ZGram - 10/13/2002 - "Margolis: The hijacking of America"

irimland@zundelsite.org irimland@zundelsite.org
Sun, 13 Oct 2002 14:44:34 -0700


ZGram - Where Truth is Destiny

October 13, 2002

Good Morning from the Zundelsite:

It can't get any clearer than this:

[START]

Toronto Sun | October 13, 2002

The hijacking of America

But now many conservatives are speaking up against U.S. foreign policy

By ERIC MARGOLIS <margolis@foreigncorrespondent.com>
-- Contributing Foreign Editor

LOS ANGELES -- The United States Congress has spoken. Not with a roar, but
with a whimper, handing President George W. Bush a blank cheque to go to
war against Iraq because of the "imminent threat" it supposedly poses to
America. One is reminded of the revolting spectacle of Roman senators
groveling at the feet of emperor Tiberius.

The notion of Iraq, a demolished nation of 22.3 million posing an "imminent
threat" to the United States, a nation of 281 million, is ludicrous. In
fact, anti-Saddam Kurds and southern Shia Muslims comprise 17.7 million, or
79%, of Iraq's population, leaving only 4.6 million Sunnis who more or less
support the regime. That's about the population of Hong Kong.

But a steady drumbeat of bellicose propaganda, pressure from powerful
special interests thirsting to destroy Iraq, and election year politics
have combined to stampede Congress and many Americans into believing this
grotesque, Orwellian fiction.

Illustrating war fever in Washington and the growing irrationality of the
White House, President Bush last week compared his impending jihad against
Iraq to the 1962 Cuban missile crisis, and himself to John F. Kennedy. I
was in Washington during the Cuban crisis and vividly recall its drama and
dangers. The Soviets had nuclear-tipped missiles ready to strike the U.S.
What the U.S. faces with Iraq - which has no long-range missiles or other
delivery systems for bulky chemical munitions or highly complex systems for
dispensing germs - is nothing comparable. And George W. Bush is no John F.
Kennedy.

Not content with this silly comparison, Bush went on to actually claim Iraq
was poised to attack the United States using remotely piloted aircraft
guided from Baghdad, a mere 13,000 km away. Bush must have cribbed this
preposterous fantasy from Dr. Fu Manchu and His Drones of Death. In the
mighty U.S., long-range drones are still in the testing stage. The claim
that Iraq has perfected such sophisticated technology - which extensively
uses satellite guidance - and can remotely pilot an ancient crop duster
from Baghdad to New York is laughable.

Last week, CIA Director George Tenet took the courageous step of publicly
refuting Bush's claim that Iraq was an imminent threat. Tenet's
unprecedented rebuke was a warning to America, but it also signalled the
deep resentment felt in the U.S. intelligence community over the way
Israel's intelligence service, Mossad, and its American helpers, have
become the White House's primary source of decision-making information on
Iraq, Palestine, Iran and Afghanistan.

Attacked and denounced

Tenet was immediately attacked and denounced by pro-Israel commentators,
though a number of senior Israeli officers have echoed Tenet's assertions
that there was no immediate risk from Iraq unless it is invaded.

Meanwhile, another revolt has erupted, this time in conservative ranks. A
new magazine, The American Conservative, was launched in Washington this
month. Created by veteran politician Patrick Buchanan, columnist Taki, and
former New York Post editor Scott McConnell, the magazine features
hard-hitting attacks by noted Republican theorist Kevin Phillips; Justin
Raimondo, editor of the excellent Web site, antiwar.com; and pieces by
Buchanan, Peter Brimelow and this writer on Bush's promotion of war
psychosis and the corruption of the conservative movement.

Phillips sums up the reasons for the rebellion, accusing the Bush
administration of representing "the economics of privilege, the foreign
policy of war, and the culture of guns and Sun Belt fundamentalism."

Phillips rightly blames the meltdown of the U.S. stock markets on an
"Enron-Armageddon fusion." The Bush administration, writes Phillips, "mixes
greed, inept economic management, business corruption, crony capitalism,
triumphalist Pentagon sabre-rattling and Axis of Evil foreign policy
theology on a scale that already boggles foreign commentators."

Many traditional conservatives are now accusing neo-conservatives and
Christian fundamentalists of having hijacked not only the conservative
movement, but U.S. foreign policy as well. Neo-conservatives are militant
ideologists representing the views of Ariel Sharon's far-right Likud Party
in Israel (though by no means the views of all Israelis).

These neo-cons view the world through the lens of what they deem is good
for Israel and bad for its enemies and, accordingly, are pressing the U.S.
into a war against much of the Muslim world. In many ways, these
war-lusting neo-cons are the mirror image of Osama bin Laden and his
anti-western al-Qaida movement. Both want an all-out clash of civilizations
and religions.

Varying views

It's harder to say what America's conservative rebels represent: their
views vary greatly from Buchanan-like neo-isolationists to European-style
conservatives like myself who are strict with public finances but liberal
on social issues. But the conservative rebels are united on one point: the
burn-Baghdad neo-cons and religious Sun Belt Armageddonites like Jerry
Falwell do not speak for America's mainstream conservatives.

True conservatives hark back to two leaders of great moral stature,
honesty, and true patriotism, men who bore the American flag inside their
hearts, not on their lapels: President Dwight Eisenhower and Sen. Barry
Goldwater.

Sadly, the conservative revolt is probably too late. Rather than face a
collapsing stock market and enraged voters, President Bush has chosen to
distract them with a jolly little war against a nation that cannot
effectively fight back.

=====

[END]

Eric can be reached by e-mail at <margolis@foreigncorrespondent.com>

Letters to the editor should be sent to editor@sunpub.com
or visit his home page.

(Source:  http://www.canoe.ca/Columnists/margolis_oct13.html )