The sad part of all of this is that, in fact, the administration did manipulate anything, and everything that the could in order to get the congress, and the American people to commit to the attack on Iraq, no matter how many Americans died, or were maimed.
It was a plan that George W. Bush had since BEFORE he became president when, in 1999, he said, "One of the keys to being seen as a great leader is to be seen as a commander-in-chief. My father had all this political capital built up when he drove the Iraqis out of Kuwait and he wasted it. If I have a chance to invade---if I had that much capital, I'm not going to waste it. I'm going to get everything passed that I want to get passed and I'm going to have a successful presidency."
And, of course there was the formation of the "White House Iraq Group" that was put together for the sole purpose of selling the war to the American people.
From Wickipedia......
The White House Iraq Group (aka, White House Information Group or WHIG) was the marketing arm of the White House whose purpose was to sell the 2003 invasion of Iraq to the public. The task force was set up in August 2002 by White House Chief of Staff Andrew Card and chaired by Karl Rove to coordinate all the executive branch elements in the run-up to the war in Iraq. One example of the WHIG's functions and influence is the "escalation of rhetoric about the danger that Iraq posed to the U.S., including the introduction of the term 'mushroom cloud'".
The members of the White House Iraq Group include: [8][9][10]
* Karl Rove
* Karen Hughes
* Mary Matalin
* Andrew Card
* James R. Wilkinson
* Nicholas E. Calio
* Condoleezza Rice
* Stephen Hadley
* I. Lewis (Scooter) Libby
* Michael Gerson...
And this is the timeline for the Iraq Group leading up to the Invasion of Iraq....
Soon after WHIG was formed, the Bush Administration's claims about the danger Iraq posed escalated significantly:
* July 23, 2002: The Downing Street Memo was written, in which British intelligence said "C reported on his recent talks in Washington. There was a perceptible shift in attitude. Military action was now seen as inevitable. Bush wanted to remove Saddam, through military action, justified by the conjunction of terrorism and WMD. But the intelligence and facts were being fixed around the policy."
* August, 2002: White House Iraq Group formed.
* September 5, 2002: In a WHIG meeting, chief Bush speechwriter Michael Gerson proposes the use of a "smoking gun/mushroom cloud" metaphor to sell the American public on the supposed nuclear dangers posed by Saddam Hussein. According to Newsweek columnist Michael Isikoff, "The original plan had been to place it in an upcoming presidential speech, but WHIG members fancied it so much that when the Times reporters contacted the White House to talk about their upcoming piece [about aluminum tubes], one of them leaked Gerson's phrase — and the administration would soon make maximum use of it."
* September 6, 2002: In an interview with the New York Times, Andrew Card did not mention the WHIG specifically but hinted at its mission: "From a marketing point of view, you don't introduce new products in August." On September 17, 2002, Matt Miller stated on NPR that the above quote from Andrew Card was in response to the question: "... why the administration waited until after Labor Day to try to sell the American people on military action against Iraq"
* September 7, 2002: Judith Miller of The New York Times reports Bush administration officials said "In the last 14 months, Iraq has sought to buy thousands of specially designed aluminum tubes, which American officials believe were intended as components of centrifuges to enrich uranium." In fact, many government officials had concluded the tubes were unsuitable for uranium refinement.
* September 7-8, 2002: President Bush and nearly all his top advisers blanketed the airways, talking about the dangers posed by Iraq.
o On NBC's "Meet the Press," Vice President Richard Cheney cited the New York Times article, and accused Saddam of moving aggressively to develop nuclear weapons over the past fourteen months to add to his stockpile of chemical and biological arms.
o On CNN, Condi Rice acknowledged that "there will always be some uncertainty" in determining how close Iraq may be to obtaining a nuclear weapon but said, "We don't want the smoking gun to be a mushroom cloud."
o On CBS, President Bush said U.N. weapons inspectors, before they were denied access to Iraq in 1998, concluded that Saddam was "six months away from developing a weapon." He also cited satellite photos released by a U.N. agency Friday that show unexplained construction at Iraq sites that weapons inspectors once visited to search for evidence Saddam was trying to develop nuclear arms. "I don't know what more evidence we need," Bush said.
* October 14, 2002: President Bush says of Saddam "This is a man that we know has had connections with al Qaeda. This is a man who, in my judgment, would like to use al Qaeda as a forward army."
* January 21, 2003: Bush says of Saddam "He has weapons of mass destruction -- the world's deadliest weapons -- which pose a direct threat to the United States, our citizens and our friends and allies."
* February 5, 2003: Colin Powell addresses the United Nations, asserting that there was "no doubt in my mind" that Saddam was working to obtain key components to produce nuclear weapons.
* March 19, 2003: The U.S. invades Iraq....
And Finally, My very own manuscript.....NEM
Will The Real "Manchurian Candidate" Please Stand Up
By
Mike Allen aka NEM
When Richard Condon wrote his cold war thriller, "The Manchurian Candidate", in 1959, he, probably, had no idea, or thought, that it would be played out, for real, within the confines of the United States.
And yet, after two film adaptations of his novel, here we are, in the United States of America, living it out, for real, the suspense, and the horror or controlling the mind of the most powerful man on the planet for the purpose of world wide dominance.
In the first film, in 1962, the plot followed the central concept of Condon's book, where the son of a powerful political family was brainwashed into becoming an unwilling assassin, for the Communist party.
The second version, released in 2004, while the plot still centers on a candidate brainwashed with the involvement of his mother and her own political aims, the mechanics of the story and the parties involved are quite different in cases.
This version brings us into the more modern world of today. The brainwashing is conducted by a large worldwide corportation that is a huge government contractor. (similar to the Carlyle Group) or similar to an oil and military services contractor (similar to Haliburton), with the end result to expand corporate influence as well as making themselves extremely wealthy through huge government contracts.
Now, before I continue, does any of this have a ring of familiarity?
Let's go back to 1992. Shortly after , what is called Gulf War I, and take a quick loolk at what is known as the PNAC…The Project For A New American Century and, The Clean Break Policy, which was written, and formulated in 1996.
If you're not familiar with those two items, lets take a brief look at the two of them, at least the names of the individuals who wrote them, and are responsible for them.
First, the PNAC, and a few of the contributors to it's birth.
Former members include prominent members of the Republican Party and the Bush Administration, including Richard Armitage, William J. Bennett, Jeb Bush, Vice President Dick Cheney, Zalmay Khalilzad, Lewis "Scooter" Libby, Richard Perle, former U.S. Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld, and Paul Wolfowitz.
A few others.Gary Bauer, former presidential candidate, president of American Values James B. Borow, former deputy director of the NSA, co-founder of the Illinois Center for Core Values Rudy Boschwitz, former US Senator from Minnesota Eliot A. Cohen, professor of strategic studies at Johns Hopkins University Steve Forbes, multi-millionaire publisher of Forbes Magazine, former presidential candidate Aaron Friedberg, director of the Center of International Studies Frank Gaffney, columnist, founder of Center for Security Policy Fred Ikle, Center for Strategic and International Studies Jeane Kirkpatrick, former U.S. ambassador Charles Krauthammer, conservative columnist Christopher Maletz Daniel McKivergan Norman Podhoretz, Hudson Institute Dan Quayle, former vice-president
Kind of looks like the gathering of neo con who's who, doesn't it?
How about The Clean Break Policy? Any familiar names amongst this group?
According to the report's preamble, it was written by the Study Group on a New Israeli Strategy Toward 2000, which was a part of the Institute for Advanced Strategic and Political Studies. Former Assistant Secretary of Defense Richard Perle was the "Study Group Leader", but the final report included ideas from James Colbert, Charles Fairbanks, Jr., Douglas Feith, Robert Loewenberg, David Wurmser, and Meyrav Wurmser.
The following paragraphs are excerpts from the Wikipedia outline of The Clean Break Policy.
Commentator Karen Kwiatkowski has pointed to the similarities between the proposed actions in the Clean Break document, and the subsequent 2003 invasion of Iraq.
Patrick J. Buchanan, in reference to the 2003 invasion of Iraq and the report, wrote that "Their plan, which urged Israel to re-establish 'the principle of preemption,' has now been imposed by Perle, Feith, Wurmser & Co. on the United States."
George Packer, in his 2005 non-fiction analysis of the Iraq war The Assassins' Gate, explicates the Clean Break report "through the lens of Wurmser's subsequent AEI-published volume, which argued (in 1999) that America's taking out Saddam would solve Israel's strategic problems and leave the Palestinians essentially helpless."
Phyllis Bennis has pointed to the similarities between the proposed actions in the Clean Break document, and the subsequent 2006 Israel-Lebanon conflict.
Sidney Blumenthal wrote in August 2006 that "In order to try to understand the neoconservative road map, senior national security professionals have begun circulating among themselves a 1996 neocon manifesto against the Middle East
peace process."
With all of that being said, how does that bring us to the title of my story, "Will The Real "Manchurian Candidate Please Stand Up?"
It's really very simple. Even with all that this group of neo cons planned, and wrote, they had no way of implementing it while a Democrat was in the office of the presidency.
It was then that they decided that the only way they could put the wheels in motion was to control the White House, and , moreso, to control the occupant of the White House.
That was where George W. Bush came along, for he was the perfect candidate to fill the mold of their "Manchurian Candidate."
George had a recognizable name. His father, of course, being the 41st president of the United States. He was, allegedly, a re-born Christian, perfect to gather in the southern bible belt vote.
His mind, so some believe, including yours truly, had been warped by years of excessive drinking and the use of hard, very hard drugs. For all intents and purposes, he had become a simpleton, or at least, had become even more simple minded than he had been before his drug, and alcohol usage.
Here was a man, George W. Bush, with the mind of a boob, and yet he had the name power, and the following of a radical hordes of religious fanatics, that he just might be able to get elected to the presidency, with a little help, of course.
So, the plan was put into motion to get their "Manchurian Candidate" into the White House….and, it almost failed, if not for one of their fellow neo cons, the one who stays under the radar most of the time, James Baker, to come to the rescue and with a little twisting and bending, managed to get the Supreme Court to anoint Bush as the first Fascist Dictator of the United States.
The plan needed a control, though. Much like in Condon's novel, they needed a "Queen of Diamonds" to trigger their man….. To get him to do their bidding…..
Who was it that they could rely on?
Well, if you all recall, before the election, George W. Bush need ed to get a running mate. So, his dad, the elder Bush, sent him Dick Cheney, one of his long time confidants. He told little Georgy that the nice man, Mister Cheney, would go out and search, and search, the entire country and come back with the "right man" to be on the ticket as VP candidate.
And, as we now know, Cheney did EXACTLY that, he came back, told George that he had found the PERFECT choice to be the Vice President…….HIMSELF.
The Queen of Diamonds, the TRIGGER, was now in place.
The election came, and George W. Bush was in the oval office. But, how would they accomplish their goals, how would they get him to , unknowingly, implement the PNAC and the Clean Break Policy?
September 11, 2001 happened, and it gave them the opportunity they had waited so long for…… World Domination, beginning with domination of the middle east.
George w. Bush had carried with him, for many years, a hatred for Saddam Hussein. It was Hussein who allegedly had attempted to put an assassination attempt out against W's father.
And ever since that day, W had carried his hatred, his desire to eliminate Saddam Hussein, no matter the cost.
So they begin to imbed it in his head, Saddam was a bad man, Saddam had WMD's, Saddam was a threat to America, Saddam this, Saddam that. They were triggering their "Manchurian Candidate."
They got him to lie, to deceive the American congress, the American people, and they got him to implement what was written in the Clean Break Policy as the first step towards fulfilling their goals.
And, they would do so by using the simplistic mind of George W. Bush to get it all accomplished.
By telling Bush that he would have the opportunity of fulfilling his long time agenda, it enabled George W. Bush to fulfill his vendetta, while at the same time, all of those that had spent nearly 20 years waiting for the opportunity, they were about to reap the spoils of what they had planned, and planned, and planned.
And only until George W. Bush entered the scene, they had to wait…. Until, on January 20th, 2001, on a cold day in Washington D.C., they had what they needed, in place…. And all that needed was for the right moment to occur and they would then, pull the trigger, and unleash the REAL MANCHURIAN CANDIDATE, George W. Bush.
And today, we are where we are, because of a book written, in 1959, by Richard Condon, "The Manchurian Candidate."
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Need any more be said?................NEM
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