UPDATED - ColdType

APRIL 4: WHAT WOULD DR. KING
SAY ABOUT ALL OF THIS?
IRONIC isn’t it, that the anniversary of the death
of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr., that apostle of nonviolence,
is being commemorated in a country
mesmerized by all the violence all the time.
Peace coalitions of the kind that Dr. King once
marched with will be devoting this weekend to a
range of anti-war activism. While they march for
peace, military units continue their march on
Baghdad, the first target in what many believe is
a crusade for “region change,” even global
change. (The term regime change is likely to be
dropped now that John Kerry is using it in reference
to the Bush Administration.)
All flights out of Baghdad’s Saddam Hussein
(oops, strike that name) airport have been cancelled
due to invasion. The city is being spooked.
The lights are out. The US military may soon be
in. Bear in mind that what you are watching on
both sides is less a military campaign than a psyops
operation. Already Washington is broadcasting
into Baghdad while its soldiers mow down a
far more poorly equipped Iraqi force. The Arab
press now speaks of the country as a “killing
field.” You know this is real because Ted Koppel
is among those checking in (but not out) from
the airfield. Unlike US airports, security there
was, shall we say, light.
It would be wrong to see this Psyops dimension
only in military terms. It is also being
directed at the American people and world public
opinion with constant events staged for media
consumption.
WAR KILLS JOURNALISTS
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Yesterday, President Bush did one more photoop
and tough-guy speech with thousands of soldiers
saluting like synchronized swimmers
behind him at Camp LeJeune. It had a certain
Nuremberg feel to it. These events are held to
fortify the President’s mental health as well as
convince us that he is still presidential and
actively commander-in-chiefish. The networks
dutifully carry them.
On TV there is as much competitive sniping as
there is on the battlefield, with dueling promos
between Fox and MSNBC and the NY Post targeting
The New York Times in an ideological battle
aimed at further polarizing our politics by
delegitimizing the center.
What are we fighting for?
REUTERS reports that the priorities, they are a
shifting: “When Defense Secretary Donald
Rumsfeld spelled out the eight U.S. objectives in
Iraq on day two of the war, he said the first was
to topple Saddam Hussein and the second to
locate and destroy Iraq’s alleged weapons of
mass destruction.”
On day 10 of the war, Pentagon spokeswoman
Victoria Clarke restated those eight objectives:
Ending the Iraqi president’s rule remained top of
the list, but finding Saddam’s suspected chemical
and biological weapons had slipped to fourth
place, while destroying them dropped to fifth.
Have you see this widely reported?
What’s in store? World War IV!
CNN reports that the Bush Administration is
now talking about fighting World War IV. “Former
CIA Director James Woolsey said Wednes-