Sunday, July 13, 2008

The Murder Trial of George W. Bush?


There are those who say that President George W. Bush should be impeached for intentionally overstating the case for war with Iraq and misleading the American public and Congress about the threat of WMD as well as Saddam Hussein's alleged role in the September 11, 2001 terrorist attacks. Since then, there have been administration insiders like Richard Clarke and Scott McClellan who've written books confirming these long-held suspicions, providing meticulously detailed accounts of how the Busheviks, as early as January 2001, began their mission to manipulate, misrepresent and manufacture evidence in order to justify an invasion.

And then there are those like former criminal prosecutor and best-selling author Vincent Bugliosi who believe mere impeachment is not enough. According to his website, his new book "The Prosecution of George W. Bush for Murder," is "a tight, meticulously researched legal case that puts George W. Bush on trial in an American courtroom for the murder of nearly 4,000 American soldiers fighting the war in Iraq..."

Bugliosi, most famous for prosecuting Charles Manson for the 1969 Tate-LaBianca murders, appeared Friday morning on MSNBC's Morning Joe program with host Joe Scarborough, NBC's Andrea Mitchell and the Boston Globe's Mike Barnicle. Citing reams of documentary evidence to support his contention that Bush should be tried for murder, Bugliosi bases his case not on Bush's false claims of WMD, but rather that the president lied that the WMD posed a grave and imminent threat to the security of the United States, which in turn became the justification for the war.

As just one example, Bugliosi points to Bush's October 7, 2002 speech to the Nation in which the president, for the first time, informed Americans of the "urgent" threat from Saddam and Iraq. Here's a few excerpts from that fateful speech:

"...Tonight I want to take a few minutes to discuss a grave threat to peace, and America's determination to lead the world in confronting that threat...Many Americans have raised legitimate questions: about the nature of the threat; about the urgency of action...First, some ask why Iraq is different from other countries or regimes that also have terrible weapons. While there are many dangers in the world, the threat from Iraq stands alone -- because it gathers the most serious dangers of our age in one place. Iraq's weapons of mass destruction are controlled by a murderous tyrant...who has struck other nations without warning, and holds an unrelenting hostility toward the United States...Saddam Hussein is a homicidal dictator who is addicted to weapons of mass destruction...If we know Saddam Hussein has dangerous weapons today -- and we do -- does it make any sense for the world to wait to confront him as he grows even stronger and develops even more dangerous weapons?...Iraq could decide on any given day to provide a biological or chemical weapon to a terrorist group or individual terrorists. Alliance with terrorists could allow the Iraqi regime to attack America without leaving any fingerprints...We have every reason to assume the worst, and we have an urgent duty to prevent the worst from occurring...I hope this will not require military action, but it may...The attacks of September the 11th showed our country that vast oceans no longer protect us from danger. Before that tragic date, we had only hints of al Qaeda's plans and designs. Today in Iraq, we see a threat whose outlines are far more clearly defined, and whose consequences could be far more deadly. Saddam Hussein's actions have put us on notice, and there is no refuge from our responsibilities..."

The problem with all this, and which Bugliosi also cites, is that just six days prior to Bush's speech the CIA presented him its 2002 assessment entitled Iraq's Continuing Programs for Weapons of Mass Destruction in which it was the consensus of 16 federal intelligence agencies that in fact Saddam and Iraq was not an imminent threat to U.S. security at home. Bush knew all along that his speech was a lie as was the fallacy of an "imminent threat," but he nonetheless pursued his aggressive mission of selling his war to the American people and to Congress. A sales job based on pure lies, deception and misrepresentations that result in over 100,000 deaths. And therein lies Bugliosi's case for murder.

Referring to what is now widely known as the Downing Street Memos, in a March 27, 2006 front-page story the NY Times reported the following:

"In the weeks before the United States-led invasion of Iraq, as the United States and Britain pressed for a second United Nations resolution condemning Iraq, President Bush's public ultimatum to Saddam Hussein was blunt: Disarm or face war. But behind closed doors, the president was certain that war was inevitable. During a private two-hour meeting in the Oval Office on Jan. 31, 2003, he made clear to Prime Minister Tony Blair of Britain that he was determined to invade Iraq without the second resolution, or even if international arms inspectors failed to find unconventional weapons..."Our diplomatic strategy had to be arranged around the military planning," David Manning, Mr. Blair's chief foreign policy adviser at the time, wrote in the memo that summarized the discussion between Mr. Bush, Mr. Blair and six of their top aides. "The start date for the military campaign was now penciled in for 10 March," Mr. Manning wrote, paraphrasing the president. "This was when the bombing would begin."... The memo also shows that the president and the prime minister acknowledged that no unconventional weapons had been found inside Iraq. Faced with the possibility of not finding any before the planned invasion, Mr. Bush talked about several ways to provoke a confrontation, including a proposal to paint a United States surveillance plane in the colors of the United Nations in hopes of drawing fire, or assassinating Mr. Hussein." Five days later Secretary of State Colin L. Powell was scheduled to appear before the United Nations to make Bush's case for war.

Remember the timeline here. This is key. The meeting between Bush and Blair occurred four months after the CIA's report in which it stated that Iraq was not an imminent threat. Yet, not only did Bush continue sounding the alarms over Saddam's WMD, but he and his blood-thirsty neocons--VP Dick Cheney, then-National Security Advisor Condoleeza Rice and Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld--had already secretly drawn up the war plans and were angling to concoct the saleable justification.

And where was the media while the Busheviks were perpetrating these lies in their march to Baghdad? Nowhere. The press was embarrassingly neutered and utterly useless. I recall possibly one or two noble attempts by MSNBC's David Gregory to doggedly get some truth out of Bush during a couple of White House press conferences, but his efforts were summarily dismissed by a smirking Bush, whose smug, arrogant, defiant reply of "I told you, we're not gonna go there, David" was beyond infuriating. Headline: Bush to Media...Fuck Off.. And that was the end of that. America's free press was rendered impotent by a tyrannical president defiantly pissing on the Constitution and laughing about it.

Nothing's changed. It's been five years, a half-trillion dollars and 4000 dead troops since the invasion and the media still has about as much impact as a flaccid wiener in a whorehouse. That was evidenced yet again with Scarborough's interview, or shall I say mocking session, with Bugliosi. Scarborough was noticeably confrontational, to the point of being belligerent in his defense of Bush's march to war. While Bugliosi was diligently trying to demonstrate, from a purely scholarly, legal, non-partisan standpoint, how the U.S. president is responsible for the death of over 100,000 people, Scarborough and Barnicle had that "behind the teacher's back" grinning/laughter thing going on as if they were a couple of high-school cut-ups. While all this was taking place, Mitchell sat in a robotic trance. On multiple occasions, Scarborough repeated the GOP talking point that "everyone said Saddam had WMD." Bugliosi, albeit unsuccessfully, kept trying to hammer home the point that it wasn't Bush's lies about the existence of WMD, but the imminent threat that Bush regurgitated ad nauseum to bolster his case for war.

But that's just the problem. From the start, the media never took this war seriously in terms of its justification; what the sacrifices would be; or its consequences. It never did its job in questioning the obvious lies and misrepresentations. Never held Bush or the administration accountable for its actions, especially when those actions included egregious violations of the U.S. Constitution, international law, the Geneva Conventions, or just plain simple morality and ethics. So why should it start now? It's as if the media at this point needs to remain hands off so as not to call attention to its gross negligence over never being hands on. It may be maddening to watch Scarborough, Barnicle and Mitchell sit it mock judgment and disdain of a former prosecutor presenting a cogent scenario for Bush's indictment for war crimes, but it sure as hell ain't surprising.


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28 comments:

Anonymous said...

REVOLUTION is the Solution!!!

Anonymous said...

Andy, what took you so long to post this? His book has been out since May 27th. The media has completely blacked out his book. This is EXACTLY why Ive been telling the sheeple to stay AWAY from the media---they dont report shit like this! And even the LEFT WING is afraid to talk about this book. Im surprised of the very small mainstream exposure it HAS had. Did you watch his TWO HOUR speech on C-SPAN last night? It re-airs August 3, 2008 at 3pm. I am copying this and sending FREE copies to everyone I know and anyone who will take a free DVD. Get this word out because this mother fucker (Bush) belongs in prison.

My site is www.realtruthonline.blogspot.com

You can see more Bugliosi posts on there. Its about time you caught up with this story and Bugliosi's book Andy. Better late than never.

Anonymous said...

Also, Andy, isnt it interesting that when I bring up things like Operation Northwoods (which was a document created by the Joint Chiefs of Staff in 1962 to justify war with Cuba by means of creating a false flag terror attack on American ships and landmarks by "PAINTING" our OWN planes with Cuban colors to attack ourselves and blame it on Cuba), or I mention the fact that the "Boeing 757" that hit the Pentagon on 9/11 could have very well possibly have been a drone to "look like" an American Airlines plane (since the damage in the Pentagon was so small, there was no fires, no plane parts, and the Pentagon was hit on the very side where they were doing renovation and had very few people in that wedge), I get called a "loon" when we now know for a FACT that Bush himself suggested the VERY SAME scenario (painting planes in order to create a false flag attack) that the "loony" "conspiracy people" believe in?

Here is an excerpt from "Operation Northwoods"--the document that was created to plan a false flag terror attack on Cuba by our OWN planes in 1962 (Kennedy rejected it):

"An aircraft at Elgin AFB would be painted and numbered as an EXACT DUPLICATE for a civil registered aircraft belonging to a CIA proprietary organization in the Miami area. At a designated time the duplicate would be loaded with the selected passengers, all boarded under carefully prepared aliases. The actual registered aircraft would be CONVERTED TO A DRONE."

Andy, tell me why it is so loony and crazy to suggest this very SAME scenario could have happened on 9-11 when 39 years BEFORE 9-11, a scenario was planned to invade Cuba with the very SAME EXACT idea that Bush ADMITTED to concocting in January 2003 in order to invade Iraq (if he found no WMD's)??

Can you answer this?

Anonymous said...

It appears to me that O.J. Simpson was convicted of the death for Nichole on less evidence than we have on Bush. Why is he not "morally and financially" responsible for the deaths of our servicemen in Iraq. I am still courious about the outing of Ms. Plame; that to was a crime which cost lives and treasure, not only American but others who worked for Bruster Jennings.

Anonymous said...

O.J. got off, so will Bush.

Anonymous said...

Al Gore and the Clinton Administration covered up the terror attack on TWA Flight 800. Google it.

Anonymous said...

anon 5:49----O.J. was convicted? when? you're talking about the CIVIL trial---which doesnt mean shit. That trial only had one purpose: So Fred Goldman could hear the word "Guilty". It mattered not that O.J. was put in prison to the Goldman's, he just wanted to hear the word "Guilty" being thrown at O.J. He got off on the criminal one---the one that mattered.

Andy--are you ever going to reply to my above posts?

Anonymous said...

A large number of Americans knew Bush was lying and desperately tried to find support for their views in the papers, on TV -- somewhere. Some even believed that Tony Blair was paid to take sides and support Bush. I still believe this. Even the NY Times supported the war. Democrats supported the war -- I used to scream at Begala and Carville when I watched them on CROSSFIRE. Actually Novak was the only one on that show against the war. Something very large was going on in the country to support that war. I have no idea what but it was bigger than just media supporting it. Even Polosi took impeachment off the table the minute she took office. The Dems and Republicans alike were for the war. Why?

Anonymous said...

Quoting the blogger

"Nothing's changed. It's been five years, a half-trillion dollars and 4000 dead troops since the invasion and the media still has about as much impact as a flaccid wiener in a whorehouse."

You make it sound like the press was/is impotent or incompetent. The fact of the matter it that the main stream media, printed and broadcast, is complicit in George Bush's War. The Washington Post, the WSJ, the New York Times, FOX News, the Weekly Standard, MSNBC, ABC, NBC, and CBS all shilled this war. And anyone who wants to know why they did it needs to look no further that finding out the names and ethnic backgrounds of the men and women who run these organizations. And these same people and organizations are shilling for the attack on Iran.

The war on Iraq was nothing more than a proxy war for Israel. If there is an American attack on Iran it will be nothing more than a proxy war for Israel.

Enough is enough! Let the Israels stew in the mess they have made of the Middle East.

Anyone who want to know the truth can easily find all the information they need by doing a Google search. Here are some topics.

"A Clean Break, A New Strategy for Securing the Realm". This was a policy paper for Isreali Prime Minister Bejamin Netanyahu written by Some of the "Americans" listed below.

Project for a New American Century

Petagon's Office of Special Plans

Richard Perle
David Wolfowitz
Douglas Feith
Michael Ledeen
Elliot Abrams

Nigerian Yellow Cake

JINSA

AIPAC

And if you want to know how good an ally Israel is to the USA look no further than.

www.ussliberty.org

Anonymous said...

We are all still scratching our asses and wondering "Why would they do this?" The answer is ridiculously simple and right under your nose. It was and is, about money. How much cash are Halliburton and other corporate contractors making off the war in Iraq? Get yourself a list of the major stockholders and you will find some very familiar names; Democrats, Republicans, Independents, are all getting rich at the expense of our American military, and at the same time throwing them away like garbage when they are no longer of any use. This is Viet Nam all over again, another war that was waged on behalf of the military-industrial complex, in order for the rich to get richer, while the poor got drafted and sacrificed life and limb. Check out our Podcast Wake Up America at http://www.cyberears.com for this topic and others. Also stop by our website http://www.prysonandpetrone.com, and enlighten yourself. If you're really serious about holding these scumbags accountable then exercise your rights as caring citizens and call your Senators demanding that they take action. The number is (202)224-3121. You can leave a voicemail there for ANY United States Senator. Also visit Democrats.com and sign some of their petitions. Or, you can do nothing other than write posts to blogs and forums in which case the business of these scumbag war criminals will go on permanently. The reason they are getting away with it is that nobody is making his/her voice heard. My generation took to the streets in order to end the war in Viet Nam. The mass media ignored us too, except to label us as communists, hippies and traitors. Ultimately though the great Silent Majority heard our voices and took the G to task.

"Those who do not learn from history are doomed to repeat it."

Anonymous said...

Quoting the blogger

The above comment citing "A Clean Break, A New Strategy for Securing the Realm" was on point.

The TRUTH can't be stated any clearer!

Iraq and Afghanistan was NEVER a threat to America. Both countries were a threat to Israel. So we (American) done the bidding for them, and wasted American lives in the process. Pimped as ususal..

It puzzles me that many Americans are jumping on the band wagon citing an illegal invasion of Iraq (WMD), but fail to mention the illegal invasion of Afghanistan (Opium).. 9/11 was clearly an inside job with the help of the above mentioned Foreign gov't.

Denial of the Truth won't help any during that Great Day of Reckoning that's coming down the road...

Not taking anything away from him, but I wonder why Mr. Vincent Bugliosi puts so much focus on the Iraq invasion and not on 9/11? Not only is the evidence greater, but there are many eyewitness accounts on what happened on that eventful day. Without 9/11, there would have been NO Iraq invasion.

So be cautious and don't get your hopes up to high. If they dismiss 9/11, then everything else is just dog & pony show to me. You can believe otherwise if you will.

And this not about putting Democrats back in office or giving them the power. Stop falling for that sham... The Dems NEVER stopped the war funding, never brought any of our boys or girls home, allowed the FISA bill (Secret Wire Taps) to pass, still allowing Karl Rove to get a pass, and numerous other issues that I can reference.

If you believe in this Democrat -vs- Republican sham, then you have missed the boat. It's about being American, and doing what's in the best interest of our country & our people (White, Black, Brown, Yellow, etc...)

Democrats and Republicans currently in office are not only cowards but traitors to me b/c then are allowing this carnage (Bush junta) to continue unchecked!

They all should be tried for murder and treason. If you disagree, then you eyes have not yet been opened to the TRUTH...

No worries, I'll continue to pray for you and our fallen country!

God Bless...

Anonymous said...

The media had to maintain its stance towards the illegal invasion all the way through, if they do try and reasons with the facts, is like shooting themselves on the foot.
the people who could say the truth as it should be would a complete new owners and new staff of the media...and that is near impossible.
Bugliosi was barking at the wrong tree

Anonymous said...

The damage Busheviks have done to America is incurable the only thing left for American to fix the astronomic damage is prey more often than usual
God is justice and if he consider your prayers he will also have to weight it against the Iraqi unimaginable suffering.

Anonymous said...

I'm young and worried about my country and my future. I've read all the comments and I'm frightened. How can we get our country back, or is it too late?

Anonymous said...

Back OBAMA!? You have got to be kidding! You mean the slave trader who just signed retroactive legislation exonerating telecoms for helping the feds do warrantless searches on whichever citizen they target? The McBama vs O'Cain campaign is a joke: two fascists who have assaulted the bill of Rights head-on. Prosecute the entire Congress, except for Ron Paul and Dennis Kucinich, for treason is more like it!

Anonymous said...

5:17 God bless you and cure you of your self-rightiousness. Or, is it that you can't read English. Have someone read. Anon. 1:33

Anonymous said...

How do we,THE PEOPLE, go about filing a 'Wrongful Death' law suit?
Not just for Iraq and Afghanistan, but for all those lost in 911. Until this is done and those responsible made to pay; we,THE PEOPLE, will have their blood on our hands just as sure as we continue to sit on them. I don't mean just those in this criminal administration, but each and every one who has profited from these most carnal of acts.

Anonymous said...

The conspiracy tools seem to love linkage (Sept 11 and Iraq and Cuba and everything else), like a flip side of the equally loony Bush. And like Bush's whole cloth argument about Saddam's mushroom cloud, it seems ridiculous to dignify their rantings by addressing them. It may be reassuring to believe that Bush and his cohorts have the ability to control history and its consequences (and no doubt they would like to), but every moment of their incompetent reign shows that they can't even fire attorneys, leak CIA operatives, or even lie about WMD without being caught with their pants around their ankles. These guys are ambitious, fucking morons. You endow them (and previous administrations) with a a crazy (and that's why you appear crazy) comic book like power to achieve anything they want. It is fun, I guess, but also nauseating.

Anonymous said...

9:47 Very few "fucking morons" are able to get "caught with their pants around their ankles" and suffer no consequences at all. So, they did get away with it and not only that, they prospered while doing so. Their agenda and purpose were served. They won. We lost. The dead soldiers and civilans lost. They don't care if we know what they did. They got away with it. Jebb might even be president one day.

Anonymous said...

I see Andy is just as scared to answer my question above as he is to address Barack Obama voting for the illegal FISA legislation.

Vierotchka said...

"A sales job based on pure lies, deception and misrepresentations that result in over 100,000 deaths."

You forgot one zero there, it should read "over 1,000,000 deaths".

Anonymous said...

Why are keeping me from posting again? I snuck one post through and you dare not delete it this late. The truth is you care nothing about the truth. You want to bend the debate to your ends. You're not on the Peoples side. You're for the oligrachs who really run this country.

Anonymous said...

He grew up in Minnesota. With Minnesota AirAmerica he talked shop about the censorship. Bestselling author and no bidding for this book. The publisher was _the_ publisher that had the guts for it. Said they had to shop the audio book tie-in to Canada because no place in the U.S. would touch it. The majority of his publicity has been web and it's stil a best seller. I wonder how many of those copies were gifts to Pelosi.

Anonymous said...

It is amazing, don't you think, that the Democratic Congress and President of the mid 1960s consciously and deliberately conjured up a fake event in the Gulf of Tonkin to justify a ware that resulted in more American deaths than there are seats in Yankee Stadium.

Yet no one ever thought of prosecuting them. Certainly not Democrats like Ostroy and his ilk.

More Americans have died in Democrat wars than in anything the GOP did. Truman handed over Eastern Europe to Soviet butchers and he is revered. Go figure.

You guys are just plain hateful people. Logic plays little role. It's all pure, unadulterated hatred.

Anonymous said...

US Military Dead in Vietnam War under Democratic President:20,000

US Military Dead in Vietnam War under Republican President: 38,000

US Military Dead under Democratic Presidents since Vietnam War: 600

US Military Dead under Republican Presidents since Vietnam War: 5000

Anonymous said...

1241

I guess by your logic the Depression was FDR's fault. Hooray for HOOVER!!!!!!!!!!

And by the way, why stop there? Why not go back all the way and list the number of dead that Democrats produced when they insisted on enslaving blacks so strongly that they touched off the bloodiest war in our Nation's history?

You people have enslaving blacks one way or another for 150 years. Too bad they don't see it.

Anonymous said...

Wow, Andy, what a powerful Report (until the last paragraph, of course). You know as well as I that both Obama and McCain will "piss on the Constitution" as you so eloquently put it. Let's not pick (once again) the "lesser of two evils". Let's vote for principles only. Let's vote NOTA! That's: None Of The Above. But since NOTA won't be on the ballot in most states, Write In Ron Paul.

He was the only Constiututionalist on the debate stages, and the media treated him with disdain even as they bowed to Bush.

Can you set Politics aside and consider Principles, instead?

Anonymous said...

4:05 why not consider "intelligence" instead. It would not be wise to write in Ron Paul since he doesn't have a chance of winningand we would have wasted our vote.

Why not elect McCain who is the lesser of the two evils and it will be better if he "messes up" than for a Democrat to do so. Then after his four years we can elect a really strong, capable Democratic or Independent candidate, if we can find one. That's the problem. Maybe Paul would be better positioned then.