From: John K Clark (jonkc@att.net)
Date: Mon Jul 15 2002 - 10:05:22 MDT
"Damien Broderick" <d.broderick@english.unimelb.edu.au> Wrote:
>do you *really* think that the paragraphs I just cited from
>Pilger's book extract in the Observer contain no facts?
Ok, I went a little over the top. Certainly there is plenty to criticize the
USA for, the acquittal of three anti-Castro terrorists who hijacked a plane
to Miami was a disgrace, I don't like the concentration camp in Cuba, I
don't like putting people in prison without even charging them and the FBI
checking what books people read in the library makes me very nervous. And
it's true "the Bush regime has torn up the Kyoto treaty" but they almost
make that sound like a bad thing. I should not have said there were no facts
rather that the signal to noise (and I do mean noise) ratio is so low as to
be useless.
For example, I think it is a tad of an exaggeration to say that America is
"the most enduring menace, and source of terror"
as is "Al-Qaeda's training camps in Afghanistan were kindergartens
compared with the world's leading university of terrorism at Fort Benning
in Georgia".
I think Israel has done a lot of bad and foolish things but to
call Ariel Sharon "the supreme terrorist" is going a little far don't you
think.
I do not believe it is a fact that "Not a single al-Qaeda leader of
importance has been caught", and I am sure it is flat out untrue that
"the coming attack has nothing to do with Saddam Hussein's 'weapons
of mass destruction", remember the man said atom bombs and germ warfare
have NOTHING to due with it. The Author says the real reason America might
go to war "is that America wants a more compliant thug to run the world's
second greatest source of oil".
How the writer was able to determine this mind set in the leaders of the USA
he does not say.
He does say "There is no war on terrorism" and "Iraq is a nation held
hostage to an American-led embargo every bit as barbaric as the
dictatorship" and "the United States as both a terrorist state and a haven
for terrorists". To be fair he says "We, too, watched with shock the
horrific events of September 11" however, as is standard practice with
the apologists of barbarians whenever they express the slightest misgivings
about that infamous day, the very next word out of his mouth is "But".
Then with unintended humor he writes "These facts will no doubt beckon
the inane slur of anti-Americanism". Gee, I wonder why.
As I said, as a work of propaganda it is poor, you've got to at least
pretend to be impartial and any hope of that was blown when he said
"As Noam Chomsky has pointed out [...]"
John K Clark jonkc@att.net
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