PNAC, PNAC, PNAC

I have been trying to tell a certain Alternet journalist that "Rearming America's Defenses", the PNAC Guide to American Foreign Policy Post 9/11, that was somehow written long before 9/11 and yet has been followed almost to the letter ever since, is not the work of "just another think-tank, no more important than the dozens of others that come and go in Washington".(his words!) Yes, despite other fascinating facts such as how the 9/11 event was eerily foretold, described as being the kind of event that was going to be required to change public opinion from that of one expecting a "peace dividend" in the wake of the collapse of the Soviet Union, how that money was being earmarked as coming out of the military budget. Tell him how this was considered a disaster as far as the arms (aerospace) industry and the prominent Likud-niks you reference, and who saw the military-strategic position Israel had long enjoyed evaporating before their eyes. Tell him that there was little they could do about it in 92-93 when Cheney and Wolfowitz set their ideas to paper, and in a last ditch attempt to save themselves from obscurity aligned themselves with media insiders Kristol and Kagan, form PNAC, and Lo and Behold, hire the rest of the the PNAC wholesale immediately upon Bush's inauguration. Tell him how Cheney's election of himself as VP, the hiring of Rumsfeld, Libby, Wolfowitz, Podhoertz, Armitage, Perle, Feith, etc., etc, was not a mere coincidence....that in fact PNAC = Neocon, and that this is the group whose influence on American policy is possibly greater than that of Congress, the Senate, and The Supreme Court combined. I fear young Holland has offhandedly equated PNAC with a the dozens of other silly 9/11 conspiracy theories that cannot withstand a second of critical analysis. This is not one of them of course. Please help advance his career by dropping him a line...perhaps a note coming from a source with a higher profile (thus to his sort, more credibility) than myself.... a person who remains unknown, yet who does indeed possess the skill you speak of earlier in the article when discussing the ability to pick and choose those media stories that have substance. Thank you. You do the world a great favor with this

Conservative Personality Disorder

This is born out by many aspects of their chosen lifestyles, not the least of which is their tendency towards militant nationalism, fundamentalist religions, or a belief that science is an evil conspiracy, or even such bizarre thoughts as believing in "plots" by homosexuals with "an agenda" that means to turn them (or their kids) gay; primitive fixations on hostile tribes that are is coming to take their land and property. Mexicans are the latest to make that list of factual perversions even though a little reading would reveal that this list used to include their own ancestors at some point. But no, they're coming to get them and they're spreading leprosy too (see Lou Dobbs). Indeed, intellect seems so unnatural to these people that they even fail to see an association between the reason they themselves are now poorer and the yet somehow the wealthy simultaneously became wealthier. Such logic requires only a minumum of math skills, but intellect is intellect, and these people react to their gut instincts. Thus it is much easier for them to simply go with their instincts and the guy on TV who tells them they are in danger from people whose lives are so desperate that they risk death for pennies...people with even less power than their own pathetically primitive, reactionary minds have been able to accumulate, despite being born with advantages most of the worlds people never had. To put it more bluntly, the right-wing are throwbacks to a time before intellect and wisdom were considered the defining characteristic that elevated man above the rest of the animals. Yet they now "ape" them with a Darwinian approach to how man should behave, using other animals as "proof" that we are meant to act in a "dog-eat-dog" fashion, never stopping to wonder why even dogs share with other dogs. (Hint: Dogs most certainly DO NOT eat other dogs.)