Wall St. Journal reports, "Senior Pentagon officials who were involved in planning the attack said that even by spring 2002 Mr. Zarqawi had been identified as a significant terrorist target, based in part on intelligence that the camp he earlier ran in Afghanistan had been attempting to make chemical weapons, and because he was known as the head of a group that was plotting, and training for, attacks against the West. He already was identified as the ringleader in several failed terrorist plots against Israeli and European targets. In addition, by late 2002,... Mr. Zarqawi was known to have been behind the October 2002 assassination of a senior American diplomat in Amman, Jordan. But the raid on Mr. Zarqawi didn't take place. Months passed with no approval of the plan from the White House, until word came down just weeks before the March 19, 2003, start of the Iraq war that Mr. Bush had rejected any strike on the camp until after an official outbreak of hostilities with Iraq."

Reuters: "The United Nations must show it is tough enough to ensure the security of its members so that individual countries do not take measures into their own hands, UN Secretary-General Kofi Annan said on Monday. Speaking to Chinese university students in Beijing, Annan said fighting terrorism was best achieved through cooperation and information-sharing between states, not the use of force. 'Indeed, the first purpose of the United Nations, laid down in Article 1 of the Charter, is 'to take effective collective measures for the prevention and removal of threats to the peace,' Annan said. 'We must show that the United Nations is capable of fulfilling that purpose, so that states do not feel obliged or entitled to take the law into their own hands.' " Annan did not name names here, but their initials are GWB and TB.

Al-Zawahiri came from a cultured family of professionals. He himself became a surgeon Everything changed in 1980 when Al-Zawahiri "went to to Pakistan and Afghanistan to treat mujahideen wounded in their bloody battle against Soviet occupation troops. He came back from the first of many trips a changed man." Shortly after, he was arrested in part of a Guantanamo-style dragnet for his association with a violent group in Egypt. Though ultimately he was cleared of involvement in any crime, Al-Zawahiri was thrown in prison and tortured. After the Afghan war the US pressured Pakistan to expel the mujahideen, leaving Al-Zawahiri homeless. "These men had no passports and weren't welcome in their own countries. They were homeless, fugitives with no place in the world to call home." After settling peacefully in Sudan, he was again expelled. Bitterness and rage soon drove the once gentle poet toward a new life - as a terrorist.

The only people Bush has managed to convince that they are safer with him in the White House are people who have not lived with the real threat of terrorism. 54% of Americans overall still think Bush is a better terrorism deterrent than Kerry. But people living in areas where terrorists attacks have actually occurred and/or are a constant real threat disagree. A whopping 78% of people in Japan, the UK, Germany, France, Spain, and other nations say Kerry would reduce the threat of terrorist attacks more than Bush. Btw - it is no coincidence that in New York City and Washington D.C., the two cities that actually experienced an attack, overwhelmingly support Kerry. The conclusion: the folks who think Bush is keeping them safe are living in a fantasyland, sheltered not from terrorism but from reality.

Every terrorism expert will tell you the same thing: Terrorism arises when people are desperate and feel they have no other avenues for change. Bush has increased terrorism geometrically through his policies and by attacking the very spiritual and national identities of Muslims around the world. Kerry and Edwards know that the war on terrorism must also be seen as "a war of ideas." To neutralize terrorism's roots, the US must have "a strategy to break down economic and cultural isolation in Arab and Muslim countries and support local efforts to promote democracy, trade, tolerance, and respect for human rights. The strategy includes a major initiative in public diplomacy and an international effort to improve education." More important still, Kerry and Edwards believe all these things can be achieved while respecting cultural differences.

Guardian: "Ten years ago Chechnya had a population of 2 million. Today it is 800,000, and Vladimir Putin has an army of what we estimate to be up to 300,000 Russian soldiers in Chechnya inflicting a regime of terror. Many Chechens are refugees and many others have simply disappeared, often in the night. At least 200,000 Chechen civilians have been killed by Russian soldiers, including 35,000 children. Another 40,000 children have been seriously injured, 32,000 have lost at least one parent and 6,500 have been orphaned. These are figures supported by reports of human rights organisations such as Amnesty International, and we believe they are conservative. This is how Putin's soldiers treat Chechen civilians. "

Just like his "soul mate" Bush, Putin apparently thinks that a "strong leader" is one who never compromises, never shows compassion, never takes anyone's advice. The result is always the same: More bloodshed, escalations in terrorism, more world instability. As the UK Mirror astutely observes: "How could these people descend...to seizing a school and holding children to ransom? The answer is that the longer the Russians fight their dirty war in Chechnya, the more angry and hopeless its people become. Two factors are making the problem worse. The first is President Putin. He was elected promising to win the war but he has failed. The second factor is the rise of al-Qaeda and Islamic extremism. So long as Putin offers no hope of freedom for the Chechens, then al-Qaeda will continue to recruit terrorists there and ordinary people will be driven to carry out terrible acts, just to give the Russians a taste of the loss every Chechen has endured for a decade."

"The threat of more Al Qaeda terror attacks demands an organised global response but UN-led sanctions and other measures are not working, according to a damning new report by experts at the United Nations... Al Qaeda and its supporters are making effective use of the media to drum up support in the Muslim world, capitalising on anger over the war in Iraq and continuing to try for a potentially devastating chemical or biological bomb attack, the report said... Efforts to block the sale of weapons and the movement of terror suspects - cornerstones of the UN sanctions regime against Al Qaeda and Afghanistan's former Taliban rulers - have not been effective, the study said." Remember this report when the GOP brags on TV about its "victories" over terrorists.

On CNN Daybreak this morning another predictable terror threat came to light. The latest threat was years old. The transcript goes "Some of this information, some of the specifics about these buildings, which is very scary, may in fact be quite old, but that's where the second part of the warning comes in. The timeframe, the imminence is not related to that information in Pakistan but the general warning that was already existing of the possibility of attacks within the political environment of an election year. Costello: And the documents have been compiled since before September 11? Clinch: That's what we're hearing. Now that doesn't mean they haven't continued to gather that information, and that's what Homeland Security is making clear. They had those specifics then, they may very well be continuing it." Hey George, John Kerry leading this country is not cause for a terror threat.

A new book published by an anonymous senior CIA official says that the U.S. is losing the war on terror because we don't understand that the Islamic insurgency against the U.S. is fueled primarily by anger against our actions, such as the war against Iraq, which the author describes as an "avaricious, premeditated unprovoked war against a foe who posed no immediate threat,..." The book, Imperial Hubris, says that our half-hearted wars against Afghanistan and Iraq have only helped Osama bin Laden, by creating widespread Arabic anger toward the U.S. policies in the Middle East. It also predicts that the majority of the war on terror will probably be fought on US soil, and that the next terror attack on U.S. soil will likely be worse that 9/11 and may well very well involve weapons of mass destruction.

"The State Department acknowledged that it was wrong in reporting that terrorism declined worldwide last year, a finding the Bush administration had pointed to as evidence of its success in countering terror. Instead, the number of incidents and the toll in victims increased sharply... When the report was issued April 29, senior administration officials used it as evidence that the war was being won. J. Cofer Black, coordinator of the State Department's Counterterrorism Office, cited the 190 acts of terrorism in 2003, down from 198 in 2002, as 'good news' and predicted the trend would continue. Richard L. Armitage, the deputy secretary of state, said at the time, 'You will find in these pages clear evidence that we are prevailing in the fight.' The erroneous report, titled 'Patterns of Global Terrorism,' said that attacks declined last year to the lowest level in 34 years and dropped 45% since 2001, Mr. Bush's first year as resident, when 346 attacks occurred." NOT!

"A still-secret congressional report detailing the Pentagon's inability to account for all of its Stinger shoulder-fired anti-aircraft missiles is causing consternation on Capitol Hill and raises the specter of terrorists using U.S.-made missiles to shoot down U.S. military or civilian airplanes. The report by the GAO, circulating among senior House lawmakers, states that although the Department of Defense is supposed to monitor the end-use of Stingers given or sold to other nations, 'DOD has no requirement for keeping records on the number and destinations of these Stingers.' The report is also critical of what it describes as toothless multinational anti-missile proliferation efforts... DoD does not know where to find all of the Stingers that it has either sold or given away. For example, Army records show that the Army transferred 7,551 Stingers to foreign countries from 1982 to 2004. The GAO report found that the actual number was at least 8,331."

"Former White House counter-terrorism adviser Richard Clarke on Sunday accused members of the US administration of using terror warnings to manipulate voters ahead of the presidential election in November. Clarke, who resigned last year, said the conflicting assessments of the risk of terror attacks presented by US Homeland Security Department Secretary Tom Ridge and US Attorney General John Ashcroft last week showed how some officials sought to inflate the threat for political gain. 'That was ass-covering, or perhaps, dare I say it, politics in an election year,' said Clarke, who was in Berlin on a book tour to promote his unflattering account of US President George W Bush's anti-terrorism policies, entitled Against All Enemies."

NY Times reports, "The names of six of the seven were publicly circulated by the authorities months ago, and officials who spoke on condition of anonymity said that they had no reason to believe any of the seven suspects were in the US... The announcement also came after weeks in which Mr. Bush's political standing has been battered by events in Iraq and as his re-election campaign is seeking to portray Mr. Kerry as opposed to the USA Patriot Act, the law giving the government broad powers to combat terrorism. Harold Schaitberger, head of the International Association of Fire Fighters, told reporters in a conference call organized by Mr. Kerry's campaign that he found the timing of the announcement to be 'politically convenient at best' because it came after 'we see the president's approval ratings plummet.'"

UK Independent: "Al-Qa'ida terrorists whose suicide bombs killed 35 people and injured 200 at a housing compound in Riyadh last May were secretly assisted by certain members of the Saudi National Guard which protects the royal family, military trainers employed by a US firm have claimed...(among the claims) the former trainers for the Vinnell Corporation [a suspected CIA front], which has an $800m contract to advise the Saudi National Guard, allege:... An 'exercise' organised by the national guard removed 50 of 70 security staff for the day of the bombing, thus leaving the compound 'defenceless'."

On 3/3/04 AP reported, "A Jordanian extremist suspected of bloody suicide attacks in Iraq [and now the beheading of Nick Berg] was killed some time ago in U.S. bombing and a letter outlining plans for fomenting sectarian war is a forgery, a statement allegedly from an insurgent group west of the capital said. Abu Musab al-Zarqawi was killed in the Sulaimaniyah mountains of northern Iraq 'during the American bombing there,' according to a statement circulated in Fallujah this week and signed by the 'Leadership of the Allahu Akbar Mujahedeen.' There was no way to verify the authenticity of the statement, one of many leaflets put out by a variety of groups taking part in the anti-U.S. resistance. The statement did not say when al-Zarqawi was supposedly killed, but U.S. jets bombed strongholds of the extremist Ansar al-Islam in the north last April as Saddam Hussein's regime was collapsing. It said al-Zarqawi was unable to escape the bombing because of his artificial leg."

Looks like the White House doesn't really expect any big attacks in coming months as they want us all to believe. If they did we doubt they'd be allowing any post-9/11 federal airport rules to be relaxed. But..."Pittsburgh International could become the nation's first major airport to get the OK to abandon the post-Sept. 11 rule that says only ticketed passengers are allowed past security checkpoints. Federal security officials are considering allowing people once more to say their hellos and goodbyes to friends and loved ones at the gate. Airport officials and western Pennsylvania's congressional delegation have pushed for two years for the change for reasons of money and passenger convenience. What happens here could become a model for other airports."

"On Oct. 10, 2001, Ashcroft, Bush and FBI director Robert Mueller appeared at FBI headquarters to announce the creation of the Most Wanted Terrorists list (http://www.fbi.gov/mostwant/terrorists/fugitives.htm). Bush called the 22 individuals placed on the list 'the most dangerous [terrorists] -- the leaders and key supporters, the planners and strategists.' Bush added, 'They must be found. They will be stopped, and they will be punished.' But thirty months later, at least 20 of the terrorist are still at large. Yet, Ashcroft bragged in October 2003 that 'two-thirds of al-Qaida's leadership worldwide is either in custody or dead.'" Bush's "War on Terror" has been a Miserable Failure - like every other aspect of his criminal regime.

A new study shows the results of Bush's anti-terrorism efforts as those efforts directly impact Americans. Less than half (47%) of Americans believe the nation is safer now than before 9/11. While 73% say they are now in a state of anxiety over possible attacks, fewer than 1 in 5 knew what their community and state emergency response plans were. Just 36% knew what their workplace plan was, while a shocking 27% knew what their local school's plan was. Bioterrorist attacks - for which the nation is least prepared according to several studies - inspire the most fear. The three factors cited by most in the study as most important in protecting America were adequate equipment and training, tight border control, and a Homeland security hotline. Bush has so far failed to deliver on all three.

The FBI last week warned BP that its refinery was under threat of a terrorist attack based on information the agency had received. http://www.nytimes.com/2004/03/25/national/25CND-TEXA.html Now a week later, the BP refinery is struck by a massive explosion. The company was suspiciously quick - too quick - to claim there was no sign of "any outside influence" in the blast and fire. Yeah, right! As if they could know that before a complete investigation is conducted! The week before, the company claimed it was doing everything it could to protect its refineries - but the blast shows that, once again, the oil industry and Homeland Security are long on hype and short on action designed to protect Americans. The question remains: was it a foreign terrorist...or an industrial terrorist?

Peter Neuman writes, "Sept. 11, 2001, brought about a quick re-orientation of foreign policy. What didn't change, however, was the state-centered mindset of the people who were in charge. According to Mr. Clarke, Donald Rumsfeld immediately suspected Saddam Hussein, and suggested military strikes against Iraq. While cooler heads prevailed at the time, and there was a real effort to track down and destroy the Qaeda network, there was also a reluctance to abandon the idea that terrorism had to be state-based. Hence the administration's insistence that there must be an 'axis of evil' - a group of states critical in sustaining the terrorists. It was an attempt to reconcile the new, confusing reality with long-established paradigm of state sponsorship. In the end, the 9/11 hearings are likely to find that intelligence failure[s] led to the horrific attacks... But it was also a failure of vision - one for which the current administration must take responsibility."

Robert Fisk writes in the Independent: "They had been warned. The Aznars and the Blairs and the Bushes had been told by those who were their allies - France and Germany and many others, not to mention the Arabs - that their crusade against al-Qa'ida could most cruelly rebound upon them. The Madrid bombings are not only a terrible revenge for Spain's participation in 'part two' of the 'war on terror' - the illegal invasion of Iraq - but a cruel and incrementally more painful attack on civilians by al-Qa'ida."

"The world is overestimating the dangers of global terrorism, especially when compared with a possible greater threat posed by environmental risks, says Hans Blix. "I think we still overestimate the danger of terror... There are other things that are of equal, if not greater, magnitude, like the environmental global risks." The hard facts support Blix. While 3,000 people died on 9/11, at least 30,000 Americans will die this year from the impact of air pollution - a situation Bush policy is making WORSE, not better. (see http://www.catf.us/publications/reports/death_disease_dirty_power.php). And isn't just environmental risks that are costing lives -- 18,000 Americans die each year due to lack of health insurance, yet Bush repudiates the idea of universal healthcare. (http://www.usatoday.com/news/health/2004-01-14-insurance-panel_x.htm) In Afghanistan and Iraq, an estimated 10,000-plus lives have been lost in the NAME of fighting terrorism. Yes, it's hard not to see Mr. Blix's point!

"A former Army Ranger inspired by anti-abortion activists pleaded guilty Friday to devising a plot to blow up abortion clinics and gay bars nationwide. Stephen John Jordi, an evangelical Christian from Coconut Creek with a flaming cross tattooed to his right forearm, pleaded guilty to one count of attempted firebombing. In stark contrast to his agitated, grizzled appearance after his Nov. 11 arrest, Jordi was calm and clean shaven during the brief hearing at U.S. District Court in Fort Lauderdale. In return for the guilty plea, prosecutors John Schlesinger and Gerald Greenberg agreed to drop two other counts: spreading explosive information and possession of an unregistered firearm. Public defenders Anne Lyons and Michael Spivack said prosecutors also agreed not to press charges against Jordi's wife, Charlotte, who has relocated with their four children, to Pensacola."

The PentaPost splashed the alleged "bioterror attack" on Sen Maj. Leader Bill Frist's office across page one, squeezing out the Dem primaries and news that Bush has dived again in polls. Yet the Post fails to mention that some of the preliminary tests of the mystery powder were negative for ricin. The "confirmation" of ricin comes only from a Ft. Detrick (as in Pentagon-controlled) lab. The Post also fails to mention that Frist's usual office is NOT in the Dirksen building - and that he & staff were only there temporarily (how did the "terrorist" know this?) Last, the Post doesn't mention that members of the Frist staff - the staff who "discovered" the "ricin" - are currently under investigation for Watergate-style computer espionage targeting Dems. Earlier in his political consulting career, Karl Rove bugged his OWN office to start an FBI investigation of the opposing candidate. Is this ricin "attack" yet another Karl Rove dirty trick?

ABC reports: "An anti-abortion activist, calling for a new wave of violence against clinics and doctors, is following the example of violent Islamic fundamentalists, telling those who share his views to become 'Christian terrorists' and promising them a reward in Heaven. There is some question among academics and others who follow extremist movements in the United States about how seriously to take the rhetoric, particularly because none believe that such views are shared by more than, at most, a few hundred people." This is reassuring? It only took 19 men with boxcutters to kill nearly 3,000 people. Worse, the Bush government, stuffed with religious fanatics, is fueling the problem, while failing to take any steps to curb it. (See http://www.newsinsider.org/seal/unchecked_and_unreported.html)

"Investigators found nearly 500,000 rounds of ammunition, 65 pipe bombs and briefcases that could be detonated by remote control. Most distressing, they said, was the discovery of 800 grams of almost pure sodium cyanide... found inside an ammunition canister, next to hydrochloric, nitric and acetic acids and formulas for making bombs. If acid were mixed with the sodium cyanide, an analysis showed, it would create a bomb powerful enough to kill everyone inside a 30,000-square-foot facility, investigators said. Also discovered were anti-Semitic, antiblack and antigovernment books and pamphlets, according to the FBI's affidavit... [Critics say] if the defendants in this case had been people with foreign backgrounds or Muslims, U.S. Atty. Gen. John Ashcroft himself would have announced the arrests and the guilty pleas. Instead... it remains virtually unknown outside East Texas - even though, critics point out, it represents an instance in which federal authorities discovered a WMD."

"Clinton fought bin Laden tooth and nail -- whereas the Bush Administration cut off drone tracking of bin Laden, abandoned federal oversight of terrorist money laundering and offshore banking operations, and, according to the Sydney Morning Herald, ordered federal agencies to 'back off' the bin Laden family. Earlier this year, Army Lt. Gen. Donald Kerrick was asked to compare the counter-terrorism efforts of the Clinton and Bush Administrations... Kerrick noticed a big difference on terrorism, according to a front-page report in the Washington Post: Clinton's Cabinet advisers, burning with the urgency of their losses to bin Laden in the African embassy bombings in 1998 and the Cole attack in 2000, had met 'nearly weekly' to direct the fight, Kerrick said. Among Bush's first-line advisers, 'candidly speaking, I didn't detect' that kind of focus, he said. 'That's not being derogatory. It's just a fact.'"

"It began as a misdelivered envelope and developed into the most extensive domestic terrorism investigation since the Oklahoma City bombing. Last month, an east Texas man pleaded guilty to possession of a weapon of mass destruction. Inside the home and storage facilities of William Krar, investigators found a sodium-cyanide bomb capable of killing thousands, more than a hundred explosives, half a million rounds of ammunition, dozens of illegal weapons, and a mound of white-supremacist and antigovernment literature. 'Without question, it ranks at the very top of all domestic terrorist arrests in the past 20 years in terms of the lethality of the arsenal,' says Daniel Levitas, author of 'The Terrorist Next Door: The Militia Movement and the Radical Right.' But outside Tyler, Texas, the case is almost unknown. In the past nine months, there have been two government press releases and a handful of local stories, but no press conference and no coverage in the national newspapers."

Memory Hole reports: "In May 2003, white supremacists in Texas were caught with a sodium cyanide bomb, other bombs, illegal weapons, hate literature, fake I.D., and chemicals, including hydrochloric acid and nitric acid. In mid-November, three people pleaded guilty to related charges, while seized documents indicate that there are other co-conspirators at large. The feds have served 'hundreds of subpoenas across the country,' and the plot has been included in the President's daily intelligence briefings. But most of us have never heard about it. The only media that saw fit to report about this terrorist plot within the US were a few newspapers and TV stations in Texas... Why have the media decided that this is a non-story? It's hard to say, but we can say with certainty that if Muslims had been caught with these weapons of mass destruction, fake I.D., gas masks, and books on making explosives, it would've been front-page news for days. "

"Federal authorities this year mounted one of the most extensive investigations of domestic terrorism since the [OKC] bombing, CBS 11 has learned. Three people linked to white supremacist and anti-government groups are in custody. At least one weapon of mass destruction - a sodium cyanide bomb capable of delivering a deadly gas cloud - has been seized in the Tyler area. Investigators have seized at least 100 other bombs, bomb components, machine guns, 500,000 rounds of ammunition and chemical agents. But the government also found some chilling personal documents indicating that unknown co-conspirators may still be free to carry out what appeared to be an advanced plot. And, authorities familiar with the case say more potentially deadly cyanide bombs may be in circulation." Hey, why isn't Ashcroft out there scaring us with these guys? He sure did get a rush out of snarling 'Al Qai-DUH!' and 'John Walker LINDH'... Guess he doesn't want to embarrass his base with their crazy relatives...

"A U.N. report due out in early December is expected to say that al-Qaeda, while probably weakened by U.S.-led assaults, possesses surface-to-air missiles for use against aircraft and is working toward a biological- or chemical-weapons attack. In Afghanistan, the Taliban militia ousted in late 2001 is resurgent, fueled by an upsurge in opium production. And while terror training camps have been eliminated in Afghanistan, new ones are being established in the Caucasus and the Philippines... No evidence of links between deposed Iraqi leader Saddam Hussein and al-Qaeda has been made public since the U.S. invasion, despite prewar claims by top Bush aides that such ties posed a growing threat to the United States. According to current and former officials, the Bush administration diverted precious assets, including U.S. military special operations forces, intelligence operatives and spy satellites from tracking al-Qaeda to the war in Iraq."

"A futures market first proposed by the Pentagon that allows speculators to bet on assassinations, coups and acts of terrorism is to be set up without government involvement, it emerged yesterday. The project, abandoned in August after political criticism, will be launched next month by the San Diego-based technology company Net Exchange - the firm the Pentagon worked with on the idea. 'At present, we aren't making any of that public,' said the company president, Charles Polk, yesterday. 'Given the treatment this received in the political machine in July and August, and in much of the press, we are being a little guarded in our approach.' The Pentagon's proposal, known as a policy analysis market, was slated, particularly in the US senate. Critics derided the prospect of speculation on acts such as terrorism, assassination and armed conflict."

"The fastest growing economy in the world is the new economy of terror, a sophisticated international economic system sustained by terror groups, their sponsors, terror states and various affiliates. Over the last decade the new economy of terror has merged with the international illegal and criminal economy and together they generate a yearly turnover of $1.5 trillion, equivalent to 5% of world GDP. Privatisation, deregulation, openness, the free movement of labour and capital, technological advances have been exploited by and adapted into the terror economy in a macabre form of geo-political ju-jitsu: the very strengths of legitimate economies have been turned into double-edged swords. Many of the states the terror economy seeks to displace are the source of arms, logistics, refuge and finance for terror groups. The US dollar, the world's reserve currency, is the new economy of terror's main currency. "

"A top State Department official criticized the military Tuesday for agreeing to a wartime cease-fire with an Iranian rebel group based in Saddam Hussein's Iraq. 'We shouldn't have been signing a cease-fire with a foreign terrorist organization,' Deputy Secretary of State Richard Armitage [yet another old spook who was involved in Iran-Contra] told the Senate Foreign Relations Committee. The military signed an April 16 cease-fire with the Mujahedeen Khalq after warplanes from the U.S.-led coalition invading Iraq and bombed Mujahedeen Khalq sites. The group agreed to disarm and was not attacked again. Armitage did not say how he believed the group should have been handled. Pentagon officials have defended the cease-fire decision, saying the military's focus at the time was to defeat Iraq, and American troops could not afford to be fighting another heavily armed group at the same time."

Why hasn't Bush found Osama Bin Forgotten or Saddam Who'sHe? Because the man Bush put in charge of the hunt - Gen. William 'Jerry' Boykin - IS NOT LOOKING FOR THEM! "In June 2003, Boykin spoke to a church group over a slide show: 'Well, is he [bin Laden] the enemy? Next slide. Or is this man [Saddam] the enemy? The enemy is none of these people I have showed you here. The enemy is a spiritual enemy. He's called the principality of darkness. The enemy is a guy called Satan.' " Say WHAT??? "Boykin also routinely tells audiences that God, not the voters, chose Resident Bush: 'Why is this man in the White House? The majority of Americans did not vote for him. Why is he there? And I tell you this morning that he's in the White House because God put him there for a time such as this.'" Did God want Bush to ignore all the urgent warnings about Al Qaeda so the 9-11 terrorists could succeed? Did God want 3,000 people to die on 9-11? Boykin isn't just blind - he's blasphemous!

"BUZZFLASH: Another factor in terms of the relationship that you've described as sleeping with the devil, and that you detail in your book, is that the Saudis have very shrewdly given jobs and consulting contracts to politicians and American government officials as they leave their government jobs. BAER: I could have sat down and done a list of all my former colleagues from the CIA who ended up on the Saudi Arabian payroll. Some of them are known, like Ray Close. Others have gone public, but there are others that haven't. A bunch of my colleagues went to work for a public consulting firm where the initial capital was paid for by the Saudi embassy to lobby the Hill for the Gulf countries. A former member of the National Security Council under Reagan set this up. And it's not like it's a secret."

Noam Chomsky: "For the second 9/11 anniversary and beyond, we basically have two choices. We can march forward with confidence that the global enforcer will drive evil from the world, much as the president's speech writers declare, plagiarizing ancient epics and children's tales. Or we can subject the doctrines of the proclaimed grand new era to scrutiny, drawing rational conclusions, perhaps gaining some sense of the emerging reality.... We should be able to appreciate recent comments by Ami Ayalon, the 1996-2000 head of Israel's General Security Service, who observed that 'those who want victory' against terror without addressing underlying grievances 'want an unending war.' The observation generalizes in obvious ways. The world has good reason to watch what is happening in Washington with fear and trepidation. The people who are best placed to relieve those fears, and to lead the way to a more hopeful and constructive future, are the people of the U.S., who can shape the future."

"The Philippine government has ... reaped a bonanza from its status as Washington's favoured terror-fighting ally in Asia. US military aid increased from $2m in 2001 to $80m a year, while US soldiers and special forces flooded into Mindanao to launch offensives against Abu Sayyaf, a group the White House claims has links to al-Qaida.... Local newspaper reports described the army's selling of weapons to rebels as 'an open secret' and 'common knowledge'.... [S]uspicions stem from a bizarre incident on May 16 2002, in Davao. Michael Meiring, a US citizen, allegedly detonated explosives in his hotel room, injuring himself badly. While recovering in hospital, Meiring was whisked away by two men - who witnesses say identified themselves as FBI agents - and flown to the US... BusinessWorld, a leading Philippine newspaper, has published articles openly accusing Meiring of being a CIA agent involved in covert operations 'to justify the stationing of American troops and bases in Mindanao.'"

The UK Independent reports: "The BBC journalist who broke the news that a British man had been arrested for trying to sell a missile to terrorists is to sue an American magazine which claimed his scoop had ruined FBI plans to infiltrate al-Qa'ida. Tom Mangold - a friend of David Kelly who spoke on behalf of the weapons inspector's family after his death - has instructed the law firm Mishcon de Reya to begin legal action against Newsweek. Mr Mangold said Mr Lakhani flew from Heathrow on Sunday and was followed on to the plane. Russian and British agents were involved. In New York a surveillance team was waiting for the 'final act', the arrival of the weapon - which had been disarmed -by ship... A BBC spokeswoman said: 'Obviously ... for Christopher Christie ... to say the news media in Britain did not compromise the investigation gave Tom Mangold the confidence to go to Mishcon de Reya and ask them to start proceedings.'"

WashPost reports: "A Qatari man described by federal prosecutors as an al Qaeda 'sleeper operative' was designated an enemy combatant by President [sic] Bush yesterday, as the government dropped criminal charges against him and turned him over to the U.S. military. Ali S. Marri, who arrived in the United States the day before the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks, was trained in computer hacking and the use of poisons, according to new information the United States has obtained from former al Qaeda operations chief Khalid Sheik Mohammed and another captured al Qaeda operative, prosecutors said... Marri's wife, Maha, is a Saudi citizen who was transported out of the United States in November by the Saudi Embassy, angering FBI agents and prosecutors who had confiscated her passport and issued her a grand jury subpoena. Saudi Embassy officials said they considered the subpoena expired... Jamie Fellner of Human Rights Watch called the [enemy combatant] designation of Marri 'extremely troubling.'"

The UK Daily Telegraph reports: "The American al-Qa'eda operative unmasked last week as having planned to bring down the Brooklyn Bridge was first detained in March, and has been used by the FBI for months as a double agent, it was reported yesterday. US authorities waited until last week to announce a plea bargain struck with Iyman Faris, a Pakistani-born lorry driver ordered to scout out terror targets, including the New York landmark. They did not say that Faris, who was also ordered to study ultralight aircraft, and the possibility of derailing a train into a chemical storage facility in Washington, had been under FBI control for months."

"The alleged plan -- to use blowtorches to cut the suspension cables of the bridge -- seems highly improbable, given both the structure of the 120-year-old span and the police scrutiny it has received since Sept. 11, 2001... But if Mr. Faris and his co-conspirators were actively plotting to bring down the bridge, New York City authorities were even more aggressive in protecting it. What may have been the truck driver's final message to his confederates before his arrest was, after all, a warning that the bridge was too well protected to try to destroy... This case [is] a ringing endorsement of [NYC's] own local security efforts... But despite its financial problems, the city spent $207 million last year on antiterrorism security... Yet Republicans in the House... are currently attempting to slash the amount of federal aid destined for high-threat big cities." Instead, Bush and the Republicans would rather create a Big Brother system under the two Johns -- Ashcroft and Poindexter.

Norway's Aftenposten reports: "An armed Iranian exile group listed as a terrorist organization by the USA and European Union may now get US support to help topple Iran's ruling regime. The Mujahedin-e Khalq Organization (MKO) has its European headquarters in Norway. Although the MKO has been listed as a terrorist organization by the USA and EU since 1997 and its leaders are banished from most European nations, it is not listed by the United Nations... British newspaper The Daily Telegraph reported that the Pentagon is now considering aiding the MKO as part of an overall strategy of trying to destabilize and topple Iran from within. According to the Telegraph, the group's 'military expertise and discipline has impressed the Pentagon, which has suggested it could be renamed and operate with clandestine American help'. The MKO has carried out several political assassinations in Iran and built up an army on the Iran border with the blessing of former Iraq head Saddam Hussein."

From LA Times: "Al Qaeda has not only survived the US-led crackdown against it, but it has also found weaknesses in the tactics of its pursuers and is exploiting them, according to interviews with US officials... Of particular concern, these officials say, are indications that the terrorist network has infiltrated an unknown number of essentially untraceable operatives into the United States. Some of them are believed to be planning suicide bombings against 'soft targets' such as subways within the next several months... The new waves of recruits may be even more dangerous than those who joined Al Qaeda before the Sept. 11 attacks. Al Qaeda has purposely chosen many locations, such as Riyadh, in which the local Muslim populations are boiling with anger over worsening economic conditions and what they perceive to be a US-led campaign to smash Islam under the guise of the war on terrorism." Are you safer today than you were before George II moved into the White House?

Mark Fazlollah writes for the Philadelphia Inquirer: "In the first two months of this year, the Justice Department filed charges against 56 people, labeling all the cases as 'terrorism.' But an Inquirer investigation has found that at least 41 of them had nothing to do with terrorism - a point that prosecutors of the cases themselves acknowledge. Among the cases: 28 Latinos charged with working illegally at the airport in Austin, Texas, most of them using phony Social Security numbers. Eight Puerto Ricans charged with trespassing on Navy property on the island of Vieques, long a site of civil protests of ordnance testing. A Middle Eastern man indicted in Detroit for allegedly passing bad checks who has the same name as a Hezbollah leader. A Middle Eastern college student charged in Trenton with paying a stand-in to take his college English-proficiency tests. He received a one-month jail sentence after pleading guilty."

"The U.S.-led war on Iraq gave Al Qaeda the opportunity to reinvigorate its weakened terrorist network with new recruits and more funding, say experts on terrorism. The Iraq war 'clearly increased the terrorist impulse,' said Jonathan Stevenson, senior fellow for counter-terrorism at London's International Institute for Strategic Studies... 'The political masters in the U.S. and Europe underestimated the extent to which bin Laden would use the war in Iraq as a propaganda weapon to rejuvenate the movement and attract more funds,' said Paul Wilkinson, head of the Center for the Study of Terrorism and Political Violence... in Scotland. 'As far as the war against Al Qaeda goes, it possibly has been counterproductive. We face turbulent times ahead'... 'So while the Al Qaeda leadership has been weakened, the network as a whole has become more elusive than before,' [Stevenson] said, adding that responsibility for planning and carrying out attacks rests more than ever with local groups."

WashPost reports: "Saudi authorities are investigating suspected illegal arms sales by members of the country's national guard to al Qaeda operatives in the country, U.S. and Saudi officials said. The weapons were seized in a May 6 raid on an al Qaeda safe house and were traced to national guard stockpiles, the officials said... A small number of officers in the national guard have been involved in illicit gun sales for years, according to the officials, and have sold weapons, including automatic rifles, to anyone willing to pay prices well above their market value. The officials emphasized that the motivation of the officers selling the weapons was money, not ideology, and does not indicate any al Qaeda penetration of a force that is supposed to protect the government."

"Malaysian Prime Minister Mahathir Mohamad on Saturday described the latest suicide bombings in Morocco as a result of how the world chose to fight the war on terror. 'We've said that overcoming the problem of terrorism by killing people and by the incursion and invasion of their countries, there'll be horrible consequences. Now, let's just watch what's happening'... Mahathir, a veteran Muslim leader who was a strong opponent of US plans to attack Iraq said he had stated from the beginning that there should be a stop to the Israeli aggression on Palestinians as it had heightened anger among Muslims and provoked them to take revenge. 'But they feel that for one of them killed, they'll kill 10. If there are more, we'll conquer your country and topple the government...it seems they can out-terrorise the terrorists. 'It may be true, but I see that these attacks will continue in many places,' he said in reaction to the string of suicide bombings in Casablanca."

Joe Conason writes: "Those murderous explosions in Riyadh have silenced, for the moment, the p-resident's round of triumphal speechifying about American progress in the war on terrorism. As we are now beginning to learn, there is a 'Potemkin village' quality to the U.S. victory in Afghanistan, which is descending into chaos. And there is an equal likelihood that we will be in more peril, not less, as a result of the Iraq invasion. Dividend taxes will be cut, but U.S. ports, factories and nuclear installations remain inadequately protected. No weapons of mass destruction have been found in Iraq, but unknown amounts of radioactive material were left unguarded and have gone missing. Our ties with allies are frayed when we need international cooperation more than at any time since the end of the Cold War."

AP reports: "Suicide attackers set off a string of explosions in the heart of Casablanca, killing at least 40 people at a Jewish community center, the Belgian consulate, a Spanish social club and a major hotel. The five separate but nearly simultaneous attacks on Friday night injured 60 people and threw the city into chaos. Decapitated bodies and smashed cars littered the streets. Walls were peeled back and some buildings partially leveled. Alone in the wreckage, a woman howled in anguish. The attacks came just days after U.S. officials warned that al-Qaida was planning a worldwide series of terrorist attacks. The assailants carried out the carnage with precision, witnesses said. Three of them entered the restaurant in the Casa de Espana social club after slitting the security guard's throat with a large knife, Lamia Haffi, an employee, told Spanish National Radio. Then two of them detonated explosives, she said."

Bloomberg reports: "The car-bomb attacks on three residential compounds in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia, that killed nine Vinnell Corp. employees have triggered alarm bells among the hush- hush coterie of some 200 firms that, like Vinnell, specialize in 'sutling.' That is, the business of supplying U.S. military operations abroad with logistical support and of training foreign armies in the art of war. 'They are in the terrorist cross-hairs and being targeted,' says P.W. Singer, an analyst at the Brookings Institution... Adds former Central Intelligence Agency Director James Woolsey, 'These companies need to be concerned. It's of extraordinary importance.' There's nothing new in companies capitalizing from combat, or having to pay the ultimate price in lives. Singer estimates military consulting firms with names such as Executive Outcomes, Armor Holdings Inc., Dyncorp Inc. and MPRI rake in an industry wide total of $100 billion annually." Vinnell is suspected of being a CIA front.

The UK Guardian reports: "The impact of the terrorist attacks in Saudi Arabia began to reverberate through US politics yesterday as the Bush administration defended itself against charges that it had taken its eye off the ball over al-Qaida because of its obsession with Iraq. With George Bush's critics alleging that serious counterterrorism efforts had become 'lost in the shuffle', analysts warned that by fostering the widespread [bogus] perception that Saddam Hussein and al-Qaida were closely linked, the White House might have created unrealistic expectations that in destroying the Iraqi regime, it was also crushing the terrorist threat."

Maureen Dowd writes: "Busy chasing off Saddam, the resident and vice resident had told us that Al Qaeda was spent. 'Al Qaeda is on the run,' Resident Bush said last week. 'That group of terrorists who attacked our country is slowly but surely being decimated. . . . They're not a problem anymore'... The administration's lulling triumphalism about Al Qaeda exploded on Monday in Riyadh, when well-planned and coordinated suicide strikes with car bombs and small-arms fire killed dozens in three housing complexes favored by Westerners, including seven Americans. The attack was timed to coincide with Colin Powell's visit to the kingdom, and clearly meant to hurt both America and Saudi Arabia... Buried in the rubble of Riyadh are some of the Bush administration's basic assumptions: that Al Qaeda was finished, that invading Iraq would bring regional stability and that a show of American superpower against Saddam would cow terrorists."

AP reports: "One Democratic senator, Bob Graham of Florida, put the blame closer to home. Graham, a presidential hopeful, said the attacks might not have occurred if the Bush administration hadn't diverted military and intelligence resources from the fight against the al-Qaida network to the Iraq war. Monday's attacks Monday were among the deadliest against Americans since Sept. 11, 2001. Attackers shot their way into the housing compounds, then set off bombs packed into their cars... At a news conference, Graham said the Iraq war 'was a distraction. It took us off the track of the war on terror, which we were on a path to win.' He said Monday's attack 'could have been avoided if you had actually crushed the basic infrastructure of al-Qaida'... Sen. Russell Feingold, D-Wis., shared Graham's views. Speaking on the Senate floor shortly before Graham's news conference, Feingold said he fears 'that our (anti-terrorism) mission has become obscured, and our approach unfocused.'"

Ian Cobain reports for the UK Times Online: "As befits a company that has been accused of being a CIA front, of recruiting 'executive mercenaries' and attempting to overthrow the Prime Minister of a Commonwealth state, the Vinnell Corporation kept a low profile in Riyadh. Its discreet security fooled nobody, however: the bomb attack was the second it has suffered in eight years. In 1995 seven people were killed. This shadowy corporation is said to have been founded during the Depression. Dan Briody, author of The Iron Triangle, a study of Vinnell's one-time owners, the Carlyle Group, serialised last week in The Times, says that there is 'no publicity, no press releases, no news clippings.' He adds: 'No one knows who the original owners were.'"

The UK Guardian reports: "Iran expressed outrage [last week] at a US ceasefire agreement with an Iranian resistance group based in Iraq that has been named by Washington as a terrorist organisation. The ceasefire deal between the US military and the Iraq-based Mojahedin Khalq Organisation (MKO) allows the group to keep its weapons. 'In the wake of the terrorist attacks in the US, Washington was portraying itself as anti-terrorist, but it entered into a deal with a terrorist group which they have nurtured and given a safe haven in Washington,' said the head of the powerful expediency council." This is just par for the course for the Bush Crime Family. Along the way, they have armed, financed and supported Noriega, Saddam Hussein, the Mujahideen (and therefore Osama bin Laden) -- and -- after the bombing of the marine barracks in Lebanon -- the Iranian sponsors of the terrorists who were responsible. What future blowback is in store for us, thanks to the Bush gang's dealings?

Paul Webster writes for the UK Guardian: "The American journalist Daniel Pearl was kidnapped and murdered in Pakistan because he uncovered links between the British terrorist Richard Reid and the Pakistani secret service, according to an investigation by the French philosopher and author Bernard-Henri Levy. Levy's book Who Killed Daniel Pearl? traces the Wall Street Journal correspondent's last investigation after he was persuaded to go to Pakistan by a London-born double agent, Omar Saeed Sheikh. Sheikh has since been sentenced to death in Pakistan for overseeing the murder, in which the reporter's body was cut into 10 pieces. Levy spent several weeks in Pakistan and described it as 'the most delinquent of delinquent nations'. He said Muslims such as Reid who were linked to al-Qaida were being manipulated by 'the most violent and most anti-American faction' inside the Pakistani intelligence service."

Cheryl Seal writes, "While Bush turns the country into a Gulag in the name of fighting terrorism, relentlessly persecuting Muslims and anyone who has even a passing acquaintance with a fundie Muslim group, nowhere will you find any similar concern by Bush, Ashcroft, or any of their marshmallows in the American media about Christian terrorists. Yet, although this group may not be able to claim responsibility for a single crime on the scale of 9/11, its crimes of violence are far, far greater in number: According to the Department of Justice, the present total is more than a dozen murders, 15 attempted murders, 209 bombings, 72 arsons, more than 750 death and bomb threats, and unknown hundreds of acts of vandalism, stalking, burglary, and harassment." These terrorists call themselves "pro-lifers".

Jack Shafer writes for Slate: "Ensconced in an interrogation shed somewhere outside the United States, alleged Sept. 11 'architect' Khalid Sheikh Mohammed is reportedly singing details about al-Qaida to his captors. But the recipients of Mohammed's revelations, U.S. 'officials,' seem to have one story for the Washington Post today and another for the New York Times...This kind of reporting requires newspaper readers to work like intelligence analysts, sorting through alleged facts to find the truth. The reliability of stories, such as these, sourced anonymously to a prisoner who has every reason to lie, is low. But not so low as to be worthless. Still, it would be helpful if editors rated the truth value of stories like the dueling pair from the Post and Times today...Put another way: It's not that newspapers shouldn't write stories like these or that we shouldn't read them. The issue is simply how big a grain of salt we should take as we swallow this stuff."

The Moonie UPI reports that Rand Beers, "The top National Security Council official in the war on terror resigned this week for what a NSC spokesman said were personal reasons, but intelligence sources say the move reflects concern that the looming war with Iraq is hurting the fight against terrorism' ... 'This is a very intriguing decision (by Beers),' said author and intelligence expert James Bamford. 'There is a predominant belief in the intelligence community that an invasion of Iraq will cause more terrorism than it will prevent. There is also a tremendous amount of embarrassment by intelligence professionals that there have been so many lies out of the administration -- by Bush, Cheney and Powell - over Iraq.' Bamford cited a recent address by Bush that cited documents, which allegedly proved Iraq was continuing to pursue a nuclear program, that were later shown to be forgeries."

"Worldwide attention is expected in the trial of Karim Koubriti, Ahmed Hannan, Farouk Ali-Haimoud and Abdel-Ilah Elmardoudi. They were arrested following a raid on a southwest Detroit (Michigan) apartment that was conducted while the Joint Terrorism Task Force was seeking a man high on the FBI's terror watch list. U. S. District Judge Gerald Rosen already has imposed a gag order forbidding lawyers from both sides to comment on even the most basic elements of the case. On Tuesday, he's expected to decide whether to close jury selection to the public." This trial is being closely watched as it is the first for terrorism since the bombing of the World Trade Center on September 11, 2001. Jurors have been given a 27-page questionnaire with 100 questions that might help to determine the jurors ethnicity (which is illegal) or political leanings. The entire process has been handled in typical Bush administration style utilizing secrecy and fear.

"An Egyptian radical will get $27 million as a reward for giving the United States information that led authorities to alleged [9/11] mastermind Khalid Shaikh Mohammed...The sources, confirming a story previously reported in a British paper and in Newsweek, said the unnamed Egyptian was captured during a raid in Quetta, Pakistan, last month. The Egyptian was described as an al Qaeda foot soldier. Officials said he not only claimed the $25 million award that was being offered by the U.S. government for information that led to Mohammed's arrest, but also demanded $2 million more to help cover the costs of his family moving to Great Britain. He is being paid the money, the sources said." What will this Al Qaida foot soldier do with that money? Isn't this providing aid and comfort to the enemy? One of the outrages of Iran-Contra is that it went completely against what Reagan said publicly, "America will never make concessions to terrorists." Concession? This is outright bribery!

Wall St Journal reports, "Halliburton Co. says an oil-field device that contains radioactive material was stolen in early December from its operations in Nigeria. Atomic-watchdog officials are concerned that the material - americium 241 - could be used to create a so-called dirty bomb... IAEA investigators have been in the west African nation for two weeks but have been unable to determine how the device was stolen... There's no evidence the theft is connected to terrorism. Nigeria oil and natural-gas production is plagued by petty vandalism and theft. The Department of Homeland Security played down the significance of the incident. 'This is a fairly common occurrence,' said spokesman Brian Roehrkasse. 'It is not a major issue at this time.'... These devices typically contain about 10 curies of radioactive americium. If this were combined with a pound of TNT and exploded, an area covering 60 city blocks would be contaminated." And it's NOT a major issue for BushRidge???

The NY Times ran a front-page profile of Abu Mussab al-Zarqawi, who is Colin Powell's alleged "missing link" between Iraq and Al Qaeda. Powell says al-Zarqawi arrived in Baghdad in May 2002 and quickly established an Al Qaeda cell of 2 dozen extremists (no evidence available). Before that, he had a small army of terrorists in Europe, of which 116 members have been arrested (denied by European intelligence). Meanwhile he also set up a "poison factory" inside Ansar Al Islam near Iran (just disproved by journalists). He also arranged the killing of USAID staffer Laurence Foley on 10-28-02. When Jordan asked Iraq to turn him over, he vanished -but where? Powell says he's with Ansar, but the CIA says he's in Iran. This multi-national operative makes Osama Bin Forgotten look like a camel-riding cave dweller. So how come al-Zarqawi isn't even mentioned on the FBI's list of 22 "Most Wanted Terrorists" (http://www.fbi.gov/mostwant/terrorists/fugitives.htm). Betcha that changes today...

WashPost reports, "The Saudi embassy quietly provided the wife of a terror suspect a passport and transit out of the US in November 2002, after she was subpoenaed to testify before a federal grand jury in New York investigating her husband's possible links to the al Qaeda terrorist network, diplomatic and law enforcement sources said. Federal law enforcement officials were outraged by the Saudi action, saying the move impeded their investigation... Maha Hafeez Marri and her five young children flew to Saudi Arabia on Nov. 10... The FBI had confiscated passports for Marri and her children soon after her husband was arrested in Peoria, Ill., in late 2001. Ali S. Marri, a native of Saudi Arabia and a citizen of Qatar, is charged with lying to the FBI about phone calls he allegedly made in the months after the Sept. 11, 2001, terror attacks to a number in United Arab Emirates that belonged to a suspected al Qaeda operative, Mustafa Ahmed Hawsawi."

"Israel is embarking upon a more aggressive approach to the war on terror that will include staging targeted killings in the United States and other friendly countries, former Israeli intelligence officials told UPI... The Israeli statements were confirmed by more than a half dozen former and currently serving U.S. foreign policy and intelligence officials in interviews with UPI. With the appointment of Meir Dagan, the new director of Israel's Mossad secret intelligence service, Sharon is preparing 'a huge budget' increase for the spy agency as part of 'a tougher stance in fighting global jihad (or holy war),' one Israeli official said... Under Sharon, 'diplomatic constraints have prevented the Mossad from carrying out 'preventive operations' (targeted killings) on the soil of friendly countries until now.' He said Sharon is 'reversing that policy, even if it risks complications to Israel's bilateral relations.'" Will NY Times, WashPost, or Frontline investigate this terrifying story?

Erich Marquardt writes: "After the September 11, 2001 attacks on the United States, it has become clear that isolated incidents spread economic fallout throughout the global economy. The Bali blasts continued to highlight this trend. The attack threatened other economies in Southeast Asia, as nervous investors feared where the next attack would take place. Indeed, Australia has issued travel alerts for most of Southeast Asia, including Indonesia, Malaysia, Thailand and the Philippines. The U.S. State Department has also issued warnings on these same four Southeast Asian countries, warning of 'high' terrorism threats to U.S. interests in the region. These threats have shown opponents of globalization that the most effective way to attack the system is through creating market insecurity in stable countries. Terrorist attacks can cause severe damage to a nation's economy; a looming threat, seen in Southeast Asia, dissuades business interests from investing in risk economies."

CNN.com reports: "The U.S. government received intelligence information from the Australian government about the possibility of terrorist actions in Kenya before the attacks that left 16 dead in Mombasa this week, a senior U.S. government official told CNN Saturday. The information, according to the source, was of a general nature and was not considered specific or credible and therefore did not lead the U.S. to take any action based on that information. Australian officials said Friday they had issued a warning November 12 for Australians to avoid Mombassa because of intelligence that 'warned of possible terrorist attacks against Western interests in Mombasa.'"

George W. Bush doesn't think the FBI is doing a good enough job spying on Americans in order to find terrorists. His top security advisers are proposing a separate agency for domestic spying. Let's see if we have this straight. The new Homeland Security department is supposed to consolidate security functions, so Bush wants to split some of those functions off from an existing agency. The economic conditions require fiscal restraint by the government, so Bush wants to create a new government bureaucracy. Bush's party claims to be against Big Government, so Bush wants to expand the size of the government. Or maybe what he really wants is to increase his power and control?

The Bush administration's rogue policy of preemptive strike - the policy of starting war to avoid war - is also being applied to covert action against terrorists. Many of us have been told that if "you go looking for trouble, you're going to find it" and that's exactly what this new policy does: increases the likelihood of terrorism within our borders in retaliation for inciting terrorist activity internationally. "P2OG would launch secret operations aimed at 'stimulating reactions' among terrorists and states possessing weapons of mass destruction, meaning it would prod terrorist cells into action, thus exposing them to 'quick-response' attacks by US forces. The means by which it would do this is the far greater use of special operations forces." First-strike terrorism is just that - terrorism by Americans - an unprincipled sham contrary to international law.

Back in 1998, a research paper published by the Cato Institute provided data to support the conclusion by the Pentagon's Defense Science Board that "a strong correlation exists between U.S. involvement in international situations and an increase in terrorist attacks against the United States." And now George W. Bush proposed to combat terrorism by increasing U.S. "involvement" in the Middle East in the worst possible way -- by attacking a country that has not attacked us.

Frank DeFrank writes: "'Internet gambling serves as a haven for money laundering and organized crime and, potentially, for international terrorism,' White House economic adviser Lawrence Lindsey wrote in a letter to Daschle, the newspaper reported... OK, it's time to review a few things.First, in the aftermath of the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorism attacks, the president and his people came up with the Patriot Act. In case you've forgotten, the Patriot Act allows, among other things, the feds to break into your house in the middle of the night, confiscate personal property and leave without ever telling you why or even if they were there. The justification: to ferret out terrorists.... Which brings us back to online gambling. Gambling, Internet or otherwise, is a moral issue. Each of us will decide its merits based on our beliefs. We certainly don't need the government to decide for us. But gambling isn't really the issue. Playing the terrorism card to push some liberty-strangling agenda is."

Christopher Brauchli writes: "What we all learned in mid-October was that Mr. Bush has come up with the very best way to combat terrorism. It's called preemption....'The United States will not hesitate to strike preemptively against its enemies, even if it faces international opposition, and will never again allow its military supremacy to be threatened....In the new world we have entered, the only path to peace and security is the path of action.' He was right. It's just no one told him what kind of action was needed. I could give him some hints. They come from a variety of reports....referring to the herculean task of providing water, food, condoms and sanitation to Third World countries. He did not say that he would call upon the American people to make whatever sacrifices might be needed to accomplish those goals because that way, and that way alone, we could show the world that we were a compassionate people and that way, and not by force, could we defang the terrorists."

Heather Wokusch writes: "Insisting that global terrorism can only be stopped by 'destroying it where it grows,' George W. Bush has conveniently forgotten the US military's own terrorist training facility: the infamous Western Hemisphere Institute for Security Cooperation (WHISC). Located in Fort Benning, Georgia, WHISC has trained over 60,000 Latin American soldiers in the most heinous of counter-insurgency warfare techniques, and its graduates have gone on to comprise a bloody who's who of coups, chaos and destruction. WHISC is also the reason several non-violent protestors languish in US jails today, and with a massive demonstration planned at the WHISC site November 15-17, that number is about to skyrocket. Between the upcoming protest and a House bill aimed at shutting down the operation once and for all, it's clear America's very own terrorist training camp will soon be in the spotlight."

Agence France Presse says the CIA, "has warned that US counterterrorist operations around the world may not eliminate the threat of future attacks because they fail to address the root causes of terrorism. In an unusual display of candor, the CIA pointed out that continued instability in Afghanistan, challenges facing Saudi rulers and the festering Israeli-Palestinian conflict were likely to fuel radicalism in the Muslim world. The grim assessment was made in a series of written answers to questions posed by members of the US Congress last April... 'While we are striking major blows against al-Qaeda - the preeminent global terrorist threat, the underlying causes that drive terrorists will persist. Several troublesome global trends - especially the growing demographic youth bulge in developing nations whose economic systems and political ideologies are under enormous stress - will fuel the rise of more disaffected groups willing to use violence to address their perceived grievances.'"

The Observer editorializes, "More terrorists are given training and sanctuary in the United States than anywhere on earth. They include mass murderers, torturers, former and future tyrants and assorted international criminals. There is no terrorist sanctuary to compare with Florida. General Jose Guillermo Garcia has lived comfortably in Florida since the 1990s. He was head of El Salvador's military during the 1980s when death squads with ties to the army murdered thousands of people. General Prosper Avril, the Haitian dictator, liked to display the bloodied victims of his torture on television. When he was overthrown, he was flown to Florida by the US Government. Thiounn Prasith, Pol Pot's henchman and apologist at the United Nations, lives in New York. General Mansour Moharari, who ran the Shah of Iran's notorious prisons, is wanted in Iran, but untroubled in the United States."

Unlike Americans after 9/11, Aussies aren't responding to the Bali tragedy by donning "patriotic" blinders and pretending their leaders have suddenly become saints. Instead, a wave of anger at those who failed to protect them has erupted. Prime Minister John Howard's alliance with Bush and Bush's obsession with attacking Iraq are being blamed for the attack. Says the UK Independent: "Such debate seems refreshingly frank and a little disorientating when compared with the reaction in the United States after the September 11 attacks. In America, criticism of...George Bush evaporated overnight. Anyone attempting to link US foreign policy in the Middle East and elsewhere with the atrocities at the World Trade Centre and the Pentagon was immediately branded a pariah by mainstream society. One congresswoman [Cynthia McKinney] who questioned the competence of the government and intelligence services was vilified as a paranoid, crypto-Marxist 'pinata of inanity.'"

The horrific Bali blast that killed nearly 200 people is starting to bear a disturbing similarity to 9/11 - except information is coming to light much sooner. Indonesian intelligence claimed it issued widespread warnings 11 days before the attack, but Megawati's government ignored them. Now Spain says it issued warnings of an impending attack in the area almost a YEAR ago - warnings that were, like the others, ignored. Meanwhile, the UK government is working over time at damage control, trying to deny they, too ignored the warnings.

"'If any government sponsors the outlaws and killers of innocents,'...Bush announced on the day he began bombing Afghanistan, 'they have become outlaws and murderers themselves. And they will take that lonely path at their own peril.' I'm glad he said 'any government', as there's one which, though it has yet to be identified as a sponsor of terrorism, requires his urgent attention. For the past 55 years it has been running a terrorist training camp, whose victims massively outnumber the people killed by the attack on NY... atrocities laid, rightly or wrongly, at al-Qaida's door. The camp is called the Western Hemisphere Institute for Security Cooperation, or Whisc. It is based in Fort Benning, GA, and it is funded by Mr Bush's government....So, given that the evidence linking the school to continuing atrocities in Latin America is rather stronger than the evidence linking the al-Qaida training camps to the attack on NY, what should we do about the 'evil-doers' in Fort Benning?"

"The Bush administration's efforts to cut off funds for international terrorism are destined to fail until it confronts Saudi Arabia, whose leaders have tolerated some of its wealthy citizens raising millions of dollars a year for al Qaeda, according to a new report from an influential foreign policy organization. The report from the NY-based Council on Foreign Relations...was especially harsh on the Bush administration's relationship with Saudi Arabia. The administration 'appears to have made a policy decision not to use the full power of U.S. influence and legal authorities to pressure or compel other governments to combat terrorist financing more effectively.' Greenberg, (CFR) chairman...said the administration needs to 'much more forceful' in dealing with Saudi Arabia, and that the administration 'should be all over' the Saudi government whenever terrorist financial ties were found. 'Sitting in a corner is not the answer,' Greenberg said. 'Whatever we are doing, it isn't working.'"

It has now come to light that the CIA knew two weeks before the Bali blast that such an attack was impending - yet did not warn Australian intelligence, whose citizens were the primary victims. The warning was passed on to the U.S. Embassy in Indonesia - but not Australia. The Aussies are stunned by this revelation. "It would be an unthinkable and unforgiveable failure of the intelligence network," said Warren Reed, a former head of the Indonesian desk of the Australian Secret Intelligence Service. "If the Americans had this information," he insists," they would have passed it directly to us and others in the intelligence club." Yet, says Prime Minister John Howard, Australia never received any warning. Just like the travel warnings never issued before 9/11.

Sacramento Bee writes, "An elaborate plot designed to force the release of an imprisoned white supremacist by creating public hysteria with explosions and an anthrax scare was thwarted by an anti-terrorism team. Using homemade bombs encased in white powder, participants planned to create so much chaos that authorities would release the supremacist from Wasco State Prison in Kern County to end the turmoil, the Daily Breeze reported Tuesday. The bombs were going to be planted at the Roybal Federal Building in downtown Los Angeles, an unidentified Torrance school and three other locations, including a hotel in Bakersfield, investigators said."

"The greatest threat to world peace and civil society today is clearly 'terrorism' - not the behavior to which the word is applied but the word itself. Since the word 'terrorism' (like the behavior to which the word is applied) can never be eradicated, it is imperative to expose it for what it is - a word. For years, people have recited (often with a wry smile) the truisms that 'One man's terrorist is another man's freedom fighter' and that 'Terrorism, like beauty, is in the eye of the beholder.' However, with the world's sole superpower declaring an open-ended, worldwide 'war on terrorism,' proclaiming that this 'war' has only just begun and promising to persevere until 'victory,' the notorious subjectivity of this word is no longer a joke. It is no accident that there is no agreed definition of 'terrorism,' since the word is so subjective as to be devoid of any inherent meaning," writes John Whitbeck.

William Jefferson Clinton writes, "We learned on Sept. 11 that the very forces of globalization we helped to create... can be used to build or destroy, to unite or divide. At the same time, old confrontations have taken on frightening urgency, [which] requires us to develop a larger strategy for American foreign policy... Our security policy should include five major elements: First, we should [finish the job in] Afghanistan. Second, [ending] the North Korean nuclear missile program. Third, we must constrain [WMD's. Saddam Hussein is a continuing concern, but although his military is weak, the] threat of his labs is real. It is not as immediate as the need to restart the Middle East peace process and stop the violence there, and it may not require an invasion, but it must be addressed. Fourth, we should increase the capacity of our friends to deal with terror... Fifth, we have to improve domestic defenses and cooperation."

Cleveland Plain Dealer columnist Tom Brazaitis writes: "With the approach of the first anniversary of Sept. 11, one thing is painfully clear: The terrorists are winning. So says the cover story in the September/October issue of Skeptical Inquirer magazine ("A Skeptical Look at September 11th: How We Can Defeat Terrorism by Reacting to It More Rationally"). It argues that we ought to combat terrorism with intellect instead of emotions." Brazaitis' column provides an excellent antidote to a year of fear-mongering.

Eric Margolis writes: "As America nears the anniversary of Sept. 11, it's worth recalling how Europe dealt with the problem of political terrorism - and won. From the 1970s to the '90s, Europe was assailed by a variety of violent extremist groups - what the North American media call 'terrorists'... This pejorative term... inhibits thoughtful analysis and has often been used as a propaganda weapon by the powerful against those resisting injustice... Unlike post-9/11 America, Europe did not indulge in self-pity and nationalist frenzy... First, police and intelligence forces must be the spearhead of a war against terrorism... Second, it was not necessary to curtail liberty and civil rights to wage a campaign against political violence... Third, during the 'terror years,' Europe's media generally behaved in a more responsible, balanced, and critical manner than much of today's U.S. media, which, since 9/11, have too often promoted panic, fear and hatred of Muslims and Iraq."

As his President [sic] sucked up to the Saudis, hoping for more oil loot, Grover Norquist, maven of the ultra-right, was busy protecting his friends in Al Qaeda. Reaction to the Florida raids on a charity that was a money-channel to Al Qaeda suggests the Feds inflicted serious injury on the Wahhabi lobby, the violent Saudi-backed extremist network that largely controls Islam in America. Officials of the targeted groups, as well as their non-Muslim apologists--notably GOP operative Grover Norquist, the chief enabler of Islamic extremists seeking access to the White House--have condemned the raids as civil rights violations.

The AP reports, that "President [sic] Bush's national security leadership met formally nearly 100 times in the months prior to the Sept. 11 attacks yet terrorism was the topic during only two of those sessions... Critics said the low number of terrorism meetings by the most senior members of the security council indicated the administration's priorities were elsewhere... Bush himself said in February 2001 that the nation hadn't done enough to prepare for possible terrorist attacks, and he pledged: 'I will put a high priority on detecting and responding to terrorism on our soil.' A few weeks earlier, Tenet had told Congress, 'The threat from terrorism is real, it is immediate, and it is evolving.' He described bin Laden and his global network as a serious and immediate threat... 'This was a failure in the Bush administration to recognize the nature of terrorism and its impact on the United States,' said a former CIA chief of counterterrorism operations and analysis."

AP's David Pace writes, "The FBI has been seeking prosecution of international terrorism cases at six times the rate it did before Sept. 11, but more than half of those cases considered by federal prosecutors never made it to court.... Despite assertions by Ashcroft and Mueller that the FBI was focusing more on terrorism prevention, the records show that bank robberies, drug violations and bank frauds accounted for more than a third of all FBI referrals in the first six months after Sept. 11. That's roughly the same level as in the previous five years." Senators Leahy and Grassley said that the FBI's continuing focus on bank robberies, drug violations and bank fraud raises "troubling questions about whether the FBI and Department of Justice are devoting sufficient resources to counterterrorism efforts." Let's see, the Anthrax culprit is still free, bin Laden is free, Muhammed Omar is free etc etc. Great job - NOT!

"The soldier from Fort Stewart, Ga, who was arrested on charges of planting an explosive device on a dirt road will serve 18 months probation after pleading no contest yesterday. A Jacksonville police officer stopped Derek Lawrence Peterson in May and found him wearing all black clothing and black plastic pads on his knees and elbows. Police said Peterson, 27, told them he was in the area practicing 'recon tactics.' After he was arrested, Peterson, who has served on an Army tank crew at Fort Stewart since March, at first was held on a $5 million bond. Peterson's attorney, Hank Coxe, said yesterday his client's case had been blown out of proportion because police initially suspected Peterson's actions were related to terrorism." WHAT? "No contest" means the Government did not want the truth to come out. Probation means Peterson will return to ACTIVE DUTY. This looks like a BLACK OPERATION by the Pentagon to create a "terrorist" attack. Call your rep at 202-224-3121 and demand the truth!

"The FBI has selected 'investigative data warehousing' as a key technology to use in the war against terrorism. The technique uses data mining and analytical software to comb vast amounts of digital information to discover patterns and relationships that indicate criminal activity… The FBI plans to build a data warehouse that receives information from multiple FBI databases... Eventually, the warehouse might receive data from other law enforcement and intelligence agencies. Data mining and data warehousing are part of a much larger FBI plan to acquire and employ modern information technology to thwart future terrorist attacks… Other top priorities for the FBI will be disrupting foreign intelligence and espionage and protecting against cybercrime, Mueller said. Investigating bank robberies, fraud and other white-collar crimes - FBI specialties in an earlier era - will be given lower priority." To find a handful of terrorists, the FBI is giving a green light to future Enrons!

Writes Rebecca Louise: "Terrorist Bombings and retreat from peacekeeping duties... did all this happen under a cowardly Democratic president? Did Marine terrorist victims have an 'indecisive, morally ambiguous, overly analytical liberal' in charge when the decision was made to send them to a far away country to keep peace with no bullets? No, their Commander in Chief was Ronald Reagan. The terrorists were Hezbollah, sponsored by Iran. After hundreds of Marines died, Reagan would pull out the rest of the peacekeepers from Lebanon and within a few years Reagan would be selling arms to Iran. The terrorists would learn an important lesson; America could be driven from its commitments with bombs. So the next time a Republican blames 9/11 on Clinton and Somalia for why terrorists think that Americans lack the resolve to defend themselves, think of those hundreds of dead Marines and diplomats and that it was Ronald Reagan who failed to stand up to international terrorism 20 years ago."

Frank Rich writes, "As we need some version of a Warren Commission to get to the bottom of what went wrong, so we need an inverted Manhattan Project (one that will stop a bomb rather than build one) to recruit America's best minds to set things right. Mr. Ridge, a decent politician with no expertise in intelligence or counterterrorism, is a frivolous choice for security czar. Mr. Ashcroft, an aspiring J. Edgar Hoover isolated from reality by a circle of cronies, lacks the intellect and leadership ability to take on an adversary as cunning as Osama bin Laden. What he cares about most is maximizing his own power, and not just over civil liberties... With all the talent in this country and all that's at stake, is this the best we can muster?" And what about Bush's treasonous refusal to negotiate the destruction of decommissioned nuclear warheads - both in the US and Russia - which might otherwise fall into the hands of terrorists???

What the HECK is going on in Florida? "Jacksonville, Fla., police arrested a Fort Stewart soldier Saturday [5/12] after finding him armed, wearing black clothes and leaving a power plant where he allegedly left an explosive. Spc. Derek Lawrence Peterson, 27, is being held on a $5 million bond ... charged with attempting to detonate an explosive device... The officer searched Peterson's truck and found a 12-inch knife, a six-inch knife, a 12-gauge shotgun, shotgun shells, .45-caliber bullets, four ammo magazines, a six-volt battery, duct tape, speaker wire and plastic from an explosive device, the report said. After being informed of his rights, wrote arresting officer D.F. Valiante, 'the suspect advised me that he was on the power plant property to practice recon tactics.'" Is Rumsfeld staging phony 'terrorist' attacks to proactively stop the investigation of Bush's 911 failures? And why is this news reported in Savannah GA, but not Jacksonville FL?? We demand an investigation!

Vague warning? Never dreamed anything like the WTC could happen? Well, either Bush, Rice, et al. are colossal liars or so totally unfit for their jobs as "leaders" of this country they should be removed IMMEDIATELY for the safety of all. A $150,000 study was undertaken in 1993 by a panel of 41 experts, including reps from the CIA, FBI, State Dept., Mossad, and the KGB, to anticipate possible terrorist scenarios likely to occur in the future. Although the report was suppressed as "too frightening and outrageous," it has been available to all who should concern themselves with such things - namely Condi Rice and G.W. Bush. The report predicted multiple simultaneous attacks, the use of airplanes as weapons, targeting of large landmarks and financial centers, etc. It is just ONE source the Bush administration had to go on. When you consider this article appeared in the LA Times in 1998, it should seem even more incredible that Bush could ignore and/or minimize pre-9/11 warnings.

As time goes on we keep seeing more and more proof that Saudi Arabia is heavily involved in supporting terrorism worldwide including the killing of an American. David Tell from the Weekly Standard writes, "Israel made public a cache of documents... captured by its soldiers during Operation Defensive Shield, that clarify exactly what the emir's instructions entail and who those 'families of the fatalities' might be. According to Saudi government spreadsheets bearing the logo of the Saudi Committee for Support of the Al-Quds Intifada, that committee's aforementioned 'tenth payment cycle' included among its beneficiaries the relatives of eight Palestinian terrorist bombers, all of them specifically and explicitly singled out by Saudi bookkeepers for their participation in amaliah istishadiah or "suicide operations." And Bush likes these guys?

Several months back, Planned Parenthood was being terrorized by the "Army of God" aka the anti-abortion movement and stated Bush supporters. Once again, even with our Homeland Defense Dept's Tom Ridge, who still refuses to testify before Congress, our country has suffered another attack. This time however, it is immediately called Domestic Terrorism, unlike the abortion anthrax letter hoaxes, which were NEVER called terrorism. Hey George, since this is your watch -- this latest domestic terrorism is another reason you have done a terrible job. A. Where is the Anthrax sender? B. Where is Bin Laden? C. Where are the rest of the members of the Army of God? (answers- A. working for the CIA/FBI, B. Helping your friends make more $$ from oil & defense the longer he is free and C. probably some of his biggest campaign contributors.)

Some war on "Terra"! The Bush administration has failed to ask Congress for ANY of the $150 million the Army Corps of Engineers wants to boost security at up to 200 reservoirs, dams and locks across the country, according to corps figures obtained by The Associated Press. There are currently 14 projects "not currently funded for protection should a terrorist attack occur." Many congressional Democrats are criticizing the administration for failing to propose enough spending for domestic security in the wake of the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks but Bush isn't listening - so what else is new??

"Congress authorized a police action to apprehend the conspirators behind the September 11 attack. Congress did not declare war because the President did not ask Congress to declare war. Yet, the Administration is conducting itself as if it were engaged in a declared war, sending military special operations forces to many new countries and ramping up defense spending. The Administration's budget contains real, inflation-adjusted spending increases only for military spending. Non-military spending is projected to remain flat… The path to ending terrorism... is a foreign or domestic policy based on social and economic justice - not corporate concerns. This is the hopeful premise of HR 2459, a bill to create a Department of Peace. This Cabinet-level Department would serve to promote nonviolence as an organizing principle in our society. We should treat others as we would want them to treat us. We should follow international law." So writes Rep. Dennis Kucinich (D-OH).

After quipping that he "brought along a little graduation present…I hereby grant amnesty…" as he addressed Virginia Military Institute cadets, Mr. Bu$h remarked, "All parties have a responsibility to stop funding or inciting terror." Mr. Bu$h did not comment on the recent ABC report that, "The United States was involved in arranging a ransom payment to the Abu Sayyaf rebel group in the Philippines meant to secure the release of an American missionary couple kidnapped nearly 11 months ago, but the couple has not been freed."( http://abcnews.go.com/sections/wnt/DailyNews/Philippines_ransom020411.html ) Abu Sayyaf is Al Qaeda's Philippine terrorist affiliate, meaning the US arranged to fund terrorists! Bu$h continued: "Dignity requires the rule of law, limits on the power of the state, respect for women, private property, equal justice, religious tolerance. No nation owns these principles; no nation is exempt from them." More double-speak!

Known for his financial prowess and philanthropy, billionaire George Soros graded Bu$h's foreign policy since 911 as 'quite dismal,' recently while at U-PA. Noting that Bu$h fell for a trap set by terrorists who wanted this country to go to W-ar and sow the seeds for further acts of terrorism, Soros said that instead of acting like the world's greatest power and leader of the global capitalist system, 'the US is acting out of fear. Although the terrorist threat is real, and we must defend against it, we are going about it the wrong way. What makes the situation so dangerous is that nobody dares to say so. The nation is endangered, therefore it is unpatriotic to criticize our leader,' Soros said. 'That is not what has made this country great. The strength of this country lies in the Declaration of Independence and the Bill of Rights and the freedom of speech and thought.'

A study by the Army surgeon general stating that as many as 2.4 million people could be killed or injured in a terrorist attack against a U.S. toxic chemical plant underscores the urgency with which Bush should be acting to ensure that U.S. chemical plants are safe. Instead, Bush's Justice Department is stalling on a very important report he's required by the Clean Air Act to send to Congress about chemical plants' vulnerability to attacks. The Justice Department claims it doesn't have the budget to meet the deadline. (Perhaps Ashcroft should divert all that money he must be spending in his vigorous attempts to defeat Oregon's assisted-suicide law to actually protecting Americans from terrorist attack!) Since Bush already seems to have the Clean Air Act in his crosshairs, perhaps he's just waiting 'til he can dismantle it completely so he won't have to worry about that pesky deadline.

Republican leaders in Washington launched a "swift and ferocious" attack on Senate Majority Leader Tom Daschle yesterday for demanding greater clarity from the Bush Administration on its ever-expanding war against terrorism. Democrats.com has launched another Call to Action to defend Daschle. Please write a letter to your local newspaper letting your neighbors know that Daschle speaks for you.

Ever since 911, rightwingliars have attacked Clinton for ignoring counter-terrorism programs. Once again, a GOP Big Lie is exposed. According to the NY Times, "Under ... Janet Reno, the department's counterterrorism budget increased 13.6% in FY 1999, 7.1% in 2000 and 22.7% in 2001." But when John Ashcroft submitted his budget on 9-10-01, he "called for spending increases in 68 programs, none of which directly involved counterterrorism... [He] did not endorse F.B.I. requests for $58 million for 149 new counterterrorism field agents, 200 intelligence analysts and 54 additional translators. Mr. Ashcroft proposed cuts in 14 programs. One proposed $65 million cut was for a program that gives state and local counterterrorism grants for equipment, including radios and decontamination suits and training to localities for counterterrorism preparedness." This fall, Democrats should make this a HUGE issue - that the Bush administration CUT counter-terrorism funds on 9-10.

KOMO-TV reports, "The government is warning us all to be vigilant and be on the lookout for anything suspicious. One Bellingham woman tried to do just that, but her efforts fell on deaf ears. Sondra Perkins had just spent 10 days in Dallas. While at Dallas' airport waiting to board her flight back to Seattle, she noticed someone acting suspiciously. She said she tried to report the suspicious activity to airport officials, but they did nothing.. The man happened to be on her flight back to Seattle. She says she even tried to tip the flight attendants to her observations. Again, no response. When she arrived home [and read the newspaper], she spotted five pictures of men the FBI wanted to talk to. 'There he was,' she said. 'I'm 99.9 percent certain the man I saw was one of the five.' She says she tried yet again to tip airline officials, the FBI, the FAA - 10 agencies in all." Hey Shrub - are you hunting terrorists, or is this a charade to give $48 billion to Poppy's pals at Carlyle?

It's now pretty obvious that Bush's "War on Terrorism" is nothing but the most expensive smokescreen/political campaign in history, aimed more at keeping G.W. Bush in office than keeping Americans safe. Despite the potential threat to nuclear plants, for example, no additional security measures have been taken since 9/11. Now the administration has stunned airport workers by refusing to extend whistleblower protections to federal airport security screeners! The Transportation Trades Dept. of the AFL-CIO calls this move a "bizarre and dangerous" move that "quite frankly defies logic." Not Bush logic, though, which will risk EVERYTHING to help his corporate cronies.

Over the objections of Congress, Bush recently appointed Iran-Contra propagandist Otto Reich to head US relations with Latin America. Reich "was alleged to have used his influence to try and get a US visa for a convicted terrorist, Orlando Bosch, jailed in Venezuela in 1976 for the bombing of a Cubana airliner with 73 people on board. Bosch had already been convicted of a terrorist attack in Miami on a Polish merchant vessel bound for Cuba and jailed in the US. According to US justice department records: '... Bosch has personally advocated, encouraged, organised and participated in acts of terrorist violence in this country as well as various other countries.' Amazingly, Bosch was paroled by George Bush senior in 1990 and is now in Florida... Although many countries seek Bosch's extradition he remains free, protected by the same government that warns other countries that they are either for or against terrorism." So writes Duncan Campbell in the Guardian of London.

On July 30, 1996, "President Clinton urged Congress Tuesday to act swiftly in developing anti-terrorism legislation before its August recess... But while the president pushed for quick legislation, Republican lawmakers hardened their stance against some of the proposed anti-terrorism measures." Trent Lott (R-MS) and Orrin Hatch (R-UT) led the opposition to the legislation because it included "taggants" (or markers) for explosives, to help the FBI identify bombers like Timothy McVeigh, the Unabomber, and the Olympic bomber. These Republicans should resign immediately!

Writes Linda Hirshman: "'What he did was a terrible, unimaginable thing, and I don't understand it or know how anyone could do it, but I love my son.' No, the speaker is not John Walker Lindh's father, Frank, but Bill McVeigh...Now that let-it-all-hang-out Marin County has produced the infamous American Taliban, the conservative culture warriors are eager to help dads like Bill McVeigh find some answers...British conservative Andrew Sullivan tells us that good communities like rural Alabama don't produce men who would hurt their fellow Americans. (Not being raised in America, perhaps Sullivan doesn't know about Selma.)" Wouldn't you know it, right wingers blame lax parenting and liberal multiculturalism for the sad case of 'the American Taliban' John Walker Lindh. Lindh helped the Taliban, but what about George Walker Bush? He sent $43 MILLION to the Taliban. Who helped the Taliban more?

"Meanwhile, there were new details about Reid's time in London. Police failed to act on warnings that Islamic radicals were recruiting young Muslims at a south London mosque once attended by Reid, the mosque's leader said Thursday. And other mainstream British Muslim leaders warned that radical Islamic clerics had recruited hundreds of other young Muslims willing to carry out similar missions. 'We've been saying for a long time that these people are recruiting,' Abdul Haqq Baker, chairman of the Brixton mosque, said. 'We've been warning about them, and look what's happened now.'" We ran an earlier story that British intelligence also failed to act on evidence of a counterfeit credit card ring at a London Mosque. This scheme allegedly raised funds for Al Qaeda. (Enter 'mosque' in our .Compass search engine).

"The alleged '20th hijacker' in the Sept. 11 attacks and the man accused of trying to detonate explosives in his shoes aboard a trans-Atlantic flight knew each other and trained in the same al Qaeda camp in Afghanistan, European law enforcement officials told ABC News. Between 1996 and 1998, shoe-bomb suspect Richard Reid was a frequent visitor to a mosque in Brixton, South London — the same one frequented around the same time as the accused hijack conspirator Zacarias Moussaoui, the first person charged in connection with the Sept. 11 attacks…Reid converted to Islam while in prison and was sent to the Brixton mosque for rehabilitation. ABC News has learned that European law enforcement officials have evidence of contact between Reid and Moussaoui in late 2000 and that the two men spent months training together in explosives and demolition at the same al Qaeda camp in Afghanistan."

"In the last decade, as thousands of young Saudis left their country to wage Islamic holy war, Saudi leaders let them go, aware of the danger they might pose to the United States, but more focused on the danger they would pose at home. At least four times in the last six years, Saudis who were trained or recruited in Afghanistan, Chechnya, Kosovo or Bosnia have been among the terrorists who carried out bombings of American targets — in Saudi Arabia, Kenya, Tanzania and Yemen. But not until October, after the American military campaign in Afghanistan began, did Saudi Arabia detain young men trying to join that fight." So reports the New York Times.

"Clinton outlined a three-pronged approach to dealing with the ongoing threats of terrorism. First, he said, the United States has to spread the 21st century's economic and political benefits while shrinking its burdens. Next, Clinton proposed working to create conditions in developing countries that make progress possible, especially in the Muslim world. Third, he said, the world must develop greater respect for the faiths and identities of others...The former president also outlined steps his administration had taken to reduce the threat of terrorism, including ratifying the chemical weapons convention, helping local authorities across the nation to prepare their response to a terrorist attack, and stockpiling vaccines, antibiotics and antidotes, in case of biological warfare."

Terrorists in Kabul had copies of "How Can I Train Myself for Jihad," which encourages would-be terrorists to learn to murder in NRA-sponsored courses. "In some countries of the World, especially the USA, firearms training is available to the general public. One should try to join a shooting club if possible and make regular visits to the firing range. There are many firearms courses available to the public in USA, ranging from one day to two weeks or more. These courses are good but expensive. Some of them are only meant for security personnel but generally they will teach anyone. It is also better to attend these courses in pairs or by yourself, no more. Do not make public announcements when going on such a course. Find one, book your place, go there, learn, come back home and keep it [to] yourself." We demand that Ashcroft investigate all non-citizens taking NRA gun courses!

"Thousands of demonstrators marched outside Fort Benning Sunday to protest a former Army school they blame for alleged human rights violations against Latin American civilians. About 40 people were taken into custody. During the annual funeral march to the front gate of the post, protesters carried signs reading 'Imperialist Assassins' and created a memorial to the alleged victims of graduates of the School of the Americas, which was a training center for Latin American soldiers. Some stuck crosses through the chain-link fence... About 40 people were taken into custody after they slipped through an opening in a fence and onto base property. The crowd, estimated by police at 6,000 to 7,000, included senior citizens and veterans." The Pentagon says it closed the SOA in December, but they simply replaced it with the "Western Hemisphere Institute for Security Cooperation." The more things change, the more they remain the same...

"The Treasury Department was warned more than a year ago about a Somali money-transfer business that the government shut last week for allegedly financing terrorism, a senator said. Sen. Evan Bayh (D., Ind.) said he will question Treasury officials at a hearing Wednesday regarding so-called suspicious-activity reports the Treasury Department received from the banking industry on activities of the Al Barakaat organization. The Treasury Department unit that investigates money laundering is the Financial Crimes Enforcement Network, known as Fincen. 'It's my intention to follow up and have a line of inquiry into why the Fincen folks have been investigating Al Barakaat for quite some time and had relayed concerns about suspicious activity to law-enforcement officials but nothing was done until last week,' said Mr. Bayh, who is chairman of the Senate Banking Committee's panel on international trade and finance."

A well-known international leader said recently that eliminating poverty, conflict and undemocratic practices would help undermine terrorism and must be part of efforts to defeat it. 'The war on terrorism starts within each of our respective sovereign borders. It will be fought with increased support for democracy programs, judicial reform, conflict resolution, poverty alleviation, economic reform and health and education programs. All of these deny the reason for terrorists to exist or to find safe havens within those borders,' he said. Guess who? (a) Tony Blair (b) Nelson Mandela (c) Fidel Castro (d) Mohammar Qaddafi (e) Colin Powell. Answer: (e). So why do the New McCarthyites attack anyone else who makes that point? And why does Powell stay in an administration that opposes every single one of these policies, not only abroad but also at home?

"The House on Thursday passed a broad package of measures designed to improve airline security but narrowly rejected a full federal takeover of security screening at the nation's airports. The action puts the House in conflict with a unanimous Senate vote to place responsibility for screening passengers and baggage with a new 28,000-member federal security force working under the U.S. Department of Justice. Instead, the House would allow private security firms to perform screening under federal supervision... 'I ask all of you: Do you want to contract out the Capitol Police? Do you want to contract out the U.S. Marines? Do you want to contract out the FBI and the Customs Service? I don't think so,' said Minority Leader Richard Gephardt, D-Mo." We will certainly remember this vote (Roll Call 423) next November!

"The war against terrorism must begin at home. I'm not talking about protecting the nation from foreign threats, but about halting the terror that for so many years has stalked abortion providers and women seeking safe and legal abortions under our laws and constitution. The deadly threat of anthrax may be new to most of America, but it has been a sad reality at abortion clinics for the past three years. All Americans should support the abortion providers who have now asked Attorney General John Ashcroft for protection from threats, harassment and violence under the 1994 Freedom of Access to Clinic Entrances Act." So writes Allan Lichtman in Gazette.net.

According to London's Evening Standard, "Yasser al-Siri, 38, was held following a raid on a house in west London. Al-Siri was found guilty of involvement in a bomb attack on the Egyptian prime minister in 1993 in which a five-year-old girl was killed. He was sentenced to death in his absence. He has been living in Britain for four years and claiming [asylum] benefits... He is believed to have supplied the key document to assist assassins in the murder of the Taliban's main opposition leader in Afghanistan. The elimination of Northern Alliance commander Ahmad Shah Massood came just three days before the suicide hijackings in America."

According to the News & Observer, "Ali Mohamed lived a double life that seemed more fiction than fact. He served in the heart of the U.S. military at Fort Bragg and in the inner circle of Osama bin Laden's Islamic fundamentalist terrorists' network... After al-Qaeda's car-bombings of the American embassies in Kenya and Tanzania, it became clear where his allegiance lay. Investigators linked Mohamed to the attacks, which killed 224 people and injured more than 4,500. He was arrested 34 days later and has since pleaded guilty and described his central role in the attack. Even more than the hijackers of Sept. 11, Mohamed lived and trained in the United States. He had training as a Green Beret officer and turned those skills against the United States." Mohamed moved in and out of the U.S. armed services, despite being identified as a "fanatic." How did this monumental intelligence failure occur? We demand an investigation!

Bill Press, the co-host of CNN's "Crossfire," takes the right-wing zealots to task for (incredibly) blaming former President Clinton for the terrorist attacks of 9/11. He calls Rohrbacher, Limbaugh, and Gingrich "dead wrong" in their cynical and hyper-partisan manipulations.

No matter what issue is before the public, Republicans automatically - and viciously - blame President Clinton. So in the spirit of bipartisanship, it is our duty to point out that President NIXON could have stopped the 911 hijackings if he had listened to the Airline Pilots Association in 1970. "Airline pilots have demanded bulletproof cockpit doors and bulkheads to thwart would-be aerial hijackers." Hey Arlen Specter - can an ex-President be impeached after they die?

The leader of Israel's far right, Rehavam Zeevi, was assassinated in a Jerusalem Hotel by the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine. The PFLP murdered Zeevi in retaliation for the Israeli assassination of Mustafa Zibri, known as Abu Ali Mustafa. Any government that engages in assassinations simply invites its enemies to retaliate in kind, thereby massively escalating the cycle of violence.

Planned Parenthood has reported that "90 of its clinics and offices in at least 13 states had received envelopes containing threatening letters and an unidentified powdery substance... Some of the letters included messages from a group called the Army of God, a militant anti-abortion group that has advocated violence against medical personnel who perform abortions... "Planned Parenthood President Gloria Feldt said: 'It is perverse that these individuals here at home, who are themselves terrorists by virtue of their actions, would seek to capitalize on the events of the last days and weeks to further their own extremist agenda. But this will not deter us from…providing essential health services...' Eric Rudolph…charged with carrying out the fatal bombings at Atlanta's Centennial Olympic Park during the 1996 Olympics and at a Birmingham, Alabama [abortion clinic] in 1998, among other bombings, has been linked to the Army of God."

"A package that tested positive for the deadly bacteria anthrax was opened Monday at the Washington office of Sen. Majority Leader Tom Daschle, the senator announced. The office was immediately quarantined and closed. Staffers were being examined and treated, Daschle said. 'I am very, very disappointed and angry,' Daschle said at a Capitol Hill news conference. Two field tests on the package tested positive for anthrax, U.S. Capitol Police spokesman Dan Nichols said. The matter is being treated as a criminal investigation, he said. Preliminary field tests sometimes yield false positives. The letter was sent to an Army facility in Maryland for further analysis, Nichols said. FBI sources told CNN that the package was postmarked Trenton, New Jersey, the same postmark as a letter containing anthrax that was sent to NBC anchor Tom Brokaw."

"While no one can know how much anthrax will surface in the United States in the coming months or years, for every real case there will probably be hundreds of patients whose illness is mainly in the head. 'The perception of the disease could be worse than the reality,' says Dr Peggy Neill, a Brown University professor who heads the Infectious Disease Society of America's bioterrorism committee...The prospect of mass hysteria is not to be taken lightly, some believe. In a month or two, flu season starts -- and it has the potential to be rough on the mildest of hypochondriacs." As for actual anthrax threats, "the likelihood of a mass attack is not great. The Iraqis tried and failed to figure out how to disperse anthrax with bombs and missiles. Without U.S. or Russian help and/or a sophisticated lab, terrorists wouldn't be able to use the germs for killings on a massive scale." So writes Arthur Allen for Salon.com.

"After all, targeting random individuals at news organizations is hardly an effective method of terror attack if your goal is large-scale casualties. But it is a highly efficient way to spread low-grade panic. 'What they've done guarantees it's going to be covered as a huge story,' says Terry Moran, a propaganda analyst at New York University. 'A panic about anthrax can be as effective as the anthrax itself. ' Beyond targeting the media as an effective way to win coverage, it may be an attempt to undermine confidence in America's institutions. [NYU Prof. Mark Crispin] Miller believes the public views television anchors and print journalists as 'protectors,' a group that explains danger but doesn't suffer from it. Seeing news organizations evacuated for fear of anthrax undermines that notion. 'To see them vulnerable like this, [we] feel that much more exposed ourselves,' Miller says."

"The U.S. gun industry sold at least twenty-five 50 caliber sniper rifles to Al Qaeda, Osama bin Laden's terror network, a study released by the Violence Policy Center (VPC) reports. The study, 'Voting From the Rooftops,' details the tremendous power of the Barrett M82A1 50 caliber sniper rifles — which U.S. Marines used in the Gulf War to knock out Iraqi armored vehicles from 1,750 yards away — and the gun's potential use to commit terror acts that could cause enormous casualties."

"House Democrats threw down the gauntlet to President Bush over airport safety on Friday, introducing a bill for a government takeover of baggage screening and daring him to veto it if he didn't like it. Bush spokesman Ari Fleischer said the president had 'lots of concerns' about an aviation security bill that passed the Senate unanimously on Thursday. It would require government employees to screen bags, place federal guards in airports and put more air marshals on flights -- adding thousands to federal payrolls in an attempt to stop hijacked airliner attacks like those of Sept. 11. Fleischer's comments seemed to inflame Democratic leaders in the House of Representatives, who were already upset that the Republican leadership had so far refused to take up the Senate bill."

An NBC News employee has tested positive for anthrax after handling "suspicious mail" that was sent to NBC's New York headquarters, network officials said Friday. The case of "cutaneous anthrax" — which is contracted through the skin rather than by breathing — is being investigated by the FBI and federal and local health officials, the network said.

"In July, Senator Carl Levin's subcommittee on investigations held a hearing on money laundering. A bill that Levin has sponsored prohibits United States banks from dealing with foreign banks that have no physical presence anywhere. It would require background checks for foreigners who make large deposits (over $1,000,000), for many new correspondent accounts. In his opening statement, the Senator pointed out that $5 trillion in assets now sit in offshore entities like corporations, including $3 trillion in offshore bank accounts. Over $800 billion now resides in the Cayman Islands, where 31 banks offer accounts to residents but almost 600 offer accounts to foreigners. One of the witnesses, New York District Attorney Robert Morgenthau, described how offshore bank secrecy had hampered several investigations of money laundering involving New York banks." So writes Tim Francis-Wright in Bear Left.

"In 1999, "the late Eqbal Ahmad, writing for a Muslim audience, analyzed what he called the roots of the religious right, coming down very harshly on the mutilations of Islam by absolutists and fanatical tyrants whose obsession with regulating personal behavior promotes 'an Islamic order reduced to a penal code, stripped of its humanism, aesthetics, intellectual quests, and spiritual devotion...' The modern Islamists, Ahmad concludes, are 'concerned with power, not with the soul; with the mobilization of people for political purposes rather than with sharing and alleviating their sufferings and aspirations. Theirs is a very limited and time-bound political agenda.' What has made matters worse is that similar distortions and zealotry occur in the 'Jewish' and 'Christian' universes of discourse." So writes Edward Said in The Nation.

George W. Bush went to FBI headquarters to unveil a new list of the FBI's 22 most-wanted terrorists. Not surprisingly, the top two names are Usama Bin Laden and Ayman Al-Zawahiri, but the other names are unfamiliar. They were involved in various attacks on Americans, including the World Trade Center bombing in 1993; the hijacking of a TWA flight in 1985; the Khobar Towers bombing in Saudi Arabia in 1996; and the bombings of two American embassies in Africa on Aug. 7, 1998. The FBI says 438 of the 467 names that have appeared on their 10 Most Wanted List have eventually been caught, 1/3 through citizen tips. Let's get these guys!!

According to the NY Times, "Anthrax can ... be obtained from germ banks, scientific supply houses that supply tissue cultures and organisms to researchers and others. More than 1,500 germ banks worldwide maintain a million or so strains of micro-organisms, many deadly. Hospitals order them to check the accuracy of diagnostic procedures, and scientists and doctors use them to investigate new therapies. In recent years, the United States has tightened up access to such banks and their hazardous germs, making it hard if not impossible for terrorists to obtain pathogens from establishments in this country... But American experts said the global network of germ banks was far less cautious, with credential checks and shipment rules uneven or rudimentary. The World Federation for Culture Collections, an organization of germ banks, has 472 members registered in 61 countries. Forty-six members offer anthrax free or for sale in exchange for other organisms."

The Miami Herald reports, "Federal investigators believe they have traced 'unique characteristics' of the anthrax that killed a Lantana man to a strain harvested at an Iowa facility in the 1950s, according to law enforcement sources... Investigators say the anthrax strain can be traced to the Iowa facility, but that the specific version of the bacteria may have been widely distributed to researchers. They declined to identify the facility." Well, you don't have to be terribly paranoid to suspect that the unidentified Iowa facility was(is?) a secret US government biological weapons lab. Did terrorists turn yet ANOTHER U.S. technology into a weapon to use against us? Stay tuned...

HHS Secretary Tommy Thompson recently told CBS' "60 Minutes": "We're prepared to take care of any contingency, any consequence that develops for any kind of bio-terrorism attack." But Senators Byrd and Specter rejected that categorical assertion by Thompson. On the one hand, Bush officials want to calm public anxiety, but on the other hand, our public health infrastructure has significant weaknesses. We should use this opportunity to strengthen our public health system to fight ALL infectious diseases, including AIDS, sexually transmitted diseases, hepatitis, TB, and antibiotic-resistant diseases. We may never have such a good opportunity to improve America's health.

In June, top government and media officials participated in a bioterrorism exercise called "Dark Winter," which was designed to simulate U.S. response to terrorism with smallpox. The exercise was developed by the Center for Strategic and International Studies (a key Richard Mellon Scaife-financed and CIA-linked think tank), Johns Hopkins Center for Civilian Biodefense Studies and the ANSER Institute for Homeland Security, and held at Andrews Air Force Base near Washington, D.C. The exercise assumed that each person infected with smallpox would infect 10 others, who would infect 10 more, etc. etc. But the CDC has just debunked this crucial assumption, saying most smallpox victims infect one or two others, and many infect none. "Dark Winter" has been used to quietly terrify Americans into supporting government anti-bio-terrorism programs. We demand an investigation!

As Bin Laden's money trail is exposed, it is important to expose Bush's efforts to shut down the war against money laundering, led by Europe. Back in February, Treasury Secretary Paul O'Neill made clear that Bush "was backing off the US commitment to reform the offshore banking system. Instead, the 'tough on crime' Republicans would stand shoulder to shoulder with the shady characters in Nauru, Aruba, Liechtenstein and elsewhere who offer state-of-the-art financial services for crooks." To fight a real war against terrorism, we must fight a real war against money laundering.

"A group of U.K.-based hackers has cracked computers at the AlShamal Islamic Bank in Sudan and collected data on the accounts of the Al Qaeda terrorist organization and its leader Osama bin Laden, Kim Schmitz, a flamboyant German hacker/businessman, has claimed. Schmitz, who has offered a $10 million reward for the capture of bin Laden, told Newsbytes that the information has been turned over to the FBI... Schmitz founded a group that numbers around 23 hackers called 'Young Intelligent Hackers Against Terror.' He calls the group YIHAT, which is similar to the word Jihad, which is Arabic for Holy War." His team "hacked the nameserver of AlShamal Islamic Bank, he said. They were able to gain access to the bank's intranet by exploiting a 'checkpoint firewall 1 vulnerability,' he explained."

"In spite of the tremendous pain, the intolerable losses that this apocalyptic crime has visited upon the American public, I wonder if this trial does not constitute one of those opportunities for regeneration and self-knowledge that, from time to time, is given to certain nations. A crisis of this magnitude can lead to renewal or destruction, it can be used for good or for evil, for peace or for war, for aggression or for reconciliation, for vengeance or for justice, for the militarisation of a society or its humanisation." So writes Ariel Dorfman, a powerful voice against the terror unleashed by Chilean dictator Augusto Pinochet.

We can always count on Maureen Dowd to tell us what her self-obsessed rich friends in Manhattan and Washington are thinking and doing. (Oh how we miss Anna Quindlen - see below - who told us about her selfless middle class friends from the boroughs and beyond, who are now America's best-loved heroes.) Dowd's friends are buying gas masks and anti-anthrax antibiotics so they can defend themselves and their families. But we can't fight terrorism on our own - we must come together as a nation and as a world.

The Air Force has revamped its operations to prevent a repeat of the Sept. 11 attacks using commercial airliners. "More than 100 fighter jets at 26 bases nationwide stand ready to take off on 10 minutes' notice, up from 14 planes at seven bases on comparable alert the day of the attacks. F-15's and F-16's fly round-the-clock over Washington and New York, and randomly over dozens of other cities... Any commercial airliner with a radio failure or a silent transponder is immediately suspect, and fighters have been scrambled several times in the last two weeks to investigate what turned out to be false alarms." Moreover, Bush has given Air Force Generals authority to shoot down a threatening commercial airliner if he cannot be reached in time. Somehow Bush didn't mention this detail during his speech on airline security in Chicago, when he urged Americans to "get on the airlines."

The investigation into a possible terrorist scheme to use trucks with hazardous materials is centering on a Pittsburgh driver's license examiner. This examiner allegedly sold at least 20 driver's licenses, including 18 for hazardous materials transport, for up to $350, taking bribes from a middleman named Abdul Mohamman. Governor Tom Ridge's Transportation Dept began an investigation 18 months ago - so why are these arrests being made only now? As the head of Bush's new "Office of Homeland Security" - America's "Anti-terrorism Czar" - Ridge owes Americans an explanation.

Let's get real - the folks who check our bags at airports are making minimum wage, get cursed by impatient passengers, and quit as soon as they find a better-paying job. So it's no surprise that the job is done carelessly. If we want real airport security, we're going to have to pay people a decent wage, and reward them - not curse at them - for doing a thorough job. The airlines and the Republicans opposed the Gore Commission's recommendation to make airport security workers into federal employees who are decently paid, and they opposed the recommended tax on airline passengers that would pay the costs. If we want greater security, we must pay for it - not with our civil liberties, but with decent wages that are funded by appropriate user fees. If that reduces airline ticket sales (and profits) by a small amount, that's the price we must pay.

"A 59-year-old businessman allegedly smuggled four box cutters past a security checkpoint and onto a plane on Monday at Philadelphia International Airport in an effort to convince his wife not to fly, the FBI said. Thirteen days after hijackers used box cutters to carry out the Sept. 11 attacks on New York and Washington, Dennis Knaus allegedly succeeded in getting four of the bladed instruments past airport metal detectors and onto a Northwest Airlines jet bound for Minneapolis." There are lots of other weapons that can be slipped past metal detectors, including plastic knives and guns. Until cockpit doors are made impenetrable, airplanes will not be safe from hijacking.

About two dozen fanatical terrorists gave George W. Bush something that before September 11th the American people had resisted giving him – a mandate to govern. How Bush interprets that new mandate will determine the course of American and world politics for the immediate future, and not the least of which will be what our mandate should be in these terrible times.

In order to protect America from terrorists using nuclear, chemical, or biological weapons, we need strong international agreements to control the spread of such technologies. According to Robert Wright, "The best existing model is the Chemical Weapons Convention, which Mr. Powell supported and Mr. Cheney and Mr. Rumsfeld opposed. Under the convention, any member nation can demand, on short notice, that an international team inspect a given building in any other member nation.... The convention is the closest thing yet to a weapons-of-mass-destruction accord with teeth: intrusive, short-notice inspections, and trade sanctions (if mild) against nonmember nations." The only problem is that Bush and the GOP oppose this and all other treaties. To fight the war against terrorism, Bush must change his position.

"Government counterterrorism experts [fear] that the bin Laden conspirators may have been planning - or may still be planning - to disperse biological or chemical agents from a cropdusting plane normally used for agricultural purposes. Among the belongings of suspected terrorist Zacarias Moussaoui, sources tell TIME, were manuals showing how to operate cropdusting equipment that could be used to spray fast-killing toxins into the air. The discovery resulted in the grounding of all cropdusters nationwide on Sunday Sept. 16th," and subsequently extended to Sept. 25. The FBI needs to check the backgrounds of all cropduster owners and pilots who registered in the past 5 years.

Former Sen. Gary Hart (D-CO) co-chaired the U.S. Commission on National Security/21st Century, which was ignored until now. Here's what Hart told Denver Post columnist Diane Carman. "'There are just millions of young people in refugee camps around the world,' he said. 'They have literally no hope for the future. Their parents have been killed in tribal wars or whatever. They're starving. These are the recruits in this type of warfare. They will not be defeated by conventional military forces. Indeed, they probably won't be defeated by military forces at all.' And successors to bin Laden are ready and waiting. The only thing that can disarm the terrorists is 'hope,' Hart said. They need a path to greatness that doesn't involve a suicide mission. That will take a sustained global effort and a level of commitment and public understanding that goes beyond flags and soundbites... If there is to be a greatest generation for the 21st century, it will have to find another way to win this war."

President Clinton's address to the UN several years ago is worth re-reading now. As President Clinton put it, "...our resolute opposition to terrorism does not mean we can ever be indifferent to the conditions that foster it. The most recent U.N. human development report suggests the gulf is widening between the world's haves and have-nots. We must work harder to treat the sources of despair before they turn into the poison of hatred. Dr. Martin Luther King once wrote that the only revolutionary is a man who has nothing to lose. We must show people they have everything to gain by embracing cooperation and renouncing violence. This is not simply an American or a Western responsibility; it is the world's responsibility."

NY Times columnist Bob Herbert writes: "In the rage that inevitably follows a murderous attack, there is a need to be wary of other, less noble responses. Americans are understandably eager for revenge. But a blind rage that snuffs out the lives of innocents with even more efficiency than the attacks on the World Trade Center and the Pentagon would only shame this nation and would not make it any more secure....There is a difference between spectacular bombing campaigns that generate applause from Americans watching on television and the creative, complex, intensely cooperative and unconventional types of warfare that might actually be effective against terrorists who slither from nation to nation like rats spreading a deadly plague. The terrorists may have altered the NYC skyline, but should not be allowed to alter the spirit and character of the American people."

Two Francisan nuns, Gwen and Dorothy Hennessey (who are sisters) were given the maximum sentence for trespassing to punish them for participiating in last November's huge protest of the the former School of the Americas in Georgia. Two dozen other people were also sentenced their parts in the protest against what is now called "The Western Hemisphere Institute for Security Cooperation" (why is it these people think by renaming something rotten it will smell any different?). The school, which trains soldiers from Latin America in counter-insurgency and military intelligence (i.e.: terrorism), has been accused of teaching torture, execution, and blackmail to thousands - including Panama's crooked despot Manuel Noriega, Haiti's Raoul Cedras, and the thugs who helped kill El Salvador's Bishop Oscar Romero. These convicted protestors' first amendment rights have been trampled in the style of the Third World dictatorships the School helps to create.