{"id":6214,"date":"2010-05-29T12:08:17","date_gmt":"2010-05-29T19:08:17","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.struat.com\/election\/?p=6214"},"modified":"2010-05-29T12:08:17","modified_gmt":"2010-05-29T19:08:17","slug":"playing-saddam","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/www.struat.com\/election\/2010\/05\/29\/playing-saddam\/","title":{"rendered":"playing Saddam."},"content":{"rendered":"

Have you heard about those crazy conspiracy theories <\/a>believed by people in Pakistan, and pushed forward by their media?<\/p>\n

Americans may think that the failed Times Square bomb was planted by a man named Faisal Shahzad. But the view in the Supreme Court Bar Association here in Pakistan\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s capital is that the culprit was an American \u00e2\u20ac\u0153think tank.\u00e2\u20ac\u009d
\n<\/em>No one seems to know its name, but everyone has an opinion about it. It is powerful and shadowy, and seems to control just about everything in the American government, including President Obama.
\n<\/em>\u00e2\u20ac\u0153They have planted this character Faisal Shahzad to implement their script,\u00e2\u20ac\u009d said Hashmat Ali Habib, a lawyer and a member of the bar association. […]<\/em><\/p>\n

One of those pundits is Zaid Hamid, a fast-talking, right-wing television personality who rose to fame on one of Pakistan\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s 90 new private television channels.
\n<\/em>He uses Google searches to support his theory that India, Israel and the United States \u00e2\u20ac\u201d through their intelligence agencies and the company formerly known as Blackwater \u00e2\u20ac\u201d are conspiring to destroy Pakistan.
\n<\/em>For Mr. Hamid, the case of Mr. Shahzad is one piece of a larger puzzle being assembled to pressure Pakistan. Why, otherwise, the strange inconsistencies, like the bomb\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s not exploding? \u00e2\u20ac\u0153If you connect the dots, you have a pretty exciting story,\u00e2\u20ac\u009d he said.<\/em><\/p>\n

Really strange what those Pakistanis would believe<\/a>\u00c2\u00a0about a clandestine American government and its clandestine activities.<\/p>\n

Unnamed former officers told the Washington Post it was one of a number of outlandish plans thought up to discredit the Iraqi dictator before the 2003 American-led invasion.
\n“It would look like it was taken by a hidden camera,” said one. “Very grainy, like it was a secret videotaping of a sex session.”
\n<\/em>Hm.
\nReportedly this was dropped because …
\nA third former officer said: “Saddam playing with boys would have no resonance in the Middle East \u00e2\u20ac\u201c nobody cares.
\n<\/em>Sigh.\u00c2\u00a0 Also note the cultural problem within the CIA: \u00c2\u00a0A second former CIA officer said the plots were obviously ludicrous and “came from people whose careers were spent in Latin America or East Asia”.\u00c2\u00a0 <\/em>Such is the problem with the retreads from the Reagan Administration, I suppose.
\nThe one line that has gotten the conspiracy theorists of the “9\/11 is an inside job” school excited in this country (and any other country, I guess) is:
\nAccording to the officer, the CIA did make a video apparently showing Osama bin Laden and his al-Qaeda lieutenants sitting beside a campfire quaffing bottles of alcoholic drinks and discussing their sexual trysts with boys.<\/em><\/p>\n

The “CIA played Osama Bin Laden” part, mind ye.\u00c2\u00a0 It is round about there that in the “Is Birtherism or Trutherism” — both tedious objects worthy of scorn — the least demented conspiracy theory — the answer is Trutherism — sorry Jonah Goldberg<\/a>.\u00c2\u00a0 Birtherism ends up parked at sniping at one individual.\u00c2\u00a0 Trutherism fades into the shadowy network of clandestine operations.\u00c2\u00a0 Then again, the National Review is staffed by people who took Oliver North as a reasonable Senate candidate, so our biases slide forward to the forefront.<\/p>\n

Skipping right ahead to the situation in Korea.\u00c2\u00a0 What the North Korean media is reporting<\/a>:
\nThe Korean people have been indignant at the anti-DPRK confrontation escalated by the south Korean puppets since the sinking of their warship “Cheonan”.
\nRi Un Chon, 45, a department director of the Ministry of Metal Industry, told KCNA that the Lee Myung Bak regime made public false “results of investigation” into the incident to mislead public opinion inside and outside and isolate and stifle the DPRK.
\nAccusing the regime of trying to inflict a nuclear war holocaust upon the Korean nation, he said the Korean workers, who have gained in strength under the Songun politics, show no mercy to the enemy.
\nThey are resolved to annihilate the aggressors to defend leader Kim Jong Il and the socialist system if the enemy dare to invade the DPRK, he said, adding:
\nThe south Korean regime’s foolish attempt to impede the advance of the DPRK will only make the Korean workers harden their resolve.<\/em>
\nAlso<\/a>:
\nThe United States is taking the lead in disturbing the world […]<\/em><\/p>\n

I think this is the People’s Democratic Republic’s version of a “Water Skiing Squirrel” story<\/a>:<\/p>\n

The technological updating of the Taedonggang Beer Factory here has made rapid progress, doubling its production capacity as compared with that at its outset. As a result, both draft beer and bottled beer are now being supplied to the capital city and various provinces on a regular basis.
\nThe factory built in Juche 91 (2002) set up several more fermentation and storing tanks and the process for the production of hop granules as required by the new century. It is also fitted with nitrogen generation and barley sorting and other equipment.<\/em><\/div>\n
\nWorth a read about Korea: Christopher Hitchens<\/a>.<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Have you heard about those crazy conspiracy theories believed by people in Pakistan, and pushed forward by their media? Americans may think that the failed Times Square bomb was planted by a man named Faisal Shahzad. But the view in the Supreme Court Bar Association here in Pakistan\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s capital is that the culprit was an […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-6214","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.struat.com\/election\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6214","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.struat.com\/election\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.struat.com\/election\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.struat.com\/election\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.struat.com\/election\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=6214"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"http:\/\/www.struat.com\/election\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6214\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":6215,"href":"http:\/\/www.struat.com\/election\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6214\/revisions\/6215"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.struat.com\/election\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=6214"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.struat.com\/election\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=6214"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.struat.com\/election\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=6214"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}