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Reindeer Games
The ginned up theme of “terrorism” again started raising its ugly deceptive head to the gullible American masses by politicians and the “media” over the Christmas and New Year’s holidays. It’s not that terrorism isn’t real but that terrorism again is being used to cover US foreign policy intentions and to restoke the profitable police state and its contracts and to keep Constitutional law and protections at bay. I suppose it is fitting given this decade of deceit is coming to an end and violators of law such as Cheney would like to keep the status quo going as well as Republican politicians (with notable exceptions) use of it to scare their mindless minions into giving them the reins of power again. Afterall, this decade has been a cornucopia of deceit and intrigue involving false flag operations and betrayal and a willing media circus of lies complete with plants and government propaganda operations. With the latest round of terrorism soundbites raining in on our TV networks due to the underwear bomber, do we want to reenter the madness of it’s color coded madness and possible permanent loss of habeas corpus and loss of Constitutional freedom? Could it be that someone does and the train won’t leave the madness behind? Let’s take a look at the underwear bomber situation and see if it is conspiracy.
Michael Collins has come out with interesting takes and comments on the political theatre playing out before our eyes in a piece titled, “Conspiracy or cock up?” White House reaction to ersatz bomber. Let’s see how it played out and the back and forth that occured on MSNBC’s Countdown and what Richard Wolffe may have been saying. Here follows Collin’s observations on it:
The underpants bomber, Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab, is a curious terrorist. He became disillusioned with his privileged life as the son of a bank chairman and member of the Nigerian elite, it would seem. Rather than pursuing his studies in London, he retreated to Yemen to learn the ways of al Qaeda inspired terrorism.
Farouk was so indiscreet that his father reported him to the U.S. Embassy as a potential terrorist in November. A month later, he managed to get on a jumbo jet headed for Detroit to complete a terror mission. Despite his training in engineering at the prestigious London School of Economics, Farouk failed in his mission. He couldn’t mix his explosives to achieve the desired effect. He apparently forgot to detonate the explosive device in mid flight, waiting until just before landing in Detroit to start his task. He retrieved and set off the chemicals to create the explosion in full view of passengers.
What kind of terrorist is this? He doesn’t know when, how or where to conduct his criminal enterprise.
Is this the best al Qaeda can do?
Is this the justification to for a media manufactured scare-a-thon about the danger Farouk poses to our “freedoms?”
Or is this guy some sort of ringer in yet another moronic master plan ?
Pardon my cynicism about the perpetual power structure but there is a spectacular history of lying by those in power to further their own endeavors: Operation Northwoods; the Gulf of Tonkin incident; the perjured testimony about babies thrown out of incubators used to justify Gulf War I; the lies about WMD before Gulf War II; and so forth.
Few are willing to discuss deep conspiracies either as a real phenomena or as an influence on our nation’s history. The inquiring mind that wanders into that minefield is labeled a “conspiracy theorist” and shoved to the sidelines of public discourse.
But Judith Miller changed all that. She was the ultimate bogus conspiracy theorist who was endorsed and headlined by the New York Times. Who could tell bigger lies better than Miller.
Game on- January 4th
On January 4, 2010, Keith Olbermann ran a segment on Countdown that featured our curious terrorist and the apparatus that somehow missed him despite his concerned father’s pleadings. After the setup, current insider in chief and apparent White House spokesman, Richard Wolffe emerged. He provided some remarkable information from inside the White House deliberations.
“It’s clear the president is still deeply concerned and troubled and even angry at the intelligence lapses. They see this more as an intelligence lapse more than a situation of airport security faults. Why didn’t the centralized system of intelligence after 911, why didn’t it work.” Richard Wolffe, January 4
Wolffe then asked and answered this question:
“Is this conspiracy or cock up?”
“It seems that the president is leaning very much toward this as a systemic failure by individuals who maybe had an alternative agenda.” Wolffe
“An alternative agenda”– what could that mean?
On the 4th, the answer to the question, “why didn’t it work” was clearly on the side of the “alternative agenda” explanation. This was extraordinary.
Olbermann was like a dog on point with this question.
“… you suggested in there that the administration is looking into perhaps mixed motives or misplaced priorities. … Are people thought to have been deliberately withholding information so the dots cant’ be connected?” Keith Olbermann
Wolffe didn’t waiver and indicated that there was something seriously wrong with the intelligence process, particularly concerning the November intelligence gathered from Farouk’s father. Watch the segment starting at 3:50 and decide for yourself.
January 4th Countdown, Richard Wolffe at 3:50
Were we on the verge of finally having someone or some faction held accountable for insulting the citizens of this country with ridiculous excuses to expand this or that war or surveillance program, deny yet more rights,and impose even greater surveillance? Not quite.
Game off (or is it) – January 5
By the very next day, Wolffe was back with Olbermann to revise the view from the White House.
“It’s closer to the cock-up rather than the conspiracy I was talking about.” Richard Wolffe
The president’s view had changed after his all hands meeting on the 4th . It was really just a screw up (cock up). There was to be “no finger pointing” and the administration would be focus on preventing future such episodes
January 5th Countdown, Richard Wolffe at 4:00
The denial of the original speculation by Wolffe lost credibility the more he expanded on his message, as I understand him. He says:
“I wasn’t talking about, as some online commentators have interpreted it, a political plot to embarrass the president by allowing civilians to die. This really gets to the heart of intent versus pure accident. An intent can be non malicious, it can be … a failure to cooperate, it can be a lack of confidence in the system. Which the president has concluded that’s where he’s at. Richard Wolffe, January 5
It’s difficult to understand how failing to report the father’s warnings about his son, warnings that proved highly accurate, can be without malice. Even if we rule out malice, it is impossible to argue that this failure to inform was anything other than gross negligence.
Collins continues by providing opinion by Obama critic Webster Tarpley,
What’s going on?
It’s important to understand that on January 4, a preferred spokesman for the White House, Richard Wolffe, told us that the president was leaning toward a conspiracy of malefactors who “maybe” let it happen, namely the Farouk mission. The motive for their “alternative agenda” was never explicated but it was clearly there, in living color commentary.
There has been little cogent speculation on what all this means. One unlikely source emerged in the president’s corner (and rightly so if he’s correct) was long time Obama critic Webster Tarpley. He noted:
“Wolffe offered two possible explanations cited by his White House sources for the intentional sabotage of security procedures, resulting in yet another egregious failure to connect the dots. The first was a “turf war” inside the intelligence community, with one agency seeking to hoard information and deny it to others. The second was the desire to ‘embarrass’ some leading figures, presumably referring to partisan animus or other resentments against Obama and his top appointees.” Webster Tarpley, January 4
And also,
Tarpley went on to provide a third possibility:
“But Obama and his advisors should be urged to consider a third explanation far more plausible than either of these. This third explanation would include the desire of a rogue network inside the US government to unleash a new wave of Islamophobic hysteria to rehabilitate the discredited ‘global war on terror’ strategy in a new and more sophisticated form, while imposing a new round of outrageous and degrading search procedures at airports (such as the full body scanners peddled by the venal Michael Chertoff) to soften up the American people for heightened totalitarian control and political repression. All of this, moreover, in ways that will be politically harmful to Obama.” Tarpley
and ends it this way,
The failure to enter the information into usable intelligence systems would seem to have alternative explanations. It could have been the CIA as a unit that did it, as Wolffe stated as though it was fact. Or it could have been rogue elements within the intelligence community doing this, with malicious intent or deliberate negligence, to achieve the ends suggested by Tarpley or broader analysis.
By tagging the CIA, the president via Richard Wolffe, finessed the real question: Are there those in the government who deliberately allowed an obvious terrorist, an incompetent one at that, to slip through the system and, as a result, revive the entire apparatus of anti terrorism based on one obviously incompetent individual?
Maybe President Obama dropped his deliberative style and turned on a dime from Monday to Tuesday.
Maybe you can fail to enter the name of an obvious risk for terrorism without any malice.
Maybe the president caved after taking a bold stance in defense of sanity.Or maybe he’s made his point for now and is regrouping to clean house.
Or maybe the huge error of failing to enter the name was just a “screw up.”
And maybe there really were weapons of mass destruction in Iraq as Judith Miller and the New York Times promised based on their stellar sources.
Before we march down the road to ratify the permanent loss of habeas corpus and other vital rights; before we spend even more money on making travel truly unbearable; and, before we finally lose the best elements of our society due to one incompetent terrorist, maybe we should get the entire truth behind the fascinating revelations of Richard Wolffe. One can only hope./i]
END
This article may be reproduced in whole or in part with attribution of authorship and a link to this article.
Further thought on this issue is how the media and certain politicians have made all terrorism into “al Queda” and the repeated imagery of highly sophisticated terror network instead of the reality that “al Queda” was originally an CIA term meaning the database of different terrorist groups and names. A database that can be used if someone wanted to engage in shotgun destabilization of a country for instance that could provide a pretext for military action or overthrow. And are we to believe that a bumbling Nigerian engineering student who set his underwear ablaze after safely arriving at his destination is somehow related to the bomber in Afghanistan that gained the trust of the CIA before detonating an explosive among them killing members? It can also be used politically as a pretext for removing Constitutionally provided civil liberties. Or it could be used to change the rules of engagement to something foreign and unAmerican away from the precedents set forth in the past such as principles of the rule of law set forth at Nuremberg and set the stage for what is normally considered crimes such as preventive war or torture camps outside the rule of law. Where do we go from here?
More On The Obama Afghanistan Decision And The Escalation/Withdrawal Double Speak.
In continuing the points made in my previous post titled,”Where The US Military Meets Frankenstein’s Monster At The Grave Yard Of Conquerors” , I decided to pull three videos together to give the reader a broader look along with background. That way, a person can sift through what is political talk, propaganda to further a geopolitical and economic hegemony game for trans-national oil interests, and how it relates to growing debt and economic conditions in the United States (sorry but it doesn’t have anything to do with liberals, or spending too much of the public’s money on the public’s welfare).
Does anyone get the symbolism of the targets now of the acts of the terrorists that flew the planes on 9/11/01 of the World Trade Center , the Pentagon , and Capitol Hill ?. And if you want a wider look at the grand chess board of American geopolitical hegemony policy, read or reread “Moon Water And Sibel Edmonds” . It is also important to keep in mind that since the formalization of OPEC, the U.S. dollar has been has been tied to oil instead of gold (countries have to pay for oil in US currency) and in recent years, Iraq and Iran were attempting to trade oil in Euros. If you contemplate that in recent years, more countries have been contemplating this move and have been changing their reserve currencies to a mixed bag of currencies and subsequently dumping or buying less US bonds, it should make you a little nervous. Should we continue this game or adjust policy to avoid any potential of it being a house of cards? Shouldn’t we have a national conversation on the issues at hand especially given our trade deficits and increasing lack of a manufacturing base not to mention the moral issues?
Moon Water And Sibel Edmonds
It seems spying for foreign governments, interests, and think tanks keeps on going unabated without the needed oversight investigations into Sibel Edmonds’s claims. On Tuesday, October 20th, moon scientist Stewart Nozette appeared in court after being arrested in an FBI sting and being charged with attempting to sell secrets to Israel. For background purposes, Nozette spent six years at a secretive defense technology agency and helped developed technology that discovered water on the moon. He was a member of the White House’s National Space Council under George H.W. Bush and also worked at the Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory which, according to the UK’s The Times, was the nerve center of US nuclear weapons research during the period of 1990-1999. He also worked as a private consultant for Israel Aerospace Industries, a company owned by the Israeli government. Wiretaps revealed his expectation that he would be approached by saying,
“I don’t get recruited by Mossad every day. I knew this day would come. I just had a feeling.”
Since he knew the day would come, doesn’t that indicate an ongoing problem?
On Wednesday, October 21st, Military.com published a piece on the Sibel Edmonds case titled, “Ex-FBI Translator Claims Spying at Dod” by Bryant Jordan. It delved into the deposition given on August 8th by Sibel in the Schmidt v. Krikorian case and concerned the testimony whereby Pentagon personnel helped in passing national defense secrets to foreign agents. Two fixtures in the 1990’s espionage scheme were two individuals, who when George W. Bush took office, ended up in the Pentagon. One of those individuals was Douglas Feith who became head of the “Office of Special Plans” which would later be dubbed “The Lie Factory” due to its purpose to create false intelligence if needed to launch an unprovoked attack and invasion on Iraq. The other individual was Richard Perle who later became chairman of the Defense Advisory Board. In May 2006, Philip Giraldi wrote an article on Sibel’s case which included the following:
“Doug Feith’s International Advisors Inc, a registered agent for Turkey in 1989-1994, netted $600,000 per year from Turkey, with Richard Perle taking $48,000 annually as a consultant”.
Both Feith and Perle were instrumental in writing “A Clean Break: A New Strategy For Securing The Rhealm”. This was a report from the neoconservative movement during the Clinton years proposing new policy for Israel and was given to then Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu in July 1996. The recommendations were as follows:
A repudiation of the concept of “Land for Peace” which was the basis for the Oslo Accords.
Armed incursions into Palestinian areas under the concept or rubric of “right of hot pursuit”.
Armed incursions into Lebanon and possible air strikes against Syria and Iran.
The removal of Saddam Hussein from power in Iraq.
A repudiation of the tenets of Labor Zionism (Israel’s socialist foundations) and a change to economic liberalism.
If your memory serves you correctly, you will recognize that much of this is what happened after Bush took office. Of course to carry out spying in the 1990’s required inside people in government, and later when these people became part of government, to help get things rolling.
“They were 100 percent directly involved”, Edmonds told Military.com. They were not in the Pentagon (in the late 1990’s) but they had their people inside the Pentagon.” One of those people, she said, was Larry Franklin, an Air Force officer assigned to the Office of Special Plans…
Larry Franklin was indicted and pleaded guilty for passing secrets to Israel in the AIPAC spy case. He was investigated by the FBI, just like the operations Sibel was exposed to as a translator or contract linguist, just like the moon scientist sting revealed this month.
The Military.com article touched on other people of interest in the Edmonds case as well. This included those Sibel reported to the FBI within the agency’s translation unit which she had found suspicious and troubling such as people both in elected and unelected positions in government that have been involved as revealed in Sibel’s Rogues Gallery. And of course a key figure is Marc Grossman, then secretary of state for political affairs. A quote from Edmonds from her deposition and Military.com revealed,
“certain people from Pentagon would send a list of individuals with access to sensitive data, whether weapons technology or nuclear technology, and this information would include all their sexual preferences, how much they owed on their homes, if they have gambling issues, and [Grossman] would provide it to these foreign operatives, and those foreign operatives would go and hook those Pentagon people”.
And concerning Grossman, he would have all the connections being a former Ambassador to Turkey to be a key facilitator. In writing on the Plame outing affair, Christopher Deliso wrote concerning Grossman,
“Although Grossman “has not been as high profile in the press” FBI whistleblower Sibel Edmonds cryptically told me the other day, “don’t overlook him – he is very important.”
She was not speaking about the Plame affair, though Grossman did indeed have a key role there, as we will see. According to her, Grossman was one of three officials – the other two, she says, are Richard Perle and Douglas Feith – who had been watched by both Valerie Plame’s Brewster Jennings & Associates CIA team, and by the major FBI investigation of organized crime and governmental corruption on which she herself was working until being terminated in April 2002.
“Interestingly enough, at the same time Feith and Perle were greasing Turkish palms and Grossman was presiding over in Ankara, the CIA’s Brewster-Jennings network and Valerie Plame were focusing on nuclear proliferation in Turkey. This scrutiny led them to trace private citizens in America as well as lobby groups like the American-Turkish Council – which is precisely where Plame met future husband Joseph Wilson, while “on duty” at a 1997 reception held by then-Turkish ambassador to the U.S. Nuzhet Kandemir.”
And of course, the American-Turkish Council was a player at the center of what Sibel Edmonds found and reported to her superiors at the FBI. As has been revealed in her testimony and in the Military.com article,
But not long after she joined the bureau another Turkish translator came on board – Malec Can Dickerson. And in December 2001 Dickerson and her husband, Douglas, then an Air Force major, tried to recruit her to join American Turkish Council — an organization that was actually being monitored by the FBI. Also, according to Edmonds, Douglas Dickerson had previously worked with Grossman in Turkey and, though assigned to the Defense Intelligence Agency, was working for Feith’s OSP and also as a coordinator with the State Department on the Turkey Republics in Central Asia.
Despite Sibel’s claims again being backed up by former FBI Counterintelligence and Counterespionage Manager John Cole as well as the OIG report claiming her accusations had basis in fact, the replies to the article by those implicated were predictable. Perle called her a “nutcase” with a vendetta. Feith replied that claims about him were “wildly false and bizarre”. Robert Tyler, co-president of the Cohen Group (where Grossman is now vice chairman) responded for Grossman by saying the claims were untrue. They have probably come to expect nothing coming of this due to Congressional reluctance. This in spite of the fact people from all political stripes and civil libertarians have backed Edmonds’ request for public testimony and inquiry. Progressives have been the most inclined to do so in the past, even when Waxman reneged on his promise to hold hearings on her matter. But lately, some progressives cooled over the flap with Rep. Schakowsy concerning Turkish agent blackmail issues. But they should ask themselves if Rep. Schakowsky had anything to hide, especially in her response accusing Edmonds of being the same as “birthers” and “teabaggers”, especially since they have not been gagged by the DOJ in the past. Blogger Mizgin has given some reasons why people might want some answers in her piece, “From Sursuluk and Chicago to Ergenekon” at The Boiling Frogs Post. Some of the reasons given are as follows:
In spite of the congresswoman’s claims that she has not been involved with the Turks, we know that in 2001, which is included in the time frame of wiretaps that Sibel Edmonds translated, Mehmet Celebi, of Hillary Clinton fame, donated $350 to Jan Schakowsky. Celebi was a fundraiser for another Chicago politician, Rahm Emanuel. Later, Celebi became a bundler for Hillary Clinton, raising $100,000 for her presidential campaign. She finally had to dump Celebi because of his role as producer of the Turkish film “Kurtlar Vadisi Irak“. …
While Celebi was moving and shaking for the Democratic Party in Chicago, Schakowsky’s husband, Robert Creamer, a political consultant, was under investigation for bank fraud. The investigation was ongoing in 1998, which was well within the timeframe of the FBI wiretaps from Chicago that Sibel Edmonds translated. It may very well be that Turkish agents targeted Schakowsky in order to obtain favors from her husband. As Sibel stated in The American Conservative interview:
They needed Schakowsky and her husband Robert Creamer to perform certain illegal operational facilitations for them in Illinois.
For Jan Schakowsky to deny any relationship would be utter foolishness, of course, because she’s been very much involved lately with the Fethullah Gulen movement through the Chicago-based Niagara Foundation, whose honorary president is none other than Hocaefendi himself. This year Schakowsky wrote a Letter of Recognition for the Niagara Foundations 2009 “Peace and Dialogue Awards”. And Schakowsky did the same in 2008 and in 2007.
As was pointed out in the “Kill The Messenger” documentary, a lot of secret activity of US government agencies and outside interests dealt with major issues that effect the security of this nation such as the nuclear black market, terrorism, and the narcotics trade. Just this week, it has been revealed that Hamid Karzai’s brother was on the CIA’s payroll and activities involved paramilitary groups and the opium trade (which begins in Afghanistan and winds its way to Turkey for final production stages). When coupled with yet another spy arrest in the person of the moon scientist, it’s time for answers. Moon water and Sibel Edmonds type answers. So what does moon water have to do with Sibel Edmonds, espionage, and FBI stings? Nothing and that is the point. Why would a moon scientist expect and want to participate in it?
Former FBI Official Confirms Buried Espionage & Corruption Cases, Adds Corroboration to Edmonds Article
With all the controversy concerning the recent stern Schakowsky denials, Sibel Edmonds’s interview in The American Conservative Magazine has some corrobation in recent comments by former FBI Counterintelligence and Counterespionage Manager John Cole. Setting aside the Schakowsky disagreements, it is worth noting and is another reason Congress should not stonewall any longer and should investigate how much our security has been compromised. The current healthcare debate alone should indicate how much money and connections influence decisions of those in office.
John M. Cole, a former FBI Counterintelligence and Counterespionage Manager, has publicly confirmed FBI’s decade long investigation of the former State Department Official. According to Cole, as in over one hundred cases involving Israeli espionage activities within the US government, this case too has been covered up and buried despite mountains of evidence collected.
Here is the public response from John Cole after the publication of The American Conservative magazine’s cover story:
“I read the recent cover story by The American Conservative magazine. I applaud their courage in publishing this significant interview. I am fully aware of the FBI’s decade-long investigation of the High-level State Department Official named in this article, Marc Grossman, which ultimately was buried and covered up. It is long past time to investigate this case and bring about accountability…”
In November 2006, in an article published by CQ on covered up espionage cases involving Israel, Cole was quoted extensively:
“John M. Cole, an FBI spy catcher who retired in 2004, says that from 1993 to 1995 alone, he had “125 open cases” of Israeli espionage, representing nearly half of all the investigations carried on in his Global Unit, part of the now-defunct National Security division.” Inside the FBI itself, Cole said, tracking suspected Israeli spies was hush-hush.In a sharp break with FBI procedures, he was prohibited from notifying field offices when an investigation crept into their jurisdictions. “No one was supposed to know we were investigating the Israelis,” Cole said.”
Stein’s article quoted several other FBI officials confirming Cole’s disclosure:“The 125 figure “makes sense,” another former top FBI counterintelligence official said, speaking only on condition that he not be identified because of the issue’s sensitivity. This official called the Israeli embassy’s denials “horse [manure].” In fact, he said, U.S. officials repeatedly warned the Israelis to back off. But the finger-wagging only seemed to energize them. “We would call them in, call them on the carpet, and next week there would be 10 more cases,” he said. The Justice Department never seemed much interested in prosecuting them, he and other counterintelligence veterans said. Agents would get pissed off,” said the former top official. “We knew they were going to walk, that they were going to get a pass. . . . It was frustrating.””
John M. Cole, Former Veteran Intelligence Operations Specialist, worked for 18 years in the FBI’s Counterintelligence Division as an Intelligence Operations specialist and counterespionage manager. Cole is the author of While America Sleeps, which will be available in bookstores this November.
Read the whole story here at Sibel Edmonds’s Blog.
Sibel Edmonds Issues a Response To Rep. Schakowsky Following Her Denials In Regards to Edmonds’s Claims In The American Conservative Magazine. Schakowsky’s Office Responds In Communication To The Brad Blog.
The explosive interview article in The American Conservative Magazine sparked a vehement denial of Sibel Edmonds’s account by Congresswoman Schakowsky’s office concerning Turkish agents attempts to blackmail the Congresswoman with a lesbian affair. The background of the episode can found at The Brad Blog . Here follows Sibel’s formal response and after, Rep. Schakowsky’s office response to The Brad Blog.
Inviting Ms. Schakowsky to Join…….
Dear Congresswoman Schakowsky:
It is an age-old tactic, when one cannot refute statements with facts, to attempt to discredit the witness. Rather than exchanging accusations, let me just go on record with facts and detailed citations.
When I became aware of incriminating evidence against high-level U.S. officials—elected and appointed—I filed under the Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) and fought for five years in court. I bore tremendous cost, financially and emotionally, to make this data public. Here is the court case identification: C.A. No. 1:02CV01294 (ESH).
Few citizens have gone this far in a FOIA case to make covered-up information available to the public. No one gains financially from fighting this kind of thing in court, and I am no exception. You have called me a fantasist, but would a fabricator pay as dearly as I did to have her claims investigated?
I fought another court case to expose government criminality through key witnesses and documents. As in the FOIA case, I bore tremendous costs and was again blocked by the invocation of the State Secrets Privilege and National Security. The court case identification is Civ.No.1:02CV01448(JR)).
No other citizen has twice had the State Secrets Privilege invoked. But why would the government, with the support of congressional representatives, go to such lengths to quash, gag, and classify the files and operations in question if they were “fantasy, lies, and nonexistent” as you say?
I complied with the whistleblowing rule and took my case to the Office of the Inspector General and provided all of the information they allowed me to. They interviewed dozens of witnesses and reviewed hundreds of pages of documents in their investigation of my credibility and the validity of my case. Here is the link to their confirmation that I and my case have merit: DOJ-IG Report. Here is the redacted report that shows how our government censored more than 90% of this report to the public: Redacted DOJ-IG Report. Very few national security whistleblowers have been granted this level of validation and vindication. The Justice Department’s own Office of the Inspector General disagrees with your characterization of me and my case.
Several senior members of Congress—from both sides of the aisle–have also investigated and publicly confirmed my credibility and the grave nature of my disclosures. This is what Senator Leahy had to say: Leahy Statement. This is what Congresswoman Maloney said: Rep. Maloney Statement. Here are the assessments of Senator Lautenberg–Sen. Lautenberg Statement—and Senator Grassley–Sen. Grassley Statement. By attacking my credibility, you are also attacking your colleagues, including many on your side of the aisle. Are you accusing these senators and representatives of being fantasists too?
You have been described as a “true blue” civil libertarian, so it will surely interest you to know that the ACLU has declared me “the most gagged” person in the history of this great nation. Are you also attacking the ACLU and calling their characterization of this case a fantasy?
I have testified under oath, and my public biography will provide you with information about my educational background, financial background, and family life. I am fully aware of the consequences of perjury, and as you can see, I would have a lot to lose were that the case. I am sure you are familiar with my sworn testimony, but you can review it here.
I’ve done more than my share through the courts, IG offices, Congress, and media. I don’t have your power. You sit on the House Intelligence Committee, and you are one of the members of the majority party in Congress.
Here is what you can do: Call for an investigation and a hearing before your committee on this long covered-up case. Subpoena the files and call the witnesses. Bring in retired Special Agent Gilbert Graham and have him testify on the official report and complaint he filed with the DOJ inspector general in 2002 regarding the FBI counterespionage investigations involving Turkey and Israel in which targeted US representatives were illegally wiretapped. This is not fiction. Here is the official and signed public version: SA Gilbert Graham Report.
Also bring in former FBI Counterintelligence Operations Manager & Espionage Investigator John M. Cole and have him testify under oath regarding espionage cases involving State Department officials, Pentagon officials, and Congressional members. Here is a preview of some of the information disclosed and confirmed by Agent Cole: Interview and Radio Interview.
Also bring in the sworn testimonies of current FBI special agents in the Chicago and DC field offices who dutifully and patriotically led the counterintelligence operations on Turkey and corrupt US officials, only to see their investigations blocked and covered-up. Their names are public.
Order the Justice Department to release the two main Counterintelligence Operations Files on Turkey and “US persons of interest”—one from FBI Chicago Field Office-1996-2002, the other from FBI DC Field Office-1996-2001. These will help bring out the facts regarding your story too. I have documentation supporting the existence of these files.
Recall that I did not accuse you of any criminal or espionage-related activity.
The last time I saw a similar attack on my credibility was when Dennis Hastert issued a non-denial denial to information contained in a previous magazine article. He later gave up his seat, registered himself (under FARA) as an agent for the government of Turkey, and went on to collect $35,000 per month as a foreign agent. I certainly hope you are not planning to follow his footsteps by giving up your seat and officially registering with a foreign government. It would be far better if you used your position to bring out the facts. I will be delighted to assist you.
Sibel Edmonds
Schakowsky Response:
It is extraordinary how quickly Ms. Edmonds’ story has evolved in just two short months. What’s more is that this blog [ed note: We checked for clarity, and he’s specifically referring to The BRAD BLOG as a whole. See our response below.] entirely ignores the fact that the allegations she made about Congresswoman Schakowsky have been shown to be untrue on their face.
In Ms. Edmonds’ sworn deposition on August 8, 2009 in Washington, DC, she states as a fact, under oath that the imagined tryst occurred between the fictional spy and Congresswoman Schakowsky “in her townhouse actually in this area.”
The rest you can read at The Brad Blog
It seems her office is not only dismissing Sibel Edmonds’s claims and accounts she has fought for so long in being able to tell what she ran into while working at the F.B.I. due to government interference but the response also seems to attempt to impugn The Brad Blog which seems unfortunate. The Brad Blog has been completely fair in all of this. But if you read the account, The Brad Blog responded. Also, Sibel emailed The Brad Blog in response to this which can also be seen at The Brad Blog whereby she says, “I am not going to engage in this silly back and forth game. They have my letter. It is very clear. Not only me, but the majority of the Americans would like to see her action in congress.”. And so it seems, her office will not be any help in leading to any investigations of any of the serious issues at hand.
Scott Horton Interviews Philip Giraldi and Joe Lauria About The Mainstream Media’s Refusal To Investigate Sibel Edmonds’s Allegations
Philip Giraldi who interviewed Sibel Edmonds in the recent issue release of The American Conservative article titled, “Who’s Afraid of Sibel Edmonds?” and Joe Lauria who wrote a series on the Edmonds case for the London Times in 2008 were interviewed on radio (you can hear it at the link) by Scott Horton. They discuss the corruption and the working relationships between the American-Turkish Council, AIPAC, and U.S. government officials and former officials Douglas Feith and Richard Perle as well as the mainstream media’s refusal to investigate the Edmonds allegations.
Sibel Edmonds Gives Interview With Philip Giraldi
Who’s Afraid of Sibel Edmonds? An interview with Philip Giraldi in The American Conservative Magazine is out today and is available online. For those following her case, you are well aware she was able to finally testify under oath by deposition without interference from the F.B.I. or DOJ recently in the Schmidt v. Krikorian Case. This interview follows her long journey to get to this point. It has been a long hard road since Ashcroft made her the most gagged person in the United States.
Some highlights are as follows:
SIBEL EDMONDS: During my work with the FBI, one of the major operational files that I was transcribing and translating started in late 1996 and continued until 2002, when I left the Bureau. Because the FBI had had no Turkish translators, these files were archived, but were considered to be very important operations. As part of the background, I was briefed about why these operations had been initiated and who the targets were.
snip
Grossman became a person of interest early on in the investigative file while he was the U.S. ambassador to Turkey [1994-97], when he became personally involved with operatives both from the Turkish government and from suspected criminal groups. He also had suspicious contact with a number of official and non-official Israelis. Grossman was removed from Turkey short of tour during a scandal referred to as “Susurluk” by the media. It involved a number of high-level criminals as well as senior army and intelligence officers with whom he had been in contact.
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Grossman and Dickerson had to leave the country because a big investigation had started in Turkey. Special prosecutors were appointed, and the case was headlined in England, Germany, Italy, and in some of the Balkan countries because the criminal groups were found to be active in all those places. A leading figure in the scandal, Mehmet Eymür, led a major paramilitary group for the Turkish intelligence service. To keep him from testifying, Eymür was sent by the Turkish government to the United States, where he worked for eight months as head of intelligence at the Turkish Embassy in Washington. He later became a U.S. citizen and now lives in McLean, Virginia. The central figure in this scandal was Abdullah Catli. In 1989, while “most wanted” by Interpol, he came to the U.S., was granted residency, and settled in Chicago, where he continued to conduct his operations until 1996.
I will have more commentary later.
F.B.I. Whistleblower Sibel Edmonds Gives Deposition In Ohio Election Fraud Case: Testimony Could Reverberate Through The DC Beltway
Sibel Edmonds was subpoened in the case of Schmidt v Krikorian and gave her sworn testimony Saturday at the National Whistleblowers Center at 3238 P St. NW, Washington DC. The significance of her testimony is huge given her status of being the most gagged person in the United States and the implications for many past and present in US government agencies and Congress. Leading up to the deposition, drama unfolded as it looked as if challenges from the FBI and the Department of Justice might once again silence her with the usual invocation of the “state secrets privilege”. The event was live blogged by Brad Friedman of Bradblog .
Krikorian’s press release stated the things he wanted provided in Sibel’s deposition. Krikorian told Bradblog that his legal team intended to determine answers to questions concerning whether “The Government of Turkey had illegally infiltrated and influenced various U.S. government institutions and officials, including the Department of State, the Department of Defense, and individual members of the United States Congress” according to Bradblog. During a break in the testimony, Brad Friedman said Edmonds told him by phone that she had been asked, and has answered, questions on Dan Burton (R-IN), Dennis Hastert (R-IL) (who is now a lobbyist for Turkey), and Stephen Solarz (D-NY), as well as other questions on those high-ranking officials and lobbyists in her “State Secrets Gallery.” . Krikorian told Bradblog “From my opinion, if I’m some of the current members of Congress, I’d be very very worried about the information that’s going to come out of this. There are current members of Congress that she has implicated in bribery, espionage. It’s not good. It’s crazy, it’s absolutely crazy. For people in power situations in the United States, who know about this information, if they don’t take action against it, in my opinion, it’s negligence.” According to Bradblog, [Other people implicated included] Livingston (R-TX), Hastert (R-IL), Dick Gephardt (D-MO), other non-Congressional members, people like Brent Scowcroft, other appointed members of the U.S. government.” According to Bradblog, Krikorian went on to say “Did not have very flattering things to say about former U.S. House Speaker Dennis Hastert. … Actually, I stopped taking notes because I was o fascinated by what she was saying. … She talked about the Rand Corp., Brewster-Jennings, nuclear secrets…” Also, the testimony included Turkish American groups such as ATC, ATAA, TACA, how some tried to recruit Edmonds and also how the OIG report exonerated her regarding her discoveries as an FBI translator and her subsequent dismissal by the FBI. According to Bradblog, Edmonds said “I told them how [third-ranking State Dept. official in the Bush Admin and former Ambassador to Turkey] Marc Grossman disclosed” that Brewster Jennings was a CIA front company to the target of an FBI investigation”. Bruce Fein as counsel for Rep. Jean Schmidt R (OH) when questioned after the deposition said Krikorian “can say anything he wants can say whatever he wants about the Armenian Genocide, but what he’s not allowed to do is state lies. We don’t want to close anybody’s mouth when it comes to taking about the Armenian Genocide…What we’re trying to do is promote freedom of speech. Some versions are trying to harass individuals who are trying to dispute history.”
For Sibel Edmonds and all of us that have followed her story over the years since Ashcroft invoked the “state secrets privilege”, this all has been a long time coming. For any of you who are unfamiliar with all this, I suggest you visit her website, her organization’s website, her blog, Luke Ryland’s blog, and of course Bradblog who did yeoman’s work on Saturday. I hope to have an interview with Sibel Edmonds possibly sometime in the fall and I will post it here.
The Stephanie Miller Show
Going Rouge
American Commentary Blog 
While Karma Catches Up To Republican Brownshirt James O’Keefe And A Mentor, Propagandist Breitbart, Examination Of Fellow Thugs In The Landrieu Office Phone Tampering Attempt Turns Up Questionable Connections That Require Official Investigation.
Lawsuits have been starting to pile up on the dark hero and rube of the American right wing, James O’Keefe. In a Pennsylvania lawsuit,
Such activities violate Pennsylvania’s wiretap laws. In Maryland, O’Keefe, accomplice Giles, and Breitbart.com are being sued in the Circuit Court for Baltimore City for,
Of course, all these attacks on ACORN along with the dubious “voter fraud” charges the rightwing has continually tried to gin up to tap into some racist tendencies in the “tea bag” movement and insinuate that was how Obama got elected and the obvious attempt to defund it was to attack any infrastructure the have nots can have for a political organizing voice as revealed in “ACORN’s Vindication: Too Little Too Late” by Katrina Vanden Heuval,
And now we have the arrest of O’Keefe in more illegal activity involving Senator Landrieu’s office. Let’s look into the connections into this operation. Arrested along with O’Keefe were Stan Dai, Joseph Basel, and Robert Flanagan, son of William Flanagan, who is the acting U.S. attorney for the Western District of Louisiana. Let’s take a peek at one of them, the circumstances and also the various rigtwing organizations surrounding the episode and events around Mary Landrieu’s (D) La., office. As reported by Lindsay Beyerstein at Alternet in “James Bond Wannabe Part of Right-Wing Plot to Tamper with Senator’s Phones“,
So who is Stan Dai and what and who is he connected with? Well let’s take a look in the same article,
Let’s look at the brochure or packets from the CIA program at which Dai was a speaker called “Annual Junior Statesman Summer School” Speakers Program. It cites his occupation as “freelance consultant”. It lists his career history as
a former Assistant Director of the Intelligence Community Center of Academic Excellence at Trinity Washington University, as serving as the Operations Officer of a Department of Defense irregular warfare fellowship program, and also as an Undergraduate Fellow on Terrorism of the Foundation for the Defense of the Democracies (a neoconservative think tank with ties to Richard Perle). The topics listed he spoke about at that session concerned “Torture” and “Domestic terrorism”. Concerning questions listed as “possible questions” are listed,
Of course to anyone that supports the rule of law, the Constitution of the United States, and International Law based on the Principles set at Nuremberg, knows that torture, Guantanamo Bay, and CIA black sites are all illegal through the aforementioned. Who else does the ODNI fund besides the ICCAE? It funds or directs Proteus USA. Why would O’Keefe need such an connection or such “expertise”?
What about the groups harrassing Landrieu’s office? Are they helping the “spin” by participating in disruption? As quoted in AlterNet article,
Groups involved in defending or aiding the bogus defense of this felony it seems are the Family Research Council , the Baton Rouge Tea Party, and the Chamber of Commerce (who must still be working from the Powell Memo). The American people need for a political party or movement to emerge that will fight the attacks on our democracy. The Democratic Party under the influence of the DLC or “centrists” seems or has been inadequate.