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In Bureaucracy, History, Military, Politics, Social commentary on March 18, 2026 at 12:40 am
On September 12, 2001, President George W. Bush attended a meeting of the National Security Council.
“Why shouldn’t we go against Iraq, not just Al-Qaeda?” demanded Donald Rumsfeld, the Secretary of Defense.
Vice President Dick Cheney enthusiastically agreed.
Secretary of State Colin Powell then pointed out there was absolutely no evidence that Iraq had had anything to do with 9/11 or Al-Qaeda. And he added: “The American people want us to do something about Al-Qaeda”—not Iraq.
On November 21, 2001, only 10 weeks after 9/11, Bush told Rumsfeld: It’s time to turn to Iraq.
Condoleeza Rice
Bush and his war-hungry Cabinet officials knew that Americans demanded vengeance on Al Qaeda’s mastermind, Osama bin Laden, and not Iraqi dictator Saddam Hussein. So they repeatedly fabricated “links” between the two:
- Saddam had worked hand-in-glove with Bin Laden to plan 9/11.
- Saddam was harboring and supporting Al-Qaeda throughout Iraq.
- Saddam, with help from Al-Qaeda, was scheming to build a nuclear bomb.
Yet as early as September 22, 2001, Bush had received a classified President’s Daily Brief intelligence report, which stated that there was no evidence linking Saddam Hussein to 9/11.
The report added that there was scant credible evidence that Iraq had any significant collaborative ties with Al-Qaeda.
Even more important: Saddam had tried to monitor Al Qaeda through his intelligence service—because he saw Al-Qaeda and other theocratic radical Islamist organizations as a potential threat to his secular regime.
Dick Cheney
Bush administration officials repeatedly claimed that Iraq possessed huge quantities of chemical and biological weapons, in violation of UN resolutions. And they further lied that US intelligence agencies had determined:
- The precise locations where these weapons were stored;
- The identities of those involved in their production; and
- The military orders issued by Saddam Hussein for their use in the event of war.
Among other lies stated as fact by members of the Bush administration:
- Iraq had sought uranium from Niger, in west Africa.
- Thousands of aluminum tubes imported by Iraq could be used in centrifuges to create enriched uranium.
- Iraq had up to 20 long-range Scud missiles, prohibited under UN sanctions.
- Iraq had massive stockpiles of chemical and biological agents, including nerve gas, anthrax and botulinum toxin.
- Saddam Hussein had issued chemical weapons to front-line troops who would use them when U.S. forces crossed into Iraq.
Donald Rumsfeld
Consider the following:
August 26, 2002: Cheney told the Veterans of Foreign Wars, “There is no doubt that Saddam Hussein now has weapons of mass destruction. There is no doubt he is amassing them to use against our friends, against our allies and against us.”
September 8, 2002: National Security Advisor Condoleeza Rice said on CNN: ”There is certainly evidence that Al-Qaeda people have been in Iraq. There is certainly evidence that Saddam Hussein cavorts with terrorists.”
September 18, 2002: Rumsfeld told the House Armed Services Committee, “We do know that the Iraqi regime has chemical and biological weapons. His regime has amassed large, clandestine stockpiles of chemical weapons—including VX, sarin, cyclosarin and mustard gas.”
October 7, 2002: Bush declared in a nationally televised speech in Cincinnati that Iraq “possesses and produces chemical and biological weapons. It is seeking nuclear weapons.”
March 16, 2003: Cheney declared on NBC’s “Meet the Press”: “We believe [Saddam Hussein] has, in fact, reconstituted nuclear weapons.”
Bush never regretted his decision to attack Iraq—on March 19, 2003.
Even as American occupying forces repeatedly failed to turn up any evidence of “weapons of mass destruction” (WMDs), Bush and his minions claimed the invasion a good thing.
In fact, Bush—who hid out the Vietnam war in the Texas Air National Guard—even joked publicly about the absence of WMDs.
He did so at a White House Correspondents dinner on March 24, 2004—one year after he had started the war.
George W. Bush at the 2004 White House Correspondents’ dinner
To Bush, the non-existent WMDs were nothing more than the butt of a joke that night. While an overhead projector displayed photos of a puzzled-looking Bush searching around the Oval Office, Bush recited a comedy routine.
“Those weapons of mass destruction have gotta be somewhere,” Bush laughed, while a photo showed him poking around the corners in the Oval Office.
“Nope—no weapons over there! Maybe they’re under here,” he said, as a photo showed him looking under a desk.
Meanwhile, an assembly of wealthy, pampered men and women—-the elite of America’s media and political classes—laughed heartily during Bush’s performance.
It was a scene worthy of the court of the ancient Caesars, complete with royal flunkies: “Hey! That country we just destroyed wasn’t a threat to us after all! Isn’t that a gas?”
The results of the war that Bush had deliberately provoked:
- Cost the lives of 4,484 Americans.
- Depleted the United States Treasury of at least $2 trillion.
- Created a Middle East power vacuum.
- Allowed Iran—Iraq’s arch enemy—to eagerly fill it.
- Frightened and repelled even America’s closest allies.
- Killed at least 655,000 Iraqis.
- Bush retired from office with a lavish pension and full Secret Service protection.
- He wrote his memoirs and was paid $7 million for the first 1.5 million copies.
- Cheney, Rumsfeld and Rice retired to private business, wrote their memoirs, and lived in comfort as respected elder statesmen.
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In Bureaucracy, History, Military, Politics, Social commentary on March 17, 2026 at 12:10 am
As President Donald Trump rains bombs and missiles on Iran, it’s vital to remember how American hubris led to a nine-year war in Iraq—from the “shock and awe” bombardment of March 20, 2003, until combat forces were finally withdrawn on December 18, 2011.
But this should also be a time to remember those Americans who made the 9/11 atrocity—and the disastrous Iraq war that followed—inevitable.
British historian Nigel Hamilton has chronicled their arrogance and indifference in his 2010 biography: American Caesars: Lives of the Presidents from Franklin D. Roosevelt to George W. Bush.
Hamilton noted that Richard Clarke, the national security advisor on terrorism, was certain that Osama bin Laden had arranged the USS Cole bombing in Aden on October 12, 2000.
For months, Clarke tried to convince others in the Bush Administration that Bin Laden was plotting another attack against the United States—either abroad or at home.
But Clarke could not prevail against the know-it-all arrogance of such higher-ranking Bush officials as Vice President Dick Cheney; Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld; Rumsfeld’s deputy, Paul Wolfowitz; and National Security Advisor Condoleeza Rice.
Rice initially refused to hold a cabinet-level meeting on the subject. Then she “insisted the matter be handled only by a more junior Deputy Principals meeting” in April, 2001, writes Hamilton.
Even after Clarke outlined the threat posed by Al-Qaeda, Wolfowitz—the number-two man at the Department of Defense—said: “You give bin Laden too much credit.”
Wolfowitz—whose real target was Saddam Hussein—insisted that bin Laden couldn’t carry out his terrorist acts without the aid of a state sponsor—namely, Iraq.
In fact, Wolfowitz blamed Iraq for the 1993 bombing of the World Trade Center. Clarke was stunned, since there was absolutely no evidence of Iraqi involvement in this.
“Al-Qaeda plans major acts of terrorism against the United States,” Clarke warned his colleagues. He pointed out that, like Adolf Hitler, bin Laden had actually published his plans for future destruction.
Osama bin Laden
And he added: “Sometimes, as with Hitler in Mein Kampf, you have to believe that these people will actually do what they say they will do.”
Wolfowitz heatedly traded on his Jewish heritage to bring Clarke’s unwelcome arguments to a halt: “I resent any comparison between the Holocaust and this little terrorist in Afghanistan.”
Writing in outraged fury, Hamilton sums up Clarke’s agonizing frustrations:
- Bush’s senior advisors treated their colleagues who had served in the Clinton administration with contempt.
- Bush, Dick Cheney, Rice, Rumsfeld and Wolfowitz seemed content to ignore the danger signals of an impending al-Qaeda attack.
- This left only Secretary of State Colin Powell, his deputy Richard Armitage, Richard Clarke and a skeptical Treasury Secretary, Paul O’Neill, to wage “a lonely battle to waken a seemingly deranged new administration.”
Richard Clarke
Clarke alerted Federal Intelligence agencies that “Al-Qaeda is planning a major attack on us.” He asked the FBI and CIA to report to his office all they could learn about suspicious persons or activities at home and abroad.
Finally, at a meeting with Rice on September 4, 2001, Clarke challenged her to “picture yourself at a moment when in the very near future Al-Qaeda has killed hundreds of Americans, and imagine asking yourself what you wish then that you had already done.”
Seven days later, Al-Qaeda struck, and 3,000 Americans died horrifically—and needlessly.
Neither Bush, Cheney, Rice, Rumsfeld nor Wolfowitz ever admitted their negligence. Nor would any of them be brought to account.
Condoleeza Rice, Dick Cheney, George W. Bush and Donald Rumsfeld
Disgustingly, these were the same officials who, afterward, posed as the Nation’s saviors—and branded anyone who disagreed with them as a traitor, practices the Right continues to exploit to this day.
Only Richard Clarke—who had vainly argued for stepped-up security precautions and taking the fight to Al-Qaeda—gave that apology.
On March 24, 2004, Clarke testified at the public 9/11 Commission hearings. Addressing relatives of victims in the audience, he said: “Your government failed you, those entrusted with protecting you failed you, and I failed you.”
Yet even worse was to come.
On the evening after the September 11 attacks, Bush took Clarke aside during a meeting in the White House Situation Room:
“I want you, as soon as you can, to go back over everything, everything. See if Saddam [Hussein, the dictator of Iraq] did this. See if he’s linked in any way.”
Clarke was stunned: “But, Mr. President, Al-Qaeda did this.”
“I know, I know,” said Bush. “But see if Saddam was involved. I want to know.”
Hussein had not plotted the attack—and there was no evidence proving that he did.
But the attack gave “W” the excuse he wanted to remove the man he blamed for the 1992 defeat of his father, President George H.W. Bush.
Bush believed that his father would have been re-elected if he had “gone all the way” into Baghdad during the 1991 Gulf War.
He would finish the job that his father had started but failed to compete.
It was Hamlet Revisited—with missiles.
On September 12, 2001, Bush attended a meeting of the National Security Council.
“Why shouldn’t we go against Iraq, not just Al-Qaeda?” demanded Donald Rumsfeld, the Secretary of Defense.
Vice President Dick Cheney enthusiastically agreed.
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In Bureaucracy, History, Military, Politics, Social commentary on March 16, 2026 at 12:55 am
On February 28, 2026, President Donald J. Trump—in collusion with Israel—launched massive airstrikes against Iran.
Since then, he—and other members of his administration—have issued a series of shifting and contradictory reasons for starting the war. Among them:
- Preventing Iran from developing nuclear weapons.
- Destroying Iran’s missile capabilities.
- Annihilating the Iranian navy.
- Ensuring that Iran quit arming, funding and/or directing “terrorist armies” outside its borders.
- Pre-empting an Iranian attack on American military bases in the Middle East.
One reason not given: Driving the Epstein files—which document Trump’s salacious relationship with pedophile Jeffrey Epstein—off the airways and Internet.
Equally worrisome has been Trump’s shifting estimates about how long the conflict will rage:
- March 9: “It’s going to be ended soon.”
- March 11: “Any time I want it to end, it will end.”
- March 13: “It’ll be as long as it’s necessary.”
- March 13: “When I feel it in my bones” when asked “When are you going to know when it’s over?”
Trump’s comments are eerily similar to those made by President George W. Bush on May 1, 2003.
Standing under a “Mission Accomplished” banner on the deck of the aircraft carrier USS Abraham Lincoln, Bush announced: “Major combat operations in Iraq have ended. In the battle of Iraq, the United States and our allies have prevailed.”
Only on December 18, 2011, were American forces withdrawn from Iraq.
But Americans, refusing to learn from history or even read it, are now being forced to repeat it.
To begin at the beginning:
Even as the rubble was being cleared at the Pentagon and World Trade Center from 9/11, President George W. Bush was preparing to use the attack as an excuse to topple Iraqi dictator Saddam Hussein.
World Trade Center on September 11, 2001
Hussein had not plotted 9/11, and there was no evidence that he did. But that didn’t matter to Bush and those planning the invasion and conquest of Iraq.
British historian Nigel Hamilton has dared to lay bare the facts of this disgrace. Hamilton is the author of several acclaimed political biographies, including JFK: Reckless Youth and Bill Clinton: Mastering the Presidency.
In 2007, he began research on his latest book: American Caesars: The Lives of the Presidents From Franklin D. Roosevelt to George W. Bush.
Nigel Hamilton
Nigel Hamilton, CC BY-SA 3.0 <http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0/>, via Wikimedia Commons
The inspiration for this came from a classic work of ancient biography: The Twelve Caesars, by Gaius Suetonius Tranquillus—known as Suetonius.
Suetonius, a Roman citizen and historian, had chronicled the lives of the first twelve Caesars of imperial Rome: Julius Caesar, Augustus, Tiberius, Caligula, Claudius, Nero, Galba, Otho, Vitellius, Vespasian, Titus and Domitian.
Hamilton wanted to examine post-World War II United States history as Suetonius had examined that of ancient Rome: Through the lives of the 12 “emperors” who had held the power of life and death over their fellow citizens—and those of other nations.
For Hamilton, the “greatest of American emperors, the Caesar Augustus of his time,” was Franklin D. Roosevelt, who led his country through the Great Depression and World War II.
Franklin D. Roosevelt
His “”great successors” were Harry S. Truman, Dwight D. Eisenhower and John F. Kennedy—who, in turn, contained the Soviet Union abroad and presided over sustained economic prosperity at home.
By contrast, “arguably the worst of all the American Caesars” was “George W. Bush, and his deputy, Dick Cheney, who willfully and recklessly destroyed so much of the moral basis of American leadership in the modern world.”
Among the most lethal of Bush’s offenses: The appointing of officials who refused to take seriously the threat posed by Al-Qaeda.
And this arrogance and indifference continued—right up to September 11, 2001, when the World Trade Center and Pentagon became targets for destruction.
Among the few administration officials who did take Al-Qaeda seriously was Richard Clarke, the chief counter-terrorism adviser on the National Security Council.
Clarke had been thus appointed in 1998 by President Bill Clinton. He continued in the same role under President Bush—but the position was no longer given cabinet-level access.
This put him at a severe disadvantage when dealing with other, higher-ranking Bush officials—such as Vice President Dick Cheney, Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld, Rumsfeld’s deputy, Paul Wolfowitz and National Security Advisor Condoleeza Rice.
These turned out to be the very officials who refused to believe that Al-Qaeda posed a lethal threat to the United States.
“Indeed,” writes Hamilton, “in the entire first eight months of the Bush Presidency, Clarke was not permitted to brief President Bush a single time, despite mounting evidence of plans for a new al-Qaeda outrage.” [Italics added]
Nor did it help that, during his first eight months in office before September 11, Bush was on vacation, according to the Washington Post, 42% of the time.
For months, Clarke tried to convince others in the Bush Administration that Bin Laden was plotting another attack against the United States–either abroad or at home.
But Clarke could not prevail against the know-it-all arrogance of such higher-ranking Bush officials as Cheney, Rumsfeld, Wolfowitz and Rice.
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In Bureaucracy, History, Law, Law Enforcement, Military, Politics, Social commentary on March 10, 2026 at 12:12 am
A reputation for being feared can be useful.
But it’s dangerous to constantly employ cruelties or punishments.
Whoever does so, warns Niccolo Machiavelli, “is always obliged to stand with knife in hand, and can never depend on his subjects, because they, owing to continually fresh injuries, are unable to depend upon him.”
Such a President is Donald Trump, who, as a Presidential candidate in 2016, told journalist Bob Woodward: “Real power is—I don’t even want to use the word—fear.”
As a Presidential candidate and President, Trump has repeatedly used X to attack hundreds of real and imagined enemies in politics, journalism, TV and films.
From June 15, 2015, when he launched his Presidential campaign, until October 24, 2016, Trump fired almost 4,000 angry, insulting tweets at 281 people and institutions that had somehow offended him.
Donald Trump
The New York Times needed two full pages of its print edition to showcase them. Making one inflammatory statement after another, he offended one group of potential voters after another. Among those groups:
- Latinos
- Asians
- Blacks
- The disabled
- Women
- Prisoners-of-war
Since becoming President in 2017 and 2025, Trump has attacked and/or infuriated a wide array of influential agencies or groups. Among these:
- “Obamacare” patients: Trump authorized the directors of Federal agencies to waive requirements of the Affordable Care Act—which provides medical insurance to 22 million otherwise uninsured Americans—to the “maximum extent permitted by law.”
- The CIA: Appearing at CIA headquarters on his first full day in office, Trump addressed about 400 case officers. Standing before the star-studded memorial wall honoring 117 CIA officers who had fallen in the line of duty. Trump ignored their sacrifice. Instead, he boasted of the size of his Inaugural crowd and how many times he had appeared on the cover of Time.
- Civil rights advocates: Trump signed an executive order banning Muslims from entering the United States.
- He also ordered the Department of Homeland Security to massively expand the number of people subject to detention and deportation.
- Women: Trump has publicly insulted numerous women—such as Carly Fiorina, Megyn Kelly and Rosie O’Donnell—on their looks.
- He’s been accused by 22 women of making improper sexual advances.
- And he successfully backed Supreme Court nominee Brett Kavanaugh, whom Dr. Christine Blasey Ford accused of sexually assaulting her when they were teenagers.
- Medicare patients: During the 2016 campaign, Trump said he would allow Medicare to negotiate down the price of prescription drugs. But after meeting with pharmaceutical lobbyists on January 31, 2017, Trump said: “I’ll oppose anything that makes it harder for smaller, younger companies to take the risk of bringing their product to a vibrantly competitive market. That includes price-fixing by the biggest dog in the market, Medicare.”
And he has bullied and insulted even White House officials and his own handpicked Cabinet officers:
- Jeff Sessions: Trump waged a Twitter-laced feud against his Attorney General. Sessions’ “crime”? Recusing himself from investigations into well-established ties between Russian Intelligence agents and members of Trump’s Presidential campaign.
- On the day after the November, 2018 mid-term elections, Trump fired him.
- Commerce Secretary Wilbur Ross: Trump told him: “I don’t trust you. I don’t want you doing any more negotiations….You’re past your prime.”
- Chief of Staff Reince Priebus: Suffered repeated humiliations by Trump—such a being ordered to kill a fly that was buzzing about.
- On another occasion, Trump told an associate that Priebus was “like a little rat. He just scurries around.”
- On July 28, 2017, Priebus resigned.
- Chief of Staff John Kelly: Trump similarly ridiculed Priebus’ replacement, a former Marine Corps general. Kelly tried to limit the number of advisers who had unrestricted access to Trump—and bring discipline to his schedule.
- Instead of being grateful, Trump became furious. Kelly told colleagues: “He’s an idiot. It’s pointless to try to convince him of anything. He’s gone off the rails. We’re in Crazytown. I don’t even know why any of us are here. This is the worst job I’ve ever had.”
John Kelly
- The United States Secret Service: Before taking office as President, Trump infuriated this agency by keeping his longtime private security force—and adding its members to the elite federal agency. Thus, he clearly sent the insulting message: “You’re not good enough, and I don’t trust you.”
Trump’s repeated humiliations—and firings—of high-ranking administration officials led to a near-paralysis of his government. Many agencies were plagued by staff shortages. And many of the replacements were not of “top drawer” quality.
If Trump ever read Niccolo Machiavelli’s The Prince, he’s clearly forgotten the Florentine’s warning on the need to avoid hatred at all costs.
The new musical version of the play/movie A Bronx Tale allows Mafia capo Sonny to sing his lesson on fear versus love to Calogero, the teenager who idolizes him:
Listen now what I tell ya
This advice is you know whose
Love or fear—
It’s up to you kid
But you live with what you choose.
And it’s true: You live with what you choose.
Make being loved your top priority, and you risk being labeled a weakling who can be rolled—as Bill Clinton did.
But make being feared your goal, and you risk creating an atmosphere of hatred and paranoia—as Donald Trump has.
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In Bureaucracy, History, Law, Law Enforcement, Military, Politics, Social commentary on March 9, 2026 at 12:10 am
It’s probably the most-quoted passage of Niccolo Machiavelli’s infamous book, The Prince:
“From this arises the question whether it is better to be loved than feared, or feared more than loved. The reply is, that one ought to be both feared and loved, but as it is difficult for the two to go together, it is much safer to be feared than loved.
“For it may be said of men in general that they are ungrateful, voluble, dissemblers, anxious to avoid danger and covetous of gain. As long as you benefit them, they are entirely yours: they offer you their blood, their goods, their life and their children, when the necessity is remote, but when it approaches, they revolt.
“And the prince who has relied solely on their words, without making other preparations, is ruined. For the friendship which is gained by purchase and not through grandeur and nobility of spirit is bought but not secured, and at a pinch is not to be expended in your service.
“And men have less scruple in offending one who makes himself loved than one who makes himself feared. For love is held by a chain of obligations which, men being selfish, is broken whenever it serves their purpose. But fear is maintained by a dread of punishment which never fails.”
Niccolo Machiavelli
So—which is better: To be feared or loved?
In the 1993 film, A Bronx Tale, 17-year-old Calogero (Lillo Brancato) poses that question to his idol, the local Mafia capo, Sonny (Chazz Palminteri).
“That’s a good question,” Sonny replies. “It’s nice to be both, but it’s very difficult. But if I had my choice, I would rather be feared.”
Sonny has “done 10 years in the joint.” There he got an education in power—from the works of Machiavelli. Now he wants to pass on those hard-learned lessons to Calogero.
“Fear lasts longer than love. Friendships that are bought with money mean nothing. You see how it is around here. I make a joke, everybody laughs. I know I’m funny, but I’m not that funny. It’s fear that keeps them loyal to me.”
Sonny gives advice to his adopted son, Calogero
But Sonny warns there is a trick to being feared: “The trick is not being hated. That’s why I treat my men good, but not too good.
“I give too much, then they don’t need me. I give them just enough where they need me, but they don’t hate me.”
Many who quote Machiavelli in defense of being feared overlook this vital point: “Still a Prince should make himself feared in such a way that if he does not gain love, he at any rate avoids hatred, for fear and the absence of hatred may well go together.”
Presidents who desire above all to be loved risk inviting their enemies to see them as weaklings.
Case in point: Bill Clinton.
Bill Clinton
Clinton needed to be loved. He once said that if he were in a room with 100 people and 99 of them liked him but one didn’t, he would spend all his time with that one person, trying to win him over.
But while he could charm voters, he could not bring himself to retaliate against his sworn Republican enemies.
Clinton sought to endear himself to Republicans by:
- Adopting NAFTA—the Republican-sponsored North American Free Trade Act—which later proved so devastating to American workers;
- Siding with Republicans against poor Americans on welfare; and
- Championing the gutting of the Depression-era Glass-Steagall law, which barred investment banks from commercial banking activities.
In 1998, emboldened by Clinton’s refusal to stand up to them, House Republicans moved to impeach him over a sex scandal with White House intern Monica Lewinsky. But his Presidency survived when the Senate refused to convict.
To establish a fearful reputation, a leader must act decisively and ruthlessly when the interests of the organization are threatened. Punitive action must be taken promptly and confidently.
One or two harsh actions of this kind can make a leader more feared than a reign of terror.
Case in point: Ronald Reagan.
Always smiling, quick with a one-liner (especially at press conferences), seemingly unflappable, he projected a constantly optimistic view of his country and its citizens.
Ronald Reagan
But there was a steely, ruthless side to Reagan that appeared when he felt crossed.
On August 3, 1981, nearly 13,000 air traffic controllers walked out after contract talks with the Federal Aviation Administration collapsed. As a result, some 7,000 flights across the country were canceled on that day at the peak of the summer travel season.
Reagan branded the strike illegal. He threatened to fire any controller who failed to return to work within 48 hours.
On August 5, Reagan fired more than 11,000 air traffic controllers who hadn’t returned to work. The mass firing slowed commercial air travel, but it did not cripple the system as the strikers had forecast.
Reagan’s action stunned the American labor movement. Reagan was the only American President to have belonged to a union—the Screen Actors Guild. He had even been president of this, from 1947 to 1954.
There were no more strikes by Federal workers during Reagan’s tenure in office.
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In Bureaucracy, History, Law, Law Enforcement, Military, Politics, RELIGION, Social commentary on February 25, 2026 at 12:10 am
Bernardo Gui was the chief inquisitor of the Dominican Order during the Medieval Inquisition (1184 – 1230s).
Gui closely studied the best methods for interrogating “heretics.” He set forth his findings in his most important and famous work, Practica Inquisitionis Heretice Pravitatis. or “Conduct of the Inquisition into Heretical Wickedness.”
Here’s how such an interrogation might go:
When a heretic is first brought up for examination, he assumes a confident air, as though secure in his innocence. I ask him why he has been brought before me. He replies, smiling and courteous, “Sir, I would be glad to learn the cause from you.”
Interrogator: You are accused as a heretic, and that you believe and teach otherwise than Holy Church believes.
Accused Heretic: (Raising his eyes to heaven, with an air of the greatest faith) Lord, thou knowest that I am innocent of this, and that I never held any faith other than that of true Christianity.
Interrogator: You call your faith Christian, for you consider ours as false and heretical. But I ask whether you have ever believed as true another faith than that which the Roman Church holds to be true?
Accused Heretic: I believe the true faith which the Roman Church believes, and which you openly preach to us.
Interrogator: Perhaps you have some of your sect at Rome whom you call the Roman Church. I, when I preach, say many things, some of which are common to us both, as that God liveth, and you believe some of what I preach. Nevertheless you may be a heretic in not believing other matters which are to be believed.
Accused Heretic: I believe all things that a Christian should believe.
Interrogator: I know your tricks….But we waste time in this fencing. Say simply, Do you believe in one God the Father, and the Son, and the Holy Ghost?
Accused Heretic: I believe.
Interrogator: Do you believe in Christ born of the Virgin, suffered, risen, and ascended to heaven?
Accused Heretic: (Briskly) I believe.
Interrogator: Do you believe the bread and wine in the mass performed by the priests to be changed into the body and blood of Christ by divine virtue?
Accused Heretic: Ought I not to believe this?
Interrogator: I don’t ask if you ought to believe, but if you do believe.
Accused Heretic: I believe whatever you and other good doctors order me to believe.
Inquisitor: Those good doctors are the masters of your sect; if I accord with them you believe with me; if not, not.
Accused Heretic: I willingly believe with you if you teach what is good to me.
Inquisitor: You consider it good to you if I teach what your other masters teach. Say, then, do you believe the body of our Lord, Jesus Christ to be in the altar?
Accused Heretic: (Promptly) I believe that a body is there, and that all bodies are of our Lord.
Interrogator: I ask whether the body there is of the Lord who was born of the Virgin, hung on the cross, arose from the dead, ascended, etc.
Accused Heretic: And you, sir, do you not believe it?
Interrogator: I believe it wholly.
Accused Heretic: I believe likewise.
Men like Bernard Gui—and Franklin Graham—do not seek a golden future. They crave to return to a “golden” past—which includes the power Christians once held to forcibly impose their religious beliefs on others.
Among those slated for forced conversions by the Religious Right:
- Atheists
- Jews
- Women
- Homosexuals
- Lesbians
- Non-Christians
- Liberals
To gain absolute secular power over the lives of their fellow Americans, the Religious Right will support any candidate, no matter how morally despicable.
During the 2016 Presidential race, evangelicals—and their leaders such as Franklin Graham and Jerry Falwell, Jr.—fervently supported Donald Trump, despite his:
- Being twice divorced;
- Multiple affairs (including one with porn star Stormy Daniels);
- Documented ties to Russian oligarchs and Mafia chieftains;
- Being a 34-times convicted felon;
- Viciousness, greed, lying and egomania.
Donald Trump and Jerry Falwell, Jr., at Liberty University
And they continue to fervently support him.
They expect Trump to sponsor legislation that will—-by force of law—make their brand of Christianity supreme above all other religions.
Legislation such as The Religious Freedom Restoration Act.
This was signed into law on March 26, 2015, by Mike Pence, then Governor of Indiana.
This allows any individual or corporation to cite its religious beliefs as a defense when sued by a private party.
Officially, its intent is to prevent the government from forcing business owners to violate their religious beliefs.
Unofficially, its intent is to appease the hatred of gays and lesbians by the religious Right, a key constituency of the Republican party.
Thus, a bakery that doesn’t want to make a cake for a gay wedding or a restaurant that doesn’t want to serve lesbian patrons now has the legal right to refuse to do so.
And a hospital can legally turn away a gay patient if it wants to.
Islamic countries are notorious for their persecution of non-Muslims. Now the Religious Right wants to impose its own version of sharia law on American citizens.
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In Bureaucracy, History, Law, Law Enforcement, Military, Politics, RELIGION, Social commentary on February 24, 2026 at 12:17 am
American Right-wing elements relentlessly claimed that President Barack Obama was waging “a war on religion.”
GOP candidates like Rick Santorum, Newt Gingrich and Mitt Romney intended to make this a major theme of their respective campaigns for President.
Obama supported a woman’s right to obtain
- Abortion—including in cases of rape and incest;
- Birth control; and
- Amniocentesis (pre-natal testing).
By promoting women’s rights, Obama was “waging a war against religion”-–according to American fascists.
Since access to such medical procedures as birth control and pre-natal testing has long been entirely legal, what’s all the fuss about?
It’s simple: The Right is not waging a “war for religious liberty.”
It’s waging a bitter struggle to establish a government that uses force or the threat of it to impose reactionary religious beliefs on religionists who do not share such religious beliefs.
And on atheists or agnostics, who share none at all.
These Rightists and their theocratic allies have less in common with Jesus Christ than with Tomas de Torquemada (1420 – 1498), the infamous Grand Inquisitor of the Spanish Inquisition.
Christ never ordered the torture or death of anyone. Torquemada—claiming to act in “defense” of the Roman Catholic Church—presided over the deaths of at least 2,000 “heretics.”
Tomas de Torquemada
Nor did these unfortunate victims of religious fanaticism meet their death quickly or painlessly. They died by perhaps the cruelest means possible—by being burned alive at the stake.
Torquemada didn’t hesitate to pronounce someone a heretic. He “knew” who such people were. They were Jews, Muslims, atheists. They were “lapsed Catholics” who, in his view, failed to show fervent devotion to the religious authorities—like himself—who tyrannically ruled their lives.
For such people, Torquemada believed, the only road to salvation lay in being “cleansed” of their sins. And nothing burns away impurities like fire.
But before the fire-stakes came the fire-mindset: The arrogance of “knowing” who qualified as “saved” and who would be forever “damned.”
Unless, of course, his or her soul had been “purified” by fire.
“Heretic” burned at the stake
Fundamentalist Christians can no longer sentence “heretics” to the stake.
But the mindset that ruled the Spanish Inquisition has not disappeared. It has been vividly displayed by no less a religious authority than Franklin Graham, son of America’s most famous preacher, Billy Graham.
Franklin Graham
Appearing on the MSNBC program, “Morning Joe,” on February 21, 2012, Graham was asked if he thought that Barack Obama, Rick Santorum, Newt Gingrich and Mitt Romney qualified as Christians.
On Obama: “Islam sees him as a son of Islam… I can’t say categorically that [Obama is not Muslim] because Islam has gotten a free pass under Obama.”
On Santorum: “I think so. His values are so clear on moral issues. No question about it… I think he’s a man of faith.”
On Gingrich: “I think Newt Gingrich is a Christian, at least he told me he is.”
On Romney: “Most Christians would not recognize Mormons as part of the Christian faith. They believe in Jesus Christ. They have a lot of other things they believe in too, that we don’t accept, theologically.”
Thus, Graham pronounced as “saved” a notorious multiple-adulterer like Gingrich. He also gave a pass to Santorum, who married a woman who had lived “in sin” with an abortionist for six years.
But he unhesitatingly damned a longtime churchgoer like Obama or a devout Mormon like Romney (whose faith, most evangelicals like Graham believe, is actually a non-Christian cult).
Six years later, in 2018, Graham defended President Donald Trump, a notorious womanizer and multiple-adulterer, against charges that, in 2006, he had slept with porn star Stormy Daniels.
“I believe at 70 years of age the president is a much different person today than he was four years ago, five years ago, 10 years ago. He is not President Perfect.”
This differs greatly from his position on President Bill Clinton’s affair with Monica Lewinsky: “If he will lie to or mislead his wife and daughter, those with whom he is most intimate, what will prevent him from doing the same to the American public?”
It’s easy to imagine Graham transported to the French city of Toulouse in the 14th century. And to imagine him wearing the robes of Bernardo Gui, the chief inquisitor of the Dominican Order during the Medieval Inquisition (1184 – 1230s).
Gui closely studied the best methods for interrogating “heretics.” He set forth his findings in his most important and famous work, Practica Inquisitionis Heretice Pravitatis. or “Conduct of the Inquisition into Heretical Wickedness.”
In this, he offered a vivid example of how such an interrogation might go. The following is taken from that manual:
When a heretic is first brought up for examination, he assumes a confident air, as though secure in his innocence. I ask him why he has been brought before me. He replies, smiling and courteous, “Sir, I would be glad to learn the cause from you.”
This is not a dialogue between equals. The Inquisitor literally holds the power of life or agonizing death over the man or woman he is interrogating.
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In Bureaucracy, History, Law, Law Enforcement, Military, Politics, RELIGION, Social commentary on February 23, 2026 at 12:05 am
Hamza Kashgari, a 23-year-old columnist in Saudi Arabia, decided to celebrate the birthday of the Islamic prophet Muhammed in a truly unique way.
Hamza Kashgar
In early February, 2012, he posted on Twitter a series of mock conversations between himself and Muhammad:
“On your birthday, I will say that I have loved the rebel in you, that you’ve always been a source of inspiration to me, and that I do not like the halos of divinity around you. I shall not pray for you.”
“On your birthday, I find you wherever I turn. I will say that I have loved aspects of you, hated others, and could not understand many more.”
“On your birthday, I shall not bow to you. I shall not kiss your hand. Rather, I shall shake it as equals do, and smile at you as you smile at me. I shall speak to you as a friend, no more.”
“No Saudi women will go to hell, because it’s impossible to go there twice.”
The tweets sparked some 30,000 infuriated responses. Many Islamic clerics demanded that he face execution for blasphemy.
Kashgari posted an apology tweet: “I deleted my previous tweets because…I realized that they may have been offensive to the Prophet and I don’t want anyone to misunderstand.”
Soon afterward, Abdullah bin Abdulaziz Al Saud, then King of Saudi Arabia, ordered his arrest.
Saudi King King Abdullah
Kashgari fled to Malaysia, another majority-Muslim country. He was quickly arrested by police as he passed through Kuala Lumpur international airport. Three days later, he was deported to Saudi Arabia.
Human rights groups feared that he would be executed for blasphemy, a capitol offense in Saudi Arabia.
After nearly two years in prison, Kashgari was freed on October 29, 2013. Kashgari used Twitter to inform his supporters of his release.
Outrageous? By Western standards, absolutely.
Clearly there is no tolerance in Saudi Arabia for the freedoms of thought and expression that Americans take for granted.
Meanwhile, Right-wing American ayatollahs are working overtime to create just that sort of society—where theocratic despotism rules the most intimate aspects of our lives.
One of these is the former GOP Presidential candidate and U.S. Senator Rick Santorum. In early January, 2012, he said that states should have the right to outlaw birth control without the interference of the Supreme Court.
Rick Santorum
In an interview with ABC News, Santorum said he opposed the Supreme Court’s ruling that made birth control legal:
“The state has a right to do that [ban contraception]. I have never questioned that the state has a right to do that. It is not a Constitutional right. The state has the right to pass whatever statutes they have.
“That’s the thing I have said about the activism of the Supreme Court—they are creating rights, and it should be left up to the people to decide.”
In the landmark 1965 decision, Griswold v. Connecticut, the Court struck down a law that made it a crime to sell contraceptives to married couples. The Constitution, ruled the Justices, protected a right to privacy.
Two years later, in Eisenstadt v. Baird, the Court extended Griswold by striking down a law banning the sale of contraceptives to unmarried couples.
Santorum has left no doubt as to where he stands on contraception. On October 19, 2011, he said:
“One of the things I will talk about that no President has talked about before is I think the dangers of contraception in this country, the whole sexual libertine idea. Many in the Christian faith have said, ‘“Well, that’s okay. Contraception’s okay.’
“It’s not okay because it’s a license to do things in the sexual realm that is counter to how things are supposed to be. They’re supposed to be within marriage, they are supposed to be for purposes that are, yes, conjugal, but also…procreative.
“That’s the perfect way that a sexual union should happen. We take any part of that out, we diminish the act….And all of a sudden, it becomes deconstructed to the point where it’s simply pleasure.”
“How things are supposed to be”—according to Right-wing fanatics like Santorum and the evangelicals who support them.
Like the Saudi religious religious zealots who demand the death of a “blasphemer,” they demand that their religious views should govern everyone. That means Jews, Catholics, Islamics, atheists and agnostics.
American Christian fundamentalists and Islamic fundamentalists fervently agree on the following:
- Women should have fewer rights than men.
- Abortion should be illegal.
- There should be no separation between church and state.
- Religion should be taught in school.
- Religious doctrine trumps science.
- Government should be based on religious doctrine.
- Homosexuality should be outlawed.
The important difference—for Americans who value their freedom—is this:
The United States has a Supreme Court that can—and does—overturn laws that threaten civil liberties. Laws that GOP Presidential candidates clearly want to revive and force on those who don’t share their peculiar religious views.
Eleanor Roosevelt once said: “No one can make you feel inferior without your consent.”
The same holds true—in a democracy—for citizens who resist dictatorial politicians seeking power over them.
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In Bureaucracy, History, Law, Law Enforcement, Politics, Social commentary on February 6, 2026 at 12:58 am
Of all the threats that President Donald Trump poses to American democracy, none may be more deadly than his repeated threats to invoke the Insurrection Act.
This is an 1807 law that empowers the President to deploy the Armed Forces to individual states in specific circumstances, such as the suppression of civil disorder, insurrection, and armed rebellion against the federal government.
What is arousing Trump’s fury is the civil unrest he’s ignited in Minneapolis, Minnesota—especially following the January 7 shooting of Renee Nicole Good, a 37-year-old writer and poet, by Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) agent Jonathan Ross.
Renee Good
He’s ordered the Justice Department to criminally investigate Minnesota Governor Tim Walz and Minneapolis Mayor Jacob Frey for allegedly conspiring to impede federal immigration agents.
Their “crime”: Daring to criticize the aggressive behavior of thousands of ICE and Border Patrol agents deployed in Minnesota.
Walz said in a statement: “Weaponizing the justice system and threatening political opponents is a dangerous, authoritarian tactic. The only person not being investigated for the shooting of Renee Good is the federal agent who shot her.”
“This is an obvious attempt to intimidate me for standing up for Minneapolis, our local law enforcement, and our residents against the chaos and danger this Administration has brought to our streets,” Frey said in a statement to CBS News.
“I will not be intimidated. My focus will remain where it’s always been: keeping our city safe.”
Jacob Frey
Czbik, CC0, via Wikimedia Commons
Attorney Ty Cobb—who served as a White House lawyer in the first Trump Administration but is now a scathing critic of the president—warns that the tensions in Minneapolis could go from bad to worse if Trump invokes the Insurrection Act.
“During the first Trump administration, there were guardrails back then. There were people who could say ‘no’ to the president. And now, he’s surrounded by sycophants and enablers and people who don’t say no.
“I mean, it’s just stunning the number of people that have signed on for what’s going on in Minnesota and what’s going on in Greenland—you know, things that would have never been tolerated in the first 250 years of our democracy.
Ty Cobb
John Mathew Smith & http://www.celebrity-photos.com from Laurel Maryland, USA, CC BY-SA 2.0 <https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/2.0>, via Wikimedia Commons
“But I do think he wants—desperately wants—to invoke the Insurrection Act….I think martial law is definitely in the cards. And it’s a way that he’ll be able to control the elections.”
* * * * *
Countless historians have tried to answer the question: “Was the rise of Adolf Hitler—and the catastrophe he unleashed—inevitable?”
William L. Shirer, author of the monumental The Rise and Fall of the Third Reich, apportioned German guilt as follows:
“The cardinal error of the Germans who opposed Nazism was their failure to unite against it. At the crest of their popular strength, in July 1932, the National Socialists had attained but 37 percent of the vote. But the 63 percent of [Germans] who expressed their opposition to Hitler were much too divided and shortsighted to combine against a common danger which they must have known would overwhelm them unless they united, however temporarily, to stamp it out.”
Competent future historians may reach the same conclusion about American voters in 2024.
- Republicans: Who feared that Trump’s Fascistic supporters would deprive them of political office if they didn’t abase themselves to a lifelong criminal and would-be dictator.
- Republican judges: Who bent and/or broke the law to enable Trump to escape justice.
- Justice Department prosecutors: Whose awe of the Presidency allowed Trump to slander and threaten federal prosecutors and judges.
- Attorney General Merrick Garland: Whose cowardice prevented him from appointing Jack Smith Special Counsel until November 18, 2022—giving Trump time to delay justice and again win the Presidency.
- Democrats: Whose cowardice toward Trump encouraged Republicans to ever more extreme measures.
- Police officers: The International Association of Chiefs of Police and the Fraternal Order of Police issued a joint statement condemning clemency for criminals who assault law enforcement officers—but did not explicitly indict the January 6 actions. The Fraternal Order of Police endorsed Donald Trump in 2024.
- History illiterate voters: Who were eager to scrap alliances—such as NATO—that had checked Soviet aggression since the end of World War II.
- Nihilists: With nothing positive to contribute, their attitude was to destroy American institutions that had created prosperity and security for decades.
- Blacks: Voted for a racist in hopes of a bigger paycheck.
- Muslims: Refused to vote for Kamala Harris because Joe Biden wouldn’t stop Israel’s military campaign to free Hamas-captured hostages.
- Hispanics: Like the Jews in Hitler’s Germany, who couldn’t believe that Trump would carry out his threats to imprison and/or deport them.
- The Biden administration: Which refused to stem the tide of illegal aliens invading America—and thus enraged millions of law-abiding Americans into supporting Trump.
- Toxic masculinity voters: Whose misogynistic attitudes toward women led them to reject a former local and state prosecutor for a 34-times convicted felon.
- American voters: Whose hatred of Hispanic illegal aliens and inflationary grocery prices led them to ignore overwhelming evidence of Trump’s intent to overturn the democratic process and make himself absolute dictator.
In short: Those opposed to Donald Trump’s evil were too divided and shortsighted to combine against a common danger.
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In Bureaucracy, History, Law, Law Enforcement, Politics, Social commentary on February 5, 2026 at 12:10 am
In 2024, nihilism—and its adherents—played a key role in reelecting Donald Trump President of the United States.
During the 2024 Presidential campaign Trump promised to appoint Robert F. Kennedy, Jr., as Secretary of Health and Human Services.
On October 27, 2024, Trump told a rally in Madison Square Garden: “I’m going to let him go wild on health. I’m going to let him go wild on the food. I’m going to let him go wild on the medicines.”
Kennedy, the son of the late Senator Robert F. Kennedy, is a self-admitted former 14-year heroin addict, which he has said began at age 15. In a 2012 deposition he claimed that doctors found a dead parasitic worm in his brain, which he believed caused significant memory loss and brain fog around 2010.
Robert F. Kennedy, Jr.
Since 2005, Kennedy has peddled vaccine misinformation and public health conspiracy theories. Among these:
- Vaccines cause autism.
- The COVID-19 vaccine—which has saved countless lives—is “the deadliest vaccine ever made.”
- There is no comprehensive system for monitoring vaccine safety.
Since Kennedy took office on February 13, 2025:
- February 14, 2025: Around 1,300 employees of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) were laid off by the administration, including all first-year officers of the Epidemic Intelligence Service.
- August: Over 600 CDC employees were laid off. Among programs completely dismantled: Maternal and child health services, oral health, and the Violence Against Children and Youth Surveys.
- By July 7, 2025, 1,281 measles cases had been reported, more than the 1,274 measles cases reported in all of 2019. This was the highest level of cases since the disease had been declared eliminated in 2000.
- Roughly 93% of infections in 2025 and 95% so far in January, 2026, were among unvaccinated people or those with an unknown vaccination status. And this can be directly traced to the influence of anti-vaccine conspiracy-spreaders like Kennedy.
Measles virus
Since becoming President again on January 20, 2025, Donald J. Trump has aggressively committed a series of outrages against his fellow Americans, including:
- Granting clemency to more than 1,500 people convicted of offenses related to the January 6, 2021 United States Capitol attack.
- Signing 26 executive orders reversing climate change initiatives, eliminating DEI programs, changing the federal designation for the Gulf of Mexico to the “Gulf of America” and initiating a federal hiring freeze.
- Revoking an executive order on Artificial Intelligence safety signed by former President Joseph Biden, to establish safeguards for the rapidly advancing AI technology.
- Firing the inspectors general—who are charged with protecting the government from waste and corruption—from more than a dozen federal agencies.
- Purging about a half-dozen executive assistant directors at the FBI. These were some of the bureau’s top managers overseeing criminal, national security and cyber investigations. Their “crime”: Investigating Trump’s inciting the January 6, 2021 coup attempt and illegally holding highly sensitive national security documents after leaving office.
- Following Trump’s anti-DEI executive order, the Department of Defense deleted content that included the achievements of nonwhites—such as Navajo code talkers, black Tuskegee Airmen, Medal of Honor winners and women veterans.
- Firing the board members at the John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts and appointing himself as chairman—just as Joseph Stalin made himself arbiter of what was permissible for artists in the Soviet Union.
- Ordering the Justice Department to indict his critics such as New York Attorney General Letitia James and former FBI Director James Comey.
- James had convicted him on 34 felony counts of falsifying business records. Comey had sought to investigate Russia’s subversion of the 2016 Presidential campaign to ensure Trump’s election.
- Shutting down the Federal Government on October 1, when Democrats refused to agree to his gutting Medicaid, Medicare and the Affordable Care Act (ACA), causing 10-15 million Americans to lose health insurance coverage.
- Among those not getting paid: Air traffic controllers for the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA). Owing to many controllers refusing to work, the FAA reduced air traffic by 10% at many airports.
- Shutting off the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP) for the poor to pressure Democrats to support his gutting of healthcare programs.
- Flooding the streets of Los Angeles, Washington, D.C., Chicago with federalized National Guard troops against state governors’ wishes during immigration crackdowns and civil unrest.
- Flooding Minneapolis and St. Paul, Minnesota, with 3,000 Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) agents who are terrorizing (and in one case murdering) both American citizens and illegal aliens.
- Governors have requested the deployment of federal troops—such as in Arkansas in 1957 for school desegregation and in California in 1992 during the Los Angeles riots following the Rodney King verdict. But Trump is the first President to deploy troops against the wishes of states’ governors.
- Pardoning favored political allies and loyalists. Among these: Seventy-seven people associated with the Trump fake electors plot to overturn the results of the 2020 U.S. presidential election, including Trump’s personal attorney Rudy Giuliani and former chief of staff Mark Meadows.
- Others included: Former Honduras president Juan Orlando Hernández, sentenced to 45 years’ imprisonment for moving tons of cocaine to the United States.
- Threatening to invade Greenland, a self-governing, autonomous part of the Kingdom of Denmark. The United States has recognized Denmark’s ties to Greenland since 1917 and signed a joint defense agreement in 1951.
- As Denmark is a member of NATO, an attack on Greenland would ignite a war between the United States and its NATO allies.
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DISASTER IN IRAQ: PROLOGUE TO DISASTER IN IRAN: PART THREE (END)
In Bureaucracy, History, Military, Politics, Social commentary on March 18, 2026 at 12:40 amOn September 12, 2001, President George W. Bush attended a meeting of the National Security Council.
“Why shouldn’t we go against Iraq, not just Al-Qaeda?” demanded Donald Rumsfeld, the Secretary of Defense.
Vice President Dick Cheney enthusiastically agreed.
Secretary of State Colin Powell then pointed out there was absolutely no evidence that Iraq had had anything to do with 9/11 or Al-Qaeda. And he added: “The American people want us to do something about Al-Qaeda”—not Iraq.
On November 21, 2001, only 10 weeks after 9/11, Bush told Rumsfeld: It’s time to turn to Iraq.
Condoleeza Rice
Bush and his war-hungry Cabinet officials knew that Americans demanded vengeance on Al Qaeda’s mastermind, Osama bin Laden, and not Iraqi dictator Saddam Hussein. So they repeatedly fabricated “links” between the two:
Yet as early as September 22, 2001, Bush had received a classified President’s Daily Brief intelligence report, which stated that there was no evidence linking Saddam Hussein to 9/11.
The report added that there was scant credible evidence that Iraq had any significant collaborative ties with Al-Qaeda.
Even more important: Saddam had tried to monitor Al Qaeda through his intelligence service—because he saw Al-Qaeda and other theocratic radical Islamist organizations as a potential threat to his secular regime.
Dick Cheney
Bush administration officials repeatedly claimed that Iraq possessed huge quantities of chemical and biological weapons, in violation of UN resolutions. And they further lied that US intelligence agencies had determined:
Among other lies stated as fact by members of the Bush administration:
Donald Rumsfeld
Consider the following:
August 26, 2002: Cheney told the Veterans of Foreign Wars, “There is no doubt that Saddam Hussein now has weapons of mass destruction. There is no doubt he is amassing them to use against our friends, against our allies and against us.”
September 8, 2002: National Security Advisor Condoleeza Rice said on CNN: ”There is certainly evidence that Al-Qaeda people have been in Iraq. There is certainly evidence that Saddam Hussein cavorts with terrorists.”
September 18, 2002: Rumsfeld told the House Armed Services Committee, “We do know that the Iraqi regime has chemical and biological weapons. His regime has amassed large, clandestine stockpiles of chemical weapons—including VX, sarin, cyclosarin and mustard gas.”
October 7, 2002: Bush declared in a nationally televised speech in Cincinnati that Iraq “possesses and produces chemical and biological weapons. It is seeking nuclear weapons.”
March 16, 2003: Cheney declared on NBC’s “Meet the Press”: “We believe [Saddam Hussein] has, in fact, reconstituted nuclear weapons.”
Bush never regretted his decision to attack Iraq—on March 19, 2003.
Even as American occupying forces repeatedly failed to turn up any evidence of “weapons of mass destruction” (WMDs), Bush and his minions claimed the invasion a good thing.
In fact, Bush—who hid out the Vietnam war in the Texas Air National Guard—even joked publicly about the absence of WMDs.
He did so at a White House Correspondents dinner on March 24, 2004—one year after he had started the war.
George W. Bush at the 2004 White House Correspondents’ dinner
To Bush, the non-existent WMDs were nothing more than the butt of a joke that night. While an overhead projector displayed photos of a puzzled-looking Bush searching around the Oval Office, Bush recited a comedy routine.
“Those weapons of mass destruction have gotta be somewhere,” Bush laughed, while a photo showed him poking around the corners in the Oval Office.
“Nope—no weapons over there! Maybe they’re under here,” he said, as a photo showed him looking under a desk.
Meanwhile, an assembly of wealthy, pampered men and women—-the elite of America’s media and political classes—laughed heartily during Bush’s performance.
It was a scene worthy of the court of the ancient Caesars, complete with royal flunkies: “Hey! That country we just destroyed wasn’t a threat to us after all! Isn’t that a gas?”
The results of the war that Bush had deliberately provoked:
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