No f'ing way will I put this in LBN, because I'd have to use the headline
AP: Iraq Detainee Plotted Chemical Attack and there's no way in good conscience that I could use a misleading headline like that in LBN.
Check out how the story begins...
AP: Iraq Detainee Plotted Chemical Attack
WASHINGTON - U.S. officials say a terror suspect imprisoned at Guantanamo Bay is a former Iraqi soldier and al-Qaida member who plotted with an Iraqi intelligence agent in August 1998 to attack the American and other foreign embassies in Pakistan with chemical weapons, according to documents obtained by The Associated Press.
Ooh...it has it all! Iraqi soldier!! al Qaeda!! Plotting!! Chemical weapons!! It's a McLellan wet dream of a story.
(Add to that the fact that the terra-ist is penned up at Guantanamo Bay so Shrub, Rummy, and Ashcrap have all kept us safe from the WMD's by waging the war on terra their way over all our liberal whining.)
Then you read the
rest of the story to mine the truth...
<snip>
"There is no public record of such an attempt being made, although the Islamabad embassy staff was reduced that month amid heightened security concerns following the Aug. 7 truck bomb attacks on the U.S. embassies in Kenya and Tanzania..."
<snip>
"There is no indication the Iraqi's alleged terror-related activities were on behalf of Saddam Hussein's government, other than the brief mention of him traveling to Pakistan with a member of Iraqi intelligence..."
<snip>
"The assertion that the Iraqi was involved in a plot against embassies in Pakistan is not further substantiated in the document. It states only that he traveled to Pakistan in August 1998 with a member of Iraqi intelligence "for the purpose of" striking at embassies with chemical mortars.
The CIA-led Iraq Survey Group that spent months in Iraq investigating its weapons programs wrote in its final report last September that an insurgent group in Iraq had managed to build nine chemical mortars in 2003 using malathion pesticide, although they apparently were not used. Malathion is in a highly toxic class of pesticides that affect the central nervous, cardiovascular and respiratory systems."
Hmmm...after the big lead-up this "document" the AP military writer cites has, weellll...no meat. Whatsoever.
Even those deadly chemical mortars the reporter mentioned were cobbled together
by the insurgency in 2003 so it's pretty obvious
these particular chemical weapons weren't what shrub's invasion was about.
Ooh...but how 'bout that malathion stuff, huh? What about that? The reporter said that's a "highly toxic class of pesticides that affect the central nervous, cardiovascular and respiratory systems"!
This terra-ist was planning some serious death and destruction!
Let's see about
that claim then, because it certainly
sounds frightening, doesn't it?
Malathion"Regulatory Status:
Malathion is a slightly toxic compound in EPA toxicity class III. Labels for products containing it must carry the Signal Word CAUTION. Malathion is a General Use Pesticide (GUP). It is available in emulsifiable concentrate, wettable powder, dustable powder, and ultra low volume liquid formulations...
Introduction:
Malathion is a nonsystemic, wide-spectrum organophosphate insecticide. It was one of the earliest organophosphate insecticides developed (introduced in 1950). Malathion is suited for the control of sucking and chewing insects on fruits and vegetables, and is also used to control mosquitoes, flies, household insects, animal parasites (ectoparasites), and head and body lice. Malathion may also be found in formulations with many other pesticides.
Environmental Fate:
Breakdown in soil and groundwater: Malathion is of low persistence in soil with reported field half-lives of 1 to 25 days <19>. Degradation in soil is rapid and related to the degree of soil binding <12>. Breakdown occurs by a combination of biological degradation and nonbiological reaction with water <12>. If released to the atmosphere, malathion will break down rapidly in sunlight, with a reported half-life in air of about 1.5 days."Not to make light of malathion...it isn't healthy to be around, but a cobbled-together mortar incorporating a "slightly toxic" pesticide which is put on our food, our asses and our heads with the blessing of the U.S. government being called a "chemical weapon"?! Give me a break!
Right now this story is listed under the Politics/White House section on YahooNews...rate it a "1" and keep it off the front page.
It's pure crap.
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