Where are Pentagon's $ 2.3 trillion unaccounted for?

One day before 911 Rumsfeld declared his war against bureaucracy.
During his speech he inserted:

"According to some estimates, we cannot track $2.3 trillion in transactions."

http://www.defenselink.mil/speeches/2001/s20010910-secdef.html

Have there been any follow ups?
Any questions asked?
I mean it's a bit of money isn't it?

Black Projects. It seems like these days, every Air Farce General has his own highly-funded black project. Or two.

...but a whole shitload of it is in sloppy accounting at the individual services level, as well as rip-offs using government credit cards. Then you've got your 'fake contractors' who submit invoices for work never performed, but get paid anyway, TAD travel scam artists...there are as many technicques to rip off Uncle Sam as there are days in a year.

The entire budgetary process in government is a joke. It's not just the military, it's every federal agency. They make it way harder than they need to...you have to wonder if it is deliberately arranged thusly....

... the B-2, Air Force auditors tracking the development dollars found such a mess that they wrote off the books and told NG to start the books over a total of three times. In most large secret military contracts, the development money equals or exceeds the profits to be made on actual production.

The other big problem was created when Congress decided to "fix" a problem--general contracts for services were to be run through the GSA, which supposedly had standardized its procurement and contract processes. The Pentagon saw the opportunity to use GSA to run money off the books through other agencies and therefore had no accounting of its own when doing so. That's why it was recently found that the GSA was contracting out to American security firms for personnel in Iraq and Afghanistan, so the actual number employed by the Pentagon could not be determined.

Despite the published numbers in the Pentagon budget, when one adds up all the money for defense, long-term contracting, black world, the intelligence budgets (which are fundamentally a part of the military budget in this national security state of ours) and the defense monies hidden in other agency budgets (NSF, Agriculture, etc.), we're likely budgeting $550-600 billion per year on defense (more when carrying on multiple small wars)--that's the real problem--the budget isn't just bloated, it's a national obsession. We've been literally throwing money at the Defense Department for sixty years, because politicians like Bush and Reagan (and many others) have chosen to scare the hell out of the American public and/or fight protracted wars of choice.

It's no wonder they can't keep track of it all.

The government is fond of saying that it's not a lot of money in terms of the GDP, but, in fact, it is. Two-thirds of the GDP is consumer spending. Take that out of the GDP, and it means that one single government agency is responsible for 15-16% of all non-consumer spending in the nation's entire economy.

the area of the Pentagon they blew up on 911 with the missile...

sarcasm...but you never know...

of execs working for defense contractors.

http://www.policyalmanac.org/world/archive/FY_2004_Pentagon_Budget.shtml


Edit for my math screw up

are accounted for.

But the asset files are incomplete, and the transactions do not tie to treasury definitions used in their accounting program.

In the end I suspect a few billion off the top for a few thousand thefts - and a few movements of money to the CIA off shore needs.

But the by saying "$2.3 trillion in transactions" - which has a reasonable explanation - Bush is effectively hiding the real multi-billion rip-off.

NT

demand it back.

Check this out:
http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2002/01/29/eveningnews/main325985.shtml

And I'm still wondering: What's going on with the press in the US?
Why does nobody care about the money?
It's taxpayer's money!

Dr. Zakheim


Dov S. Zakheim was sworn in as the Under Secretary of Defense (Comptroller) and Chief Financial Officer for the Department of Defense on May 4, 2001. Dr. Zakheim has previously served in a number of key positions in government and private business. Most recently, he was corporate vice president of System Planning Corp., a technology, research and analysis firm based in Arlington, Va. He also served as chief executive officer of SPC International Corp., a subsidiary specializing in political, military and economic consulting. During the 2000 presidential campaign, he served as a senior foreign policy advisor to then-Governor Bush.

From 1985 until March 1987, Dr. Zakheim was Deputy Under Secretary of Defense for Planning and Resources in the Office of the Under Secretary of Defense (Policy). In that capacity, he played an active role in the Department's system acquisition and strategic planning processes. Dr. Zakheim held a variety of other DoD posts from 1981 to 1985. Earlier, he was employed by the National Security and International Affairs Division of the Congressional Budget Office.

Dr. Zakheim has been a participant on a number of government, corporate, non-profit and charitable boards. His government service includes terms on the United States Commission for the Preservation of America's Heritage Abroad; the Task Force on Defense Reform (1997); the first Board of Visitors of the Department of Defense Overseas Regional Schools (1998); and the Defense Science Board task force on "The Impact of DoD Acquisition Policies on the Health of the Defense Industry" (2000).

A 1970 graduate of Columbia University with a bachelor's in government, Dr. Zakheim also studied at the London School of Economics. He earned his doctorate in economics and politics at St. Antony's College, University of Oxford, where he was graduate fellow in programs of both the National Science Foundation and Columbia College, and then a research fellow. Dr. Zakheim has been an adjunct professor at the National War College, Yeshiva University, Columbia University and Trinity College, Hartford, Conn., where he was presidential scholar.
http://www.defenselink.mil/bios/zakheim_bio.html


He was a signitory to a document that said,

"Furthermore, the process of transformation, even if it brings revolutionary change, is likely to ba a long one, absent some catastrophic and catalyzing event - like a new Pearl Harbor."

http://www.newamericancentury.org/RebuildingAmericasDef...



The CEO of SPC

Dr. Dov Zakheim has been nominated to serve as Under Secretary of Defense and Comptroller. He is presently the CEO of SPC International, and in the past he has served as Deputy Under Secretary of Defense for Planning and Resources as well as in a variety of Defense Department positions under former President Reagan. He was a member of the Task Force on Defense Reform under then-Secretary of Defense William Cohen and in February of 2000 he was appointed to the Defense Science Board Task Force on the Impact of DoD Acquisition Policies on the Health of the Defense Industry. He has received the Department of Defense Distinguished Public Service Medal; the Bronze Palm to the DoD Distinguished Public Service Medal and the CBO Director's Award for Outstanding Service. A New York native, Dr. Zakheim is a graduate of Columbia University and has also studied at the London School of Economics. He received his doctorate degree from St. Anthony's College at Oxford University.
http://www.whitehouse.gov/news/releases/20010212-2.html

It was an SPC subsidiary, TRIDATA CORPORATION, that oversaw the investigation after the terrorist attack on the World Trade Center in 1993.


Dr. Dov S. Zakheim
CEO, Systems Planning Corporation International

Dov S. Zakheim is Corporate Vice President of System Planning Corporation (SPC), a high technology, research, analysis, and manufacturing firm based in Arlington, Virginia. He is also Chief Executive Officer of SPC International Corporation, a subsidiary of SPC that specializes in political, military and economic consulting, and international sales and analysis. In addition, Dr. Zakheim serves as Consultant to the Secretary of Defense and the Under Secretary of Defense for Policy. He is an Adjunct Scholar of the Heritage Foundation, and a Senior Associate of the Center for International and Strategic Studies.

From 1985 until March 1987, Dr. Zakheim was Deputy Under Secretary of Defense for Planning and Resources. In that capacity, he played an active role in the Department's system acquisition and strategic planning processes. Dr. Zakheim also guided Department of Defense policy in a number of international economic fora including the US-USSR Commercial Commission; the Caribbean Basin Initiative; and the Canadian-US Free Trade Agreement. He also successfully negotiated numerous arms cooperation agreements with various US allies.


A graduate of Columbia University, New York, where he earned his B.A., Surnma Cum Laude, and was elected to Phi Beta Kappa, Dr. Zakheim also studied at the London School of Economics. Dr. Zakheim earned his doctorate in economics and politics at St. Antony's College, University of Oxford, where he was a National Science Foundation Graduate Fellow, a Columbia College Kellett Fellow, and a post-doctoral Research Fellow. He has served as Adjunct Professor at the National War College, Yeshiva University and at Columbia University. He is currently Presidential Scholar and Adjunct Professor at Trinity College, Hartford, CT.

Dr. Zakheim served for two terms as a Presidential appointee to the United States Commission for the Preservation of America's Heritage Abroad. In 1997 he was appointed by Secretary of Defense Cohen to the Task Force on Defense Reform. In May 1999 Secretary Cohen named him to the first Board of Visitors of the Department of Defense Overseas Regional Schools.

Dr. Zakheim writes, lectures, and provides radio and television commentary on national defense and foreign policy issues both domestically and internationally, including appearances on major US network news telecasts, McNeil-Lehrer Newshour, Larry King Live, BBC Arab and World Service. and Israeli, Swedish, and Japanese television. He is an editorial board member of Israel Affairs and of The Round Table (the Commonwealth Journal of International Affairs), and serves on review panels for the Wilson Center for International Scholars, the United States Institute of Peace, and the U.S. Naval Institute. He is the author of Flight of the Lavi: Inside a US.-Israeli Crisis (Brassey's, 1996), Congress and National Security in the Post Cold War Era (The Nixon Center, 1998), and numerous articles and chapters in books. Dr. Zakheim is also a trustee of the Foreign Policy Research Institute; serves on the Board of Directors of Search for Common Ground, and of Friends of the Jewish Chapel of the United States Naval Academy; and is a member of the Council on Foreign Relations and other professional organizations. Dr. Zakheim is a member of the advisory boards of the Center for Security Policy, the Initiative for Peace and Cooperation in the Middle East, and the American Jewish Committee
more
http://www.ndu.edu/inss/symposia/jointops00/zakheim.htm...


Pentagon finance manager resigns
Thursday 11 March 2004

Rabbi Dov Zakheim's refused to tell journalists the exact reason for his departure on Wednesday. A former adjunct economics professor at New York's Yeshiva University, Rabbi Zakheim has spent more than 30 years working in various jobs at the Pentagon.

But he has also worked in private industry, specifically as a consultant to McDonnell Douglas and Boeing.


Rabbi Dov Zakheim,
Pentagon comptroller and chief financial officer, a conservative Republican who graduated from Jew's College in London in 1973, Zakheim first joined the Department of Defence in 1981 under former president Ronald Reagan.

He was responsible for such tasks as preparing defence planning guidance for nuclear war.

As Pentagon Comptroller and Chief Financial Officer, Rabbi Zakheim's priority has been financial management.
But that does not include additional spending needed to support US wars in Iraq and Afghanistan - a sum expected to range from $30 billion to $50 billion.


A General Accounting Office report found Defence inventory systems so lax that the US army lost track of 56 aeroplanes, 32 tanks and 36 Javelin missile command launch-units.

more
http://english.aljazeera.net/NR/exeres/635B6007-9DD0-436C-BFF6-E6521520B1C7.htm


US tells Afghan warlords security needed for aid

MAZAR-I-SHARIF: US Undersecretary of Defence Dov Zakheim has told rival factions in northern Afghanistan they cannot expect reconstruction aid if they continue to fight each other.

Speaking after meeting faction leaders in the northern town of Mazar-i-Sharif on Friday, Zakheim said there was a link between such aid and security. “Of course, if the conflict continues, it makes it very hard for the humanitarian efforts,” he said.

“They have seen that we have invested in places where there are no skirmishes.”

In Mazar, Zakheim met Uzbek warlord General Abdul Rashid Dostum, his rival Ustad Atta Mohammad of the Jamiat-e-Islami faction, and a representative of the Shi’ite Hezb-i-Wahdat. Repeated clashes between Dostum’s and Atta’s forces in northern Afghanistan in recent months have claimed the lives of dozens of people, both soldiers and non-combatants.

Zakheim said he had received assurances from them that they would work to improve security to allow implementation of humanitarian and reconstruction programmes.

Last week, after a visit by the US special representative to Afghanistan Zalmai Khalilzad, the rivals agreed to start disarming their forces in the cities and remote areas.

Zakheim said relations between Dostum and Atta appeared civil.

“They seemed to be very comfortable together,” he said, adding that said they were working together to disarm and reduce the number of what they termed “skirmishes” between their forces.

Both Atta and Dostum are members of President Hamid Karzai’s U.S-backed government that came to power last year after the ouster of the former Taliban regime. However they have appeared more interested in pursuing regional interests than helping the central government establish its control.

Last month Karzai threatened to sack regional warlords and government officials if they continued to abuse their power.

Before his visit to the north, Zakheim met in Kabul with Defence Minister Mohammad Qasim Fahim to discuss US-backed efforts to rebuild the national army, ministry officials said. —Reuters

more
http://www.dailytimes.com.pk/default.asp?page=story_3-11-2002_pg4_15

Analysis: Defense budget practices probed
Thursday, 02-Oct-2003 10:00AM PDT Story from United Press International
Copyright 2003 by United Press International (via ClariNet)

MIAMI, Oct. 2 (UPI) --

Zakheim said, however, he was limited in his response because of the ongoing audit of the issue, which originally was sparked by a telephone call to the Pentagon's Defense Hotline.

"Our objective will be to review the allegations to the Defense Hotline concerning funds 'parked' at the U.S. Special Operations Command by the Office of the Under Secretary of Defense (Comptroller)," said a letter from the inspector general's office to Gen. Charles Holland, who has since retired as Special Operations commander.

Among several documents The St. Petersburg Times obtained during its investigation was e-mail sent by Special Operations Command Comptroller Elaine Kingston to colleagues in February 2002.
She said an unidentified official in the Pentagon comptroller's office had asked her if the command could "park" $40 million of research-and-development money in its proposed budget for the 2003 fiscal year.

The programs where the money was placed included missile warning systems on aircraft, infrared equipment on helicopters and radar system. The amounts ranged from $2 million to $5 million.
Kingston said in the e-mail message she coached her colleagues on how to account for the money and avoid attracting congressional attention to it.

"We are doing a favor for the OSD (Office of the Secretary of Defense) which we hope will benefit the command if we should need additional (research and development funds)," the message said.
Young said at the hearing on President Bush's request for $87 billion for Iraq and Afghanistan Tuesday that he wants to know if it is a common practice.

Young is clearly not finished and called it "an obvious attempt to keep from Congress what was happening. I think that would make you suspicious. It makes me a little suspicious."

more
http://quickstart.clari.net/qs_se/webnews/wed/dp/Uus-defense-young-analysis.RUt1_DO2.html

Dov S. Zakheim to Resign from the Department of Defense
March 24, 2004
In this position, Zakheim initiated an enterprise architecture to achieve a vision of simpler budget processes, activity-based costing, and a clean audit by 2007. He oversaw three Department of Defense budgets, each totaling more than $300 billion, and recently proposed a 2005 budget of $401.7 billion. He played a leading role in raising in excess of $13 billion for the reconstruction of Iraq, and walked through six wartime supplementals in support of operations in Afghanistan and Iraq. He further created the Defense Business Board and worked closely with the Office of Management and Budget and the Government Accounting Office on financial management affairs.

“I am proud to have been part of President Bush and Secretary Rumsfeld's senior Pentagon team for the past three years,” said Zakheim reflecting on his tour. “It has been an exhilarating, albeit extremely demanding experience. Even as we have addressed the many concerns arising out of the War on Terror and Operations Enduring Freedom, Noble Eagle and Iraqi Freedom, including winning both military and financial support from the international community for operations in Afghanistan and Iraq, we have also tended to ongoing budget needs to support our forces and defense civilians at home and abroad. We have also made great strides in rectifying the department's antiquated financial management system; we continue to anticipate that DoD will receive clean audits in the not too distant future.”

Regarding Zakheim’s resignation, Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld said, “Dov Zakheim has been a cornerstone to the Department of Defense over the past three years. He has been a leader in helping transform the Department to better address the needs of the 21st century. I thank him for his commitment and his counsel. He will be missed.”

Zakheim was sworn in to his current position May 4, 2001. Prior to that, his government service included a number of key positions, to include from 1985 until March 1987, as the deputy under secretary of defense for planning and resources in the office of the under secretary of defense (policy). He also held a variety of other Department of Defense posts from 1981-1985 and served with the National Security and International Affairs Division of the Congressional Budget Office.

During other periods of Zakheim’s career, he served as a senior foreign policy advisor to then-Gov. Bush, during the 2000 presidential campaign. Prior to that, he was the corporate vice president of System Planning Corporation (SPC), a technology, research and analysis firm. He also served as chief executive officer of SPC International Corp., a subsidiary specializing in political, military and economical consulting.
http://www.allamericanpatriots.com/m-news+article+storyid-635.html
"According to some estimates we cannot track $2.3 trillion in transactions," Rumsfeld admitted.

$2.3 trillion — that's $8,000 for every man, woman and child in America. To understand how the Pentagon can lose track of trillions, consider the case of one military accountant who tried to find out what happened to a mere $300 million.

"We know it's gone. But we don't know what they spent it on," said Jim Minnery, Defense Finance and Accounting Service.

Minnery, a former Marine turned whistle-blower, is risking his job by speaking out for the first time about the millions he noticed were missing from one defense agency's balance sheets. Minnery tried to follow the money trail, even crisscrossing the country looking for records.

"The director looked at me and said 'Why do you care about this stuff?' It took me aback, you know? My supervisor asking me why I care about doing a good job," said Minnery.

He was reassigned and says officials then covered up the problem by just writing it off.

"They have to cover it up," he said. "That's where the corruption comes in. They have to cover up the fact that they can't do the job."
http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2002/01/29/eveningnews/main325985.shtml

Zakheim has been a participant on a number of government, corporate, non-profit and charitable boards. His government service includes terms on the U.S. Commission for the Preservation of America's Heritage Abroad; the Task Force on Defense Reform (1997); the first Board of Visitors of the Department of Defense Overseas Regional Schools (1998); and the Defense Science Board task force on "The Impact of DoD Acquisition Policies on the Health of the Defense Industry" (2000).

A 1970 graduate of Columbia University with a bachelor's in government, Zakheim also studied at the London School of Economics. He earned his doctorate in economics and politics at St. Antony's College, University of Oxford, where he was graduate fellow in programs of both the National Science Foundation and Columbia College, and then a research fellow. Zakheim has been an adjunct professor at the National War College, Yeshiva University, Columbia University and Trinity College, Hartford, Conn., where he was presidential scholar.

Zakheim has written, lectured and provided media commentary on national defense and foreign policy issues domestically and internationally. He is the author of "Flight of the Lavi: Inside a U.S.-Israeli Crisis" (Brassey's, 1996), "Congress and National Security in the Post-Cold War Era" (The Nixon Center, 1998), "Toward a Fortress Europe?" (Center for Strategic and International Studies, 2000), and numerous articles and chapters in books.

Recently reflecting on the sacrifices associated with managing the financing of the nation's war effort, Zakheim said, “Our people need to be constantly on their guard, constantly at the ready, razor sharp, in difficult conditions; we don’t want to make (the mission) one iota more difficult over something that’s easily taken care of … if something bothers our people in uniform, I don’t consider it trivial at all.”

“I look forward to more time with my family, and to an exciting new phase of my life,” said Zakheim, regarding his departure from the Department of Defense, “but I shall indeed miss the pleasure of working closely with my colleagues at DoD, and throughout the government, in the Congress, and in many capitals overseas.”
http://www.allamericanpatriots.com/m-news+article+storyid-635.html
In a report to the DoD comptroller, Undersecretary of Defense Dov Zakheim, acting Assistant Inspector General for Auditing David Steensma wrote: "We reported that DOD processed $1.1 trillion in unsupported accounting entries to DOD Component financial data used to prepare departmental reports and DOD financial statements for FY2000. For FY2001 we did not attempt to quantify amounts of unsupported accounting entries; however, we did confirm that DOD continued to enter material amounts of unsupported accounting entries to the financial data."

What this gibberish means is that the DoD still cannot account for at least $1.1 trillion from fiscal 2000 under former president Bill Clinton, and the assistant inspector general of DOD wouldn't even touch the unsupported money expenditures for fiscal 2001 because "material amounts" still couldn't be accounted for properly in the year George W. Bush came to power. The trillion-dollar question is how much is "material amounts"? Because the auditor would not "quantify" the amount, some fear it's worse than the previous year's unaccounted for $1.1 trillion.

Of course the Department of the Army, headed by former Enron executive Thomas White, had an excuse. In a shocking appeal to sentiment it says it didn't publish a "stand-alone" financial statement for 2001 because of "the loss of financial-management personnel sustained during the Sept. 11 terrorist attack."

So where is that missing $1.1 trillion? Traditionally the top dogs at the Pentagon haven't liked the word "missing." The rationale at DoD has been that just because the money can't be accounted for doesn't mean it is lost, stolen or strayed. According to Susan Hansen, a spokeswoman for DoD: "These are unsupported entries. When the auditors go to audit the books and they look at the balance sheet for the year, someone has entered in an adjustment because they made an error somewhere."
more
http://www.insightmag.com/main.cfm?include=detail&storyid=246188

Yet even Allbaugh is small-time compared to the latest defector to the private sector, Pentagon comptroller Dov Zakheim, who announced two weeks ago that he will be leaving for a partnership at Booz Allen Hamilton, the technology and management strategy giant that is one of the nation's biggest defense contractors. Although Zakheim is not nearly as familiar as Condoleezza Rice, Deputy Defense Secretary Paul Wolfowitz, or Defense Policy Board member Richard Perle, he too has been identified as one of the ultrahawkish "Vulcans" who shaped Bush foreign and military policy from its earliest days. Zakheim has bustled through the revolving doors before, serving as a deputy undersecretary of defense during the Reagan administration, where he worked for Perle before leaving government to join a missile-defense contractor.

At the mammoth Booz Allen firm, Zakheim will join R. James Woolsey, the former director of central intelligence and Perle associate on the Bush Defense Policy Board. These were the defense intellectuals who favored invading Iraq long before Sept. 11 -- and long before any U.N. resolutions on the topic were introduced.
So far Booz Allen has yet to win any major Iraq contracts of its own, although it has shared Pentagon boodle for several years with Kellogg Brown & Root, the Halliburton subsidiary that is by far the biggest contractor out there. (At a recent hearing on Halliburton's scandal-scarred performance in Iraq, Zakheim did his best to defend the vice president's old company. "They're not doing a great job," he shrugged, "but they're not doing a terrible job.")

Booz Allen swiftly jumped on the Baghdad bandwagon last May, when it co-sponsored (with the Republican-connected insurance giant American International Group) a postwar conference on "The Challenges for Business in Rebuilding Iraq" that featured speeches by Woolsey and Undersecretary of Defense Zakheim. (The price of admission for industry executives ranged from $528 to $1,100 a head.) Included was the chance for executives to participate in a "not-for-attribution session that will permit a dynamic, frank exchange of views on the opportunities and challenges businesses will face in post-conflict Iraq."

More recently, Booz Allen was listed as a partner in a controversial $327 million contract to outfit the new Iraqi army. The prime contractor in this murky deal was Nour America Inc., which on closer inspection turned out to be controlled by a close associate of Ahmad Chalabi, the dubious former exile promoted by Perle, Woolsey and their ideological associates as the best possible leader for Iraq after Saddam. Chalabi is a leading member of the U.S.-appointed Iraqi Governing Council and enjoys enormous influence inside the Defense Department, which issued the Nour contract. Unfortunately Nour had scant qualifications, if any, for the lucrative contract. After protests from more qualified contractors who had lost out, the contract was withdrawn for rebidding. Meanwhile, Booz Allen denied any role in the Nour affair, aside from a post-bid $50,000 consulting contract.
more
http://216.239.41.104/search?q=cache:iUASMhjvMuIJ:www.s...
GovCon Executive Speaker Series Featuring Former DCI James Woolsey

The GovCon Council is pleased to present this event in partnership with the International Exchange Business Council (IBEC), an emerging initiative of the Fairfax County Chamber.

R. James Woolsey has said that strategic security is the greatest challenge the business world faces today. In his role as a Vice President and officer in Booz Allen Hamilton’s Global Assurance practice, Mr. Woolsey helps corporations and government agencies integrate security into their strategic business planning in an effort to protect the vital networks upon which we all depend.

Those networks - electricity grids, oil and gas pipelines, telecommunications infrastructures, financial systems, food production and delivery systems and hundreds of others - are constructed to be responsive to the public and easily accessed and maintained. However, in a post-September 11 world, these characteristics translate to vulnerability.
http://www.gcn.com/events/16483.html

COMPANIES ON THE GROUND:
THE CHALLENGES FOR BUSINESS IN REBUILDING IRAQ
1 May 2003 - Washington DC
SPEAKERS

Kenneth H Bacon, President, Refugees International (confirmed)
Ashton Carter, Ford Foundation Professor of Science and International Affairs, Harvard University (confirmed)
Anthony H. Cordesman, Arleigh A. Burke Chair in Strategy, CSIS (confirmed)
Pat Cronin, Assistant Administrator, U.S. Agency for International Development (confirmed)
Ambassador James Dobbins, Director, International Security and Defense Policy, RAND Corporation (confirmed)
Jane Harman, U.S. Representative (D-CA), Ranking Democrat on the House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence (confirmed)
Ambassador Wolfgang Ischinger, German Ambassador to the United States (confirmed)
Zoran Kusovac, Jane's Intelligence Review Correspondent (confirmed)
Alan Larson, Undersecretary for Economic Affairs, State Department (confirmed)
Martin Levine, Senior Managing Director, Shorebank Advisory Services (confirmed)
General William Nash (ret.), Director, Center for Preventive Action, Council on Foreign Relations (confirmed)
Thomas Pickering, Senior Vice President of International Relations, The Boeing Company, former Undersecretary of State for Political Affairs (confirmed)
David Rothkopf, Chairman & CEO, Intellibridge Corporation (confirmed)

Rubar Sandi, President of the U.S.-Iraq Business Council (confirmed)
James Steinberg, Vice President and Director, Foreign Policy Studies Program, Brookings Institution, former Deputy National Security Advisor (confirmed)
John Taylor, Undersecretary for International Affairs, Department of the Treasury (confirmed)
James Woolsey, Former Director of Central Intelligence, Vice President, Booz Allen Hamilton, Inc., CSIS Trustee (confirmed)
Daniel B Yergin, Chairman, Cambridge Energy Research Associates (confirmed)
Dov S. Zakheim, Under Secretary of Defense (Comptroller) (confirmed)
http://www.janes.com/defence/conference/rebuilding_iraq...


Wolfowitz Approves New DTSA Under Feith
Defense Daily - September 6, 2001
Tarbell To Retire

As expected, Deputy Defense Secretary Paul Wolfowitz on Friday approved shifting what is now the Technology Security Directorate (TSD) out from under the Defense Threat Reduction Agency (DTRA) overseen by Pentagon acquisition chief Pete Aldridge to the control of DoD policy chief Douglas Feith, and renaming it the Defense Technology Security Administration (DTSA), according to documents and officials.

TSD Director Dave Tarbell disclosed the shift yesterday during the ComDef 2001 conference in Washington, D.C. Tarbell also disclosed plans to retire and seek a new career in industry. Lisa Bronson will replace Tarbell as the head of the new DTSA under Feith, while Jack Shaw will serve as Aldridge’s point man on export control issues.

Pentagon officials suggested the move in July to improve the export competitiveness of U.S. suppliers by shifting export control oversight away from DTRA, which is charged with controlling the proliferation of defense technologies, a mission in opposition to DTSA’s charge (Defense Daily, July 30).

"The Director, Administration and Management in coordination with the Under Secretary of Defense for Acquisition, Technology and Logistics, the Under Secretary of Defense for Policy, and the General Counsel, DoD, will take the actions necessary to implement this decision," Wolfowitz wrote in an Aug. 31 memo authorizing the changes that was obtained by Defense Daily. "The Under Secretary for Policy shall ensure that there is appropriate coordination with the Under Secretary of Acquisition, Technology and Logistics on technology security matters. The latter has important responsibilities, especially relating to international defense industrial cooperation, that should be taken into account in the formulation and implementation of export licensing policy."
more
http://www.clw.org/atop/newswire/nw090701.html


Jews brainwashed Bush? What a joke!'

Edited on Mon Aug-16-04 10:15 AM by seemslikeadream
Four years ago, when Zakheim was on presidential candidate George Bush's foreign policy planning team, he told Haaretz the U.S. did not need to play policeman around the globe, and that American military involvement overseas should be reserved for extreme situations, such as the prevention of genocide.

...

From the time when reports about the Bush administration's intention to go to war started to circulate, critics have charged that Jewish neoconservatives in the Pentagon were responsible for dragging the U.S. into war with Iraq, with the intention of protecting Israeli, not American, interests. Proponents of this claim hail from all parts of the political spectrum, starting with arch-conservative Pat Buchanan, and continuing with two Democrats from Capitol Hill, Congressman Jim Moran (Virginia), and Senator Friz Hollings (South Carolina).

"Pat Buchanan, in my view, is an anti-Semite," said Zakheim. "I'm sorry, but you cannot keep saying what he says, and say he's not an anti-Semite. He is an anti-Semite. I know one when I see one."

...

Alongside such claims about corruption in Saddam Hussein's regime, Zakheim brings up the issue of terror. Given Saddam Hussein's well-known support for Palestinian suicide bombers, "why is it so hard to believe that he had ties with Al-Qaida," Zakheim wonders. "If you make the connection - Iraq, weapons of mass destruction, terrorism - then it definitely becomes a world problem," he concludes.

...


Israelis who worked with Zakheim are full of praise for his professionalism. Though he always upheld American interests, they say, he had a warm place in his heart for Israel and he did as much as he could to help. For instance, after the start of the intifada, when it became clear that Israel's police force lacked equipment to defuse bombs, Zakheim found funds, and arranged a transfer of $28 million for automatic gear used by sappers. Zakheim is proud of his close relations with many Israelis - recently his son was married in Jerusalem, but at the time, a stepson who went on a photo-shoot in Hebron was beaten by settlers.
more
http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/441712.html


Iraq Survey Group
Donald Rumsfeld's al Qaeda

By John Stanton and Wayne Madsen
Online Journal Contributing Writers


And with the ISG's intelligence fusion operation located in Washington, DC, that means Rumsfeld's hands are dirty. There is also a clear line that can be drawn between the ISG and Undersecretary for Plans and Policy Douglas Feith's Office of Special Plans/Office of Northern Gulf Affairs (speculation has been that he is a dual USA-Israeli citizen like Dov Zakheim). Feith reportedly created the disinformation about Iraqi WMD and then Rumsfeld/Cambone allegedly used torture as a tactic to elicit false confessions and exaggerated claims under extreme duress. It is a tactic that SS Commander Heinrich Himmler and Soviet KGB Chief Levrenti Beria practiced so well in Germany and the USSR, respectively. No one claims that the USA and Israel rise to the level of Nazi and Soviet torturers, but, it is too early to say.

Recent evidence offered by General Janis Karpinski, NGO's and investigative reporters, indicates that Israeli interrogators may have been active in Iraqi detention centers. But the Israeli government has stated that any Israelis in Iraq were there on their own. We are inclined to believe them to a point. The problem is that it gives rise to the specter that anti-Arab Israeli xenophobes, including members of the racist and terrorist Kach and Kahane Chai, were participating as either freelance torturers in Iraq or as part of a parallel intelligence operation—separate from Mossad—being run out of Ariel Sharon's office. They, like their American counterparts, make for great recruits. The scary part is that neither government can control them—or, perhaps, does not want to get involved.
http://www.onlinejournal.com/Special_Reports/070904Stanton-Madsen/070904stanton-madsen.html


How Zakheim "found funds" is what is at issue here...

For instance, after the start of the intifada, when it became clear that Israel's police force lacked equipment to defuse bombs, Zakheim found funds, and arranged a transfer of $28 million for automatic gear used by sappers.

Alright, Dov, where did you get those funds? It is our money and it was appropriated for a specific purpose, where did you get it from?


Winds of Change:Troubled Waters Ahead For the Neo Cons


by
Wayne Madsen

The neo-con attack on Shaw was predictable considering their previous attacks on Ambassador Joe Wilson, his wife Valerie Plame, former U.S. Central Command chief General Anthony Zinni, former counter-terrorism coordinator Richard Clarke, former Treasury Secretary Paul O'Neill, CIA counter-terrorism agent Michael Scheuer (the "anonymous" author of Imperial Hubris who has recently been gagged by the Bush administration), fired FBI translator Sibel Edmonds (who likely discovered a penetration by Israeli and other intelligence assets using the false flag of the Turkish American Council and who also has been gagged by the Bush administration), and all those who took on the global domination cabal. But Shaw showed incredible moxie. When he decided to investigate Pentagon Inspector General Reports that firms tied to Perle and Deputy Defense Secretary Paul Wolfowitz were benefiting from windfall profit contracts in Iraq, Shaw decided to go to Iraq himself to find out what was going on. When Shaw was denied entry into Iraq by U.S. military officers (yes, a top level official of the Defense Department was denied access to Iraq by U.S. military personnel!), he decided to sneak into the country disguised as a Halliburton contractor. Using the cover of Cheney's old company to get the goods on Cheney's friends' illegal activities was yet another masterful stroke of genius by Shaw. But it also earned him the wrath of the neo-cons. They soon leaked a story to the Los Angeles Times claiming that Shaw actually snuck into Iraq to ensure that Qualcomm (on whose board sat a friend of Shaw's) was awarded a lucrative cell network contract.

But nothing could be further from the truth. Shaw, who worked for Ronald Reagan and George H. W. Bush, represented the Old Guard Republican entity that in August 2003 set up shop in the Pentagon right under the noses of Rumsfeld, Wolfowitz, and Feith to investigate the neo-con cabal and their illegal contract deals. The entity, known as the International Armament and Technology Trade Directorate, was soon shut down as a result of neo-con pressure. Not to be deterred, Shaw continued his investigation of the neo-cons. Although the neo-cons told the Los Angeles Times that the FBI was investigating Shaw, the reverse was the case: the FBI was investigating the neo-cons, particularly Perle and Wolfowitz, for fraudulent activities involving Iraqi contracts. And in worse news for the neo-cons: Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld was giving the Inspector General's and Shaw's investigations a "wink and a nod" of approval.

The financial stakes for the Pentagon are high - the Iraqi CPA's Inspector General recently revealed that over $1 billion of Iraqi money was missing from the audit books on Iraqi contracts. For Shaw and the FBI, it was a matter of what they suspected for many years - that Perle, Wolfowitz, and their comrades were running entities that ensured favorable treatment for Israeli activities - whether they were business opportunities in a U.S.-occupied Arab country or protecting Israeli spies operating within the U.S. defense and intelligence establishments.

Shaw certainly must have recalled how, during the Reagan administration, an Israeli spy named Jonathan Pollard was able to steal massive amounts of sensitive U.S. intelligence over a long period of time and hand it over to his Israeli control officer, a dangerous and deadly agent provocateur named Rafael "Rafi" Eitan. That had disastrous effects on U.S. intelligence operations throughout the world because some of the documents were handed by the Israelis to the Soviets in return for letting more Soviet Jews emigrate to Israel.
more
http://www.fromthewilderness.com/free/ww3/081104_winds_change.shtml

Is he a Rabbi?

Dr. Dov Zakheim, the U.S. Under Secretary of Defense, a rabbi and a friend, said it well. “Religious extremists are not religious. And that it does not matter what their religion is. Religious extremists are not religious.”

http://www.torahfromterror.com/sermons/SanfordShudnow.htm

Similarly, Sackheim or Zackheim, indicates that they are from 'holy seed'. (Rabbi Dr. Dov Zakheim was a recent Under-Secretary for Defence in the United States.)
http://www.aje.org.uk/daf/daf.htm

By a curious coincidence Dov Zakheim used to be a Vice-President of SPC.
Later he served Donald Rumsfeld as comptroller/CFO for the whole DoD, but quit April 15th, coincidentally the same day SPC announced yet another government contract, and the letsroll911.com site went up.

Luckily for Rumsfeld and Zakheim the announcement that the Pentagon audit was out by 2.3 trillion dollars came late on Sept. 10, 2001, but was buried in the news due to the 9/11 events. Reportedly the audit documentation was moved to the 'renovated' ONI area and incinerated on 9/11.

his bio gives zero indication he is even qualified.


http://www.defenselink.mil/bios/zakheim_bio.html

A 1970 graduate of Columbia University with a bachelor's in government, Dr. Zakheim also studied at the London School of Economics. He earned his doctorate in economics and politics at St. Antony's College, University of Oxford, where he was graduate fellow in programs of both the National Science Foundation and Columbia College, and then a research fellow. Dr. Zakheim has been an adjunct professor at the National War College, Yeshiva University, Columbia University and Trinity College, Hartford, Conn., where he was presidential scholar.

I would assume he is not a real Rabbi

42ND ANNIVERSARY NATIONAL DINNER
The noted author, lecturer and commentator on national defense and foreign policy issues Hon Dr. Dov Zakheim, United States Under Secretary of Defense was the keynote speaker at the 42nd Anniversary National Dinner of Yeshivat Sha’alvim on March 12, at the New York Marriott Marquis. The scion of a prominent rabbinic family, himself an ordained rabbi and the parent of Sha’alvim alumni, Reuven and Sadya, he and his wife Deborah were recipients of the coveted Joseph K. Miller Achdut Yisrael Award. The announcement was made by Dinner Chairman Rabbi Steven Pruzansky, spiritual leader of Teaneck’s Congregation Bnai Yeshurun.

http://www.shaalvim.org/alumninews.htm

Assuming he is one.

with links.

your post identifies him as a Rabbi. It seemed important for some reason. It's a title that is meaningless in the context of the thread yet that how you identified him.

Which he is.

It strikes me as odd you omit the mention of "Dr." I suppose because you can't make an inflammatory supposition about its inclusion.

Sept. 20, 2002: Something odd is circling our planet. It's small, perhaps only 60-ft long, and rotates once every minute or so. Amateur astronomer Bill Yeung first spotted the 16th magnitude speck of light on Sept. 3rd in the constellation Pisces. He named it J002E3.
Automated asteroid surveys scan the skies every few weeks, yet there was no sign of Yeung's object earlier this year. "It must have entered Earth orbit recently," says Paul Chodas of NASA's Near-Earth Object Program at JPL. "But it doesn't match any recently-launched spacecraft."
In other words, it's a mystery.
<snip>
Could it be an alien spaceship? "If it is," says Chodas, "the aliens aren't good pilots. J002E3 is in a chaotic orbit. It loops around Earth once every 48 days or so, coming as close to our planet as the Moon and ranging as far away as two lunar distances." There's no evidence that the speck is moving under its own power. The orbit is constantly changing because of gravitational perturbations by the Sun and Moon.
At first Yeung and others thought J002E3 might be a small asteroid--a reasonable guess. The object is as bright as a 30m-wide space rock and it's moving about as fast as an asteroid should move. Mars and Jupiter have captured asteroid moons before; perhaps Earth had done the same.
It was a good idea, except for the paint.
That's what University of Arizona astronomers found on Sept. 12th when they measured the spectrum of sunlight reflected from J002E3. "The colors were consistent with ... white titanium dioxide paint--the type of paint NASA used on Apollo moon rockets 30 years ago," says Carl Hergenrother, who conducted the study with colleague Robert Whiteley.
<snip>
So, J002E3 might be a spacecraft after all--an old one from Earth. Where has it been all these years?
"Orbiting the Sun," answers Chodas. "I've traced the motion of J002E3 backwards in time to find out where it's been," he explains. Apparently, J002E3 left Earth in 1971, went around the Sun 30 or so times, and came back again. Chodas, a expert in planetary motion who has seen plenty of complicated orbits, says "I've never seen anything like this."
At first glance, J002E3 would seem to be from Apollo 14. That mission began in January of 1971, and according to Chodas' calculations J002E3 broke out of Earth orbit in March of the same year. There's a problem, though: NASA has accounted for all the big pieces of the Apollo 14 spacecraft. None are missing.
http://science.nasa.gov/headlines/y2002/20sep_mysteryobject.htm

Really interesting story, but is there any relationship between your post and the thread?

LARED,
how much money do you think it cost to build something like that?
How much money is the Pentagon missing?

What is that thing anyway?
http://www.spaceref.com/news/viewpr.html?pid=9497
It is pretty big.

CNN) -- An object recently detected in a chaotic Earth orbit is possibly a section from one the largest rockets ever built, a NASA monster taller than a football field that carried men to the moon, scientists said.
<snip>
There was one caveat. Chodas, a research scientist with the space agency's Near Earth Program Office in California, which monitors potentially hazardous space boulders, noted that the object "could not be associated with any recent launch."
http://archives.cnn.com/2002/TECH/space/09/13/mistaken.moon/

Have a look.
http://science.nasa.gov/headlines/y2002/images/mysteryobject/gallery/gallery_j002e3.html

http://www.spaceref.com/news/viewpr.html?pid=9319

how much money do you think it cost to build something like that?

The Saturn V rocket you mean? Try google.


How much money is the Pentagon missing?

Missing money? What missing money? The article talks about missing transactions over many years. Given the context I believe they are referring to unaccounted asset transactions. That could mean lots of different things.

is a breath of fetid air in this pre-apocalyptic fascist landscape. :yourock:

chronic credulity and total lack of skepticism...

Should never talk about the pre-apocalyptic fascist landscape you believe we live in, because --- well it takes all the fun out if it.

:eyes:

Good, great, never been better?

Or maybe- well, sure we got a a few problems here and there, but that's the way it always is, nothing too serious.

Or worse?

Is what it is. America will survive two terms of Bush. Yes we really will. America is still the best and brightest place on earth to live. Millions have given up family and friends just for the chance to live here. Millions more will continue to do so. Are we perfect? Nope.

But if you really think we are facing a pre-apocalyptic fascist landscape please tell me why.

I know that YOU are a progressive Democrat, of course. Stop grinning.

what ideas would those be?

n/t

America is still the best and brightest place on earth to live.

Excuse me, LARED, please don't tke this as a personal comment, but just reading your above mentioned statement:
For foreigners (and here on DU there are many of them and as you can see by reading my humble English) I'm one of them, this remark might appear to be pretty chauvinist and very close to the mission Bush feels to be in charge of: bringing the American Way of Live to all countries (well, without asking their consent obviously). And it's the same believe of superiority that has characterized Englsih and French Colonialism and the German Third Reich and Mussolini's Italy.
(I'm just talking about your remark. Having read it without further explanation and giving you my feeling as a foreigner. As I said, no personal comment, just analysing this phrase).
And to the millions that will come to the US. As far a I can see never are there so few people from Europe coming to the US and Bush is the reason. On the contrary quite a lot of Europeans are coming back.

But in my mind the fact the America is one of if not the best place to live on earth has nothing to do with any Bush agenda.

Which pretty much makes my point. America was a great place before Bush and will continue to be a great place after Bush.

Also seeing as you do not live in America, how would you know if we are facing a pre-apocalyptic fascist landscape? Are you one of those expecting progressives to be carted off to re-education camps in the near future?

How about we impeach Bush and his handlers for Iraq. That is assuming we had the votes... but the principle is the thing really.
And then send 'em all to gitmo and string em up with piano wire. NYTimes, are you listening?

How about we impeach Bush and his handlers for Iraq.

Being a practical sort of fellow, that ain't happening.

And then send 'em all to gitmo and string em up with piano wire. NYTimes, are you listening?

If that's how progressives think, you can count me out. Is that how folks in your country handle political leaders they disagree with?

the Geneva Conventions, all Americans should be allowed to do the same.

But you have yet to mention one progressive or Dem issue that interests you. Any of your top 5 would be apppreciated.

I thought you said you were not from the USA.

Here's a progressive thought for you;

And then send 'em all to gitmo and string em up with piano wire

Anyone that thinks that is the proper response to the Bush administration is no progressive. So what are you? A reactionary, A radical? Something else?

B. Is torture OK for terrorists? If it is you have one of my answers.

After you define torture, I can answer on a case by case basis.

I, Lared, believe the number one issue for the Democratic party is...?

Au revoir.

Regain some sanity. They need to stop pretending it is still 1960. They need to start admitting that the issues of the 60's are not going to sway people back to the party or keep people in the party and start articulating a compelling message as to why Democrat principles made this country great and why they will continue to do so.

Frankly I believe the Democratic party has lost its way.

Or should they be, in your opinion?

And I will now bet money that you won't give a sensible answer this time either.

Well, fellow DU'ers, lurkers, newbies, trolls and Woodrow fans, that was close. At least my predictive faculties are in working order. I was right about the WMD's too. If only Rummy had asked, sorry, I forgot, he ALWAYS knew those WMD'S wouldn't be found.

You're obviouly not a progressive? So what's so hard about answering my question?

1. Me- Left Lib Dem, ie progressive taxation, single payer health care, gun control, pro-choice, FCC reform, campaign finance reform, etc. Any of these concepts seem alien to you and the other OCT'ers?

2. Regarding punishment for war criminals and terrorists. The piano wire was satire, S-A-T-I-R-E...and was only intended to rile the party faithful, and it did. In reality, the best way to deal with terrorists, and war criminals, and treasonous lying administrations, is through established legal procedures, full stop.
Even if the BFEE doesn't agree.

3. Your turn then.... and once again I predict a blizzard of obfuscation and non-answers from LaRed.

Me. Moderate Dem. End corporate welfare. Sensible environmental laws and regulations. Not in favor of single payer heath care, but system needs massive reform to ensure health care is available and affordable. Gun control laws do not work, so lets stop pretending they are effective. We need drug law reform in a big way so the criminal justice system can better deal real criminals instead of pot heads. Capitalism actually works, it just need to be watched carefully. There more but you really don't care, you just want to convince yourself any one that is a so called OCT'er have some ulterior motive for posting on DU.


Do any of these concepts out me a stealth repuke?

Also exactly how does one deal with terrorist through established legal system? Just curious?

too much but I would not call you a progressive Dem, more of a moderate Republican/libertarian type, and thus not really on the approprate political site at all. You actually should be progressive, liberal, etc, to be on DU, but that's a judgement call, and I'd rather have the full spectrum of Democrats. We havent kicked Zell Miller out yet, have we?

2.The appropriate terror laws existed here, and in other countries, long before 9/11, and we also signed to the Geneva conventions. Gitmo and similar camps set up by this Admin in Iraq and Afganistan are immoral and illegal under those laws. This admin is guilty of torture, and even bigger war crimes, since mid 2002, yes, even treason, for which the leaders should be court-martialed and impeached. And given life-sentences when found guilty.

And I bet you don't agree with that at all.

I'm so glad you think it's ok for me to be here. :)

You really did not answer my question on how to deal with terrorists. Once you catch a person that wants nothing but your death. What do you do with them?

I'm not advocating Gitmo, but what would you do?

If so, I missed it, unless you believe the Govt about the Gitmo inmates, or the shoe-bomber, or the Jose Padilla, but generally they should get thrown in jail, if found guilty, and not in open air cages.

I think we might be in agreement on this.

If Ralph Reed isn't a terrorist, what definition does he fall under?

I can think of maybe one other person caught by the U.S. (there have been others worldwide) - William Krar, the guy who was picked up in Texas but was http://www.upi.com/view.cfm?StoryID=20040311-030156-8181r">never mentioned by Ashcroft.
From the article:
<snip>
Krar, who is affiliated with several anti-government, white supremacist militia organizations, was apprehended after mailing a package containing false U.N. credentials, Defense Intelligence Agency IDs, phony birth certificates and a forged federal concealed weapons permit to a co-conspirator in New Jersey.

The package came with a note that read, "We would hate to have this fall into the wrong hands." It did. It was delivered to the incorrect address.

An alert citizen contacted the FBI, which led to the arrest of Krar and the discovery of a mind-numbing weapons cache: fully automatic machine guns, remote-controlled explosive devices disguised as briefcases, 60 pipe bombs, nearly 500,000 rounds of ammunition and enough pure sodium cyanide "to kill everyone inside a 30,000 square foot building," according to federal authorities.
</snip>




Edited to include correct info on Texas domestic terrorist

Thank you. And rest assured, I won't try to tell you to stop posting, even if I think what you have to say isn't something you'd normally expect from a progressive Democrat. But, I digress. Just tell us the logic you're using to arrive at branding Ted Kan'tpronounceorspellhislastname a "terrorist".

There was a guy on the radio (NPR if you're curious) that was discussion the definition of the term "terrorist" and how malleable it is - how some sides will call a person a "freedom fighter" while the other will call him or her a "terrorist". His definition was simple - all non-state-sponsored violence committed against civilians is terrorism. Maybe it's not the best definition, but I find it to be easier than arguing over terminology. If you have a better one, I'd like to hear it.

Have I sympathized with the causes of terrorists before? Yes. Can I condone their actions? No.

I can't spell his name either.

Is this something you would expect of a progressive Democrat, or do I fail your litmus test?

I looked on NPR to see if I could find the program I was listening to when I heard this. It was the June 7, 2004 Talk of the Nation with guest Michael Ignatieff. He has recently written "The Lesser Evil: Political Ethics in an Age of Terror" and is the Director of the Carr Center for Human Rights Policy at Harvard University (info from the page above).

I haven't re-listened to the whole show yet (I'm about 1/3 of the way through) but if you go to the link above you can listen. The transcript costs money and I'm not willing to pay but this way you can check my memory.

what form of torture is according to you ok for suspected terrorists?

No form that I'm aware of. Perhaps a little mental distress is OK. Maybe force them to watch reruns of Gilligan's Island for 24 hours straight.

This ought to be good. Go ahead, brother. You're a Drexel man, right?
Tell us your definition of torture, and while you're at, tell us how much torture is acceptable to you (not ON you, because I'm sure you would only reserve it for use on "them" - because only OTHERS could possibly be terrusts).

A person that relentlessly asks questions based on some convoluted view of reality, but never seems to be able to answer any themselves.

Anyone who confesses deserves swift justice, tempered with mercy.
Go thou and torture no more. Please.

The problem is that saying
America (Well, I don't start saying that already giving its own country the name of two continents is rather strange) is the best place on earth to live is the statement of superiority and of excluding all the other countries of this planet (and unless you haven't lived in all countries of this planet it is a statement of superiority without personal knowledge and experience). And if there is only one thing history can teach then it is that exactly all theses nations that had the impressions of being the best places to live that is the best nations on earth have committed unnumbered atrocities.
As I said in my last post: This is not supposed to be a personal comment on you. I don't know you. I just want to stress that you should be very careful with theses kind of statements.
And concerning your question. I didn't say that the US is facing a pre(apocalyptic fascist landscape. But what I can say is that the situation of cicil freedom and human rights is very much in danger to say the least.
The human rights are universal. Guantanamo is beyound a shadow of a doubt against human rights. And if once there is a whole in the human rights and one has created a new class of human beings called "Unlawful combattant" the way is paved to start doing whatever you like. And to finish just look at the draft of Patriot Act II that was leaked to the press in February 2003....

my personal belief that America is one of, if not the best place on earth to reside leads to your notion that history can teach then it is that exactly all theses nations that had the impressions of being the best places to live that is the best nations on earth have committed unnumbered atrocities actually reflects some truth is well -- just ridiculous. Certainly unrestrained nationalism plays a role in some of the worlds more ugly history, but recognizing the truthfulness that America is a great place to live it is hardly a precursor to unnumbered atrocities.


Also on a personal note

I just want to stress that you should be very careful with theses kind of statements.

Be careful? Am I in some danger of losing my ideological credentials if I actually have the gaul to say out loud that America is a wonderful country? Will it becomes a crime to love your country? Are you going to turn me in so I lose my secret decoder ring. Am I in some danger for thinking that America is a great place to live? Your arrogance is astounding.

The Perpetuum mobile of discussion boards :

Just never understand what the other guy is trying to say.

I stresse several times that I'm talking about your statement and that I'm not giving a personal comment on your person.
And you:

"Your arrogance is astounding."

This is purely and simply a personal attack on my person.

And very nicely in order to be able to attack me you're twisting the words in my mouth:
I was clearly refering to your remark: "The best place". And I explained that with this remark you exclud all other countries. With this remark you imply that other countries are less a wonderful place.

And you twist my remark:
"I actually have the gaul to say out loud that America is a wonderful country?"

No problem about that. Here the difference is that you say the US is a wonderful country and you don't imply any judgement about other countries.


So, to be honest I find it very bizarre that you attack me personally. I was talking about a statement. You leave the discussion in order to jump to personal attacks.

telling me to be careful about what I say (ie think) just pisses me off.

Who are you to warn me about what to say?

I'm somebody who doesn't jump to conclusions. I'm somebody who doesn't twist the words of the others in their mouth in order to call them arrogant ...

I told you what I think about your statement as America as the BEST place on earth to live. And I was careful to draw a distinction between you and your statement.
I tried nothing else then to give you a hint that people might easily put you into the category of people that have put nationalism as the heighest priority of their agenda. That's all.

As I said: I don't judge people immediately as others apparently love to do.

And talking about history:
Just have a look what:
France is the best place on earth did from Napeolon till the loss of their colonies.
United Kingdom is the best place on earth did from the beginning of Colonialism till the 50th.
Germany is the best place on earth did during the Third Reich.
I don't have to tell you this.
And the idea of mission in American Foreign Politics is certainly known to you as well.

I tried nothing else then to give you a hint that people might easily put you into the category of people that have put nationalism as the heighest priority of my agenda.

Tell me how my view that American is the best place to live defines nationalism as the heighest priority

Regarding history. May I suggest you broaden your horizon a bit. Many people from different nations believe their county is the best place to live on earth. It's normal to believe that. America historically is one of the few places on earth were people are actually encouraged to take a critical look at our culture and country in order to make it better.

Tell me how my view that American is the best place to live defines nationalism as the heighest priority

Again this is not what I said....
I said you could be (by people with a superficial look) put into the same category of nationlist people because your statement is their credo.

And you really don't need to broden my horizon:
I have lived already in two different continents and five different countries. So, please, I know a bit personally about different forms of nationalism. And I am in a position to compare a bit the different countries...

But, anyway.
I think we start discussing 911.
I'm a bit tired of being attacked personally. That's not my style. Maybe I spent to much time in the UK...

It is rare that someone feels the need to give advice protecting me from those that might take my belief that America is the best place to live as a facade for Nationalism. You know - the kind of Nationalism that leads to atrocities. That is what you're concerned about? Yes?

Again, thanks for looking out for me.

> "America is still the best and brightest place on earth to live."

> "Excuse me, LARED, please don't take this as a personal comment, but just reading your above mentioned statement:
For foreigners (...), this remark might appear to be pretty chauvinist and very close to the mission Bush feels to be in charge of: bringing the American Way of Life to all countries (well, without asking their consent obviously)."

The concern was not one of protecting you. Again I get the same feeling as back with RH, the feeling that you can twist your mind for hours to find the right words, it will still not bring you one step closer to being understood.

"it will still not bring you one step closer to being understood."

Most people who've been around here for a while understand well enough.

tiping mistake

n/t

Or maybe you were being ironic.

But yes, Lared, America is a 'great place to live', but so is France, and Italy, and the UK, even some parts of Texas are livable..
The question is what if anything, can be done do to make our country even better? You must have some thoughts on this issue, surely.

In my country - Norway - I don´t think I´ve hardly heard anybody say that this is the greatest country.
( Journalists repeat again and again that this is one of the richest countries in the world, but that is different. )

My thoughts when I hear a remark like this, go to "Deutchland uber alles" , "Britannia rule the waves", and the U.S.

Someone saying they live in the greatest country just make us have to quench a laugh over such conceit. This is probably so in all countries that never had a lot of power.

So it has obviously something to do with power. Norway has never been a powerful nation in any way, and so a thinking like this about ones own country being the greatest never came about. It comes about where there is POWER.

We should probably determine criteria for "greatest" before arguing over which countries are actually the greatest.

Your post, however, appears to deal more with self-identification as "greatest country". I think it would be interesting to find out percentages of national populations that do agree with that assessment of their country, and why they think it is the greatest country.

about this is just so alien to me.
I´ve lived in Norway all my life, and I don´t think I´ve ever heard any Norwegian say in earnest that Norway is the best (/greatest) country there is.

( If you forced a Norwegian to say it, he would say it with a question in his face like "What is this, a contest in the most foolish conceit?" )

I´ve never been to the US, yet I´ve heard plenty of Americans (on TV etc.) stating with patos that the US is the best / greatest of all countries.

I can´t remember hearing anyone of any other nationality (than American) saying that their country is the best/greatest. Probably I have, but it was not with enough patos, or many enough from the same country, that I remember it.

disturbs me greatly.

Nationalism is prevalent on the teevee and is the cause (IMHO) of much of the self-satisfied ego-stroking of Rush and Fox News.


Q: What do you mean by "patos"? Is it possible you mean pathos?

> "What do you mean by "patos"? Is it possible you mean pathos?"

Yes, but no. It didn´t mean what I thought it meant. Guess what I meant was something like "empassionately" (?) / "with emotion".

Just thought I´d add, that I don´t want to give the impression that Norwegians are really humble/modest.

Compared to Sweedes, or Danes, Norwegians are really preoccupied with everything Norwegian. Sweedish and Danish media are not hardly as preoccupied with stuff related to their own nation as the Norwegian media is. So we are pretty conceit.

But even so, the closest we have come to a "Norway rule the waves" was during the Winter Olympics held in Norway in 1994. It was a great success, and the Norwegian prime minister stated something like: "It is typical Norwegian to be good."
The sentence is ridiculous also in Norwegian, and it became a standing joke. ( Still standing. )

We here in the States usually end up being compared to the Canadians, mostly because of proximity. They are pretty relaxed, although some of the separatist groups get a little crazy about cultural superiority.

Your Norway story is humorous. I think there is a difference between being proud of your country (and your countrymen/women) and being convinced that your country is superior in all respects to any other country. I think the former is acceptable while the latter is "Nationalism". It is difficult for some people here to differentiate (IMHO because of Fox News-like reporting) and criticism of country is condemned as un-patriotic (when it is quite the opposite).