"Just look at the things we're debating -- whether the U.S. Government can abduct and indefinitely imprison U.S. citizens without charges; whether we can use torture to interrogate people; whether our Government can eavesdrop on our private conversations without warrants; whether we can create secret prisons and keep people there out of sight and beyond the reach of any law or oversight; and whether the President can simply disregard long-standing constitutional limitations and duly enacted Congressional laws because he has deemed that doing so is necessary to "protect" us.* ewastud:
These haven't been open questions for decades if not centuries. They've been settled as intrinsic values that define our country. Yet nothing is settled or resolved any longer. Everything -- even the most extremist and authoritarian policies and things which were long considered taboo -- are now openly entertained, justifiable and routinely justified."
"I read Madsen's post about Ney and his ME dealings. It seems partly plausible at least about Ney working with Plame and Brewster Jennings to a certain point. But Ney was probably doing considerable self-dealing, too, IMHO.great post. i don't follow madsen - so i don't really know how to read him - some smart people tell me that he's useful to read to help get a read on things, and at least a reminder to 'follow the money' - but he generally just makes me dizzy. I agree with ewastud here - madsen seems to have drawn distinct good/bad lines here for whatever reasons.
However, I don't buy Madsen's take that Ney is pretty much an innocent in this. Ney is a very dirty fellow, too. He was the one who got the Israeli telcomm firm into the House in the first place, and who has been the key figure in our crooked electronic voting systems installed throughout the country which has helped mostly the GOP to steal elections. How can Madsen forget about that? On the other hand, Madsen portrays Patrick Fitzgerald as somehow corrupt and being blackmailed by BushCo. I don't buy that line either.
Even if there was more criminality involved in the 1993 WTC car bombing that did not get prosecuted, it does not necessarily mean he had the evidence or ability to prosecute with a free hand. Or perhaps Fitzgerald intended to gather more evidence or opted to wait for a more opportune time.
I find it much more plausible that Fitzgerald is "clean" and Ney is "dirty," than vice versa.
It seems hard to believe that Madsen could actaully be serious in that spin that he delivers. It makes me wonder if he is taking that line to confuse and throw off the GOP/neo-con intriguers who are nervous about Fitzgerald and what card he may play next.
There has been a lot of wingnut criticisms of the movie Syriana. I saw it and the plot is complex and difficult to follow. If it is unrealistic, though, it is because reality is actually considerably more complex than fiction, not less, as the wingnuts would have us believe -- life is a mere contest between good and evil. Syriana ironically left out for the most part much about the large scale flows of narcotics involved in the international oil/weapons trading/"terrorism" nexus, even though one the director's previous films was Traffic. "
the idea of an israeli telecoms company wiring up the whitehouse is kinda outrageous, given israel's status as the number one 'friendly' espionage-engager, and given the sponsors of the project (not unlike the wilkes crew providing WH office furniture)
2 comments:
I'm looking at the Madsen now, and ewastud's take seems about right. With Madsen, the trick is usually to ignore his conclusions and keep thinking about the bits and pieces he offers that seem most plausible and interesting.
In this case, one thing that struck me was Madsen's statement that, "According to a Democratic Party official in Ohio, it was always well known that Ney had 'special protection' stemming from his CIA past," and his description of Ney as "The member of Congress, who, like Plame, had been an earlier CIA 'non-official cover (NOC) energy consultant' in the Middle East during the late 1970s and early 80s."
So much about Ney's career has screamed out "CIA" -- but I was never able to find anyone saying it straight out before. Madsen's word may not be rock-solid, but since it echoes my own intuitions, I'm inclined to trust it here.
My eye was also caught by Madsen's reference to "Richard Armitage (who was worried that the CIA would discover his own involvement in shady deals in Azerbaijan)," because -- like Ney's possible CIA history -- it points directly towards the Shackley/Clines/Wilson Enterprise and its involvement in Iran in the 70's. According to my notes, Armitage became involved with Ted Shackley's drugs-arms-and-assassinations operations when he was in Saigon in the early 70's and a few years later was sent by Shackley to Iran to set up similar operations there. Ney was also in Iran in the 70's -- and I've wondered mightily if he was hooked up with the Enterprise then. If, as Madsen says, he was CIA at the time, it starts to look increasingly possible that he was. Also, though I don't seem to have anything in my notes linking Armitage to Azerbaijan, another Enterprise member, Richard Secord, was definitely engaged in dubious schemes there in the early 90's.
I've wrestled a great deal with the question of to what extent the Enterprise network of the 70's and 80's survived after the retirement of its original founders and how such a survival might be related to the drugs-and-arms operations of the 90's that Sibel describes. What Madsen says at least suggests that there really still is something of that nature going on and that Ney and his casino buddies are part of it.
Of course, one thing that any unified theory of Bob Ney is going to have to explain is that 1996 trip to Bosnia funded by the National Security Caucus Foundation -- just before the NSCF funded a burst of Abramoff trips to the Northern Marianas, Moscow, and Pakistan (where Abramoff had been lobbying for the lifting of sanctions related to Pakistan's nuclear program.)
And finally, since I never can resist a good Viktor Bout reference, I was delighted to see him coming into the story Madsen tells as well:
Zayat's myriad aircraft firms in Uzbekistan and Kyrgyzstan are based in the same locations as those of Russian Mafia arms smuggler (and favored Pentagon contractor) Viktor Bout. Bout's Kyrgyzstan companies -- Phoenix Aviation and Inter Transavia, both connected to U.S. private military contractors operating in Iraq and Africa -- and Zayat's Kyrgyz-based aviation company, Aqua Transit, share the same airfield in the Kyrgyz capital of Bishkek. Zayat's Samaya Investments Ltd. comfortably resides in Tashkent, Uzbekistan along with firms controlled by the Uzbek-speaking Bout. Bout and Zayat share more than central Asian airports and capitals in common -- they both have high level contacts in the Bush administration, contacts that reach right into the Oval Office.
When she was National Security Adviser, Condoleezza Rice interceded with Sharjah authorities not to arrest Bout. She informed U.S. intelligence to "look but don't touch" with regard to Bout. And Alberto Gonzales' Justice Department, while convicting Ney, has yet to go after Zayat's lobbyist, Coffee, George W. Bush's former deputy campaign manager and "eyes and ears" on K Street. And there is continued Department of Homeland Security disinterest in the activities of Bout's Syrian associate Monzer al Qasser, who has been involved with his brother Ghassem in arms and drug smuggling and counterfeiting of $100 U.S. notes. Interpol has long been interested in the al Qassers' weapons smuggling and counterfeiting activities but the official U.S. Secret Service replies have echoed Rice's "look but don't touch" orders. Monzer Al Qasser's weapons smuggling activities, selling former East Bloc arms and using secret bank accounts in Luxembourg and Switzerland, cross the path of Viktor Bout's supply of weapons to the Taliban, Al Qaeda, and pro-Al Qaeda Islamist elements in the Balkans. The supply of arms from Mafia smugglers to Muslim guerrillas in Bosnia and Kosovo also involve the financial networks employed by the Bosnia Defense Fund, a 1990s weapons-purchasing slush fund set up at Riggs Bank in Washington, DC and the Central Bank of Bosnia in Sarajevo by Richard Perle and Douglas Feith. WMR has learned of a significant Washington, DC-based lobbying and smuggling operation involving Al Qasser and Bout. This operation appears to be sanctioned by high-level Bush administration officials.
Bosnia in the 90's, of course, leads back to Bob Ney again. This stuff may go round and round in circles -- but they're fairly small circles, and the same names and locations keep reappearing.
thnx starroute - fp'd
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