Monday, January 31, 2011

Google head of marketing for Mid East and N Africa missing after arrest in Egypt demonstration

Google's head of marketing for the Middle East and North Africa has gone missing after being taken into custody at a demonstration in Cairo. (Read here and here.) The moment of his arrest/abduction by Mubarak's dreaded plainclothes police was captured in the below-embedded news report.


Here's a screen shot that's been posted on Facebook.


(Hat tip: Octavia Nasr.)

Protesters defended Cairo's Egyptian Museum from looters

Mixed news about the state of Egypt's cultural heritage in the chaos of the uprising. On the one hand, there are reports that numerous museums and artifact repositories have been looted or vandalized. On the other, local residents have banded together to protect their cultural heritage from this wanton destruction, and the military have started deploying troops to do this as well.


Money quote from Zahi Hawass, Egypt's chief archeologist and secretary general of the Supreme Council of Antiquities, regarding some of the looters at the Egyptian Museum:

"I'm glad that those people were idiots," he told Time magazine. "They looted the museum shop. Thank God they thought that the museum shop was the museum."

The TIME article contains a less rosy picture, with some looters raiding the museum collections, breaking open cases and tearing up exhibits of priceless artifacts searching for gold.

Saturday, January 29, 2011

Egyptian looters attack mummies

Why?

Would-be looters broke into Cairo's famed Egyptian Museum, ripping the heads off two mummies and damaging about 10 small artifacts before being caught and detained by army soldiers, Egypt's antiquities chief said Saturday.Zahi Hawass said the vandals did not manage to steal any of the museum's antiquities, and that the prized collection was now safe and under military guard.


from the AP: Egypt moves to secure antiquities from looters

Have Egyptian police abandonded the Gaza border?

So says this source. I have no idea how reliable this is. Anyone out there know? 

Ex post facto anti-Zionist rationalizations

Ex post facto anti-Zionist rationalizations happen so frequently yet the phrase is so unwieldy.  The uprisings in Egypt and Tunisia are eliciting ex post facto anti-Zionist rationalizations with Pavlovian inevitability.  (Now say that three times quickly.)

On C-SPAN's Washington Journal call-in program this morning, a caller pointed out that Egypt's dictatorship was kept in place by the U.S. to protect "the 5 or 6 million Jews who are occupying Palestine", by which the caller meant the State of Israel.  The logic behind that accusation was so tenuous that the host had to ask for the connection between Israel and the Egyptian uprising.  The caller was at a loss to explain what seemed so self-evident to him.  The host dismissed the caller and moved the conversation back to the realm of real events.

Columnist MJ Rosenberg is a step up from C-SPAN callers raving against Israel, so it's disappointing to see him taking a not entirely dissimilar position in a column titled "Thank AIPAC for Placing USA on Wrong Side in Egypt".  He writes

Few would argue that the imminent collapse of the Mubarak regime (and other Middle East dictatorships) derives from the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. Neither Egyptians nor Tunisians are risking and losing their lives for Palestinians. They are doing it for themselves. They want freedom.  But the hatred for America that the revolutionaries feel stems in large part from our support for the occupation and the regional dictators who help enable it. And that support stems entirely from the lobby's power to intimidate policymakers.


Rosenberg thus takes the entirely contradictory positions that the revolutionaries in Tunisia and Egypt both are and aren't motivated by opposition to Israel.  Let's backtrack.  When Rosenberg writes about "the occupation" and "the lobby", he assumes that his reader understands that he refers to Israel because Israel's occupation and Israel's lobby are the only occupation and lobby in the world worth commenting on.  Rosenberg himself acknowledges that he is


often accused of harping on the lobby's baleful influence. I plead guilty.

I am not Rosenberg's attorney, but I do think that his guilty plea would be better received if he didn't make it in the course of continuing to commit the offense. He argues that this harping is defensible: it has both a pedigree and a virtually prophetic imperative.  He writes

But it's my obligation because (1) I know from personal experience -- 15 years on Capitol Hill and four at AIPAC -- how it operates, (2) I know how little it really cares about Israel, and (3) I am free to tell the truth about it. If I worked in the mainstream media or in the U.S. government, I wouldn't be.


Another area where the lobby has done so much damage is in our relations with Iran.

Those lines contain a great deal of information, albeit in a condensed and somewhat disordered form.  Their author wants to show his expertise.  He has a unique knowledge of the evils of AIPAC -- that they really don't care about Israel.  So while he can't really explain why he believes this to be true, it has the air of an ineffable and deeply profound insight.  Based on the subtle truth that's been somehow revealed to him, he must save Israel from itself, and save the world from Israel.  That brings him to his real subject: the threat posed to world peace by Israel's opposition to Iran's nuclear program.


AIPAC is dedicated to "crippling" sanctions and eventually war with Iran if sanctions don't bring down the regime. Later this spring, AIPAC will host its annual conference which will, as has been the case for a decade, feature mind-numbing warnings about the danger posed by an Iranian nuclear bomb.
Unfortunately for the lobby (and happily for everyone else), there probably won't be an Iranian bomb anytime soon, thanks to the Stuxnet worm which, somehow, the Israelis devised to rip the guts out of Iran's centrifuges.
Israeli officials say that any Iran bomb will be delayed for years and maybe forever.  One would think that the lobby would be ecstatic, but it barely mentions the Stuxnet triumph. Why is that?  Because it was never really worried about an Iranian bomb (especially since Israel has 200 nuclear weapons) but worried that a nuclear-armed Iran would challenge Israel's regional hegemony. (It's the same reason the lobby despises Turkey.) So the lobby pretends as though Stuxnet didn't happen. We need more "crippling sanctions" and then possibly war, they maintain.


Rosenberg claims that the Israeli government is somehow upset about Stuxnet's success because it removes their excuse for going to war against Iran, which is what they really want.  He claims, again without any attempt at substantiation, that the Iranian nuclear program has virtually come to an end as the result of Stuxnet, and that Israel feigns concern about Iranian nukes out of sheer malice. 

The face of that malice is Benjamin Netanyahu, who Rosenberg claims

is angry that Stuxnet removed his pretense for war. And that means Congress, pushed by AIPAC, will keep passing sanctions bills that punish not the Iranian regime but the Iranian people. And Iranians will always remember it and hold it against us.

In addition to unjustifiably impugning the motives for Israeli concerns about Iran's nuclear program, Rosenberg's argument conflates his assertions concerning the purported end of Iran's nuclear program with humanitarian questions about the effects of sanctions.  MJ Rosenberg has somehow reached the conclusion that Israel, far from wishing to protect itself against real threats, actually wishes to harm the Iranian people, as they have already purportedly harmed the Tunisian and Egyptian people, in order to "establish regional hegemony".  To my mind, that puts him on much the same level as that fellow raving about Jews on C-SPAN.  Unfortunately, there's no one to hang up on him.  The people at Talking Points Memo don't seem notice that he's raving.  (Or maybe they think that he's "only half-joking", as said he was when he somehow connected AIPAC with Bernie Madoff and the craisglist killer.)

I have a question for Rosenberg and his editors at TPM.  If, as he now claims, AIPAC is somehow responsible for Mubarak's being in power, why has he only gotten around to writing about that after the fact?  He touts his 15 years of experience on Capitol Hill. According to his Huffingotm Post bio, he edited AIPAC's weekly newseletter 25 years ago. He worked as the Director of Policy at the Israel Policy Forum from 1998- 2009.  In the course of his career, he has  written many columns, given speeches, attended conferences and met with political leaders including the president.  In all that time, he somehow neglected to point out that AIPAC was oppressing the people of Egypt.  Now, after the fact, after the revolution has possibly begun, Rosenberg has finally revealed the Zionist hand behind Egypt's suffering.  He owes the people of Egypt an apology for, until now, having participated in this cover-up.

Read Rosenberg's column here: Thank AIPAC For Placing USA On Wrong Side In Egypt | TPMCafe

http://www.rosenbergradio.com/wordpress/wp-content/uploads/2008/06/obamamj4.jpg

Wednesday, January 26, 2011

Responding to Palestine Papers, supporters of both PA and al-Jazeera make the same charge

Al-Jazeera and the Palestinian Authority are at odds now over the publication of the so-called Palestine Papers, 1600 documents concerning PA negotiations with Israel. These documents (purportedly) reveal that PA negotiators have privately made offers to the Israelis that far exceed what they have discussed in public. Nothing revealed thus far in these documents seems especially surprising, but the PA has responded to their publication by raiding the al-Jazeera bureau in Ramallah.

Max Blumenthal, in a blog post about this supporting al-Jazeera, calls the Palestinian Authority "U.S. and Israel-funded", oddly neglecting that the PA is also funded by the E.U., Saudi Arabia, the Islamic Development Bank, Algeria, other Arab states, the U.N., the World Bank, and innumerable NGO's.  (Read here and, in pdf, here.) That more nuanced and more accurate picture of PA funding might detract from Blumenthal's zero-sum approach to the conflict.  (Does Blumenthal actually object to U.S. funding of the PA, or just find it convenient for the sake of his argument?.)

Meanwhile, Fatah supporters protested outside the al-Jazeera offices carrying a sign with an inverse zero-sum view of the situation.  (Sorry for that mixed mathematical metaphor.)  They charged al-Jazeera with being part of a Zionist conspiracy.  (Read here.)







Elsewhere, protesters burned Israeli flags which substituted the al-Jazeera logo for the Star of David. (Via Elder of Zion.)





It seems that some charges are simply too convenient not to be used.

Tuesday, January 25, 2011

Ambassador Susan E. Rice, U.S. Permanent Representative to the United Nations, on Richard Falk


"Mr. Falk endorses the slurs of conspiracy theorists who allege that the September 11, 2001, terrorist attacks were perpetrated and then covered up by the U.S. government and media.

Mr. Falk’s comments are despicable and deeply offensive, and I condemn them in the strongest terms. I have registered a strong protest with the UN on behalf of the United States. The United States has in the past been critical of Mr. Falk’s one-sided and politicized approach to his work for the UN, including his failure to condemn deliberate human rights abuses by Hamas, but these blog comments are in another category altogether.

In my view, Mr. Falk’s latest commentary is so noxious that it should finally be plain to all that he should no longer continue in his position on behalf of the UN."

Source

According to the Telegraph:

Richard Falk, a retired professor from Princeton University, wrote on his blog that there had been an "apparent cover up" by American authorities. He added that most media were "unwilling to acknowledge the well-evidenced doubts about the official version of the events" on 9/11, despite it containing "gaps and contradictions". And he described David Ray Griffin, a conspiracy theorist highly regarded in the so-called "9/11 truth" movement, as a "scholar of high integrity" whose book on the subject was "authoritative".
Ban Ki-Moon, the UN Secretary-General, described the comments as "preposterous" and "an affront to the memory of the more than 3,000 people who died in the attack." But Mr Ban said that it was not for him to decide whether Prof Falk, who serves the organisation as a special investigator into human rights abuses in the Palestinian territories, should be fired by the UN. Vijay Nambiar, Mr Ban's chief of staff, said this was up to the human rights council, a 47-nation body based in Geneva, Switzerland, that was created by the UN in 2006.


And AFP:

UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon condemned the comments by Richard Falk, UN special rapporteur on human rights in the Palestinian territories, as "an affront" to the victims of the 2001 Al-Qaeda attacks on New York and Washington.


Falk's ridiculous statement, which he somehow believes addresses the Tucson massacre, is still available at his website. (Read here.)

UPDATE: How dumb was Falk's commentary?  Here's an excerpt:

We don’t require WikiLeaks to remind us not to trust governments, even our own, and others that seem in most respects to be democratic and law-abiding. And we also by now should know that governments (ab)use their authority to treat awkward knowledge as a matter of state secrets, and criminalize those who are brave enough to believe that the citizenry needs to know the crimes that their government is committing with their trust and their tax dollars.

The arguments swirling around the 9/11 attacks are emblematic of these issues. What fuels suspicions of conspiracy is the reluctance to address the sort of awkward gaps and contradictions in the official explanations that David Ray Griffin(and other devoted scholars of high integrity) have been documenting in book after book ever since his authoritative The New Pearl Harbor in 2004 (updated in 2008). What may be more distressing than the apparent cover up is the eerie silence of the mainstream media, unwilling to acknowledge the well-evidenced doubts about the official version of the events: an al Qaeda operation with no foreknowledge by government officials. Is this silence a manifestation of fear or cooption, or part of an equally disturbing filter of self-censorship? Whatever it is, the result is the withering away of a participatory citizenry and the erosion of legitimate constitutional government. The forms persist, but the content is missing.

This brings me to the Arizona shootings...

UPDATE 2:  I knew that Tikkun magazine was pretty bad, but this?  In their January 18, 2011 edition they published a column by Falk in which he promotes the myth of Khazar origin.  That canard, which is popular among those who seek to deligitimize Israel, claims that either all modern Jews or only Ashkenazi Jews descend not from ancient Israel and Judah but from a Central Asian Turkic nation called Khazaria.  DNA has largely debunked this theory, but it lives on in the minds of those who need it for reasons of political ideology or religious bigotry. Israeli professor Shlomo Sand has taken this myth farther than its previous exponents to assert that the Diaspora itself never occurred.  In turn, Sand supporters like Richard Falk take this implausible theory to be proof positive.  The editor at Tikkun writes that he published Falk's promotion of this anti-Semitic myth because

"Although Falk's perspective differs important ways from some of us at Tikkun on the nature of Jewish identity, particularly to the extent that it depends on Shlomo Sand's research which many of us question, some agree with him, and others, not being Jewish, don't have strong opinions on the topic but agree with his general critique of ethno-nationalism."

Falk asserts in his Tikkun column that Sand has somehow proved "the absence of a Jewish ethnos", i.e. that Jews don't exist as an ethnic group. Falk doesn't explain how he proved this, but never mind.  Based on the fact that the Jews aren't really Jews, Falk argues, there is no need for a Jewish state.  That takes care of that.

Falk's column condemns by name only one form of what he calls "ethno-nationalism", that of Jews.  He condemns other forms of nationalism only in the abstract.  Michael Lerner of Tikkun rationalizes his statement of agreement with Falk by characterizing his anti-nationalism as a "general critique". Lerner thus completely whitewashes the column's monomaniacal focus on the real object of Falk's hate.  Falk's critique is all too clearly specific.  He is anti-nationalist in theory, but anti-Israel in practice.

Sunday, January 23, 2011

Argentine Torture Survivor Patricia Isasa

From Democracy Now: Argentine Torture Survivor Patricia Isasa Tells of Her Struggle to Bring Her Torturers to Justice



A full transcript of Isasa's 2006 appearance on Democracy Now is available here.  Here's an excerpt, focusing on Isasa's narration of a television documentary on her case:

AMY GOODMAN: One of those who disappeared but lived to tell her story is Patricia Isasa. She was only 16 in 1976, when she was kidnapped by police and soldiers, tortured and held prisoner without trial for two-and-a-half years. One of Patricia’s torturers was Domingo Marcelini. He’s a graduate of the School of the Americas.

A documentary about Patricia’s ordeal and her subsequent investigation to bring her torturers to justice premiered on Argentine television last May. It’s called El Cerco, and it features interviews with some of her torturers, who are now in prison awaiting trial. In the film, Patricia Isasa revisits the sites where she was held, and she describes her torture. This is an excerpt.

PATRICIA ISASA: I arrived here for the first time when I was 16 years old, July 30th at noon. They forced me through this hallway. This place was empty. First, they slammed me against the wall. They dragged me across the floor. They beat me. Then they tied my feet to my hands, which were already handcuffed. I was kept like this for one week. Two men appeared, and one of them told me that I had to talk. He said that the other guy was crazy and that I should talk for my own good. This crazy guy was Eduardo Ramos.

EDUARDO RAMOS: I entered the police force in 1973. While I was working for the police as an analyst, the government was overthrown. My job was to monitor terrorist groups in universities. Some people call it "going undercover."

PATRICIA ISASA: After two days, they took the hood off me. They gave me water, a lemon, and they took me to the bathroom. Then Ramos and the other guy came back playing good cop and bad cop. I was told that Ramos was going to kill me and that I’d better talk.

EDUARDO RAMOS: I was not a typical policeman. I was more of a secret agent than a regular cop.

PATRICIA ISASA: I was thrown here. Ramos gave me a warning. He was insinuating that I would be raped. He said, "Tell me if anyone touches you, because we are the only ones that can touch you." I was 16 years old. I couldn’t believe it. Ramos was telling me, "You are my property. If I want, I can rape you."

Ramos was a spy at this law school. He turned in a lot of students here while pretending he was a law student.

My next step was to reconstruct my captivity at Police Station #4, where I learned what it was like to be tortured. This was a camp for torture and extermination run by Mario Jose Facino in 1976. Over here. This is it. It’s this place and this here. It’s both of these. These are the places where they tortured us. We’re looking at them from the outside, but I’m convinced, I’m telling you.

No, I can’t talk. Look, this is it. This is the place. They were over here. On this floor and at this window. This is where I spent the worst days of my life, simple as that. This was stuck, but I managed to open it. And through here, you could see, as you can now, the school. I could manage to see the school. These cracks—if you excuse me—this was stuck. You couldn’t open it. But to be able to see the school, I could suspect what street I was on and where I was being held. After talking with other detainees, we figured out that we were being held at Police Station #4.

I never thought that I would be standing in front of the bench that I was locked to. It’s incredible. 20, 25 years have passed. The bench that I was locked to when I was 16 is still here, same as ever. No one came to look at this place. There’s a case in Spain, a case in Argentina, and a case in Santa Fe fifteen blocks away from here, and no one was capable of coming over to look at this. I have to be the one to show it to you.

This is where I had to force myself not to use the bathroom. I was sent to an absolutely filthy room to pee. This was the only place where you could drink a little bit of water, and it’s all still here. Everything is still here, because no one has been held accountable.

And there, you could clearly see the cells. They were three feet by four feet. You couldn’t even lay down inside the cell. This was the central area where they tortured us. In 1976, the man responsible for the torture was Facino.

MARIO FACINO: I was not involved in any repressive group or anything like that. I was the supervisor of Police Station #4 in Santa Fe. I had an important job. My job was to detain people, who at that time were called subversives. Subversive delinquents.

PATRICIA ISASA: They put a hood on my head and tied my wrists to a rickety old bed. First, I remember feeling something cold on my stomach, and then I felt it. I felt the first electric shock. You feel this burning pain. It’s a horrible thing. They also humiliated me. They were laughing at me. They ejaculated onto me. They were enjoying themselves.

MARIO FACINO: She says they tortured her there. She says that they would lift off her hood and rape her. I doubt all of it.

PATRICIA ISASA: I recognize this place. This is it. I won’t ever forget it. I mean, this was the floor, I’m totally sure. And I was here three days. The worst three days of my life.

MARIO FACINO: A minor detained for subversive activities. No, no. It’s a lie. The woman, Patricia Isasa, says that the police detained her and she knows who detained her and where. Why she says it was at Police Station #4, I don’t know. I honestly don’t. But I can’t recall whether we detained her or not. But if we look at her records, it has to be recorded, where she was detained, when she was detained, and who detained her.

VICTOR BRUSA: I started working at the federal court as a student. When the government was overthrown, I was an employee of the court. I was 27, 28 years old. As a secretary for the judge, I would take statements in the office of the police station. The head of the police station had us take statements. Nothing more!

PATRICIA ISASA: They would hit you. They would torture you. They would hound you. Then they would pick you up and open this door for you. You would go through this door. And whom would you find on the other side? Brusa. This man was on the other side of the door. He would be writing, and he would take out a sheet of paper. You would be all beaten up, bleeding, naked. He’d throw you some clothes, and then he’d say, "Here, sign this." Brusa!

The Victor Brusa referred to above went on from working in the torture chambers of the Argentine Dirty War  to serving as a federal judge.  In 2009, Brusa was convicted of crimes against humanity for his role in the campaign of abduction, torture of killing.  His conviction came largely on the brave testimony of Silvia Suppo, who, like Patricia Isasa, was just a teenager when Argentine police abducted her, tortured and raped her, and held her for years without charges.  (Read here.)  In March, 2010, Silvia Suppo was brutally murdered in her crafts shop located in Rafaela, an area where violent crimes are extremely rare.  A subsequent official inquiry ruled that the motive for Suppo's murder was robbery, although the facts that Suppo was stabbed 12 times, that her wounds were deep and intended to kill her, and that there is no evidence that any property was taken, have called the soundness of this ruling into question.  Since Suppo's murder, defendants connected to Dirty War atrocities have threatened other witnesses that they would meet Suppo's fate.  Some of these threats have even occurred in the very courtrooms where these cases are being heard.  (Read here.)

Marie Trigona's report on this for CIP Americas is available here.

Thursday, January 20, 2011

A former student of SSPX Bishop Williamson speaks about anti-Semitism in the Traditionalist Catholic far-right

The schismatic Catholic order SSPX (Society of St. Pius X), the largest organized group within the so-called traditionalist Catholic movement, has a long record of promoting anti-Semitism and extreme far-right politics while portraying itself as merely restoring traditional theology and values.  The SSPX, while formed in reaction to the religious reforms of the Second Vatican Council,  has for many years played a significant role in the far-right politics of a number of predominantly Catholic nations in South America and Europe. The connections between the SSPX leadership and the far-right is longstanding and significant, going back (in the pre-Vatican II era) to ideological roots in Charles Maurras'  Action Française, and its founder's support for the Vichy regime.  The SSPX aided and abetted the fugitive Nazi war criminal Paul Touvier, whom they hid from justice within their priory in Nice.  They have close associations with the leadership of the French National Front Party and the International Third Position, among other neo-fascist parties.  Their support for the Argentine junta during the Dirty War included providing theological justification for torturing those deemed by the regime to be subversive.  Works by Marcel Lefebvre, the founder of SSPX, were taught in Argentine military academies and distributed by the military and church hierarchy to indoctrinate those operating the torture chambers of the Dirty War.  (Read here and here and here.) In a nutshell, the SSPX's connections to the far-right and anti-Semitism comprise a very long and sordid history which has never been fully told.

Kansas Attorney J. Christopher Pryor used to belong to the SSPX.  Pryor, who was raised in a conservative Catholic home in Brooklyn's Bay Ridge neighborhood and on Long Island, became affiliated with the traditionalist Catholic movement under the impression that it merely promoted a conservative brand of Catholicism including the traditional Latin Mass.  His experiences studying for the priesthood within a SSPX seminary gave him an intimate view of the organization and led him to believe that it represents something more sinister.  In fact, Mr. Pryor studied at the largest American seminary of the SSPX, located in Winona, Minnesota, a school which was at that time run by the infamous Holocaust-denying Bishop Richard Williamson.  (Williamson was given the title of Bishop by the order after it broke away from the Vatican so the legitimacy of that title may be questioned.)  Williamson gained notoriety after his November, 2008 interview on Swedish TV, during which he denied the Holocaust.  The ensuing uproar led to the SSPX firing him from his position as the leader of their Latin American operation, which, not coincidentally, is headquartered in Buenos Aires.  Williamson fled Argentina for London, where he received assistance from his ideological comrades Michelle Renouf and David Irving.  (More here.)  Although Williamson has become a lightning rod, embarrassing the order by drawing public attention to his outrageously bigoted statements and associations, the attention given him has not done enough to bring to to light the anti-Semitism, paranoia and political extremism at the ideological core of the traditionalist Catholic movement.

Christopher Pryor has, in recent years, made an effort to inform the public about Williamson and the SSPX in particular, and the traditionalist Catholic movement in general.  In October, 2010, he participated in the annual conference of the Journal for the Study of Anti-Semitism (JSA), where he gave a brief talk on the subject.  Nine minutes isn't nearly enough time to hear all he has to say about this, but it's a good start.  I strongly recommend that those interested in this subject read Pryor's article, "Traditional Catholicism and the Teachings of Bishop Richard Williamson", in Vol. 1, Issue #2 of the JSA.  It can be downloaded in pdf here.  I also recommend reading the blog Fringe Watch, which covers this subject on an ongoing basis.




(More video of the conference is available here.)

The Southern Poverty Law Center has published a number of useful articles about the traditionalist Catholic movement. Check them out here and here and here and here.  More here.

Here's video of Williamson's infamous interview:




Bishop Richard Williamson (left, background) with David Irving (foreground)

U.S.Soldiers Arbitrarily Judged on "Spiritual Fitness"

Chris Rodda has an article at Talk2Action.org that must be read in it's entirety: Soldiers Forced to See Chaplain After Failing Army's Spiritual Fitness Test. Here's an excerpt:

After failing a recently implemented mandatory Army-wide "Spiritual Fitness" test, soldiers are given the following message on their computer screens:

"Spiritual fitness is an area of possible difficulty for you. You may lack a sense of meaning and purpose in your life. At times, it is hard for you to make sense of what is happening to you and others around you. You may not feel connected to something larger than yourself. You may question your beliefs, principles, and values. Nevertheless, who you are and what you do matter. There are things to do to provide more meaning and purpose in your life. Improving your spiritual fitness should be an important goal. Change is possible, and the relevant self-development training modules will be helpful. If you need further help, please do not hesitate to seek out help from the people you care about and trust -- strong people always do. Be patient in your development as it will take time to improve in this area. Still, persistence is key and you will improve here if you make this area a priority."

This mandatory online test, called the Global Assessment Tool (GAT), is part of the Army's Comprehensive Soldier Fitness (CSF) program, a program that puts spiritual fitness on par with physical and mental fitness.

Upon flunking the "Spiritual Fitness" section of the GAT, and receiving the above message telling them that "Change is possible" and that "you will improve here if you make this area a priority," the spiritually deficient soldiers are directed to training modules to correct this problem with their "fitness."


Rodda's article relays a firsthand account of the arbitrary, capricious and clearly unconstitutional campaign of religious indoctrination in the military. Here are the words of a decorated soldier who failed the Army' s spiritual fitness test.

Subject: I Am A "Spiritual Fitness Failure" ......Before I tell you, Mr. Weinstein and the MRFF of my total outrage at the U.S. Army for grading me as a "Spiritual Fitness failure", I will tell you a few things about myself. My name is (name withheld) and I am an enlisted soldier with the rank of (rank withheld) in the United States Army stationed at Ft. (military installation withheld). I am in my early-to-mid twenties. I have been deployed downrange into Iraq and Afghanistan 6 times. I will deploy again for my 7th time very soon; to Afghanistan and more combat. All of my deployments have been very heavy combat assignments. I have been wounded 4 times including traumatic brain injury. I have earned the Combat Action Badge, the Bronze Star and multiple Purple Hearts. I have fought in hand-to hand- combat and killed and wounded more than a few "enemy combatants." M religion? I was born a Methodist and guess I still am one. I'm not very religious but consider myself to be a Christian. I don't go to chapel services that often although I go every now and then. I can't stand the chaplains as most of them are trying to always get me and my friends to "commit to Christ" and be far more religious as well as they try to get more and more soldiers to get more and more soldiers to be the same type of "committed Christian". I cannot count the number of times that these chaplains and my own chain of command has described this war we fight as a religious one against the Muslims and their "false, evil and violent" religion. I am a Christian and therefore neither an agnostic nor an atheist though many of my fellow soldiers are such. Now to the point. I, and everyone else who is enlisted in my company, was ORDERED by my Battalion Commander to take the GAT's Spiritual Fitness Test not very long ago. Let me make this CLEAR, we were all ORDERD to take it. After we did, our unit's First Sgt. individually asked us all how we did on the test. There was NO "anonymity" at all. None of us were ever told that we did NOT have to take this Spiritual Fitness Test nor that we did NOT have to tell our FIrst Sgt. what our results were. A bunch of us "failed" the SFT and when we told that to our First Sgt., per his disclosure order, he further ordered us to make immediate appointments with the chaplains so that we would not "kill ourselves on his watch". None of us wanted to do it but we were scared. None of us wanted to get in the shits with our First Sgt. who can and will make life miserable for anyone who might have said no to him. They keep saying that this is all to stop us soldiers from killing ourselves but THIS degrading SFT "failure" only makes it worse. Two of my battle buddies who I KNOW are thinking of ending it all were a million times worse off after failing this SFT and being called a "spiritual failure" and then ordered to go see the chaplains. I felt like a total coward for not standing up to my First Sgt. but I did what he told me to do. I was scared to tell him no. So I went to see the chaplain. When this chaplain told me that I failed the SFT because it was "Jesus' way of personally knocking on my door as an invitation for me to come to Him as a born again 'REAL' Christian" so that I could be saved and not burn forever in Hell for rejecting him, I thought of 3 things. First, I thought of the fact that I was already born a Christian and did not need to be born again. Second, I thought of my battle buddy (name and rank withheld) who took a bullet for me in his face during the Battle of (name of Iraqi battle withheld) and that he was the same kind of Christian as me and this chaplain is telling me that my battle buddy (name and rank withheld) is burning in hell for all time.


The military chaplaincy should not be using coercive force or deception to proselytize soldiers. In fact, they should not be allowed to proselytize at all. Their job is to serve those who desire their services, not to gain converts via force, deception or even by persuasion. The Constitution forbids establishment of a state religion and interference in the free exercise of religion. The government and its agencies cannot single out particular religious beliefs for special favor and others for disfavor. The military, by allowing, cooperating with and even mandating this sort of discrimination, betrays the trust that we as a nation have in their role as defenders of the Constitution. That they should subject to such unfair treatment those who have sacrificed so much for this country makes this injustice especially egregious.

Monday, January 17, 2011

Hamas Witchhunt: 150 Women Arrested in Gaza

What's life like in Gaza under the rule of Hamas?

In 2010, the Hamas regime in Gaza conducted a literal witchhunt in which they arrested 150 women. According to news reports, women arrested as witches are forced to sign confessions and statements renouncing witchcraft. In connection with the witchhunt, the regime has placed large anti-witchcraft posters at mosques, universities and at government offices. These posters warn women against occult practices and give helpful information to Gaza residents wishing to accuse their neighbors of the crime.

The issue emerged again in August last year when a 62-year-old woman, Jabryieh Abu Ghanas, considered to be active in the field of ''witchcraft'' and the production of ''voodoo dolls'', was shot dead in a street in the centre of Gaza. This murder caused great alarm in the Palestinian human rights defence organisations al-Mezan and PCHR-Gaza (Palestinian Center for Human Rights).


More here and here and here and here.

Sunday, January 16, 2011

More Tucson shooting conspiracy theories, bigotry, and slanders against Gabrielle Giffords

Martin Hill blogs as the "L.A. County Libertarian Examiner". He describes himself as "a Catholic paleoconservative and civil rights advocate" who has written for "LewRockwell.com, WhatReallyHappened, Infowars, PrisonPlanet, Rense, National Motorists Association, and many others."  Hill has posted at the Examiner website a column which both promotes hateful, anti-Semitic conspiracy theories concerning the Tucson shootings and slanders Rep. Giffords as supporting mass-murder.  The author bases the latter charge on a hodge-podge of her votes to which he takes somewhat confused ideological exception. (Read here: Gabrielle Giffords should stop supporting the deaths of innocent people - Los Angeles LA County Libertarian | Examiner.com).

Hill introduces his wacky, hateful conspiracy theories by stating that he believes that several questions need answering -- that he only wants further inquiry -- a standard conceit of conspiracy theorists. First, he absurdly claims that Judge Roll, not Rep. Giffords may have been the target of the attacks -- this in spite of the already published extensive history of Jared Loughner's obsession with Giffords and the complete lack of any evidence that Loughner was in any way aware of Judge Roll.  Hill bases this theory solely only on the fact that Judge Roll had ruled on several highly controversial matters.  Hill cites a ruling by Judge Roll knocking down a law limiting weapon ownership, and based only on this, absurdly implies that the Tucson shootings may have been motivated by liberal anti-gun extremists targeting Judge Roll.  The fact is that Judge Roll also ruled against the far-right in a number of cases and had, in fact, been a target of their very real threats.  (Read about that, and about Lou Dobbs and Glenn Beck's role in that, here.)  That fact, which conflicts with Hill's far-right bias, is simply too inconvenient to mention.  That Loughner's writings contain extensive evidence of his intention to kill Rep. Giffords renders Hill's baseless call for investigation doubly foolish.  Hill's "questions" have already been answered by Loughner.

Next, Hill deploys some traditional anti-Semitic tropes to back an absurd rumor which has been disseminated by an excessively credulous reporter for Mother Jones.  (Read here.) Mother Jones has reported that one of Loughner's friends has said that Loughner told him that Loughner's mother is Jewish, thus propelling a new meme into the world of David Duke, Stormfront, and their fellow travelers.  (Read here.) That story, based on hearsay from the demonstrably delusional Loughner, was published by Mother Jones without any effort at substantiation and without any warning regarding its reliability.  It is not news.  It's worse than an unfounded rumor, it's a rumor based on the words of a madman, and it was debunked within days of its publication.  (Read here and here.)  Hill sees it differently. He claims not only that the debunked rumor is true, but that local Jews, including the rabbi at a local synagogues, are lying when they say that the Loughners never attended services there.  Here's Hill:


The Rabbi at Gabrielle Gifford's synagogue was interiewed [sic] excluseively by Ron Kall of OpEdNews. She claims that the Loughner family did not attend her Synagogue as had been reported by some. That claim was disputed as non reliable by skeptics though, who claim that the Jewish 'holy book' the Talmud allows Jews to lie and deceive. Giffords herself served on the Regional Board board of the Anti Defamation League in  Arizona while she was in the state legislature, a fact that has received surprisingly scant attention in the aftermath of the shootings.


Hill offhandedly slanders Jews as liars, slanders Jewish scripture, implies that Giffords' association with the ADL is a wrong and that it is being suppressed by the media as part of a cover-up, and cites a pro-Nazi website as evidence.  This indicates the extreme bigotry and paranoia of the man.  He seems delighted to not only slander the target of the horrific shootings, but to slander the entire Jewish people as somehow possibly responsible for the shootings, thus requiring "further attention".  Hill's evidence of the Jewish evil behind this is a post by the anti-Semitic preacher Ted Pike at the hate website Rense.com, a website infamous for publishing Nazi propaganda in a form which appeals to contemporary readers looking for stories about the New World Order and UFOs.  In addition to publishing Ted Pike and Martin Hill, Rense has published the writings and even the artwork of neo-Nazi leader Ernst Zundel.

After thus slandering Judaism and endorsing Nazi views, Hill goes on to slander liberals by claiming that the they all, inevitably advocate violence, while the libertarian far-right never does.  His basis for this, as spelled out in a blog post to which he links, is a foolish belief that taxation is the ultimate form of violence, and that advocacy for a small government is the ultimate expression of non-violence. (Read here.)

With the words "I do not wish to express any ill will whatsoever towards Gabrielle Giffords. She is a precious child of God", Hill piously starts his attack on Giffords' legislative actions.  He distorts Giffords' support for several measures to encourage the use of contraception as somehow "anti-life".  On the contrary, Giffords' support for several mainstream, moderate measures promoting contraception is precisely designed to prevent unwanted pregnancy and reduce the number of abortions.  That an extremist like Hill cannot understand this is not surprising.  He similarly condemns Giffords' support for a moderate position advocating teaching public school students about contraception and abstinence as somehow extreme.

Hill also distorts or misunderstands Giffords's foreign policy record, which also is moderate.  She has voted consistently for war funding, to sanction Iranian nuclear weapons development and to express support for Israel, but also voted "yes" on the Kucinich bill to investigate President Bush for lying to Congress in the buildup to the Iraq War.  (Read here.)   For this, Hill portrays her as a neo-con true believer, and links to a video of Ron Paul as an example of the sort of isolationist views he advocates.

Hill writes

I think that the record presented here will be a sober reminder of what is really at stake when the public supports warmongering anti-life politicians such as Gabrielle Giffords.

He then concludes with a somber, self-righteous prayer for her repentance, complete with quotes from the Bible. 

That Hill is a confused, extreme and malicious commentator is very clear.  As Hill publishes his cruel slanders, Rep. Giffords still lies in a hospital bed in a medically-induced coma with half her skull removed to prevent further damage to her brain as the result of the shooting.  Hill uses her shooting as an opportunity to slander her and the Jewish people and to promote his Nazi-like theories and those of Rev. Ted Pike and Rense.  He distorts Giffords' moderate views to make them seem extreme and his own to seem mainstream.  My question is why Martin Hill's hate-filled distortions are published by the Examiner.  The Examiner shows up near the top of Google searches.  That gives the stories they publish a very wide readership.  For that reason, it's imperative that they take responsibility, remove this post, and stop promoting hate.

UPDATE:  The Daily Paul, one of the largest of websites associated with the Ron Paul campaign, has published Hill's column.  Read here.

Friday, January 14, 2011

Gilad Atzmon's self-hating ego trip continues

Here, without comment, are some recent quotations from blogger and musician Gilad Atzmon:

Rather often we hear from Jews on the left that their affinity to humanitarian issues is driven by their ‘Jewish humanist heritage’. More than once I myself have commented that this is an utter lie. There is no such a Jewish heritage. [sic] Driven by tribal precepts, both Judaism and 'Jewish ideology' are devoid of universal ethics. If there are some remote patches of humanism in Jewish culture, these are certainly far from being universal. (Milton Friedman’s ‘Capitalism and the Jews’ Revisited 1/3/11)


For years Israelis and Zionists have been pumping 'Shoah' into our veins by using every possible propaganda outlet: media, education, Hollywood, music, literature, billboards and so on... (A) real Shoah is taking place in front of our eyes in Palestine, where the Jewish state locks millions of Palestinians behind bars: it starves them, it stops medical supplies, food, cement, and educational materials from getting in. But it does not stop there -- when the Jewish state feels like it, it also kills Palestinians indiscriminately. ("Shoah Backfires" 1/10/11)


'Jewish ideology' is basically an amalgam of racially orientated exclusive arguments. It is fuelled by assumptions about 'ethno'-centric supremacy, and ideas such as ‘choseness’. Being a tribal setting then, Jewish ideology defies equality. It also opposes universalism. The followers of that ideology tend to believe that they are somewhat different and even better (chosen) than non Jews. And much Jewish political activity is a formulation, and expression of a tribal exclusive club that demands a ‘Jews only’ entry card. ("JEWS, JUDAISM & JEWISHNESS" 12/15/10) 

Though it is certain that there is no ethnic or racial continuum between the Biblical Israelites and the Khazarians who lead the Jewish state and its army, the similarities between the murderous enthusiasm described in Deuteronomy and the current string of Israeli lethal actions cannot be denied. Israel is a murderous society not because of any biological or racial lineage with its imaginary ‘forefathers’. Israel is deadly because it is driven by a fanatical tribal Jewish ideology and fueled by a psychotic merciless Biblical poisonous enthusiasm.  The Jewish State is beyond the law. It doesn’t follow any recognised universal value system either. ("JEWISH IDEOLOGY AND WORLD PEACE" 6/7/10)

Within the discourse of Jewish politics and history there is no room for causality. There is no such a thing as a former and a latter. Within the Jewish tribal discourse every narrative starts to evolve when Jewish pain establishes itself. This obviously explains why Israelis and some Jews around the world can only think as far as ‘two state solution’ within the framework of 1967 borders. It also explains why for most Jews the history of the holocaust starts in the gas chambers or with the rise of the Nazis. I have hardly seen any Israelis or Jews attempt to understand the circumstances that led to the clear resentment of Europeans towards their Jewish neighbors in the 1920’s-40’s.  ("JEWISH IDEOLOGY AND WORLD PEACE" 6/7/10)

(T)o safely apply the ‘Jew’ category, you just have to make sure you say the right things. No one will ever cause you any trouble for mentioning Albert Einstein in reference to Jewish intelligence or even bringing up Anne Frank as an exemplary motif of Jewish innocence but you may get into some serious trouble once you mention the following list of real and fictional characters: Bernie Madoff, Fagin, Wolfowitz, Lord Levy, Shylock, Alan Greenspan, Netanyahu and Nathan Rothschild without even identifying them as Jews.  ("SYMBOLIC IDENTIFIERS AND JEWISH STEREOTYPES" 4/18/10)

Fagin is the ultimate plunderer, a child exploiter and usurer. Shylock is the blood-thirsty merchant. With Fagin and Shylock in mind Israeli barbarism and organ trafficking seem to be just other events in an endless hellish continuum. However, it is also obvious why the HET [British Holocaust Education Trust] is so thrilled by Anne Frank. On the face of it, and for obvious reasons, Frank is there to convey an image of innocence. And indeed not a single moral system could ever justify the ordeal this young girl went through along with many others. Yet, Anne Frank wasn’t exactly a literary genius. Her diary is not a valuable piece of literature. She wasn’t an exceptionally clever either. [sic] ("SYMBOLIC IDENTIFIERS AND JEWISH STEREOTYPES" 4/18/10)

Removing Fagin, Shylock and TS Eliot won’t stop the word ‘Jew’ from being an adjective and a negative descriptive emblem. For that to change, or for Jews to be genuinely respected, self-reflection is of the essence. Instead of pointing out what is so wrong with the Goyim, Jews may want to consider looking in the mirror. I tried it once many years ago. I have never recovered. It transformed me into a profound self-hater. ("SYMBOLIC IDENTIFIERS AND JEWISH STEREOTYPES" 4/18/10)

I have spent the last ten years elaborating on Jewish national ideology and tribal politics. During my journey of grasping what Zionism and Israel stand for, I came to realize that it is actually the Jewish left -- and Jewish Marxists in particular -- that provide us with an adequate glimpse into contemporary Jewish identity,  tribal supremacy,  marginal politics and tribalism.  ‘Jewish left’ is basically an oxymoron. It is a contradiction in terms, because ‘Jewishness’ is a tribal ideology, whilst ‘the left’ are traditionally understood as aspiring to universalism...  

(T)he ‘Jewish left’ is, at least categorically, no different from Israel or Zionism: after all, it is an attempt to form yet another ‘Jews only political club’. And as far as the Palestinian solidarity movement is concerned, its role is subject to a growing debate -- For on the one hand, one can see the political benefit of pointing at a very few ‘good Jews’, and emphasizing that there are Jews who ‘oppose Zionism as Jews’. Yet on the other hand, however, accepting the legitimacy of such a racially orientated political affair, is in itself, an acceptance of yet another form, or manifestation of Zionism, for Zionism claims that Jews are primarily Jewish, and had better operate politically as Jews.

To a certain extent then, it is clear that Jewish anti Zionism, is, in itself, still just another form of Zionism.  ("ZIONIST TOLERANCE FOR A CHANGE" 10/29/10)

Jewish politics is always a form of Zionism. ("Jews, Jazz and Socialism"  10/22/10)

Wednesday, January 12, 2011

Chutzpah: Palin says she's the victim of a "Blood Libel"

Palin uses her first public statement on the Tucson shootings to portray herself as a victim of its aftermath. She says that recent criticism of her use of gun metaphors with respect to Gabrielle Giffords is a "blood libel", thus identifying herself as the victim of a virtual pogrom. Frankly, with the real victims lying dead and wounded, it is difficult to see her as a victim at all. If anything, her statement reaffirms the view that she's a narcissistic huckster with little connection to the real import of the issues she comments on.

If Sarah Palin wishes to defend her use of cross-hair target maps and entreaties to "reload" against Gabrielle Giffords in the 2010 campaign, let her do so without portraying herself as a victim. To use that defense in this context shows a weakness not only of intellect, but of character.


Monday, January 10, 2011

Chris Matthews is right on target, you should pardon the expression.



Chris Matthews Grills Tea Party Leader: Why Would Someone Bring A Gun To A Political Rally? | TPMDC

Glenn Beck reacts to Giffords shooting: An attempt on Palin's life "could bring the republic down"

The weirdest reaction to the Giffords shooting that I've seen in the mainstream media comes from Glenn Beck. He's made public a letter he's sent her in which he advises her to boost her security, writing:


(P)lease look into protection for your family. An attempt on you could bring the republic down.

...and the conspiracy mongering continues

I noted yesterday that the conspiracy nuts had already started spinning their complex webs, spreading lies about purported hidden hands behind the Giffords assassination attempt within minutes via Twitter and blog posts. I neglected that endless font of mad conspiracy theories: Lyndon LaRouche, the longtime presidential candidate and political cult leader. LaRouche, who is revered by his followers as a virtual prophet, has an implausible and impenetrably complex answer for every question. Here's LaRouche's authoritative version of the Giffords shooting, via the website of his political action committee:


Lyndon LaRouche said today that the version of the story about the shooting of Rep. Gabrielle Giffords in Tucson, Arizona on Saturday presented thus far is not believable. On the one hand, it is clear that the perpetrator who was apprehended is a nutty kid. On the other hand, the targeting of Sarah Palin is a tip off that the story is a fake and that someone is using the kid who carried out the shooting.

There is a widespread effort on the part of the press to attempt to make a hero out of a woman, Rep. Giffords, who had the wrong policy on health care. An attempt is being made to use the case to attack Sarah Palin, who had targeted Giffords and 19 other Congressmen for defeat in the last election because of their vote for Obama's Nazi health bill.

LaRouche said that this is a tip off that something is phony in the story being put forward now by people who support the Obama T-4 policy. Giffords was on the wrong side morally. The kid who shot her and others is clearly a nut, a psychotic. But his action is now being used to attack Sarah Palin, who did nothing wrong in targeting supporters, including Giffords, of the Obama health bill for defeat in the last election.

LaRouche said that anyone who attacks Sarah Palin is implicitly pro-Hitler.


...and...


(T)he press build up of the attack on Sarah Palin is a tipoff that something is phony, that the attack is being used to promote something else.

The attack itself is a criminal atrocity. Then you have what the press is doing as an official line. LaRouche said that what the press is doing in attacking Sarah Palin is as bad a crime as the crime itself. It is criminal to try to put blame on people who are anti-genocide. The events in Arizona were not caused by people who attacked a pro-genocide policy. The actions of a nut case are being used to build up a witchhunt against people who correctly oppose the murderous, genocide policy epitomized by the Obama T-4 policy.

In effect there are two crimes. First the crime against the Congresswoman and second the crime against Sarah Palin.

LaRouche said it is a toss up as to which is a worse crime. Somebody is trying to use a crime as an after the fact justification for a pro-genocide line. The attack on Sarah Palin is the fraud. The Congresswoman's support for Obama's health policy was wrong.

Those who know the history of the Third Reich will recognize the T-4 policy as Hitler's program to exterminate those who the regime deemed medically unfit to live. It was the first phase of the Nazi genocide. LaRouche is claiming that the Obama medical program is a similar first phase in an incipient Holocaust and that the Giffords shooting is part of his plan.


Sunday, January 9, 2011

Let the conspiracy mongering commence

It doesn't take very long for the conspiracy mongers to start. Soon after any major news event, they rush in, ready to dress the event in whatever off-the-rack paranoia suits their ideology.

Yesterday's horrifying mass-murder in Tucson is a fresh and painful wound in the national psyche. What better time to explain it as the product of a broad conspiracy? According to the shock doctrine, the public is vulnerable after a disaster and more susceptible to extreme messages they would otherwise reject. That theory applies not only to governments, but to the political lunatic fringe as well.


Michael Rivero

Michael Rivero

@WRH_Mike_Rivero Oahu
Visual Effects, Webmaster, talk radio host






Case in point #1: Mike Rivero of the What Really Happened blog.  Both on his blog and on Twitter, he writes that President Obama is behind the shooting of Rep. Gabrielle Giffords.  He bases this lunacy on two facts.  First, Mark Penn, the political consultant who led Hilary Clinton's 2008 primary campaign (and infamously botched that effort by misunderstanding California's Democratic primary procedure), stupidly said in an November, 2010 interview with MSNBC's Chris Matthews that the best thing that could happen to President Obama would be another Oklahoma City massacre.  Second, police in Arizona are searching for a possible accomplice in the Giffords shooting.

To a paranoid mind, those two facts provide motive and opportunity for a presidential conspiracy to assassinate a member of Congress.  Speaking of the shock doctrine, that's what Rivero sees in the shooting, perhaps projecting his own motivation.  Rivero sees in this what the truthers see in 9/11, the Clinton-haters saw in Waco and Oklahoma City, the JFK conspiracy people see in their fantasies, and what assorted isolationists and paleo-conservatives see in Pearl Harbor.  Any disaster which requires a federal response of any kind is perceived by this type of mind as an inside job by a chief executive seeking to usurp unconstitutional powers.

from Twitter:


Michael Rivero
FLASHBACK - Obama Needs ‘Similar’ to Oklahoma City! AND TODAY HE GOT IT!   

from WHAT REALLY HAPPENED | The History The US Government HOPES You Never Learn!:


Authorities seek associate of Jared Loughner in Tucson shooting


Authorities are seeking help identifying a man who is believed to be associated with the suspect in the Tucson mass shooting, which left six people dead and injured 13 others, including U.S. Rep. Gabrielle Giffords.
The Pima County Sheriff's Department said investigators believe the man is associated with the suspected shooter, who has been identified through law enforcement sources as Jared Loughner, 22. The suspected shooter is in custody.
The man is described as a White male, approximately 40 to 50 years old, with dark hair. He was last seen wearing blue jeans and a dark blue jacket.
Anyone want to take bets this suspect just "goes away" like the Columbine third shooter or the RFK "Girl in the Polka Dot Dress?"




Case in point #2: Gordon Duff.  Duff runs the anti-Semitic conspiracy theory blog with the innocuous name Veterans Today.  He's pushing the line that Gifford's assassination attempt was a Manchurian Candidate style mind-control operation connected to some sort of nebulous Jewish conspiracy.  He somehow finds intimations of all this in the YouTube ravings of Jared Loughner, the Tucson shooter.  Considering that Loughner's writings consist of intellectual disordered imitations of syllogisms ('If A, and B, thus C'), the fact that Duff sees unspecified proof of a Jewish conspiracy in this says more about his paranoid view of the world than it does about anything else.

Here's a quote to get a sense of where he's coming from:

With Israel backing both Gifford and financing those threatening her also, an avenue of possible investigation may need to be opened.

Gordon Duff is not claiming that he knows the answer to how the Jews are behind the Tucson shooting, he just wants to open an investigation to find out.

Here's some of what Duff and friends have to say in the column's comments:


J. Bruce Campbell says:
Whoever wrote this is/was a victim of mind-control. The writer appears to be protesting the only way he/she knows how.


There are two other alternative possible explanations that I can see. Firstly that the vid was actually created by his mind control programmers to disguise the real reason for the hit(s). Secondly that Jared is actually a psychopath and was setting up his legal defense (insanity) in advance.


  1. Miriam says:
    2 things….and they are connected….the shooter, had he been brown, bearded might have been killed today…but for some reason……he was not shot. He/his name was protected most all of today… interesting that in that place Arizona…..he was protected arrested and taken away….at a time when police retaliation…with so much carnage in that parking lot…so much death…..Then there is the question about how he came to that end….was he a stooge…was he put up to it….egged on…trained encouraged…? a dead Federal judge, along with 5 other dead victims and Rep gifford…Now that the news about her choosing to be jewish is out (Haaretz and JTA this evening) you have to wonder if this is going to be the justification Congress will use to silence verbal/written criticism of zionists/Israel etc as they have done (somewhat) in Europe. things perceived as being “anti semitic” are ‘crimes’ there. Buh bye free speech…whats left of it, that is…
    • Penumbra says:
      Miriam,
      I must say that thought crossed my mind when I did some checking on Ms. Giffords and saw that she was not only “Jewish” but a firm and loyal cohort of AIPAC.
      Nothing spells orchestrated sensationalist event for Pro-Zionist propaganda like an AIPAC stooge being placed in harm’s way.
      Just watch the “anti-Semitism” angle being increasingly spun across the networks in the days and weeks to come.
      Methinks this is also timed perfectly to draw attention away from escalating Israeli demolitions in the East Jerusalem and the AIPAC spying scandal of recent past months (as well as a raft of other likely nefarious aims of the new Congress nearing the boil).
      Anyone got a bead on what Goldman Sachs is up to lately?
    • Ken Rechtstein says:
      Jared is a very common Jewish name… As a matter of fact, strange that nobody at the scene drew a gun and shot the aggressor.
      Mind control or not, it seems to me that this new tragedy is the expression of a sick society producing weird citizens by truck loads, due to many factors and Hollywood is one the contributors to it.
      Of course, this sad incident will be used Lieberman-McCain and the likes to tighten the screw on citizens constitutional rights and introduce bills for more restriction of civil liberties.

Duff inexplicably illustrates his disjointed column with a bizarre photo of Sarah Palin which has been altered to depict her with fangs and holding in one hand a piece of raw meat and in the other a gun.  


Illustration from the Veteran's Today coverage of the Giffords shooting.



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