Lies, and the lying liars, part 872...

[sophiaserpentia]

Iraqi intelligence officials seeking a last-minute deal with Washington to avert war appeared to have the backing of Saddam Hussein, a Lebanese businessman who relayed the offer to U.S. officials said on Friday. Imad Hage, who told U.S. officials of proposals to let Washington scour Iraq for weapons of mass destruction and hand over an al Qaeda figure, said the Iraqis were rattled by the threat of war and apparently chose him for his Pentagon contacts.

... Hage, an insurance executive educated in the United States, described the proposal as it unfolded to personal acquaintances in the Defense Department with the aim of reaching Richard Perle, an influential Pentagon adviser whom he himself met.

"I had met Richard through acquaintances in the past, and thought he'd be one of the people to pass it on to," he said of his March meeting with Perle, who he said seemed willing to at least hear the offer.

"He said he would meet with them but he needed approval of higher-ups in Washington," Hage said. "It came back that there was no interest in this proposal."

The White House said on Thursday it exhausted all peaceful opportunities before invading Iraq on March 20, without clarifying whether President Bush had been aware of the offer relayed by Hage.

from Saddam Seen to Have Backed Iraq Peace Envoys

Comments

[alobar.livejournal.com]

Interestingly enough, I received the below missive via e-mail just before reading your LJ post.

DON'T TRUST THE NEWS MEDIA!

Those who pay attention to the popular news media, have been subjected to a particularly incompetent hoax over the past 24 hours, in the form of a fraudulent story, played prominently in the New York Times, ABC News, and elsewhere, about alleged last-minute efforts to prevent the U.S. attack on Iraq in March of this year. Who should be in the middle of this noble effort to stop the war, but Richard Perle, Doug Feith, and two scoundrels whom most people have never heard of -- but whom we have been following for many months -- one Michael Maloof, and a Lebanese-American arms dealer, Imad el-Hage.

The real story, as opposed to the fictionalized version in the news media, is one that we are totally in the middle of. Maloof was one of the two original operatives in the secret Pentagon intelligence-cooking unit, that became known as the Office of Special Plans (OSP). (The other was David "Clean Break" Wurmser, now working directly in Dick Cheney's office.) We know that Congressional investigators are examining the formation of the OSP in 2001, and the role of Maloof and Wurmser in this, as part of a trail that leads directly to Vice President Cheney.

So the real story, so far, is that Maloof, knowing that he is a target, and fearing that he is being set up to take the fall, {himself} planted the phony story in the New York Times.

A further significant element of the story, is that some in Congress and the intelligence community are well aware that elements in and around the Bush Administration -- such as Perle, Wurmser, Maloof, and el-Hage, along with the Israeli Likudnik crazies -- are likely to try and start a war with Syria and Lebanon, in order to divert attention from the disaster in Iraq. Without getting into details, you should know that we are playing a critical role in these efforts to prevent a new outbreak of war in the Middle East.

Could you understand what is actually going on, by trying to "interpret" news media coverage of these matters?

Likewise, the flap in the Senate and the media around the "Rockefeller memo," the purloined strategy memorandum circulated among the Democratic staff on the Senate Intelligence Committee. The real issues here are, first, that with the issuing of the letters co-signed by both Senators Pat Roberts and Jay Rockefeller last week, to the White House, Pentagon, and State Department, the intelligence-fakery probe was gathering momentum, and heading in the direction of Cheney and his closest cronies. Was it not to be expected, that something would be done to try and blow everything up, and derail the investigation?

And, second, as Sen. Rockefeller has stressed, what must be investigated, is the question of {how} did the memo make its way from the secure offices of the Democratic staff in the Intelligence Committee, to a right-wing talk show host. As was stressed to us by sources yesterday, this is an "electronic Watergate," constituting an escalation of the criminality expressed previously in the Wilson leak.

These are two, readily-accessible clinical cases, illustrating why Lyn has been so emphatic that our intelligence assessments must not be derived from interpretations of news-media accounts. Those accounts are but the deliberately-distorted shadows on the wall.

Or, to take another example. Can you understand the significance of what happened in Philadelphia on Tuesday, by reading or listening to the news media? Any more than you can comprehend what is going on in the presidential election campaigns, by following the press or television?

{continued below}

[alobar.livejournal.com]

{continued from previous comment}


The {only} thing going on of importance, is what LaRouche and the LaRouche Youth are doing. You won't read about it in the newspapers, but you can be assured that the "buzz" in the Democratic Party these days is about LaRouche -- how LaRouche is mobilizing and bringing out voters that no other candidate can. You won't hear it on TV or radio, but the big question in Democratic Party circles is: How does LaRouche do it? How does LaRouche get all those kids out in the street, when no one else can?

We are transforming politics in the United States, from the halls and committee rooms of Congress, to the streets of Los Angeles and Philadelphia.

This is reality. Don't trust the news media!

Marty Rowland
romar1@ix.netcom.com

Now I am not a big fan of LaRouche & his people, but they are worth examining.