9/11 Is a Joke

Today, I’m going to bring up an uncomfortable topic: conspiracy theories.

As a resident of Left Blogostan, I am supposed to view conspiracy theories the same way I view Trickle Down Economics, school prayer and corporate welfare – that is, with utter contempt. Only a right wing survivalist kook from rural Montana can believe it’s a good idea to give tax cuts to ExxonMobil as they are experiencing record profits, and he’s got the grainy alien autopsy video to prove it.

Or something like that.

As I’ve mentioned before, I do not believe in Bigfoot – unless of course you are referring to the Barley Wine brewed by the Sierra Nevada Brewing Company. I do not believe the government nor any elements thereof have made contact with extraterrestrials helping design secret technologies at Area 51. I’m not buying the cattle mutilation stories; I don’t believe UN troops are stationed in Canada preparing for attack.

I do believe that science and reason are the path to human understanding. I believe teachers and stay-at-home moms are criminally under-compensated, financially and psychologically. I believe that education, healthcare, public transportation and the environment deserve the bulk of our federal expenditures, and that whenever we run out of funding for such areas, we should dip into the Pentagon’s budget. I believe that altruism and not corporate profit should be at the core of our foreign policy treaties and initiatives.

Okay? Have I sufficiently established my liberalism and sanity? Well, not so fast.

I believe elements of the United States Government helped orchestrate the September 11th attacks.

Okay, for those few of you who are still reading, this is my explanation:


One of the first arguments I get whenever I share my opinion on this horrible chapter in history is that no one in the government would participate in such a scheme. It’s that faith thing again. Actually, it’s faith and denial – faith in the essential righteousness of the American Way and denial of our own dark impulses.

Despite copious evidence to the contrary, most people believe that government and industry are captained mainly by honest, morally erect individuals who have the nation’s best interest at heart. Eisenhower era Secretary of Defense Charles E. Wilson’s famous remark that, “what was good for the country was good for General Motors and vice versa,” pretty much sums up most people’s view of the military indstrial complex Wilson helped create. It was Wilson who, as president of General Motors, declared that a “permanent war economy” was the only way to avoid returning to the depression economy that plagued America before WW2. With that in mind, Wilson kick-started the National System of Interstate and Defense Highways, whose stated purpose was to provide evacuation routes in the event of a nuclear attack, but whose actual purpose was to coerce the taxpayers into footing the bill for a venue for his company’s products. Conservatives like to argue that these projects created jobs that enabled families to improve their standard of living, which is true in the short term at least. But what it also enabled was an irrational belief in the doctrine of endless expansion – ever new markets to penetrate, expenses to cut, enemies to confront. This belief and its goodie bag of breakfast cereal and board games and frisbees and hoola-hoops coaxed cold-war America into a junkie-dealer relationship with Wall Street. The endless cornucopia of material possessions – why, even homeless people have computers now – is the fix that temporarily relieves the negative side effects of our collective self-deception.

For most of us, this belief is essential to survival. How can we get up every morning and raise kids and attend school conferences and vote and everything else if all we are doing is serving narrow corporate interests? Sure, sometimes our leaders give in to temptation from time to time – a bribe here, an indulgence there – but who would go so far as to allow thousands of innocent lives to be lost? Besides, the CEOs and Generals and intelligence operatives and appointed officials who I believe perpetrated this crime are all products of American educational and cultural institutions. Therefore, we are all guilty of this and other crimes, if only by extension. But, more importantly, we are all capable of assisting in such an act; in fact, we do so every day in small ways. That’s the most troubling aspect of this thing, and the aspect about which we are most in denial.

When I was a kid, one of the most common dirty tricks involved one boy clandestinely getting on all fours behind another boy while a third boy pushed the second boy backward. The second boy would trip over the first boy and fall flat on his ass, resulting in several minutes of hilarity. These incidents were almost always carried out nonverbally, or with a minimum of whispering and inscrutable asides. One boy would be singled out – usually the geekiest or least fashionably dressed – and the other boys, thankful that they had not been selected as the fall guy, would become willing participants. Since early childhood, I have seen this routine repeated again and again in the workplace, in the classroom, during creative endeavors. Someone is singled out and the others either participate in that guy’s undoing or simply look the other way. Usually, the one who is singled out adheres most rigidly to the honest, logical course of action, while the members of the dog pile prefer the wing-it-and-then-lie-your-ass-off approach. The latter is always threatened by the former; history provides many examples. Leon Trotsky was singled out and eventually assassinated under such a plot, as was JFK. The “Wobblies” were similarly punked by Samuel Gompers and early industrialists; Judi Bari and her organization, Earth First!, suffered at the hands of the FBI, the Oakland Police and other, more moderate environmental groups. J.P. Morgan hosed down the inventor and electronics pioneer, Nicola Tesla. Later, Wall Street thugs tried to hobble the FDR White House. And on and on and on...

It’s difficult to admit you’re wrong or to relinquish power, especially in a society like ours that values status and self-assurance so much. It’s easier to simply undermine those who have proven you wrong or have demonstrated the validity of an alternative hierarchy in which you factor poorly. We are all guilty. Unless you come from another planet where they do things much differently than we do here on earth, you have participated – if only by silence – in the downfall of a classmate, co-worker or colleague. And we are all conspirators when it comes to undermining the labor movement or the civil rights movement or the environmental movement. Don’t deny it.

Well, this is the culture that spawned the September 11th attacks, and we are all part of it. To deny that Dick Cheney, Donald Rumsfeld, Paul Wolfowitz, Marvin Bush et al are capable of carrying out such a dastardly deed is to deny some essential-but-uncomfortable truths about ourselves. But if you’re still not convinced, in Part 2, I will discuss specific instances in which Wall Street, the “Intelligence Community,” the Pentagon and Organized Crime – or elements thereof – conspired to dramatically alter world history to the detriment of everyone but their own greedy interests.

The Next Kennedy to Die?

Interview: Robert F. Kennedy Jr.
Journalist Q&A
PR Week USA Jun 19 2006 11:00
This month, Rolling Stone ran an investigative feature claiming that Republicans used a systematic combination of voter disenfranchisement and fraud, centered in Ohio, to rob John Kerry of a win in the 2004 presidential election.

Robert F. Kennedy Jr., an environmental lawyer and son of liberal icon Bobby Kennedy, wrote the article, available, along with supporting research, at rollingstone.com. Kennedy spoke to PRWeek about the story.

PRWeek: How did you come to write this piece?

Robert F. Kennedy Jr.: I had not paid much attention to this issue. And then a number of books came out, and I read them because I [wanted to use them] to interview people on my radio show. And then I read the [Rep. John] Conyers report, [a 2005 Congressional inquiry into the election], and started talking with people in Ohio. And at one point, I said, "Holy cow, this is real." And then I talked to [RS editor] Jann Wenner about it. I encouraged him to do a piece, and he said "We'll print one if you write it."

PRWeek: Tell me about the process of putting the story together - it obviously took a while.

Kennedy: I read the literature out there, and read the articles. Then I interviewed voters in Ohio, and public officials, and people who were involved in the election from all over the country.

PRWeek: Why do you think this wasn't covered heavily by major media directly after the election?

Kennedy: I think the mainstream media took up the Republican echo chamber, and just echoed the right-wing talking points.

PRWeek: Why didn't the Democrats themselves pursue this?

Kennedy: Well, there was a lot of complaining; there were a lot of lawsuits. But it got very little traction in the media. But you know, the Democrats on this issue have been abysmal as well.

PRWeek: Your story wasn't based on any secret information, correct?

Kennedy: No, that's the whole thing. This was not a secret conspiracy. This was done openly and shamelessly. Across Ohio, there were people who did everything they could to stop this.

PRWeek: Have you had any indication that the national media will take another look at this issue?

Kennedy: I had a good indication [June 7]. The New York Times, as its lead editorial, did a piece on [Ohio secretary of state] Kenneth Blackwell's current efforts to suppress registration drives in Ohio. And the Republicans are doing the same thing in Florida, and the Times talked about that, as well.

PRWeek: What reaction have you seen from the general public?

Kennedy: There's a huge reaction. Rolling Stone told me that it's gotten two and a half times as many e-mails [about this article] as it's ever gotten for any other story in its history. So there's a huge appetite for this story.

PRWeek: This story didn't have a 'smoking gun'; was there one person coordinating this entire operation?

Kennedy: There's never going to be 100% certitude that the election was stolen, because the only way you could get that is by recounting the ballots, and the recount was illegally derailed by Republican operatives. The mastermind behind the efforts in Ohio was Kenneth Blackwell, along with…[Toledo elections official] Bernadette Noe. But on a national level, it's [Republican National Committee chairman] Kenneth Mehlman and Karl Rove.

PRWeek: Have you gotten any reaction from the Republican Party on this?

Kennedy: I've gotten, certainly, reaction in the blogosphere. But most of the reaction has been supportive.

PRWeek: Is there a next step?

Kennedy: I've been meeting with attorneys... to devise a litigation strategy. And I would say that very soon we'll be announcing lawsuits against some of the individuals and companies involved.

PRWeek: Who exactly would that litigation be targeting?

Kennedy: I wouldn't say, right now.

PRWeek: The election is over. Is it too late now?

Kennedy: There's another election soon. And as the Times [just] reported, the same people are up to the same shenanigans.

From PRWeek.

Read Kennedy's Rolling Stone article here.

Happy Daddy's Day

How You Gonna Come?

When they kick at your front door
How you gonna come?
With your hands on your head
Or on the trigger of your gun

When the law break in
How you gonna go?
Shot down on the pavement
Or waiting on death row…

—The Clash, Guns of Brixton



Top court upholds no-knock police search
By GINA HOLLAND, Associated Press WriterThu Jun 15, 7:05 PM ET

The Supreme Court made it easier Thursday for police to barge into homes and seize evidence without knocking or waiting, a sign of the court's new conservatism with Samuel Alito on board.
The court, on a 5-4 vote, said judges cannot throw out evidence collected by police who have search warrants but do not properly announce their arrival.

It was a significant rollback of earlier rulings protective of homeowners, even unsympathetic homeowners like Booker Hudson, who had a loaded gun next to him and cocaine rocks in his pocket when Detroit police entered his unlocked home in 1998 without knocking.

The court's five-member conservative majority, anchored by new Chief Justice John Roberts and Alito, said that police blunders should not result in "a get-out-of-jail-free card" for defendants.

Dissenting justices predicted that police will now feel free to ignore previous court rulings requiring officers with search warrants to knock and announce themselves to avoid running afoul of the Constitution's Fourth Amendment ban on unreasonable searches.

"The knock-and-announce rule is dead in the United States," said David Moran, a Wayne State University professor who represented Hudson. "There are going to be a lot more doors knocked down. There are going to be a lot more people terrified and humiliated."

Supporters said the ruling will help police do their jobs.

"People who are caught red-handed with evidence of guilt have one less weapon to get off," said Kent Scheidegger, legal director of the Criminal Justice Legal Foundation.

The case provides the clearest sign yet of the court without Justice Sandra Day O'Connor.
Hudson had lost his case in a Michigan appeals court. Justices agreed to hear his appeal last June, four days before O'Connor's surprise announcement that she was retiring.

O'Connor was still on the bench in January when his case was first argued, and she seemed ready to vote with Hudson. "Is there no policy of protecting the home owner a little bit and the sanctity of the home from this immediate entry?" she asked.

She retired before the case was decided, and a new argument was held this spring so that Alito could participate, apparently to break a 4-4 tie.

Four justices, including Alito and Roberts, would have given prosecutors a more sweeping victory but did not have the vote of Justice Anthony M. Kennedy, a moderate conservative.
Ronald Allen, a Northwestern University Law professor, said the ruling "suggests those four would be happy to consider overturning" a 1961 Supreme Court opinion that said evidence collected in violation of the Fourth Amendment cannot be used in trials. "It would be a significant change," he said.

Kennedy joined in most of the ruling but wrote to explain that he did not support ending the knock requirement. "It bears repeating that it is a serious matter if law enforcement officers violate the sanctity of the home by ignoring the requisites of lawful entry," he said.
Kennedy said that legislatures can intervene if police officers do not "act competently and lawfully." He also said that people whose homes are wrongly searched can file a civil rights lawsuit.

Justice Antonin Scalia, writing for the majority, said that there are public-interest law firms and attorneys who specialize in civil rights grievances.

Detroit police acknowledge violating the knock-and-announce rule when they called out their presence at Hudson's door, failed to knock, then went inside three seconds to five seconds later. The court has endorsed longer waits, of 15 seconds to 20 seconds. Hudson was convicted of drug possession.

"Whether that preliminary misstep had occurred or not, the police would have executed the warrant they had obtained, and would have discovered the gun and drugs inside the house," Scalia wrote.

Four justices complained in the dissent that the decision erases more than 90 years of Supreme Court precedent.

"It weakens, perhaps destroys, much of the practical value of the Constitution's knock-and-announce protection," Justice Stephen Breyer wrote for himself and Justices John Paul Stevens, David H. Souter and Ruth Bader Ginsburg.

Breyer said that while police departments can be sued, there is no evidence of anyone collecting much money in such cases.

The case is Hudson v. Michigan, 04-1360.
___
On the Net:
Supreme Court decisions: http://www.supremecourtus.gov/opinions/05slipopinion.html

Amurrikans R Stoopid

Once again, research has proven the obvious. Haven't they heard all those numbskulls asking, "If evolution is real, how's come we don't have three arms?" I mean, duh! Special thanks to Turkey for keeping us out of last place. Reminds me of a Mississippi/Arkansas joke I heard once.

More On That Faith Thing

I was reminded recently of this passage from Slaughterhouse Five, by Kurt Vonnegut:

America is the wealthiest nation on earth, but its people are mainly poor, and poor Americans are urged to hate themselves. To quote the American humorist Kin Hubbard, “It ain’t no disgrace to be poor, but it might as well be.” It is in fact a crime for an American to be poor, even though America is a nation of poor. Every other nation has folk traditions of men who were poor but extremely wise and virtuous, and therefore more estimable than anyone with power or gold. No such tales are told by the American poor. They mock themselves and glorify their betters. The meanest eating or drinking establishment, owned by a man who is himself poor, is very likely to have a sign on its wall asking this cruel question: “If you’re so smart, why ain’t you rich?” There will also be an American flag no bigger than a child’s hand glued to a lollipop stick and flying from the cash register.

Americans, like human beings everywhere, believe many things that are obviously untrue. Their most destructive untruth is that it is very easy for any American to make money. They will not acknowledge how in fact hard money is to come by, and, therefore, those who have no money blame and blame and blame themselves. This inward blame has been a treasure for the rich and powerful, who have had to do less for their poor, publicly and privately, than any other ruling class since, say, Napoleonic times.
Many novelties have come from America. The most startling of these, a thing without precedent, is a mass of undignified poor. They do not love one another because they do not love themselves.

I'd say that about sums it up.

Got Faith?

"The point is that faith, even moderate faith, is pernicious because it teaches that believing something without evidence is a virtue."
Richard Dawkins

Of course, Dawkins is referring to religious faith, but there are all kinds of faith that are at least as destructive – faith that the Iraq War is about anything but oil; faith that America stands for liberty and justice; faith that our elected representatives actually care what we think – and this rampant faith has infested our public discourse so badly that it is impossible to calmly discuss the best course of action for our society.

In Hennepin County, where I live, for example, many people have faith that the newly ratified $500 million Minnesota Twins stadium will generate enough revenue to justify the cost. This is in direct conflict with well-publicized facts. Just across the river in St. Paul, the Chamber of Commerce estimates that fans of the Minnesota Wild NHL franchise generate about $23 million of revenue per season. So at $23 million per season, it would take about 28 seasons to recuperate the $500 million cost of a new stadium. That’s if there are no strikes or steroid controversies or any other interferences with the sports fans’ mindless adulation.

Meanwhile, health clinics that serve the uninsured – around 50,000 strong in supposedly liberal Minnesota – are closing left and right because the legislature rejected an initiative that would have provided them with $1.5 million in grants. We know that an ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure, thanks to that notorious liberal, Benjamin Franklin, but far be it from us to put those wise words to use.

Faith – 1
Evidence – 0

This is nothing new, of course, in Minnesota or America. Dumbfucks infatuated with the glory of the ballpark – or the battlefield (or the Elysian Fields) – always prevail over common sense.

In addition to the healthcare crisis alluded to above, Minneapolis’ schools and libraries are also in financial trouble despite the obvious and well documented correlation between education and financial stability.

Faith – 2
Evidence – 0

And the local Ford plant, which has been a source of jobs and revenue since 1924, is also in danger due to soaring gasoline costs and plummeting common sense among Ford’s leadership, which insists upon churning out Rangers and Explorers instead of more fuel efficient vehicles.

But don’t worry. Real estate developers will come to the rescue. You see, they have faith that despite increasing unemployment and diminishing wages, the housing boom will continue unhindered and it will profit all of us to convert the abandoned Ford plant into condominiums.

Faith – 3
Evidence – 0

Next year, Twin Cities residents can look forward to another stadium proposal. This one will benefit the Minnesota Vikings, who just can’t seem to make ends meet in the 60,000 seat Metrodome. A new publicly financed football stadium is just the ticket.

In Major League Losers: The Real Cost of Sports and Who’s Paying for It, Mark S. Rosentraub, of the Center for Urban Policy and the Environment at Indiana University, analyzes the finances surrounding publicly financed sports palaces. What he has found in city after city is that public financing of professional sports stadiums provides a dismal return on investment, and that team owners and their minions in government use falsified financial projections to promote the schemes. In the introduction to the book, Rosentraub writes, “A welfare system exists in this county that transfers hundreds of millions of dollars from taxpayers to wealthy investors and their extraordinarily well paid employees.” Rosentraub also suggests that professional sports leagues use team loyalty against fans who fear of losing the team to another, more deserving city.

Faith – 4
Evidence – 0

But of course, Barry Bonds didn’t check 714 books out of the library; he hit 714 home runs, which allows us to vicariously enjoy his display of testosterone (and other hormones). For those of you who are keeping score, you can see that this is going to be a trouncing. We have faith that the telcom companies don’t want to fuck up the internet for narrow self interest; we have faith that the TeeVee never lies; we have faith that The Big Game isn’t rigged. It’s a collective faith because we share a collective fear of reality.

UPDATE: Make that 715 home runs. Bonds broke Babe Ruth's mark on Sunday, putting him in second place on the all-time home run list, right behind Hank Aaron, but first among prima donna steroid junkies.

UPDATE II: Compare and contrast the new Twins stadium deal with other such corporate bailouts around the nation. Neil deMaus provides the lowdown in the City Pages - the only local publication to critically examine the scheme. Like Major League Losers, mentioned above, deMause's book, Field of Schemes, thououghly debunks the local-profits-through-billionaire-bailout myth. His web site is here.

Caspian Sea Pimps

The Bush Era has been good for Big Oil, and vice versa. Record oil profits are the reward for the massive cash infusions Big Oil pumped into Republican coffers - $27 million in 2000 alone – and Congress’ limp-wristed response to voters’ complaints is customary.

In case you haven’t figured this out yet, the ultimate goal of our mid-east misadventure is the vast, untapped ocean of oil that allegedly lays like a waiting virgin beneath the Caspian Sea. Mini-Mussolinis like this guy and this guy and this guy can’t wait to pimp their constituents and natural resources to these overpaid johns. All that stands in their way is access to international shipping lanes.

The first attempt to bring Caspian Sea oil to market began in the early ‘90s. Unocal led a multinational consortium of public-private entities called CentGas, which was determined to build a pipeline from Turkmenistan through Afghanistan to the Pakistani port city of Gwadar.

Desire for stability among Afghanistan’s bickering factions triggered CentGas’ support of the Taliban. When, in 1998, the Taliban balked at the proposed financial arrangements, CentGas pulled out of the deal. In repeated public statements, Unocal blamed the Taliban’s poor treatment of women for the deal’s failure, but the real reason it collapsed is that the Taliban wanted more money for the many services they would be providing, including protecting the pipeline from northern warlords. In 2000, President Bush tried unsuccessfully to resuscitate the deal. Shortly thereafter, oil industry support shifted to the so-called “Northern Alliance.”

At the same time, Big Oil turned its greedy eyes to Iraq, which had been weakened by years of sanctions and constant harassment from American and British warplanes. The US and British invasion and subsequent manipulation of ethnic rivalry has produced a power vacuum soon to be filled by a feudal corporate dictatorship disguised as democracy. A succession of pseudo-democratic puppet governments will be the public face of a Halliburton-led borg collective whose goal is the complete assimilation of the Mid-east, or at least the oil-rich portions thereof.

Next stop, Iran.

Plans for the inevitable invasion of Iran have been accelerated due to Big Oil’s fear of losing its grip on Congress in the November mid-term elections. Military preparations for an Iran attack are already in place; all that remains to be done is the production of an adequate bullshit story to justify the action. Be prepared for another massive terrorist attack designed to galvanize public support for military action against Iran. The WMD meme probably won’t work twice – even on America’s bovine press.

Of course, there’s nothing new in any of this. America has a long, long history of incidents in which powerful corporate interests duped the public into supporting nefarious foreign policy. Click here to learn how Panama was created by Wall Street, and here to learn how Big Oil toppled the democratically elected government if Iran once before.

President Eisenhower recognized the threat posed by Big Oil many years ago, but he underestimated their power, writing in a letter to his brother, “Should any political party attempt to abolish social security, unemployment insurance, and eliminate labor laws and farm programs, you would not hear of that party again in our political history. There is a tiny splinter group, of course, that believes you can do these things. Among them are H. L. Hunt (you possibly know his background), a few other Texas oil millionaires, and an occasional politician or businessman from other areas. Their number is negligible and they are stupid.”

Unfortunately, as Ike was writing this, his friends the Dulles Brothers were doing Big Oil’s bidding in Iran and Big Fruit's in Guatemala. But if Ike was right, we won’t be hearing much from the Big Oil Republicans after 2008.

If the last three elections are any indication, however, Diebold, ES&S, GE and Fox have more to do with choosing our leadership than do the voters. But that’s a discussion for another post.

I'm Back. You Can Relax, Now.

Well, I guess it’s time for Big Daddy to crawl out of his cave. Encouraging words from Blue Gal and others have roused me from my hibernation. See, the thing is, my interest in Current Events alternates between morbid fascination and utter disgust, and when I’m in the utter disgust phase, my brain goes into this sub-human mind-lock thing during which I can only utter random syllables – to say nothing of actually typing them onto a computer. It’s kind of like being a guest on the O’Reilly Factor 24/7. The bullshit spews out so fast that my brain can’t process it and the mind-numbing rage takes hold. Not only that, but I’ve got a lazy streak in me a mile wide. Not only that, but I’m the world’s biggest procrastinator. Not only that, but so many other bloggers are doing a pretty good job of covering the bases without me – bloggers like this guy, and this guy, and these guys…

But the stupidity grows exponentially and the intelligence only grows gradually. What good are bloggers, after all, when the Shiny Happy People in my fair town cannot seem to grasp the concept of NOT DRIVING ON THE LIGHT RAIL TRACKS? They could’ve put the thing underground, but the Shiny Happy People didn’t want to cough up the dough. You see, the Shiny Happy People don’t want mass transit; they want more roads – that is, more venues in which to ostentatiously display their wealth. So they put the thing at street level where the Shiny Happy People are free to drive their SUVs on the tracks while talking about themselves on their cell phones. AAARRRGGGHHHH!!!

It’s.

Happening.

Again.

Must. Not. Think. About. Useless. Self-absorbed. Yuppy. Dildoes.

War is a Racket

Many blogospherians seem to be shocked, shocked I tell you, to learn that Bush Inc. falsified intelligence in order to instigate a war that would profit its corporate partners, but anyone familiar with history has more of a sense of déjà vu. Indeed, it has been the American modus operandi for over a century. Every war since the Civil War has been preceded by a “surprise” enemy attack and inflated threat estimates.

The explosion of the Maine sparked the Spanish-American War; the sinking of the Lusitania sparked U.S. involvement in WWI; the Japanese “sneak” attack of Pearl Harbor sparked WWII; the Gulf of Tonkin Incident led to increased troop deployments in Viet Nam; Saddam Hussein’s “surprise” invasion of Kuwait sparked the Gulf War; and the Sept. 11 attacks have sparked the current global war on terrorism.

In each of these episodes, there is ample evidence of foreknowledge and intelligence manipulation.

In General Smedley Darlington Butler’s 1935 screed, War is a Racket, Butler writes, “The normal profits of a business concern in the United States are six, eight, ten, and sometimes even twelve percent. But wartime profits – ah, that is another matter – twenty, sixty, one hundred, three hundred, and even eighteen hundred percent. The sky is the limit. All that the traffic will bear. Uncle Sam has the money. Let’s get it.” Seventy years later, that sentiment is truer than ever.

War profiteering is probably as old as war itself. As one of the famous Rothschilds put it, “when the streets of Paris are running with blood, I buy.” In the most obscene incarnation of the Trickle Up Theory, today’s “sutlers,” as they were once known, wage a three-pronged attack on their own countrymen by compromising on quality, gouging on price and hiding the profits in offshore tax shelters. Luckily for them, the press has been mostly AWOL from its duty in reporting on the handful of opportunists who have been “Saddaming” the treasury in the name of Democracy – especially when it comes to the $8 billion (that’s right, BILLION) that has disappeared from Iraq.

Seven years ago, America had a budget surplus, the lowest unemployment rate since WW2, the highest home ownership rate ever and we were at peace. Now that the “moral values” party is busy “restoring dignity to the White House,” however, we are $400 billion (that’s right, BILLION) in debt, mired in an interminable war on a noun, and at odds with our allies in NATO and the UN over our scandal-per-week foreign policy. See what happens when you give the keys of the empire to a bunch of coke-addled draft dodgers?

The alarming spike in military suicides is a telltale symptom of the corruption that defines the US military establishment. Col Ted Westhusing’s June suicide near the Baghdad airport is perhaps the most distressing (and questionable) one of Operation Iraqi Freedom. Westhusing’s suicide does not fit the standard military suicide profile; he was educated, fairly well to do and in a position of authority. But in a military campaign so obviously driven by lies and greed, Wall Street represents the ultimate authority, and for Westhusing, a West Point professor and expert in military ethics, this authority was undeserved.

“He was sick of money-grubbing contractors,” commented an Army Corps of Engineers official. Indeed, Westhusing’s suicide note stated, “I cannot support a mission that leads to corruption, human rights abuse and liars. I came to serve honorably and feel dishonored.”

An Army psychologist’s report on Westhusing’s suicide reveals the level to which the Pentagon has become Wall Street’s bitch.

“Despite his intelligence, his ability to grasp the idea that profit is an important goal for people working in the private sector was surprisingly limited,” wrote Lt. Col. Lisa Breitenbach. “He could not shift his mind-set from the military notion of completing a mission irrespective of cost, nor could he change his belief that doing the right thing because it was the right thing to do should be the sole motivator for businesses.”

Thank you, Lt. Col. Lisa Breitenbach, for confirming what I have been saying all along: We are not in Iraq to spread democracy or topple a bad guy; we are there for the oil. Period. If justice were the Pentagon’s motivation, we’d be in Sudan. Know why we’re not in Sudan? Cuz they don’t have oil, bee-yotch.

All of which brings painfully to mind a question that stuck in Butler’s craw 70 years ago and sticks in mine today: “Why don’t those damned oil companies fly their own flags on their personal property – maybe a flag with a gas pump on it?”

UPDATE [6/6/07]: E&P has more here, and documents confirming Westhusing's assessment and that others shared his concerns can be viewed here.