May 13, 2004 by s.z.

More Conspiracies The Saddam-9/11 Link Confirmed!  That's pretty big news, right -- so why haven't you heard it before?   Well, first, the story appears in FrontPage Mag.  And secondly, it's by Laurie Mylroie.  But since today is Wo'C Conspiracy Day (not as much fun as "Anything Can Happen Day," but it's the best we can do on our budget), let's read some of it, won't we? Important new information has come from Edward Jay Epstein about Mohammed Atta’s contacts with Iraqi intelligence.  The Czechs have long maintained that Atta, leader of the 9/11 hijackers in the United States, met with Ahmed al-Ani, an Iraqi intelligence official, posted to the Iraqi embassy in Prague. As Epstein now reports, Czech authorities have discovered that al-Ani’s appointment calendar shows a scheduled meeting on April 8, 2001 with a "Hamburg student."    That is exactly what the Czechs had been saying since shortly after 9/11: Atta, a long-time student at Germany’s Hamburg-Harburg Technical University, met with al-Ani on April 8, 2001.  Indeed, when Atta earlier applied for a visa to visit the Czech Republic, he identified himself as a “Hamburg student.” The discovery of the notation in al-Ani’s appointment calendar about a meeting with a “Hamburg student” provides critical corroboration of the Czech claim.  Do you get it?  Atta had been a student in Hamburg.  When he applied for a visa, he said he was a "Hamburg student."  Therefore, if somebody says that the Czechs say they found a calendar which indicates that al-Ani had an appointment with a "Hamburg student," it proves he met with Atta!  And if Atta met with an Iraqi intelligence official in Prague (or rather, the Iraqi intelligence officer in Prague, because the Iraqi embassy in Prague was small potatoes) in April 2001, then that PROVES that Saddam was behind 9/11.  Case closed. But there's more! Epstein also explains how Atta could have traveled to Prague at that time without the Czechs having a record of such a trip. Spanish intelligence has found evidence that two Algerians provided Atta a false passport. You're probably thinking, "Is there any record that this false passport was used by Atta (or anybody else) to leave the United States and enter the Czech Republic in April 2001?"  Nobody is saying.  But hey, if the Spaniards reportedly say that two Algerians gave Atta a false passport, that should be good enough for you, you ingrate. And why did the Czechs (they have reportedly retracted the claim) say that Atta met with al-Ani?  Because one of their counterintelligence service's Arabic informants came forward after seeing Atta's picture in the papers following 9/11, and said that back in April he saw al-Ani meet with a guy who looked like Atta. That's it.  Could the informant have mixed up Atta with somebody else (al-Ani reportedly met frequently with one of his friends, an Arabic car dealer whom Atta resembled)?  Especially after several months?  Could he have lied?  No.  Because Dick Cheney and the neo-cons really, really want it to be true, and they know more than you do.  Here's more from Laurie: Never before in this country’s history has a president ordered American soldiers into battle, without fully explaining why they are asked to risk life and limb. One would never know from the administration’s public stance that senior officials, including the President, believe that Iraq was involved in the 9/11 attacks. Iraq was indeed involved in those assaults.  There is considerable information to that effect, described in this piece and elsewhere.  They include Iraqi documents discovered by U.S. forces in Baghdad that U.S. officials have not made public. So, Cheney (and the neo-cons) have really good evidence that Iraq was involved in the 9/11 attacks -- but they're just not telling us (or Dick Clarke or George Tenet or anyone else) about it, because we don't need to know.  It's enough that they know.  Nothing more to see here.  Go about your business. Anyway, facts and knowledge and stuff are totally overrated, as Ann Coulter demonstrates in this week's column -- which isn't about the abuse of Iraqi prisoners (imagine that!), but instead "rebuts" John S. Carroll's speech about "pseudo journalists" (which really hurt Ann's feelings, because her name never came up).  She also mentions the Atta/al-Ani meeting.  I suspect a conspiracy! So, Ann is in a dudgeon (not, alas, a dungeon like she belongs) because Carroll cited that survey which showed that Fox News viewers were much more likely to believe misinformation favorable to the Bush administration than normal people were.  Ann claims that it ISN'T misinformation, as Iraq really WAS behind 9/11, and we really DID find WMDs there (and Hillary Clinton really IS responsible for the Abu Ghraib photos). Last year papers were found in Iraqi intelligence headquarters documenting Saddam's feverish efforts to establish a working relationship with al-Qaida. Note: last year papers actually were found in Iraqi intelligence headquarters.  Ann made up the rest. In response to Iraq's generous invitation to pay all travel and hotel expenses, a top aide to Osama bin Laden visited Iraq in 1998, bearing a message from bin Laden. The meeting went so well that bin Laden's aide stayed for a week. Iraq intelligence officers sent a message back to bin Laden, the documents note, concerning "the future of our relationship." Yes, in 1998, a bin Laden aide visited Iraq.  Proof positive that Saddam was behind 9/11! [Note: Of COURSE there were contacts between Iraq and al Qaeda -- much like there may be contacts between you and your religious fanatic neighbors a couple of doors down.  Since you have to live near them, you try to get along.  If invited, you attend their "Save the Sinners" soiree (until you suddenly recall that you have a migraine and need to go home).  And in return, you invite them to your Tupperware party (because you need ten guests to earn the free cake saver).  But you don't consider them friends, don't confide in them, and certainly aren't going to join their  plot to bomb the abortion clinic on Main Street.  End of analogy.] In addition, according to Czech intelligence, a few months before the 9-11 attacks, Mohammed Atta met with Iraqi intelligence agents in Prague. No doubts about that at all, huh, Ann? Finally, a Clinton-appointed federal judge, U.S. District Court judge Harold Baer, has made a legal finding that Iraq was behind the 9-11 attacks -- a ruling upheld by the 2nd Circuit Court of Appeals last October. Ann, Ann, Ann, you're such a liar.  As everybody (except the Freepers, whom you plagiarize to get the "facts" for your columns) know, this is what actually happened: A federal judge Wednesday awarded nearly $104 million in damages to the families of two victims of the Sept. 11 attacks, finding the plaintiffs had provided some evidence that Iraq provided support to Osama bin Laden and al-Qaida. Judge Harold Baer outlined the damages against bin Laden, the Taliban and Saddam Hussein and his Iraqi government in a written decision in U.S. District Court in Manhattan. Baer said he had concluded that lawyers for the two victims "have shown, albeit barely ... that Iraq provided material support to bin Laden and al-Qaida." ...The default judgment was granted by Baer after public announcements of the lawsuits failed to attract a response from any of the defendants. He said lawyers relied heavily on "classically hearsay" evidence, including reports that a Sept. 11 hijacker met an Iraqi consul to Prague, Secretary of State Colin Powell's remarks to the United Nations about connections between Iraq and terrorism, and defectors' descriptions of the use of an Iraq camp to train terrorists. Baer said the opinions of the lawyers' experts was sufficient to show that Iraq collaborated in or support bin Laden's terrorist acts on Sept. 11. The judge noted that the experts provided few actual facts that Iraq provided support to the terrorists. But he said the experts "provide a sufficient basis for a reasonable jury to draw inferences which could lead to the conclusion that Iraq provided material support to al-Qaida." But back to Ann, to prove that the judge's ruling proves that Fox News viewers are really smart. When some judge discovers a right to gay marriage in a 200-year-old document written by John Adams, Americans are forced to treat the decision like the God-given truth. But when a federal judge issues a decision concluding that Iraq was behind the 9-11 attacks, it is a "misperception" being foisted on the nation by Fox New Channel. Exactly!  Ann, I knew that if you kept up those dermabrasion treatments, in time some free-floating information would seep through your pores and into your head. Interestingly, liberals refuse to believe Czech intelligence on the Prague meeting ... because the CIA (news - web sites) doesn't believe it. Apparently, this is the lone, singular assertion by the CIA that liberals wholeheartedly trust. Well, the Czechs have also said it isn't true, the FBI says it isn't true, there is no evidence that it's true, and it's a really stupid story on the face of it.  But hey, if you and Fox News say it's true, then any non-belief is just a case of silly liberals taking the CIA's side. The CIA also concluded that evidence of WMDs in Iraq was -- in the words of CIA director George Tenet -- a "slam dunk case." But liberals hysterically denounce that CIA conclusion as a "misperception" created by Fox News Channel. Ann, everybody in the know says that Bush and Cheney told the CIA to find evidence that there were WMDS in Iraq -- and when they didn't, Cheney and the Pentagon started their own intelligence agency (with Chalabi et al. as their primary sources) to come up some.  Then, on the eve of the invasion, the White House invites Tenet and his deputy to present what they had.  They show charts, photos, intercepts -- but it's not that exciting.  Bob Woodward says that somebody (either Bush or Rice, it would seem) told Tenet that the presentation wasn't that convincing ("It won't sell Joe Public"), and indicated that somebody with more PR experience should put together a better dog and pony show ("Bush told Condoleezza Rice, 'Let's get some people who've actually put together a case for a jury.')  That's when Tenet allegedly made the "slam dunk" remark about the WMDs.  So, Ann -- who created this "misperception"?  Not just the CIA, right?  And anyway, how stupid are Fox News viewers if they still believe it?  Thus another question in the PIPA poll was this: "Since the war with Iraq ended, is it your impression that the U.S. has or has not found Iraqi weapons of mass destruction?" Thirty-three percent of Fox News viewers said they believed the U.S. had found WMDs, compared to only 11 percent of those smart NPR listeners. (How about asking NPR listeners which kills more children -- handguns or buckets?) Ann (not surprisingly) claims that we HAVE found "weapons of mass destruction," such as "systems, plans, 'recipes' and equipment," "research," and "that old jar of botulism spores found in that scientist's fridge."  But what I really want to discuss is Ann's question to NPR listeners, "Which kills more children -- handguns or buckets?"  Ann is implying that NPR listeners are so out of touch with what it REALLY important (unlike Fox viewers) that they would think that handguns kill more kids.  And, of course, handguns do kill more kids.  Ann got her research from John Lotts, which is why she (once again) looks like an idiot. First, let's look at the Killer Bucket factoid.  Per a pro-gun piece I found via Google, "According to Yale researcher John Lott, more children under age five die from drowning in mop buckets than are lost to handgun accidents all the way to age 15."  That's apparently the quote that stuck in Ann's mind (she doesn't offer a citation) -- but she forgot Lott's stipulation about only accidental handgun deaths counting (because if people kill people, then you can't blame the poor gun.).  So, we're only going to answer question as asked: "which kills more children, handguns or buckets?"  (However, even in accidents, firearms still kill way more kids than buckets do -- and buckets are rarely used in homicides.) However, a 1999 Aquatic Injury Fact Sheet (with information compiled by the National SAFE KIDS Campaign) informs us that: More than 320 children, 88 percent between the ages of 7 and 15 months, have drowned in buckets containing water or other liquids used for mopping floors and other household chores since 1984.   So, how many kids under 14 died from handgun injuries between 1984 and 1997?  I'm not sure, but I can tell you that, per the very cool CDC Injury/Mortality Searchable Database, 11,416children aged 0-14 were killed by firearms during that period.  Other stats show that the majority of people killed by firearms are killed by handguns. [A Connecticut Safe Kids site says: "More than 70% of unintentional firearm shootings involve handguns." A Georgia study shows 64% of the firearms used in fatal accidents in that state in 1998 involved handguns.  Stats compiled by the "Trauma Foundations" indicated that "Although they account for less than one third of all guns, handguns are used in four out of five gun homicides, in seven out of ten gun suicides, and are involved in the majority of unintentional gun deaths of children and adolescents."] So, if we just give the handguns every advantage and say that only half of the firearm deaths were caused by handguns, we get over 5000 children killed by handguns from 1984-97.  Which is more than the 320 who were killed by buckets (I found stats for other time periods, and the average of 22-24 kids drowning in buckets each year seems to hold true).  So, Ann, I think this proves, once and for all, that NPR listeners are smarter than Fox viewers.  And that you're a complete fraud.  At least, that's the conspiracy theory I want to start. 5:23:09 AM

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Conspiracy Theories 'R' Us Yes, today's theme is wacky conspiracy theories and the people who love them.  Let's start with a perennial favorite: Hillary Clinton is behind all evil in the world.  Richard Poe, the author of Hillary's Secret War: The Clinton Conspiracy to Muzzle Internet Journalists (published by WorldNetDaily Books, so you know it's good), was recently interviewed by FrontPage Magazine (Wacky Theory Central).  Here are a few highlights from that interview: FP: Hillary's Secret War tells us that Hillary personally led a secret police force from her office in the White House. Tell us about your proof and evidence. Poe: The operations of Hillary’s secret police have been copiously documented, to the point where the topic can hardly be called controversial any longer. I.e. Poe has no proof and evidence.  But he makes up for that with crazy theories -- gee, I wonder why Random House refused to publish his book? Poe: During the Clinton years, journalists who probed too deeply into Clinton scandals ran terrible risks. Journalists were beaten, wiretapped, framed on criminal charges, fired and blacklisted. They experienced burglaries, IRS audits, smear campaigns and White-House-orchestrated lawsuits. Some may have paid the ultimate price. In February, 1998, just as the Clinton impeachment was gathering steam, Sandy Hume, the 28-year-old son of Fox News anchorman Brit Hume, suddenly turned up dead of a gunshot to the head. He was covering the U.S. Congress for the magazine The Hill, and was known for his excellent sources among Republican insiders. Sandy Hume supposedly committed suicide, but friends and associates have questioned the official story. So, did Hillary kill Brit Hume's son personally, or did she just order to gang, the nefarious Shadow Team, to do it for her?  Developing . . . See, not only did Hillary murder Vince Foster, Ron Brown, and Sandy Hume, but she is also behind Sydney Blumenthal's libel suit against brave truthteller Matt Drudge (who, as you will recall, claimed without any evidence and after getting the info from only one source that Blumenthal beat his wife).  And after Horowitz offered to defend Drudge, he got audited by the IRS.  Coincidence?  Read the book.  No, not the Time/Life book on the paranornal -- Poe's book.  But there's more!  Yes, Hillary also got the Washington Times and the LA Times to sue Free Republic for copyright violation, just because Freepers were posting entire articles on the message boards.  Of course, the only reason that these papers would have sued FreeRepublic is because Hillary and the Shadow Force ordered them to do it. Per Poe, Drudge and FreeRepublic are part of the New Underground, a rag-tag group of American patriots (which also includes NewMax's Christopher Ruddy and WorldNetDaily's Joseph Farrah) who wage a never ending battle with their archenemies, Hillary and the Shadow Team.  Yes, it's pretty much like an episode of  "The Super Friends." But shouldn't Poe be in fear for his life now? FP: Have you experienced any persecution or harassment personally? Any threats or warnings? Do you have concerns for your and your family’s safety? Poe: Well, I doubt that I’m important enough to merit Hillary’s personal attention. The Shadow Team has bigger fish to fry. For instance, I imagine they’ve got their hands pretty full, right now, trying to frame Rush Limbaugh on drug charges. Yes, Hillary and her Shadow Team are behind Rush's drug addiction!  You heard it here first! Now, for a new conspiracy: Hillary and her Shadow Team were behind the Abu Ghraib photographs.  Not, as The American Speculum said a few days ago, by forcing the army to admitt women and gays, but by getting soldiers to fake the photos, in order to make George Bush look bad.  I learned of this new conspiracy at Lucianne.com -- and it's not just one person advancing it, it's a whole bunch of people.  Here's the basic plot: When Hillary was in Afghanistan over Christmas, she set the whole thing up.  Her minions included Gen. Karpinski, feminist, Clinton-era officers who were sick of the tight way Rummy was running things.  They either bribed the guards at Abu Ghraib to fake the photos, or else these reservists did it willingly, because they're Democrats.  The photos weren't supposed to surface until later this year, in order to upset the election -- however God got involved, causing them to surface early enough so that everyone will have forgotten about them by November.  Here are a few posts from one thread, although I've seen the meme more fully developed in other threads which I can't locate now -- I've also seen it at FreeRepublic: Reply 3 - Posted by: Maybeth, 5/11/2004 6:22:15 AM Could it be possible that all these pictures are the result of a set~up ..... of 'planned photo sessions' for the purpose of getting rid of Donald Rumsfeld and for embarrassing the President? Knowing how the clintonites work, I would not be surprised. I certainly hope the 'investigation' includes careful checking on this possibility. Soldiers involved in any set~up should cover their backs. These kinds of people usually have accidents. Reply 6 - Posted by: Betty Jean, 5/11/2004 6:55:25 AM Didn't Broomhilde take a trip to Iraq either right before or right after President Bush's Thanksgiving trip last year? Evidently she got her minions all lined up to start doing their thing because didn't this first come out in January or early in the year? 'Myself' is EVIL INCARNATE.  Reply 18 - Posted by: artlover , 5/11/2004 8:45:56 AM I have been saying all along that I think this was a staged affair. Some democrat set this up. He or she did this just to hurt Bush. I wonder how much money they were given to do this. I cannot imagine a criminal photograhing his own crime. It just is not done. Someone had to suggest this. Maybe it was a sargent that the democrat ordered to do this and it was passed down. They will do anything for ONE vote. Reply 36 - Posted by: cousair, 5/11/2004 10:35:39 AM #18 I agree with you completely....and as time goes on the "set up" by some DNC creep seems to be entirely believable. I wouldn't put anything past these people because they are after President Bush. It never has been about anything else.  Reply 44 - Posted by: patrickmchenry, 5/11/2004 11:55:08 AM Without a doubt, I see God's hand at work here. 1) Desparate dRats stage/pay for/protect photos they believe will hurt W where he is strongest - effective leadership in the WOT. 2) They will be exposed for the traitorous scum they are. 3) God oversees the early, therefore less impactful, release of these photos so they will have little effect in Nov. 4) God reveals to Iraq the real meaning of the rule of law, gaining converts to our way of thinking. 5) A newly formed Iraqi gov executes the majority of those abused, thus making the issue moot 6) America ignores the pathetic joke that is Kerry and finally . . . 7) GOP and W win massively in NOV! Put on the shield of faith and bring old friends to the polls . . . we're winning!  So, just like the moon landing, the whole "Abu Ghraib abuse of prisoners scandal" is a big fake, which I'm sure is a big relief to some people.  Yes, no need to worry your pretty little head about it anymore: we're winning the war in Iraq, the President and Rumsfeld have everything well under control, and Americans are always the good guys.  It's just another example of those cosmic chess matches between God and Hillary Clinton to decide the fate of the world.  (Ha, ha, Hillary -- foiled again!) 12:57:44 AM