Allow me to set up a hypothetical situation...

[EarlG]

The year is 1993, and the World Trade Center has just been bombed. New president Bill Clinton decides to use the attack as an excuse to invade Iraq. In order to expedite the invasion, his administration hunts for evidence of a connection between the WTC attack and Saddam Hussein's regime. Having captured some alleged terrorists, Clinton illegally orders them held without trial and tortured until they admit to a connection.

The Clinton administration then goes before the United Nations and presents "evidence" gleaned from this torture to "prove" that Iraq is linked to terrorism and intends to strike the U.S. with weapons of mass destruction. Next Clinton terrifies the American people with a chilling State of the Union address during which he gives explicit descriptions of the WMDs that Iraq will bring to bear upon the United States if no action is taken.

Having convinced a majority of Americans that Saddam Hussein was behind the World Trade Center attack, and having silenced any anti-war opposition in Congress by accusing dissenters of being unpatriotic, anti-American, and even siding with terrorists, Clinton invades Iraq.

Post-invasion, no weapons of mass destruction are found. Embarrassed, Clinton orders more illegal torture to be used, this time on captured Iraqi soldiers, specifically to find evidence of a connection between Saddam Hussein and the terrorists who attacked the WTC.

This war of choice, which destabilizes the Middle East and destroys the international reputation of the United States, costs the American taxpayer $2 trillion dollars and results in the deaths of several thousand U.S. troops and hundreds of thousands of Iraqi civilians. The people who committed the attack on the World Trade Center remain at large.

And the person most to blame for all this would be...

http://www.opensecrets.org/revolving/rev_summary.php?id=70327">Larry Combest (R-TX)

...who was the ranking member of the House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence at the time.

[EFerrari]

1. Yeah, it's ridiculous. But it serves the purpose of buying time

for Cheney and the other perps.

[maddezmom]

2. kick

:thumbsup:

[Political Tiger]

3. Your point is well taken!

K & R!

[blm]

4. Why do you think BushInc's cronies bought control of broadcast media in the 80s and 90s?

So they can control any narrative that PROTECTS the BFEE.

[Overseas]

61. That has been one of their most effective strategies.

I'll put some links to the background info on the 50 or so media companies being conglomerated into the 5 we have left today, consolidated into conservative hands. That has been the biggest triumph of the right wing in the USA. http://www.corporations.org/media/

Conservative media ownership has been painfully clear to me throughout the past decade in particular.

Watching big stations like CNN prepare special branding for an illegal war of choice-- even as many experts were denying the claims of the administration and MILLIONS around the world were protesting to stop the Bush Gang's war, the major news stations were dutifully playing all the clips of the Bush team scaring the public about falsified connections between Sadaam and Bin Laden (even though they hated each other) and then on to the secret stockpiles of WMD which they later admitted --Whoops-- didn't exist. But they got lots of TV clip time to scare the public about mushroom clouds.

When that upstart, diplomat Joe Wilson, exposed their lies about Sadaam seeking yellow cake uranium in Niger, the Bush Gang outed a covert CIA officer and her whole company, that had been getting the facts about WMD throughout the Middle East. The Bush Bullies smashed an intricate covert operation to get back at the agent's spouse. (And probably to stop that pesky accurate information from being collected anymore. It interferes with the Bush Gang and their ilk from setting their own agendas and pushing their wars of choice. Don't want those annoying facts to interfere with their grand plans to dominate the dwindling natural resources with brute force.)

Watching the major news outlets run all the ready-made Pentagon "news" stories and hire Pentagon spokespeople as their "independent" military experts, has also been appalling. And they are still pandering to the right by putting so many Republicans on the air to criticize Obama's agenda by demanding more tax cuts even though those and the Bush Gang's war of choice have bankrupted our country. The TV media spokespeople would say that they are just being "balanced" by showing so many critics of the administration. Funny how during the Bush maladministration, they showed 2 critics for every 8 supporters, and now it seems more like 7 anti-administration comments for every 3 in support.

The media takeover co-existed with the right's concerted campaign through think-tanks, editorial commentators, talking-point distribution, and other means, to move the national dialogue to the right. They did this even as they were "playing the ref" by accusing the media of having a liberal bias. Calling the media out as liberal provided more impetus to the channels to incorporate more right wingers on the air to show that "no mommy, we're not liberal!" Eric Alterman's book "What Liberal Media?" is full of detail about this concerted campaign from the 80's to the 2000's. www.whatliberalmedia.com . I believe Media Matters has some revealing data about the proportion of pro-Iraq-War to anti-war commentators allowed on the TV media-- very strong pro-war slant.

The conservative-owned mass media are even allowing the people who ignored the August 2001 PDB about Al Qaeda planning to strike in the USA on the air to criticize President Obama for endangering our national security !! Allowing the people who cooked up an illegal war of choice that greatly weakened our national security and economy to get air time to criticize President Obama for making our country less secure is really revolting. And provides further proof of right wing domination of our media.

During Jimmy Carter's administration, major newspapers ran 90-point digits on the front pages of their newspapers-- 155, 156, 157 -- to indicate how many days our hostages had been in captivity in Iran. But I didn't see 155, 156, 157 giant type counting the days Bin Laden had been at large during the administration that promised to get him "Dead or Alive." Just a few pesky news anchors and blogs kept the tally going.

That Bush was allowed to be Re-Selected was further proof of right wing media domination too.

The man who didn't support our troops enough to provide them with adequate body armor, and whose administration allowed the horrors of Abu Ghraib to be perpetrated in our name, was being re-selected over a war hero who had exciting plans to reduce our country's use of imported oil through an Apollo program for alternative energy development. But Kerry's speeches were sometimes dull, so some of the anti-Gore tactics could be revived-- the conservative media could pretend that people preferred the torturing beer guy over the veteran policy wonk.

Our legislative, executive and judicial branches were supposed to be overseen by an independent press. It is a great pity that we let that slip. It will be tough to correct that "free market" (i.e. cash dominated) media ownership consolidation.

So here we are again, with the rest of the world having seen tons of photos of the Bush Gang's torture program in effect, but lots of media talk about the images being dangerous for the US public to see because they may give more fodder to our enemies. The rest of the world, friends and enemies alike, have seen far more images of Bush-approved torture than the US public has. Our enemies have stacks of PR material already, thanks to the Bush Gang's torture program and illegal war against Iraq. It is really only the US public that has been spared from seeing a lot of that ugly brutality, thanks to conservative corporate domination of our media.

[conscious evolution]

70. For the same reason they took over

the Southern Babtist Convention.
To manipulate and control the population.

[SIMPLYB1980]

5. Well done.

K&R.

[unblock]

6. but double-standards and hypocrisy are the republicans' bread and butter

in fact if clinton had done all this they would have impeached him for it (well, that AND the blue dress thing).
but if he had announce, mid-trial, that he was converting to the republican party and appointing only conservatives to the courts and so on, then they would have immediately dropped everything and touted him as the greatest president ever.

they value republican party identification and loyalty above all else. double-standards and hypocrisy don't bother them in the slightest, in fact they see them as effective weapons to infuriate democrats with.

[mikelgb]

7. Are they really saying in the media she is THE MOST to blame?

Pelosi is to blame for not allowing congress to act to hold Bush Admin accountable for it many many crimes including torture.

Dick Cheney, Bybee, Gonzalez, Bush et al are THE MOSY responible for TORTURE

Hopefully this extra pressure on Pelosi will encourage her to impeach bybee or anything, anything

[rucky]

18. those other people aren't even mentioned in the same breath.

[slay]

8. And yet all it took to get (D)Bill Clinton impeached was a blue dress. What does a (R) have to do

to answer for their REAL crimes? Will the media ever stand up to them the way they have been obcessed with Pelosi these last few days? And what about the TORTURE itself? There seem to be two sets of rules in the government - one for the Republicans, and one for everyone else - and the rule book for the Republicans is filled with blank pages. Pelosi is stuck having to play by the "rules for Democrats". :shrug:

[Gregorian]

9. And of course, impeachment would have been off the table.

Doh!

It's very difficult to not be raving mad about what happened then compared to what has happened now. And I would like to have superior intellect enough to use that to reveal the utter hypocrisy. We've got our answer staring us right in the face, and yet cannot produce effective results. But then we're up against the forces of the universe. It is almost always harder to produce order, than to reduce order to rubble. It's how they operate. Republicans and matches should never be allowed in close proximity.

[glitch]

10. Most excellent! K & R nt

[symbolman]

11. Hypocritical Situation :)

Bush gets a blow job, Palin claims daughter was avoiding Teen Prenancy..

Impeachment?

Cheney/Bush/Rove should be sitting, along with many media folks, in cells at the Hague, on Suicide Watch..

[Bjorn Against]

12. Good point, I think it is going to backfire on the Republicans to go after Pelosi

At this point I am remaining neutral on Pelosi's role in this mess, I haven't trusted her for a long time but I do not know enough about what she knew on this issue to pass judgment. Either way however I have seen absolutely no evidence that she planned or committed any acts of torture so it is clear that if she did have any role in this it was minor compared to that of the Bush Administration. The Republicans are playing with fire because by asking questions about her they are only going to increase the number of questions asked about them. It is possible that there were some Democrats involved in this and if so they should be held accountable, but it is not going to fly for the Republicans to think they can get away with focusing all the attention on Pelosi.

[JDPriestly]

34. If they call a grand jury, they probably could not get an indictment of Pelosi.

She was not an accomplice under the legal definition of that word. She did not conspire to commit the crime. She did no more than does a bank customer who happens to be in a bank at the time of a robbery and is taken hostage by the bankers.

Here is my post where I quote Black's Law Dictionary (6th ed.) on the definition of an accomplice.
http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_mesg&forum=389&topic_id=5663253&mesg_id=5663253

[Bjorn Against]

41. I suspect you are probably correct

There are conflicting stories on what Pelosi knew and without more evidence I don't feel I can really take a position on her role in this case, but I have a hard time believing they could ever come up with sufficient evidence to show that she had committed a crime. I think that from a moral perspective she should have done a lot more than she did to stand up against torture, but from a legal perspective it seems unlikely to me that she committed any sort of offense that she could be prosecuted on.

[tomp]

56. does a member (speaker) of the house have the duty to report a crime?

pelosi gets no pass from me. i'll wait to see the evidence, but i already think her failure to allow impeachment was treasonous (as in aiding and abetting an enemy of the u.s.). in the non-legal sense i presume she is guilty.

it seems to me we need a separate body of law for elected and or appointed officials. these people hold a special status in our country and the standard of behavior should be higher.

[creeksneakers2]

66. I'm glad you posted the definition

So many are confused about the culpability of an innocent bystander who doesn't report a crime.

[Gold Metal Flake]

13. It's fun, but it's still playing their game.

I see no reason to play in the latest Republican political/media paradigm. Cheney ordered torture to provide a false confession of a link between Al Quida and Iraq to justify the invasion of Iraq. There were no weapons of mass destruction. Their lies were revealed.

The last two weeks, we have seen amazing disclosures from people not just close but in the same room as Cheney. People on the receiving end or orders. We have never been closer to the truth.

On DU, it should be all Cheney, all the time right now.

We can try Pelosi if we want, after we try Bush, Cheney, Yoo Rumsfeld, and the rest.

We've never been closer, yall!

[me b zola]

14. K&R

[Call Me Wesley]

15. If the whole thing weren't this tragic and hundred thousands of people killed,

it would be the joke of the century.

However, there's a slight hope on the horizon regarding this guy: http://www.wsws.org/articles/2009/may2009/garz-m01.shtml. At least he got Auguste Pinochet arrested, and he's working on arrest warrants of most of the Bush company now.

In my opinion, the release of all the torturing documents will be the very hot button, showing that whoever was involved in it, legalized it, justified it with any means beyond any civilized law, will end up being a wanted criminal. Unfortunately, I don't think the U. S. will prosecute them, but let's hope that at least the rest of the World will have the balls to have the arrest warrants handy, like France still has one out on Kissinger.

In the end, they'll hide within the borders of their country, still happy, still going after their businesses, giving a damn, just not traveling anymore outside. Sad.

[David Zephyr]

16. Thank you for some perspective on all of this.

Excellent.

[BeFree]

17. Didn't know...

..you were a CTer!! Shouldn't this be moved to the dungeon?
__________

What we are witness to is that Pelosi has a great deal of power to effect the course of history and the crooks are trying to stop her from making the moves necessary to bring justice forward. They will lose.

[progressoid]

19. Aaayup.

[PassingFair]

20. Their best defense is a PREPOSTEROUS offense...

It's like prosecuting a priest
for listening to a confession,

and letting the murderer go free!

[Swamp Rat]

21. k&r

[rasputin1952]

22. Under Clinton, (although he had little to do w/it), the perpetrators

were caught, as were the OK City bombing conspirators.

Good police work, a lot of luck and some dedicated Federal and local officials took the situation and had those responsible in custody relatively quickly.

Under bush/cheney, we have a never ending war that has cost tens of thousands of lives, enough money to settle the national debt and fund SS/Medicare for a long time and feed hungry kids.

gwbush...Worst President Ever!...criminal...x(

[Kablooie]

23. You are using reason and logic. Repubs don't. They say whatever serves their immediate purpose.

Hypocritical and illogical statements are necessary if you are to always condemn whatever is confronting you.

[ibegurpard]

24. pretty much sums it up

and watching their attitudes about things like torture change overnight now that they're piling on Pelosi is almost comical.

[spanone]

25. you've nailed it EG. this is despicable politics....CIA is a rogue agency imo

[masuki bance]

26. Did Cheney get anyone to admit the connection under torture?

[Mike 03]

27. THANK YOU EARLG! KICK THIS MF'ER TO THE MOON. NT

[DCKit]

28. Oh Earl, you're so sweet and naive. It still would've ended with a BJ...

and that's all anyone would remember two months later.

Kidding, of course. But how do we convince the insane 21% who want to follow the Nazi's, let alone the other 79% of like minded citizens who saw the creep of fascism and decided they didn't want to go down that road?

There's more than enough blame (let alone the actual crimes) to go around.

[Catherine Vincent]

29. K&R!

Lurking repukes should read this!

[AnnInLa]

30. And the person most to blame for all this would be...

George W. Bush, of course. I blame him for being born and for everything else wrong in the world. Really.

[Ohio Joe]

31. Do you mean to imply....

That Bill is NOT responsible for the current torture program?
:rofl:

[Canuckistanian]

32. Great perspective

Too much fucking perspective, that is, to quote a fictional famous rock band.

K&R

[DU GrovelBot]

33. ## PLEASE DONATE TO DEMOCRATIC UNDERGROUND! ##

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[deacon]

35. And another hypothetical. Suppose bush was still president and pelosi

was found out to have actually supported torture. The GOP are calling for her resignation would they be calling for bush and cheney to resign too???

Crazy stuff going on.

[KoKo]

36. K&R!

[kentuck]

37. Excellent hypothetical, Earl..

How would we get the media to go along with blaming it on Combest? :-)

[Baby Snooks]

38. And the person most to blame for all this would be...

The problem is as always the need to scapegoat and that was a potential problem with Nuremberg. Who was truly guilty and who was truly innocent? In varying degrees all were guilty and all were innocent.

Except for Hitler.

We are such complex creatures psychologically. We have so many things at work in our daily "decisions" influenced by not only external influences but internal influences.

At Nuremberg, one unspoken criteria was at work in terms of complicity. Who was silent? Who, in other words, was a good German?

Who really spoke up in Congress? Who really questioned it all? Once again the varying degrees.

The reality of Nuremberg is that it damned everyone in Germany.

Unfortunately we cannot have a Nuremberg while we are still invading Poland. And we are still invading Poland.

There is something wrong with damning Hitler while we are still invading Poland.

[JimGinPA]

39. Excellent!

K&R

[dweller]

40. following this hypothetical, in my mind ...

DU would not exist. :cry:

i don't go there. Perhaps it's so in an alternative universe, but not mine.


and it's all b/c of a bad combover?

Face it, things are what they are. Now, what do we,you,us do about it?


i'm going to sleep for the night, tomorrow is another day thankfully.
dp

[napoleon_in_rags]

42. That was BRUTAL. Thank you! nt

[Justitia]

43. I love you. Where have you been all my frustrated posting life?

:argh:

:loveya:

[stevedeshazer]

44. Bang!

I think you've got it, EarlG.

[RFKHumphreyObama]

45. Good analogy EarlG

Spot on. Right on the mark:thumbsup:

[Sunnyshine]

46. knr - Signifies the measurable truths in re: * dark era.

The evidence is floating around all over the place, but it is hidden BY the halls of the White House, Congress, and Justice?
Gravy train media loves all the attention it gets- as everyone ignores the obvious crimes. In the end, history will condemn these obfuscates. Those who abuse their powers- will eventually fall from them. Everyday, the * Admin. will be shamed. As it should be.

[Enthusiast]

47. It still comes down to a complicit media.

They are directing the thought process right now. Just watch C-Span and CNN. One would think Pelosi was holding the cattle prod to the detainee's balls.

[Hubert Flottz]

48. K&R...

Poppy Bush would have been screaming..."This Aggression Shall Not Stand!" Right before the public hanging of The Big Dog!

I'm drinking my coffee from my new "Support The Troops" mug from DU...thanks again.

[livefreest]

49. ha! and then Nov 4th, 1996: president-elect Bob Dole

[Zodiak]

50. This would be an accuracy analogy, yes.

I really do not think people will buy this one....we ALL know Bushco did the torturing.

This is a media circus designed only to spread the blame around, stall for time, and threaten the Democrats into inaction.

[myrna minx]

51. Perfect analogy. K&R n/t

[Warren Stupidity]

52. And this theory is not laughed off the air.

How is that possible?

[Wednesdays]

53. K&R

:kick:

[WillyT]

54. Big K & R !!!

:kick:

[lonestarnot]

55. Son of a bitch Larry Combest!

[tomp]

57. in your analogy was combest informed of the torture?

did he sign off on it? did he do anything about it?

if yes, yes, and no respectively, i would go after him, among many others. he would not be first in line.

[tomp]

58. in the same scenario, bush comes in to office, knowing all this...

...and he does what about it?

[lostnotforgotten]

59. And Now We Have The Democrats Aiding And Abetting By Not Investigating, Charged, And Tried

eom

[Bluerthanblue]

60. pretty excellent comparison EarlG-

sometimes it helps to see things from a different window.

:hi:

[Joanne98]

62. I don't get it. I would make more sense if you used Serbia...

The bombing of Serbian state owned factories, bridges etc. The Clinton declares a "Marshall Plan" which is just a bait and switch for the vultures. Or Russia during Yeltsin when the country got looted by vultures and Clinton.

I'm a Shock Doctrine girl.

[NoPasaran]

63. Combest must resign!

And a pinata effigy of him must be beaten to a pulp on Countdown by Ariana Huffington, Jonathan Turley and a blogger chosen at random>

[Initech]

64. This is fun, I love playing with alternate history.

Now say that Clinton was elected to two terms like he was in real-life. Do you think the opposition party would still be trying to go after him like they did? Of course keep in mind that starting an unnecessary war is much more horrible than getting a BJ in the oval office. Do you think the GOP would have started the massive campaign to undermine Clinton like they did? If so who would have benefited the most from this?

[iamthebandfanman]

65. definitely hypothetical

cause i dunno any republican that woulda been against the invasion of iraq even back then.

[creeksneakers2]

67. Great analogy!

The rules change when a Democrat is in office. Its absurd to go after Pelosi for the crimes of Bush.

[blondeatlast]

68. Hammer, meet head of nail. Perfect and I'm spreading this one around to everyone! nt

[McCamy Taylor]

69. Very good! Note Congressional DEMS would have been falling all over themselves

to impeach Clinton if that happened---because big business wanted a Republican in the WH, and Congress represents business not us.

[lunatica]

71. word

[Duer 157099]

72. IBTL!!

Or to the dungeon with you!

This is about 9/11 isn't it???

:rofl: