BUSH WILL NOW CELEBRATE BY PUTTING FALLUJA TO THE TORCH

As 19 year old Scots are sacrificed on the altar of Blair’s Christian zeal in Falluja, here’s a round up of the best post-Kerry (was there a Kerry or a pre-Kerry?) Falluja nightmare.

The “Kerry was no-good” brigade kick off here with Carolyn Baker
“Hello: You Are Now Living In A Fascist Empire” who also links through to the Institute for Public Accuracy http://www.accuracy.org/new.htm which catalogues the problems that make American the cradle of democracy (see also Palast in a minute).

John Pilger is certainly a part of this tendency. Earlier this year he argued: “A myth equal to the fable of Iraq's weapons of mass destruction is gaining strength on both sides of the Atlantic. It is that John Kerry offers a world-view different from that of George W Bush. Watch this big lie grow as Kerry is crowned the Democratic candidate and the "anyone but Bush" movement becomes a liberal cause celebre.”

Full article here.

Pilger’s loved and hatred in equal measure. Something about his droning certainty grates. But his filmmaking is better than his writing. This is worth watching:

“There are times when one tragedy, one crime tells us how a whole system works behind its democratic facade and helps us to understand how much of the world is run for the benefit of the powerful and how governments lie. To understand the catastrophe of Iraq, and all the other Iraqs along imperial history's trail of blood and tears, one need look no further than Diego Garcia.”

Watch “Stealing a Nation” here...

Robin Cook looks to the future of the 2nd Bush administration: “Cheney himself may not go the distance if the rumours about Halliburton continue to lap closer to his desk, but while he is in post it is hard to see an administration so dripping in contacts with the oil industry taking serious action on global warming. This is a real problem for Tony Blair, who has identified climate change as a major priority for Britain's presidency of the G8 next year. The dilemma for Blair will be whether he uses the role to lever the Bush administration towards the consensus among the other seven, or cajoles the rest to accommodate the idiosyncratic Washington position. If he wants to signal a break from Bush, he will not get a clearer opportunity to do so.

The first sign as to whether the Bush second term will be more flexible will be what now happens to the neoconservatives. Will Paul Wolfowitz, the Pentagon No 2 who lobbied for the invasion of Iraq, be promoted to the front rank? Will John Bolton, the No 3 at the state department who has overseen the Bush campaign to torpedo the International Criminal Court, survive in any rank? Bolton has been responsible for much of the sabre-rattling towards Iran and responded to a question about whether he would support Europe's attempt to offer Iran incentives with the terse one-liner: "I don't do carrots."

Full article here.

Greg Palast starts with the startling statement: Kerry won. “I know you don't want to hear it. You can't face one more hung chad. But I don't have a choice. As a journalist examining that messy sausage called American democracy, it's my job to tell you who got the most votes in the deciding states. Tuesday, in Ohio and New Mexico, it was John Kerry.”

Read his argument here, Information Clearing House

While Abdul-Raheem Ali considers the possibility that Palestinian President Yasser Arafat has been poisoned. More here.