WE ARE THE DECIDERS

"There is nothing worse than aggressive stupidity."~~Johann Wolfgang von Goethe

If it weren't so dangerously sad, the media gyrations to deflect attention from the sordid mess defense secretary Donald Rumsfeld has made in Iraq would be amusing. But efforts to hide the truth are futile because Rumsfeld is literally surrounded by "stars" -- retired general officers speaking publicly about the fatal mistakes Rumsfeld made in his mad dash to "sweep everything up" and dash blindly off to war.

CNN and the Boston Globe say there are six officers, Fox News says "a handful," the New York Times says seven, the Christian Science Monitor plays it safe with "several," and Rumsfeld himself laughs it off with "two or three out of thousands."

There seems to be eight so far -- Gen. Eric Shinseki, former Army Chief of Staff, was cut off at the knees a year before his retirement for testifying under oath during a Senate hearing a month before the assault on Iraq that it would take "several hundred thousand" troops to quell ethnic tensions that could lead to an insurgency.

He was soon joined by Marine Gen. Anthony Zinni, former CENTCOM commander; Lt.Gen. Greg Newbold, Director of Operations for the Joint Chiefs of Staff during the war planning; Maj.Gen. John Batiste, former 1st Infantry Division commander; Maj.Gen. Charles Swannack, former commander of the 82d Airborne Division in Iraq; Maj.Gen. John Riggs who, after 39 years in the Army, retired from the Pentagon in 2005; Maj.Gen. Paul Eaton, who oversaw training of Iraqi troops from 2003-2004 and Gen. Wesley Clark, former NATO Supreme Allied Commander.

Pay Attention!

We are now victims of a full-bore public relations assault. White House bullhorns and media mockingbirds are out in force, only too happy to be diverted from discussing the treasonous Bush/Cheney/Rove/Libby leak of an undercover CIA operative or from investigating the restless murmurings of an impending nuclear attack on Iran. The punditry brigade, including former military brass on media payrolls as "analysts" immediately began regurgitating talking points from a Pentagon memo hurriedly sent out when criticism began to gain momentum. They were then summoned en masse to the Pentagon for a briefing on the miraculous successes of Iraqi Operation Let God Sort 'Em Out.

CNN jumped out in front of the pack with a continuous loop of a staged video package showing Marines training top-notch Iraqi troops while winning "hearts and minds" of grateful Iraqi citizens, followed quickly by an article defending Rumsfeld. The issue soon became a disorderly political media debate on whether the generals were at war with each other, if they were attempting a coup of their civilian leaders or were merely rats deserting a sinking ship.

The brothers Limbaugh went into complete meltdown. Rush's head exploded as he shrieked that the generals were just a bunch of malcontents hooking up with the "liberal drive-by media" to get rid of Rumsfeld for attempting to fix the mess President Clinton made of the military. David took each general to task for joining the anti-Bush liberal media vultures who "have hovered over Rumsfeld's stubbornly vibrant carcass for way too long..."

Then, Rumsfeld, like Dick Cheney does when he needs to "catapault the propaganda," picked up the phone and called the drug-addled, dangerously ignorant "El Rushbo" to reassure millions of panting dittoheads that those who oppose him or criticize his handling of the war are being manipulated by terrorists like Zarqawi, Bin Laden and Zawahiri.

It didn't help matters when four retired generals penned an April 17 Wall Street Journal op-ed defending Rumsfeld and scolding their outspoken peers.

"We do not believe that it is appropriate for active duty, or retired, senior military officers to publicly criticize U.S. civilian leadership during war," they wrote, and added that the feelings of those who had come forward were "irrelevant." They went on to single out Zinni and Newbold, saying the two "do not understand the true nature of this radical ideology, Islamic exremism, and why we fight in Iraq." They then neatly connected the war in Iraq to 9-11 by smugly suggesting Zinni and Newbold "listen to the tapes of United 93."

Generally speaking

Who are these four men? Unlike those who were in Iraq and are alarmed at the chaotic, snarled disorder of Rumsfeld's leadership, the four Journal writers are warriors of a different era and were not involved in the planning or execution of the ongoing slaughter.

I suspect that Lt. Gen. John S. Crosby, my former boss for whom I have tremendous admiration and respect, now director of the government's Civilian Marksmanship Program (CMP), and Maj. Gen. Burton R. Moore, director of legislative liaison for the Air Force, allowed their names to be used because of a sense of honor and conviction that commissioned officers, whether active or retired, do not speak out against their civilian leaders, especially in a time of war.

However, the Journal and other media failed to mention that the latter two -- Vietnam-era Lt. Gen. Thomas McInerney, former assistant vice chief of staff of the Air Force, and Maj. Gen. Paul Vallely, former deputy commander of US Army, Pacific, are paid Fox News analysts and active, aggressive, warmongering Bush supporters.

McInerney joined the chorus of "swift-boaters" before the 2004 election, calling Sen. John Kerry's 1971 testimony about US soldiers committing barbaric acts on Vietnamese civilians "treasonous." According to Media Matters, Vallely, infuriated with former ambassador Joe Wilson's "agenda against the war on terror," emerged a week after Cheney chief of staff "Scooter" Libby was indicted on charges of obstruction of justice, perjury, and false statements in the Valerie Plame leak scandal to claim that a year before Robert Novak revealed Plame's identity Wilson had bragged to him and others in the Fox News green room that his wife worked at the CIA. When asked why he had waited two years before coming forward, Vallely remarked he "figured Joe Wilson would self-destruct at some point in time."

At first, Vallely said that Wilson had told him "three, possibly five times" in the spring of 2002 that his wife worked at the CIA. Upon further questioning, Vallely then said it was only one time, and perhaps in the "spring-summer" time frame. Then it was "summer-early fall." Vallely called on McInerney to back up his story on ABC's John Batchelor Show. Media Matters reports that McInerney appeared on the show to "repeat and expand upon Vallely's memory," but he would only admit to being a friend of Vallely and did not even suggest that Wilson had discussed his wife's identity. Upon Wilson's threat to sue Vallely for slander, Vallely, mercifully, shut up.

The two generals teamed up in 2004 to write a truly frightening manifesto (with a forward written by Fox News Iran-Contra hoodlum Oliver North) on how Rumsfeld should really wage war -- “Endgame: The Blueprint for Victory in the War on Terror.” Deluded by a grandiose sense of US power, they expanded Bush's three-nation "Axis of Evil" to an eight-nation "Web of Terror." With the colossal successes of Afghanistan and Iraq, it's now on to Syria and North Korea, Libya, Saudi Arabia, and Pakistan. Forget the paradigm of diplomacy; of containment. Forget trying to settle political crises in the Middle East. Screw 'em. Invade 'em. Conquer 'em. McInerney and Villely suggest, however, that because of Iran's size, it might be wiser to "slap" it with an embargo and keep it in line with a naval blockade.

So, what's the deal?

The administration and the Pentagon's aggressive disinformation pundits want us to believe this issue is political; merely disgruntled generals attempting to stir up a mutiny within the ranks and breed discontent within the populace before an upcoming election. If you believe that -- you're not paying attention. The generals being trashed for speaking out are patriots who have committed their entire lives to honorably serving and protecting the Republic and all it stands for, and are no longer able to remain silent when they see it being wantonly destroyed.

George Bush seems to think (sic) that Rumsfeld is doing a heckuva job. He says he doesn't "appreciate the speculation" about his buddy "Don." He's the decider, Bush says. He reads the front page. Bush hears voices and he listens to them. "But mine is the final decision," he says. "I'm the decider, and I decide what is best. And what's best is for Don Rumsfeld to remain as the Secretary of Defense."

But this is not about politics. It's about stopping the madness -- and the giggling madman whose aggressive stupidity and exaggerated sense of himself has brought shame to this once proud nation.

Henry Kissinger once said, "Of all the despots I've had to deal with, none was more ruthless than Donald Rumsfeld." With Rumsfeld, it's about rendition, brutal torture, sexual humiliation and ghoulishly insane war crimes. It's about a group of immensely brave apolitical patriots being forced to do what the US Congress and the US media steadfastly refuse to do -- tell the American people the truth. The blood dripping from the corpses in Iraq is nothing compared to that literally gushing from those who know what is going on, but choose to remain silent.

This is not about Rumsfeld "transforming" the Army. It's about the calculated destruction of all the services. It's about privitazing the military -- contracting out US security to war profiteers such as Halliburton, Bechtel, Blackwater. It's about psychological operations (PsyOps) teams and death squads roaming throughout Iraq murdering innocents in their homes and mosques, gunning down anything that moves in the streets. It's about a secretary of defense not only ordering torture, but getting personally involved in it.

This is not about whether Rumsfeld should be replaced. It is about whether he should be hanged for not supporting those for whom he is responsible. It is about sending hundreds of thousands of Americans into the mayhem of an insurgent battlefield; many to certain death as a result of improper training, lack of protective armor and lack of proper equipment.

It is about Rumsfeld "disappearing" the nearly 2,400 dead servicemembers who continue to return in the dead of night without honor. It is about 35 families who will drop to their knees tonight and pray for the safety of their children, not knowing they are already dead. It is about more than 20,000 soldiers and marines evacuated from Rumsfeld's war, many physically and mentally damaged beyond repair -- nearly 12,000 of them suffering from disease. This is about destroying entire populations with Depleted Uranium, including many future generations of Americans.

Of course Rumsfeld must go. And, ultimately, he will take George Bush, Dick Cheney, Condi Rice and the rest of the depraved warmongers with him. The American people have finally had enough of aggressive stupidity.

And we are the deciders.

THOMPSON'S DOG WON'T HUNT

When I first read the March 31 Capitol Hill Blue headline, "9/11 conspiracy theories don't pass the smell test," I thought editor Doug Thompson was pulling an April Fool's joke on us a day early. Buoyed by Thompson's well-deserved reputation for being out there first with "damn the torpedoes -- full speed ahead" -- truth no matter where it takes him, I read avidly to the end of the rant, poised to burst into laughter at his "Gotcha!" punch line. It wasn't there.

"I know my government," Thompson ended lamely, "They're just not good enough to pull off something like this."

That's it, then? Thompson's reason for ridiculing those who question 9/11 is "it's improbable such a ragtag group" is capable of attacking a vulnerable nation and killing thousands of its people? Man -- in the wake of all that has happened since 9/11, that dog won't hunt. If Thompson is serious when he says "the many theories surrounding 9/11 come mostly from conspiracy buffs" -- or when he says those whose judgment he trusts "support the facts that Al Qaeda planned and executed the attacks," then his credibility is destroyed on this subject and on all other subjects as well. If he's serious, there's no reason to revisit Capitol Hill Blue or Thompson ever again.

But I'm not convinced Thompson is serious. He's too good at what he does. Like he says -- often -- he's been in journalism "for more than 40 years." He's a hard-hitting reporter whose cognitive and investigative skills are legend; whose "unnamed sources" walk shoulder-to-shoulder throughout the administration; frolic through the halls of Congress. Thompson doesn't just report the news, he breaks it, busts it wide open and takes no prisoners. It is inconceivable that Thompson would back off a story of this magnitude, given his penchant for holding the administration's cloven hooves to the fire, especially those of George Bush and Dick Cheney.

Thompson is the man who wrote on March 20 that "the most dangerous man in the world is not sitting in a jail cell somewhere in Iraq...He is not hiding out in a cave somewhere in Afghanistan...The most dangerous man in the world may well be working out of an oval-shaped office at 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue in Washington, DC."

He is the one who unearthed a GOP memo less than a year ago suggesting that a "new attack by terrorists on US soil" could reverse the sagging fortunes of Bush as well as the GOP and would "restore his image as a leader of the American people." This strategy, the memo says, would "'validate" the President's war on terror and allow Bush to "unite the country in a time of national shock and sorrow," and would reverse the President's fortunes and "keep the party from losing control of Congress in the 2006 midterm elections."

And, as recently as April 4, Thompson wrote, "America is a bully, an international thug that uses fear, lies and deceit to advance the personal agendas of its leaders. Bullies do not deserve respect. Bullies do not deserve the benefit of the doubt. Bullies are beneath contempt." Thompson continued, "Unfortunately, as long as Americans tolerate the despotic rule of George W. Bush, we share responsibility for the shame our leadership has brought upon a once-great nation called the United States of America."

Why, then, would Thompson say that he "cannot -- and will not" believe any explanation of what happened on 9/11 other than what the most dangerous man in the world tells him -- a despotic leader who's entertaining the "strategery" of murdering even more Americans for no other reason than to advance his political agenda, and who is a vicious liar who doesn't want the US Constitution thrown in his face because "it's nothing but a goddamned piece of paper?

Does Thompson's dog look to you like it's hunting?

It's futile to try to reach a mind so firmly closed. However, Thompson's reasons are more than passing strange. For example, the only investigation that apparently passed his "smell test" was conducted by the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) because he says "an engineer he'd known for 25 years" ran a computer simulation of the building collapses for him.

According to Kevin Ryan, formerly of Underwriters Laboratories (UL) which certified the steel used in the WTC buildings, "NIST put together a black box computer model that would spit out the right answers." Ryan said when the parameters did not generate the results they were seeking, they changed the parameters. The final model, according to Ryan, "produced video graphics that would enable anyone to see the buildings collapse without having to follow a train of logic to get there." NIST offered no proof for the dynamics of the amazing free-fall collapse of the only three buildings to do so in history as a result of fire, other than "...once the upper building section began to move downwards...global collapse ensued."

Thompson says he was at the Pentagon on 9/11 where he interviewed "dozens" of witness who saw the plane hit. He smelled the burning jet fuel. He says he's flown Boeing 757, 767, and 777 flight simulators, and he can safely assure us "the maneuvers made by the hijackers on September 11 were relatively simple course corrections that are not that difficult in planes equipped with modern navigational computers." Well, I've never flown a simulator, but I once knew a guy who practiced his riding skills on a mechanical bull, but when he hit the rodeo circuit, he got his ass stomped in two seconds flat.

According to a site dedicated solely to Pentagon research, Hani Hanjour, the pilot of Flight 77, was refused the rental of a Cessna 172 just weeks prior to 9/11 because of his sadly lacking maneuvering skills. But after reading a 757 manual on the way to the airport, Hanjour was able to cruise over the unsecured White House, enter Reagan International airspace while performing a 270-degree turn with a 7,000-foot drop in altitude in 2.5 minutes with military precision -- then hit five 25-foot, 293-pound steel lamp poles, a fence, a 39,500-pound generator trailer, two cable spools, two single-wide mobile home construction trailers and a tree -- before slamming into the only wedge in the Pentagon under construction, leaving only a couple pieces of debris small enough to hold in your hands. He left "no tail, no wings, no engines, no horizontal stablizer, no passenger seats, no luggage and no aircraft cargo," and left the lawn in front of the Pentagon untouched.

But it's Thompson's vicious "kill the messenger" ad hominem attack on actor Charlie Sheen for questioning the official scenario that is the most bewildering. Thompson wants to know -- Is Sheen the best we wild-eyed conspiracy nut jobs can do? Is Sheen our new poster child? Thompson sneered at conspiracy freaks for "pinning their credibility on a known drug user, admitted purchaser of the services of prostitutes and an intellectually-challenged misfit who couldn't even graduate from high school..."

Somebody should remind Thompson that Sheen, however randy and hot-headed he may be, is also a concerned American citizen, and he has a dog in this hunt. Sheen has an inherent right -- a duty -- to question his government. He wants to know, as we all do, how 19 amateurs armed with box cutters could take over four commercial airliners and fly around over New York City and Washington DC until they finally hit three of their targets.

Sheen wants to know how the official story of fuel running down elevator shafts could cause the inferno it would take to bring down the world's two tallest and most solidly built buildings. He wants to know about the early eyewitness accounts from the media and bystanders about "huge explosions" in the bowels of the WTC -- and why WTC landlord Larry Silverstein openly admitted the decision to "pull" building 7 before it toppled in 6.6 seconds into its own footprints.

But Thompson will not be moved. He said, "I have yet to get a report from a structural engineer or demolitions expert that support the theories of internal explosions and too many witnesses saw the planes. If an engineer or expert with credentials that could be verified came forward I might be willing to take another look at this but in the absence of such, I'll go with the conclusions of experts I trust."

If Thompson has viewed "Loose Change, 2nd Edition or perused Brigham Young University Physics Professor Stephen E. Jones' critical paper, "Why Indeed Did the WTC Buildings Collapse"; if he has visited the many 9/11 research sites, and is still determined to cling to administration experts he trusts, so be it.

The hunt for the truth will go on -- whether Thompson's dog is in it or not.