A confidential memo circulating among senior Republican leaders suggests that a new attack by terrorists on U.S. soil could reverse the sagging fortunes of President George W. Bush as well as the GOP and “restore his image as a leader of the American people.”

The closely-guarded memo lays out a list of scenarios to bring the Republican party back from the political brink, including a devastating attack by terrorists that could “validate” the President’s war on terror and allow Bush to “unite the country” in a “time of national shock and sorrow.”

The memo says such a reversal in the President’s fortunes could keep the party from losing control of Congress in the 2006 midterm elections.

GOP insiders who have seen the memo admit it’s a risky strategy and point out that such scenarios are “blue sky thinking” that often occurs in political planning sessions.

“The President’s popularity was at an all-time high following the 9/11 attacks,” admits one aide. “Americans band together at a time of crisis.”
capitolhillblue

by Peter Okema Otika
There is nothing new about police denials of confrontations with African peoples—we’re quite familiar with it here in the U.S. Enraged French-Africans and French-Arabs took to the streets. For decades anger simmered as they endured poverty, unemployment, racial discrimination, poor education, housing and above all, police brutality. Just as it was during the colonial days in Africa and the apartheid regime in South Africa, the Africans are now being portrayed by the media and French authorities as uncivilized and “barbaric.” The Associated Press, the leading newswire called the uprising a “savage assault” on the French people. Whenever Africans stand up for their rights white media demonize them as “barbaric” or “uncivilized.”

As in other European countries, including Britain and Germany, the French have always discriminated against Africans to the extent that they treat them as second class citizens who do not have equal rights. The current turmoil was a time bomb long overdue to explode. The French will now have to do the right thing and fix the problems once and for good. Britain, Germany and other countries should see this situation as warning.

Nearly five million people of North and West African descent live in France, a country with a population of 62 million. These immigrants perform tedious and poorly paid jobs, while living in wretched housing projects. Successive French governments have always instituted social, economic, urban and political programs that were meant to deter progress within the African and migrant neighborhoods in France. There are no outstanding successful Africans in France with the exception of a few soccer players and musicians.

The French people and government must come face to face with reality and address the uprising by solving the root causes instead of calling the immigrants “barbaric.” Until that is done, we will similar scenes replayed throughout France and in other European countries.
blackstarnews.com

by Kurt Nimmo

Once upon a time, I read Noam Chomsky religiously. Even now, I admire his knack for detail, although reading his most recent book leads one down a meandering path (and I admit buying this book, Hegemony or Survival: America’s Quest for Global Dominance, and reading it cover to cover, a rare thing these days). However, after reading Emma Brockes interview with Chomsky (published in the Guardian), my disenchantment with “the world’s top public intellectual” (according to Prospect magazine) has increased exponentially.

…According to Daniel L. Abrahamson, Chomsky is not advocating flawed reasoning so much as consciously acting as a “re-direct agent,” offering his many followers “dead-end solutions and alienating rhetoric.” In regard to nine eleven, it is worth quoting Abrahamson at length:

“Noam Chomsky has acted as the premier Left gatekeeper in the aftermath of the 9-11 crimes, lashing out at the 9-11 truth movement and claiming any suggestions of government complicity are fabrications. The “radical” Chomsky takes a position so deeply rooted in denial that it makes the staged 9-11 whitewash commission look like an honest study. He belligerently refuses to discuss any of the massive evidence proving government foreknowledge and participation in the crimes, claiming it would destroy the activist movements worldwide.”
kurtnimmo.com

It’s amazing the way the corporate media simply passes along unsubstantiated claims and outright Bushcon propaganda as fact—for instance, over at the Chicago Tribune, it is said an “al-Qaida offshoot” is “spearheading the anti-U.S. insurgency in Iraq,” in other words, according to Joel Greenberg of the Tribune, the al-Zarqawi black op designed to discredit Iraqis who are attempting to end the illegal occupation of their country are terrorists who blow up hotels in neighboring countries. No doubt Greenberg is paid well to make up such fairy tales—or rather pass along the lies and distortions contrived by his editors and the Bushcons.

“After first claiming responsibility for the Wednesday attacks on three hotels popular with Israelis and Westerners, al-Qaida in Iraq later issued a second Internet statement that appeared to acknowledge that its tactics may have backfired and undermined any support the group enjoyed among the Jordanian population,” writes Greenberg. In other words, the intelligence ops who issue these “internet statements” for the dead al-Zarqawi’s P2OG false flag terrorist group decided their initial story didn’t hold water, so they are sending out a clarification via one of their secured servers.

“The group said the attacks were launched only after its leaders became ‘confident that (the hotels) are centers for launching war on Islam and support the crusaders’ presence in Iraq and the Arab peninsula and the presence of the Jews on the land of Palestine,’” Greenberg continues. “They also were, the group asserted, ‘a secure place for the filthy Israeli and Western tourists to spread corruption and adultery at the expense and suffering of the Muslims.’” No mention here of the now scrubbed fact the “filthy Israelis” were tipped off and evacuated the hotel before the black op unit attacked. Moreover, as usual, the blasts killed not only innocent Arabs, but in this instance also “the commander of the Palestinian Special Forces, Bashir Nafeh, Jihad Fatouh, the commercial attaché at the Palestinian Embassy in Cairo, and Mosab Khorma, deputy Chairman of Cairo-Amman Bank in the Palestinian territories and Col. Abed Allun, another high-ranking Preventive Security forces official, were also killed in the three nearly simultaneous suicide bombings on American-owned hotels,” according to Rumor Mill News. It sure is odd how al-Zarqawi kills important Palestinians for the Likudites.
kurtnimmo.com

Dear Prime Minister Howard,

11/11/05 “The Age” — — You would not have recognised our son, he was just another face in the group as you met members of the defence forces and their families in Darwin this year.

You would not have known of the pain trapped in my heart as he held me in his strong arms prior to his departure, reassuring me he would be OK.

I do not presume to speak for others but simply as a mother whose only son is deployed in Iraq. I feel betrayed and misled by you and your Government regarding the justification for the invasion of Iraq.

Time passes slowly for me, never more than in the early hours of the morning when unanswered questions, hopes and fears compete for time. Occasionally I am visited by despair. I despair when old men send young men to war, when those detained are mistreated and subjected to acts of humiliation, and the relative ease with which those with opposing views are labelled.

If I condone this behaviour, what can I expect in the event a member of the Australian Defence Force is detained? I wonder what the Iraqi definition of terrorism might be. Could ADF members be perceived as terrorists by some Iraqis? What might the consequences be?

If detained, would they be treated in accordance with international law, or an interpretation of the law created to justify the situation? Is there an Iraqi equivalent to Guantanamo Bay? These are the questions that haunt me in the early hours of the morning. I know fear can be irrational, real or perceived. This is my perception, my reality.

I think of the young lives extinguished in Iraq, and of the Iraqi civilians killed in the conflict. Every death represents the loss of somebody’s son/daughter and perhaps somebody’s father/mother, brother/sister, uncle/aunt, nephew/niece . . . I wonder about the futility of war.

I will light a candle as a symbol of hope – hope that those entrusted with the responsibility of leading nations will act with honesty, integrity and compassion in the interest of all humanity, hope for the safe return of defence force members, hope for the safe return of our son.
informationclearinghouse.info

BAGHDAD — Iraqi Army soldiers near the Iranian border discovered the bound bodies of 27 people in civilian clothes who had been shot in the head, the latest in a series of suspected political killings, officials said yesterday.

Human rights workers and families of victims suspect death squads from either the Shi’ite Muslim majority or the Sunni Arab minority have been carrying out executions of political or sectarian enemies. Bodies have turned up in rivers, in back streets, and in refuse pits in recent months, and the killers are almost never found. The numbers found so far total in the hundreds.
boston.com

Option Salvador. Negroponte.

…The event, which took place on the 9th day of the 11th month, carries the signature of Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, the top representative of al-Qaeda in Iraq. In the warm night of early November, while the body count soared and the Middle East was confronted with its own 9/11, the world came again face to face with the myth of the new global terror leader: Zarqawi.

Of Bedouin origins, Zarqawi was born and raised in a working class section of Zarqa, Jordan’s second-largest city. After a brief spell as a petty criminal, he went to Afghanistan but arrived too late to fight the Soviets. In Afghanistan, he embraced radical Salafism, a creed that calls for a total rejection of Western values and influence. Arrested in Jordan for his subversive ideas, he spent five years in prison. This experience transformed him into one of many jihadists, with a handful of followers. In 2000, in Kandahar, he met Osama bin Laden for the first time, but rejected the Saudi’s offer to become part of al-Qaeda. Zarqawi was not prepared to fight against the U.S.; instead, he wanted to wage his struggle against the Jordanian government. This became the purpose of the modest training camp that he ran in Herat, near the Iranian border, where he mainly trained recruits for suicide missions.

But it was on Feb. 5, 2003, when Colin Powell described him to the UN Security Council as the fictitious link between Saddam Hussein and Osama bin Laden, that Zarqawi achieved global stardom. Since then, his myth has grown exponentially in both the West and the East.
antiwar.com

Record oil prices as a result of Hurricane Katrina and a strike at plane-maker Boeing sent America’s trade deficit surging to an unprecedented $66.1bn (£37.8bn) in September, the US commerce department announced yesterday.

Shattering the previous record shortfall of $60.4bn in February, the scale of the deterioration shocked a Wall Street that had been bracing itself for bad news following the devastation to Louisiana and Mississippi at the end of August.

“We knew that there were going to be some hurricane-related distortions in the September data. But this really exceeded our worst fears. This was a turn for the worst,” said Michael Woolfolk, senior currency strategist for Bank of New York.
guardian.co.uk

Scores dead in three Amman hotel bombings; Israelis evacuated before attack
November 10, 2005

Bombs rocked three hotels in Amman late last night, killing at least 57 people and wounding more than 115 in apparent suicide attacks. One of the hotels is known to be popular with Israeli tourists.

“There were three terrorist attacks on the Grand Hyatt, Radisson SAS and Days Inn hotels, and it is believed that the blasts were suicide bombings,” police spokesman Major Bashir al-Da’aja told The Associated Press. He declined to elaborate.

There was no immediate claim of responsibility for the attacks.

A police official said the attacks were simultaneous and hit minutes before 9 P.M. in two districts in the Jordanian capital, including the commercial area of Jebel Amman and Al-Rabiyeh, which houses the Israeli Embassy.

A number of Israelis staying yesterday at the Radisson SAS were evacuated before the bombing by Jordanian security forces, apparently due to a specific security alert. They were escorted back to Israel by security personnel.

The Foreign Ministry stated yesterday that no Israeli tourists are known to have been injured in the blasts. Representatives of Israel’s embassy in Amman were I contact with local authorities to examine any report of injured Israelis, but none were received. There are often a number of Israeli businessman and tourists in Amman, including in the hotels hit yesterday.

Israel’s counter-terror headquarters yesterday recommended Israeli citizens not travel in Jordan. Travel recommendations regarding Jordan were tightened a few months ago, but many Israelis still visit the country. Many also visit other regions such as the Jordanian Arava and the ancient city of Petra.
haaretz.com
(more…)

WASHINGTON — Iraqi Deputy Prime Minister Ahmed Chalabi on Wednesday denied that he deliberately fed the U.S. faulty intelligence to strengthen the case for invading Iraq, calling such accusations “an urban myth.”

Chalabi’s comments to reporters came after he met privately with Bush administration officials and delivered a speech at a conservative think-tank here, in which he discussed his vision of Iraq’s political future.

Chalabi also rebutted accusations that he passed U.S. security secrets to Iran and denied knowledge of an FBI inquiry into the allegations.

“I have no knowledge of any investigation about me,” he said. “I did not pass any information to Iran or compromise the security of the United States. I did not pass any codes to Iran.”
seattlenews.nwsource.com