An MSNBC.com report on the bin Laden tape carried the following sentence:
"At the same time, the message also called on Iraqis to rise up and oust
Iraqi President Saddam Hussein, who is a secular leader." This clearly
confirms the clarity of mind Osama bin Laden displayed in regard to Saddam
Hussein, and conforms to the recorded message heard by millions and
millions of people around the world.

Less than twenty minutes after this report appeared on MSNBC, that
sentence was deleted from the report. A few intrepid Internet news
junkies, including myself, preserved what is called a 'screen-grab' of the
original article before it was scrubbed. The version of the article
currently in existence has replaced the text above with this far more
benign text: "The taped statement reflected Saddam, a secular leader, but
made it clear that Saddam was not the immediate target." A similar story
line, bereft of the portions describing bin Laden's wish that Hussein be
killed, has appeared in virtually every mainstream news media report on
the matter.

http://truthout.org/docs_02/021303A.htm>http://truthout.org/docs_02/021303A.htm

OSAMA RALLIES MUSLIMS, CONDEMNS HUSSEIN

t r u t h o u t Wednesday 12 February 2003
By William Rivers Pitt

*William Rivers Pitt is a New York Times bestselling author of two
books - "War On Iraq" (with Scott Ritter) available now from Context
Books, and "The Greatest Sedition is Silence," available in May 2003 from
Pluto Press. He teaches high school in Boston, MA. Scott Lowery
contributed research to this report.

Osama bin Laden rose from the dead yet again on Tuesday to prophesy doom
and death for America. This is nothing new; he has been clawing his way
out of various burial holes for seventeen months now, and always manages
to strike fear into the American heart by way of the American media and
the Bush administration at exactly the moment when incredibly important
shifts in history are in the offing.

At this moment, George W. Bush stands almost completely alone in his
desire to make pre-emptive war on the nation of Iraq. Several key NATO
allies - France, Germany and Belgium among them - have thrown sand into
the gears of battle by refusing to prepare Turkey for an immediate war
they do not support nor deem necessary. As this incredible state of
affairs unfolded, Americans found their ears ringing with orange-hued
warnings of imminent death. Homeland Security Director Tom Ridge went so
far as to tell people to load up on plastic sheeting and duct tape so as
to bar their windows from chemical attack, but the administration he calls
home made sure to tell people to live their lives normally and continue
shopping.

And so it goes. This is fairly standard stuff within the American echo
chamber. Let there be one important piece of legislation, or one highly
embarrassing turn of events for the administration, and the word goes
forth that the sky is falling. We have been dealing with this politically
manufactured low-grade hysteria for many months now. Most Americans have
reached a suspended state of disbelief about it all, and won't be taking
these warnings seriously unless they see Osama bin Laden on their doorstep
in a black cassock with scythe in hand. Bush and Ashcroft will soon run
out of colors on the warning chart if this keeps up; the shade after red
likely exists somewhere in the fourth dimension, visible only to
ultraconservative war-hawks and media talking heads.

When the voice of Osama comes out of the television, however, things
suddenly become much more serious. The Bush administration may have
forgotten him entirely, but every single American still sleeps with
visions of burning towers and plummeting bodies projected on the backs of
their eyelids. Peter Bergen, noted terrorism expert, stated on CNN that
such messages from bin Laden usually herald new attacks. If the Orange
Alert was dubious on Monday, it was given new importance on Tuesday.

Secretary of State Colin Powell set the stage for this new bin Laden
statement early on Tuesday, much to the surprise of CIA Director George
Tenet. Powell, during testimony at a Senate Budget Committee meeting, let
it drop that the Middle East news network Al Jazeera had in hand a tape of
Osama bin Laden. Tenet, seated with the Intelligence Committee, had not
heard of this tape. One is left wondering at Powell's sources, especially
after the story unfolded.

Powell used the existence of this tape, and the words he claimed bin Laden
had said on it, to further tie Saddam Hussein to international terrorism.
He claimed bin Laden was clearly establishing a connection between himself
and Hussein on the tape, beyond all question. "This nexus between
terrorists and states that are developing weapons of mass destruction,"
said Powell, "can no longer be looked away from and ignored."

The actual tape, played and translated live on every major cable news
channel, told a very different story. Osama bin Laden swore vengeance
against America if Iraq was attacked, and demanded that the Muslim world
stand in solidarity with the Muslim people of Iraq. In very clear words,
Osama bin Laden told the people of Iraq to rise up against both American
aggression and against "socialist" Saddam Hussein. If the translations
that were provided were reliable, there is no ambiguity in bin Laden's
words on the matter. So much, it seems, for Powell's case that Hussein and
bin Laden are working together.

And this is where it gets interesting.

An MSNBC.com report on the bin Laden tape carried the following sentence:
"At the same time, the message also called on Iraqis to rise up and oust
Iraqi President Saddam Hussein, who is a secular leader." This clearly
confirms the clarity of mind Osama bin Laden displayed in regard to Saddam
Hussein, and conforms to the recorded message heard by millions and
millions of people around the world.

Less than twenty minutes after this report appeared on MSNBC, that
sentence was deleted from the report. A few intrepid Internet news
junkies, including myself, preserved what is called a 'screen-grab' of the
original article before it was scrubbed. The version of the article
currently in existence has replaced the text above with this far more
benign text: "The taped statement reflected Saddam, a secular leader, but
made it clear that Saddam was not the immediate target." A similar story
line, bereft of the portions describing bin Laden's wish that Hussein be
killed, has appeared in virtually every mainstream news media report on
the matter.

The manner in which this story unfolded brings forth a number of serious
questions.

First of all, questions must be asked regarding Colin Powell's motives in
this. The recording heard by the world diverged significantly from the
spin Powell put on it before the Budget Committee. Osama bin Laden did not
state an alliance with Saddam Hussein, but with the Muslim civilians in
Iraq who will bear the bloody brunt of any American attack. In fact, bin
Laden told the Iraqi people to rise up against Hussein. This is not the
way allies deal with each other.

Why would Powell go to such lengths to stretch the glaringly obvious truth
in this matter? He is already suffering from a deficit of credibility in
the aftermath of the plagiarism scandal that is currently rocking Tony
Blair's administration. Powell stood before the UN last week and praised a
British intelligence dossier that contained cut-and-pasted pages and pages
of an essay, with all spelling and grammatical errors intact, written by a
postgraduate student from California. The data was years out of date,
flat-out contradictory in several key areas, used without the student's
awareness, and yet was offered as an up-to-the-minute assessment of Iraqi
weapons capabilities.

This, in combination with Powell's obviously skewed interpretation of
Tuesday's bin Laden recording, forces us to call into question every
single word he and the Bush administration have said on the matter. The
question of whether Saddam Hussein has ties to al Qaeda terrorism and
Osama bin Laden can be put to bed now, it seems, alongside the tatters and
shreds of honor and dignity formerly enjoyed by the Secretary of State.

More ominously, why would a news network like MSNBC so obviously haul
water for the failed allegations of the Bush administration? Events happen
in seconds on the internet, but merely scrubbing uncomfortable sentences
from articles cannot stop the tens of thousands of readers who are wise
enough now to save the evidence before it evaporates in a cloud of
silicon.

These deletions display a manifest breach of faith on behalf of MSNBC, and
call to mind issues surrounding the conflict of interest that are inherent
in the ownership of this network. MSNBC, along with NBC and CNBC, are
owned by the corporate giant General Electric. GE is one of the largest
defense contractors on the face of the earth, and will, bluntly, be paid a
king's ransom in the event of a war. Following this line of questioning
leads to some dark corners, indeed. How often is the data being
manipulated by the corporate-owned media? Are we to rely solely on the
nimble fingers of keyboarded citizens to get to the heart of the matter?

A report appearing later on Tuesday on MSNBC.com served to refute the
claims of collusion between bin Laden and Hussein. "Although Powell sought
to characterize the tape as a concrete link between al-Qaida and the Iraqi
government," the MSNBC.com report read, "White House officials
acknowledged later to NBC News that it did not. Powell did not know it had
not been broadcast when he spoke to the committee and was 'a little on the
front of his skis,' a government source said." These lines were buried
deep within the report.

By Wednesday morning, this text had been completely removed from the
article.

Virtually the entire global community stands against us today on the
subject of this war, with nations willing and able to destroy NATO before
allowing it to take place. The Bush administration has cut billions of
dollars from street-level homeland defenders like police forces and fire
houses, yet has the eagle screaming for a war that will be fought
simultaneously in downtown Baghdad and in your utterly undefended
neighborhood. They have the gall, simultaneously, to speak of trillion
dollar tax cuts for rich people that will further debilitate our budgetary
ability to defend ourselves. Links between Osama bin Laden and Saddam
Hussein have proven to be not only false, but laughable. The credibility
of the Bush administration has been destroyed.

And yet we go, with the news media whistling 'Onward Christian Soldiers'
all the while. The Bush administration is ecstatic, believing they can
spin bin Laden's statement of support for Iraqi civilians into a
connection between the terrorist and Hussein.

You are being lied to, clumsily.

Pass it on.

Page created February 14, 2003 by Charlie Jenks.