DID BUSH REALLY WANT TO BOMB AL JAZEERA?--Jeremy Scahill(Nation)

[laststeamtrain]

DID BUSH REALLY WANT TO BOMB AL JAZEERA?

Jeremy Scahill
Wed Nov 23, 5:49 PM ET

The Nation -- On November 22, Britain's Daily Mirror published a startling allegation: In an April 2004 White House meeting with British Prime Minister Tony Blair, President Bush proposed bombing the Arab TV network Al Jazeera's international headquarters in Qatar. The report was based on a memo stamped "Top Secret" that had been leaked by a Cabinet official in Blair's government.
Is the allegation "outlandish," as the White House claims? Or was it a deadly serious option? Until a news organization or British official defies the Official Secrets Act and publishes the five-page memo, we have no way of knowing. But what we do know is that at the time of Bush's White House meeting with Blair, the Bush Administration was in the throes of a very public, high-level temper tantrum directed against Al Jazeera. The Bush-Blair summit took place on April 16, at the peak of the first US siege of Falluja, and Al Jazeera was there to witness the assault and the fierce resistance.
A day before Bush's meeting with Blair, Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld slammed Al Jazeera in distinctly undiplomatic terms:
REPORTER: Can you definitively say that hundreds of women and children and innocent civilians have not been killed?
RUMSFELD: I can definitively say that what Al Jazeera is doing is vicious, inaccurate and inexcusable.
REPORTER: Do you have a civilian casualty count?
RUMSFELD: Of course not, we're not in the city. But you know what our forces do; they don't go around killing hundreds of civilians. That's just outrageous nonsense. It's disgraceful what that station is doing.
What Al Jazeera was doing in Falluja is exactly what it was doing when the United States bombed its offices in Afghanistan in 2001 and when US forces killed Al Jazeera's Baghdad correspondent, Tareq Ayoub, during the April 2003 occupation of Baghdad. Al Jazeera was witnessing and reporting on events Washington did not want the world to see...
http://www.thenation.com/doc/20051212/scahill

[aquart]

1. George was not joking.

His family routinely makes mean, vicious, sadistic remarks and expects laughs, but none of them are actually joking.

[global1]

2. Brits - Please Demand That Blair Release All The Downing Street Minutes...

GWB lied the U.S. into a war with the help of Tony Blair. You Brits never supported this war and only half-heartedly support Blair. Demand that Blair pull your troops out of Iraq immediately and demand that all of the DSM related to this lie of a war be released. You could help us rid this world of *Co.

[phaseolus]

3. One thing that's interesting about this story

Ignoring for the time being whether the Al Jazeera thing is true or not, Bush has put himself in a position where stories like this are entirely plausible. More and more of these revelations are bound to come out in the next few months. Let's assume that some will be true and some will be fabrications. Even the false ones will be entirely believable, and they'll all damage him.

This illustrates what a miserable failure he's been as a leader.

[Snap]

5. Correcto Mundo

People no longer trust "Mr. Good 'Ol Common Guy Bush". He has been exposed as a craven simpleton and a liar. The wheels are coming off.

[Monkey see Monkey Do]

6. Not on the same scale, but the other day Peter Galbraith

recounted a Bush annecdote from January 2003. Apparently he'd invited three exiled leaders from Iraq to join him to watch the Superbowl - one Kurd, one Sunni & one Shiite. Bush was confused - he didn't understand why there were two muslim guys there, so they had to explain the historical and theological differences and how that had been exploited by Saddam.

Now I think I've heard a slightly similar story from a Saudi Prince who briefed Bush on Palastine and Bush didn't know the difference between (I think) the PLO & Hamas.

"Even the false ones will be entirely believable, and they'll all damage him."

is exactly the point my ramble is supposed to make. :)

[lumpy]

4. Excellent balanced article.

Recommended- every one should read this, concise and to the point. The article makes everything about the role of Al Jareeza more clear.