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Association of Peace Reporters established in Iran with aim of promoting peace

Press TV – September 21, 2019

The Association of Peace Reporters (APR), an international NGO, has been established in Iran to promote and protect peace in the world irrespective of any religious and political orientation.

The APR, which received its official permission for its activities from the Islamic Republic’s Interior Ministry quite recently, has introduced itself as an international group, whose transpartisan activities are aimed at promoting and protecting international peace.

In a statement, the NGO, whose informal activities began in 2017, said that it is composed of “a group of activists of media, culture and arts who are mainly concerned with peace and have taken small yet impressive steps in this regard.”

It also noted that the reason behind its establishment was “to monitor the human rights and human dignity and contribute to their promotion.”

Some of the most significant steps the APR has so far taken are as follows:

  • Raising awareness regarding the dire condition of Rohingya Muslims in Myanmar through reading an open letter written by Iranian and foreign journalists at the United Nations Human Rights Council.
  • Establishing a campaign to protest against the detention of Press TV anchor Marzieh Hashemi by the US authorities.
  • Working with several other NGOs across the world in signing a letter protesting against the US sanctions against the Islamic Republic.
  • Attending the largest conference of the world’s NGOs in Brazil to raise awareness about the humanitarian situation of women and children in Palestine and Yemen.

September 21, 2019 Posted by | Solidarity and Activism | | 1 Comment

Laurel Canyon: Haven of Peace, Love and Military Intelligence

By John Wear | Inconvenient History, Vol. 11, No. 1 (2019)

During the first week of August 1964, warships under the command of U.S. Adm. George Stephen Morrison allegedly came under attack while patrolling the Tonkin Gulf off Vietnam. This attack was later called the Tonkin Gulf Incident. Although this attack probably never took place, it was used as an excuse to start the Vietnam War.[1]

Meanwhile, in the early months of 1965, an astounding number of musicians, singers and songwriters suddenly moved to a geographically and socially isolated community known as Laurel Canyon in Los Angeles. Within months, the “hippie/flower child” movement started in Laurel Canyon and began to protest the Vietnam War.[2] This article will show that this so-called peace movement was likely controlled by the same military/intelligence community that instigated the Vietnam War.

Musicians

One of the most iconic, controversial, critically acclaimed and influential figures to take up residence in Laurel Canyon was Jim Morrison of the band the Doors. Jim Morrison also happens to be the son of the aforementioned Adm. George Stephen Morrison. So while the father actively conspired to fabricate an incident that started the Vietnam War, his son moved to Laurel Canyon and became an icon of the peace/anti-war movement.[3]

John Phillips also moved to Laurel Canyon and played a major role in spreading the emerging “counterculture” across America. Phillips helped organize the Monterey Pop Festival and wrote the popular song San Francisco, which were both instrumental in luring the disaffected to San Francisco to create the Haight-Ashbury phenomenon and the 1967 Summer of Love. John Phillips was the son of U.S. Marine Corps Capt. Claude Andrew Phillips, and attended a series of elite military prep schools in the Washington, D.C. area, culminating in his appointment to the U.S. Naval Academy at Annapolis.[4]

Ellen Naomi Cohen, better known as Cass Elliot, was a childhood friend of John Phillips’s nephew. Elliot was born in Baltimore but grew up in Alexandria and attended the same high school as Phillips. John Phillips, Michelle Phillips, Denny Doherty and Cass Elliot formed the highly popular Laurel Canyon band the Mamas and the Papas.[5]

Stephen Stills was a founding member of two of Laurel Canyon’s most-acclaimed and beloved bands: Buffalo Springfield and Crosby, Stills & Nash. He was the product of yet another career military family, and was educated primarily at schools on military bases and at elite military academies. Stephen Stills claimed to have served in Vietnam before moving to Laurel Canyon and becoming an icon of the peace movement.[6]

David Crosby was one of Laurel Canyon’s most-flamboyant residents and a founding member of the Byrds as well as Crosby, Stills & Nash. Crosby is the son of World War II military-intelligence officer and Annapolis graduate Maj. Floyd Delafield Crosby. Crosby’s family tree includes numerous U.S. senators and congressmen, governors, mayors, Supreme Court justices, members of the Continental Congress, and high-ranking Masons. If there is a network of elite families that has shaped national and world events for generations, it is likely that David Crosby is a bloodline member of that network.[7]

Jackson Browne, who became a star of the Laurel Canyon scene a few years later, is also the scion of a career military family. Browne was born in a military hospital in Heidelberg, Germany because his father had been assigned to postwar reconstruction work in Germany.[8]

The three members of the band America—Gerry Beckley, Dan Peek and Dewey Bunnell—were also Laurel Canyon residents whose fathers were all members of the military/intelligence community. The three met in West Ruislip near London, where their fathers worked at the West Ruislip U.S. Air Force base, a facility deeply involved in intelligence operations.[9]

Mike Nesmith of the Monkees and Cory Wells of Three Dog Night both arrived in Laurel Canyon after serving with the U.S. Air Force. Gram Parsons, who briefly replaced David Crosby in the Byrds, was also a Laurel Canyon resident and the son of a decorated military officer and bomber pilot.[10]

Frank Zappa was Laurel Canyon’s father figure during the early years of its heyday. Although many of his recording artists were obscure, some such as psychedelic rocker Alice Cooper went on to superstardom. Zappa’s father was a chemical-warfare specialist assigned to the Edgewood Arsenal near Baltimore, Maryland. The Edgewood Arsenal is the longtime home of America’s chemical-warfare program and is frequently cited as being enmeshed in MK/ULTRA operations.[11]

Brian Wilson of the Beach Boys bought his first real home in Laurel Canyon in 1965. Wilson was heavily influenced by the work of Phil Spector, whose crack team of studio musicians, dubbed the Wrecking Crew, provided the instrumental tracks for countless albums by Laurel Canyon bands.[12]

David McGowan wrote:

      All these folks gathered nearly simultaneously along the narrow, winding roads of Laurel Canyon. They came from across the country—although the Washington, D.C. area was noticeably over-represented—as well as from Canada and England, and, in at least one case, all the way from Nazi Germany. They came even though, at the time, there was no music industry in Los Angeles. They came even though, at the time, there was no live music scene to speak of. They came even though, in retrospect, there was no discernible reason for them to do so.[13]

Film    

Lookout Mountain Laboratory was also located in Laurel Canyon. Originally envisioned as a fortified air-defense center, this facility by 1947 featured a fully operational movie studio that included sound stages, screening rooms, film-processing labs, editing facilities, an animation department and 17 climate-controlled film vaults. This studio produced approximately 19,000 classified motion pictures over its lifetime—more than all the Hollywood studios combined.[14]

Lookout Mountain Laboratory apparently had an advanced research and development department that was on the cutting edge of new film technologies such as 3-D effects. Hollywood luminaries including John Ford, Jimmy Stewart, Howard Hawks, Ronald Reagan, Bing Crosby, Walt Disney, Hedda Hopper and Marilyn Monroe worked at the facility on undisclosed projects. The facility also employed up to 250 producers, directors, technicians, editors, animators, etc.—all with top security clearances.[15]

Laurel Canyon in the 1950s was home to leading actors such as Marlon Brando, James Dean, and James Coburn. It was also home to Natalie Wood, who lived in the same home that Cass Elliot would later turn into a Laurel Canyon party house. Other former Laurel Canyon residents connected to the film industry include W.C. Fields, Mary Astor, Roscoe Arbuckle, Errol Flynn, Orson Welles and Robert Mitchum.[16]

A group that played a key role in promoting the new Laurel Canyon bands was Hollywood’s so-called Young Turks. This group included Peter Fonda, Jack Nicholson, Bruce Dern, Dennis Hopper and Warren Beatty, along with their female counterparts such as Jane Fonda, Nancy Sinatra and Sharon Tate. Many of these Hollywood stars forged very close bonds with the Laurel Canyon musicians, and some purchased homes in Laurel Canyon so that they could live and party among the rock stars.[17]

As with the Laurel Canyon musicians, the Young Turks had impressive establishment credentials. Bruce Dern’s godparents were Eleanor Roosevelt and two-time Democratic presidential nominee Adlai Stevenson. Dern’s mother was the sister of Archibald MacLeish, who held several offices in the Roosevelt Administration and was a member of the Skull and Bones society.[18]

Peter and Jane Fonda’s father, Henry Fonda, was a decorated U.S. Naval Intelligence officer during World War II and was once married to a Rothschild descendent. Dennis Hopper’s father was employed by military intelligence and was in the OSS during World War II. Sharon Tate was the daughter of career U.S. Army intelligence officer Lt. Col. Paul Tate, and Nancy Sinatra’s father, Frank Sinatra, had many associations with known Mafia figures.[19]

David McGowan wrote:

      Let’s wrap up this chapter with a quick review of what we have learned about the people populating Laurel Canyon in the mid-to-late 1960s. We know that one subset of residents was a large group of musicians who all decided, nearly simultaneously, to flood into the canyon. The most prominent members of this group were, to an overwhelming degree, the sons and daughters of the military/intelligence community. We also know that mingled in with them were the young stars of Hollywood, who also were, to an astonishing degree, the sons and daughters of the military/intelligence community. And, finally, we know that also in the mix were scores of military/intelligence personnel who operated out of the facility known as Lookout Mountain Laboratory.

I’ve got to say that, given the relatively small size of Laurel Canyon, I’m beginning to wonder if there was any room left over for any normal folks who might have wanted to live the rock’n’roll lifestyle.[20]

Deaths   

The “hippie/flower child” movement was supposed to be about peace, love and gentleness. Unfortunately, an astonishingly large number of Laurel Canyon residents suffered premature and often violent deaths.

The Charles Manson Family murders of Sharon Tate, Stephen Parent, Jay Sebring, Voytek Frykowski and Abigail Folger at 10050 Cielo Drive in Benedict Canyon had deep ties to Laurel Canyon. Frykowski and Folger lived in Laurel Canyon, and Jay Sebring’s hair salon sat right at the mouth of Laurel Canyon. Sharon Tate frequently visited friends in Laurel Canyon such as John Phillips, Cass Elliot and Abigail Folger, and when Tate wasn’t in Laurel Canyon, many of the Laurel Canyon residents visited her place on Cielo Drive.[21]

The unsolved murder of four people on July 1, 1981 at Wonderland Avenue in Laurel Canyon is regarded by Los Angeles homicide detectives as the most-brutal multiple murder in the city’s history. Ron Launius, Billy Deverell, Joy Miller and Barbara Richardson all died from extensive blunt-force trauma injuries. Only Launius’s wife, Susan Launius, miraculously survived the attack.[22]

These murders are hardly unique. For example, Diane Linkletter (daughter of Art Linkletter), comedian Lenny Bruce, actor Sal Mineo, actress Inger Stevens, and actor Ramon Novarro were all found dead in their homes, either in or at the mouth of Laurel Canyon, in the decade between 1966 and 1976. While only two of these people are officially listed as murder victims, it is likely that all five were murdered in their Laurel Canyon homes.[23]

Numerous other people connected to Laurel Canyon died during this period, often under very questionable circumstances. The list includes, but is certainly not limited to, all of the following people:

1) Marina Elizabeth Habe, whose body was carved up and tossed into the heavy brush in Laurel Canyon on December 30, 1968;

2) Christine Hinton, a girlfriend of David Crosby, who was killed in a head-on collision on September 30, 1969;

3) Jane Doe #59, a teenage girl who was never identified, found dumped into the heavy undergrowth of Laurel Canyon in November 1969. She had been stabbed 157 times in the chest and throat;

4) Alan Wilson of the Laurel Canyon band Canned Heat was found dead on September 3, 1970 at age 27. Wilson had moved to Topanga Canyon after the band’s Laurel Canyon home burned to the ground. Wilson’s former bandmate, Bob Hite, also died of a heart attack at age 36;

5) Brandon DeWilde, a friend of David Crosby and Gram Parsons, died in a freak accident in Colorado on July 6, 1972;

6) Christine Frka, the Zappa family’s former housekeeper, died in her early twenties of an alleged drug overdose;

7) Danny Whitten, who was with Neil Young’s band Crazy Horse, died of an overdose on November 18, 1972 at age 29;

8) Bruce Berry, a roadie for Crosby, Stills, Nash & Young, died of a heroin overdose in June 1973;

9) Clarence White, a 29-year-old guitarist who had played with the Kentucky Colonels and the Byrds, was run over and killed on July 14, 1973;

10) Gram Parsons allegedly overdosed on a speedball on September 19, 1973;

11) Amy Gossage, Graham Nash’s 20-year-old girlfriend, was stabbed to death in her San Francisco home on February 13, 1975;

12) Tim Buckley, a singer/songwriter signed to Frank Zappa’s record label, died of a reported overdose on June 29, 1975;

13) Phyllis Major Browne, the 30-year-old wife of Jackson Browne, reportedly overdosed on barbiturates on March 25, 1976;

14) Cass Elliot died in London at age 32, allegedly of heart failure. Some think she was killed because she knew too much;

15) Judee Sill, who sold a song to the Laurel Canyon band the Turtles and worked on an album in Mike Nesmith’s recording studio, died in November 1979 at age 35;

16) Steve Brandt, a friend of John Phillips, allegedly overdosed on barbiturates in November 1969;

17) Ricky Nelson, who had lived in Laurel Canyon, died in an unusual plane crash on December 31, 1985;

18) John Denver, whose father was a career U.S. Air Force officer, moved to Los Angeles in 1964 and became part of the Laurel Canyon scene. Denver died in 1997 when his self-piloted plane crashed soon after taking off from Monterey Airport;

19) Sonny Bono, who began his Hollywood career as a lieutenant for Phil Spector, died on January 5, 1998, after purportedly skiing into a tree;

20) Phil Hartman, who had substantial ties to the early Laurel Canyon scene, was murdered in his Encino home on May 28, 1998;

21) Lawrence Eugene “Larry” Williams was found dead in his Laurel Canyon home on January 7, 1980, with a gunshot wound to his head;

22) Brian Cole, bass player for the Laurel Canyon band the Association, was found dead on August 2, 1972, of a reported heroin overdose;

23) Lowell George, who had worked with Frank Zappa, died of a heart attack on June 29, 1979 at age 34;

24) Tim Hardin, a Laurel Canyon musician and close associate of Frank Zappa, died of a reported drug overdose on December 29, 1980 at age 39;

25) Natalie Wood, who died on November 29, 1981 in a drowning incident at Catalina Island that has never been adequately explained. Wood was 43 when she was laid to rest.

Also, as is widely known, Jim Morrison, Jimi Hendrix and Janis Joplin all died at Age 27 under questionable circumstances.[24]

On December 6, 1969, occasional Laurel Canyon residents Mick Jagger and Keith Richards along with permanent Laurel Canyon residents Crosby, Stills, Nash & Young staged a free concert at a desolate speedway known as Altamont. Four people died and another 850 people were injured at this concert. These deaths and injuries were caused mostly by members of the Hell’s Angels, who had ostensibly been hired by the Rolling Stones to provide security. Since it was widely known that the Hell’s Angels club was openly hostile to hippies and anti-war activists, the selection of this motorcycle club to provide security was probably done for malicious reasons.[25]

Conclusion

Many of the Laurel Canyon stars were openly using and dealing in illegal substances. The state could have utilized its law-enforcement and criminal-justice powers to silence many of its most prominent voices. However, that never happened. For example, David Crosby acknowledged that “the DEA could have popped me for interstate transport of dope or dealing lots of times and never did.” John Phillips, who was busted for drug trafficking and thought he would receive a 45-year sentence, served only 24 days in a minimum-security prison.[26]

The state also could have used the draft to silence its war critics. After all, there was a war going on, and hundreds of thousands of young men were being sent to Vietnam. However, none of the Laurel Canyon stars had their careers interrupted by the Vietnam War. The tricks used unsuccessfully by thousands of young men across the country to avoid the draft always seemed to work for the Laurel Canyon crowd.[27]

The state, working hand-in-hand with corporate America, also had the power to prevent the musical icons of the 1960s from ever becoming the megastars they became. The mass media could have easily prevented the entire countercultural movement from getting off the ground since it controlled the channels of communication. Instead, the mass media actively promoted the Laurel Canyon stars.[28] Books such as The Greening of America were even written to promote the ridiculous idea that the new countercultural icons were representatives of an advanced social consciousness.[29]

Vladimir Lenin once stated: “The best way to control the opposition is to lead it ourselves.”[30] The evidence indicates that the peace movement of the 1960s was not a grass-roots challenge to the Vietnam War. Rather, the “hippie/flower-child” movement was a fake opposition that could be easily controlled and neutralized. The Laurel Canyon musicians and other leaders of the countercultural movement were typically as much a part of the military/intelligence community as the people they were supposedly opposing.[31]

A version of this article appeared previously in the Barnes Review.

Notes

[1] McGowan, David, Weird Scenes inside the Canyon: Laurel Canyon, Covert Ops & the Dark Heart of the Hippie Dream, London: Headpress, pp. 11-12.

[2] Ibid., p. 12.

[3] Ibid., p. 13.

[4] Ibid., pp. 15-16.

[5] Ibid., pp. 205-207

[6] Ibid., pp. 16-17.

[7] Ibid., pp. 17-18.

[8] Ibid., p. 19.

[9] Ibid.

[10] Ibid., pp. 19-20.

[11] Ibid., pp. 13-14.

[12] Ibid., pp. 137, 254.

[13] Ibid., p. 20.

[14] Ibid., pp. 55-56.

[15] Ibid., p. 56.

[16] Ibid., pp. 57-58.

[17] Ibid., pp. 85-86.

[18] Ibid., pp. 89-90.

[19] Ibid., pp. 90-92.

[20] Ibid., p. 95.

[21] Ibid., pp. 26-28.

[22] Ibid., pp. 26, 28, 115; https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wonderland_murders.

[23] Ibid., pp. 28-29.

[24] Ibid., pp. 30-37, 41-43, 109-118.

[25] Ibid., pp. 179-182.

[26] Ibid., p. 154.

[27] Ibid., p. 155.

[28] Ibid.

[29] Reich, Charles, The Greening of America, New York: Bantam Books, 1971.

[30] https://www.goodreads.com/quotes/38974-the-best-way-to-control-the-opposition-is-to-lead.

[31] McGowan, David, op. cit, pp. 23-24.

September 21, 2019 Posted by | Deception, Timeless or most popular | | 5 Comments

Why Does Chris Hedges Hedge His Bets?

By Edward Curtin | September 21, 2019

The revelations about the machinations of the so-called “deep state” often conceal deeper truths that go unmentioned. This is quite common, whether it is done intentionally or not.

Sometimes it is intentional and is directed by the intelligence agencies themselves or their accomplices in the media, who operate a vast propaganda network. In that case, it is because the secret rulers have been caught doing some evil deed, and, not being able to fully deny it, they admit to part of it while concealing deeper secrets. This is termed “a limited hangout.” It is described by ex-CIA Deputy Director Victor Marchetti, author of The CIA and the Cult of Intelligence, as follows:

Spy jargon for a favorite and frequently used gimmick of the clandestine professionals. When their veil of secrecy is shredded and they can no longer rely on a phony cover story to misinform the public, they resort to admitting—sometimes even volunteering—some of the truth while still managing to withhold the key and damaging facts in the case. The public, however, is usually so intrigued by the new information that it never thinks to pursue the matter further.

For the average person, it is very hard to read between the lines and smell a skunk. The subterfuge is often very subtle and appeals to readers’ sense of outrage at what happened in the past. After the Church Hearings in the 1970s, and then Carl Bernstein’s limited hangout article in Rolling Stone in 1977, where he named the names and “outed” many major media and individuals for having worked with the CIA, many people breathed deeply and consigned these evil and propagandistic activities to the bad old days. But these “limited hangouts” have been going on ever since, allowing people to express outrage and feel some sort of redemption is at hand in the naïve belief that the system is reformable. It is a pipe dream induced by the smallest puff on the media’s latest recreational drug, for which no prescription is needed. The media that more openly and proudly than ever reveal their jobs as stenographers for the intelligence agencies (see my US Media Propaganda. Drawing “Liberals” and “Leftists” into the CIA’s Orbit. NPR) . 

In The Iceman Cometh, the playwright Eugene O’Neill puts the delusional nature of so much public consciousness thus:

To hell with the truth! As the history of the world proves, the truth has no bearing on anything. It’s irrelevant and immaterial, as the lawyers say. The lie of a pipe dream is what gives life to the whole misbegotten mad lot of us, drunk or sober.

Truth may never have been popular, but if one studies the history of propaganda techniques as they have developed in tandem with technological changes, it becomes apparent that today’s incredibly sophisticated digital technology and the growth of screen culture that has resulted in what Guy Debord has called “the society of the spectacle” has made the manipulation of truth increasingly easier and far trickier. News in today’s world appears as a pointillistic canvas of thousands of disconnected dots impossible to connect unless one has the desire, time, determination, and ability to connect the points through research, which most people do not have. “As a result,” writes Jacques Ellul in his classic study, Propaganda, “he finds himself in a kind of kaleidoscope in which thousands of unconnected images follow each other rapidly” and “his attention is continually diverted to new matters, new centers of interest, and is dissipated on a thousand things, which disappear from one day to the next.” This technology is a boon to government propagandists that make sure to be on the cutting edge of new technology and the means to control the flow of its content, often finding that the medium is the message, one that is especially confounding since seemingly liberating – e.g. cell phones and their easy and instantaneous ability to access information and “breaking news.”

Then there are writers, artists, and communicators of all types, whether consciously or not, who contribute to the obfuscating of essential truths even while informing the public of important matters. These people come from across the political spectrum. To know their intentions is impossible, unless they spell them out in public to let their audiences evaluate them, which rarely happens, otherwise one is left to guess, which is a fool’s game. One can, however, point out what they say and what they don’t and wonder why.

A recent article, Our Invisible Government, by the well-known journalist, Chris Hedges, is a typical case in point. As is his habit, he sheds light on much that is avoided by the mainstream press. Very important matters. In this piece, he writes in his passionate style that

The most powerful and important organs in the invisible government are the nation’s bloated and unaccountable intelligence agencies. They are the vanguard of the invisible government. They oversee a vast “black world,” tasked with maintaining the invisible government’s lock on power.

This, of course, is true. He then goes on to catalogue ways these intelligence agencies, led by the CIA, have overthrown foreign governments and assassinated their leaders, persecuted and besmirched the names of those – Edward Snowden, Julian Assange, et al. – who have opposed government policies, and used propaganda to conceal the real reasons for their evil deeds, such as the wars against Vietnam, Syria, Afghanistan, Iraq, and Libya. He condemns such actions.

He spends much of his article referencing Stephen Kinzer’s new book, Poisoner in Chief: Sydney Gottlieb and the CIA Search for Mind Control and Gottlieb’s heinous exploits during his long CIA career. Known as “Dr. Death,” this Bronx born son of Jewish immigrants, ran the CIA’s mind control programs and its depraved medical experiments on unknowing victims, known as MK-ULTRA and Artichoke. He oversaw the development of various poisons and bizarre methods to kill foreign leaders such as Fidel Castro and Patrice Lumumba. He worked closely with Nazi scientists who had been brought to the United States by Allen Dulles in an operation called Operation Paperclip. Gottlieb was responsible for so many deaths and so much human anguish and suffering that it is hard to believe, but believe it we must because it is true. His work on torture and mind control led to Abu Ghraib, CIA black sites, and assorted U.S. atrocities of recent history.

Hedges tells us all this and rightly condemns it as “the moral squalor” and “criminality” that it is. Only a sick or evil person could disagree with his account of Gottlieb via Kinzer’s book. I suspect many good people who have or will read his piece will agree with his denunciations of this evil CIA history. Additionally, he correctly adds:

It would be naive to relegate the behavior of Gottlieb and the CIA to the past, especially since the invisible government has once again shrouded the activities of intelligence agencies from congressional oversight or public scrutiny and installed a proponent of torture, Gina Haspel, as the head of the agency.

This also is very true. All these truths can make you forget what’s not true and what’s missing in his article.

But something is missing, and some wording is quite odd and factually false. It is easy to miss this as one’s indignation rises as one reads Hedges’ cataloguing of Gottlieb’s and the CIA’s obscenities.

He omits mentioning the Clinton administration’s dismantling wars against Yugoslavia, including 78 days of non-stop bombing of Serbia in 1999 that killed thousands of innocent people in the name of “humanitarian intervention,” wars he covered for the New York Times, the paper he has come to castigate  and the paper that has a long history of doing the CIA’s bidding.

He claims that Gottlieb and the CIA’s scientists failed in their “vain quest” for mind control drugs or electronic implants that might, among other things, get victims to act against their wills, such as acting as a Manchurian candidate, and as a result, “abandoned” their efforts. That they failed is not true, and that they abandoned their efforts is unknowable, unless you wish to take the CIA at its word, which is a hilarious thought. How could Hedges possibly know they abandoned such work? A logical person would assume they would say that and continue their work more secretly. On one hand, Hedges says, “It would be naive to relegate the behavior of Gottlieb and the CIA to the past,” but then he does just that. Which is it, Chris? By definition, the “invisible” government, the CIA, never reveals their operations, and lying is their modus operandi, especially with their brazen in-your-face biblical motto: “And ye shall know the truth and the truth shall make you free.”

He says the invisible deep state “failed to foresee… the 9/11 attacks or the absence of Iraqi weapons of mass destruction.” This is factually wrong and quite absurd, as is well documented. They simply lied about these matters ex post facto. He suggests such failures were due to “ineptitude,” a coy word used by numerous other writers who find reasons to deny intentionality to the “deep state.”

He therefore is implying that the attacks of September 11, 2001, a subject that he has consistently failed to address over the years even while he has written in detail about so much else, did not involve America’s “invisible government forces.” The ineptitude explanation fails elementary logical analysis. Does he think it was intelligence ineptitude that allowed operatives to wire the highly-secure Twin Towers and Building 7 for controlled demolition that brought those buildings down, as the testimony of one’s eyes and that of hundreds of NYC firefighters who reported explosions throughout the buildings affirm? Ineptitude is another word for avoidance of evidence, gathered over the years by careful scholars and researchers. Ineptitude is another word for the belief “in miracles,” as David Ray Griffin has phrased it.

What does he think Colin Powell was doing at the United Nations on February 5, 2003 with CIA Director George Tenet sitting behind him when he lied repeatedly and fabricated evidence for Iraq having weapons of mass destruction to promote and justify the U.S. war against Iraq? Ineptitude? A failure of intelligence?

Chris Hedges is a very intelligent man, so why does he write such things?

Most importantly, why, when he writes about the past evil deeds of the intelligence operatives – Gottlieb and the CIA’s overseas coups and assassination of foreign leaders, etc. – does he fail to say one word about the CIA’s assassination of domestic leaders, including President John Kennedy in 1963, the foundational event in the invisible government’s takeover of the United States. Can an act be more evil and in need of moral condemnation? And how about the assassinations of Martin Luther King and Robert Kennedy in 1968, or Malcolm X in 1965? Why does Hedges elide these assassinations as if they are not worthy of attention, but Gottlieb’s sick work for the CIA is? Like the attacks of September 11, 2001, he has avoided these assassinations throughout the years.

I don’t know why. Only he can say. He is a very well-read man, who is constantly quoting from scholars about various important issues. His books are chock full of such quotations and references. But you will look in vain for references to the brilliant, scholarly work of such writers on these assassinations, the attacks of September 11, 2001, and the CIA’s criminal and morally repugnant activities as James Douglass, David Talbot, David Ray Griffin, William Pepper, Graeme MacQueen, Lisa Pease, and so many others. Is it possible that he has never read their books when he has read so much else? If so, why?

As I said before, Chris Hedges, who has a passionate but mild-mannered style, is not alone in his disregard of these key matters. Other celebrity names on the left have been especially guilty of the same approach: Noam Chomsky, Howard Zinn, and Alexander Cockburn, to name just a few (Zinn and Cockburn are dead). They have avoided these issues as if they were toxic. Nor would they logically explain why. The few times they did respond to those who criticized them for this, it was usually through a dismissive wave of the hand or name calling, a tactic such as the CIA developed with the term “conspiracy theory.” Cockburn was particularly nasty in this regard, priding himself on dismissing others with words such as kooks, lunatics, and idiots, even when his logic was deplorable. He liked to use ineptitude’s synonym, “incompetence,” to explain away what he considered intelligence agency failures. “Why,” he wrote in one piece attacking September 11 critics while upholding the government’s version, “does the obvious have to be proved?”  “Brillig!” as Humpty Dumpty would say. Absolutely brillig!

The CIA’s mind control operations need to be exposed, as Hedges does to a degree in this latest article. But revealing while concealing is unworthy of one who condemns “creeps who revel in human degradation, dirty tricks, and murder.” It itself is a form of mind control.

Perhaps he will see fit to publicly explain why he has done this.

September 21, 2019 Posted by | Deception, Mainstream Media, Warmongering | , , , | 1 Comment

BBC tries to understand Welsh independence movement

Press TV – September 21, 2019

The giant strides of the Welsh independence movement this year have finally grabbed the full attention of the British mainstream media, which would otherwise prefer to ignore this phenomenon.

The BBC ran a short documentary on Welsh independence yesterday, with a focus on the role of young people in the movement.

The BBC Wales political reporter, Teleri Glyn, ostensibly tries to understand what is driving young Welsh people toward independence by interviewing niche groups, notably Cardiff University’s Independence Society.

Despite the veneer of objectivity, Glyn’s report tries to downplay the momentum toward Welsh independence by creating a generational schism between the young and old in Wales.

The older people she interviews for the report all happen to be strongly opposed to independence thus creating the impression that Welsh nationalism is a transient phenomenon largely confined to the youth.

The BBC’s barely concealed misconceptions, or distortions as some might argue, stand in stark contrast to reporting by less mainstream media.

Four months ago, Vice News ran a features story on the issue of Welsh independence with a particular focus on the role of young people in it.

Entitled “Welsh Independence Has Gone Mainstream”, and published on May 24, 2019, the story showcases specific youth-based groups who are at the sharpest end of the independence movement.

One such group, the “Welsh Independence Memes for Angry Welsh Teens”, has a strong online presence, boasting more than 17,500 followers on Facebook.

Vice also showcases “Sianel Pump” a YouTube channel targeting a youth/young adult audience, which was launched by the Welsh language broadcaster S4C back in 2016.

Sianel Pump’s success led to the development of “Hansh”, a pro-independence, Welsh-language YouTube channel for youth whose video contents regularly get tens of thousands of views.

The focus on young people in the Welsh independence movement is unfolding against a backdrop of a dramatic rise in nationalist sentiment in Wales.

So far this year there have been three large pro-independence rallies, the first in Cardiff (May), the second in Caernarfon (July) and the last in Merthyr Tydfil earlier this month.

According to the latest YouGov opinion poll, conducted between 6-10 September, and with a sample size of 1039 people, 24 percent of respondents said they would vote for an independent Wales if there was a referendum tomorrow.

The support for separation from the UK jumps to 33 percent if Welsh independence also entailed staying within the European Union.

September 21, 2019 Posted by | Mainstream Media, Warmongering | , | 1 Comment

Syrian Army Intercepts Drone Loaded With Cluster Bombs – Reports

Sputnik – September 21, 2019

The Syrian Army has intercepted a drone loaded with cluster bombs over Jebel al-Sheikh near the Golan Heights, the Syrian Arab News Agency said on Saturday.

According to the report, special services dismantled the drone, which they managed to detect and shoot down north of the city of Al Qunaitra.

In addition, Syrian intelligence agencies discovered a stash of weapons, ammunition, medicine, food, and equipment produced in Israel, in the village of Barika in the suburbs of Quneitra.

​The incident comes two days after another drone interception over the Damascus suburb of Aqraba.

Israel seized control of the Golan Heights from Syria during the 1967 Six-Day War and annexed the territory in 1981, although the move was not recognised by the United Nations. In 2018, the UN General Assembly adopted a resolution urging Israel to immediately withdraw its forces from the occupied territory.

September 21, 2019 Posted by | War Crimes | , | 6 Comments

Even Saudis don’t believe fiction of Iranian attacks on oil plants – Zarif

RT | September 21, 2019

Saudi Arabia may have joined the US in blaming Iran for last week’s attack on its oil facilities, but the kingdom’s response clearly shows it doesn’t believe it to be true, Iranian Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif has said.

“Since the Saudi regime has blamed Iran – baseless as that is – for the attacks on its oil facilities, curious that they retaliated against Hodaideh in Yemen today – breaking a UN ceasefire,” Zarif wrote on Twitter.

“It is clear that even the Saudis themselves don’t believe the fiction of Iranian involvement.”

A key Saudi oil facility was seriously damaged last Saturday in a raid by drones and cruise missiles, leading to a sharp drop in production. Yemen’s Houthi rebels claimed responsibility for the attack, but Washington and Riyadh insist the group was incapable of launching such an elaborate assault, and accused Iran of being the perpetrator.

Despite this, Saudi Arabia launched bombing sorties in Yemen targeting the Houthi-controlled port of Hodeidah on Friday, which the Yemeni rebels called a dangerous escalation that could “blow up” a UN-negotiated truce between the two parties.

The Saudis have been intervening in Yemen since 2015 in an attempt to return a Riyadh-friendly president to power. The conflict is perceived by Saudi Arabia as a proxy war against Iran, its regional arch-rival. Tehran denies supporting the Houthis militarily.

Washington responded to the attack on Saudi oil infrastructure by deploying more troops to the Middle East. The incident was a major embarrassment for the US since its costly air defense systems failed to protect the site from the drones and missiles. Saudi Arabia is a leading buyer of American arms and has been using them extensively in Yemen, but last week’s debacle questions whether those investments were wise.

The US is also set to impose additional sanctions on the Iranian banking system in retaliation. Washington framed these as measures necessary to stop the funding of terrorism by Tehran, but Zarif said the US wants to stifle Iran’s foreign trade and “its access to food and medicine.”

“This move is unacceptable and dangerous,” the Iranian official said.

Iran is already living under increasingly harsh sanctions from the US, which the Trump administration has been ratcheting up since the president’s first months in power.

September 21, 2019 Posted by | Deception, Mainstream Media, Warmongering | , | 1 Comment

US tap water contaminants linked with 100,000 cancer cases: Study

Press TV – September 21, 2019

Chemicals present within legal limits in tap water are projected to be responsible for more than 100,000 cancer cases in the US, according to estimates from a new study.

The study, published Thursday in the journal Heliyon, looked at nearly 50,000 water systems across the country.

It analyzed the presence of 22 cancer-causing chemicals that are regulated by states and the Environmental Protection Agency but still found in varying degrees in drinking water.

Researchers with the Environmental Working Group, a nonprofit advocacy organization, said the study is the first to project on a national level the cancer risk the combination of chemicals pose over a person’s statistical lifetime – about 70 years.

They found that the majority of cancer cases came from water systems that were fully complying with drinking water standards set either by states or the EPA.

“Water that meets legal standards still poses health risks,” says Sydney Evans, the lead author of the study and a science analyst at Environmental Working Group.

Of the nearly two dozen chemicals examined, the biggest problem is arsenic, which even in small concentrations is responsible for disproportionate numbers of cancer cases, according to the study.

But Evans says that this study is an attempt to start looking at the chemicals present in water as a mixture instead of assessing them one by one.

The analysis is conservative, according to Evans, because it only looked at chemicals with national monitoring data or health benchmark levels. Many more chemicals exist in drinking water that haven’t been studied enough to include in the assessment, Evans says.

The study does not include measurements from private wells, which roughly 13.5 million Americans rely on for drinking water. Private wells don’t have to follow federal drinking water standards.

A water filter is a good “first course of action for an individual who is concerned,” Evans says. Residents should check their local water reports to know what kind of filter would be best for the types of chemicals present where they live.

The study shows that tougher standards for drinking water are needed, according to Evans.

“Filters aren’t a solution,” Evans says. “They’re a measure people can take right now until their water quality is improved.”

(Source: US News & World Report )

September 21, 2019 Posted by | Environmentalism | | 2 Comments

We stop, you stop! Houthis offer Saudi Arabia mutual halt to strikes in wake of devastating oil-plant attacks

 Houthi Ansarullah movement president of the Supreme Political Council, Mahdi al-Mashat
RT | September 21, 2019

Yemen’s Houthi rebels have announced a halt on strikes against Saudi Arabia, adding that they expect reciprocal steps from Riyadh. The ceasefire offer comes days after a major attack on Saudi oil refineries claimed by the Houthis.

The televised announcement was made on Friday by Mahdi al-Mashat, head of the Houthi political council in Sana’a. It comes as the Saudi-led coalition launched a massive operation against “legitimate military targets” north of the port of Hodeidah, in southwestern Yemen.

“I call on all parties from different sides of the war to engage seriously in genuine negotiations that can lead to a comprehensive national reconciliation that does not exclude anyone,” said Mashat. If the Saudis ignore the ceasefire offer and continue bombing, the group reserves its “right to respond,” he warned.

This is not the first instance of Houthis making a ceasefire gesture to try and stop the Saudi bombing campaign – but this time they appear to have some added leverage. The offer comes just a week after a strike on oil processing facilities in Abqaiq and Khurais halved Saudi Arabian production and spiked global oil prices by nearly 20 percent.

The Houthis claimed responsibility for the strike, which demonstrated failure of Saudi Arabia’s US-made air defenses, but Riyadh and Washington chose to blame Iran for the attack instead.

No proof of Tehran’s involvement in the launch of drones and missiles has so far been provided, with Saudi Arabia only identifying the source of the attack as somewhere in the “north.” Iran has denied any involvement in the attack.

Meanwhile, the Houthis also capitalized on the attack’s outcome by promptly threatening another member of the Saud-led coalition, the UAE. Earlier this week, the rebels claimed that they’ve picked dozens of Emirati targets that would be attacked by drones unless Abu Dhabi ceases its participation in the Yemen war.

Conflict has ravaged the Arabian peninsula country since 2015, when a coalition led by Saudi Arabia and the UAE invaded Yemen trying to reinstall the ousted pro-Saudi President Abdrabbuh Mansour Hadi. While they have been unable to defeat the Houthis despite their overwhelming advantage in numbers and weaponry, the war has taken a heavy toll on the people of Yemen. Tens of thousands have been killed in the conflict, while millions have been deprived of the very basic healthcare, food and clean water, with starvation and disease rampant.

September 21, 2019 Posted by | Illegal Occupation | , | 1 Comment