Re: Rumsfeld (at the CFR) Zeros in on the Internet
Gitchee Gumee wrote:
Rumsfeld Zeros in on the Internet
By Mike Whitney 02/24/06
http://informationclearinghouse.info/article12060.htm
Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld was warmly greeted at the recent meeting of the Council on Foreign Relations. The CFR is the hand-picked assemblage of western elites from big-energy, corporate media, high-finance and the weapons industry. These are the 4,000 or so members of the American ruling class who determine the shape of policy and ensure that the management of the global economic system remains in the hands of U.S. bluebloods.
The CFR is far from a hostile crowd, but it wasn’t as warm as this says. Here are some of the questions Rummy was asked http://cfr.org/publication/9900/new_realities_in_the_media_age.html:
QUESTIONER: Esther Newberg, ICM. Mr. Secretary, Don Imus has been trying to raise $10 million this week to build a hospital in New Mexico to help kids coming back without arms and limbs from Iraq and Afghanistan. My question is, you’ve asked the government, I think, for $65 billion more dollars-the Congress. Isn’t our first obligation, sir, to take care of these children that are fighting the war for all of us old people sitting in this room and all over America?
QUESTIONER: Thank you. Toby Gati, Akin Gump. Mr. Secretary, you- RUMSFELD: I couldn’t understand you. I’m sorry. QUESTIONER: Toby Gati, Akin Gump. RUMSFELD: Oh, Bob Strauss’s outfit. QUESTIONER: Yes. Yes. In your closing comments, you said something very important, that free people exposed to information will make the right decision. And I know you were calling for foreigners to get more information, mainly from us. But in case after case, we are hearing from the administration the need to keep information from the American public, whether-and all of it in the name of national security, whether it’s our right to know through expanded congressional hearings, or executive privilege, or the idea that an average citizen who hears classified information will be subject to U.S. laws from disseminating that-and I speak as being a former assistant secretary for Intelligence and Research, so I know what that means. And it just-I just wonder if-don’t you think it would be nice if we weren’t always talking about the need to make our debates less inclusive, get less information for our own people when we talk to foreigners, because if foreigners get their own television, they also hear what we’re saying to our own people, and it seems that we’re really not trusting our own people the way you’re saying we should trust foreigners with the truth.
QUESTIONER: Thank you. Mr. Secretary, Andrea Mitchell from NBC News. RUMSFELD: You’re kidding. (Laughter.) QUESTIONER: Yes, sir. Last night, Secretary-General Kofi Annan said that he believes based partly on this latest report from a panel to the United Nations that the human rights abuses that were alleged at Guantanamo were severe enough that Guantanamo should be closed as soon as possible. And I’m wondering if you can respond to that. I know the administration has said that the people doing the report never got to Guantanamo, but it was, they claim, because they were told they could not do any interviews if they did go there. So I’m wondering, what do you see as the timetable, if any, for dealing with Guantanamo and for moving people into a state where they either prosecuted or released, as Mr. Annan suggested they should be?
QUESTIONER: Raghida Dergham (ph) of Al-Hayat. My question is about Iran, but I want to follow up on Guantanamo. Those people did not get there, sir, because you did not allow them to have interviews with the detainees in Guantanamo. And we have our friends, such as Blair and others, telling us, close down that facility. So since this is a war of manipulation of the media and we’ve been in the media reduced in this speech to simply pawns in this war of manipulation, I’d like that follow-up. But on Iran, sir- RUMSFELD: What was the question? QUESTIONER: The question is that why didn’t you allow them to interview the detainees? That was the condition. You said to them, no, you cannot interview them.
QUESTIONER: I’m Carroll Bogert from Human Rights Watch. (Laughter.) You want to wrestle, Mr. Secretary? (Laughter.) RUMSFELD: I thought this was the Council on Foreign Relations! (Laughter.) QUESTIONER: It is. QUESTIONER: You bet it is. RUMSFELD: (Laughs.) QUESTIONER: There have been many panels and commissions that have looked into the question of abuse of detainees in U.S. custody. RUMSFELD: Right. QUESTIONER: But not one of them has really been independent of the Pentagon. All but one of them have been led by military officers who weren’t authorized to go above their rank, and the Schlesinger Group drew significantly from a military advisory group that’s associated with the Pentagon. And as you know, there is substantial dissatisfaction among U.S. servicemembers that responsibility for this abuse is being pinned, frankly, as you just did in your speech, on lower-ranking servicemembers.