Mon - March 29, 2004

Fabrication of a Fabrication



Some timely humor from The Stranger

The books editor for The Stranger committed an unconscionable act of journalistic fraud last week in a feature article entitled "The Liars" Club," an investigation by Stranger journalists has found. The egregious fabrication represents a profound betrayal of trust and a low point in the 12-year history of the newspaper.


FRIZZELLE Leaving the office after being fired late Friday morning.

The editor, Christopher Frizzelle, 23, misled readers and Stranger colleagues by submitting a piece that purported to be an exclusive interview with disgraced journalists Jayson Blair, formerly of the New York Times, and Stephen Glass, formerly of the New Republic, conducted in a bar in Brooklyn, New York. The Stranger has since discovered that Frizzelle did not travel to New York City, and spent the last two months writing the piece far away from there, in his Capitol Hill apartment. He fabricated comments. He concocted scenes. He lifted material from other newspapers and magazines. He altered a photograph to create the impression he had been somewhere, and had seen someone, when he had not...

Posted at 09:57 PM    

Tue - December 16, 2003

Conspiracy Theory of the week


Indications Saddam Was Not in Hiding But a Captive

DEBKA file Special Report

December 14, 2003, 6:55 PM (GMT+02:00)

A number of questions are raised by the incredibly bedraggled, tired and crushed condition of this once savage, dapper and pampered ruler who was discovered in a hole in the ground on Saturday, December 13:

1. The length and state of his hair indicated he had not seen a barber or even had a shampoo for several weeks.

2. The wild state of his beard indicated he had not shaved for the same period

3. The hole dug in the floor of a cellar in a farm compound near Tikrit was primitive indeed – 6ft across and 8ft across with minimal sanitary arrangements - a far cry from his opulent palaces.

4. Saddam looked beaten and hungry.

5. Detained trying to escape were two unidentified men. Left with him were two AK-47 assault guns and a pistol, none of which were used.

6. The hole had only one opening. It was not only camouflaged with mud and bricks – it was blocked. He could not have climbed out without someone on the outside removing the covering.

7. And most important, $750,000 in 100-dollar notes were found with him (a pittance for his captors who expected a $25m reward)– but no communications equipment of any kind, whether cell phone or even a carrier pigeon for contacting the outside world.

According to DEBKA file analysts, these seven anomalies point to one conclusion: Saddam Hussein was not in hiding; he was a prisoner.

After his last audiotaped message was delivered and aired over al Arabiya TV on Sunday November 16, on the occasion of Ramadan, Saddam was seized, possibly with the connivance of his own men, and held in that hole in Adwar for three weeks or more, which would have accounted for his appearance and condition. Meanwhile, his captors bargained for the $25 m prize the Americans promised for information leading to his capture alive or dead. The negotiations were mediated by Jalal Talabani’s Kurdish PUK militia.

These circumstances would explain the ex-ruler’s docility – described by Lt.Gen. Ricardo Sanchez as “resignation” – in the face of his capture by US forces. He must have regarded them as his rescuers and would have greeted them with relief.

From Gen. Sanchez’s evasive answers to questions on the $25m bounty, it may be inferred that the Americans and Kurds took advantage of the negotiations with Saddam’s abductors to move in close and capture him on their own account, for three reasons:

A. His capture had become a matter of national pride for the Americans. No kudos would have been attached to his handover by a local gang of bounty-seekers or criminals. The country would have been swept anew with rumors that the big hero Saddam was again betrayed by the people he trusted, just as in the war.

B. It was vital to catch his kidnappers unawares so as to make sure Saddam was taken alive. They might well have killed him and demanded the prize for his body. But they made sure he had no means of taking his own life and may have kept him sedated.

C. During the weeks he is presumed to have been in captivity, guerrilla activity declined markedly – especially in the Sunni Triangle towns of Falluja, Ramadi and Balad - while surging outside this flashpoint region – in Mosul in the north and Najef, Nasseriya and Hilla in the south. It was important for the coalition to lay hands on him before the epicenter of the violence turned back towards Baghdad and the center of the Sunni Triangle.

The next thing to watch now is not just where and when Saddam is brought to justice for countless crimes against his people and humanity - Sanchez said his interrogation will take “as long as it takes – but what happens to the insurgency. Will it escalate or gradually die down?

An answer to this, according to DEBKA file ’s counter-terror sources, was received in Washington nine days before Saddam reached US custody.

It came in the form of a disturbing piece of intelligence that the notorious Lebanese terrorist and hostage-taker Imad Mughniyeh, who figures on the most wanted list of 22 men published by the FBI after 9/11, had arrived in southern Iraq and was organizing a new anti-US terror campaign to be launched in March-April 2004, marking the first year of the American invasion.

For the past 21 years, Mughniyeh has waged a war of terror against Americans, whether on behalf of the Hizballah, the Iranian Shiite fundamentalists, al Qaeda or for himself. The Lebanese arch-terrorist represents for the anti-American forces in Iraq an ultimate weapon.

Saddam’s capture will not turn this offensive aside; it may even bring it forward.

For Israel, there are three lessons to be drawn from the dramatic turn of events in Iraq:

First, An enemy must be pursued to the end and if necessary taken captive. The Sharon government’s conduct of an uncertain, wavering war against the Palestinian terror chief Yasser Arafat stands in stark contrast to the way the Americans have fought Saddam and his cohorts in Iraq and which has brought them impressive gains.

Second, Israel must join the US in bracing for the decisive round of violence under preparation by Mughniyeh, an old common enemy from the days of Beirut in the 1980s. Only three weeks ago, DEBKA file ’s military sources reveal, the terrorist mastermind himself was seen in south Lebanon in surveillance of northern Israel in the company of Iranian military officers. With this peril still to be fought, it is meaningless for Israelis to dicker over the Geneva Accord, unilateral steps around the Middle East road map, or even the defensive barrier.

Third, Certain Israeli pundits and even politicians, influenced by opinion in Europe, declared frequently in recent weeks that the Americans had no hope of capturing Saddam Hussein and were therefore bogged down irretrievably in Iraq. The inference was that the Americans erred in embarking on an unwinnable war in Iraq.

This was wide of the mark even before Saddam was brought in. The Americans are in firm control - even though they face a tough new adversary – and the whole purpose of the defeatist argument heard in Israel was to persuade the Sharon government that its position in relation to the Palestinians and Yasser Arafat is as hopeless as that of the Americans in Iraq. Israel’s only choice, according to this argument, is to knuckle under to Palestinian demands and give them what they want. Now that the Iraqi ruler is in American custody, they will have to think again.

From DEBKA file, an Israeli Intelligence site known for its paranoid leanings, here's the whack theory of the week:
Saddam Hussein was not in hiding; he was a prisoner.

After his last audiotaped message was delivered and aired over al Arabiya TV on Sunday November 16, on the occasion of Ramadan, Saddam was seized, possibly with the connivance of his own men, and held in that hole in Adwar for three weeks or more, which would have accounted for his appearance and condition. Meanwhile, his captors bargained for the $25 m prize the Americans promised for information leading to his capture alive or dead. The negotiations were mediated by Jalal Talabani’s Kurdish PUK militia...

Posted at 07:44 AM    

Sun - December 7, 2003

Newly-elected mayor promises the city of Houston bigger pants


Mr. Sanchez, who narrowly lost the 2001 election to Mayor Lee P. Brown, a three-term mayor who has reached the end of his term limit, conceded on Saturday night, saying: "We drove the candidates to a consensus — higher taxes are on the way out."

Mr. White, who ran a cerebral if sometimes plodding campaign heavily focused on the city's traffic and budget problems, claimed victory before Mr. Sanchez finished his concession speech. "I'm ready to serve as Houston's next mayor," he told cheering supporters.

Houston's elections are non-partisan with candidates not running on party lines. But Mr. White was long identified as a Democrat and Mr. Sanchez a Republican. Although Mr. Sanchez attracted some support from national party echelons, Mr. White maintained good relations with the Bush administration and was spared partisan attack.

The race was notable for several factors. In a city with no majority bloc it is roughly one third each African-American, Latino and Anglo — Mr. White, who is white, fended off challenges by a Latino and a black candidate, drawing support from both their constituencies, defying stereotypes of race-based voting patterns and confirming Houston's image as a city of tolerance.

In the last few weeks, Mr. White was endorsed by Mayor Brown, who is a former New York City police commissioner, as well as all four other living mayors of Houston. Mr. White was also endorsed by the Houston Chronicle.

The campaign broke spending records. Mr. White. put up to $3 million of his own fortune into the race and raised $6 million more from contributors large and small. Mr. Sanchez spent about $4 million and the third candidate, Sylvester Turner, a member of the Texas House of Representatives who lost a bid for mayor in 1991, spent $1 million or so. As the bottom vote-getter in the November election, Mr. Turner was dropped from the race, leaving the runoff to Mr. White and Mr. Sanchez.

Some $14 million in expenditures — this for a job paying $165,817 a year. But the mayor of Houston enjoys one of the nation's strongest city pulpits. The mayor has appointive powers beyond many of his big-city colleagues and sits on the City Council. Houston will also occupy a national spotlight as host of the Super Bowl on Feb. 1 and will showcase a new light rail system for the occasion.

"Houston is like my 12-year-old son who outgrew his pants three times last year," Mr. White said in an interview in his bustling campaign office as the race wound down a few days ago. "Which is good," he continued. "But traditionally Houston waits to buy its pants until they're outgrown."

He would remedy that, he promised, with better road-building and redevelopment projects.

His victory, he said on Saturday night, "reminds Houstonians that we're all neighbors — isn't that great!" He told his supporters, "You have transformed a political campaign into a civic movement."

The New York Times reports: HOUSTON, Dec. 7 — Bill White, a Clinton administration deputy energy secretary who began well behind two challengers in the race for Houston mayor, swept to a decisive victory in the campaign to lead the nation's fourth largest city for the next two years.



Mr. White, who ran a cerebral if sometimes plodding campaign heavily focused on the city's traffic and budget problems, is not without his colorful moments. Bill White appears to have an unprecedented fondness for metaphors involving pants.

"Houston is like my 12-year-old son who outgrew his pants three times last year," Mr. White said in an interview in his bustling campaign office as the race wound down a few days ago. "Which is good," he continued. "But traditionally Houston waits to buy its pants until they're outgrown."

Is that a metaphor? Or a simile?

Posted at 01:57 PM    

Fri - November 21, 2003

JFK assassination theories continue to thrive



From the Fort Worth Star-Telegram

Forty years after his death, nowhere is the memory of John F. Kennedy more alive than in the ongoing drama over who killed him and why .





Posted at 02:53 AM    

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