WP: accessory to NYT, the instrument of the crime!

Well New York Times and Washington Post seem to be in cahoots! No big surprise!

In the previous post, I have provided the REAL text of the IAEA agreements with Iran regarding the nuclear issue. So that door is slammed in their face! But they are now accusing Iranians of killing Americans!

Says who?
On August 21st, Washington Post comes up with this jolly editorial: Tougher on Iran: The Revolutionary Guard is at war with the United States. Why not fight back? Where is this line coming from? The Israel Lobby!

And what are these facts based on?
As Garth Porter of The American Prospect reveals: The New York Times military reporter Michael Gordon!

Who is Michael Gordon?

Gordon played a key role, along with Judith Miller, in legitimizing a major theme of the Bush administration's Iraq propaganda -- the infamous aluminum tubes argument -- as the White House Iraq Group kicked off its campaign to prepare public opinion for war in September 2002.

Now whom does Gordon claim to derive his facts from?

"supposedly" from Brig. Gen. Bergner!

But what did Brig. Gen. Bergner actually say?

• Brig. Gen. Bergner offered no real evidence of Iranian involvement in planning the January attack in his press briefing on July 2.
• Bergner never even explicitly claimed such direct Iranian involvement in the planning.
• When in the press release Bergner failed to claim a direct Iranian involvement -- or even through a Hezbollah operative in Iraq -- in the planning of the January raid in Karbala, Gordon pushed him to state clearly that the Iranians not only helped plan but actually "directed" the attack on Americans.
• He responded: "Michael, I can't substantiate that proposition."
• What Bergner said in his prepared statement was that both Hezbollah operative Ali Musa Daqduq, who was in liaison with the militia group which carried out the attack, and Kais Khazali, the Iraqi said to have been in charge of the group.
• Bergner provided a number of details in the briefing about Hezbollah training of Shiite militia groups in Iran, including the number of sites, their location, and the number of militiamen trained at any given time, he did not claim that the specific group in question had been trained by Hezbollah, either in Iran or anywhere else.
• In that briefing, Gordon pushed Bergner to say that the purpose of Iranians was to try to "capture these American soldiers in the hope of trading them for the detained IraqiBergner refrained from addressing Gordon's restatement of the story as Iranian help and guidance of the January attack." officials."

What had Gen Petraeus said about the Iranian involvement in American killings?

In an April 26 press briefing, Petraeus had referred to a 22-page memorandum captured with the Shiite prisoners that he said "detailed the planning, preparation, approval process and conduct of the operation that resulted in five of our soldiers being killed in Karbala." But he did not claim that either the document or the interrogation of Khazali had suggested any Iranian or Hezbollah participation in, much less direction of the planning of the Karbala assault.

Petreaus even insisted that they had no evidence of Iranian involvement: "No. No. No. That -- first of all, that was the operation that you mentioned, and we do not have a direct link to Iranian involvement in that particular case."

At the time Petraeus made this statement, Khazali, the chief of the militia group that had carried out the attack, had been in U.S. custody for more than a month. Despite nearly five weeks of intensive interrogation of Khazali, Petraeus's comments would indicate that U.S. officials had not learned anything that implicated Iran or Hezbollah in the planning or execution of the Karbala attack.

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As I intend to disappear for the next little while:

Here's some food for thought and topics for discussion:

James Joiner talking about why Bush is controlling us.

I also had a good find this afternoon, picking up a DVD on sale: This Film is Not Rated by Dick Kirby. It is a hilarious documentary uncovering the secrecy of Hollywood's MPA, but more importantly about Hollywood's sinister ties to Washington, Military, and Church (and I won't rule out the mob!! Excellent film! Please let me know if you have seen this film, and what you think about it. I'd appreciate yoru thoughts VERY MUCH!