why ignore the fact that it took place at the time of the first Gulf War when many Americans were "anti-Arab?" Why ignore the fact that the attack anthrax was made no more than two years before the attacks? Why ignore the fact that there is really nothing that points at Dr. Zack other than a mistaken belief that he's a Jew and part of The Great Jewish Conspiracy?

Do conservatives like Mr. Raimondo think that Dr. Zack is a liberal Arab hater? Is there such a thing as a liberal Arab hater?

If Dr. Zack is not a Jew, who conservatives readily label as "bigots" because Jews don't seem to like the Arabs who want to exterminate them, what kind of "bigot" could Dr. Zack be? If he's a Catholic who didn't like Arabs at the time of the first Gulf War, what kind of "bigot" would that make him? Does "conservative bigot" seem a reasonable term? It appears that Mr. Raimondo is pointing the finger at a fellow conservative!

Hmmn. That's strangely incoherent and uninformed, in contrast with other information Lake has provided.

It's possible that Raimondo jumped to conclusions because only two members of the Camel Club were publicly named, and even that was only because they quit their jobs. I haven't seen any other websites mentioning Ivins' name. And yet, as I said a month ago:

It seems clear that the prime suspects in the anthrax case today must be Dr. Philip M. Zack, Dr. Marian K. Rippy, their "camel club" colleagues, and their supervisors.

So now we find out that Bruce Ivins was a member of the Camel Club, and he is conveniently dead. His Wikipedia page has already been updated (just 5 hours after the LAS Times story broke):

After Hatfill was no longer considered a suspect, Ivins began "showing signs of serious strain". As a result, he lost access to sensitive areas at his job. He began being treated for depression and expressed some suicidal thoughts.[2]

Late in July 2008, investigators informed Ivins of his impending prosecution for his alleged involvement in the 2001 Anthrax Attacks that Ivins himself had previously assisted authorities in investigating.

Ivins apparently committed suicide on July 29, 2008 by overdosing on Tylenol with Codeine.[3]

Does that mean he was the author of the anthrax letters? No.

Does it mean he wasn't? No.

We should expect a lot more information about this case to come through soon. Keep your eyes open for what is NOT said. There are a lot of unanswered questions at this point.

If Ivins did it, what was his motivation? Why did he frame Arabs for the attacks? Who fingered Dr Assad? Who fingered Dr Hatfill, and why did the FBI (ad the corporate media) pursue these leads so aggressively while ignoring others?

What did the Feds find in that lake?

Did the DoJ try to block this investigation? If so, why? As I write, the DoJ still has no comment.

Did those reporters reveal their sources?

And could all this have anything to do with Jerome Hauer?

Thursday, July 31, 2008

$12 Billion Is Not Enough

Greed knows no boundaries:

Exxon Mobil Corp has reported second-quarter earnings of $US11.68 billion ($A12.38 billion), the biggest profit from operations ever by any US corporation, but the results were well short of Wall Street expectations and its shares fell.

Teh Legacy! Teh Legacy!

Condi's talk of a final push for Middle Eastern peace is not fooling anybody:

According to a press release sent out by Time, this Friday's edition of the magazine will reportedly include a article that describes how Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice is deeply involved in an effort to "clean up [President] Bush's foreign policy legacy."

But one newspaper in the Persian Gulf believes the negotiations are tailored for the benefit of John McCain during the fall election season. In a Thursday editorial entitled "Negotiations for the Sake of Rice," the UAE's Al-Khaleej writes that leaders in the United States, Israel and the Palestinian Territories all know that no breakthroughs can be expected in President Bush's last few months in office.

"But since the attention is focused on helping the Republican candidate John McCain in the presidential election in November, US Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice will increase her pressures in an attempt to change some positions and facts, and sign a document - a mere document - that would be regarded as an accomplishment," the paper claims, adding that the negotiations are "pointless."

It's tempting to think that the Bush team's sudden and dramatic turn towards realism on multiple fronts might signal a change of heart within the administration, some desperate acts of contrition, a belated recognition of widespread and sometimes horrific errors, and an attempt to at least salvage something of worth from their remaining months in office. It would be nice to think so.

But the fact is that this is all just political theater designed to help John McCain win office.

Too Clever By Half

I hate it when I reach a new milestone in understanding how things work in this sorry, fucked-up world. But here we go again...

First, take a look at this mushy interview with Frank Lowy:

The Australian tycoon's cheery optimism in the face of the present pessimism about British prospects may well stem from the almost biblical narrative of his life. Born into a Jewish family in Hungarian-speaking Czechoslovakia, he survived the Holocaust along with his mother, brother and sister. 'My father was taken to Auschwitz and never returned,' he states sparely.

Now ask yourself why is Frank Lowy doing an interview like this right now? Shouldn't he be busy trying to fend of that US Senate investigation?

Lowy is doing the interview because he's in trouble. He has already put a lot of money into these London developments, and he stands to make a lot more. But if his financial backers get cold feet, the whole deal could collapse.

So he's gone to his friends, calling in favours:

Lowy (a former director of DMGT, the owners of the Mail and This is Money) is remarkably optimistic about the future of shopping in Britain...

Yeah, that's right, he's a former director of the company publishing this drivel. Well, at least they had the decency to mention that fact, even if they conveniently forgot to tell their readers about Lowy's big tax troubles.

Now pay careful attention to this bit at the bottom of the interview:

At a time when much of the property world is struggling to secure loans, he seems to be able to finance his projects. Westfield has been a customer of the National Australia Bank since 1960, although these days his bankers are spread across the globe and the company has debt outstanding in Britain, the US and Australia.

See that? OK, now read this:

NAB's new chief executive Cameron Clyne and chairman Michael Chaney today left open the option for NAB to finally bite the bullet in relation to the UK market and either make an acquisition or get out.

At a media conference in Melbourne, Clyne said he would be reviewing the bank's strategic direction in response to changed market conditions.

You see? NAB is getting cold feet. And why wouldn't they, especially given their own difficulties of late?

Chaney made clear today that NAB is not going to launch into an acquisition frenzy under Clyne's leadership with the sort of silly “double the business” target that has caused trouble at other companies. He did not rule out the sale of assets.

Clyne made reassuring noises about his commitment to reviewing risk management at NAB after last week's sudden $830 million provisioning charge. He said reviewing risk management was “one of my priorities”. That contrasts with Stewart's comment last week that risk management was fine.

"Stewart", of course, is the NAB director who just resigned in disgrace. And Frank Lowy is now categorized as a "risk".

PS: Seriously, I hate this shit. What sort of dumb bastard stays up till 11:30 pm joining these kind of dots, unless he is making a lot of money out of it himself? (I am not). I must be stupid, or mad, or both. Good night.

Oh and by the way, the new head of NAB is only 40 years old but already making $7.5 million per year.

Wednesday, July 30, 2008

Whitney Down Under

Mike Whitney says the NAB's recent move was a "game-changer" which will send shockwaves through the global markets:

The scariest news of the week comes from down-under, where the National Australia Bank (NAB) announced it would "slash a £400m bond sale by two thirds. The retreat comes days after the Melbourne lender shocked the markets by announcing a 90pc write-down on its £550m holdings of US mortgage debt, an admission that it AAA-rated securities are virtually worthless....The decision by National Australia Bank to make drastic provisions on its US mortgage debt could have ramifications in the US itself. It opted for a 100pc write-off on a clutch of "senior strips" of collateralized debt obligations (CDO) worth £450m - even though they were all rated AAA. (Ambrose Evans Pritchard, "Australia faces worse crisis than America", UK Telegraph)

This is a huge story with grave implications for America's struggling banking system. No wonder the establishment media is avoiding it like the plague. If AAA rated CDOs are worthless, then some of the biggest financial institutions in the country will be packed off to the boneyard feet-first.

The original article appeared in the Business Spectator and was titled "NAB will shock Wall Street", by Robert Gottliebsen. "Shock" is an understatement. This is more like a meat cleaver crashing down on a butcher block. Schwook! This is a must-read for anyone who is following the meltdown in the financial markets. Here is an extended excerpt from Gottliebsen's article:
"The National Australia Bank's decision to write off 90 per cent of its US conduit loans will have dramatic repercussions around the world. Wall Street will be deeply shocked when they understand the repercussions of what NAB has done. It is clear global banks have nowhere near provided for their exposures to US housing loans which in the words of John Stewart are experiencing a “meltdown”.

We are now way beyond sub-prime. NAB says that it is suffering a 55 per cent loss on American housing loans – an event that has never happened in the history of a developed country in recent memory. This is an unprecedented event and means that the cost of bailing out the US financial system is now far beyond the highest estimates. A US recession is now locked in, but more alarmingly, 55 per cent loan losses point to the possibility of a depression.

It means the cost of bailing out housing exposures to the two mortgage insurers will be so great that it will leave no room to bail out anything else and there are several US banks that are now in big trouble. NAB says that the dislocation in the residential market is separate from the corporate market, but the flow on is inevitable." ( The Business Spectator,"NAB will shock Wall Street")
The conduits are off-balance sheets operations run by the banks which contain hundreds of billions of dollars of bonds which are now essentially worthless. So far, many of the banks have not accurately reported the losses from these operations hoping that the housing market will stabilize and the value of the bonds will rebound. The action taken by the National Australia Bank is a "game-changer"; it's like the Grim Reaper swooping down on Wall Street and lopping-off the top of every big investment bank in downtown Manhattan.

Ouch.

Tuesday, July 29, 2008

Teh Anti-Semitism! Teh Anti-Semitism!

TIME's Joe Klein comes under attack for daring to point out an unspeakable truth:

There is a small group of Jewish neoconservatives who unsuccessfully tried to get Benjamin Netanyahu to attack Saddam Hussein in the 1990s, and then successfully helped provide the intellectual rationale for George Bush to do it in 2003. Their motivations involve a confused conflation of what they think are Israel's best interests with those of the United States. They are now leading the charge for war with Iran.

He is talking about the Richard Perle, Netanyahu and others involved in A Clean Break. And yes, the similarities with the PNAC ideological manifesto are more than a little bit interesting (e.g. Perle helped author both docs).

Via Joshua Micah Marshall (another self-hating Jew, I suppose).

A Vote Of Confidence

Not! A big fund just completely dumped 3,211 shares Westfield Group shares. One would assume that any serious investigation of the Lowy family's tax affairs is going to affect the share price.

Frank Lowy's Fat Lawyer Caught Out

This is pretty funny. The Real News Network has video of Frank Lowy appearing before the US Senate, where Lowy refused to talk but his fat lawyer waved papers in the air claiming the subpoena was based on mistaken assumptions. But the NPR film crew followed Lowy and his lawyer into the lift after the hearing, and their cameraman caught Lowy's lawyer whispering to him:

"This will be the story."

Confronted by the film crew, Lowy's lawyer lies:

Q: "Sir, did you just say 'This will be the story'?"

A: "No. (shuffles in front of Lowy) No I said the... this will be the... People will focus on the... this statement, which is false, is what I am talking about..."

You can watch the video here.

The program points out that the estimated $100 billion per year lost to US taxpayers (that's just the annual interest on an estimated $1.5 trillion hidden in these havens) is more than the US government budget spends on education, triple what they spend on the environment, and nearly five times what they spend on helping the needy.

From the comments:

The smirk on Mr. Lowy's face most of the time says pretty much all that needs to be said of what these people's attitudes are.

I have just added The Real News to my bookmarks.

I See Dead People

Haiti has always been the canary in the coal mine of global poverty, and people there are now eating mud:

As desperation rises so does production of mud cakes, an unofficial misery index. Now even bakers are struggling. Trucked in from a clay-rich area outside the capital, Port-au-Prince, the mud is costlier but cakes still sell for 1.3p each, about the only item immune from inflation. "We need to raise our prices but it's their last resort and people won't tolerate it," lamented Baptiste, the Cité Soleil baker.

Vendors of other foods who have increased prices have been left with unsold stock...

How did it come to this?

Haiti's woes stem from global economic trends of higher oil and food prices, plus reduced remittances from migrant relatives affected by the US downturn. What makes the country especially vulnerable, however, is its almost total reliance on food imports.

Domestic agriculture is a disaster. The slashing and burning of forests for farming and charcoal has degraded the soil and chronic under-investment has rendered rural infrastructure at best rickety, at worst non-existent.

The woes were compounded by a decision in the 1980s to lift tariffs, when international prices were lower, and flood the country with cheap imported rice and vegetables. Consumers gained and the IMF applauded but domestic farmers went bankrupt and the Artibonite valley, the country's breadbasket, atrophied.

Now that imports are rocketing in price the government has vowed to rebuild the withered agriculture but that is a herculean task given scant resources, degraded soil and land ownership disputes.

So what's the alternative?

Walk along a beach in the morning and you find Haitians gazing at the azure ocean horizon, dreaming of escape. They are fiercely proud of their history in overthrowing slavery and colonialism but these days the US, the Bahamas, the Dominican Republic - anywhere but home - seems the best option.

The only thing stopping an exodus are US coastguard patrols, said Herman Janvier, 30, a fishermen on Cap Haitian, a smuggling point. "People want out of here. It's like we're almost dead people."

More here.

UPDATE: And of course, let's not forget why Bush dumped Aristide. From Common Dreams:

Haiti is sending approximately $1 million each week in debt service payments to the World Bank and other creditors...

Nice Dream

From Ted Rall:

And - blow me down with a feather - Bill Leak actually has a funny cartoon again in Teh Organ:

I have been watching Leak on a near-daily basis and I reckon he averages about one funny cartoon every three months. Maybe he'd be funnier if his job spec didn't include parroting the Murdoch talking points of the day.

LowyGate: Spotlight On The ATO

Australia's Tax Commissioner, Michael D'Ascenzo, turned down a request to appear before the US Senate commission looking into tax havens:

In a letter dated July 15 to Senators Carl Levin and Norm Coleman, D'Ascenzo thanked them for the invitation "to attend and give testimony".

"Unfortunately, a prior commitment in Australia prevents me from attending at this time," he wrote, noting that "the Australian Taxation Office is very supportive of the good work of your subcommittee".

But the ATO is also conspicuously silent on this issue. The Australian arm of Swiss banking giant UBS is still providing offshore banking services, despite its US counterpart banning the practice:

"Our business model is not going to change," a UBS spokeswoman told The Australian.

The spokeswoman said the Australian offshore investment model was different from that of the US because of different reporting requirements, but he was unable to explain further.

Repeated requests for further information from UBS offshore investment experts went unanswered.

According to the Australian Taxation Office, $5 billion flowed from Australia to known tax havens each year, with much of that driven by wealthy individuals.

The ATO says "most" Australians using tax havens are doing so within the law. So it's pretty obvious that we need to change the law! Why isn't Michael D'Ascenzo pressuring Kevin Rudd on this issue?

UPDATE: Interesting that this innocent little blog post has sparked a flurry of interest from .gov.au readers in Canberra. Who says Big Brother is not watching very carefully indeed? Hey guys! You should be watching the look on Frank Lowy's face when his lawyer gets caught out.

See that jugular vein popping out? That's your target, right there. Now go for it - that's why I am paying you guys. To work for me, not them.

A Fucking Medal

OK, so you have been blogging against Bush for what? Three, five, eight years? So what do you want...?

Actually, this idea is not as cynical as it might sound. I think all of us who have worked so hard to bring the Bush regime to its knees deserve some recognition, respect, and reward.

This medal is my way of saying "Thank You" to everyone who joined the anti-Bush online throng. If you think you deserve the medal, save it to your blog. If you think someone else deserves it, send it to them (along with a big thank you).

But be warned: posting this image in Bush's USA could bring you a fine and even a 6 month jail term. I am not kidding. It is based on the US Medal Of Honour, "the highest military decoration awarded by the United States government". Given that the US military has been busy killing innocent civilians and invading sovereign countries while the rest of us went after the real criminals, I think we have a right to claim the image for our own purposes, don't you? In fact, given the upside down, right-is-wrong, good-is-evil madness that is and was BushWorld, I think it is a totally appropriate form of much-needed celebration, which simultaneously rewards the true heroes of the day while giving the finger to the military stooges and the legal eunuchs who let Bush and his gang get away with it all.

And as a special bonus, just for you my dear readers, I am also giving away Presidential Pardons.

That's right, anyone who has done anything even remotely illegal (as long as it was not violent) while blogging against Bush is welcome to cut-and-paste the following text, insert their name, print it out on a piece of paper, and present it to a judge in a court of law:

"By the power endowed in me by the overwhelming forces of public opinion, I hereby declared that [INSERT NAME HERE] was momentarily overcome by the daily horrors of cognisant existence in the reality-based zone of BushWorld. I hereby decree that [INSERT NAME HERE] is pardoned for any non-violent crimes he/she may have committed during this horrendous period in US history.

Yours Presidentially,

Gandhi"

Enjoy.

Monday, July 28, 2008

Is This The End?

Mike Whitney gets apocalyptic:

Bank runs are a direct hit on the foundation of the free market system. Unchecked, the tremors can ripple through the entire society and trigger violent political upheaval, even revolution. The public may not grasp their significance, but everyone in Washington is paying attention. They take it seriously, very seriously. It is a sign that the system is disintegrating and it may be irreversible.

An article in the San Francisco Business Times said that the FDIC is worried about the reporting on Internet blogs. They'd rather keep banking system's troubles out of the news. The publicity just further undermines the publics confidence and spreads fear. Sheila Bair, chairman of the Federal Deposit Insurance Corp., summed it up like this after the run on Indymac:
"The blogs were a bit out of control. We're very mindful of the media coverage and blogs in controlling misinformation. All I can say is were going to continue to stay on top of it. The misinformation that came out over the weekend fed a lot of depositors' fears."
Is that a threat? The cure for a failed banking system is adequate capital and prudent oversight not threats to critics of the system.

It's ironic, isn't it? Those who turned to fear as their main political weapon are now afraid that widespread fear of an economic crash could signal the end of the world as they know it.

From the comments at ICH:

What is $20,000 worth of debt when it will cost that much for a bag of groceries.

And:

There's one case where I'd work very hard to eliminate debt: if I'd bought a fully loaded SUV on poor terms last year. It's way past time to unload that for an economical second hand car or if homeless looms as a potential, a van you can sleep in.

And:

The american dream was sold to the ignorant, and now they will pay for there easy life. They will pay for the blood of 20,000,000 human beings the CIA/Pentagon has murdered with their tacit consent of the last 60 years. They will pay and their children will pay with poverty, disease, and violence. I am in Argentina looking at the history of the monetary devaluation which the Chicago Boys orchestrated here in 2002 when the peso was devalued from 1 to 1USD to 4 to 1 USD overnight.

OTOH:

People should start eating alot while they can. Put some weight on if you're not fat.

Take your pick of the free advice on offer!

No More Mandatory Detention

Suddenly it becomes clear how stupid and unnecessary the whole thing was:

"Desperate people are not deterred by the threat of harsh detention - they are often fleeing much worse circumstances."

But it sure did bring in the votes when it mattered.

Is It Even Possible For Bush's USA To Experience a Brain Drain?

Australians with the greenback blues:

"We joke that America is the new Thailand: a great place for a cheap holiday."