Larry Johnson: Get Ready for Rightwing Blowback

[laststeamtrain]

Get Ready for Rightwing Blowback

By Larry Johnson on December 3, 2007 at 1:21 PM in Current Affairs

Now we know why some in the Bush Administration–Dick Cheney’s folks in particular–fought like hell to keep the National Intelligence Estimate on Iran’s nuclear program under wraps. IRAN HALTED ITS NUCLEAR PROGRAM IN 2003. Here’s what CNN is reporting:

"Iran halted work toward a nuclear weapon under international scrutiny in 2003 and is unlikely to be able to produce enough enriched uranium for a bomb until 2010 to 2015, a U.S. intelligence report says.

"A declassified summary of the latest National Intelligence Estimate found with “high confidence” that the Islamic republic halted an effort to develop nuclear weapons in the fall of 2003."

This report was ready to go in December of 2006 but Cheney and his allies pushed back hard to stop it. They knew, as they know today, that this headline does not help them in their rush to start a new war. Damn it all!!! How dare those pesky Iranians prove malleable to diplomatic initiatives and pressure. You mean we can solve things without starting a war and killing civilians?

<more>

http://noquarterusa.net/blog/2007/12/03/get-ready-for-rightwing-blowback/

[sicksicksick_N_tired]

1. They've gotten caught red-handed LYING,....AGAIN!!! How's the media gonna',...

,...treat their big freakin' lies THIS TIME? The same damn way: distraction, denial, etc.? :shrug:

[damntexdem]

3. The media won't resort to distraction or denial --

they'll just ignore it altogether.

[Hydra]

9. Yup

in these days of "make the message fit the policy," we'll never hear this info, or it will be derided as "ineffective UN efforts that are inaccurate."

[springhill]

32. They can get away with another war......

because we are spreading "Democracy".

[mzmolly]

48. They'll talk about Britney's custody battle.

:puke:

[Joe Fields]

2. It's been so long since we've had diplomacy, ..

I've almost forgotten what it looks and smells like.

[anitar1]

4. People need to see this.

K&R

[Selatius]

5. The defense industry could make tens of billions in profits if a war with Iran occurs.

Think how much money that is. For some people, killing a few people is worth a paycheck that will grant one an insanely filthy rich lifestyle.

[mojowork_n]

13. Good point. Why hasn't every American heard about the Emperor of Flak Jackets?

From Commondreams, a few years ago. The link to the complete article is pasted underneath this excerpt:

"...David H. Brooks, CEO of bulletproof vest maker DHB Industries, earned $70 million in 2004, 13,349 percent more than his pre-9/11 compensation, according to “Executive Excess,” co-published by the Institute for Policy Studies and United for a Fair Economy. On top of that, Brooks sold company stock worth about $186 million last year, spooking investors who drove DHB’s share price from more than $22 to as low as $6.50.

Shareholders were mighty ticked, but what makes Brooks’ $250 million in war windfalls particularly obscene is that the equipment which boosted his fortunes appears not to work very well. In May 2005, the US Marines recalled more than 5,000 DHB armored vests after questions were raised about their effectiveness in stopping 9 mm bullets. In November, the Marines and Army announced a recall of an additional 18,000 DHB vests.

Hearing nothing from DHB’s PR team in response to media coverage of the report, I thought Mr. Brooks might be cowering in shame. Instead, I now find out that he was busy planning a party. And not just any party.

The New York Daily News estimates that the bat mitzvah Brooks threw for his daughter over the weekend cost an estimated $10 million. Virtually every musician that you might guess would appeal to a 50-something Long Island CEO was flown in by private jet: Aerosmith, Tom Petty, the Eagles' Don Henley and Joe Walsh, who performed with Fleetwood Mac's Stevie Nicks, Kenny G. As a likely concession to his daughter's tastes, Brooks also booked 50 Cent, DJ AM (Nicole Richie's fiancée) and rap diva Ciara.


13,000 percent raise, not counting income from stock options & sales

Then again, as (I think it was her, on Air America Friday afternoon) Randi Rhodes said last week, 'our whole domestic economy is now a full-blown war economy.'

[Selatius]

15. I'm sure there will be more wanting to emulate Brooks. They simply need more war to do it.

The greater the war, the greater the opportunities to make money off the war.

"A few profit – and the many pay. But there is a way to stop it. You can't end it by disarmament conferences. You can't eliminate it by peace parleys at Geneva. Well-meaning but impractical groups can't wipe it out by resolutions. It can be smashed effectively only by taking the profit out of war."

-- War is a racket (1935), Gen. Smedley Butler.

[sicksicksick_N_tired]

17. I have always been an advocate of OUTLAWING war profit.

The incentive for unnecessary or illegal war would certainly take a huge hit.

[nxylas]

53. Hitler wanted to outlaw war profit too

That means you must be a Nazi. Yes, I have actually heard this argument from a Freeper troll over at the Peace Takes Courage forum.

[sss1977]

36. That's fucking obscene.

And I hate using that word.

Obscene.

[calimary]

6. Yeah, SUUUUUUUURE. Maybe they oughta put kkkarl rove on it.

You remember him? Mr. "Oh, we did NOT want to go to war with Iraq! Those mean ol' Democrats MADE US DO IT!!!" Watch him try to spin this such that the Democrats were the ones pushing to bomb Iran because the Democrats thought Iran had WMDs!!!

:rofl:

[mojowork_n]

18. They *did* put Karl Rove on it.

You could call it "Faith Based 'Defense' Policy" :

This is an excerpt from Gary Wills' Nov. 16, 2006 piece in the New York Review of Books:

Link to complete text

"...It is common knowledge that the Republican White House and Congress let "K Street" lobbyists have a say in the drafting of economic legislation, and on the personnel assigned to carry it out, in matters like oil production, pharmaceutical regulation, medical insurance, and corporate taxes. It is less known that for social services, evangelical organizations were given the same right to draft bills and install the officials who implement them. Karl Rove had cultivated the extensive network of religious right organizations, and they were consulted at every step of the way as the administration set up its policies...

...The deputy undersecretary for defense intelligence, General William (Jerry) Boykin—a man leading the search for bin Laden—made headlines during the Iraq war with a slide- show lecture he gave in churches. He appeared there not in his dress uniform but in combat gear. He asked audiences (this was after the 2000 election and before the 2004 one):

Ask yourself this: why is this man in the White House? The majority of Americans did not vote for him. Why is he there?... I tell you this morning he's in the White House because God put him there for such a time as this. God put him there to lead not only this nation but to lead the world, in such a time as this.
Then he asked the congregation who the enemy is. He showed slides of Osama bin Laden, Saddam Hussein, Kim Jong Il, and Taliban leaders, asking of each, "Is this man the enemy?" He gave a resounding no to each question, and then revealed the foe's true identity:

The battle this nation is in is a spiritual battle, it's a battle for our soul. And the enemy is a guy called Satan.... Satan wants to destroy this nation. He wants to destroy us as a nation, and he wants to destroy us as a Christian army.<35>
This was not a momentary lapse on Boykin's part. He has been an active translator of war into religion for many years. After he led the failed "Blackhawk Down" raid on Mogadishu in 1993, he flew over the city taking photographs. When developed, the pictures showed black smears on the landscape. He showed them to his Sunday-school-teaching mother, and she asked, "Don't you know specifically what you were up against?" Only then did he get the full supernatural meaning of the pictures. "It was a demonic presence in that city, and God revealed it to me as the enemy that I was up against in Mogadishu." He remembered, in this light, the first feeling he had experienced in that non-Christian country: "I could feel the presence of evil.... The demonic presence is real in a place that has rejected God." His task was not simply to defeat an enemy force, but to carry Jesus to the benighted. "It is the principalities of darkness. It is a spiritual enemy that will only be defeated if we come against him in the name of Jesus."<36> The evangelical groups he addressed responded eagerly when he attacked the "godless" courts of his own country. "Don't you worry about what these courts say, our God reigns supreme."<37>

When General Edwin Walker began to promote the John Birch Society to his NATO troops, President Kennedy removed him. What happened to General Boykin after he went around calling Muslims Satanic? He was not silenced, demoted, removed, or even criticized. He has continued to work on the Pentagon's special intelligence group. His boss, Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld, said, "This is a free country," and that Boykin had "an outstanding record" in his active career as a Delta Force commander. What caused the difference in response between President Kennedy's time and President Bush's? Could it be the power of the evangelicals? As soon as Boykin became an object of public criticism, the evangelicals rallied around him.

When President Bush, asked about the content of Boykin's remarks, said, "He doesn't reflect my point of view," Gary Bauer was quick to attack his own leader for this mild expression of difference. He sent a memo to his organization's members:

I must be missing something. The general has said that America is under attack because we are built on a Judeo-Christian values system; that ultimately the enemy is not flesh and blood, but rather the enemy is Satan, and that God's hand of protection prevented September 11 from being worse than it was.... Precisely which of those statements does the president take issue with?
The Christian Coalition directed petitions to Secretary Rumsfeld urging him not to knuckle under to the "intolerant liberal mob has castigated General Boykin, a true American hero." James Dobson, on his radio show, called Boykin a "martyr," and told his listeners to send in their protests to the White House.

There was nothing surprising in all this. Boykin was just repeating what other evangelicals had been saying about the war in Iraq. Charles Stanley, a former president of the Southern Baptist Convention, wrote: "We should offer to serve the war effort in any way possible.... God battles with people who oppose him, who fight against him and his followers." Jerry Falwell put it succinctly in 2004: "God is pro-war." For some evangelicals, this was a war against the enemies of Israel, who are by definition anti-God. The evangelical writer Tim LaHaye called it, therefore, "a focal point of end-time events." For others, it was a chance to spread Christianity to the infidels. An article syndicated on the Southern Baptist Convention's wire service said that "American foreign policy and military might have opened an opportunity for the Gospel in the land of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob..."

Speaking for myself, as a non-whack job, non-fundamentalist or evangelical (but practicing, more or less) Christian, that sort of lust for power is so completely anti-thetical to Christ's message, it ought to be identified for what it really is -- Bizarro World lunacy. Remember, it was the Pharisees and High Priests, in collusion with the Roman Imperial Authority, who crucified Christ in the first place.

Bill Moyers, this past week on PBS Frontline, did a great piece on some of the fundamentalist whack jobs ("Christians United For Israel") who have been pounding the drums (and their pulpits and parishioners) for war with Iran.

The difference, this time, is that there are many more centrist and liberal Christians who are starting to stand up against them.

http://www.pbs.org/moyers/journal/index-flash.html

[seafan]

7. Mr. Cheney, Mr. Bush, your move. What's it going to be?

U.S. report: Iran stopped nuclear weapons work in 2003

December 3,2007

WASHINGTON (CNN) -- Iran halted work toward a nuclear weapon under international scrutiny in 2003 and is unlikely to be able to produce enough enriched uranium for a bomb until 2010 to 2015, a U.S. intelligence report says.

A declassified summary of the latest National Intelligence Estimate found with "high confidence" that the Islamic republic stopped an effort to develop nuclear weapons in the fall of 2003.

The estimate is less severe than a 2005 report that judged the Iranian leadership was "determined to develop nuclear weapons despite its international obligations and international pressure."

.....

"We judge with moderate confidence that the earliest possible date Iran would be technically capable of producing enough highly enriched uranium for a weapon is late 2009, but that this is very unlikely," the report says. A more likely time frame for that production is between 2010 and 2015, it concludes.

.....

The report comes amid widespread accusations that the Bush administration is attempting to maneuver the United States into a conflict with Iran, which it accuses of meddling in the war in Iraq. In October, the United States designated elements of Iran's Revolutionary Guard Corps as supporters of terrorism.

NIEs examine current capabilities and vulnerabilities and, perhaps more importantly, consider future developments. Policymakers usually request the estimates, but the intelligence community also can initiate them.

Ms. Pelosi, once again:



Here is A TINY BIT MORE EVIDENCE that these TWO TRAITOROUS LIARS should be IMPEACHED, TRIED, CONVICTED, REMOVED FROM OFFICE AND INCARCERATED.

[Javaman]

8. This will make no difference...

morons* like kristol will say iran still needs to be bombed, just because.

[Mr_Monday]

20. I hate Kristol, soooooo much.

Especially that arrogant half-smile that he has on his face 24/7.

[Javaman]

21. He has the, "I may get screwed in the end, but no matter what I'm better than you" smile. nt

[Cha]

34. It must really really

suck, though, to be that brain dead asshole.

[catmandu57]

10. Why did it take a year for this to get out?

I guess I should be happy it's seeing the light of day at all, it's a sad commentary on the state of our country to have to say that. Somebody ought to be screaming this from the fucking mountaintop.

[EVDebs]

23. To keep people from finding out who gave Iran these blueprints perhaps ?

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_mesg&forum=389&topic_id=2390597&mesg_id=2390781

[butterfly77]

11. Just think about all of the things we don't know...

and we do, all hell will break loose.

[Happyhippychick]

12. I thought a rightwing blowback

is what Larry Craig was hoping to get in the Minneapolis airport.

[sicksicksick_N_tired]

27. Uh,...

:rofl:

[rockybelt]

41. lol

[NewJeffCT]

42. Welcome to DU

good post!

[Happyhippychick]

55. Thanks for the welcome! n/t

[Prophet 451]

14. He kinda lost his credibility

...when he got onto Chavez whining about some CIA plot (I've read nothing about that) defeating his proposals to become President-for-life (the reforms said no such thing).

[in_cog_ni_to]

16. Lies, Lies, Lies and MORE LIES. When will enough be enough? Can you imagine if this was Clinton?

OMG. The man would have been impeached YEARS ago.

[mojowork_n]

19. Remember the "Golden Rule" of Politics --

Those with the Gold, rule.


(I mean, how else would you explain the mind and soul rotting ubiquity, on the AM band, of our contemporary Grima Wormtongues -- the Hannity's, Levin's, Savage/Wiener's...)

http://www.lord-of-the-rings.org/books/grima.html


Edit: Added note in parantheses and link.

[robinlynne]

22. When was Valerie Plame outed? Was it 2003?

[tridim]

24. Good point. No idea if there's a dot to connect here, but the dates match.

[krkaufman]

25. I'm so surprised that I didn't hear Charlie Gibson reveal this facet of the story ....

... during tonight's newscast. ABC News mentioned the report, but didn't remind the viewer that the White House had been fighting to keep the report classified.

Shocked and awed.

[Joanne98]

26. I wish the good guys would get off Hugo Chavez!

I like Larry Johnson but I think it's ridiculous to say the Bush adminstration isn't after him. We know that's not true.

[mod mom]

28. A 'puke on Abrams Report was saying that this NIE Report proved */Cheney

strategy against Iran worked. Abrams and Lawrence O'Donnell couldn't believe he was attempting to spin this such.

[Cha]

35. cliff may?

I read about that earlier..I'm glad they let him know they didn't believe his shit.

[OzarkDem]

29. So CNN will stop pushing for an Iran invasion?

Here's hoping this puts all the overheated invade Iran rhetoric to rest.

[sicksicksick_N_tired]

30. Nope. They got the "call" and have TONED it down.

Yep.

[magellan]

31. The Right will just point to the intelligence "failure" on Iraq's WMD

Even though the intel agencies got Iraq right and BushCo cherry-picked the evidence and then blamed them for the "failure" on WMD, there are probably enough people who bought their lie who won't trust this report now. So be prepared to hear we can't trust the intel agencies.

[Cha]

33. cheneydick is like...

"NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO" YOU WILL NOT RELEASE THAT REPORT..WE MUST KILL KILL KILL=OIL OIL OIL=POWER POWER POWER=WORLD DOMINATION WORLD DOMINATION WORLD DOMINATION!

[bklyncowgirl]

37. There must be some heroes in the Intelligence community and military who would not give in.

I expect once the neocons find their voices the backlash will be brutal.

[The Doctor.]

38. No...no...no.... war IS the solution, not diplomacy!

That's what they're trying to say now... Iran put a halt in 2003 because we invaded Iraq! Just imagine the results if we invade Iran!

[The Backlash Cometh]

39. We, as Americans, have been manipulated, but the Republicans have

been manipulated the most, and we should not let them forget it. They are the weakest link.

[Sean Stuart]

40. I still don't buy it. I'm convinced Iran is going for it.

Invasion is not the answer, of course - not even close, but common sense to me screams that Iran is doing everything they can in a clandestine fashion to acquire a nuclear weapon. They are faced with a mentally unstable rogue superpower chomping at the bit to invade their country and turn it into a cauldron of suffering, death, and terrorism (but spectacular crony profits! Wooo!) as they did with Iraq. If I were them, I would feel that a nuke would be the most effective deterrent from such an attack. It simply doesn't make sense in my mind that they would NOT want a nuke. And it's been reported that Iran is among A.Q. Khan's former customers in nuclear technology.

At the same time I'm pleased with the report. It shows that there are many within the Bush Administration who look at their past acquiescence of his and the neocons' insanity and are saying more and more fuck this, I am not rolling over again.

[DFW]

44. I'm probably in the minority, but I agree with you.

I think that AhmadiNejad is every bit as whacko and as devoid of scruples as Cheneybush,
but making cleverer use of the limited resources he as. I don't see him actually making
use of any nukes. He can't reach North America, and if he bombs Saudi Arabia, the fallout
will affect Iran (not that he cares a lot about people, as long as he isn't contaminated,
but Iran's oil leaves through ports geographically close to Saudi Arabia). But his leverage
is enhanced if he can suddenly announce he has them (e.g. India, Pakistan), and even if
he parades his nukes in downtown Tehran, as long as Iran makes no menacing gestures to any
of its neighbors or Europe, there is NO military action Cheneybush can undertake that will
be anything less than a 100 disaster for us.

I also think that AhmadiNejad is sly enough to have hidden enough things from scrutiny that
to the best knowledge of Cheneybush, they have no concrete knowledge whatsoever of this, only
the same suspicions that you and I harbor. They therefore resort to lies rather than present
concrete evidence, of which they little or none.

Besides all that, Dick Cheney still owns (now under Halliburton's name) a nice resort house
on the Iranian island of Kish (Persian version of Maui, though not as nice, from what I've
heard). He wouldn't want to spoil his little vacation hideaway, would he?

[rAVES]

51. OK.. get this into your head: Mahmoud Ahmadinejad does not control the Irainan Army.

He would have nothing to do with the supposed WMD program, his only real power is accepting diplomats.
Christ on a bike... I think this has to be wrote out and stickied on the ME forum.. people just don't seem to get it.

[rAVES]

49. Common sense? have you been to Iran? do you work in intelligence? Why is it common sense?

[Sean Stuart]

50. I kind of explained that, didn't I?

The whole thing about a deterrent to invasion ...

[NewJeffCT]

43. The Blowback is already started - Podhoretz thinks those traitorous commies

at CIA are doing it to discredit Herrs Bush & Cheney. You know what a bunch of cowardly tree-huggers they are over there.

[rAVES]

52. As do Fox.. thers a "vast left wing conspiracy" going on apparently...

[happygoluckytoyou]

45. HERE IS THE OTHER REASON.....AND WHY THE REPORT IS FRONT PAGE NOW

HERE IS WHAT ELSE IS IN AMERICA

http://justanothercoverup.com/?p=334
http://justanothercoverup.com/?p=334
http://justanothercoverup.com/?p=334

THE MORE YOU KNOW... THE MORE YOU SHOULD WRITE YOUR SENATORS AND MEDIA OUTLETS



POST AND REPEAT THIS STORY TO EVERY MEDIA OUTLET....
SOMEONE HAS TO CARRY IT

[emald]

46. impeach the mf'rs right f**king now

I'm pissed at my "elected" leaders allowing this sort of deception to happen without consequence. I'm listening to the chimperor now on this the lying asswipe.

[DirtyDawg]

47. Guaran-damn-teeya...

...that before the week's out they'll have come up with the 'spin', to-wit, 'Well I guess we didn't realize just how effective our strategy against Iraq was truly going to be. We already knew it stopped Kadhafi (sp?) in his tracks but we simply underestimated just how far-reaching we truly were, and are. Sure our intelligence services had an inkling, but we, for the sake of the country, couldn't assume too much. So let's just say 'we erred on the side of caution...take this as good news...but keep our guard up because we all know there are bad people out there that want to do us harm, and it takes a strong-minded, committed Republican to make sure we stay on top of 'em...'

Just watch...hell, it's what I'd do. I just hope one of the Demo candidates predicts it before it starts to happen.

[Cary]

54. You're behind the times.

Some joker was spewing that line on Dan Abrams' show last night.