Just as other large and powerful nations are solidifying their opposition to the Bush regime war machine, just as a growing, massive international peace movement is poised to take to the streets of the world once again to sound the call for sanity, just as some members in the U.S. congress are beginning to FINALLY question the wisdom of an invasion of Iraq, an audio tape surfaces linking Osama bin Laden to Iraq. Imagine that. And just in case you missed that particular story, the Ministry of Fatherland Security booted up their terrorism threat machine to Code Orange a day or so before. But the tape?
Never mind that Secretary of State Colin Powell had access to the transcript before the Arab television station Al-Jazira knew they had it! (explain THAT one). Never mind that
the tape looks, for all the world, like a non-smoking, malfunctioning gun and that the timing of its release is so suspect that kids in a schoolyard would roll their eyes over it. Never mind questions have been raised about the speaker on the mysterious tape using pronunciation formerly unassociated with bin Laden. The needs of empire must be met.
If works of fiction must be manufactured to support disastrous foreign policy, then so be it.
Meanwhile, in the real world, everyone with half a brain (including the CIA Director, now strangely backpedaling from his previous anti-war position) knows that the U.S. will in fact be LESS secure if it sends in the Marines. The operatives of The Empire are, however, so fixated on their plans for world domination and limitless access to oil that they are apparently willing to fabricate any “evidence” necessary to fuel their dreams.
As we speak, the newly transformed super-hawk, Colin Powell goes before the U.S. House Intelligence Committee to lay down his case for war in Iraq. Much of said deliberations are to take place behind closed doors, out of sight from the American people. Will their representatives in congress consider their best interests as Powell presents his dog and pony show? Not likely. These are the usual suspects who voted overwhelmingly for that war. Only the people of the U.S. can pull The Empire back from the brink at this point. Wishful thinking? No more fanciful than 11th hour “evidence”, I’d say. What can we do? RAISE HELL! Get into the streets.

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