THE CIA IS A COMPANY YOU MAYBE DON’T WANT TO FUCK WITH

In a transparent attempt to get his lying ass off the hook over the failure to turn up any Iraqi WMDs and starting a war under false pretences, GWB has instituted an inquiry into the failure of the intelligence community to tell him what he already knew. That the inquiry is a shameless attempt to shift the blame from the White House to the Central Intelligence Agency is being swiftly confirmed by conservative pundits who, in a truly bizarre role reversal, are now damning the agency as the heart of darkness where once it was the great bastion of freedom. One of the first into the ring with this rightist newthink was NY Times resident lamebrain and lockstep Bush propagandist David Brooks, who yesterday in a confusing and unattractively written column condemned the CIA for its betrayal of the president. Here’s a snippet...

For decades, the U.S. intelligence community has propagated the myth that it possesses analytical methods that must be insulated pristinely from the hurly-burly world of politics. The C.I.A. has portrayed itself as, and been treated as, a sort of National Weather Service of global affairs. It has relied on this aura of scientific objectivity for its prestige, and to justify its large budgets, despite a record studded with error

For those of us who are old enough to remember the murders of Che Guevara, Salvador Allende or Malcolm X, or Operation Chaos that sought to link the Anti-Vietnam war movement with the Red Menace, and who maybe still have files in the Langley vaults, these developments can only produce a bitter smile.

And by a weird piece of synchronicity, a book of mine from the late 1990s, CIA – Secrets of the Company has just been republished in the UK by Chrysalis Books, with new updated chapters. The book was intended as a young persons guide to basic paranoia, but now Barnes & Noble have taken quite a substantial order for the US, and I’m wondering if the eventual readership may turn out to be right-of-Attila, GOP hard-ons. An odd prospect, although the royalties may still keep me in Jack Daniels and reefer. Lord knows something has to.

One word of warning, though, George, old boy. The last president who threatened the CIA was Jack Kennedy after he decided Allen Dulles had railroaded him into the Bay of Pigs, and we all know what happened to Jack. Maybe it would be a good idea to stay out of Dallas, know what I mean?

For a quick resume of old-time CIA–JFK conspiracy (courtesy of fidcen) try... http://www.ciajfk.com/

THE TURTLE THEORY

I have yet to completely gather my thoughts about what the Kerry surge in the Dem primaries really means. A USA Today/CNN/Gallup Poll that shows Bush trailing Kerry by 53 percent to 46 percent, but, after the savage destabilization of Dean, I do see the image of a turtle. (Not unlike Homer Simpson after he ate the Guatemalan Insanity pepper.) When the head pokes out – in the form of a clear Dem frontrunner – it will be immediately hammered to a bloody pulp by the Bush media and money machine. I hope to hell I’m wrong, but time will quickly tell. I also see a potential divide between those who want a particular Dem contender elected, and those who simply and desperately want to see Bush evicted from 1600 Pennsylvania. Again, my mental ducks are not quite in a row, but we have to find away to make this a positive, and not four more years of the disaster named George.

FROM THE EMAIL

Kaymo comes up with another horror story...

IMPERIAL AMERICA

Been reading "The Sorrows of Empire" by Chalmers Johnson (author of "Blowback"). He's a Japanese oriented wonk with lots of experience. Essentially his case is that the US Military has slipped the leash and is now steadily taking control of the State. It's budget is no longer controllable by any civilian authority and we may have already reached the point where the Military decides what it's going to do and then tells the Administration. There are more than 750 US military bases around the world now, and CINCs for every continent. Some interesting questions occur. The Pentagon is said to be thinking of taking control of orbital space and forbidding other countries to put anything in orbit without American permission. Clearly this puts the US and China on collision course. Russia is fast losing the power to even fire its missiles let alone keep them in good working order. The enfeeblement of the Russian economy shows no signs of ending anytime soon. But look further down the road. Consider: US Military is the global hyperpower, cop etc. etc. But the US itself is heading into massive, systemic debt. At some point down that road the needs of the Baby Boom generation for their Social Security Checks and the demands of the Military for ever more spending are going to come in conflict. The Boomers are too big and vocal a group to be denied, unless the US suffers a military coup and becomes a full fledged fascist state. The other possibility is that the US Military would begin to charge other countries for the costs of protecting them. It might begin with "contributions" in oil and Euros, and thus progress bit by bit to the good ol' annual tribute. Once that kind of thing is established can anything hold the US back from becoming a kind of hyper-Rome, a vast parasitical military, and state, foot firmly planted on the necks of the rest of the world, imposing taxes on everyone else to fund an ever expanding Military Industrial complex?

There was a whole mess of other fine email, but I’m too tired tonight to clean up the codes. But, as Scarlett O’Hara told us, tomorrow is another day. So come on back, and I might even reveal the secret plans of The League of Extraordinary Bushwhackers and the plan to put boots and a duster coat back into politics.

NOW FOR SOMETHING REALLY DISGUSTING

This was circulating in the topless tower of CityBeat World HQ. I’m not even going to tell you what it is, except it’s fucking gross – and Dominican.

http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&u=/040204/481/xwa10102041432

AND THIS MAKES ME VERY HAPPY

My novel Jim Morrison’s Adventures in the Afterlife was, although brilliant, hardly a runaway best seller, but now some folks who do that kind of thing have turned it into an online role-playing game called Afterlife. If you so fancy, take a look at...

http://www.livejournal.com/community/the_afterlife/

CRYPTIQUE – I can’t do that, Dave.