REPOST: What is Kerry going to say about the Office of Special Plans?

[arendt]

This is a tightened-up REPOST of a thread I posted on Tuesday night.
That thread got lost in the election horserace frenzy. But, OSP is a real
issue, which must be aired if we are to have meaningful discussions,
instead of bloveating about hairdoos and horseraces.

Many left-wing political activists are afraid that Kerry is the "corporately-
electable" candidate, who will get rid of Bush without letting the
blame spill onto the greedy corporate bastards who have backed
him to the hilt.

The OSP is a litmus test for how Kerry intends to run his campaign.
If all we get is the corporate FRAMING of the issue, which is doing
its best to ignore OSP and PNAC, then there will never be an honest
airing of the damage that Bush has done across the board to US
foreign policy and the Defense Department and the Intelligence
agencies.

One more time, is any Kerry supporter able to tell me what Kerry's
position is on OSP? Has he ever mentioned it?

------------------------------------

Kerry people: What is Kerry going to say Re: Office of Special Plans?

The scariest thing about the Bush administration is its across the
board implementation of a police state. At DU, we worry about Ashcroft,
Patriot Acts, Police Goon Squads as in Miami FTAA, uncaught Anthrax
bombers, First Amendment Zones, and many other accouterments of
secrecy not for legitimate defense, but for authoritarian domination.

At the moment, the WMD fiasco has exposed them to attack on that front.
Recognizing the danger, the Bush handlers have decided to blame this
ALL on the CIA. The media whores are going along with this, even as
the media itself is now being blamed for its craven war cheerleading.

The corporate media doesn't want to mention yet another embarrasment
to the Bush Cabal, the OSP. Everyone at DU, if they do not know, can
easily find out about the infamous Office of Special Plans. For example:

http://cooperativeresearch.org/wot/iraq/office_of_special_plans.html

DUers want the OSP to be part of the investigation because it is
the OSP who "stovepiped" phony intelligence cooked up by their
tiny team of PNAC Likudniks straight into the White House, because
OSP is Rumsfeld's bastard child, because Cheney's dirty fingerprints
are all over OSP, because convicted felon Eliot Abrams was appointed
to this little shop of horrors, etc.

--------

So, since I keep being told how strong John Kerry is on investigating
CIA corruption and knowing his way around the intelligence community,
and since I further keep hearing about how one Rand Beers (formerly
the Bush Jr guy in charge of South American Anti-terrorism) has joined
the Kerry Campaign, I expected to find Kerry blasting away at the OSP.

After all, Kerry has the experience, the expertise, and the team to do
it. So I am told.

Therefore I went to the Kerry website to see what John has to say about
OSP. To avoid suspense, the answer is NADA, ZILCH, ZERO.

At the website, I looked under "John Kerry on the Issues". Two topics
seemed relevant to this: "Foreign Policy" and "Homeland Security".

They say nothing about stopping the TAMPERING with the intelligence process.
They pretend its all just a bureaucracy problem, and offer more useless
rearranging of the deck chairs on the Titanic.

Why isn't Kerry shouting OSP from the rooftops? This is perfect positioning
for him.

----------------------

Now, let me turn to Mr. Rand Beers, who was touted as a guy who
could expose the Bush lies because he was an insider on the Bush
team until last summer.

Because I hadn't heard much from Mr. Beers, I Googled:

campaign + "John Kerry" + "Rand Beers"

I got a grand total of 769 hits. A mere handful.

And what I found was not flattering. Apparently, he hasn't done much
since joining. And, when he joined, he was roundly criticized for his
behavior within the Bush Administration.

Hit # 3 on Google was the admittedly controversial CounterPunch site:
http://www.counterpunch.org/donahue01262004.html
January 26, 2004
The Toxic Career of Rand Beers
Kerry's Drug War Zealot
By SEAN DONAHUE

--------

Hit #6 was from Al Giordano's new website (He used to do Narco News.)
www.bigleftoutside.com/archives/000025.php

(This Al is for real; not to be confused with crypto-spook Al Martin.)

....June 16, 2003
....What Did Rand Beers Know and When Did He Know It?

....The front page of the Washington Post today has a shocker: State Department
....fixer Rand Beers jumped ship days prior to Gulf War II and has now signed up
....with the Kerry campaign as a foreign policy advisor.

....Beers was the administration’s point man in the post-9/11 efforts to confuse
....national liberation movements (that don’t attack targets in other countries) with
....“international terrorists." See Narco News, March 1, 2002: Beers Fumigated in Deposition.

....See also Narco News, September 10, 2002, in which Beers had to file an affidavit to
....correct a dangerously false claim that he made under oath:

....I made the following statement: "It is believed that FARC terrorists have received training
....at Al Qaida terrorist camps in Afghanistan." I wish to strike this sentence.

....It’s all well and good that Beers had what the Post today portrays as an attack of
....conscience, but he has to come clean on what really happened with the lies that –
....in at least one instance – he admitted that he told under oath to frighten the American
....public into supporting un-American policies in Latin America.

....Otherwise, Randall Beers will soon become a deserved millstone around John Kerry’s neck.
....Memo to Beers: go have a heart to heart with Dan Ellsberg, then do the right thing and
....come 100-percent clean. Memo to Kerry: Caveat Emptor.

Just great, the man lied under oath and had to retract it. And we are supposed to applaud
Kerry for having this guy on board? Only if he does something to show he has really
changed sides - something like blasting the OSP.

----

Challenge number two:

Where, oh where, is Rand Beers? What does he know about the fraudulent
cooking of intelligence? What does he know about OSP?

----

arendt

[nothingshocksmeanymore]

1. I wouldn't expect him to break it out yet

I would expect him to use the momentum he has now to continue to solidify his leads and use that planting info against Bush in the press in the general. Apparently Bush is afraid of it since hit pieces about Rand Beers and attacks on his credibility were surfacing shortly after it was announced that Beers was on Kerry's staff.

I am not saying Kerry has a secret plan....I am simply saying that if I as a candidate had info that set me apart from the pack, I certainly would NOT share it until the pack was so far behind, they could never catch up.

Suffice it to say, simple logic dictates that Beers would NOT be on Kerry's staff if he were of NO BENEFIT in prevailing in the security debate.

[arendt]

3. You are spinning his ducking OSP now as a "horserace" thing, but...

not talking about OSP when the opportunity presents itself is
EXACTLY what the corporations love.

They are willing to let the AWOL issue sink Bush, when they
furiously covered it up four years ago. Why? Because AWOL
is one of those personal moral failings that are the only thing
that the ignorant dummies who vote GOP are able to grasp.

PNAC coup d'etats are never, ever to be mentioned inside
the US. That would be telling.

Basically your answer is that the media have decided that
Bush can be attacked on AWOL, not on OSP; and why
should Kerry challenge something that benefits him.

Answer: because what benefits HIM does not necessarily
benefit AMERICA; i.e., exposing the hijacking of our intelligence
apparatus by the PNAC.

----

> Suffice it to say, simple logic dictates that Beers would NOT be on
> Kerry's staff if he were of NO BENEFIT in prevailing in the security debate.

Simple logic dictates the American public should never have
bought Bush's lies. I have no idea what Beers is doing, and you
have added nothing to my knowledge. Bland acceptance of
non-obvious things is how we got into this mess. What is
Beers DOING NOW?

arendt

[nothingshocksmeanymore]

And you are spinning your take as well with pejoratives

Guess we both should brush up on our debate tactics a bit, eh?


I think you just rewrote what I said in the manner in which your frame of reference can recontextualize it in order to fit your agenda.

I simply said in a poker game (and yeah elections are like that...don't blame me I didn't make up the game) I wouldn't show my cards until the table folded.

A good suggestion if you haven't already considered it is to dial Kerry headquarters and ask them since you are asking a bunch of interent people something they don't know the answer to and can only speculate about.

Simple logic dictates if this were an honest question on your part, you would take it to the most logical source to answer it. A board ripe with conspiracy theorists and one liners is hardly a track I would consider to be the right one.

[arendt]

12. Once again, you produce no public fact; but tell me to call Kerry.

Aside: I hope we can debate strongly, without personal rancor.
After all, this is GD: P2004, the steel-cage death match forum of DU.

----

My whole point is that :

to date, Kerry has not talked about OSP.

I raise this awkward point, and get told to call Kerry's campaign,
where I will be taken as some garden-variety nobody, palmed
off on some lightweight outsider, and receive nothing of value.

I love the tactics here.

I have a question about which Kerry supporters should be proud to
talk about their candidates positon. Except, there is no postion.
So, the answer to my inquiry is:

Go do it yourself.
Our candidate is too busy being electable
to have to bother with details like this.

I submit that if you had the slightest iota of fact to put forward,
you would.

Lack of facts on your part proves my case.

Score is now FIVE NON-ANSWERS.

arendt

[Old and In the Way]

2. Tenet's press-conference tomorrow should be quite interesting.

I suspect that he'll strongly defend the integrity of CIA intelligence and refute Kay's statements that the Iraq debacle was caused by bad intel. I have to think he'll point to OSP as a major cause for distorting the raw intel to fit this administration's agenda.

Once that happens, I think the now disbanded OSP will get much more attention from the press and the Democrats...I'm sure Kerry's going to have a lot to say about this over the coming months.

[arendt]

4. To boil it down, you also have no information about what Kerry will do...

about OSP.

You "think" the press will willingly publicize OSP.
Based on past performance, it is dangerous to
believe the press will do anything that favors democracy.

You "are sure" Kerry will say something.
But, if he has said nothing until now, and if the
press refuses to allow that issue into the debate,
but continues to allow AWOL, how can you be
so sure Kerry won't continue to play by the
corporate script of "electability" that has been
dropped into his lap?

arendt

[DrFunkenstein]

6. You Post Again After I Took The Time To Refute It

Again, you automatically go straight to the worst-case scenario speculation. Still not a real argument.

[arendt]

9. Half-truth: I removed the part you questioned (you say refuted)...

No one has said ONE WORD about what Kerry has said about
OSP. Because he does not seem to have said one word.

Want to refute me? Find me a Kerry quote in which he acknowledges
that OSP was stovepiping intelligence.

Score is now four non-answers.

arendt

[charlie]

10. I have no confidence that Tenet will do that

After the OSP ginned up the Nigerian yellowcake bugaboo and Tenet personally petitioned the White House to remove references to it in the SOTU speech, he still took the rap for the errant "16 words and said squat about the OSP.

[NNN0LHI]

5. Give the other candidates position on this and I'll give it some thought

Need some comparison. I know DK voted to close it down, but what of the rest of them?

Don

[arendt]

7. Why do *I* have to research all others? Why don't you? I asked about Kerry

Kerry is Mr. National Security Investigations. He, of
all the candidates, should be on top of this.

Edwards is a lightweight, Clark should know but is
hanging on by his fingernails and playing the Bible
Belt card, Dean may know but be afraid it will just add
to his "kook" factor to bring up more embarrassing facts,
Sharpton is a GOP operative who wouldn't spill these
beans.

The finger points at Kerry, not at the other candidates.
Kerry is the front-runner. Kerry has the background.
Kerry has RAND BEERS.

Why is Kerry sitting on this?

Score so far in this thread: three non-answers.

arendt

[NNN0LHI]

8. OK. Thanks then. See ya n/t

[nothingshocksmeanymore]

11. Why do WE have to humor you?

Write the guy a letter and ask him

[arendt]

13. Remind me to quote you the next time you hammer Dean.

LOL - I ask a tough question in a forum that is nothing
but tough questions, and you pretend that you owe me
NOTHING. What a double standard.

You guys got NOTHING. And you are too defensive to
just say that so far Kerry has said nothing.

SIX NON-ANSWERS. Do I hear seven?

arendt

[nothingshocksmeanymore]

20. I answered your question. You don't like it.

I don't have to ask anything about Dean. I know all I need to know about him and his most virulent supporters.

I don't KNOW that Kerry has said NOTHING because I don't presume to know all Kerry has ever said on the subject.

I also think that it WILL be addressed by him if it hasn't been and you are operating under the pretense that if he hasn't said it by now, he won't.

Now...I'll let someone else play fetch with you.

BTW..if this is how Dean supporters are campaigning for him, it's no wonder he's losing his arrogant ass off.

[arendt]

22. You didn't answer my question. You told me to go pound sand.

Now you are down to Bush Sr. levels of

"that question is old news, Dan, I answered that charge
a long time ago".

And you accuse me of being arrogant. What projection.

I refuse to shut up just because you find the question
uncomfortable.

If we don't get the truth, which every DUer knows, about
OSP and PNAC in front of the American public, then
why the hell are we bothering to elect a Democrat?
If the people who pulled off this illegal war, and the
shredding of the Constitution along with it, get a
free pass, then they will just hang back til the next
GOP administration and do again. Hell, that's exactly
what Eliot Abrams, convicted felon, did.

You seem to think I am *picking* on Kerry. No, sir.
I want to see the PNAC crowd swing from the end
of a rope. And, from what I've seen so far, that is
strictly optional for John Kerry.

> Now...I'll let someone else play fetch with you.

That's about what I expect from the "horserace" and
"electability" crowd. Personal insults when they have
no real answers to clearly stated questions.

> if this is how Dean supporters are campaigning for him

And you expect people to bow down and support Kerry
after he has won primaries in no state that went Democratic
in 2000. The arrogance of a campaign founded on the
word "electability" is absurd.

Electability is like celebrity. A celebrity is someone who
is famous for being well-known. Electability can vanish
in a second.

OSP is a REAL issue; and how any candidate stands on
it deserves a better discussion than being blown off
EIGHT times by know-nothing, knee-jerk supporters
of "electability".

arendt

[arendt]

14. Time out: have to eat dinner and go to Dean meetup. Back later. n/t

n/t

[Old and In the Way]

17. Who are you meeting with? Maybe he or she will have the answer.

Do tell us where Dean's position is OSP. We'll make sure that Kerry plagerizes Dean's it. :-)

[arendt]

18. Yes, we have SEVEN non-answers

You don't even try.

And none of you Kerry supporters even GETS it.

The OSP *must* see the light of day. If the Dems don't out
this, then that slimeball, convicted felon Eliot Abrams, and
all the other Likudnik warmongers have gotten a free pass
for starting a war.

There is NOBODY in the CIA who *started* this war. The
OSP, almost single-handedly cooked the books.

A whitewash of OSP will make the Warren Commission
look honest, because the facts of OSP are in plain sight.

Do you people think I'm busting your candidate to score
points? Wrong. I am on this issue because it is vital to
democracy. If Kerry wins, but buries this issue, then he
has done a disservice to American democracy.

</rant>

arendt

[TheDonkey]

15. This is ridiculous, I've never heard any canidate mention this stuff?

Or at least in any detail.

I doubt anyone is going to give you info you want.

[charlie]

16. Kucinich press release

(Letter to Rumsfeld)

...

With regard to the Office of Special Plans:

In late 2001, under your direction, a new intelligence office called Office of Special Plans (OSP) was created within the Department of Defense. According to Seymour Hersh in New Yorker magazine, the purpose of the OSP was to evaluate CIA and DIA intelligence, as well as Iraqi defector testimony, and to then manipulate the data to fit into a particular policy envisioned by yourself and Deputy Secretary of Defense Paul Wolfowitz:

"According to the Pentagon adviser, Special Plans was created in order to find evidence of what Wolfowitz and his boss, Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld, believed to be true—that Saddam Hussein had close ties to Al Qaeda, and that Iraq had an enormous arsenal of chemical, biological, and possibly even nuclear weapons that threatened the region and, potentially, the United States."

**snip**

On July 25, 2003, Jason Leopold, the former Los Angeles bureau chief of Dow Jones Newswire, wrote an article about the findings of the CIA analysts currently investigating the weapons controversy, “…the agents said the Office of Special Plans routinely rewrote the CIA's intelligence estimates on Iraq's weapons programs, removing caveats such as "likely," "probably" and "may" as a way of depicting the country as an imminent threat.”

He further wrote, “More than a dozen CIA agents responsible for writing intelligence reports for the agency told the former CIA agents investigating the accuracy of the intelligence reports said they were pressured by the Pentagon and the Office of Special Plans to hype and exaggerate intelligence to show Iraq as being an imminent threat to the security of the U.S.”

Further Questions:

9. Did the Office of Special Plans re-evaluate and re-write CIA and DIA intelligence on Iraq’s weapons of mass destruction?

10. Did you or anyone in the Office of Special Plans transmit to the CIA, the State Department, the White House or the National Security Advisor, any of the conclusions the Office of Special Plans drew? If so, when and to whom?

11. Did the Office of Special Plans ever assess the findings of Ambassador Wilson and/or General Fulford? If so, what was its assessment of the findings?

http://www.house.gov/apps/list/press/oh10_kucinich/031205rumsfeldltr.html

[arendt]

19. Thank you, charlie. Now, Kerry people, see how straightforward it can be?

n/t

[Jacobin]

21. <crickets>

Arendt, I would also like to know because this is the central issue on the Iraq debacle. It's being hidden by the media completely and totally. I'm not a Kerry supporter (but will vote for him instead of Bush* if he's nominated), but have noticed that Kerry is NEVER out in front (read in leadership position) of anything at all. He lets others take the heat, take the charge, and he stands back to see what sticks on the wall and what doesn't. This does NOT bode well as a characteristic of a good president, obviously, although it may well make him a successful politician.

We need to hammer this with the media (OSP). Finally, the AWOL thing is starting to fester a bit (after 3 years!!!).