Scoop Reader Opinion: Hello From America

Monday, 17 March 2003, 11:33 am
Opinion: Scoop Reader Opinion

I believe that this is the first time that the elite that rule our supposedly democratic nations have taken it upon themselves so openly to manufacture consent for starting a war that will enrich them and impoverish the nations that they rule.

Obviously the war in Kosovo was the first time that NATO and the UN charters were broken in the name of destroying what was left of Yugoslavia. For Britain the notion that the Labour party has departed from its roots and become as, if not more rightwing than the conservatives is scary but true as shown by the vote in Parliament the other day.

Over here in the States those of us who either didn’t grow up here or haven’t accepted the “America is perfect” brainwashing dished out on a daily basis have long been aware that the corporations control the government here.

This is evident by the fact that less than 50% of the eligible population votes in the Presidential elections and less than 40% in the mid-term congressional elections. Also the way thousands of mainly black voters (who vote democrat over 90% of the time) were incorrectly removed from roles in Florida before the last election because they had a name similar to a convicted criminal sheds some light on the fact that things aren’t improving.

Has anyone asked the question how is it possible for the son of a former president to become president eight years after his father left office? Is this what happens in a real democracy?

I feel that George W doesn’t have any concept of what position he is in. The way he says everything with a smirk is very unsettling and makes me think of him as a little spoilt kid who thinks this whole thing is a fun game of who’s the boss.

When I start looking at what his administration has done since coming into power and how it is trying to spin the 9-11 atrocities and ‘War on Terrorism’ from Bin Laden and Al Qaida onto Sadam I begin to wonder where this is all going to end. The War on Terrorism is a war against those that are chosen as enemies by the US, it does not include states of terror like those in Columbia and Israel who violate human rights on a daily basis and in the case of Israel defy UN resolution after resolution.

Israel also happens to have a secret nuclear arsenal of about 200 warheads but has not signed the nuclear non-proliferation treaty like India and Pakistan. This is acceptable because these nations are friendly to our cause and as a result receive massive amounts of US aid.

How did this new omnipresent enemy to unite the people behind the flag in the War on Terrorism get it’s beginning? Having read the book War on Freedom by Nafeez Mosaddeq Ahmed, I am in no doubt that George W’s administration played a hand in not stopping the attacks of 9-11. Even if you do not buy that the CIA and FBI were all over the hijackers long before 9-11 and had warnings from all over the world that something big was going to happen around that date, then the fact that no Air Force jets were scrambled until after all the planes had crashed is rather damming.

It is standard procedure for the FAA to call for a fighter jet escort if there is a change of course and no response from the plane. The last plane crashed into the Pentagon a hour after the first one crashed into the WTC and Andrews Air Force base is 15 miles from the Pentagon. Also the revelation on Friday that fake documents regarding Iraq’s purchase of uranium from Niger were given to the Atomic Energy Agency by the US makes it reasonable to question any other evidence that has been presented in the case for war.

Post 9-11 USA is looking strikingly like the picture painted by George Orwell in the famous 1984. People are being arrested for wearing shirts proclaiming peace while shopping at a mall. Others are being thrown in jail for 6 months for protesting and the secret services are being handed more powers to access people’s private information.

Travellers on airlines are soon to be required to give more details when making reservations and have background checks performed including bank accounts, etc. starting with Delta airlines next month. They will then be given a colour coding based on their threat level and if they are red then they will not be permitted to travel.

Obviously political activists and the like will be hassled even more under this system. Media censorship of views opposing the administration is worse than before, which wasn’t good to start with. It is amazing the difference in reporting between CNN and CNN en Español, both of which come from the same broadcast station.

Moving back to Iraq and the whole concept of pre-emptive strikes. This reminds me of Spielburg’s chilling Minority Report in which crimes are solved and the culprit arrested before they have been committed.

As with the doctrine of George W it all seems relatively harmless if we are getting the bad guys before they get us, but then what if our information was wrong or we made up the information and we got the wrong people. We all know Saddam is an evil man, but he used to be doing evil things that we wanted so we gave him the weapons that we are now trying to take away.

It is a big stretch for any one who is slightly critical about any thing they are told to believe that Sadam is a threat to world peace.

He had almost everything destroyed by the inspectors after the Gulf War (a conflict during which he didn’t use any of these weapons of mass destruction) and we have been flying over two thirds of his country since that time.

He has not threatened the US or his neighbours with any type of attack, so why are we suddenly concerned about him?

Also none of the 9-11 hijackers were from Iraq, they were from Saudi Arabia and Egypt, so why aren’t we going after them?

The answer is that the Bin Laden family is friends with the Bush family (they visit each other’s homes) and yes the Bin Laden family still has ties to Osama and therefore Al Qaida.

So knowing this, it becomes obvious that George W is after Saddam’s oil for US companies and US control of Iraqi oil will lead to the breaking of OPEC and to US domination of the Middle East.

It also helps that Cheney (Haliburton – military logistics and oil), Bush (Arbusto - oil) and Condoleezza Rice (Chevron -oil) all will do rather well out of the war logistics and supporting the US oil industry in Iraq.

They have no plans for democracy, they are going to replace the top person in every ministry with a US military advisor thereby keeping Sadam’s minority regime in place minus Sadam. After all is there stable democracy in Afghanistan or Kosovo?

If you think there is it is because they no longer report the chaos that these places currently are in. When will they realize that the Iraqi people may actually not be that pro-US, after the first war and the human cost to their children of the US-led sanctions and a second war when we destroy everything again and kill thousands of them.

The protests of February 18th were historic as it was the first time ever that citizens of the world have come out in unison to protest the hypocrisy of the world’s rogue superpower in its quest for total control. It is obvious that this call for peace will not be heeded despite the elite understanding that their control over the people is slipping and that they need to pay more heed to the voices of the majority. Prepare for war this week and hope that you aren’t the target of the actions of your leadership.

- AUTHOR NOTE: I am a Kiwi currently living in Los Angeles and despite working in a technical field I have become interested in politics. Thank you very much for providing a rare independent viewpoint. I have turned several colleagues here on to your website because of the outstanding international coverage you have.

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