SCARY, VERY SCARY

"This is the century of fear."
~ Albert Camus.

No, this story did not come from The Onion. I have no idea what those Nobel people were thinking, but it must have been the same thing they were thinking when they gave the same prize to Henry Kissinger.

Unfortunately, this news didn't come from The Onion either:

Mary Cheney, the daughter of former vice president Dick Cheney and the sister of go-to Obama critic Liz Cheney, is leaving the political consulting firm Navigators Global to start her own consulting company, and multiple sources familiar with her plans say she will not be going it alone.

"She told me she is going to be starting a firm with her dad and sister," said one friend of Mary's, with whom she has shared her plans.

[ . . . ]

"Mary is starting an independent strategic consulting firm," [American Enterprise Institute and Cheney family spokeswoman Lucy] Tutwiler confirmed.

[ . . . ]

Mary Cheney's colleagues did have some things to add. "She has told people within the firm that she wants to do something with her father," said a source within Navigators Global. "It's going to be a firm like Kissinger Associates."

If that news doesn't scare the crap out of you then I don't know what will.

FORMER FBI AGENT CONFIRMS INVESTIGATION ON MARC GROSSMAN

"I do not have anything to say about such stupid ridiculous things as this."
~ Marc Grossman, former US Ambassador to Turkey.

Those Rastî readers familiar with everything written here on The Cohen Group back in late 2006 when the Ralston conflict of interest was going on, will remember Marc Grossman.

Grossman was the US ambassador to Turkey from 1994 to 1997 and was pulled from that position before the end of his tour because he was involved with the Susurluk scandal as mentioned in yesterday's post.

Today another round of artillery was fired in Grossman's direction, from Sibel Edmonds and a friend:

"I read the recent cover story by The American Conservative magazine. I applaud their courage in publishing this significant interview. I am fully aware of the FBI's decade-long investigation of the High-level State Department Official named in this article [Marc Grossman], which ultimately was buried and covered up. It is long past time to investigate this case and bring about accountability..."

There's more on that at The Brad Blog.

I don't know about you, but all this knowledge about Grossman, especially the Susurluk connection, really fills this description, from The Cohen Group website, with an enormous amount of irony:

Ambassador Grossman was U.S. Ambassador to Turkey 1994-1997. In Turkey, he promoted security cooperation, human rights and democracy and a vibrant U.S.-Turkish economic relationship. Ambassador Grossman had previously served as the embassy’s Deputy Chief of Mission from 1989 to 1992.

He promoted human rights and democracy?? In a pig's eye.

There is a funny side to this if you know where to look. In Grossman's bio it says, "Ambassador Grossman had previously served as the embassy's Deputy Chief of Mission from 1989 to 1992." Joseph C. Wilson was one of Grossman's buddies at the State Department and served as the Deputy Chief of Mission at the US Embassy, Baghdad, from 1988 to 1992--under US Ambassador April Glaspie. Both Grossman and Wilson served in comparable positions in two countries that border each other, during the same time frame. Their diplomatic paths had to have crossed during that time.

The funny part is that Wilson's wife is Valerie Plame, whose company, Brewster Jennings & Associates, was outed by Grossman to the Turks long before the news was ever splashed across headlines in the US. In other words, Grossman outed his pal's wife as CIA. For more on that, don't miss the interview with Phil Giraldi and Joe Lauria.

As The Brad Blog points out from The Times article--to which Joe Lauria contributed--on the sale of nuclear secrets, when contacted about the information that Sibel provided, this is what Grossman had to say:

“If you are calling me to say somebody said that I took money, that’s outrageous . . . I do not have anything to say about such stupid ridiculous things as this.”

Doesn't he sound like Dennis Hastert? Like Jan Schakowsky??

And nobody's really brought up Grossman's connection to the most powerful "cemaat holding" in Turkey, which is able to compete with Sabancı and Koç . . . namely, Ihlas Holding.

I think it's time for heads to roll.

UPDATES AND THINGS TO WATCH

"The speaker does not have any connections to American Turkish interests."
~ Spokesman for Dennis Hastert, while Hastert served as Speaker of the House of Representatives.

Let me list a few updates on the interview in American Conservative magazine with Sibel Edmonds:

1. Congressional Representative Jan Schakowsky (D-IL) responds to Sibel's statements that she, Schakowsky, was trapped in a Turkish espionage honeypot operation. Additional update here.

Now when you read what Schakowsky's spokesman says in reply, bear in mind what Dennis Hastert's spokesman said in response to the 2005 Vanity Fair article on Sibel:

"This is all nonsense. It's not being reported by the mainstream press because there's no factual evidence. The reporter does not have a transcript of any wiretapped conversations that we know of and, even if we did, it's preposterous. The speaker does not have any connections to American Turkish interests."

Hastert joined Dickstein Shapiro in 2008, where he was going to provide "strategy advice" to D & S clients, among which is BOTAŞ. For more, see Luke Ryland's post on the matter. Hastert now works on a $35,000 per month contract through D & S for the TC.

2. Sibel's letter to the Congresswoman, in pursuit of the facts.

3. Connecting the Deep State's trail in the US, from Susurluk and Chicago to Ergenekon.

4. Be prepared for additional information on the role of former US ambassador to Turkey and former Under Secretary of State for Political Affairs (that would be the number 3 position in the US State Department), Marc Grossman, in connection with Sibel's story. As Sibel stated in the AmCon interview:

Grossman became a person of interest early on in the investigative file while he was the U.S. ambassador to Turkey [1994-97], when he became personally involved with operatives both from the Turkish government and from suspected criminal groups. He also had suspicious contact with a number of official and non-official Israelis. Grossman was removed from Turkey short of tour during a scandal referred to as “Susurluk” by the media. It involved a number of high-level criminals as well as senior army and intelligence officers with whom he had been in contact.

Grossman was pulled from Turkey "short of tour" because he was involved with Susurluk. The military representative in Grossman's embassy in Ankara was Douglas Dickerson, who worked as Grossman's weapons procurement guy. Kurds should know exactly what that means: early to mid-1990s, American weapons procurement for Turkey, slaughter of Kurds, Dirty War, extrajudicial murder, forced displacement, destruction of villages, torture, etc.

In 2005, Grossman abruptly and quietly left the number 3 position at State. Why?

5. The Schmidt v. Krikorian hearing with the Ohio Elections Commission is due to resume this week on 1 October and I'm keeping my fingers crossed that we will witness a spectacular fireworks display.

BARGAINING OVER THE OCCUPATION OF SOUTH KURDISTAN

“In this, our age of infamy
Man's choice is but to be
A tyrant, traitor, prisoner:
No other choice has he.”
~ Aleksandr Pushkin.

There was something very interesting in Phil Giraldi's interview with Sibel Edmonds regarding South Kurdistan. Here is Sibel speaking, with my emphasis:

The monitoring of the Turks [by the FBI] picked up contacts with Feith, Wolfowitz, and Perle in the summer of 2001, four months before 9/11. They were discussing with the Turkish ambassador in Washington an arrangement whereby the U.S. would invade Iraq and divide the country. The UK would take the south, the rest would go to the U.S. They were negotiating what Turkey required in exchange for allowing an attack from Turkish soil. The Turks were very supportive, but wanted a three-part division of Iraq to include their own occupation of the Kurdish region. The three Defense Department officials said that would be more than they could agree to, but they continued daily communications to the ambassador and his defense attaché in an attempt to convince them to help.

Meanwhile Scowcroft, who was also the chairman of the American Turkish Council, Baker, Richard Armitage, and Grossman began negotiating separately for a possible Turkish protectorate. Nothing was decided, and then 9/11 took place.

Scowcroft was all for invading Iraq in 2001 and even wrote a paper for the Pentagon explaining why the Turkish northern front would be essential. I know Scowcroft came off as a hero to some for saying he was against the war, but he was very much for it until his client’s conditions were not met by the Bush administration.

What is happening here is that the neo-conservatives were discussing a Turkish occupation of South Kurdistan but it looks like they weren't able to swing the deal in the end. Brent Scowcroft, as the chairman of the American Turkish Council, was definitely working for Turkish interests during the period Sibel is talking about.

But when Turkey didn't get what it saw as it's portion of Iraq--the Kurdish region--Scowcroft opposed the war because his client opposed it.

Now, picture this: If there had been an American deployment from Turkey into the north of Iraq, the Americans would have kept moving toward the south while Turkish forces could have just walked in behind the Americans and parked themselves permanently in the autonomous Kurdish region.

Does that sound far-fetched? Read Sibel's words again. Sibel's words also tell me that the TBMM voted against a US deployment from Turkey and denied an American northern front not because it opposed the invasion or occupation or even the carving-up of Iraq, but the TBMM opposed an American deployment from Turkish soil because it was not going to be allowed to occupy South Kurdistan.

If Turkey had, in fact, ended up as occupiers of South Kurdistan, would it then consider Kerkuk to be a part of South Kurdistan? Would it then insist that Kerkuk be added to the Kurdish region?

Sibel also mentions that some of the individuals that the FBI knew to be spying for the Turks and the Israelis were working at the RAND Corporation, too. That brings up something else that was in the news recently:

“Under pressure from the military and nationalists, the government of Prime Minister Erdoğan might launch a large-scale, cross-border incursion into northern Iraq designed not only to weaken the PKK, the Kurdish insurgent group that has attacked Turkish forces, but also to hold and occupy KRG (Kurdistan Regional Government) territory to put pressure on the KRG government to crack down on the PKK or to forestall a KRG annexation of Kirkuk.”

It may very well be that the occupation of South Kurdistan is still on the Turkish table but my money says that if such an invasion takes place, Turkey will insist upon the annexation of Kerkuk. After all, there are millions of brother Turkmen there to bring into Ağabey's ever-loving arms.

THE INTERVIEW IS AVAILABLE

"The original targets were intelligence officers under diplomatic cover in the Turkish Embassy and the Israeli Embassy. It was those contacts that led to the American Turkish Council and the Assembly of Turkish American Associations and then to AIPAC fronting for the Israelis. It moved forward from there."
~ Sibel Edmonds.

The Phil Giraldi interview with Sibel Edmonds is online:

Sibel Edmonds has a story to tell. She went to work as a Turkish and Farsi translator for the FBI five days after 9/11. Part of her job was to translate and transcribe recordings of conversations between suspected Turkish intelligence agents and their American contacts. She was fired from the FBI in April 2002 after she raised concerns that one of the translators in her section was a member of a Turkish organization that was under investigation for bribing senior government officials and members of Congress, drug trafficking, illegal weapons sales, money laundering, and nuclear proliferation. She appealed her termination, but was more alarmed that no effort was being made to address the corruption that she had been monitoring.

A Department of Justice inspector general’s report called Edmonds’s allegations “credible,” “serious,” and “warrant[ing] a thorough and careful review by the FBI.” Ranking Senate Judiciary Committee members Pat Leahy (D-Vt.) and Chuck Grassley (R-Iowa) have backed her publicly. “60 Minutes” launched an investigation of her claims and found them believable. No one has ever disproved any of Edmonds’s revelations, which she says can be verified by FBI investigative files.

John Ashcroft’s Justice Department confirmed Edmonds’s veracity in a backhanded way by twice invoking the dubious State Secrets Privilege so she could not tell what she knows. The ACLU has called her “the most gagged person in the history of the United States of America.”

But on Aug. 8, she was finally able to testify under oath in a court case filed in Ohio and agreed to an interview with The American Conservative based on that testimony. What follows is her own account of what some consider the most incredible tale of corruption and influence peddling in recent times. As Sibel herself puts it, “If this were written up as a novel, no one would believe it.”

Read the entire interview at The American Conservative.

UPDATE: Sibel has a link to an interview with Philip Giraldi, who conducted the American Conservative interview, and Joe Lauria. This interview deals with the credibility question that certain factions have brought up with regard to Sibel's story. I don't have a problem with Sibel's credibility because I know how things work in Turkey and Sibel's story fits the pattern of behavior. In addition, Sibel's story has been out in the public realm for some time and those who have been named as evildoers by her in the past--like Dennis Hastert and Marc Grossman--have not brought any libel or other charges against her for the issues she's brought up. And the reason for that is that they don't dare.

FOLLOWING THE BLOOD MONEY TRAIL

"And, yes, I refer to it as blood money because where I come from, when you take money to deny the killing of innocent women and children, that is blood money."
~ David Krikorian.

Luke Rosiak at The Sunlight Foundation has more information on the Turkish lobby in the US and it's relationship to US defense contractors. Rosiak focuses on someone who's been highlighted here at Rastî--Yalçın Ayaslı of Hittite Microwave:

Turkey’s efforts have now been augmented by a domestic effort launched by a Turkish-American entrepreneur. Yalcin Ayasli founded Hittite Microwave in 1985 as a one-man company with a grant from the U.S. Air Force, and built the electronics company into a firm worth $1.2 billion, with half of its products sold overseas, according to a company presentation. The company had $180 million in revenue in 2008, according to SEC filings.

Since 2004, Hittite Microwave has received roughly $30 million in contracts directly from the government—mostly to sponsor research and development—and has also done business with Lockheed Martin and other prime contractors, many of whom use Hittite electronics in their jets and other equipment, sold to both the U.S. military and Turkey.

In 2007, Ayasli transferred $30 million in stock to fund a new endeavor, the nonprofit Turkish Coalition of America. The organization is headquartered in a Washington suite that has also been listed as the address for the Turkish Coalition USA PAC, the lobbying firm of Lydia Borland (who has represented the Turkish government), and the law firm of Bruce Fein and Associates (Fein comprises half of the Turkish American Legal Defense Fund).

The family of Hittite founder Ayaslin contributed nearly half a million dollars to federal politics in 2007-2008, donating near the maximum amount to the House campaign committees for both parties, but largely neglecting the Senate.

Read the rest and make sure to check out the great mind map Rosiak created to illustrate the connections of this web. Toward the end of the piece, Rosiak highlights the role of major US corporations that have lobbied Congress for their own interests in Turkey.

David Krikorian was completely on target when he labeled lobby money as "blood money", with that blood first being Armenian and then being Kurdish, and that's something that Sibel Edmonds confirmed on the day of her deposition.

This time, there's no need for me to ask what Sibel would think because she's got her own opinion of Rosiak's piece up at her place, 123 Real Change.

For more on Ayaslı, Hittite Microwave, and Schmidt v. Krikorian, see these:

Turkish Espionage Operations Target Congress

Who Is Paying the Piper?

THE SUNLIGHT FOUNDATION ON SCHMIDT V. KRIKORIAN

"Chase after the truth like all hell and you'll free yourself, even though you never touch its coattails."
~ Clarence Darrow.

It looks like The Sunlight Foundation is taking an interest in the Schmidt v. Krikorian Ohio Elections Commission hearing. From The Sunlight Foundation:

Backed by lawyers from the Turkish American Legal Defense Fund, Rep. Jean Schmidt, R-Ohio, filed a false claims complaint against David Krikorian, who ran against her in 2008 as an independent and garnered 18 percent of the vote. Schmidt’s complaint stems from campaign literature in which Krikorian claimed she “has taken $30,000 in blood money from Turkish sponsored political action committees to deny the slaughter of 1.5 million Armenian men, women and children by the Ottoman Turkish government during World War I.”

Though Jean Schmidt doesn’t sit on the subcommittee responsible for the Armenian Genocide legislation, it’s clear that she’s a favorite of the Turkish community. With $18,450 in contributions from three Turkish-focused PACs since 2007, the second-term House member has received far more than even influential senior members, and nearly twice as much as the second-highest recipient, Virginia Foxx, whose son-in-law is Turkish. A list of fundraisers compiled by the Turkish Coalition USA PAC shows that the group held several events for Schmidt, raising thousands more. And four individuals who gave to Turkish PACs also donated a combined $8,700 directly to Schmidt’s campaign.

At issue before the Ohio Board of Elections is whether Krikorian’s language holds up—whether it was accurate to describe three Turkey-focused political action committees as “Turkish sponsored.” The false claims complaint against Krikorian comes after the board censured Schmidt for a “reckless disregard for truth” in her own campaign literature.

I don't know whether this part is funny or sad:

Schmidt expressed little familiarity with the workings of her campaign as well as the complex ties between Turkish groups, including the Turkish American Legal Defense Fund, whose lawyers, she says, are being paid in campaign funds. (The latest expense reports don’t reveal the amount.)

“What is the Turkish American Legal Defense Fund?” she is asked.

“It’s a U.S. organization that has a PAC,” she answers.

“The Legal Defense Fund does?”

“I don’t know. I don’t know. I guess it doesn’t. I don’t know. I don’t know what it is.”

Ignorance is a killer.

I think truth will reign supreme soon. Very soon. For those with eyes to read, let them read this very carefully.

WHO IS PAYING THE PIPER?

"People who contribute get the ear of the member and the ear of the staff. They have the access and access is it. Access is power. Access is clout. That's how this thing works."
~ Rep. Romano Mazzoli.

In mulling over the Schmidt v. Krikorian case, I'm drawn back to the activity of Hittite Microwave founder Yalçın Ayaslı and the Ayaslı in the Turkish Coalition of America (TCA), which also funds the Turkish American Legal Defense Fund (TALDF). The TALDF is the organization that has provided legal counsel to Jean Schmidt in the case.

Both the TCA and the TC-USA PAC were established in February 2007. Yalçın Ayaslı is not listed on the TCA website but is listed on the TCA's 2007 Form 990 as the director of the organization. The TCA holds 600,000 shares of Hittite Microwave, which accounts for the vast majority of its assets. Ayaslı must have been involved with the establishment of the TCA, which is a propaganda organ of the Turkish lobby, and the next question would be if he were involved with the establishment of the TC-USA PAC. The TC-USA PAC is not a 501(c)3 so it is not restricted according to IRS exemption requirements for 501(c)3 organizations, most specifically in this case, the political restrictions:

In addition, it [a 501(c)3 organiztion] may not be an action organization, i.e., it may not attempt to influence legislation as a substantial part of its activities and it may not participate in any campaign activity for or against political candidates.

This allows for the TC-USA PAC to pursue its "immediate goal":

The immediate goal, however, is to raise money from the Turkish American community in order to make political contribubtions to the campaigns of Turkish Caucus members. TC-USA PAC, as of July, has contributed to some 25 congressional campaigns. “This is the first time that such endeavors are being made,” says McCurdy. Due to TC-USA PAC’s activities, Turkish Americans, who are regarded as a relatively new US immigrant group, have begun to make their presence felt in the political arena. As the 2008 election approaches, the role of this Turkish American political action committee becomes even more important.

Following the money, although Ayaslı and his family members gave more than $300,000 in campaign contributions in the 2006 campaign cycle and most of that was not given to local New Hampshire candidates. Moreover, $39,000 was given to the TC-USA PAC.

If we look at Yalçın Ayaslı's campaign contributions for the 2008 campaign cycle, we find something interesting.

Going down the list, Dan Burton (R-IN) received money from Ayaslı and, lo and behold, Burton is a member of the Caucus on US Turkish Relations and Turkish Americans. Sibel Edmonds testified that Burton was involved in ""[E]xtremely illegal activities against the United States citizens who were involved in [covert] operations that were ... against ... foreign government[s] and foreign entities against the United States' interests."

Jean Schmidt (R-OH) received money from Ayaslı, even though she doesn't remember the guy, and, what do you know?? She's a member of the Caucus on US Turkish Relations and Turkish Americans!

Dutch Ruppersberger (D-MD) received money from Ayaslı and, what a coincidence! He's a member of the Caucus on US Turkish Relations and Turkish Americans!

Ileana Ros-Lehtinen (R-FL) received money from Ayaslı and, imagine it! She's also a member of the Caucus on US Turkish Relations and Turkish Americans!

Do you see a pattern developing here? These people are not from Ayaslı's home state of New Hampshire and they're all members of the Caucus on US Turkish Relations and Turkish Americans. Remember what the "immediate goal" was? Remember, too, that there is no significant Turkish-American constituency in Jean Schmidt's Ohio congressional district. Instead of constituents contributing to a politician's campaign, you have some rich guy in New Hampshire with a political agenda favorable to a foreign power helping to pay the bills.

And he who pays the piper calls the tune.

UPDATE ON SCHMIDT V. KRIKORIAN

"Corruption in the US government is something that no one wants to talk about, particularly if powerful foreign interests are involved."
~ Philip Giraldi.

I need to post an update of events that have happened this past week in the Schmidt v. Krikorian election case in Ohio. For some backgrounder on the case, check the Rastî post from 9 August as well as a post-deposition interview. Links to the full deposition video can be found here.

The Brad Blog has some follow-up news, including the fact that Bruce Fein, attorney for the Turkish lobby through the TCA-funded Turkish American Legal Defense Fund (TALDF), was deposed by Mark Geragos. As The Brad Blog points out, during Sibel Edmonds' deposition on 8 August, Fein didn't believe he'd be deposed for the Schmidt v. Krikorian case "'because this case has nothing to do' with the organizations he's associated with." Furthermore, The Brad Blog says:

Krikorian tells us he believes Fein is the "archtect of the entire Turkish Lobby's defense in the U.S. ... The guy who travels the country attacking anybody he can attack vis a vis the Armenian Genocide. ... We will now be able to take his testimony, which is highly unusual given that he is the opposing counsel in the case."

The Brad Blog also carries an excerpt of Jean Schmidt's deposition, in which she admits she doesn't know a damned thing about what happened in 1915, except to admit, after being prodded numerous times, that some people died. However, as was mentioned in the deposition, Schmidt wrote an editorial for Today's Zaman in which she says: "What happened in 1915 must never be forgotten. To quote the great poet Maya Angelou, 'History cannot be unlived, despite its wrenching pain, but if faced with courage, need not be lived again.'"

Okay, if nothing happened in 1915 except that "People got killed on both sides. How many people? I don't know," then why should anyone have to worry about history being faced with courage so that it "need not be lived again"? People get killed every day, but it's nice to know Jean Schmidt has so much concern for "people [who] got killed on both sides. Will this great congressional humanitarian bother herself about these killings? Or these? Or maybe these killings?

Schmidt's excuse just doesn't wash with me. Everyone knows the events of 1915 were more than just people getting killed "on both sides" and anyone who says differently is a liar.

But Schmidt is not only willfully ignorant of the events of 1915. In addition, she claims ignorance as to why she received more Turkish lobby contributions during her 2008 campaign than any other member of Congress. I find that very difficult to believe, given that she participated in the ATAA's annual convention in 2008 or that, immediately after the convention ended, she commemorated Atatürk on the floor of the Congress. Then there was her participation in the Turkish Coalition of America's (TCA) first Congressional trip to Turkey, during which Schmidt dutifully made obeisance at Anıtkabır. Schmidt also claimed that she knew nothing about the Ayasli family, which donated lots of money to her campaign, even though they're not her constituents. And, as I've mentioned before, Yalçın Ayaslı owns the TCA and is listed as the TCA's director on the TCA's own filed IRS Form 990. Didn't Schmidt bother to find out who was footing the bill for her trip to Turkey?

It seems to me that anyone so completely ignorant of Turkey's history as Jean Schmidt would have to have been coached on what to say to commemorate Atatürk or place a wreath at Anıtkabır. It seems to me she's also been coached on what to say regarding people she knows or doesn't know.

If you would like a short cheat-sheet of Sibel's deposition, you might want to check The Brad Blog post on those congressmen mentioned in the deposition. There's also a post about the Schmidt v. Krikorian hearing that began on Thursday and ran over time, so that it will have to continue on 1 October. If that's the case, be prepared to see Sibel Edmonds testify at the hearing.

GOOGLE BLOCKS SIBEL EDMONDS

Google has blocked Sibel Edmonds' blog:

URGENT: GOOGLE BLOCKS MY SITE DURING SENSITIVE PERIOD



WE NEED YOUR HELP

My Blog Site http://123realchange.blogspot.com/" is now blocked by Google’s Blogger. They will not let me post during this most sensitive period, when I am about to provide deposition on Foreign US government illegal operations in the United States!



A few weeks ago I started receiving ‘Google & Blogger warnings’ from my technologically savvy friends and well-wishers, who encouraged me to have a mirror site as a back up and or cease using Google’s Blogger all together. I did take these warnings seriously and started looking at alternatives and other options. Well, this is what I got from Blogger yesterday:



From: Blogger
Date: Thu, Aug 6, 2009 at 8:19 AM
Subject: http://123realchange.blogspot.com/ - ACTION REQUIRED
To: sibeldenizalt@gmail.com



Hello,

Your blog at: http://123realchange.blogspot.com/ has been identified as a potential spam blog. To correct this, please request a review by filling out the form at http://www.blogger.com/unlock-blog.g?lockedBlogID=6542765284440328864

Your blog will be deleted in 20 days if it isn't reviewed, and your readers will see a warning page during this time. After we receive your request, we'll review your blog and unlock it within two business days. Once we have reviewed and determined your blog is not spam, the blog will be unlocked and the message in your Blogger dashboard will no longer be displayed. If this blog doesn't belong to you, you don't have to do anything, and any other blogs you may have won't be affected.

We find spam by using an automated classifier. Automatic spam detection is inherently fuzzy, and occasionally a blog like yours is flagged incorrectly. We sincerely apologize for this error. By using this kind of system, however, we can dedicate more storage, bandwidth, and engineering resources to bloggers like you instead of to spammers. For more information, please see Blogger Help: http://help.blogger.com/bin/answer.py?answer=42577

Thank you for your understanding and for your help with our spam-fighting efforts.

Sincerely,

The Blogger Team

P.S. Just one more reminder: Unless you request a review, your blog will be deleted in 20 days. Click this link to request the review: http://www.blogger.com/unlock-blog.g?lockedBlogID=6542765284440328864



I am still looking into it and will be corresponding with them to find out what the heck is going on, but I must say the timing of this is extremely troubling:



Is it coincidence that this comes up when I am subpoenaed to provide sworn deposition on matters that have sent our government scrambling and certain high-level criminal entities sweating big time?



Is this due to my latest interviews for my Boiling Frogs Show on explosive issues such as AIPAC, Iran, Central Asia, and Pakistan? We know big brother NSA has been listening, and my guests have really been talking. We just wrapped up our phone interviews with Phil Giraldi (on AIPAC & Israel and more), Richard Barlow (on Pakistan and what our government didn’t want its people to know), Joe Trento (on Iran, Brzezinski, and more), Sandalio Gonzalez (on our phony War on Drugs, House of Death, Kent Memo, and more)…You see what I am getting at here?



Or is it the fact that this blog is becoming more popular, the visitors’ number has been going up rapidly, and its content getting picked up by many, nationally and internationally? And I am talking about content and topics that are blacklisted by the US Mainstream Media.



I don’t know the answer. I may never know. However, what I know is this: I better find a different or multiple different, blog sites and keep this forum alive. I also want to warn others who may become subject to this kind of notice, or maybe get terminated without any notice!



Please help me, thus all of us, resolve this blockage immediately, since in the next few days this blog may prove to be extremely crucial to report developing news and cases which will not be covered by MSM.



Thank you,

Sibel Edmonds

Sibel is due to be deposed by the lawyers for David Krikorian in his case against Turkish-funded Congressvermin Jean Schmidt of Ohio. Sibel's press release on the deposition can be found here.

There are a lot of people who would want to see Sibel Edmonds silenced over the Turkish lobby in the US. The same people would like to see her silenced on a lot of other issues as well.

You see, Truth is the greatest weapon against these terrorists and that's why they strive to enforce Silence.

"Fascism Anyone?".

IMPUNITY, CORRUPTION, AND A JOB OPPORTUNITY

"Power corrupts. Knowledge is power. Study hard. Be evil."
~ Anonymous.

I'd like to point out a few things for you to read, just in case you missed them.

First, at Children of the Sun there's a recent post updating us about the status of the trial of the state assassins who murdered Uğur Kaymaz and his father, Ahmet:

On 18 June 2009, the High Trubinal Court ruled that the police who shot Ugur from his back together with his father have acted in self defense. How is it acting in self defense, let alone being justifiable by any means, to shoot a child from behind at close range with 13 bullets? What kind of "law" would allow and tolerate such abomination?

Unfortunately, it's not surprising because the name of the game in Turkey always has been IMPUNITY:

Impunity means "exemption from punishment or loss".[1] In the international law of human rights, it refers to the failure to bring perpetrators of human rights violations to justice and, as such, itself constitutes a denial of the victims' right to justice and redress. Impunity is especially common in countries that lack a tradition of the rule of law, suffer from corruption or that have entrenched systems of patronage, or where the judiciary is weak or members of the security forces are protected by special jurisdictions or immunities.

Mmm, yeah, that's Turkey. For more, see Amnesty.

The second item is from Zerkesorg and is an interview with DTP's Emine Ayna. Comrade Emine is eminently Rastî-ful:

People don't change overnight. It's not like the Prime Minister and the President [of Turkey], while they were in denial yesterday, have changed overnight and said "okay let's accept it today". This is not about the Prime Minister and the President either. This is about the system.

I couldn't have said it better myself. Read the whole interview.

The third item I have for your consideration is a little something about government-narcotics relationships and how the MSM facilitates the cover-up of the truth about those relationships. If you don't know how this works, check Sibel Edmonds, another Rastî-ful woman who goes into the relationships of the CIA with the Latin American narcotics industry, the KLA and the narcotics industry,and Afghanistan and the narcotics industry. You'll find it all here.

Finally, with the global economic situation being what it is--thanks to the Wall Street vermin--many people are out of work with no prospects in the immediate future. Fear not, however, because it would appear that the US State Department has an opening . . . for a "viable" candidate for Iran. You can find a list of candidate qualifications and benefits here.

A couple of examples of past "viable" include one that most Rastî readers are familiar with--Tansu Çiller:

Former Prime Minister of Turkey, Ms. Tansu Ciller is a perfect example of a Middle Eastern leader who was selected, declared ‘viable,’ supported, promoted, installed, and protected by the United States. As can be seen Ms. Ciller met many if not all of the qualifications criteria listed above:

1. Ms. Ciller completed her advanced degrees in the United States - M.S. from the University of New Hampshire and PhD from the University of Connecticut. During this extended period while she resided in the US we had ample time and opportunity to train and mold her for the leadership position in Turkey.

2. Ms. Ciller was granted citizenship in the United States. In order to keep this fact from tarnishing her image during her candidacy campaign in Turkey and afterwards, we designated her US citizenship status ‘Classified and Top Secret’ on the grounds of Sensitive Diplomatic Relations. To this date, despite all attempts, Turkish authorities have been unable to have these files opened.

3. Ms. Ciller and her husband Ozer Ciller were closely involved with certain CIA operations prior to and after her return to Turkey, and their intimate relationship continued throughout her tenure as Prime Minister of the Republic of Turkey. In fact, the CIA’s Roger Tamraz (see BCCI) was their partner in two front companies: ‘Emperyal’, which acquired and operated six (6) Casinos in Turkmenistan, and, ‘Lapis,’ involved with the oil pipeline project.

4. Ms. Ciller and her husband, before being considered ‘viable’ by us, already had an established shady financial past, including involvement in an embezzlement scandal connected to the collapse of ‘Istanbul Bankasi’, one of Turkey’s largest private banks. This along with involvements fortified Ms. Ciller’s qualification criteria when compared to competing applicants.

5. Ms. Ciller understood and participated in Turkey’s important strategic and operational role in the supply and transportation of heroin. She skillfully and very aggressively combined and furthered the marriage between the state military-police-intelligence and the underground heroin industry. Her notoriety even reached the German Courts, where she was accused of supporting and protecting the drug mafia - active not only in Turkey but elsewhere, including Europe and Central Asia.

6. Ms. Ciller played a direct role in scandals involving corruption, embezzlement, and state sponsored terrorism and narcotics operations. The best known scandal, one of her masterpieces, is known as ‘Susurluk’. Ciller and her husband - who is known for his mafia links and dealings, were directly implicated in Susurluk. The high profile kept by Ms. And Mr. Ciller during these scandals and their handling of them afterwards significantly bolstered their ‘value’ and ‘viability’ for us.

7. Ms. Ciller’s ‘known’ wealth is confirmed to be over $50 million, all of which was gained after she became a ‘’viable’ candidate supported directly by the US. A large portion of her investments and accounts are in the United States. We will not list the exact amount at this point, however, the selected candidate will be given an opportunity to see the ‘real’ dollar amount, and even consult with Ms. Ciller directly.

We can list many other desirable qualities of former Prime Minister Ciller, however for this appendix the above points should suffice. Interested candidates can conduct their own research and compare their qualifications to Ms. Ciller to get a better understanding of our ‘viability’ criteria for those candidates we select, support, promote, install, and sustain in ‘that’ part of the world. As you can see, we helped Ms. Ciller weather all accusations, investigations, and official charges, whether in Turkey or internationally. We made sure she and her government continuously received our military aid, development funds, and of course IMF funds. How she chose to spend, divert, or ‘lose’ these funds were left completely up to her, with no questions asked. Today she enjoys her incredible, almost fairytale like lifestyle, made possible with the enormous wealth accumulated through her official position, gained and sustained by our backing. We are pleased to take full credit for this. We will guarantee similar benefits for our candidate of choice in Iran.

So dear reader, if you're one of the millions out of work with no future prospects in view, you too can apply to become the "candidate of choice for Iran". The benefits package alone will enable you to view the Wall Street vermin as indistinguishable from the unwashed masses.

THE CORRUPTION CONTINUES

"Let us not seek the Republican answer or the Democratic answer, but the right answer."
~ John F. Kennedy.

Sibel Edmonds has an opinion piece just out about the Jane Harman/AIPAC/Israeli spies scandal which I first mentioned in this post. There's an update on Hypocrite Harman's weekend activities at Glenn Greenwald's blog:

A couple of weeks ago, I wrote about one of the most shameless and absurd spectacles to appear in Washington in some time: the self-righteous, self-obsessed rage expressed by Blue Dog Rep. Jane Harman (D-Calif.) -- leading defender of Bush's illegal domestic eavesdropping programs -- upon learning that one of her conversations had been legally eavesdropped upon as part of a criminal investigation into the actions of a suspected Israeli agent. Over the weekend, Harman (along with half of the U.S. Congress) appeared at the AIPAC conference and continued her new anti-eavesdropping crusade, actually vowing to lead an investigation into potential eavesdropping abuses to assure that it would never happen again. Atrios notes just some of the points that makes her behavior incomparably shameless.

What would have been the result if Hypocrite Harman's Israeli agent had been able to lean on Nancy Pelosi in order to get Pelosi to name Harman as head of the House Intelligence Committee? How about this:

Just imagine if Harman had obtained either senior intelligence position that she sought. She would have had access to every sort of top secret intelligence possessed by the US government and would have been in a good position to influence policy. From the Israeli perspective, she would have been their spy, a highly placed agent of influence who could also provide every bit of sensitive intelligence in the CIA cupboard.

Now this story has gone basically nowhere in the bullshit American media. Kind of like how the espionage trial of AIPAC officials Steve Rosen and Keith Weissman has gone nowhere in the bullshit American justice system. And, now that I think about it, that's exactly how the Turkish bribery scandal of Dennis Hastert went--nowhere. But Hastert did have a happy ending since he's now an official lobbyist for the Ankara regime, with a contract valued at $35,000 per month for Hastert to secure Turkey's interests in the US Congress.

If there were such a thing as justice, the Congressional criminals like Hastert and Harman would get their comeuppance in a court of law. Their shame would be front page news and the first story up on the evening news. But those of us familiar with Susurluk know that there is no justice and the criminals always move on to greener pastures.

It would appear that I'm not the only one who thinks this way because the deliberate downplay of these kinds of scandals in the bullshit American media and the lack of any kind of dispensation of justice from the bullshit American legal system and the protection of criminals in high office is what, it seems to me, bothers Sibel Edmonds, too. And make no mistake about it, this whole rotten System is a bipartisan effort.

The recent stunning but not unexpected revelations regarding Jane Harman (D-CA) by the Congressional Quarterly provide us with a little glimpse into one of the main reasons behind the steady decline in the integrity of Congress. But the story is almost dead - ready to bite the dust, thanks to our mainstream media's insistence on burying 'real' issues or stories that delve deep into the causes of our nation's continuous downward slide. In this particular case, the 'thank you' should also be extended to certain blogosphere propagandists who, blinded by their partisanship, myopic in their assessments, and ignorant in their knowledge of the inner workings of our late Congress and intelligence agencies, helped in the post-burial cremation of this case.

Ironically but understandably, the Harman case has become one of rare unequivocal bipartisanship, when no one from either side of the partisan isle utters a word. How many House or Senate Republicans have you heard screaming, or even better, calling for an investigation? The right wing remains silent. Some may have their hand, directly or indirectly, in the same AIPAC cookie jar. Others may still feel the heavy baggage of their own party's tainted colleagues; after all, they have had their share of Abramoffs, Hasterts and the like, silently lurking in the background, albeit dimmer every day. Some on the left, after an initial silence that easily could have been mistaken for shock, are jumping from one foot to the other, like a cat on a hot tin roof, making one excuse after another; playing the 'victims of Executive Branch eavesdropping' card, the same very 'evil doing' they happened to support vehemently. Some have been dialing their trusted guardian angels within the mainstream media and certain fairly visible alternative outlets. They need no longer worry, since these guardian angels seem to have blacked out the story, and have done so without the apparent need for much arm twisting...

[ . . . ]

How does it work? How do these people escape the consequences of accountability? Are we talking about the possible use of blackmail by the Executive Branch against Congressional representatives, as if the days of J. Edgar Hoover were never over? Cases such as NSA illegal eavesdropping come to mind, when Congressional members were briefed long before it became public, yet none took any action or even uttered a word; members of both parties. Or is it more likely to be a case of secondhand blackmail, where members of Congress watch out for each other? Or, is it a combination of the above? Regardless, we see this 'all for one, one for all' kind of solidarity in Congress when it comes to criminal conduct and scandals such as those of Hastert and Harman.

[ . . . ]

Despite a certain degree of exposure, cases such as Harman's and Hastert's, involving corruption of public officials, seem to meet the same dead-end. Criminal conduct, by powerful foreign entities, against our national interest, is given a pass, as was recently proven by the abandonment of the AIPAC spy case. The absence of real investigative journalism and the pattern of blackout by our mainstream media seem now to have been almost universally accepted as a fact of life.

Read the whole thing here and prepare to be disgusted.

For more disgust, take a look at a recent post on Zerkesorg, which outlines the Ankara regime's efforts to remove the wildly popular Osman Baydemir from his mayoral seat. A sample, from the MGK meeting in January 2006--months before the Amed Serhildan:

Commanders of the armed forces request that Mayor of Diyarbakir [Amed] be removed from his post:

All units of government must show their decisiveness about terrorism. We have two expectations. The first one is that the mayor of Diyarbakir is committing a crime. Conditions for his removal [Mr. Baydemir][from his post] by the Ministry of Internal Affairs have ripened. This request is not out of legal norms. If tolerance continues, the terrorist organization will bring its activities all the way to the cities. Our second expectation is that the village guards [korucular] are targets of sympathizers of the terrorist organization; we benefit from their contribution to the security forces. There are two problems regarding these issues. First: we cannot make up for the loss of village guards. We want the declaration and action plan of 2000 to be reviewed. The second [problem regarding village guards] is with softening down the volunteered village guard system.

Azadîxwaz has a translation of something from columnist Etyen Mahçupyan on trusting the Turkish state . . . or not:

The ones who are talking about PKK’s disarmament are acting as if they are not aware of the history of the Republic of Turkey in the minds/memories of the Kurds. PKK could seriously lay down the arms, and they could genuinely want this, too… But it will not lay down arms as far as possible, because the Kurdish society does not trust the state. There is no guarantee that a more tyrannical regime will not be imposed upon the Kurds under the disguise of politicization of the PKK and there isn’t any state authority that can guarantee this. Because history has proven that these kinds of guarantees are (never) executed.

[ . . . ]

Nowadays, you could explain to the Kurds what a “right” decision it would be if the PKK laid down the arms. As a matter of fact that is how they think, too. They know that peace can only be achieved in an environment where there are no weapons. But they also know the history of this region and they don’t trust the state. That is issue…

Not only regarding disarmament, but this is exactly the same kind of argument that goes through my head whenever I hear someone talk about the "repentance" law or the granting of a general amnesty. What in the hell do those things really mean and why should we trust such schemes?

Something to keep an eye on . . . earlier today the news broke in English-language media that 44 people had been killed during a wedding in Mardin province. You can get the basic rundown from The Times. Early reports have mentioned that this attack might be the result of a blood feud between korucu families. However, the gunmen were described as masked and armed with "assault rifles" and grenades. Certainly it could be the result of a blood feud gone very bad but it's also highly possible that it's a state operation, since the Ankara regime has specialized for decades in the massacre of unarmed civilians.

UPDATE ON US CORRUPTION AND OTHER NEWS

"Now the freaks are on television, the freaks are in the movies. And it's no longer the sideshow, it's the whole show. The colorful circus and the clowns and the elephants, for all intents and purposes, are gone, and we're dealing only with the freaks."
~ Jonathan Winters.

A few items from the front in the US that I'd like to submit for your consideration, dear Rastî readers.

First, what this guy said:

America is going from what used to be the major capitalistic country in the world of free market – a crusader – into what Mussolini would have called fascism: the merger of state and corporate powers. So it is not socialism as people believe, it is socialism’s egalitarianism. It’s not communism where the state controls monopolies – it’s fascism, plain and simple. The merger of corporate and government powers. State-controlled capitalism is called fascism, and fascism has come to America in broad daylight. But they’re feeding them it in little bits and pieces. First AIG was too big to fail. Mortgage companies Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac were too big to fail. Banks too big to fail and auto companies. And now we give money to the people that make the auto parts. And now there’s talk about the technology companies, wanting their piece of the action. The merger of state and government is called fascism. Take it from Mussolini; he knew a thing or two about it.

And this:

The people don’t really have a choice, there is no ballot box. I’m of Italian descent and I’ve heard enough of mafia stories for the rest of my life. If you want to look at a mafia, you can call it a republican and democratic party. And if you want to look at the two families, the heads of the mafia, all you have to do is to look at the Bushes and the Clintons. They’ve been running the show now for some 24 years. We heard about Obama who is going to bring in ‘change’. A change you could believe in if he is dumb, stupid and blind. Look who he’s brought in as his chief policy makers. Retreads from the old Clinton administration. It’s a two-headed one-party system. So it’s very difficult for the people to vote in a new administration that isn’t part of the old one.

I first heard this guy on the radio about two years ago. While he was talking about a mortgage meltdown, the MSM was still in la-la land. He's been absolutely on target on the financial crisis each time I've heard him, so pay attention.

Second, the same neo-Nazi who served as the Bush administration's pit bull on warrantless wiretapping of Americans, and who sponsored the "Violent Radicalization and Homegrown Terrorism Prevention Act" in Congress, has now been caught in an FBI wiretap as offering to help get a couple of AIPAC (i.e. Israelis or foreign agents for Israel) off the hook in their upcoming espionage trial. The best item on who that neo-Nazi is, and her reaction, can be found here. As for me, I'm enjoying a wonderful sense of schadenfreude.

Third, another congresswoman is caught diverting bailout funds to her husband's real estate company.

Fourth, Dennis "I-Took-Turkish-Drug-Money-To-Ditch-The-Armenian-Genocide-Resolution" Hastert has a son. And that son is eyeing his dad's old Congressional seat. For more on Hastert's Deep State crimes, see my latest on Sibel Edmonds.

Finally, if you remember this post, then you'll be interested to know that the reporter who worked the story won this year's Pulitzer Prize for investigative journalism. The TV channels that used, and continue to use, paid Pentagon propagandists have still not discussed the story.

Isn't all this great news?! The US is becoming more and more like Turkey! Now if you could only get some decent poğaça around here . . .

THE DEEP STATE AND CHANGE YOU CAN BELIEVE IN

"It is puzzling to observe that in reporting this major artery (Turkey) of terrorists’ funding, the U.S. mainstream media and political machine do not dare to go beyond the poppy fields of Afghanistan and the fairly insignificant low level Afghan warlords overseeing the crops."
~ Sibel Edmonds.

Sibel Edmonds has a new interview at Electric Politics (Run time 1 hour, 16 mins.) in which she talks about Turkey's involvement in the drug industry. The interview ranges into other issues, too, including the Deep State in the US. A few notes that I picked up while listening:


1. At the end of the 1990s, 40% of Turkey's GDP was based on heroin.

2. First Merchant Bank has been involved in laundering heroin money for Turkey, among others. Süleyman Demirel's brother, Murat, was involved among the higher-ups at First Merchant. Everyone should remember that Süleyman Demirel was Turkey's president during the Susurluk days.

3. AIPAC set up the ATC and convicted spy for Israel Larry Franklin was very much involved in the ATC's early meetings.

4. The Turkish Deep State lobby in the US uses smaller organizations, like ATAA and TACA to spread its interests.

5. The president of one of those "cultural" associations donated $100,000 to Secretary of State Clinton's failed presidential campaign.

6. The FBI has tried to take action against the American criminals/spies/foreign agents involved in the Deep State but have been prevented from doing so by both the Pentagon and the State Department. Remember the neocons and other Israeli agents, like Grossman, Feith, Perle, Larry Franklin, etc., who used to be directing policy at both of those agencies.

7. Prior to the November 2006 midterm elections, Congressman Waxman and his office wanted a public investigation into Sibel's case and those of other whistleblowers but claimed the big, bad Republicans were tying their hands on the matter. After the Democrats took a congressional majority in November 2006, Waxman and his office blew off Sibel.

8. It's quite possible that Nancy Pelosi and the Israeli lobby (AIPAC) "persuaded" Waxman to not insist on a public hearing for Sibel.

9. The Democrats dumped Sibel after she spoke to them in a SCIF because, through her information, at least three Democratic politicians could be further investigated, leading to prosecutions, for Deep State criminal activity.

10. Certain members of the current US administration could be further investigated, leading to prosecutions, for Deep State criminal activity.

11. Sibel was asked if there would ever be a time when her story could be told fully. She answers that maybe when everyone involved in her story is dead, it might be possible to tell it. Mizgîn adds that she hopes this happens very soon.


In connection with Sibel's case, let me point out that the current administration, the Obama administration, is not only supporting the Bush administration's hyper-application of the bullshit state secrets privilege, but it's surpassing the Bush administration's hyper-application of the privilege that is used to protect those involved in Deep State criminal activity, espionage, and treason. Not only that, the Obama administration is going above and beyond the call of duty by introducing a new blanket of protection called "sovereign immunity". More from Glenn Greenwald at Salon:

But late Friday afternoon, the Obama DOJ filed the government's first response to EFF's lawsuit (.pdf), the first of its kind to seek damages against government officials under FISA, the Wiretap Act and other statutes, arising out of Bush's NSA program. But the Obama DOJ demanded dismissal of the entire lawsuit based on (1) its Bush-mimicking claim that the "state secrets" privilege bars any lawsuits against the Bush administration for illegal spying, and (2) a brand new "sovereign immunity" claim of breathtaking scope -- never before advanced even by the Bush administration -- that the Patriot Act bars any lawsuits of any kind for illegal government surveillance unless there is "willful disclosure" of the illegally intercepted communications.

In other words, beyond even the outrageously broad "state secrets" privilege invented by the Bush administration and now embraced fully by the Obama administration, the Obama DOJ has now invented a brand new claim of government immunity, one which literally asserts that the U.S. Government is free to intercept all of your communications (calls, emails and the like) and -- even if what they're doing is blatantly illegal and they know it's illegal -- you are barred from suing them unless they "willfully disclose" to the public what they have learned.

For more on the continuation of Deep State fascism, see the more recent posts by Greenwald, here and here.

Change you can believe in!

Not mentioned in the interview, but relevant, is the fact that in order to win Turkish support for Danish PM Rasmussen's appointment as Secretary General of NATO, NATO will appoint a special envoy for Afghanistan from the ranks of Turkish diplomats. This was one of the conditions Katil Erdoğan insisted on. How very, very convenient for the Turkish heroin industry. I'm sure this will help boost Turkey's economy, and continue to bail out the banker vermin, during the global economic crisis.

Let me also point out that neither Sibel nor her interviewer at Electric Politics, who had purposely searched for information on Turkey's heroin industry, mention the PKK once. And that's because there is nothing to mention, contrary to a long-standing and massive propaganda effort on the part of the Ankara regime.

TORTURING "DEMOCRACY"

"Congress cannot look the other way; it must demand an independent investigation and independent prosecutor. Congress is duty-bound by the Constitution not only to hold the President, Vice President and all civil officers to account, but it must also send a message to future presidents that it will use its constitutional powers to prevent illegal, and immoral conduct."
~ Caroline Fredrickson, ACLU.

Here's a Sunday evening documentary for you, titled "Torturing Democracy". There's a website for the documentary, hosted at George Washington University. The website also contains an annotated transcript which is available in .pdf.

As you watch the video, remember that the US has not been at war since the Second World War and it is not at war now. Only Congress has the power to declare war and it has not done so since 11 December 1941 (see Article 1, Section 8, of the Constitution for more).

Run time just over an hour.

All three parts here.

Compare with PKK's treatment of its prisoners:

"THE PKK WAY"

"TURKISH POWS RETURN HOME"

"HPG HANDOVER OF TURKISH POWS"

EITHER WAY, A VOTE FOR GOLDMAN SACHS

"Banking establishments are more dangerous than standing armies."
~ Thomas Jefferson.

Wow! No wonder Obama and McCain urged passage of and voted for the bailout of the Wall Street criminals! They're owned by those vermin.

McCain's top five campaign contributors between 2003 and 2008 were, in order of the greatest amount of bribes to the least: Merrill Lynch ($306,813), Citigroup Inc. ($277,251), Goldman Sachs ($234,345), Morgan Stanley ($234,272) , and AT&T Inc. ($192,557).

Obama's top five campaign contributors between 2003 and 2008 were, again in order of the greatest amount of bribes to the least: Goldman Sachs ($748,880), University of California ($625,911), JPMorgan Chase & Co. ($493,469), Harvard University ($473,669), Citigroup Inc. ($467,849).

But I'm sure they wouldn't let campaign contributors from Wall Street dictate how they vote on the criminal Wall Street bailout, now would they?

Now I understand how it came about that these two were chosen to be the presidential candidates in this election year. A vote for either one is a vote for Goldman Sachs, et. al.

THE era of US global economic dominance is over and the world now needs a new and "more just" financial system, Russian President Dmitry Medvedev said today.

"The time of domination by one economy and one currency has been consigned to the past once and for all," Mr Medvedev said in an address to a Russian-German development forum, with German Chancellor Angela Merkel at his side.

"We must work together towards building a new and more just financial-economic system in the world based on the principles of multipolarity, supremacy of the law and taking account of mutual interests."

The Australian.

THE F WORD

"You're here because you know something. What you know, you can't explain. But you feel it. You felt it your entire life. That there's something wrong with the world. You don't know what it is, but it's there. Like a splinter in your mind -- driving you mad."
~ Morpheus, The Matrix.

Uh-oh! They used the "F" word and they mean it!

Scott Horton interviews Greg Palast about oil, Iraq, Georgia, and the "F" word. MP3 here. Run time just over 24 minutes.

I love the cynicism there. It's so refreshing.

Much more on corruption, fascism, and cynicism, and why there's no point voting--especially for McCain here. Run time, again, just over 24 minutes.

SIBEL EDMONDS AND THE VARIETIES OF TREASON

"Sometimes the things we have to do are objectionable in the eyes of others."
~ Richard Perle.

Luke Ryland adds to the discussion begun here in July, on the varieties of treason, looking at Richard Perle's involvement in a consortium of Kazakhistani and South Kurdistani oil. One interesting item to note is that the Prince of Darkness denied involvement in Doug Feith's lobbying company, International Advisors, Inc.(IAI). At the time, Feith was a registered foreign agent representing Turkey in matters having to do with "U.S.-Turkey defense industrial cooperation."

The time frame for IAI's existence coincided with the period leading up to the "Clean Break" strategy:

In 1996, a group of American neoconservatives participated in a study group organized by the Israel-based Institute for Advanced Strategic and Political Studies. The group produced a paper entitled "A Clean Break: A New Strategy for Securing the Realm," which advocated an ambitious set of policies aimed at ensuring Israel's security. Although originally directed at Israel's then-incoming Likud government led by Benjamin Netanyahu, the ideas discussed in the paper parallel to a remarkable degree U.S. foreign policy in the Middle East, which has resulted in disastrous consequences for American interests in and out of the region. It's time for the Bush administration to make a clean break with this flawed strategy and to implement a new policy that promotes peace and security in the Middle East.

Members of the "Clean Break" study group included Douglas Feith, Richard Perle, David Wurmser, Meyrav Wurmser, and several other like-minded ideologues, many of whom would later be given posts in the administration of President George W. Bush. Among the paper's more salient points was the argument that "Israel can shape its strategic environment, in cooperation with Turkey and Jordan, by weakening, containing, and even rolling back Syria. This effort can focus on removing Saddam Hussein from power in Iraq-an important objective in its own right-as a means of foiling Syria's regional ambitions." The authors also encouraged Israel to seize the initiative on its northern borders, "engaging Hezbollah, Syria, and Iran as the principal agents of aggression in Lebanon." If striking military targets in Lebanon proved insufficient, Israel should feel free to strike at "select targets in Syria proper." To justify the new policy, Israel was counseled to remind the world that "Syria repeatedly breaks its word" (emphasis in the original). Finally, the paper considered it "both natural and moral" for Israel to abandon the idea of a "comprehensive peace," move to contain Syria, draw attention to Syria's weapons programs, and reject "land for peace" deals on the Golan Heights.

Feith went on to become the number three civilian in the Department of Defense under Rumsfeld and Wolfowitz. Perle served as an assistant secretary of defense from 1981 to 1987, during which time he made himself conspicuous by his willingness to accept bribes and involve himself in conflicts of interest. From 2001 to 2003, Perle served as the chairman of the Defense Policy Board Advisory Committee. The Defense Policy Board Advisory Committee is supposed to:

. . . serve the public interest by providing the Secretary of Defense, Deputy Secretary and Under Secretary for Policy with independent, informed advice and opinion concerning major matters of defense policy. It will focus upon long-term, enduring issues central to strategic planning for the Department of Defense and will be responsible for research and analysis of topics, long or short range, addressed to it by the Secretary of Defense, Deputy Secretary and Under Secretary for Policy.

Conflict of interest appears to be Perle's middle name. No wonder that Perle distances himself from his business deals which, coincidentally--or not--benefit from the foreign policies that he's involved with pushing on the rest of the world. That is known as a conflict of interest.

Perle is consistent because, as with IAI, so now with Perle's business dealings in the Kazakhstani/South Kurdistani oil consortium. Perle denies any involvement with a business deal that sets him up to benefit from the very foreign policies he has been instrumental in implementing.

Now, I'll let Luke Ryland tell the rest of the story:

************

In 1989, the Wall Street Journal reported that Richard Perle and Douglas Feith had set up a lobbying company called International Advisors Inc [IAI] to lobby for "appropriation of U.S. military and economic assistance’ to Turkey."" When news of the $600,000 per annum contract got too hot to handle, Perle and Feith folded IAI and helped establish the American Turkish Council (ATC) to accomplish the same goals, but with a more respectable veneer.

Now, nineteen years later, the Wall Street Journal is reporting that Richard Perle is "exploring going into the oil business in Iraq and Kazakhstan" with a "consortium founded by Turkish company AK Group International... Potential backers include two Turkish companies as well as Kazakhstan."

Richard Perle issued a strange-sounding denial to the Wall Street Journal that he is involved with these latest oil projects, although he also issued a similarly "bizarre" denial to the 1989 WSJ article which reported on his consulting company IAI.

The WSJ continues:


"AK's chief executive is Aydan Kodaloglu, who, like Mr. Perle, has been involved with the American Turkish Council, an advocacy group in Washington."


In fact, according to her bio on the AK Group website, Kodaloglu "serves as a Board Member of the American Turkish Council." The ATC, established by Perle et al as a "sister organization" to AIPAC, was often caught on wiretaps heard by former FBI translator Sibel Edmonds. She described the ATC as a "front for criminal activity."

The ATC has been under surveillance by both the FBI and the CIA since at least 1996, in part because of suspected involvement in drug trafficking, public corruption and involvement in a nuclear black market procurement ring, but more importantly because of involvement in the 'great game' of the vast energy fields in Central Asia including Uzbekistan, Azerbaijan, Kazakhstan and Turkmenistan.

Investigative journalist John Stanton has written extensively about the connections between Central Asia and many of the 'associations' in the US, including the ATC, and others such as the American Azerbaijan Chamber of Commerce (AACC) and the US Kazakhstan Business Association (UKBA). Stanton argues that:


"While the ATC is an Association in name and in charter, the reality is that it and other affiliated Associations are the US government." (emphasis in original)


Perle's partner in this enterprise, the AK Group is an "international consulting" group whose two other directors are Murat Akay who works "Turkish companies interested in establishing joint ventures with U.S. and Israeli enterprises" and Fehmi Sait Hurol who is "involved in various cultural activities and exchange programs between Turkey and the U.S."

Interestingly, Sibel Edmonds has previously referred to "organization(s) supposed to be promoting the cultural affairs of a certain country within another country" as front groups for organized crime networks. Given the connections here, it would not be surprising if Mr Hurol and the AK Group are one such front group.

In my recent article "The Central Asia Islamization Cocktail: Mosques, Madrassas, Heroin & Terrorism" I quoted former FBI translator Sibel Edmonds describing the use of Turkish operatives and front groups to gain "control of Central Asia, particularly the oil and gas wealth, as well as the strategic value of the region." Sibel said:


"This started more than a decade-long illegal, covert operation in Central Asia by a small group in the US intent on furthering the oil industry and the Military Industrial Complex, using Turkish operatives, Saudi partners and Pakistani allies, furthering this objective in the name of Islam.

"This is why I have been saying repeatedly that these illegal covert operations by the Turks and certain US persons dates back to 1996, and involves terrorist activities, narcotics, weapons smuggling and money laundering, converging around the same operations and involving the same actors.

"And I want to emphasize that this is "illegal" because most, if not all, of the funding for these operations is not congressionally approved funding, but it comes from illegal activities.

"And one last thing, take a look at the people in the State Secrets Privilege Gallery on my website and you will see how these individuals can be traced to the following; Turkey, Central Asia, Pakistan and Saudi Arabia - and the activities involving these countries."


Richard Perle is listed in Sibel's State Secrets Privilege Gallery, and now we see him attempting to profit from his ATC connections by entering into an oil deal in Kazakhstan and Iraq, two decades after the WSJ first reported on the early phases of this criminal enterprise.

Meanwhile, the US media is mostly silent on the key issues again. Despite even the most mainstream WSJ reporting on Perle's recent dealings, including the importance of Turkey and the American Turkish Council, the rest of the media is asleep at the wheel, completely ignoring, or whitewashing, these important elements of the story.

Perhaps investigative reporter Joe Lauria said it best last week.


"Centrism is the philosophy of the American media - and that essentially backs the status quo, when you're a centrist, and this game of objectivity that they play is really limited by parameters that you're allowed to ask questions and to investigate and in a sense then you're transmitting these assumptions, and reinforcing every day that the US is really a functioning democracy, not even a representative democracy. And as we know of course there are oligarchic interests that buy off Congress, that puts the person in the Whitehouse that they need..."

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The original can be read at Luke's place, Let Sibel Edmonds Speak, and at DailyKos