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Amazing Plan Surfaces: "We Need Ethno-Weapons!" David Price tells how top-flight US anthropologists eagerly obeyed US government's mandate to "think in a-moral terms". One scheme of OSS's willing executioners: target Japanese physical "weak spot", the respiratory tract, with anthrax germs. Gabriel Kolko asks What's so New About the Neo-Cons? If they had not existed, would the policies have been the same? Jeffrey St Clair digs up more dirt on Halliburton's secret history. Alexander Cockburn on why we need more "celebrity justice". Get the answers you're looking for in the latest subscriber-only edition of CounterPunch ... CounterPunch Online is read by millions of viewers each month! But remember, we are funded solely by the subscribers to the print edition of CounterPunch. Please support this website by buying a subscription to our newsletter, which contains fresh material you won't find anywhere else, or by making a donation for the online edition. Remember contributions are tax-deductible. Click here to make a donation. If you find our site useful please: Subscribe Now! or write CounterPunch, PO BOX 228, Petrolia, CA 95558 |
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Other Lands Have Dreams: From Baghdad to Pekin Prison by KATHY KELLY ![]() Today's Stories John
Walsh Mike
Marqusee Gilad
Atzmon Nicole
Colson Jack
Random Norman
Solomon Len
Colodny Cockburn
/ St. Clair
July 6, 2005 Elaine
Cassel Sean
Donahue Jeremy
R. Hammond Joshua
Frank Ali
Khan Michael
Dickinson Norman
Solomon Dave
Zirin Gary
Leupp Website
of the Day
July 5, 2005 Behrooz
Ghamari Elaine
Cassel Ron
Jacobs Bob
Libal Dr.
Peter Rost Mark
Engler Gideon
Levy Dave
Zirin Sameer
Dossani
July 2 / 4, 2005 Alexander
Cockburn Lenni
Brenner Laura
Carlsen James
Petras William
A. Cook Brian
Cloughley Saul
Landau Tom
Crumpacker Greg
Moses Dr.
Susan Block Fran
Shor Fred
Gardner Moshe
Adler David
Model Seth
Sandronsky Ramzy
Baroud Suzan
Mazur Ben
Tripp Justin
Taylor Brendan
Bailey Poets'
Basement Website
of the Weekend
July 1, 2005 Christopher
Brauchli Pat
Williams Gary
Leupp John
Stauber John
Chuckman Justicia
y Paz Cockburn
/ St. Clair
June 30, 2005 Kathy
Kelly John
Stauber Virginia
Rodino Jason
Leopold Dave
Lindorff Greg
Moses Norman
Solomon Joshua
Frank Alexander
Cockburn
June 29, 2005 Mike
Schaefer Roger
Burbach / Paul Cantor Sharon
Smith Sam
Husseini John
Stauber Ahmad
Faruqui Linda
S. Heard Stew
Albert Ray
McGovern
June 28, 2005 Paul
Craig Roberts Landau
/ Hassen John
A. Murphy Mike
Whitney CounterPunch
News Service Dave
Zirin Dave
Lindorff Patrick
Cockburn
June 27, 2005 Paul
Craig Roberts Mike
Marqusee Mark
Scaramella Leigh
Saavedra Kathy
Kelly June 25 / 26, 2005 Alexander
Cockburn Jennifer
Van Bergen George
Corsetti Mark
Chmiel / Andrew Wimmer Kevin
Zeese P.
Sainath John
Stauber Scott
Handleman Tom
Barry John
Walsh Justin
E.H. Smith Alan
Wallis Ben
Tripp Frederick
B. Hudson Poets'
Basement
June 24, 2005 Ray
McGovern Jorge
Mariscal Desiree
Hellegers Zeynep
Toufe Joshua
Frank David
Lindorff Michael
Neumann Website
of the Day June 23, 2005 Christopher
Brauchli Clay
Conrad Standard
Schaefer P.
Sainath Mark
Engler Norman
Solomon Cockburn
/ St. Clair Kathy
Kelly
June 22, 2005 Kevin
Zeese William
S. Lind Arsalan
Iftikhar Dan
Nagengast David
Krieger Kathleen
& Bill Christison
June 21, 2005 Brian Cloughley Mike Whitney Dave Lindorff Mark Weisbrot Matthew R.
Simmons Dave Zirin Virginia Rodino Paul Craig
Roberts
June 20, 2005 Alan Maass Tariq Ali Mickey Z. William Blum Gary Leupp Jason Leopold Dave Lindorff Alan Maass Uri Avnery Website of
the Day
Hot Stories Alexander Cockburn Subcomandante
Marcos Norman Finkelstein Steve Niva Dardagan,
Slobodo and Williams Steve
J.B. Sheldon
Rampton and John Stauber Wendell
Berry CounterPunch
Wire Cindy
Corrie Gore Vidal Francis Boyle
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July 7, 2005 From "Pariah" to "St. Judy"The Luckiest MartyrBy
ALEXANDER COCKBURN Is there ever anyone luckier than Judy Miller! All last year she was pilloried as the prime saleslady for the imaginary WMDs that offered the prime pretext for the invasion of Iraq. Although it refused to denounce her by name, the New York Times publicly castigated itself for poor reporting, and Miller's career seemed to be at an end, except for the occasional excursion to CNN studios for tete-a-tetes with Larry King. But then came a glimmer of hope. With unexpected zeal, special prosecutor Patrick Fitzgerald was pressing his investigation of who exactly outed Valerie Plame as a CIA officer. Plame, (as the world knows, is the wife of Joe Wilson, who had incurred the displeasure of the Bush White House by discrediting the phony Nigerian yellowcake story, part of their vast propaganda operation to sell the Iraq attack to Congress and the American people. Fitzgerald was threatening journalists with prison time unless they disclosed their sources. It wasn't long before some journalists informed the zealous Fitzgerald that they had been released from confidentiality by their sources. Indeed, Scooter Libby, Cheney's chief of staff, declared publicly that any journalist who had talked to him was free to discuss such conversations with Fitzgerald. The Washington Post's Walter Pincus and Glenn Kessler testified forthwith before the federal grand jury, as did Tim Russert of NBC. The general assumption is that Robert Novak, who'd outed Plame in his column in July 2003, was subpoenaed by Fitzgerald and duly testified. How Miller's heart must have leaped. Here was the glorious prospect of her instant conversion from pariah, only one rung up from Jayson Blair, to martyr to free speech, only one rung below John Peter Zenger. She and Matt Cooper of Time magazine declined to testify or furnish their notes. Encumbered by the counsel of that perennial incompetent, Floyd Abrams (representing the NYT), their cases commenced their climb up through the federal courts, until the U.S. Supreme Court refused to review the ruling of the federal appeals court in favor of Fitzgerald. Time magazine roared its dedication to free speech, while simultaneously declaring it had to obey the law of the land. Against Cooper's proclaimed wishes, Time handed over Cooper's notes to Fitzgerald. The New York Times said it would not comply. But Fitzgerald was not appeased by Time's ductility. He said he was not to be appeased by only Cooper's notes. By now he wanted to grill the two journalists on the stand. The issue was not just the matter of the identity of the White House source, but the handy standby of all federal prosecutors, the matter of perjury. Ask Martha Stewart. It was her misleading declarations to federal investigators that put her in prison. Cooper bid a manly adieu to his family, packed his toothbrush, and made himself ready for incarceration at least as far as October, when the grand jury's term expires. Then came the dramatic release from confidentiality by Cooper's source. Cooper went off to court, embraced Judy Miller in a fine display of solidarity, and then told the judge he would comply with Fitzgerald's subpoena. Miller, of course, was publicly adamant. But there seems to be no reason why she should not have echoed Cooper's statement to Judge Thomas Hogan. Fitzgerald has publicly declared that not only does he know the identity of Miller's source, but also that this source has released Miller from confidentiality. But Miller was not be balked of the martyrdom that will blot out her fake stories on Iraq's WMDs and convert her into the heroine of the Fourth Estate, with lucrative lecture fees and book sales for the rest of the decade. Never, she told the judge, would she reveal the Name that could not be named. The gates of the federal prison in Alexandria invitingly beckoned. There are curious questions hanging over Miller's determined march towards her prison cell, not far from that of Moussaoui, who is probably offering her free legal advice on the prison grapevine. Miller never actually wrote a story in the New York Times about Plame being in the CIA. So why has Fitzgerald been so eager to have her testify? The answer may lie in a paragraph buried in the Washington Post, reading as follows: "Sources close to the investigation say there is evidence in some instances that some reporters may have told government officials not the other way around that Wilson was married to Plame, a CIA employee." We could conjecture that when Fitzgerald interviewed White House political adviser Karl Rove and Cheney's chief of staff, Scooter Libby, one or other or both had said that they learned Plame was married to Wilson and in the CIA from Miller, who again this is surmise might well have learned this from one of her other sources, whether Perle or Chalabi or someone else in the intelligence world. After all, this is Miller's style of reporting. Learn something (entirely false in the case of the WMDs) from one source, then bounce it off another, and then put together a story citing two sources. In the case of the WMDs, Chalabi would give her a "defector" who would duly impart his fantasies about Saddam's arsenal. She would relay the defector's story to "a high intelligence source" who would confirm it. We applaud prosecutor Patrick Fitzgerald's gallant bid to do what now departed Times ombudsman Daniel Okrent should have done: grill Miller about the techniques and veracity of her reporting. Here, after all, is a journalist with blood on her hands, a fabricator who played a major role (rivaled perhaps only by the New Yorker's Jeffrey Goldberg) in selling a war with one fabrication after another, eagerly offered to the public by the New York Times. But alas, all hopes that her
career would expire in ignominy have now been dashed. As swift
as the moves to canonize John Paul II, the vestments of sainthood
are being draped over St. Judy. If her past career is anything
to go by, already the prison guards are melting before her winsome
smiles and confiding the little secrets and disclosures that
will soon being their careers to end and their families to the
brink of starvation. It would require the pen of Henry Fielding
to do her proper justice.
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