If we human frogs are to escape boiling–or baking, frying, glowing and other fates our leaders are warming us up to–we need to heed the voices summoned by Sibel Edmonds on Boiling Frogs Post warning us to help each other jump out of the pot and off the stove.

Boiling Frogs brings to you crucial voices, viewpoints and stories that are blacked out elsewhere. In these times when truth seems to be harder to come by, and maintaining hope keeps getting harder to do, here is an oasis in the desert of spin, half-truths, and fabrications that sadly passes for the “free press” guaranteed by our Constitution. What you read here, what you hear here, and what you will soon see here is un-filtered by government or corporate interests and not driven by ideology – a breath of fresh air.

I want to congratulate Sibel on launching this much needed venue free of partisanship focused on issues that truly matter. I wholeheartedly endorse and support this site and the distinguished team of truth-reporters, and I invite all of you to do the same: join this movement, spread the word, and contribute what you can.

Dan Ellsberg

Dan Ellsberg graduated from Harvard in economics in 1952, served in the US Marine Corps from 1954-57, and obtained a PhD in economics from Harvard while working for the Rand Corporation in 1962. In 1964 he joined the Defense Department to work principally on decision-making in the Vietnam War. Mr. Ellsberg precipitated a national political controversy in 1971 when he released the Pentagon Papers, a Top-Secret Pentagon study of US government decision-making about the Vietnam War, to the New York Times and other publications. He was indicted facing 115 years in prison; charges were eventually dismissed on grounds of government misconduct, White House crimes against him which figured in President’s Nixon resignation facing impeachment. Ellsberg has ever since campaigned for peace, encouraging others to reveal truths that are wrongfully withheld by those in power.

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Last Friday as I was searching the headlines for noteworthy and interesting news articles I came across a fairly lengthy and detailed story on Humam Khalil Abu-Mulal al-Balawi. Considering the saturated state of this recent CIA slaying story and the reporting source, I almost skipped the article, but then, something caught my eye; something easy to miss with the naked eye, at least those of gullible US Media readers-believers. It wasn’t the story itself, nor was it the flowery details in an attempt to make it a possible future ‘Hollywood Action Drama’ worthy of a six figure movie rights offer. It also wasn’t due to the authors, since neither one of them was familiar to me. No, it was none of that. What caught my attention and held it there for the next few hours was the very calculative and selective usage of a word in the title; Victim:

“In Afghanistan attack, CIA fell victim to series of miscalculations about informant”

With that word, victim, in mind, I quickly checked a few other media sites, and sure enough the word was there. I will give you a couple of quick examples, starting with NY Daily News:

Among the CIA victims, including several contractors, was a mother of three who directed operations and intelligence gathering at Forward Operating Base Chapman, a secretive site in Khowst province on the Pakistan border that also houses a State Department reconstruction team.

An eighth American victim was a State Department worker. An Afghan also was killed in the attack and six other Americans were wounded.

…

And the next excerpt from the so-called lefty PBS:

Families of some of the CIA victims have released information about their lives. Harold Brown Jr., 37, from Massachusetts, had a wife and three children; Jeremy Wise, 35, was a former Navy SEAL and worked as a security contractor; Scott Michael Roberson, 39, worked as a security officer and had a wife who was eight months pregnant; and Dane Clak Paresi, 46, was a contractor and retired soldier.

…

First, let’s get the very simple facts straight here: Read more ?

Soon-to- be- Launched Boiling Frogs Exclusive Video

I’m going to start with an exciting update on our Boiling Frogs Exclusive Video Project. Again, I’m not known for being very patient, and in this case I’m not able to contain my excitement.

Kristina Borjesson and Katrina Rill have been working very hard on the production side, and have been doing it under extraordinary circumstances. Kristina’s brother lives in Haiti and for almost 4 days they were unable to establish contact with him, know about his well-being or whereabouts. They heard from him yesterday, after days of frantic phone calls, e-mails, and stressful waiting-pacing. I am so very happy and relieved. Additionally, during that chaotic period they had to resolve several software-hardware related problems and glitches. Fortunately, they have now arrived at the ‘happy-satisfied-exciting’ stage where they are putting their final touches on our first four-part video series.

The upcoming video series will be based on exclusive interviews with Larry Wilkerson, with great footage. I don’t believe anyone has ever heard or seen some of the extraordinary revelations and commentaries contained in these clips; at least I hadn’t. Here is a glimpse of what I’m talking about from the transcript:

Larry Wilkerson on Israel:

I have not mentioned one other motivation in here which was, I think very much at work. And that’s Israel… Douglas Feith, for example as many people often said in the state department, including the highest members of the state department, was a card carrying member of the Likud Party… what it meant of course was that he had a double set of interests in mind at most times and those interests were not just America’s interests, they were Israel’s interests…

We have a situation today in both Israel and the United States created in part because of incompetent leadership but in part because of very venal leadership in exploiting the politics of fear, that can’t bring us peace—either of us—and is making lots and lots of money as Andrew Basevitch said, off not bringing us peace. Lots of money.

there are a group of people in this country who have an interest in Israel’s security that goes beyond America’s interests…. When the Cold War ended, Israel in that regard became a strategic liability, not an asset…

LW on our Disappearing Civil Liberties:

…So we’re moving away rapidly from all those things—the constitution, the rule of law, operating within our own revenues instead of debt, debt, debt and so forth, all because the presidency has become so powerful that it can do these things and it has become powerful in some respects because of the politics of fear…

LW on the Role of Military Industrial Complex:

In our country, money is negating democracy. It is doing it in a host of ways. It is doing it in a way Dwight Eisenhower warned it would do in 1961 when departed the Oval Office…

…there’s nothing out there that will tell you how to deal with this. This is not the president of Lockheed Martin, the president of uh, of uh General Dynamics or Graumann or whatever plotting at night to take over Washington or to take your money away from you. This is much more insidious than that. It is power, and building over time as we decided after world war two to build a national security state and to make security the end all and be all of our existence. Just listen to the democratic candidates the other night in the debate. Every one of them I believe as I recall even the guys on the fringes they essentially said the first requirement of any president is to protect the United States of America. Hogwash. The first requirement of any president is to protect the Constitution. The Constitution will, if it’s adhered to, protect America.

…….

Okay, you see what I mean? How could I not be ultra excited?! The interview is loaded with macro points and facts long ignored by the media and others, and issues and realities that have been chosen by our public to be denied rather than being faced and dealt with.

Buckle up and get ready for our soon to be launched video series. For some of you who have not registered with the site, this is a good time and even a better reason to go ahead and do it. The full-length clips will be available only to Boiling Frogs Registered Users, those I refer to as members of the Irate Minority Club.

………

Boiling Frogs Podcast

We had a great interview session with Chris Hedges. After reading his sound analytical pieces, hearing him articulate issues relevant to our discussion, and knowing a bit about his sincere and non-partisan outlook, I decided to add his ‘corner’ to my ‘must-read’ daily list. I say corner, because I don’t particularly like some of the angles and partisan approaches of the general site, and I believe that’s mutual, since those operating it happen to not like mine either On the other hand, I try to give credit where it’s due, and in this case, having Chris Hedges on board is a major positive.

This week we’ll interview Professor Julien Mercille and Coleen Rowley. I know I’ve said this a gazillion times, but I truly enjoy these sessions, and end up learning so much. I’m looking forward to having both guests this coming week.

Coming up on Friday: Our interview with Andy Worthington.

………….

And here is a round up of a few headlines and news of interest:

US Public Majority: Willing to Sacrifice Liberties for Perceived Security

The following makes us truly members of the irate minority club:
 

           Most OK with TSA full-body scanners
           By Thomas Frank, USA Today

Air travelers strongly approve of the government’s use of body scanners at the nation’s airports even if the machines compromise privacy, a USA TODAY/Gallup poll finds.

Poll respondents appeared to endorse a Transportation Security Administration plan to install 300 scanners at the nation’s largest airports this year to replace metal detectors. The machines, used in 19 airports, create vivid images of travelers under their clothes to reveal plastics and powders to screeners observing monitors in a closed room.

…

In the poll, 78% of respondents said they approved of using the scanners, and 67% said they are comfortable being examined by one. Eighty-four percent said the machines would help stop terrorists from carrying explosives onto airplanes. The survey was taken Jan. 5-6 of 542 adults who have flown at least twice in the past year.

…

And, this one:

            Poll: Most Americans would trim liberties to be safer
            By Steven Thomma, McClatchy

After a recent attempted terrorist attack set off a debate about full-body X-rays at airports, a new McClatchy-Ipsos poll finds that Americans lean more toward giving up some of their liberty in exchange for more safety. The survey found 51 percent of Americans agreeing that “it is necessary to give up some civil liberties in order to make the country safe from terrorism.” At the same time, 36 percent agreed that “some of the government’s proposals will go too far in restricting the public’s civil liberties.”

…

Here are my questions for the ‘majority’ who support giving up privacy and liberties for perceived security:

Let’s say the next attack, or attempted terrorist attack, takes place in a shopping mall on a busy Saturday. What should be our government’s measures and so-called solutions afterwards? Should they place metal detectors at all main entrances of all US shopping malls? And since they happen to be ‘ineffective,’ should they go all the way and have these body-scanners instead? But then, some terrorist or terrorist wanna-be or just mentally deranged person may try to pull the explosive truck in the parking lot trick. Then what? Should we also place search guards and detectors at all entrances of all US shopping malls?

Please feel free to replicate the example, scenario above, for all the mega movie theaters, mega hotels, mega amusement parks, mega restaurants, museums… Each one of them a possible target. Each one of them vulnerable. Each possible attack with a possible large civilian death toll. So I’m asking those supporters of giving up privacy and liberties for some irrational and perceived security: What would you want to be done to make you feel secure, safer? Will you be willing to stand in long lines and check points, spread your legs and arms before government patters, maybe even bend over for a good ole cavity search and enema, for shopping, dining, entertainment…? And don’t pull that ‘oh, that’s different’ line with me. Because it isn’t. Because there are millions of ways for those who are willing to execute terror plots, and there are thousands of places to be targeted. Even if we were to turn the entire country into a massive check point with scanners and patters, even if we were to turn our entire population into security guards and police… So, what you gonna do? Maybe ignorantly do the following: Read more ?

Dr. Nafeez Ahmed provides us with an overview of the role played by US military and intelligence practices in the creation of terrorism, particularly Al-Qaeda. He tells us about the status of investigations into the Blair government’s complicity with the Bush administration in supporting the invasion of Iraq. He discusses possible factors behind Americans’ long-held denial and dismissal of dark US foreign policy practices as conspiracies. Mr. Nafeez talks about the Obama administration, the ongoing posture of US corporate interests and the desire to dominate world energy supplies, the so-called liquid bombing plot and how it was mythologized in the US, and more.

Dr. Nafeez Ahmed is a bestselling author and political analyst. He is the Executive Director of the Institute for Policy Research & Development, and has taught courses in contemporary history and international relations theory at the University of Sussex. His Doctoral thesis investigated the radicalization processes and dynamics of violent conflict in the context of hierarchical social systems in the modern world. Dr. Ahmed has also published extensively on international security issues, including The London Bombings; The War on Truth; Behind the War on Terror; and The War on Freedom. He has been an expert commentator for BBC News 24, BBC World Today, Al-Jazeera English, among others. He is currently advising the Royal Military Academy Sandhurst on engaging British Muslim communities. Visit Dr. Nafeez’ website.

Here is our guest Nafeez Ahmed unplugged!

 

 Interview with Dr. Nafeez Ahmed [75:51m]: Play Now | Play in Popup | Download

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The US and UK intelligence communities have known for decades of al-Qaeda’s presence in Yemen. The presence, however, is not simply peripheral to the question of international terrorism. US intelligence investigations into major terrorist attacks such as the 1998 US embassy bombings, the USS Cole bombing, as well as  9/11 (among others) have consistently revealed that Yemen has been used by al-Qaeda as a central communications hub for the coordination of transnational terrorist activities – with the tacit (and often not-so-tacit) complicity of the Yemen government.

In fact, abundant evidence from the History Commons shows that the National Security Agency has, and continues to, monitor al-Qaeda communications in Yemen extensively. But from 1996 all the way through to the terrorist attacks of 9/11, the NSA consistently failed (in violation of mandatory security protocols) to share the detailed mountains of intercept evidence on Osama bin Laden’s activities thus obtained with the rest of the US intelligence community, despite repeated urgent requests from the CIA in the context of then ongoing terrorism investigations. After 9/11, however, much of this information became public knowledge – the US thus has extensive and intimate understanding of al-Qaeda’s activities in Yemen, and their direct connection with the execution of terrorist attacks against US and Western targets. The failures that facilitated the 25^th December 2009 crotch bombing must be understood against this background – how could the same loopholes remain open now?… unless our relationship with the terrorists is a little more complicated than officials would like us to believe.

Al-Qaeda & the 1994 North-South Civil War

A US Congressional Research Service (CRS) document – Yemen: Background and US Relations (7^th July 2009) – by Jeremy M. Sharp, Middle East analyst in the foreign affairs, defense and trade division, provides a few surprisingly candid snapshots of all this, and the ambiguous response of the US to it all:

“The Republic of Yemen was formed by the merger of the formerly separate states of North Yemen and South Yemen in 1990. In 1994, government forces loyal to President Ali Abdullah Saleh put down an attempt by southern-based dissidents to secede from the newly unified state… since the 1980s, Yemeni President Ali Abdullah Saleh has tolerated the presence of radical Islamists in the country and has used their presence to bolster his credibility among Islamist hardliners… During the 1994 civil war, President Saleh dispatched several brigades of ‘Arab Afghans’ to fight against southern late secessionists. In the mid to 1990s, Yemeni (and many foreign) militants, many with ties to Al Qaeda, began striking targets inside the country.” (pp. 1-2)

During this period, in which bin Laden’s mujahideen networks were mobilised by the north to consolidate its control over the south, President Saleh was supported by the United States. Tufts University historian Professor Gary Leupp writes: “During the 1994 civil war in the country, the U.S. had backed the current leadership against the ‘leftist’ opposition. (So had anti-U.S. Muslim fundamentalist factions, whom the leadership cannot now afford to alienate.)”

Notably, during the same period, as I and others have documented extensively, the US was busy covertly sponsoring the mobilisation of bin Laden’s networks in Azerbaijan, Dagestan and Chechnya, and the Balkans.

Al-Qaeda in Yemen in Context: the Pentagon’s Saudi-Backed ‘Redirection’ Strategy

The CRS report continues: “Overall, Islamist terrorist groups are not strong enough to topple President Saleh’s regime, but most analysts consider them capable of successfully striking a high value target, such as an oil installation…” (p. 5) It goes on to note that in January 2009, al-Qaeda militants in Yemen “announced that the Saudi and Yemeni ‘branches’ of Al Qaeda were merging under the banner of Al Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula (AQAP), which formerly had denoted militants responsible for the wave of terrorist violence that swept Saudi Arabia from 2003 through 2007.” The report also notes that many militants are coming in not only from Saudi Arabia but from Iraq. (p. 6)

But who was responsible for the expansion of Saudi militant activity? A few years back, Seymour Hersh answered that question in the New Yorker, when he reported that since around 2003, the CIA and Pentagon have ‘redirected’ US policy by funnelling millions of dollars via Saudi Arabia to al-Qaeda-affiliated Sunni extremist groups across the Middle East and Central Asia, as part of a bid to counter Iranian Shi’ite influence. Alex Cockburn was the first to report on the early US Presidential Finding – uncontested by Republican and Democratic representatives – that this funding has amounted to at least $400 million. The “black” operation aimed at isolating Iran was also confirmed by ABC News. Hersh went on to quote one of his sources, a US government consultant, explaining that Prince Bandar and other Saudi officials had assured the White House as follows: Read more ?

Spectre of Serial War

Security agencies are now focusing their sights on a whole set of countries deemed to be at-risk. According to a leaked confidential memo, people from these countries will be profiled and targeted for “additional screening” at airports. In the words of one US commentator for the Philadelphia Inquirer:

“… most frightening to me was that while the leaked document deemed that holders of passports from Cuba, Iran, North Korea, Libya, Syria, Sudan, Afghanistan, Lebanon, Somalia, Iraq, Yemen, and Algeria should be subjected to additional screening, no such special attention was given to holders of passports from Saudi Arabia – the home of 15 of the 9/11 hijackers. And now it’s worth noting that the list doesn’t include Pakistan or Nigeria – Umar Farouk’s home – either.”

The decision to widen the “screening” of travellers to encompass this vast array of countries deemed to be countries of particular threat to the West fits well within the original logic of the pre-9/11 geostrategy that has now become the ‘War on Terror’.

Hints of this geostrategy surfaced from disparate sources, such as former NATO Commander General Wesley Clarke, who wrote in his book Winning Modern Wars:

“As I went back through the Pentagon in November 2001, one of the senior military staff officers had time for a chat. Yes, we were still on track for going against Iraq, he said. But there was more. This was being discussed as part of a five-year campaign plan, he said, and there were a total of seven countries, beginning with Iraq, then Syria, Lebanon, Libya, Iran, Somalia, and Sudan.”

Clarke didn’t mention Yemen. But Yemen was explicitly mentioned in an address by the infamous Richard Perle – then Chairman of the Pentagon’s Defense policy Board and former Assistant Secretary of Defence in the Reagan administration – in the same month, at the Foreign Policy Research Institute in Washington DC:

“Those who think Iraq should not be next may want to think about Syria or Iran or Sudan or Yemen or Somalia or North Korea or Lebanon or the Palestinian Authority.”

Obama’s Neocons: Kissinger and Brzezinski

The escalation of US military activity in Yemen, therefore, is by no means simply a response to events of recent years, but merely the continuing extension of a wider bipartisan geostrategy that was formulated not only by people largely associated with Republican neocons, but also by arch-Democrats, such as former US Secretary of State Henry Kissinger and former National Security Adviser to President Carter, Zbigniew Brzezinski. During the 1970s Middle East oil crisis, Kissinger secretly advocated that the US military might have to intervene to directly and permanently occupy the oil-producing Gulf States to prevent future volatility in US energy security. Four years before 9/11, in his study published by the Council on Foreign Relations, Brzezinski outlined in unnerving detail the contours of what the Bush, and now the Obama, administration, have pursued in the context of the ‘War on Terror’: a plan to dominate “Eurasia” – the landmass comprising the continents of Europe and Asia, at the juncture of which lies the Middle East:

“… how America ‘manages’ Eurasia is critical… A power that dominates Eurasia would control two of the world’s three most advanced and economically productive regions. A mere glance at the map also suggests that control over Eurasia would almost automatically entail Africa’s subordination, rendering the Western Hemisphere and Oceania geopolitically peripheral to the world’s central continent. About 75 per cent of the world’s people live in Eurasia, and most of the world’s physical wealth is there as well, both in its enterprises and underneath its soil. Eurasia accounts for 60 per cent of the world’s GNP and about three-fourths of the world’s known energy resources.”

“Two basic steps are thus required: first, to identify the geostrategically dynamic Eurasian states that have the power to cause a potentially important shift in the international distribution of power and to decipher the central external goals of their respective political elites and the likely consequences of their seeking to attain them;… second, to formulate specific U.S. policies to offset, co-opt, and/or control the above…”

Democratic neocons Kissinger and Brzezinski continue to play a key role in Obama’s foreign and security policies, particularly in… (drum roll)… Eurasia! (Eureka? – no, way too easy) In December 2008 before Obama’s foreign policy team was even fully formed, the incoming President dispatched  Kissinger to Moscow to meet Putin and president Medvedev. Kissinger re-visited Russia in March 2009,  this time joined by a whole cohort of former senior US administration officials, just two weeks before the Medvedev-Obama summit in London. Although the White House insisted this was a purely private affair, it was obvious that his visit was part of normal ‘Track Two’ diplomacy. Brzezinski is also playing a behind-the-scenes advisory role to Obama, on Russia and NATO, as well as on issues in the Middle East including Iran and the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.

Just how key their role is, is a matter for debate. While Brzezinski has acted as Obama’s senior foreign policy advisor, Kissinger purportedly has no ‘official’ position. Or has he? “As the most recent National Security Advisor of the United States,” declared Obama’s National Security Advisor General Jim Jones at the 45^th Munich Conference, “I take my daily orders from Dr. Kissinger, filtered down through Generaal [sic] Brent Scowcroft and Sandy Berger, who is also here. We have a chain of command in the National Security Council that exists today.”

Say what?? Read more ?

On Christmas Day, 2009, 23-year old Nigerian, Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab, allegedly tried to blow up a plane on route from Amsterdam to Detroit by detonating a device stitched to his underwear. Fortunately, in yet another example of the level of sophistication of the new league of violent extremists, Abdulmutallab succeeded only in setting fire to his own crotch, before being apprehended by fellow passengers.

Security officials now reveal that the attack was planned by an al-Qaeda network in Yemen, where Abdulmutallab was apparently radicalized and trained, although he had been originally recruited, they say, in London. During his stint in London as a student, Abdulmutallab had been President of the Islamic Society at University College London.

The incident has been described as a major intelligence failure exposing the ongoing weakness of US and British security infrastructures and procedures. According to President Barack Obama, intelligence agencies were unable to “connect and understand” separate strands of information that would have alerted them to the attempted attack. “What we have here is a situation in which the failings were individual, organizational, systemic and technological,” said one US official. “We ended up in a situation where a single point of failure in the system put our security at risk, where human error was compounded by systemic deficiencies in a way that we cannot allow to continue.”

More simply: no one is to blame.

British Security Surveillance

The problem is that the official narrative is already hopelessly littered with contradictions. Abdulmutallab was apparently first added to the UK Border Agency’s immigration watch list in May 2009 after failing to get a UK entry visa. “His refusal was not on national security grounds”, claimed an early BBC report rather earnestly, “but because he had been tagged as a potential illegal immigrant because he had applied to study at a bogus college… This would, in theory, have prevented him from entering the UK – but not from passing through the country, if he was in transit to another country.”

We now know that MI5 had him “tagged” as far more than a “potential illegal immigrant.” “The security services knew three years ago that the Detroit bomber had “multiple communications’ with Islamic extremists in Britain”, reported the Times of London. “Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab was ‘reaching out’ to extremists whom MI5 had under surveillance while he was studying at University College London.” And then, another crucial caveat: “None of the information was passed to American officials, which will prompt questions about intelligence failures prior to the attack.”

Unfortunately, it now turns out that MI5’s files on Abdulmutallab were, indeed, passed on to the Americans – despite their initial claims that they had received nothing. As the Scotsman reported: “On Monday, Downing Street revealed that intelligence on Abdulmutallab had been passed to the US authorities before the Detroit incident. That revelation prompted suggestions of a rift between Gordon Brown and the White House, and increased pressure on US security agencies to explain why they had failed to identify the alleged bomber.”

CIA and NSA

The narrative from the American side has now also taken shape. Security analyst Tom Burghardt provides a meticulous overview: Abdulmutallab was placed in a “catch-all” US terrorism watch list, the Terrorist Identities Datamart Environment (TIDE), containing 550,000 individuals. This by itself was not enough to put him on a no-fly list. But in September 2009, the National Security Agency (NSA) reportedly picked up intercepts among al-Qaeda leaders in Yemen planning an imminent terror plot by a Nigerian man. The intercepts were translated and disseminated “across classified computer networks”, including the National Counterterrorism Centre (NCTC) run by the Office of the Director of National Intelligence. Then in November, Abdulmutallab’s father, a former top Nigerian government official, provided detailed information to the US embassy in Nigeria warning that his son was a violent extremist. Read more ?

 “We have 50 percent of the world’s wealth but only 6.3 percent of its population. In this situation, our real job…is to devise a series of relationships which permit us to maintain this position of disparity. To do so we have to dispense with sentimentality…we should cease thinking about human rights, the raising of living standards and democratization,” said famed US strategist George Kennan in 1948.

Since that time the USA’s national security policies and practices have been based on Kennan’s dictum. How “to maintain this position of disparity” has always been formulaic: Embellish the opponent’s capabilities and push the public—through marketing campaigns–into the equivalent of a shark feeding frenzy. The bait/red meat becomes Communism, Socialism, Islamic Fundamentalism, Wars on Crime, or Drugs and Terrorism. And make it all a matter of US National Security. The “American Way of Life” requires coups, assassinations, torture, a domestic and foreign gulag, bribes, brinkmanship, sanctions, tariffs, subsidies, punitive military strikes, state secrets invocations, spying, watch lists, and racial profiling.  Isn’t this just Gangland Democracy?

This is just a reflection of American society. Its military interventions at home and abroad, 18,573 murders yearly, and its lust for violent television/videogame programming (beginning at an early age) are just three of many indicators that the USA is redefining what it means to rule by the sword. It also says much about the collective philosophy of governance at the corporate and federal, state and local levels. The trends point to the emergence of a governing class and concomitant public that would welcome a military-style capitalist republic rather than a messy constitution based on checks and balances. Security is favored over freedom/privacy.

Texas Justice

The US prison system is instructive in this regard. The extraordinary and vivid effort by Robert Perkinson titled Texas Tough should be mandatory reading at the college level and in every hall of governance. Perkinson examines the history of the US prison system focusing on the state of Texas. It is at once story of American character, American history, and even American foreign policy. Read more ?

The impulse to secrecy is now the dominant trait of federal government.  Public access to information is disappearing faster than the Amazon rain forest, and a recent case is an important example of how this impulse distorts and undermines crucial institutional accountability and the U.S. legal system.  The Freedom of Information Act meant to put knowledge in the hands of the people so they could make intelligent decisions about public policy and subject the government to the cleansing effects of public scrutiny.  Over the decades, courts have pared down the reach of FOIA by upholding agency refusals to disclose information that are questionable and sometimes transparently motivated by desires to avoid embarrassment, public scrutiny, or revelation of criminal acts perpetrated by the government.

Courts will even accept no response as an acceptable response under FOIA in a rather strange device known as a Glomar Response.  Built by Howard Hughes under the guise of a private vessel designed to mine manganese nodules from the ocean floor, the Glomar Explorer was actually designed and built in the early 1970s to recover nuclear weapons and other material from a sunken Soviet submarine.  A FOIA request for information concerning the relationship between the CIA and the Glomar Explorer was met with rejection and an explanation that,

“the fact of the existence or non-existence of the records . . . request[ed] would relate to information pertaining to intelligence sources and methods which the Director of Central Intelligence has the responsibility to protect from unauthorized disclosure.”

The Glomar Response was designed to permit the CIA to remain silent in the face of requests for information when the very fact of possession or lack of possession of the requested documents would compromise national security.  Although the government abandoned its position in the original case, Glomar responses are now routinely accepted by the courts.  As one all-star appellate panel claimed in justifying judicial timidity,

“When a pattern of responses itself reveals classified information, the only way to keep secrets is to maintain silence uniformly. And this is what the CIA has done.”

With complete predictability, a myriad of federal agencies seized on the doctrine.  Since the mid-1990s, the NSA, FBI, Department of Justice, U.S. Marshall’s Service, Department of State, and even the U.S. Customs Service, have used the Glomar Response.  But nowhere in FOIA are agencies given the right to not respond to requests for information; the courts supplied them with that benefit by creating it as a judge-made rule.  Self-emasculation has become a high art by the federal judiciary in national security cases.   Obviously, such a tool as Glomar is very useful to federal agencies to avoid scrutiny and blanket requests with the pall of national security – whether or not a real national security concern underlies any particular matter. Read more ?

Welcoming Dr. Bill Weaver

We are delighted to announce a great addition to our team. Dr. Bill Weaver, who specializes in executive branch secrecy policy, governmental abuse, and law and bureaucracy, has joined Boiling Frogs Post. Bill has been my mentor, a good friend, and a senior advisor to the National Security Whistleblowers Coalition (NSWBC). I consider him one of the top nonpartisan experts when it comes to government secrecy and excessive classification, states secrets privilege, and intelligence and law enforcement agencies related whistleblowers. On Monday, January 11, I’ll post a great piece by Bill on ‘the Glomar Response.’ Here is a bit more on Bill Weaver:

Bill Weaver served in U.S. Army signals intelligence for eight years in Berlin and Augsburg, Germany in the late 1970s and 1980s. He subsequently received his law degree and Ph.D. in politics from the University of Virginia, where he was on the editorial board of the Virginia Law Review. He is presently Professor and Director of the Center for Law and Border Studies at the University of Texas at El Paso. He specializes in executive branch secrecy policy, governmental abuse, and law and bureaucracy. His articles have appeared in American Political Science Review, Political Science Quarterly, Virginia Law Review, Journal of Business Ethics, Organization and other journals. He has co-authored several books on law and political theory.  His most recent book, co-authored with Robert Pallitto, is Presidential Secrecy and the Law (Johns Hopkins University Press, 2007).

Boiling Frogs Show

As expected, our latest Podcast interview featuring Dan Ellsberg was a great hit. If you haven’t had a chance to listen to it here is the link: Podcast #18. Coming up next week – our interview with Dr. Nafeez Ahmed, and the following week we’ll have Andy Worthington. This Thursday, Peter and I are scheduled to interview author and journalist Chris Hedges. Let me know if you have any questions you want me to ask Chris.

Also, on Monday, one of our video project team members, Katrina Rill, will be flying from California to New Jersey where she’ll be working on our project with Kristina Borjesson for two weeks. Please wish her a smooth flight and eventless TSA process. As are many prospective fliers she is dreading the process, and who could blame her?!

This week, due to my daughter’s nasty cold, I didn’t have a chance to add my own brief analysis and comments on our select weekly news and links of interest. Instead I’ll leave you with a few links and excerpts, and await your comments and responses. Is that a deal? Good. Here they are:

Obama’s Yemeni odyssey targets China

A year ago, Yemeni President Ali Abdallah Saleh made the startling revelation that his country’s security forces apprehended a group of Islamists linked to the Israeli intelligence forces. “A terrorist cell was apprehended and will be referred to the courts for its links with the Israeli intelligence services,” he promised.

Saleh added, “You will hear about the trial proceedings.” Nothing was ever heard and the trail went cold. Welcome to the magical land of Yemen, where in the womb of time the Arabian Nights were played out.

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Is Obama so incredibly forgetful of his own December 1 speech outlining his Afghan strategy that he violated his own canons? Certainly not. Obama is a smart man. The intervention in Yemen will go down as one of the smartest moves that he ever made for perpetuating the US’s global hegemony. It is America’s answer to China’s surge.

A cursory look at the map of region will show that Yemen is one of the most strategic lands adjoining waters of the Persian Gulf and the Arabian Peninsula. It flanks Saudi Arabia and Oman, which are vital American protectorates. In effect, Uncle Sam is “marking territory” – like a dog on a lamppost. Russia has been toying with the idea of reopening its Soviet-era base in Aden. Well, the US has pipped Moscow in the race.

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This is a fairly well written piece and provides a bit more context than our usual media blurbs over here. You can read the entire article by M K Bhadrakumar at Asia Times here.

Another related article:

Russia, China keep toehold in Yemen

Russia has stolen a march over the United States in the multimillion-dollar arms market in cash-strapped Yemen, whose weapons purchases are being funded mostly by neighboring Saudi Arabia. The Yemeni armed forces, currently undergoing an ambitious modernization program worth an estimated $4 billion US, are equipped with weapons largely from Russia, China, Ukraine, eastern Europe and the former Soviet republics.

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Yemen receives assistance under several US-funded programs, including Foreign Military Financing, International Military Education and Training, Non-Proliferation, Anti-terrorism and De-mining, and Combating Weapons of Mass Destruction.

But the proposed military aid to Yemen – all of it gratis – along with US arms supplies, is negligible compared with weapons, military training and technical expertise from non-US sources.

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I think you know why I find it interesting. It’s never really about terrorism or human rights…basically it always boils down to: chase the money angle, strategic location for that money angle, and the resources bringing about that money. So who is next? My bet would be: CENTRAL ASIA. How about Iran? I’m sure we can arrange for some Al-Qaeda presence rumor over there, add some ‘concerns’ over human rights abuses, and maybe a little bit of war on drugs or something like that, and voila! You can read the piece here, and let me know what you think. Read more ?

Dan Ellsberg provides us with his analysis of Barack Obama’s presidency, shares with us what led him to cast his vote for Obama, and how and why he’s been let down and betrayed by our current president. He discusses the stark similarities between the previous administration and Obama’s Whitehouse on issues and abuses related to civil liberties, and questions the possibility of ‘hoping’ again. Mr. Ellsberg talks about his experience as a whistleblower, the futility of disclosure to Congress then and today, the current sorry state of the US media, and more!

Dan Ellsberg graduated from Harvard in economics in 1952, served in the US Marine Corps from 1954-57, and obtained a PhD in economics from Harvard while working for the Rand Corporation in 1962. In 1964 he joined the Defense Department to work principally on decision-making in the Vietnam War. Mr. Ellsberg precipitated a national political controversy in 1971 when he released the Pentagon Papers, a Top-Secret Pentagon study of US government decision-making about the Vietnam War, to the New York Times and other publications. Ellsberg has ever since campaigned for peace and encouraged others to speak truth to power.

Here is our guest Dan Ellsberg unplugged!

 

 Interview with ;Daniel Ellsberg [69:35m]: Play Now | Play in Popup | Download

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