Yellow and Orange

THE ABSURD TIMES

I wonder who first said "the fat is in the fire".  Nobody knows.  It's a secret that nobody will care about, so we'll just say that it is and leave it at that.  At the same time, Trump proclaimed that all the pleas deals with his Russia connections had no "smocking gun" [sic.].  That's right, there is no smocking gun.  Are we back to "cofeffe" time?

The French know how to conduct a riot and we don't.  In 1968, our police stage a riot, swing and beating on skinny kids who had seen John Kennedy, Martin luther King, and Bobby Kennedy killed – all well-know people, establishment type people, who didn't think going over to this once French occupied oriental country to kill a bunch of the people there and to bee targets of people who had been fighting occupation for at least a thousand years.  Yes, the police rioted at the command of Dick Daley.  On the other hand, the French kids demonstrated violently and overthrew the government. 

After individual number one, Donald Trump, a (pardon the expression, Republican) had been exposed as a felonious thug who gave thugs a bad name, there are perhaps a few demonstrations, but then these days with a (pardon the expression, Republican) congress little will be done until January.  Meanwhile, in France, everybody that drives an automobile or truck started wearing yellow jackets and now duck tear gas and their President went back on the tax increase (the yellow of the jackets is a result, apparently, of a law requiring anybody driving a vehilcle to have one with them) and is even more under seige.  They want him to resign.  He had to shut down the Louve, the Eiffle Tower, and the famous arc with their tomb of the unknown soldier where all the real rioting is taking place. 

We can understand the French this time as we faced the same situation back in the 1964 election.  The (pardon the expression) Republican Party put Barry Goldwater, supported by the John Birch Society, up against Lyndon Johnson.  That group was the precursor to the Tea party and both were the products of the Koch family.  John Birch was some sort of right-wing Jesus freak who went to China and tried to force feed the people there.  The tea party was a protest against English taxes.  The modern versions of these were simply neo-fascist groups supported by the over-rich and the under-educated.  Macron was the alternative to a populist neo-fascist party.  Pick one, you people.  Well, the result was 1968. 

The new take on Trump – there was no collusion as he has been saying all along.  What there was we call "synergy"!  Yes, Synergy Now!  That's the Russian term for it, so we have to adopt it, I suppose.  To be more precise, no "political synergy," which means no smocking gun.  Nope. 

Our networks here have finally caught on and put the emphasis on what we have been saying all along – don't worry about "voter fraud" (maybe 4 case) but let's look at Election fraud.  The (pardon the expression) Republican party has been systematic on this, particularly in the south, but also in other places such as Wisconsin and Michigan.  Right now, the Wisconsin (pardon the expression) Republican Party is holed up in an emergency session to limit the authority of all statewide elected officials as they all are democrats, elected by a majority.  It will be worth watching to see what happens in January when Democrats take power in so many places.  Another example in North Carolina which was so bad that the official body has started investigation one race and may hold another election to take it's place.  We haven't even started on the voter suppression laws passed in many (pardon the expression) Republican states and we also hove investigations into the Georgia where the (pardon the expression) Republican candidate also supervised his own election.  Not surprisingly, he won. 

It seems that the bitter and frustrated Hillary fans are still at it which is why Bernie should not run for office as it will alienate these people.  After all, she listed among her qualifications for office that she was a Grandmother.  Beat that!  Of course, say anything negative about her is a sure way to incur wrath.  For her sake, of course, she should not run for anything either, but stay in Germany where she has some sort of house.  Bernie, on the other hand, is too busy with his work in the Senate and in advising other worthwhile political fugures to really consider running again.  He just put together a bill along with a right-wing Senator, Lee, for Utah to stop our part in the Saudi war against children in Yemen. 

Well, the Saudis, especially the weirdo called MBS (not the Mutual Broadcasting System) like the Zionist state continue to have the sympathies of the Trumps.  It is worth pointing out that, if you play with the accent on the vowel in Arabic, the name is pronounced "Tramp," not "Trump" and a newscaster, entirely by sloth, used that pronunciation recently.

Well, that's enough of this crap. 

Finally, Why Gaddafi Had to Go

THE ABSURD TIMES

Finally, the truth about Lybia.

Illustration: A rare glimpse of Trump or ex-French President before morphing into their modern shapes.

Finally, we get the facts from somewhere else than here on why Gaddafi had to go.  Thought I'd pass it along.

AMY GOODMAN: Mark Fancher, can you talk about what the U.S. troops are doing right now in Niger? I'm surprised many a number of senators, although apparently they've been briefed several times this year—that at least 800 U.S. soldiers are in Niger right now. Can you talk about why a drone base is being built? Can you talk about where Agadez is, what they're doing both in Niger and in other places in that region?

MARK FANCHER: Well, it's not just Niger. What many people also don't know is that this level of military presence can be found in many countries throughout Africa—most of them, as a matter fact. Since 2007, the United States has been expanding its reach and has been planting small groups of people in various different locations, not always with what would be regarded as military bases, but as embassy-based operation centers, where they carry out military training and different operations using African armies. So, it's no different in Niger. And the use of drones is just an extension of the basic idea of carrying out reconnaissance missions, and sometimes actual attacks, without putting U.S. troops at risk. So, this is very much par for the course.

And I really think it's important to really understand what has happened in Africa over the last 10 years. In 2007, when AFRICOM was created, the presence of terrorists, to the extent that we see them now, was—there was nothing comparable. The presence, if any, was minimal. What was going on in Africa at the time was that you had organizations like the Movement to Emancipate the Niger Delta, or MEND, which had engaged in very militant kinds of attacks on U.S. oil installations, breaking up pipelines, kidnapping U.S. oil company and Western oil company personnel, and issuing a threat in 2006 that they could not guarantee the safety of either the facilities of oil companies in and about Nigeria and in that region or the people who were sent there to work on them. It was at that moment that the United States decided that it was going to set up this special command, which was unprecedented, for Africa exclusively.

You know, you also see what was happening during that period was what they branded as piracy off the coastal waters of Somalia. These were fishermen whose waters had been contaminated by people who had come in and had plundered and raided their fishing facilities and had made them unable to engage in a livelihood. And in retaliation, they began to attack those boats and ships that were coming through those waterways, which was a major international shipping lane.

So, these twin concerns about access to the coastal region in Somalia, the oil that was being produced in the Niger Delta and in the Gulf of Guinea, those were the primary drivers for the creation of AFRICOM. And the more that the U.S. military established a presence in that region and throughout Africa, the more terrorism tended to grow.

JUAN GONZÁLEZ: Well, Mark Fancher, I wanted to ask you about another key event in the history of Africa, the recent history of Africa, which was the U.S. participation in the overthrow of Gaddafi and the situation in Libya. To what degree did the total destabilization of Libya and the—Libya is now, in essence, a failed state—have an impact on the growth of extremism and terrorist groups in other parts of Africa?

MARK FANCHER: Oh, it had a huge impact. And if you look at the infamous emails of Hillary Clinton, which are available at the State Department's website, you see an email exchange where State Department personnel are talking very frankly about their conversations with Sarkozy about his interest in overthrowing Gaddafi because he wanted two things. One, he wanted to eliminate the threat of a pan-African currency, gold-backed currency, that Gaddafi wanted to establish, because he was afraid that it would devalue the franc. And he also wanted access to Gaddafi and Libya's oil fields. That was the bottom line for why they went after Gaddafi in the way that they did.

And in order to do it, AFRICOM stepped in and played a major role in recruiting local forces within Libya to attack Gaddafi. They chose to establish relationships with some of the worst elements in Libya. In fact, one of the groups that they established a relationship with was one which, by its very name, said that its mission was to eliminate black people from Libya. And so they gave guns, heavy artillery, to all kinds of people in Libya, with the hope and expectation that they would, you know, carry out this overthrow of the Libyan government and assassinate Gaddafi. That played itself out, but those weapons were still there. And—

AMY GOODMAN: Professor Horace Campbell, we just have 30 seconds. Your final comment in talking about what's happened in this latest attack in Niger—also five Nigeriens were killed—not to mention what happened in Somalia with over 358 dead?

HORACE CAMPBELL: I want to follow up on the point about what happened in Libya and why the progressive forces must continue to press for a United Nations investigation in what happened in Libya. I spelled all this out in my book, Global NATOand the Catastrophic Failure in Libya.

What is happening in Niger is a continuation of what happened in Libya. France is in deep crisis. France is over—has taken over as undersecretary of peacekeeping forces in the United Nations. France tried to put a resolution through the United Nations Security Council to get more money for France in Niger, in Chad, in Mali and Burkina Faso.

AMY GOODMAN: Horace Campbell, we're going to have to leave it there, and Mark Fancher, as well, but we'll do Part 2 and post it online at democracynow.org.

AMY GOODMAN: This is Democracy Now! I'm Amy Goodman, was we continue to examine the U.S. military presence in Africa and what happened during the ambush of U.S. Special Forces in the West African nation of Niger, which is now the subject of both a military and FBI investigation, with the death of four Green Berets, five Nigerien soldiers, and at the same time, you have President Trump attacking the African-American congresswoman, friend of the La David Johnson family. The widow herself feels under attack, as well, by the president of the United States.

We'll look at all of this with Horace Campbell. He's in Luanda, Angola. Professor Campbell is currently spending a year in West Africa as the Kwame Nkrumah chair at the Institute of African Studies at the University of Ghana, peace and justice scholar and professor of African American studies and political science at Syracuse University in New York.

You're now in Luanda, Angola, Professor Campbell, but I wanted to go back to Part 1 of our conversation, where we started to talk about Libya. You say in order to understand what's happening in Niger, we have to understand what has happened in Libya. Can you take us down that path?

HORACE CAMPBELL: Thank you, Amy. And, you know, I wrote a book called Global NATO and the Catastrophic Failure in Libya: Lessons for Africa in the Forging of African Unity. We now know, as was said on this program, that Sarkozy of France said that France went into Libya to save the Europe. There are 14 African countries who cannot have independent monetary and fiscal policy because their currency is tied to the euro through France. Now, France mobilized jihadists, those who are called terrorists, especially from among the Tuareg, in Libya to fight. France mobilized jihadists to overthrow Gaddafi. Those same jihadists were guided to Mali to overthrow the people and to disrupt the situation in Mali. The same France that mobilized the jihadists then went to the United Nations in 2013 to get the United Nations Security Council to support France to fight against terrorism. This is duplicity.

The same thing is happening with Chad. Chad had 4,000 troops fighting in Libya. Chad is part of this five-nation-plus-one that is working with France to destabilize West Africa and the Sahel. Now, the United States has recently placed the government of Chad on the list of countries that have a Muslim ban. And the United States call the government of Chad duplicitous. It is the same government of France and Chad and the United States of America that is working to undermine efforts of the African Union to bring peace and reconstruction and the African currency to Africa.

So what we must be clear about to the progressive forces in the United States of America, that neither France nor the United States can have any political legitimacy in Africa, when on the streets of the United States of America fascists are walking around with Nazi flags and police are killing black people. I want to go back to the point that we made at the beginning. United States has no legitimacy for fighting terrorism in Africa, because you cannot fight to defend black lives in Africa when black lives are not important in the United States of America.

AMY GOODMAN: Professor Campbell, I don't know how much you're following back in the United States as you're there in Angola, but I wanted to go to this unusual news conference that the Joint Chiefs of Staff Chair General Joseph Dunford had on Monday laying out a timeline of the deadly October 4th Niger ambush in which five Niger soldiers and four U.S. soldiers were killed while on patrol, promising the military would conduct a thorough and transparent investigation.

The general's explanation came as the widow of U.S. Army Sergeant La David Johnson spoke out against Donald Trump's handling of the aftermath of her husband's death, saying during a condolence call the president couldn't remember the name of her husband. In an interview with ABC's Good Morning America Monday, Myeshia Johnson reaffirmed she and others heard President Trump say, quote, "He knew what he signed up for, but it hurts anyway." You know, that statement refutes Trump's claim that the remark was "totally fabricated."

So you have here in the United States the widow of one of the four Green Berets and the congressmember, both African-American, Frederica Wilson, who's a dear friend of the Johnson family, making these allegations against Trump on the morning of the funeral of La David Johnson. President Trump did not tweet honoring La David Johnson. He attacked the congressmember as "wacky." Both of these women are African-American. And, of course, Sergeant La David Johnson was the only African-American of the four Green Berets who died in Niger. Can you make this connection around everything that has happened, Professor Campbell?

HORACE CAMPBELL: We should send our condolences to Mrs. Johnson, because what is being played out with the congresswoman and Mrs. Johnson is a reflection of the relationship between the present White House and African population in the United States of America. We know the history of Donald Trump, the Republicans and the conservative forces, when it comes to the African people in the United States of America. It was inevitable that we would have this relationship, because one of the difficulties for the United States in Africa is that it's very nervous about the presence of black people in the U.S. military, because if black people in the U.S. military get in touch with the revolutionary forces in Africa, then it could create bigger problems for the United States of America. So the nervousness that we see at the top of the U.S. military, in the White House, over its relationship with black people was manifest in what happened with the congresswoman and with Mrs. Johnson.

And what we should be doing is to intensify the call for the dismantling of the U.S. Africa Command, and that every cent that is being spent within the U.S. Africa Command to militarize and destabilize Africa should go to reconstruction in Detroit, in the inner cities and to provide water, healthcare and education for people in the United States of America. Africa is very rich. Africa can reconstruct itself, if the United States is not in Africa to ensure that the dollar is the currency of world trade and that African dictators send billions of dollars out of Africa to keep the dollar as the international currency.

AMY GOODMAN: Professor Campbell, before we go, we talked about Niger, five Nigerien soldiers killed, four U.S. Green Berets killed. In Somalia, over, it looks like, 358 Somalis were killed in what's known now as the Mogadishu massacre. It may be—there's speculation that the Somali involved with this terrible bombing, his own village was drone-struck this summer. Can you talk about what happened in Somalia and also this trip that the U.S. ambassador to the United Nations, Nikki Haley, is now in the midst of, in Ethiopia, South Sudan and Democratic Republic of Congo?

HORACE CAMPBELL: Let us be clear: The United States is very weak in Africa. I was in Djibouti in May, where the United States has 4,000 troops, the largest number of troops in Africa. They're basically prisoners there. In 1993, we had the incident of the United States being militarily defeated in Somalia and this famous case called Black Hawk Down. It was decided then that the United States would not re-enter Somalia because the presence of United States troops instigate memories of the United States presence in Somalia and would be a recruiting tool for those who are extremists in Somalia.

Well, the situation is like this in Somalia, that the people of Kenya want the Kenyan troops to withdraw from Somalia. Uganda plans to withdraw from Somalia. Next door, in Ethiopia, there's a revolutionary situation in Ethiopia, and Ethiopia cannot deploy troops into Somalia as it did in the past. Then, the United States have to deploy troops in Somalia in order to quell the possibilities of revolution in Ethiopia and to support the conservative forces in Kenya—if you note that the head of the Africa Command said to the Kenyan people that electing Raila Odinga would be wrong, because Raila Odinga is calling for U.S. troops to depart from Somalia.

So, the United States, by going back into Somalia, has a number of reasons: one, to intensify the destabilization of Somalia; number two, to prop up those conservative governments in Uganda, Ethiopia and Kenya, who have troops in Somalia; and, number three, more importantly, to act as an ally of Saudi Arabia, Israel, in the planned war against the people of Iran. It is for those reasons why we have to see the United States' militarization of the region as part of its failed militarization of the Near East and Iraq and Afghanistan. And Africans will not tolerate this militarization. So, the United States' presence in Africa is creating the basis for supporting military dictators, as we have in Ethiopia.

AMY GOODMAN: And the visit of Nikki Haley, the significance of where else she is going, like the Democratic Republic of Congo?

HORACE CAMPBELL: Yes. Nikki Haley is someone who doesn't have a clue about what's going on in Africa. And in the Democratic Republic of the Congo, we have, again, a situation where, for 40 years, the United States has supported the oppressive forces, after assisting in the killing of Patrice Lumumba. Again, in that society, the African Union, the peacekeeping forces and the democratic forces want peace. There is a collaboration between the United Nations peacekeeping forces and the government of the Congo to ensure that the situation remain destabilized so that the Congo can be looted. The same about South Sudan, where we have more generals than schoolteachers—I'm sorry, more generals in South Sudan than—the amount of generals is so much that millions of dollars are being spent on both sides. And the African Union had an investigation into how to bring peace into South Sudan. Nikki Haley, the United Nations, United States of America are stirring up fires in Africa to ensure that there's no peace in Africa.

AMY GOODMAN: Well, we'll have to leave it there, and I thank you very much, Horace Campbell, for joining us, joining us today from Luanda, Angola, currently spending a year in West Africa as the Kwame Nkrumah chair at the Institute of African Studies at the University of Ghana, peace and justice scholar and professor of African American studies and political science at Syracuse University in New York. This is Democracy Now!, democracynow.org, The War and Peace Report.

Dear France -- Juste une note pour vous faire savoir quelle catastrophe Trump a été ici et que Le Pen est votre version de lui.

Just a note to let you know what a disaster Trump has been here and that Le Pen is your version of him.

Juste une note pour vous faire savoir quelle catastrophe Trump a été ici et que Le Pen est votre version de lui.

The court, the south, and religion (oh, and crime)

@honestcharlie posted: "THE ABSURD TIMES Above: Book about music and philosophy CRIME "If you want to make crime pay, go to Law School"" Respond to this post by replying above this line New post on THE ABSURD TIMES -- STILL The court, the south, and religion (oh, and crime) by @honestcharlie THE ABSURD TIMES Above: Book about music and philosophy CRIME "If you want to make crime pay, go to Law School" @honestcharlie | June 29, 2015 at 1:18 pm | Categories: Uncategorized | URL: http://wp.me/pt2r1-PL Comment    See all comments    Like Unsubscribe to no longer receive posts from THE ABSURD TIMES -- STILL. Change your email settings at Manage Subscriptions. Trouble clicking? Copy and paste this URL into your browser: https://czardonic.wordpress.com/2015/06/29/the-court-the-south-and-religion-oh-and-crime/ Thanks for flying with WordPress.com

Yemen, et al., WTF?

THE ABSURD TIMES

The Absurd Times (and archives)

Illustration: one of the key issues behind all this crap.

           Heard from Yemen lately?  One of the best reporters from Yemen has been Iona Craig who gives a good idea of what is going on in Yemen.  She told us that the was so much to say and so little time, which leads us to believe that there is much more going on than even hinted at in the interview, below.

            Essentially, a Shia group (that hate the U.S.) wants to take over the government (which loved the U.S.) which helped attack Al Qaeda (which hates the U.S.). The Houthi (or however you spell it) is the Shia faction and it does not consider itself connected with Al Qaeda (which is Whabbi Sunni, which is sort of like Southern Baptist of the Jimmie Swaggert type.  Kinda.

            Anyway, all of this, I.S. or ISIS, Al Quada in wherever, basically gets its justification from Israel, although it is pretty far off the target.  Hezbolla, the Army of God, is Shia and helping the Alowite Assad in Syria against ISIS which we once called "noble rebels", now re-branded as evil so we are training other noble rebels is Saudi Arabia, which is also Wahabbi Sunni but which Bin Laden (remember him? He's the one we helped get set up to evict the Soviet Union from Afghanistan where Canadians are now being shot at) got angry at because they let us on their soil.  Bin Laden's other enemy was Saddam Hussein.  We now have 3,200 official troops back in Iraq and more to come.  We are also bombing lots of places.   

            OK, so the spelling is strange.  The main question is when did any U.S. military intervention in the Mid-East help anyone, either the west or the people in the attacked countries?  Who, besides a few oil company billionaires benefited at all from ANY of this interference? 

            Well, we can see how things are going in Iraq, Egypt, Libya, Yemen, Jordan, Lebanon (the last two affected by refugees), or anyplace else.   In Syria things are not going well for anyone either.  

            Remember all the fuss in France and the roundup in Belgium and other places?  That is attributed to Anwar Al Alwaki (who we learn was only a mid-level figure in the organization, see Scahill, below).  The west certainly is making great strides.  No?

            Well, time for a couple interviews:

         TUESDAY, JANUARY 20, 2015

A Coup in Yemen? Jeremy Scahill & Iona Craig on Rebel Offensive to Seize Power, Saudi Role & AQAP

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As the world focuses on the threat posed by al-Qaeda in Yemen, the Yemeni government is on the verge of collapse. A dispute between Shia Houthi rebels and the government of President Abd Rabbuh Mansur Hadi has sparked the capital Sana’a’s worst violence in months. Houthi fighters have reportedly entered Yemen’s presidential palace in a possible coup attempt. This comes days after fighters abducted the president’s chief of staff. As the government fights the Houthis, it also wages a U.S.-backed offensive against al-Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula (AQAP), whose insurgency has only grown deadlier by the year. The latest unrest comes days after AQAP took responsibility for the Charlie Hebdo massacre in Paris. Will the Yemeni government be overthrown in a coup? We are joined by two guests: Iona Craig, a journalist who has reported from Yemen for years and until recently was its last accredited foreign reporter; and Jeremy Scahill, co-founder of the The Intercept and the reporter who broke the story that AQAP took credit for the Charlie Hebdo killings. Scahill reported from Yemen extensively for his book and documentary film, "Dirty Wars."

TRANSCRIPT

This is a rush transcript. Copy may not be in its final form.

AARON MATÉ: We begin in Yemen, where the capital Sana’a is seeing its worst violence in months. Intense clashes between government forces and Shia Houthi rebels have sowed chaos and raised fears of a coup. The latest round of fighting broke out this weekend when the Houthis kidnapped the chief of staff to President Abdu Hadi. The Houthis are protesting the text of a new draft constitution that would divide Yemen into six federal regions. Talks for the charter began under a peace deal reached in September after Houthis mobilized large protests and captured most of Sana’a by force. They were supposed to withdraw in the months since, but have only expanded their hold.

Now the country faces political collapse. On Monday, new gun battles erupted as Houthi fighters surrounded the prime minister’s residence and the presidential palace. The attack came despite a second ceasefire between the two sides. The capital appears calm for now, but tensions are high.

AMY GOODMAN: The Houthis’ rise has further upended Yemen’s fragile political order. As the government fights the Houthis, it also wages a U.S.-backed offensive against al-Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula, AQAP. Despite the long-running U.S. drone war, the al-Qaeda insurgency has only grown deadlier each year. The Houthis themselves have also fought al-Qaeda at the same time as they now take on the Yemeni government. The Houthis appear to have major backing from longtime President Ali Abdullah Saleh, the ousted leader who was ousted in a popular uprising in 2011. The latest unrest also comes days after al-Qaeda in Yemen took responsibility for the Charlie Hebdo massacre in Paris.

For more, we’re joined by two guests. Iona Craig is with us, a journalist who was based in Sana’a for four years as the Yemen correspondent for The Times of London. She was awarded the Martha Gellhorn Prize for Journalism in 2014. The government has cracked down on local and foreign journalists, and at one point last year Iona Craig was the country’s last accredited foreign reporter. She’s joining us now, though, from London.

And we’re joined by Jeremy Scahill, co-founder of the TheIntercept.org. Just days after the Charlie Hebdo massacre, Jeremy broke the story that al-Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula had taken credit. He cited a confidential al-Qaeda source in Yemen. Days later, AQAP put out an official statement confirming it took responsibility.

We welcome you both to Democracy Now! Iona Craig, let’s begin with you. Just tell us what is happening right now in Yemen and who the Houthi militants are.

IONA CRAIG: What’s happening now is it’s really political posturing on behalf of the Houthis. They’re trying to get leverage to get this draft constitution changed, which they don’t agree with. So they’ve kidnapped the presidential aide, the chief of staff, in order to get that leverage. And then the fighting that we saw in the last 24 hours was also part of that. So the negotiations at the moment are going on for the release of Ahmed Awad bin Mubarak, the chief of staff, in exchange for changing the draft constitution.

But the issue with the Houthis, the Houthis were first formed as a movement in 2004. They then fought the government in six wars between 2004 and 2010. But they then became part of the Arab Spring. They put down their weapons. They joined the protests. They joined the sit-ins, particularly in Sana’a, and became part of that peaceful movement. But the transition that followed that was backed by the international community—and actually instigated by the U.S. in the first place—did not go their way. So when the national dialogue was concluded in January last year and the decision was made about federalism and to divide the country into six regions, the Houthis weren’t happy about that. And that was when they started taking territory. So they were pushing from their stronghold, if you like, in Sa’dah up in the north, which is up by the Saudi border, and they started pushing south toward Sana’a.

This was also then an opportunity for Ali Abdullah Saleh to join in, because the Houthis’ main enemy is Islah, which is Yemen’s equivalent to the Muslim Brotherhood, who had gained a lot of power after the Arab Spring and a lot of political power. So they had a joint enemy. So, between the support of Ali Abdullah Saleh and the Houthis, they were able to take that ground, they were able to beat the Islahi-supported tribes, and eventually got to Sana’a in September. And in the space of four days of fighting, the minister of interior then ordered the troops to stand down, and they took control of the city.

AARON MATÉ: When you say the Houthis are engaging in political posturing, do you mean then that they’re not trying to carry out a coup, despite all this fighting in the capital?

IONA CRAIG: I think it’s really hard to determine whether that’s the case or not. In September, they had the opportunity to do that. They could have kicked President Hadi out at that point, but they didn’t, which makes me think that they probably won’t do that now. It depends how far they’re pushed. If they don’t get their way with the constitution, then they may indeed do that. But I think the Houthis have so far stopped short of actually taking physical power. Again, they could have put their own people up as ministers when the new government was formed at the end of last year, but they chose not to do so, because it means that then they are not held responsible for when the government collapses and things go wrong, where they’re taking this silent control by trying to manipulate the government, take control inside ministries, without actually having their own men in power.

AMY GOODMAN: Jeremy Scahill, how does what’s going on in Yemen right now, a place you also have spent time in and reported from, relate to what happened in France and AQAP, al-Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula, taking responsibility for theCharlie Hebdo attack?

JEREMY SCAHILL: Well, you know, one of the things that’s interesting, just to add to what—you know, to Iona’s analysis, which I think is really spot-on, is that the Houthis have been a really interesting political football of sorts in the U.S. policy in Yemen. They have also been bombed repeatedly by the Saudis, you know, Saudi Arabia waging a not-so-secret war, bombing the Houthis. In the WikiLeaks cables, you see that when Ali Abdullah Saleh was in charge, officially in power in Yemen, he would consistently say to the United States, "We have to do something about the Houthis, because they’re being backed by Iran." And actually, to the credit of U.S. diplomats, they said, "Well, you know, we don’t exactly think that that’s true." And what was happening is that Ali Abdullah Saleh was a master manipulator of the United States, and he was looking for any way he could to justify getting more military assistance, more money to bolster his own forces that were supposedly fighting al-Qaeda, to actually use them to shore up his own power base. So, when the well was sort of dry, started to dry up with al-Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula at points, he would then sort of appeal to the United States and say, "Hey, we have these Iranian agents in the form of the Houthis inside of Yemen." And so, what we’re seeing right now is that Ali Abdullah Saleh, who actually himself is a Zaydi Shiite and has roots in that region, has now flipped sides and, as Iona said, is sort of the not-so-hidden hand behind some of the power grab efforts of the Houthis.

As it relates to the Charlie Hebdo massacre, of course, al-Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula is facing a situation in the world where they and al-Qaeda Central have sort of been eclipsed by the rise of the Islamic State, ISIS. And so, in this case, it seems like, at a minimum, there are ties between the Kouachi brothers, who conducted the massacre, and AQAP. It’s to AQAP’s benefit to maximize the way that that group portrays its involvement with Charlie Hebdo. But there are still very serious questions about whether or not, as AQAP says, they financed it and directed it, or that they simply provided some training to aspiring jihadists who went on then to conduct this very, very public, globally recognized massacre.

AARON MATÉ: Iona, Jeremy mentioned Saudi Arabia. That’s Yemen’s neighbor to the north. Can you expand more on their role in this current conflict? And also, do you agree that Saleh, the former leader, is playing a major role in the current unrest?

IONA CRAIG: Yes, I think it’s certainly clear that Saleh has played some role. It was clear to me, after the Houthis had taken over control of Sana’a in September, just walking around the city, talking to people, even talking to some of the men that were Houthis and other people around the city, that many of those plainclothes gunmen that you were seeing on the street, as Houthis, had actually been part of the Republican Guard before, which the Republican Guard was a unit under Ali Abdullah Saleh’s time and was commanded by his son, Ahmed Ali, so there was very much an overlap between the Houthis and what used to be the Republican Guard in the takeover of Sana’a in September and indeed in the continued control of the city since then.

Just to go back to the issue of the Saudis, the Saudis are sort of stuck in a situation now where, you know, obviously the Houthis are seen as very much as supported by Iran—how much support there is isn’t clear, but those are obviously their regional rivals. The Saudis, as Jeremy mentioned, were very much involved in bombing the Houthis. And we actually know from more recent reporting that there were cluster bombs that were fired on the Houthis during those wars, that came from America, that were sold to them by America to the Saudis. So, this slogan the Houthis have of "death to America" not only comes from a dislike of American foreign policy, but issues over that, where the Houthis have claimed that it’s American bombs that were hitting them in the past. But Saudi Arabia is now in the situation where the Houthis are effectively in charge of the government, although not physically, as I mentioned before, as Hadi is still there. So they’re reluctant to give any more economic aid to Yemen as a result, because the Houthis are in control, and they very much see them as supported by Iran. So that brings Yemen closer to the edge of economic collapse, which it’s now facing at the moment.

On the other side, you have who is taking on the Houthis, if the Saudis are looking at it from that perspective. And the only people who are physically and able—willing and able to take on the Houthis at the moment is al-Qaeda, which is also putting a lot of tribal groups in a difficult position. When the Houthis started taking further territory after Sana’a in September, there were areas where tribes didn’t want the Houthis coming into their territory, and they then found themselves, whether they liked it or not, on the same side as al-Qaeda, and possibly with the prospect of fighting alongside al-Qaeda, even if they didn’t agree with them ideologically, because they were the only ones that were standing up to the Houthis’ expansion, because the government was neither willing or able to do so.

AMY GOODMAN: Iona Craig, I wanted to ask you about the comments of Louisiana Governor Bobby Jindal. He’s in London right now, and he was repeating the allegations that have repeatedly been uttered on Fox—now, though, four major apologies from Fox about what they’ve been saying—that whole areas of London—of, rather, Britain, are no-go zones. Being that you are in London right now, having reported in Yemen for years, can you talk about this controversy and the response of David Cameron and others in Britain? They also made the—Fox also made the allegations about France.

IONA CRAIG: I think, really, people here obviously feel incredibly insulted by that kind of very ignorant comment, or, you know, some people have just laughed it off as slightly ridiculous, as many people see those kind of comments. But yeah, I mean, I’ve spent time in Birmingham. I’m living at the moment in South London. You know, these are communities, multicultural communities, in both cities that are—that are certainly no-go areas for anybody in that respect. So, yes, I think it’s deeply insulting to the people of Birmingham particularly. And, you know, if—

AMY GOODMAN: Birmingham is the place—

IONA CRAIG: —that’s how we can—

AMY GOODMAN: Birmingham is the place where the so-called terrorism expert Steve Emerson said on Fox is completely Muslim. It’s majority Christian, actually. And then he was forced to apologize, Iona.

IONA CRAIG: Yeah, I think probably the crucial thing is that "so-called terrorism expert." You know, perhaps this is somebody who hasn’t spent much time from behind a—out from behind a desk for a while. Certainly, obviously, hasn’t visited Birmingham anyway.

AARON MATÉ: Well, Iona, back to Yemen, what do you see happening next?

IONA CRAIG: I think it’s really hard to predict right now. I think that the situation politically, obviously—you know, unless you have political stability, you can’t have security. You’ve got a very weak government. You’ve got a very weak president. You’ve effectively got a president now with a gun to his head from the Houthis, who are saying, "We want the draft constitution changed; otherwise, we’re going to keep control and hold onto the chief of staff."

You’ve got al-Qaeda, who have really changed their mode of operation since the Houthis took over in September, and have started targeting civilians as a result, civilians that they claim are Houthis. But before, al-Qaeda had never deliberately and gone out of their way to kill civilians in Yemen, and that changed after the Houthis took control in September. So they attacked a Houthi gathering in October with a suicide bomber. I was actually walking into the square when that suicide bomb went off in October. And twice since the beginning of this year, they have attacked civilians, and deliberately targeting civilians. So that’s really worrying for people in Yemen, obviously, that now civilians are seen as a legitimate target by al-Qaeda. They’ve claimed responsibility for over 150 attacks across Yemen since the Houthis took control.

So, you have this issue of instability both politically and security-wise, and the economy, as I already mentioned, on the brink of collapse, where the government has run out of money to even pay the civil service and the military. So, at the moment, really, it’s all in the hands of the Houthis. It’s up to them whether they start this fighting again in order to push what—and force the government into a corner and to take heed of their demands, or whether we now see a peaceful end to all of this. But it won’t really be an end. The Houthis still have the power in their hands at the moment, and President Hadi most certainly does not.

AMY GOODMAN: Well, Iona, we want to thank you for being with us. Iona Craig, joining us from London, she was based in Sana’a for four years as the Yemen correspondent for The Times of London, was awarded the Martha Gellhorn Prize for Journalism in 2014, left Yemen last month, joining us from London.

When we come back from break, we’ll be continuing with Jeremy Scahill, co-founder of The Intercept, about the so-called terrorism experts and the networks they’re on. We’ll play a clip of Jeremy taking on CNN on CNN. And also, what does it mean to protect sources, no matter who or where they are? Stay with us.

TUESDAY, JANUARY 20, 2015

As Fox News Apologizes, Jeremy Scahill on Fake "Terror Experts" & Challenges of Real War Reporting

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Fox News has apologized for broadcasting false information about Muslims in the wake of the Paris attacks. Last weekend, self-described terrorism expert Steve Emerson claimed on air that parts of Europe, including the entire English city of Birmingham, were totally Muslim areas where non-Muslims do not go. Emerson was forced to apologize, but the claim about so-called "no-go zones" was repeated by other Fox guests and anchors. On Saturday, according to a CNN Money tally, Fox News took time out of four broadcasts to apologize for reports on Muslims. Jeremy Scahill, co-founder of The Intercept, discusses the rise of so-called "terrorism experts" by Fox News and other major cable networks. In two recent interviews with CNN, Scahill has criticized the news giant and others for their use of "on-air analysts who also work in the private sector and make money on the idea that we should be afraid." He also responds to blistering criticism fromFBI chief James Comey of using an anonymous al-Qaeda source in reporting on the Charlie Hebdo massacre, and analyzes what al-Qaeda’s claim of responsibility will mean for the U.S. drone war in Yemen.

TRANSCRIPT

This is a rush transcript. Copy may not be in its final form.

AMY GOODMAN: Our guest—we continue with Jeremy Scahill. He’s the author ofBlackwater: The Rise of the World’s Most Powerful Mercenary Army, and his latest book is called Dirty Wars: The World is a Battlefield. He broke the story that al-Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula, AQAP, took credit for the Charlie Hebdo massacre in Paris, based on an al-Qaeda source in Yemen. Days later, AQAP put out a statement of that very nature, but Jeremy broke it first. Jeremy, talk about the controversy—The Washington Post has written about it, you were on CNN talking about it—protecting what they call "terrorist sources," not naming the sources that leaked you that story before it was officially acknowledged.

JEREMY SCAHILL: Well, I mean, I actually, as a—you know, I’ve been a journalist for around 20 years, and I’m honestly a bit dumbfounded at the response from other journalists. I mean, a classic part of good journalism, responsible journalism, going many, many centuries back, is that you’re trying to provide people with information that is actionable, that they can use to make informed decisions on what to believe or positions to take on certain issues. And a key part of covering war is that you have to have journalists willing to go to the other side to speak with the people that you are told are the enemies and to get their perspective so that we can better understand the nature of this conflict. And so, just as I’ve gone to areas in Yemen that are controlled by al-Qaeda or areas in Somalia that are controlled by al-Shabab or areas in Afghanistan that are controlled by the Taliban, you know, we have an obligation to try to understand where al-Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula is coming from. And so, you know, the idea we should have a special standard that in certain cases we’re actually not journalists, but we are somehow militant nationalists who should not engage in responsible journalism because the U.S. government doesn’t like us talking to those individuals, to me, just flies in the face of just basic journalistic principles.

AARON MATÉ: Well, Jeremy, the director of the FBI, James Comey, he criticizedThe New York Times for anonymously quoting a source from al-Qaeda. And I presume he would criticize you, too, since you broke the story, the first person to reveal that AQAP had taken credit for the Charlie Hebdo massacre. And Comey said the use of the source was "mystifying and disgusting." And he added, to the Times, "I fear you have lost your way and urge you to reconsider allowing your newspaper to be used by those who have murdered so many and work every day to murder more." Your response?

JEREMY SCAHILL: Yeah, well, I mean, clearly, Director Comey doesn’t actually want us to have a truly free press. And let’s remember that this Justice Department is waging a war against whistleblowers that effectively amounts to a war against journalism. Look, I don’t believe, you know, in using anonymous sources widely, and I particularly think that newspapers and news organizations should not be giving senior U.S. officials anonymity so that they can project their propaganda on the world, which is largely why senior U.S. officials request anonymity. They want to be able to say things that secretly or privately benefit U.S. policy, and it’s not actually moving the story forward. A lot of disinformation gets pushed out that way. So I believe in a limited use of confidential sources.

In this case, we had a situation where we had something that was of tremendous news value on a breaking news story. The gunmen had declared that they were from al-Qaeda in Yemen. There was a lot of speculation going on. And so, I reached out to sources that I know are members of AQAP with access to the leadership of that organization to try to get an understanding of whether or not this was true. And it was not clear at the time that any official statement was forthcoming from AQAP. And if we were to identify our source, who is not authorized to speak, not just because they’re like a private spokesperson, but because AQAP has a very strict set of guidelines as to who speaks officially for the organization—also the source could potentially be in danger, which, to me, is the number one reason why you would grant anonymity to a confidential source whose information in the past has been verified as legitimate, if they’re life is going to be in danger.

So, I didn’t just decide this on my own to grant anonymity to someone from AQAP. Our general counsel at The Intercept reviewed this, our editor-in-chief, Betsy Reed, and two senior editors. We all discussed this issue and ultimately made a determination that granting anonymity in this case was a responsible thing to do.

AMY GOODMAN: On Sunday, Jeremy, you appeared on CNN’s Reliable Sources, which is hosted by Brian Stelter.

JEREMY SCAHILL: Where I think it gets into really kind of fear-generating territory is when you have these so-called terror analysts on the air, many of whom also work for risk consultancy firms that benefit from the idea of making us afraid. I don’t think that CNN, MSNBC and Fox News do anywhere near a good enough job at revealing the potential conflicts of interest of some of the on-air analysts who also work in the private sector and make money off of the idea that we should be very afraid.

BRIAN STELTER: But you understand that is a pretty incendiary charge, that these people want us to be frightened inappropriately, for unnecessary reasons.

JEREMY SCAHILL: Well, I mean, look, I’ve spent a lot of years investigating how the war contracting industry works. You’ll have these retired generals come on CNN, MSNBC, Fox, and they’ll talk about the danger of a terror group in a particular country. And they’re on the board of a huge weapons manufacturer or a defense company that is going to benefit from an extension of that war, an expansion of that war. Perhaps the biggest violator of this is General Barry McCaffrey, who has made a tremendous amount of money off of war contracting, and then he’s brought onto these networks.

AMY GOODMAN: That is Jeremy Scahill on CNN’s Reliable Sources, hosted by Brain Stelter. Jeremy, if you could take it by there. You were talking about General McCaffrey and others.

JEREMY SCAHILL: Right. I mean, look, we also know that soon after 9/11, the Pentagon expanded its use of a program where they would invite in former U.S. military brass who were serving as pundits on cable news, and they would basically give them talking points that amounted to propaganda, a backdoor way of the war machine being able to spread its message. And then these guys, without disclosing that they were part of these secret meetings, would go on cable networks and project, supposedly as independent analysts, the very policies that Rumsfeld and others at the Pentagon were trying to drive through to the American public. Almost all of these guys who are retired generals and retired brass that appear on these networks have their hand in the war industry to one degree or another. Many of them are making money off of working with risk consultancy firms, where they are going to big multinational corporations and offering them their services analyzing risk in countries around the world. If you remember Paul Bremer, who was put in charge of the occupation of Iraq, what he was doing prior to 9/11 was benefiting off of the notion that companies need to be afraid all around the world and that they need people like him to help them assess their risk and mitigate any kind of potential terrorist actions against these corporations. So, on the one hand, it’s the retired generals and other brass that are working in the war industry.

On the other hand, it’s people like Evan Kohlmann from Flashpoint Partners, who is on MSNBC, who is a total fraud and is constantly brought on as an expert. His so-called expert testimony has been used to put countless people away in prison on very dubious, thin terrorism charges. You have Samuel Laurent, who was on CNN for a couple of days—he’s been missing in action. We don’t know where he is. He doesn’t seem to be on CNN anymore. But Samuel Laurent, who is a French so-called terror expert, is widely viewed in France as a fraud, and people were up in arms when CNNput him on the air as a terrorism expert.

So, you know, part of what I think is the problem here is it’s—you know, CNN has actually really great international reporters, who have great experience on the ground. I have tremendous respect for many journalists, particularly in the international section, of CNN. But then they bring on these analysts who have a vested interest in revving up the fear engine, and they don’t disclose, in many cases, the built-in agenda of particularly some of these retired military people.

AARON MATÉ: Jeremy, as we wrap, I just want to ask you again about the story you broke about al-Qaeda in Yemen taking responsibility for the Charlie Hebdo massacre. What do you see is going on there with them coming forward to say that they financed the brothers, trained them? Because that would presumably invite an intensified U.S. drone war. And what questions or concerns do you have, going forward, in the aftermath of them taking credit?

JEREMY SCAHILL: Well, I mean, you know, this may be somewhat of a cynical read on this, but who really has benefited—the people that really have benefited most from the U.S. drone war in Yemen have not been ordinary Yemenis, have not been the people of the United States. The only real beneficiaries of that policy have been the manufacturers of drones and the missiles fired from the drones, and al-Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula, because when the U.S. conducts a drone strike and they kill innocent civilians, AQAP can use that for propaganda purposes. In the limited cases where they actually have killed individuals from AQAP, then they’re celebrated as martyrs. So I think that part of what AQAP is doing is trying to goad the United States into once again escalating or intensifying its drone campaign inside of Yemen, because it elevates the stature of AQAP. Now, it could be that AQAP had limited involvement and that all of the facts about it are already on the table. My sense is that if AQAP did indeed direct this plot, that they’re going to produce photographic or video evidence to back that up. If they don’t do that, then I think that, you know, it’s likely that the truth is that they had some involvement but were not effectively running the show.

AMY GOODMAN: And finally—we have 20 seconds—what’s repeated on so many networks, that Anwar al-Awlaki, before he was killed in a U.S. drone strike, was behind this terror attack on Charlie Hebdo?

JEREMY SCAHILL: Well, look, I mean, they try to link Anwar al-Awlaki to every plot under the sun. The fact is that Anwar al-Awlaki’s writings and speeches clearly have inspired so-called lone-wolf terrorists. No doubt about that. Whether he was operationally in charge of this is actually kind of a joke. Anwar al-Awlaki was not even mid-level management in AQAP. They’re exploiting his legacy because of the power of nightmares. He speaks in English. He aims his message at a Western, English-speaking audience. So the United States has elevated his status within the organization. AQAP has a leadership structure. Anwar al-Awlaki was not a senior figure within AQAP.

AMY GOODMAN: Jeremy Scahill, we want to thank you for being with us, co-founder of The Intercept, broke the story that AQAP took credit for the Charlie Hebdomassacre in Paris, based on an al-Qaeda source in Yemen. Days later, AQAP put out an official statement confirming it took responsibility. Jeremy’s latest book, Dirty Wars: The World is a Battlefield; his Oscar-nominated film, Dirty Wars, as well. He is an award-winning journalist.

This is Democracy Now! When we come back, we go to Guatemala for a remarkable verdict that has just come down around crimes against humanity. Stay with us.

[break]

AMY GOODMAN: Charlie Haden and the Liberation Music Orchestra, "Spiritual," a song inspired by Medgar Evers, Dr. Martin Luther King and Malcolm X. And to see other choice picks of music inspired by or inspiring Dr. King, you can go todemocracynow.org. A big shout out to Ruth Haden, who is the widow of Charlie Haden, who has joined us today at our studios just to come by and say hi. This isDemocracy Now! I’m Amy Goodman, with Aaron Maté.

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