subject: mardridney
first to madrid
"The Spanish daily El Mundo claimed... the same suspects were also in contact with Jamal Ahmidam, nicknamed 'The Chinese', who was said to be the
"mastermind" behind the attacks."
http://www.expatica.com/source/site_article.asp?subchannel_id=81&story_id=8393
ok - nickname alert. we know have at least three masterminds spoiling the broth - The Tunisian, The Egyptian and The Chinese. fuck off.

speaking of madrid
"The White House has declared open season on Mark Latham. One by one, from George Bush to Richard Armitage and now to Armitage's boss, Colin Powell, the Bush Administration made it obvious this week it does not want Latham as prime minister if he will not adopt John Howard's - i.e., George Bush's - Iraq policies. We know this because the "Reverend" Paul Kelly, at his ecumenical, thundering best, has told us very frankly so in his master's national newspaper, the Murdoch daily, The Australian. Hallelujah, the word cometh!
http://www.smh.com.au/articles/2004/06/11/1086749896060.html

it behooves me to comprehend how the sadmin has the time or energy to launch an orchestrated assault on latham, who is behind the polls for some election at some indeterminate date in the future - which may or not be after the am election. one imagines that the war, or the torture thingy, or ashcrofts performance in congress or the NATO meeting, or the G8, or the domestic election or some such ought be attracting their attention, rather than some hypothetical withdrawal if latham wins. the actual military support from oz is minimal - and 43 deosnt want any troops even from nato
"GEORGE W BUSH: I don't expect more troops from NATO to be offered up. It is an unrealistic expectation. Nobody is suggesting that." http://www.abc.net.au/lateline/content/2004/s1130485.htm
so the oz presence is largely symbolic - but the unanimous UN vote this week would seem to trump the symbolic value of oz troops. so why the full court media press? and when did 43 give a shit about allies anyway?

we heard that howard and 43 didnt discuss latham before 43 went on the rampage - i speculated at the time that it was cos the latham msg was purely for the amdomestic audience - and we see this from the Age today: "As this newspaper commented at the time, if President George Bush's intention in making his remarks was to help the Howard Government's re-election prospects, this aim was likely to backfire... Now, US Secretary of State Colin Powell and his deputy, Richard Armitage, have made statements on Labor's Iraq policy; what they have had to say, however, leaves little room for anything resembling dialogue."
http://www.theage.com.au/articles/2004/06/11/1086749893358.html

so all the stuff about the wadmin trying to influence ozdom politics seems like a bit of a redherring. which leaves the awkward question about their motivations - and unfortunately, it seems to fit with my longterm suspicions that they might do a madrid here in syd/mel. and yet, despite all this debate/noise, still no-one has asked the question about whether we might be madrided. the ozspain analogy couldnt be more apparent - even in the official story.

The Australian goes with this story this morning
"MARK Latham is retreating on his promise to pull Australian troops out of Iraq by Christmas, suggesting almost a third of the contingent could stay on under a Labor government to guard diplomats in Baghdad."
http://www.theaustralian.news.com.au/common/story_page/0,5744,9819140%255E601,00.html

which put me in a bit of a spin cos it surprised me, and i wondered whether the sadmin would call off the dogs and i figured that would be the acid test. I was saved by The Age:
"Federal Opposition Leader Mark Latham today disputed reports he was wavering on his pledge to bring troops home from Iraq by Christmas.
Mr Latham said reports in today's media which indicated he was back-peddling on the commitment were simply wrong. "That report on the front of the Australian newspaper today is absolutely untrue and absolute nonsense," Mr Latham told journalists." http://theage.com.au/articles/2004/06/12/1086749932096.html

ftr - The Weekend Australian (which i mentioned recently wrt that missing terrorist ('Election Delay' story) led with "Latham in retreat on Iraq troops", then "Hero sent off into the sunset" and "Editorial: Australia is obligated to stay in Iraq". The Saturday Age went with "Ronald Reagan laid to rest", "Iraq deputy foreign minister killed in ambush" and "Latham not wavering on troops" and "ed: A question of sovereignty"... in any fight, who u gonna trust - murdock or the other guy? (ftr The Australian is murdercks only credible/broadsheet paper)

but the big problem for the radmin is that if we lived in a non-truman world, they have painted themselves into an untenable position. if we assume the whole democracy thing, then theres about a 45% chance that latham will win the election, and lets assume that he keeps his promise to withdraw the troops, and lets assume that the oz election is in october. bush et al have said that an ozzie 'cut and run' would be 'disastrous' - surely karlrove is thinking about nov04 and is sufficiently sophisticated to see the presumed potential damage. yet they send in powell and armitage and others to turn up the volume. in a nontruman world, theres no way theyd risk something 'disastrous' about 43s apparent strong point, war, with a 45% likelihood, just weeks before the election. my guess is that they wouldnt be making all this noise if the oz election was gonna be after the us election, which prolly means that the oz election will be b4 then - which means that the dadamin appears to be picking a fight, about a minor issue, where their main election issue is about even-money to take a 'disastrous' hit just weeks before the election. and karlrove is a genius.

all of which leads me to think that theres a purpose behind the attacks on latham, and that the official version of the fight is invalid and that it is intended to pre-empt something else, and unfortunately, this all fits in with my previous concerns. none of which augurs well.

i feel like im watching a trainwreck in slow motion - and its been playing out
since madrid. praps the ozelection will be called in december, and we can shift our attention back to the same problme, but in the us election. or praps we'll see attacks elsewhere which might change the story - ftr usnews is running an 'olympics terror' series - this is the same crew who recently bought us the news that the cadmins 'working hypothesis' is that there will be a pre-election attack in the us, "one things for sure, we wont be like spain" said some helpful, anonymous source in a section called 'washington whispers'

(the oz abc (bbc equiv) just ran an ad for a program called "ww3 - alqaeda" with fox-type graphics)