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Peace Patriot's Journal
I am quoting the entire linked article, because it is so complex--reflective of the Byzantine nature of our anti-democratic, corpo-fascist run government. I'm also boldfacing the "players" listed, because we need to identify and dig deeper into the actions of these foreground "players" if we are ever to understand this situation and effectively strategize to support real democracy in Honduras (and throughout Latin America). ---- U.S. STATE DEPARTMENT SELLS OUT HONDURAN DEMOCRACY FOR SENATE CONFIRMATIONS
Written by Laura Carlsen
Thursday, 12 November 2009
Source: Americas Mexico Blog
• Policy change to recognize elections without reinstatement of Zelaya torpedoes peace agreement, mollifies Republicans and alienates Latin America
• President Zelaya pronounces Tegucigalpa-San Jose Accord a “dead letter”
• Anti-coup organizations call for elections boycott on Nov. 29
In one of the lowest points in U.S. diplomatic history, the State Department announced a turnabout in its Honduran policy and stated it will recognize the results of Nov. 29 elections even if held under the military coup.
The new strategy to promote elections without first assuring a return to constitutional order torpedoes the accord that the State Department itself brokered and was signed by President Manuel Zelaya and coup leader Roberto Micheletti on Oct. 29.
On Nov. 4, just days after Secretary of State Clinton anounced a major breakthrough in resolving the Honduran political crisis, Asst. Secretary of State Thomas Shannon stated in an interview with CNN that “the formation of the National Unity Government is apart from the reinstatement of President Zelaya” and that the Honduran Congress will decide when and if Zelaya is reinstated. His surprise declaration scuttled the point of reinstatement in the agreement, leaving the matter up in the air while confirming that the U.S. government will recognize elections anyway.
U.S. Ambassador to the Organization of American States, Lewis Anselem and Ambassador to Honduras Hugo Llorens confirmed this new position. At the OAS meeting, Anselem, whose disparaging remarks toward Latin American countries have alienated many southern diplomats, criticized the other nations’ refusal to recognize elections staged by a coup regime, “I’ve heard many in this room say that they will not recognize the elections in Honduras… I’m not trying to be a wiseguy, but what does that mean? What does that mean in the real world, not in the world of magical realism?”
Llorens also portrayed the new policy as pragmatism, stating on Nov. 8, “The elections will be part of the reality and will return Honduras to the path of democracy.”
The repeated use of "reality" as the justification for the policy change shows an attempt on the part of the State Department to unilaterally impose a definition of Honduran reality—contrary to its own previous definition and that of the international community. This unilateral diplomacy harks back to Bush foreign policies that many Americans and Latin Americans believed had been thrown out with the incoming Obama administration
The Diplomacy of Deceit
As analysts piece together the events of the past few days that took us from breakthrough to breakdown in international efforts to restore rule of law in Honduras, the real story emerges.
As former ambassador Robert White writes today, Tom Shannon met with Republican Senator Jim DeMint on Oct. 20 and DeMint urged him to recognize the Honduran elections without the reinstatement of Zelaya. DeMint offered to release his holds on Shannon's nomination to the ambassadorship of Brazil and the nomination of Arturo Valenzuela to fill Shannon's shoes as Asst. Secretary of State for Western Hemisphere Affairs.
DeMint, who traveled to Honduras to meet with the coup regime last month, had blocked these two key State Department nominations ostensibly in protest of the administration’s policies to reinstate Zelaya.
White reports that there is every indication that Shannon had already formulated this critical change in policy to abandon the demand for reinstatement when he flew down to Tegucigalpa on Oct. 28, and that coup leader Roberto Micheletti knew this. That left only President Zelaya and the rest of the world in the dark as to the real goal of the negotiations.
What will surely go down in the books as one of the worst diplomatic agreements ever, was hammered out by the State Department team—Shannon, joined by Obama advisor Dan Restrepo and the man who has now been sent in to try to clean up the mess, Craig Kelly. It was signed by the two parties on Oct. 29.
The agreement includes a commitment to form a Government of National Reconciliation by Nov. 5. It calls for the Honduran Congress to vote on returning presidential powers with no deadline whatsoever. It includes a non-binding opinion from the Supreme Court, again with no deadline.
In retrospect the trap is clear. The agreement left open the absurd but possible solution of having the coup form the unity government without a legitimate president, with non-compliance made to seem the fault of Zelaya if he refused to participate. So why did Zelaya sign?
Many of us believed at that point that the State Department was negotiating in good faith to reinstate the president and that the Congressional vote was merely a face-saving measure for the coup. Zelaya had laid out a position in negotiations that it should be the Congress, and not the Court, that made the decision to revoke the destitution decree. In the context of unspoken agreements with members of the Honduran Congress and the U.S. State Department, the understanding was that the need to hold recognized elections and the threat of more sanctions had finally broken the intransigence of the coup and paved the way for a return to constitutional rule.
Lest there be any doubt about the deal, DeMint released a press statement bragging “Senator secures commitment for U.S. to back Nov. 29 elections even if Zelaya is not reinstated.”
The statement reads, “I am happy to report the Obama Administration has finally reversed its misguided Honduran policy and will fully recognize the November 29th elections... Secretary Clinton and Assistant Secretary Shannon have assured me that the U.S. will recognize the outcome of the Honduran elections regardless of whether Manuel Zelaya is reinstated. I take our administration at their word that they will now side with the Honduran people and end their focus on the disgraced Zelaya.”
He goes on to lay out his scenario for the anachronism of the first elections staged by a military coup in the 21st century.
“Now, thanks to the Obama Administration’s welcome reversal, the new government sworn into office next January can expect the full support of the United States and I hope the entire international community. I trust Secretary Clinton and Mr. Shannon to keep their word, but this is the beginning of the process, not the end. I will eagerly watch the elections, and continue closely monitoring our administration’s future actions with respect to Honduras and Latin America.”
The Washington script played out. On Nov. 9, the Senate confirmed Valenzuela. DeMint lifted his hold on Shannon's confirmation, although another Republican stepped up to protest, this time over Cuba policy. With Shannon's confirmation still blocked, it seems the Republicans repaid the diplomat in his own coin.
DeMint's crowing is understandable. The recent machinations mean that a rightwing coup could remain in power to preside over elections in which only pro-coup candidates are likely to participate. It means a setback—not defeat—of the popular movement to hold a constitutional assembly and push forward with policies to relieve the suffering of the poor and build greater equality.
But DeMint cannot take full credit for the reversal. The Clinton State Department had been signalling a reversal on the commitment to restore Zelaya for months. Statements became more and more ambivalent, sometimes saying it supported Zelaya's return and others calling only for a "return to constitutional order" without mentioning Zelaya even when pressed. This past week was the first time that it marked a clear "no-Zelaya" strategy option.
In Whites's words, "As Shannon well knew, this change of policy would give away the principal leverage the U.S. could bring to bear to persuade the de facto government to permit the prompt return of President Zelaya." By going back on the commitment to withhold recognition of elections held under a coup regime, the U.S. government has given coup leaders and the armed forces a green light to remain in power until a new president is sworn in on Jan. 27.
That president, if indeed the crisis doesn't explode into even greater proportions before then, will likely not be recognized by most of the countries in the hemisphere or a huge percentage of the Honduran population. Governance in these conditions will be impossible. Unless Zelaya is restored immediately, the groundwork has been laid for a prolonged and severe period of violence and unrest in Central America.
Move Producces Anger and Distrust in Latin America
The Honduran Congress has set no date for voting on reinstatement of President Zelaya and indicated he will not be reinstated before the elecitons.
Recall that Zelaya’s reinstatement was the key point of the San José Accords that the State Department organized under the auspices of Costa Rican president Oscar Arias, and the center of resolutions in the United Nations and the Organization of American States, both supported by the U.S. government.
The UN declaration resolves, “To reaffirm that President José Manuel Zelaya Rosales is the constitutional President of Honduras and to demand the immediate, safe, and unconditional return of the President to his constitutional functions.”
The July 1 resolution of the OAS, “Demands the immediate and unconditional restoration of the legitimate and Constitutional Government of the President of the Republic, Mr. José Manuel Zelaya Rosales, and of the legally established authority in Honduras;” Honduras was suspended from the OAS as a result of the failure to reinstate President Zelaya, amid ongoing diplomatic efforts to achieve that end.
The new U.S. position has raised the ire of other Latin American countries. At a meeting of the OAS Nov. 10, many expressed a commitment not to recognize coup-held electons. Secretary General Jose Insulza stated that the organization would not send elections observers to Honduras.
The Rio Group, which includes the U.S.’s most powerful allies in the region, Mexico and Brazil, issued an unequivocal statement Nov. 6 calling for the immediate reinstatement of Zelaya. It was signed on to by the meeting of Latin American and Caribbean (foreign) ministers held simultaneously in Montego Bay.
The 24 Latin American nations stated, “The immediate reinstatement of president Jose Manuel Zelaya in the office to which he was elected by the Honduran people constitutes an indispensable prerequisite to re-establish constitutional order, rule of law and democracy in Honduras, as well as for the normalization of relations between the Republic of Honduras and the Rio Group and for it to be possible to recognize the results of elections scheduled to take place on Nov. 29.”
Craig Kelly, one of the architects of the diplomacy of deceit revealed in the Oct. 29 agreement, has now been dispatched to patch things up. He did not receive a warm welcome from President Zelaya and unless he carries a mandate for repentence in his briefcase, he will have very little room to maneuver.http://upsidedownworld.org/main/content/vi... / ------ Magbana replies to all this: ------ In an article yesterday, Laura Carlsen, suggests that the State Department sold out Honduran democracy in order to unfreeze the hold Sen. DeMint put on diplomatic post confirmations. I doubt this. I think the US had little to sell in that regard since Honduran democracy was never a priority.
But, here is another angle you might want to consider. The hold on Valenzuela’s confirmation prevented him from being in Honduras when Tom Shannon put the screws to President Zelaya last week and from being anywhere near the US’ decision to recognize the November 29th election without reinstatement of Zelaya. Valenzuela’s lack of involvement in the questionable US role in Honduras allows him to come to his new job with clean hands. More importantly, should there be any congressional inquiry in the future about the US’ shenanigans in Honduras, Valenzuela will have “plausible deniability.”
As of now, there is still a hold on Shannon’s confirmation to be ambassador to Brazil and maybe that will be lifted after the Honduran election takes place. DeMint lifted his hold on Shannon’s confirmation at the same time he lifted the hold on Valenzuela. But, retiring Florida Sen. Mel Martinez’ replacement, Sen. George Lemieux, placed a hold on it immediately thereafter. This leaves Shannon in limbo as Valenzuela is in Shannon’s job now and Shannon has yet to hit the beaches of Ipanema.
For the State Department, the more daylight between Shannon’s duplicitous deeds in Honduras and his diplomatic post in the powerhouse of Latin America, the better. I am sure that the Brazilian diplomats in Tegucigalpa have received an earful from Zelaya about what went down with Shannon.http://hondurasoye.wordpress.com/2009/11/1... / ------------------------------------------- I don't think either of these articles is very enlightening as to what really went down in Honduras. I think that what really went down happened at the Obama-Clinton-Pentagon (top brass)-James Baker (Bush Cartel) level, not at the Shannon-Valenzuela-DeMint-Lemieux level (the foreground theater). And I fear that it is very, very, VERY bad, and basically has to do with Rumsfeld's oil war plan for South America and some hold that the Bush Cartel has on Obama. This may go way back to a deal that I think Daddy Bush engineered, in circa late 2006, to rescue Junior from Cheney/Rumsfeld's plan to nuke Iran. The deal offered Bush/Cheney immunity from impeachment/prosecution in exchange for their not nuking Iran (an action that may have brought nuclear powers China and Russia into the fray, on Iran's side--a potential Armageddon). The deal also required Rumsfeld's resignation, although he was probably also given immunity. If this is what occurred in late 2006, then several things follow. One is that the next president of the US had to agree to "the deal." And, with the US voting system now entirely in the discretionary control of a handful of far rightwing voting machine corporations, the global corporate predators and warmongers who rule over us are in a position to easily--EASILY!--determine election outcomes. The candidates were vetted on this "deal," and only those who agreed to abide by it were allowed to go forward. Obama has certainly acted like he agreed to immunity from prosecution for the Bush Junta principles. (His stated reason for not investigating/prosecuting these rancid war criminals--that "we must look forward, not backward"--is absurd on its face, and, from a Constitutional scholar, disgraceful.) Secondly (given an "Iran is off the table" scenario): If the US military's huge war machine was not to get its next oil supply from Iran, where would it get it? What I'm getting at is just about the worst thing that I was hoping against hope was not true--that Obama has agreed to the war plan, or, at the least, has agreed to not blocking the war preparations--the Honduran coup (securing the US military base in Honduras), the SEVEN new US military bases in Colombia, the $6 BILLION in military aid to Colombia, the re-activation of the US 4th Fleet in the Caribbean, the continued, virulent psyops-disinformation campaign against Chavez and other leftist leaders--perhaps in the hope (Obama's) that they will not block his re-election in 2012 (and give him an even worse Puke/'Blue Dog' controlled Congress in 2010). Then he will at some point have to decide what his response to the next "Gulf of Tonkin" will be (Colombian/Venezuelan border, or their coastal waters) when the Pentagon springs it on him. The corrupt, failed, murderous US "war on drugs" is both a huge war profiteer boondoggle, and cover for war preparations. Obama has thus far done nothing to stop the war profiteering OR the use of the "war on drugs" to surround Venezuela's main oil reserves and operations (north Venezuela/Caribbean coast) with US war assets (in Colombia, Honduras, Panama and the Caribbean). I thought there was a "hawks vs doves" struggle going on within our government over this war plan that Rumsfeld left on the desk, maybe with Obama on the right side (the "dove" side) of the struggle. I thought I saw, in the Honduran situation as it developed, his increasing awareness of the war planning and his increasing control of the Pentagon, the Bushwhack diplomatic corps in Latin America and other deep insurrectionist elements in our government and national political establishment. It may be true that Obama was NOT lying when he stated his policy for Latin America (peace, respect and cooperation), but he has lost the "hawks vs doves" struggle, for whatever reason (deals he made that are now tying his hands; other ways they've tied him down--Diebolding a Puke/'Blue Dog' Congress into place). OR, he has been a war stalking horse all along--a thing I would hate to believe about him. My gut feeling is that his hands are very tied by deals or election blackmail--that his inclination is peaceful but he doesn't have the power to establish a peaceful policy. What we are seeing in these two articles are the operatives in the foreground, as Obama (or "dove" proponents in his circle of advisers) lost the "hawks vs doves" struggle. This would explain the confusion, ambivalence and reversals of US policy. The Pentagon intends to get its next oil supply from South America--by toppling the Chavez government (and probably the Correa government in Ecuador), likely through a civil war/invasion scenario, no matter what Obama thinks about it. If he tries to stop it, he will be Diebolded out of office in 2012. If he doesn't (or can't), we are likely going to see South Vietnam all over again, as Colombia is prepped as the main proxy army and puppet government for an attempted US assault on Venezuela/Ecuador and takeover of their oil resources. The main beneficiary of this yet more genocidal quest for oil will be Exxon Mobil and brethren, who will get the contracts (as they just did in Iraq) and charge US taxpayers $500/barrel, or whatever the fuck they are currently charging the US military. (I read $500/barrel somewhere this week, but it wasn't documented--I think it was for oil to Afghanistan.) OIL! That is the deep background for the struggle in Honduras. And, while it's important to identify the foreground "players," and understand what they have done and hold them accountable (however we can), and, while I am grateful to the writers of these two articles for doing so, and for trying to analyze the foreground "play," I do think it's rather useless, as to a strategy for the left, merely to blame Shannon, or DeMint--or even Obama and Clinton-- and not see James Baker in the background. Rumsfeld signaled the war plan by his op-ed in the Washington Psst, in Dec 2007. Baker signaled one of the war preliminaries in his op-ed in the same CIA rag of a few weeks ago--the reversal of Obama policy on recognizing the coup elections in Honduras. Both of these op-eds went by unnoticed by leftist commentators. But both are absolutely crucial to understanding what the REAL rulers of the U.S. intend. Rumsfeld's op-ed was directly related (in its very first paragraph) to the effort to lure Hugo Chavez into negotiating with the FARC for hostage releases, and then pulling the rug out from under him and later accusing him of being a "terrorist lover." This was the leadup to the US/Colombian bombing/raid on Ecuador (March 2008), in which ten 500 lb US "smart bombs" blew away the FARC hostage negotiator and all hopes for peace in Colombia's 40+ year civil war. After his preface--that Chavez's help with FARC hostage negotiations is "not welcome in Colombia" (though it had been days before)--Rumsfeld then suggests bombarding the internet with anti-Chavez propaganda and urges "swift action" by the US in support of "friends and allies" in Latin America. Baker, in his op-ed of a few weeks ago, lays out the plan that US diplomats in fact carried out this week--an ugly backstabbing of Zelaya and abandonment of Obama's explicitly stated policy of no recognition of the Honduran election without Zelaya's reinstatement. James Baker--the engineer of the election coup d'etat here in 2000--is, in my opinion, orchestrating this coup and its election absurdity in Honduras, on behalf of the Bush Cartel. James Baker does not weigh in for no reason. Nor does Donald Rumsfeld (who had resigned from the Pentagon a year before his op-ed on Chavez/Latin America). These deep background power players have ONE OVERRIDING OBSESSION and it is OIL! There is really no other good explanation for this sudden reversal of an EXPLICITLY STATED Obama policy. You have to believe that Obama is a goddamned liar and a complicit Bush Cartel tool to explain this reversal, and I don't buy either of those things. The US war machine has been in motion all along on this coup, but they only exercised whatever vulture clutch they have on Obama this week, following James Baker's op-ed. It is not Shannon. It is not Clinton. It is not DeMint. It is the same people who hijacked the US military to invade Iraq--at the cost of a million innocent lives--to steal their OIL. |
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last 24 hours. What are the Traitorgate cover-ups covering up?
The reason Fitzgerald hasn't indicted anyone on the Plame/Brewster-Jennings outingS--though he has a number of the outers by the short hairs--Cheney, Libby, Rove, Armitage, Novak--COULD be that he is either suspicious of the story (political revenge) or already knows that it is a cover story. And that points to Rumsfeld, in my book. Office of Special Plans. Look at this way: This conspiracy--if it was, indeed, a conspiracy to plant the nukes in Iraq after the invasion--would have two tracks, political and operational. Cheney in the charge of the political end. Rumsfeld in charge of the operational end. Cheney segues the forged docs into a full-scale allegation against Iraq on nukes, and insures that it gets into Bush's SOTU speech (against advice from several agencies). He continues to adamantly defend that charge no matter how often it is totally and completely debunked. Why doesn't he temper it--show a bit of caution (considering the evidence)? Nope. It has got to be THAT charge--over and over. In addition, the whole Junta goes into summer '03 still maintaining that WMDs will be found (--although many will soon switch to "Iraqi freedom" as motive for the war). It's all set up for the phony "find"--and a triumphant Bush-Blair announcement that will smother all criticism, and all talk of "sexed up" prewar intel, and will cement their political positions with their FIRST and foremost justification for the war: WMDs. Rumsfeld (if this theory is true) has meanwhile got several black ops teams (possibly connected to the notorious Iran/Contra arms dealer Manucher Ghorbanifar, who was present at the Rome meeting of Pentagon Neo-Cons and SISMI in late 2001, where many suspect the Niger forgeries were cooked up) moving nukes illicitly into (or on their way to) Iraq. He's got NYT WMD propagandist Judith Miller "embedded" with the U.S. troops who were "hunting" for WMDs (and, according to reports, actually directing, or trying to direct, their efforts), ready to get the "big scoop" of a WMD "find." (She said she had an "embed" contract signed by Donald Rumsfeld. Whether it's true or not, why would she claim it? It's like saying: "...but they TOLD me there WOULD BE a story"! She had Rumsfeld's word--or the word of someone speaking for him.) And Rumsfeld furthermore permitted the creation of chaos in Iraq--in his failure to stop the looting and the breakdown of all order (in fact laughing at). Civil chaos was a prime condition for planting WMDs in Iraq and then "finding" them. It was also a prime condition for setting up a puppet government to sign the oil contracts, giving away Iraqis' interest in their only resource (--and for massive looting by corps like Halliburton). Anyway, that's how it would be: Cheney covering the political front--and scrambling to cover up the "incompetence of others" (as he put it in his memo on not wanting Libby to be the fall guy) when the shit started hitting the fan. No WMDs. Nuke allegation based on forgeries. Wilson calling them out on the false allegation. And David Kelly, in England, whistleblowing to the BBC about the "sexed up" prewar intel. It would have been RUMSFELD's responsibility to get those WMDs planted and "discovered." What we are seeing may be the political fallout of his failure to do so. (We are also seeing him gone--with no change in Iraq War policy. Was it the midterm elections? Or was it that he was operational head of this attempted massive deceit--a phony "find" of weapons--which Cheney in now having to cover for--politically and legally?) Back in early July 2003, Kelly, under interrogation at a "safe house" --after he had been outed to his bosses (late June 2003)--revealed that he knew something MORE (--Kelly "could say some uncomfortable things," is how it was reported to Tony Blair on July 7, 2003 (Hutton report))-- but he promised not to speak of it publicly ("I wasn't about to give away any government secrets" is how Kelly put it). I suspect that THIS was the trigger for the Plame/B-J outingS. Not Wilson's article of July 6, but rather the report to Blair on July 7 that Kelly "could say some uncomfortable things." (He was already whistleblowing, so it wasn't something that he HAD said--i.e., the "sexed up" the prewar intel--it was something that he COULD say. What ELSE did he know?) He had friends in Iraq--from his visits there as UN weapons inspector. He had told them that if they cooperate with the UN inspections, there would be no invasion. (And he then told a friend that if there WAS an invasion, he would be "found dead in the woods"--a truly haunting prefiguration.) IF there was a scheme to plant the weapons, he was in a good position to hear about it (--and my distant judgment of his character--excellent scientist, true believer in his mission of stopping WMD proliferation--is that he would have been offended by it; this could even have been the trigger for his own whistleblowing--it pissed him off that such deception was attempted or planned.) IF the WMD-planting theory is true, the Blairites discovery that Kelly knew about this nefarious scheme would have put tremendous pressure on the Bushites (and the Blairites), because it would appear to them that the plot was in imminent danger of being exposed--whether it was or not. How far had it gone? Who all knew? There were a couple of reports in the Islamic press about botched US efforts to plant WMDs in Iraq (--and what happened to THOSE people (local observers)--Abu Ghraib?). Was the CIA itself about to expose them (contrary to their tradition of secrecy)? But mainly, WHO ELSE knew? If the Brits couldn't keep a lid on it, how many people, from how many directions, could come at them, with facts and evidence about this audacious effort to deceive? So, in their panic, they outed EVERYBODY--the entire network of deep cover foreign agents and contacts, built up over the years, of friends of the US and friends of humanity, whose job it was to keep us all safe from illicit traffic in weapons of mass destruction. The multiple-outing was because they DIDN'T KNOW--who had foiled them, and who knew. Their purpose: 1) to punish and disable anybody who had foiled their scheme (including getting them killed by their own governments or by other bad actors); or (if they were still trying to plant the nukes or other WMDs, in July 2003) to destroy the network of WMD detectors and foilers that was slowing things up. By fall 2003, with the CIA enraged at the assault on its own agents, and calling for an investigation, they had to give it up--and switch to "Iraqi freedom" as the motive for the war (which is just about the time that that "talking point" was brought forward). Someone upthread asked, why did they kill Kelly, and not Wilson and Plame? I imagine that Wilson and Plame have lived with that fear. But the critical difference between Plame and Kelly may be that Plame, as a NOC and a high-placed CIA operative, is sworn to a lifetime of keeping government secrets, and Kelly was not. He was a scientist on loan to different agencies (including the UN weapons inspection team). He was not a spy (that we know of). He was already whistleblowing. He was "off the reservation," and could not be trusted, when he promised, under interrogation, not to disclose "government secrets." Also, she has the protection of the CIA--which, if it kills its own, likes to make that decision itself, I would imagine. And Kelly did not have any such protection. The Blair government and British intel agencies cut him loose. They outed him to the press, and sent him home without protection and apparently without surveillance. And if he WAS under surveillance, they let him bleed to death all night under a tree near his house. (--doesn't add up--none of it adds up). As for Wilson, he, a) comes under CIA protection as the husband of a NOC, I would imagine, and b) sought the protection of widespread publicity for his dissent. Kelly, too, was the subject of a blazing public controversy in England--one caused by his government's deliberate outing of him to the press. He did not seek publicity. In fact, he backed down somewhat under the kleig lights. It may have been his fatal mistake, allowing the "many dark actors playing games"* around him to spin a web of deceit around his assassination. If he had stuck to his allegation 100% (re: the "sexed up" prewar intel--which turned out, of course, to be 100% true), and had not tried to backpedal a bit, and get himself out of the way of the Blairites' pointed guns, his murder might have been significantly more difficult to cover up, and the plan to kill him abandoned. It also may be a measure of the how dangerous he was to the Bushites/Blairites that they had him killed in the midst of the publicity. One more thought: Kelly's murder may have saved the Wilson's. Three WMD-related murders in one week was too much to cover up. ---------- *(On the day he died, Kelly wrote an email to none other than Judith Miller--an old colleague of his--in which he expressed concern about the "many dark actors playing games." She had emailed him, stating that a "fan" of his had told her that he did well in the hearing that week (note: by all accounts, except this one, he did NOT do well--he was severely stressed during the parliamentary hearing at which he backpedaled on his whistleblowing accusations). He wrote back to her that he would know more by the end of the week, and that there were "many dark actors playing games." He added "thank you for your friendship and support at this time." I've recently begun to wonder if that was an ironical tag. Did he suspect her of being one of the "dark actors"? Of how he got outed to his bosses? His emails to other friends of his that day were upbeat and forward-looking--about his daughter's upcoming wedding, and plans to return to Iraq. He may have been worried about "dark actors," but he was not suicidal. He thought the storm had blown over.) (Note: Miller had used him as a major quoted source in her book "Germs" about bioweapons, published just after 9/11.) *(Notably, Miller has refused to disclose the OTHER topics of conversation between her and Libby (besides Wilson/Plame and the NIE). Fitzgerald had to agree to this, to get her testimony against Libby on his perjury/obstruction. A week after her first conversation with Libby (mid-June) about Wilson/Plame and the NIE, Kelly was outed to his bosses (as the BBC whistleblower)--initiating the train of events that led to his death several weeks later (three days after Plame was outed). And the other thing that Miller has been secretive about is the "dark actors" email itself. She wrote the NYT news obit on Kelly's death, and did not disclose this email, or her close connection to the subject of the article. It was his family who later disclosed the email.) --------- So--does Fitzgerald suspect or know that there is something much worse behind the Plame/B-J outingS, beyond Cheney and the political coverup, that has caused him to grant immunity to the actual outers (political operatives), and to be digging deeper into this onion, in his stated purpose of understanding WHY these outings occurred? And is it this--that the Niger forgeries were just Part 1 of a yet more nefarious scheme to plant the weapons--a scheme hatched out of the Pentagon, by Donald Rumsfeld, that Cheney is now covering up? Dunno. And Rumsfeld name hasn't come up at all, so far, in this case (that I know of). Fitzgerald appears to be building a conspiracy case against Cheney. But when you add up all the people whom Fitzgerald has NOT indicted--and the lack of indictments on the outing crime itself (despite a lot of evidence against certain people, just in the available info)--you have to wonder if he isn't trying to go deeper. The non-indictments (so far) could be part of the strategy of nailing Cheney for conspiracy. But the WHY of that conspiracy is still not known, except on a superficial level (effort to silence dissent--political motive). -------------------------------------- Originally posted by Peace Patriot in General Discussion Thu Feb 08th 2007, 01:52 PM Comment #150 at http://www.democraticunderground.com/discu... Visitor Tools
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