TALIBAN = 9/11??
Afghanistan by Hypnosis

Thursday 5 November 2009
by Greg Palast for Zeek.net

On September 11, 2001, my office building, the World Trade Center, was attacked by al Qaeda, a murder cult of Saudi Arabians, funded by Saudi Arabians. And so, in response to the Saudis' attack, America invaded ... Afghanistan. Like, HUH?

And here we go again. New York Times headline last Friday: "Pakistani Army, In Its Campaign In Taliban Stronghold, Finds A Hint Of 9/11."

Google it and you'll find the Times report repeated and amplified 5,785 times more.

Taliban = 9/11. Taliban = 9/11. Taliban = 9/11.

Your eyelids are getting heavy. Taliban = 9/11. Taliban = 9/11.

It's the latest hit from the same crew that brought you Saddam = 9/11 and its twin chant, Saddam = WMD, Dick Cheney's chimerical tropes which the New York Times' Judith Miller happily channeled to the paper's front page.

And they're at it again.

Every war begins with a lie. In addition to Saddam = WMD, I'm old enough to remember the Gulf of Tonkin resolution authorizing the war in Vietnam, based on a fictional Vietnamese gunboat attack on our Navy. (White House recordings have Lyndon Johnson gloating privately, "Hell, those damn stupid [US] sailors were just shooting at flying fish.")

In the Glorious War against the Taliban in Afghanistan, the lie is thus: al Qaeda is "based" in Taliban-controlled Afghanistan. If we don't fight the wily Taliban, as the British once fought the wily Pathan, al Qaeda will attack America again from Talibanistan.

The latest Taliban=9/11 fantasy is a yarn spun wildly outward from the finding of a passport of an al Qaeda flunky who worked with suicide pilot Mohammed Atta in the same mountain area where, years later, a Taliban group operated. It's a stretch, but when you want to sell a war, it will do.

But selling the re-invasion of Afghanistan requires a repetition of Lie #1: that the original attack on the World Trade towers and the Pentagon were planned from Afghanistan's and Pakistan's mountains with the connivance of the Taliban.

It's not true, of course. The September 11 attack was neither organized nor directed from Afghanistan by the Taliban. In fact, as our BBC Report found, it was clear that the attack on my friends and co-workers was planned and carried out by al Qaeda operations in Falls Church, Virginia; Paris, France; Sarasota, Florida; Hamburg, Germany;— and, I repeat, funded and manned from Saudi Arabia. Neither the Sunshine State nor the Aryan namesake of the original beef patty sandwich were, nor are they now, convenient targets for a revenge attack by the 101st Airborne.

And revenge was what it was and remains: on September 11 the skunks hit us and we, goddamnit, were going to HIT BACK. ANYONE. SOMEONE. So we hit the odious, and conveniently weak, Taliban, who'd, undeniably, given refuge to killer Osama bin Laden. Though let us not forget that Osama's safe passage from the Sudan to Afghanistan was initially encouraged by the US government.

Today, we continue to throw our soldiers' bodies into Afghanistan, and our drones' rockets into Pakistan, to deny al Qaeda the supposed base from which to strike us again.

The media is eating it up and swallowing it whole. For example, CNN quotes a Pakistani from the Afghan border area, "Probably your next 9/11 is going to be from Swat."

That's not true either, of course: In the extraordinarily unlikely event Osama remains in the "caves of Tora Bora" (not where multi-millionaires with kidney disease tend to linger), any conceivable attack will be planned, funded and organized from comfy hotel rooms in Paris, Germany and Dubai as is the habit of these well-heeled hellions.

The truth is, we're not in Afghanistan to stop al Qaeda's US attackers, because they weren't "based" there in the first place, and their leaders are not there now.

So, why are we now re-invading Afghanistan? Beats me. I just hope our President will give us a hint that doesn't involve some cockamamie fairytale about 9/11 and al Qaeda.

Now, please don't get me wrong: the Taliban are monsters. If you have any doubt, I suggest you read progressive journalist Michael Griffin's masterful history of the Taliban, Reaping the Whirlwind. (Published in early 2001, Griffin presciently warned against the US policy of placating the Taliban.)

Undeniably, the Taliban gave sanctuary to the killer, but that does not make the Taliban guilty of planning and participating in the 9/11 attack. However, the Taliban's innocence in the 9/11 massacre does not wash their hands of the blood of Afghans, particularly Shia and Sufi Muslims, whom the Taliban have tortured, raped and murdered.

I can't say I shed tears for the Taliban when, after my office towers fell, US troops ended their sharia dictatorship. And, honestly, there's a case to be made that rocketing more Taliban, really nasty cutthroats that they are, is a laudable exercise. But let's not pretend it has anything to do with preventing another 9/11.

And that's the danger. As the poet T.S. Eliot warned,

"The last temptation is the greatest treason
To do the right thing for the wrong reason."

Taliban = 9/11? Innocents, by the thousands and thousands, have paid and will pay in blood for this treasonous falsehood.

I hope Thom asks Frank Gaffney if the Religious Right has any impact on on the issue of Gays in the military.
How could this not be a huge factor ? http://www.religiousrightwatch.com/2009/04/evangelical-proselytization-s...

Quark,

Funny thing, I came here for stinky cheese. But, hey, I'm a lumberjack and I'm OK.

DDay,

To paraphrase Monty Python, "I came here for an argument." "Sorry, sir, this is abuse!"

Hi, Thom;
I am a natural health consultant and I missed the source of the comparison information on medical diagnosis and treatment of cancer between USA and Europe...I thought it was the NYTimes but I can't find the source. This would be an excellent reference for some of my wellness talks that I conduct.

Regards,
Teresa

B Roll,

Thank you. It was more than 3 posts. It was in excess of 30. Speaking of which, is there some way to identify and print out selected posts from the roll? Also, how does someone locate past posts on this blog roll?

Your explanation of Project-Censored is much appreciated. Finally I was hoping for your input and reactions to my one serious piece yesterday. I put some thought into it and had a few observations which I thought might provoke you to comment. (I love a good debate) I remember one assertion which I expected flack for: "The Obama campaign was more about pigment and personality than policies or principals. It appears that this continues today." It got no reaction. Bummer

DDay and the Quark

I suspect that the first 3 or so posts from yesterday's blog were lost (somehow) when the date was reset to the correct date. It's a shame because you had what looked like a long, thoughtful and insightful post that I was going to read, but it was gone.

Project Censored is a project by the School of Social Sciences at Sonoma State University. They choose the 25 most important stories that were unreported or under-reported by the mainstream media each year. Then they give recognition to the media personality or journalist they feel did the most to report the story. It's accused of having a left-wing bias.

I believe that Project Censored has recognized Thom four times for reporting on these "censored" stories. You can't imagine how ironic I find this. I guess recipients of Project Censored Awards are given for the stories you cover, not the stories you don't.

Quark,

Re: Too cold

I've heard a thick coating of vaseline is an effective insulator.

DDay,

Re: “Life is too short to worry about health care!”

Yeah, and if you peasants would shut up and go away (or die), you'd make our (the corporate elites) lives easier!

P.S.
Re: Godiva event --- Too cold to go out without my parka!

Dateline: Washington DC

Leo F. Drummond, (aka actor Jon Voight) told and audience of largely seniors while aiding Michele Bachmann's Teabagger efforts at the Capital, that: "Life is too short to worry about health care!"

Forgive me if this was covered yesterday but Washington State voters passed a very strong civil union law this week, essentially legalizing for gays everything but the word "marriage".

While full equality would be better, as a practical matter this is IMPORTANT! The haters lost and we all are the winner.

We should be happy and proud to live in this time, because our every effort matter. Yes, the problems are HUGE but that just means that we have plenty to do and step-by-step are doing it. Populism is reborn, in a messy way but that's fine ... we should be suspicious when things are too neat and orderly.

Quark,

There have been a few protests outside Bachmann's offices. Not much interest by the media. She is never there anyway. Maybe we could stage a lady Godiva type stunt ?? I'll get the horse and we could invite Thom to play the peeper. How are your equestrian skills? Whatcha think? It would attract interest.