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* Who were the Israelis living next to Mohammed Atta? * What was in that Moving Van on the New Jersey shore? * Was the Mossad Tracking the 9/11 Hijackers in the US? * How did two hijackers end up on the Watch List weeks before 9/11?
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Exclusive to CounterPunch Newsletter Subscribers! WHAT DID ISRAEL KNOW IN ADVANCE OF THE SEPTEMBER 11 ATTACKS? * Those Celebrating "Movers" and Art Student Spies
* Who were the Israelis living next to Mohammed Atta?
* What was in that Moving Van on the New Jersey shore?
* Was the Mossad Tracking the 9/11 Hijackers in the US?
* How did two hijackers end up on the Watch List weeks before 9/11?At last, the answers. Read Christopher Ketcham's exclusive expose in CounterPunch special double-issue February newsletter. Plus, Cockburn and St. Clair on how this story was suppressed and ultimately found its home in CounterPunch. Get your copy today by subscribing online or calling 1-800-840-3683 Remember contributions to CounterPunch are tax-deductible. Click here to make a donation. If you find our site useful please: Subscribe Now
Get CounterPunch By Email for Only $35 a Year Landau at UC Santa Cruz; Cockburn in San Francisco
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Today's Stories February 26, 2007 Bill Quigley February 24 / 25, 2007 Jeffrey St.
Clair R. T. Naylor Gary Leupp Saul Landau Ron Jacobs Jeffrey Blankfort Chris Sands Gary Freeman Larry Portis P. Sainath Lee Sustar Kevin Wehr Ken Couesbouc Soffiyah Elijah Kathlyn Stone Dave Lindorff Jason Kunin Kevin Zeese Remi Kanazi Missy Beattie Poets' Basement Website of the Weekend
February 23, 2007 Franklin Spinney Jonathan Cook Patrick Cockburn Kathy Kelly Chris Dols Evelyn Pringle Stephen Pearcy Dan Brook Yifat Susskind Website of
the Day
February 22, 2007 Robert Fantina Tariq Ali Michael Shank John Ross Christopher Brauchli Cindy Litman Niranjan Ramakrishnan Kevin Zeese Aseem Shrivastava Reza Fiyouzat Illinois Students Against the
War Website of
the Day
February 21, 2007 Maass / St.
Clair Sharon Smith Greg Moses Margaret Kimberly Ralph Nader Nicola Nasser Mike Whitney Tao Ruspoli Byeong Jeongpil Corporate Crime
Reporter Josh Mahan Website of
the Day
February 20, 2007 Sgt. Martin
Smith Werther Corporate Crime Reporter Carl G. Estabrook China Hand Joshua Frank Megan Boler John Feffer Daryll E. Ray Alan Gregory Website of the Day
February 19, 2007 Paul Craig
Roberts Gary Leupp Ron Jacobs Michael F.
Brown Robert Jensen Roger Burbach Monica Benderman Sonja Karkar John Walsh Talli Nauman Website of the Day
Feburary 17 / 18, 2007 Alexander Cockburn Tao Ruspoli Gary Leupp Jeffrey St.
Clair Roger Morris Uri Avnery James Brooks Sen. Russell
Feingold Linn Washington, Jr. Michele Brand Fred Gardner Mitchel Cohen Mike Ferner David Swanson P. Sainath Mike Stark Missy Beattie Jonathan Franklin Website of the Weekend
Marc Levy Andrew Cockburn Glen Ford Greg Moses Ron Jacobs John W. Farley James Marc Leas Tim Rinne Albert Wan Website of
the Day
Patrick Cockburn Saul Landau Stephen Lendman Evelyn Pringle Michael Simmons Kevin Zeese Dave Lindorff Pete Shanks Peter Rost Lenni Brenner
/ Gilad Atzmon Website of the Day
February 14, 2007 Tao Ruspoli Dick J. Reavis Margaret Kimberly Christopher Brauchli Paul Craig
Roberts John Ross Michael F.
Brown Dave Lindorff J.L. Chestunut,
Jr. Don Fitz Michael Donnelly Dr. Susan Block Website of
the Day
February 13, 2007 Uri Avnery Patrick Cockburn Ralph Nader Marjorie Cohn Col. Dan Smith Col. Douglas
MacGreagor Thomas Power Nicola Nasser David Swanson Columbia Coalition
Against the War Website of the Day
February 12, 2007 Patrick Cockburn Paul Craig
Roberts John Walsh Dr. John Carroll,
MD Greg Moses Nicole Colson Dave Lindorff Ray McGovern Doug Giebel David Swanson Website of the Day
February
10 /11, 2007 Alexander Cockburn Gabriel Kolko Patrick Cockburn Jeffrey St.
Clair Kevin Alexander Gray M. Shahid Alam Greg Moses Paul Craig
Roberts George Ciccariello-Maher Kevin Zeese Turner / Kim George Duke Walter Brasch Shepherd Bliss Missy Beattie Peter Harley Pat Wolff Poets' Basement Website of the Day
Conn Hallinan Gary Leupp Lee Sustar Nikolas Kozloff Newton Garver Yitzhak Laor Dave Lindorff David Swanson Website of the Day
February 8, 2007 John V. Walsh Marjorie Cohn Trish Schuh Ron Jacobs Laura Carlsen Ramzy Baroud Brenda Norrell Bryan Farrell Judith Scherr Website of
the Day
February 7, 2007 Daniel Wolff Tao Ruspoli Tony Swindell Sharon Smith Ken Couesbouc Jeff Cohen Col. Dan Smith Tom Kerr Joshua Frank Adam Elkus Stephen Fleischman Website of
the Day
February 6, 2007 Diana Johnstone Gregory Wilpert Norman Solomon Dave Lindorff William Blum Mike Ferner CP News Service Evelyn Pringle Christopher Brauchli Alan Cabal Website of the Day
Dave Zirin Uri Avnery Ron Jacobs Paul Craig Roberts Newton Garver Bruce Anderson Saul Landau Ralph Nader James T. Phillips Mike Whitney Kenneth Rexroth Website of the Day
Alexander Cockburn Tao Ruspoli Jeffrey St.
Clair Patrick Cockburn P. Sainath Sen. Russell Feingold Diane Christian Brian Cloughley Diana Barahona Timothy J. Freeman Conn Hallinan John Ross Greg Moses Missy Beattie Joshua Frank Evelyn Pringle Stephen Fleischman Muhammad Idrees Ahmad Poets' Basement Website of the Day
Chris Kutalik R. Gibson /
E. W. Ross Pam Martens John Feffer Daryll E. Ray Ronald Bruce
St. John Mitchel Cohen Website of
the Day
Diane Farsetta Marjorie Cohn Mark Scaramella Ranni Amiri Christopher Ketcham Winston Warfield Corporate Crime Reporter Thomas P. Healy Website of the Dau
January 31, 2007 Patrick Cockburn Jean Bricmont Tao Ruspoli James T. Phillips William Johnson Tim Wilkinson Evelyn Pringle Joshua Frank Ramzy Baroud Mickey Z. Website of the Day
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February 26, 2007 Everything He Touches Turns Into Someone Else's GoldDoomsday Dick and the Plague of FrogsBy MIKE WHITNEY Gold traders love Dick Cheney. Every time he opens his twisted lip and barks out another threat to Iran, the dollar takes a powder and gold futures shoot to the moon. Maybe that's the way Cheney likes it. After all, he dumped about $25 million in euro-bonds before he took office. Judging by the way he and brother-Bush have flogged dollar, he must have doubled his investment by now. The old greenback has dropped nearly 35% in the last 6 years while gold has just about tripled. In 2000 the dollar was a trim, sinewy pillar of strength. It entered the ring like a young Mohammed Ali; darting to and fro while pummeling his prey with quick laser-like blows that were barely visible. Now, the greenback plods along like a 60 year old Rocky Balboa, wheezing heavily and reeling with every punch; waiting for the one roundhouse that will leave him staring up from the canvas, spitting up broken teeth and blood. The dollar's in a heap o' trouble and "Doomsday" Dick is doing his level-best to make sure that it hits the skids before he leaves office. Just yesterday the snappish Vice President said, "It would be a serious mistake if a nation like Iran were to become a nuclear power. Then he added ominously, "All options are still on the table." That comment put the dollar on its backside and sent Tokyo gold futures to a 21 year high. Good work, Dick. At present, the rest of the world is wondering if dollar's going to pull through without a nervous breakdown. Central banks in Europe, Japan, and China have increased their money supply and kept rates low in order to prop up the droopy greenback. But that won't last. Eventually, they'll all have to raise rates to slow inflation and stop equity bubbles from getting out of control. (The Chinese stock market rose by a whopping 140% in one year. They probably don't like the prospect of a Dot.com-type meltdown like we had in the US.) Regrettably, once interest rates start to rise, the dollar will quickly slip from view leaving nothing but a trail of vapor behind. It's astonishing how cavalier Cheney and the gaggle of racketeers at the Federal Reserve have been regarding the dollar. After all, why kill the goose that lays the golden egg? As the world's "reserve currency" the fed can simply print out a couple trillion whenever it comes up short and bring back boatloads of sleek, Chinese manufactured goods or tankers weighed down with petroleum to power our boxcar-sized SUVs. Or, maybe, Bernanke would rather crank-out another $12 billion in crisp $100 bills, shrink-wrapped and loaded onto pallets and sent off to Iraq where they can vanish in the black hole of corporate malfeasance. That's not a problem as long as the world keeps accepting our "overdrawn" checks. But what happens when the rest of the world sees that the "stewards of the global economic system" (that's us) are nothing but a bunch of Texas yahoos, religious zealots, and war-mongering boneheads? See, the funny thing about money is that it requires confidence in the provider that he will honor his part of the deal and operate in good faith. Otherwise, no one would dream of exchanging valuable resources and manufactured goods for silly, green tokens of credit-based fiat money with squiggly writing and funny looking men in powdered wigs on it. We all expect money to have value, and yet, the Bush team continues to sabotage the currency with their unfunded tax cuts, their $9 per month war in Iraq, and their 35% expansion of the federal government. (Remember when Clinton said the "era of big government is over"?) The result of this craziness was thoroughly predictable; central banks are running for the exits. Last Firday, the government reported that net capital inflows reversed from the requisite $70 billion to AN OUTFLOW OF $11 BILLION! The current account deficit (which includes the trade deficit) is running at roughly $800 billion per year, which means that the US must attract about $70 billion per month of foreign investment (US Treasuries or securities) to compensate for America's extravagant spending. When foreign investment stumbles, as it did in December, it puts downward pressure on the dollar. So what does it all mean? It means they don't want our stinking greenbacks. And, if they don't resume purchasing our debt (US Treasuries or securities) the dollar will join Rocky Balboa on the canvas peering out blankly at the klieg lights. Just last week, the Royal Bank of Scotland conducted a survey which showed that Central Banks in Italy, Switzerland and Sweden have made "major adjustments" in their stockpiles of dollars. The cutbacks raise the fear that a stampede away from the dollar could begin at any time, triggering a global currency crisis of biblical proportions. "The full faith and credit" of the US Dollar does not mean what it did 6 years ago. That's a fact. The Bush-Cheney-Federal Reserve axis believe they can keep this ponzi-scheme going by cornering the oil market (attacking Iran) and forcing the petroleum-thirsty world to accept our feeble banknotes. But that's just nuts. The Chinese are already killing us by buying up oil and natural gas leasing rights around the world WITH OUR OWN DOLLARS! We're getting beat with our own stick. It wasn't supposed to work that way. We thought we were being clever by destroying the American labor movement and shipping our industry to China. We figured we could trounce the middle class at home while putting the "fear o' god" in the Chinese with our "shock and awe" military that was supposed to be out of Iraq in 3 years at the most. How's that working out? Now the housing-bubble albatross is dragging down millions of home owners while the maxed out American consumer is down to his last credit card. In other words, the $11 trillion of new debt that was cleverly engineered through Greenspan's low interest rate bonanza is about to detonate and bring the whole, wretched tower of American debt crashing to earth. The whole mess could have been avoided with responsible leadership. If Bush's wasteful tax cuts had gone to the middle class they would have stimulated positive growth in the economy and reduced the widening wealth gap. If Greenspan had raised interest rates in 2001 it would have slowed down new home construction and circumvented the housing bubble. If Bush had negotiated with Saddam, he could have secured oil-leasing rights (which Saddam offered in the weeks before March 2003) without dragging the country to war. Instead, the economy is facing disaster; the dollar is shaky, gold is soaring, personal savings rates are shrinking, margin debt is skyrocketing, foreign investment is drying up, home sales are plummeting, and Dick "Last throes" Cheney wants to expand the war to Iran. All we're missing is a "plague of frogs." Cheney is still convinced he can pull off his whacko scheme to control Middle East oil and, thus, force the world to take worthless sheets of green scrip that're backed up by $8.7 trillion of debt and wouldn't even make good bird-cage liner. It's madness. Mike Whitney lives in Washington state. He can
be reached at: fergiewhitney@msn.com |
CounterPunch Books The Gang's All Here: Judy Miller, Bob Woodward, Jeffrey Goldberg, Rupert Murdoch, Bill O'Reilly...End Times Leaves No Reputation Unstained!  Buy End Times Now! CounterPunch Books! Saul Landau's Bush and Botox World with a Foreword by Gore Vidal  Click Here to Order!  Michael Neumann's Devastating Rebuttal of Alan Dershowitz Grand Theft Pentagon: Tales of Greed and Profiteering in the War on Terror by Jeffrey St. Clair           The Occupation by Patrick Cockburn           Bruce Springsteen On Tour By Dave Marsh                  |
