[Peace] [Sdas] Fwd: The war on dissent widens - AlterNet (fwd)

[parenti susan rose]

---------- Forwarded message ----------
Date: Fri, 15 Mar 2002 06:09:59 GMT
From: manni at snafu.de
To: sdas at onthejob.net
Subject: [Sdas] Fwd: The war on dissent widens - AlterNet (fwd)

Forwarded Message:
> To: Ann Singleton <a.singleton at wsel.lu>
> From: Andre Gunder Frank <franka at fiu.edu>
> Subject: The war on dissent widens - AlterNet (fwd)
> Date: Thu, 14 Mar 2002 22:10:29 -0500 (EST)
> >
>
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>
> ---------- Forwarded message ----------
> Date: Thu, 14 Mar 2002 17:27:15 PST
> From: shniad at SFU.CA
> Reply-To: Discussions on the Socialist Register and its articles
>     <SOCIALIST-REGISTER at YorkU.CA>
> To: SOCIALIST-REGISTER at YORKU.CA
> Subject: The war on dissent widens - AlterNet
>
> http://www.alternet.org/story.html?StoryID=12612
>
> AlterNet                                          March 12, 2002
>
> The war on dissent widens
>
>      By Jim Lobe
>
> A powerful group of neo-conservatives is launching a new public
relations
> campaign in support of President George W. Bush's war on terrorism.
>
> At a Tuesday gathering of the National Press Club, members of the new
> Americans for Victory Over Terrorism (AVOT) declared their intention to
> "take to task those groups and individuals who fundamentally
misunderstand
> the nature of the war we are facing."
>
> Those groups and individuals, AVOT claims, need to be resisted both
-here and
> abroad. A full-page AVOT advertisement carried in the March 10 Sunday
New
> York Times pointed to radical Islam as "an enemy no less dangerous
and no
> less determined than the twin menaces of fascism and communism we
faced in
> the 20th century." At the same time, the $128,000 ad lambasted those at
home
> "who are attempting to use this opportunity to promulgate their agenda
of
> 'blame America first.'"
>
> "Both [internal and external] threats," the ad continues, "stem from either
> a hatred for the American ideals of freedom and equality or a
> misunderstanding of those ideals and their practice."
>
> To expose the internal "threats," AVOT has compiled a sample list of
> statements by professors, legislators, authors and columnists that it
finds
> objectionable. The strategy appears similar to an earlier, much-criticized
> effort to monitor war dissidents by the American Council of Trustees and
> Alumni (ACTA), a group founded by Lynne Cheney, the wife of Vice
President
> Dick Cheney, and neo-conservative Democratic Senator Joseph
Lieberman.
>
> AVOT's list of speakers it considers threatening include:
>
> - Congresswoman Maxine Waters, who said, "Some of us, maybe
foolishly, gave
> this president the authority to go after terrorists. We didn't know that he,
> too, was going to go crazy with it."
>
> - President Jimmy Carter, who assailed Bush's use of the phrase "axis
of
> evil," arguing that it was "overly simplistic and counter-productive."
>
> - Congressman Dennis Kucinich, who accused the president of
"canceling, in
> effect, the First, Fourth, Fifth, Sixth and Eighth Amendments" and called
> the war "the patriot games, the lying games, the war games of an
unelected
> president."
>
> - American Prospect editor Robert Kuttner criticizing "Bush's dismal
> domestic policies" and his "dubious notion of a permanent war."
>
> - Lewis Lapham, the editor of "Harper's Magazine," who in a recent
editorial
> said that Washington itself has used terrorist tactics during the 1990s,
> including the bombing of civilian targets in Baghdad and the Balkans.
>
> Who exactly is behind AVOT's efforts? The newly-formed organization is
> headed by a formidable array of right-wing luminaries. At the top of the
> list is former Secretary of Education and drug czar William Bennett,
AVOT's
> chairman. The group's Senior Advisors include former CIA director R.
James
> Woolsey; former Reagan Pentagon official Frank Gaffney; William P.
Barr,
> attorney general under George Bush, Sr; and mega-political donor
Lawrence
> Kadish. AVOT is a project of Empower America -- also co-chaired by
Bennett
> -- whose principal members include conservative political operatives
Jeane
> Kirkpatrick, Jack Kemp, Vin Weber and William Cohen.
>
> During the press conference, Bennett insisted that, "We do not wish to
> silence people," adding that for now, AVOT plans to hold teach-ins and
> public education events, particularly on college campuses.
>
> In response to AVOT's criticism, Harper's Lewis Lapham said Bennett is
a
> "wrong-headed jingo and an intolerant scold." He added that AVOT
appeared to
> be a new "front organization for the hard neo-con (neo-conservative)
right,"
> which has gained unprecedented influence in the Bush administration,
> particularly among the top political appointees in the Pentagon and Dick
> Cheney's office. "This is the war-monger crowd," he said.
>
> Indeed, AVOT is being initially funded primarily by Lawrence Kadish,
> chairman of the Republican Jewish Coalition (RJC) and a top donor to
the
> Republican Party. Kadish, a real estate investor in New York and
Florida,
> was cited by Mother Jones Magazine as one of the country's top
individual
> donors, having given $532,000 to the GOP. His RJC has long tried to
build
> links between the Republican Party, including its Christian Right
component,
> and American Jews.
>
> Bennett, Gaffney, and Woolsey are all veteran members of a
neo-conservative
> network of groups with overlapping boards of directors that have long
> championed rightwing governments in Israel and, among other things,
urged
> strong U.S. action against both Iraqi President Saddam Hussein, the
Islamic
> government in Iran, as well as Palestine Authority President Yasser
Arafat.
>
>
> Both Gaffney and Bennett, for example, were two of about three dozen
mainly
> neo-conservative signers of an open letter sent to Bush in the name of
the
> "Project for a New American Century" nine days after the Sept. 11
attacks.
> It called not only for the destruction of Osama bin Laden's al Qaeda
> network, but also to extend the war to Iraq, and possibly to Iran, Syria,
> Lebanon and the Palestine Authority unless those nations ceased their
> alleged support of terrorist groups opposed to Israel.
>
> Woolsey, meanwhile, was sent by the Pentagon's Defense Policy Board
to
> Britain in late September to gather evidence that could link Iraq to the
> Sept. 11. He and has since become one of the most visible
commentators in
> the media in favor of extending the war to Baghdad. Woolsey is also on
the
> board of the Jewish Institute for National Security, a hawkish pro-Israel
> group.
>
> AVOT is also linked through many channels to Richard Perle, chair of
the
> Pentagon's Defense Policy Board (which sent Woolsey on his Iraqi
quest).
> Perle, like Jeane Kirkpatrick, perches full time at the American
Enterprise
> Institute (AEI), a neo-con think-tank that has emerged as the hub of an
> "axis of incitement" -- a small but potent network of like-minded,
> ultra-hawkish officials, analysts and opinion-makers. It appears that
AVOT
> is the latest institutional offspring of that network, which is united by a
> passionate belief in the inherent goodness and redemptive mission of
the
> United States; the moral cowardice of liberals and European elites; the
> existential necessity of supporting Israel in the shadow of the Holocaust
> and in the face of Arab hostility; and the primacy of military power.
>
> These beliefs came through clearly at Tuesday's press conference.
Woolsey,
> for example, told reporters he agreed with those who are "calling the
war
> we're in now World War IV." But Gaffney was the most strident of the
> speakers at the event, saying that we should be skeptical of our
"new-found
> friends" in the war on terror.
>
> "[We must] pay special attention to friends like Saudi Arabia and Egypt
> whose ongoing use of media are creating problems for our allies,"
(implying
> Israel), Gaffney said. Any criticism of the administration's conduct of the
> war, he added, could be "interpreted in such a way as to hurt national
> resolve...(and) embolden the enemy."
>
> Jim Lobe writes on international affairs for Inter Press Service,
> Oneworld.net, Foreign Policy in Focus and AlterNet.org.
>



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