Cheney accussed of running Executive Assassination Ring

"At a “Great Conversations” event (MP3) at the University of Minnesota last night, legendary investigative reporter Seymour Hersh may have made a little more news than he intended by talking about new alleged instances of domestic spying by the CIA, and about an ongoing covert military operation that he called an “executive assassination ring.”

Hersh spoke with great confidence about these findings from his current reporting, which he hasn’t written about yet." (1)

The CIA denies the allegations from Hersh'. (3)

Stories have been coming out about covert Pentagon assassination squads for the last several years. In 2003, Hersh himself reported on Task Force 121, which operated chiefly out of the Joint Special Operations Command. Others stories spoke of a proposed Proactive, Preemptive Operations Group.As Hersh noted in Minnesota, the New York Times on Monday described the Joint Special Operations Command as overseeing the secret commando units in Afghanistan whose missions were temporarily ordered halted last month because of growing concerns over excessive civilian deaths. (2)


Keith Olbermann discusses it on his show:




Olberman consults the legal implications with John DeanJohn Dean



This is what Hersh Said:

Yuh. After 9/11, I haven’t written about this yet, but the Central Intelligence Agency was very deeply involved in domestic activities against people they thought to be enemies of the state. Without any legal authority for it. They haven’t been called on it yet. That does happen.
"Right now, today, there was a story in the New York Times that if you read it carefully mentioned something known as the Joint Special Operations Command -- JSOC it’s called. It is a special wing of our special operations community that is set up independently. They do not report to anybody, except in the Bush-Cheney days, they reported directly to the Cheney office. They did not report to the chairman of the joint chiefs of staff or to Mr. [Robert] Gates, the secretary of defense. They reported directly to him. ...

"Congress has no oversight of it. It’s an executive assassination ring essentially, and it’s been going on and on and on. Just today in the Times there was a story that its leaders, a three star admiral named [William H.] McRaven, ordered a stop to it because there were so many collateral deaths.

"Under President Bush’s authority, they’ve been going into countries, not talking to the ambassador or the CIA station chief, and finding people on a list and executing them and leaving. That’s been going on, in the name of all of us.

"It’s complicated because the guys doing it are not murderers, and yet they are committing what we would normally call murder. It’s a very complicated issue. Because they are young men that went into the Special Forces. The Delta Forces you’ve heard about. Navy Seal teams. Highly specialized.

"In many cases, they were the best and the brightest. Really, no exaggerations. Really fine guys that went in to do the kind of necessary jobs that they think you need to do to protect America. And then they find themselves torturing people.

"I’ve had people say to me -- five years ago, I had one say: ‘What do you call it when you interrogate somebody and you leave them bleeding and they don’t get any medical committee and two days later he dies. Is that murder? What happens if I get before a committee?’

"But they’re not gonna get before a committee.”




Sources:
1. Eric Black http://www.minnpost.com/ericblackblog/2009/03/11/7310/investigative_reporter_seymour_hersh_describes_executive_assassination_ring#comments_section

2.http://rawstory.com/news/2008/Hersh_US_has_been_running_executive_0311.html

http://rawstory.com/news/2008/John_Dean_Bush_and_Cheney_neutered_0313.html

(3)

(4) John DeanJohn Wesley Dean III (born October 14, 1938) was White House Counsel to U.S. President Richard Nixon from July 1970 until April 1973. As White House Counsel, he became deeply involved in events leading up to the Watergate burglaries and the subsequent Watergate scandal cover up, even referred to as "master manipulator of the cover up" by the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI).[1] He was convicted of multiple felonies as a result of Watergate, and went on to become a key witness for the prosecution, resulting in a reduction of his time in prison.
Dean is currently an author, columnist, and commentator on contemporary politics, strongly critical of conservatism and the Republican Party, and a registered Independent who supported impeachment of President George W. Bush.

Video: Ehren K. Watada / His story & an interview

A Soldier's Duty? The Ehren Watada Story 18 min.
Excellent movie with views from both sides.

On June 22, U.S. Army First Lieutenant Ehren K. Watada became the first commissioned officer to publicly refuse deployment to the unlawful Iraq War and occupation.
For the first time since 1965, the military is prosecuting an objector for his opinions. He faces over eight years in prison - over six years for First Amendment speech alone!





The Interview


*posted by paul Grant (follower of Basho)

REPUBLICAN SENATOR GORDON SMITH

CNN'S WOLF BLITZER DOES INTERVIEW WITH REPUBLICAN SENATOR GORDON SMITH WHO ON THE FLOOR OF THE SENATE SAID THE IRAQ WAR MAY BE ILLEGAL.

This is a man who has studied and reflected on what is happening in Iraq- and has in hiw own words- "come to the end of his rope". The dying US troops really are effecting him. He is not pointing fingers, rather, he accepts responsibility as part of the US Government. "What I say I say not in anger, but in sorrow."

posted by paul grant (follower of Basho)