The pathos of the neo-cons and their think tanks is as clear as can be in this riveting documentary, please share it...

http://www.documentarywi...the-new-american-century

You're right Blubonnet about the Project for the New American Century (PNAC.) In that neo-con think tank one finds the major players
The PNAC pressured Clinton in 1998 to formally change the U.S. government's policy regarding Iraq to one that is explicitly dedicated to "regime change".
http://www.newamericance...rg/iraqclintonletter.htm
Though Clinton wisely decided against launching an unprovoked invasion of Iraq he did sign into law the so-called "Iraq Liberation Act" in 1998 that commits the U.S. government to a policy of regime change.
http://www.fas.org/news/...1998/11/01/981101-in.htm
When Bush and Cheney were installed in office in 2000 their administration was built around a core of PNAC members. This think tank includes or included in its membership Dick Cheney, Elliot Abrams, Jeb Bush (not in the administration but Bush's brother and then the governor of Florida), Paul Wolfowitz, Donald Rumsfeld, "Scooter" Libby, John Bolton, Zalmay Khalilzad and Richard Perle.
http://www.sourcewatch.o...the_New_American_Century

...

{Ed Note: Rest of comment truncated. Brutal Truth, this comment is insanely long and completely off topic and copied and pasted from numerous other sources. Please see our rules for commenting at BRAD BLOG. Not trying to censor you (as I have no prob with the general content of the full comment itself), but trying to keep comment threads readable and unhijacked whenever possible. That's not easy, but your help would be appreciated. Thank you! - BF}

Brad, it was cut and pasted from my own comments at other sites. I have used different names at various sites but rest assured, it's me. As far as being off-topic it was no more so than Blubonnet's comment above. I was commenting about the P.N.A.C. As for the post's length, how about actually making some threads that deal with this issue so I don't have to? You have a great forum here that could be used for exposing the truth about a whole range of issues instead of the focus being almost exclusively on election fraud which is practically a non-issue considering the complete falsity of the U.S. political process anyway in other words even with hand counted paper ballots unless you take private money out of politics you're pissing in the wind because the electorate will continue to have no real choice at the ballot box, just choosing between two slightly different conservatives because all the major candidates are all firmly in the pocket of the wealthy ruling elite as surely you realize by now. So how about devoting a section of the blog to what is by far the most important issue of our time, the 9/11 false flag operation which has been used as the excuse for the country's entire foreign policy and domestic repression ever since that morning? Don't you think it's worthy of your time? Nobody should HAVE to "hijack" a thread as this issue should be front and center, not tiptoed around.

Off-topic but let me ask you Brad since I've never heard one way or the other what your opinion on this matter is: Can I get you to tell me whether or not you believe in the ridiculous and provably false official 9/11 myth about the "nineteen hijackers with boxcutters"? Or have you realized that you've been fed a load of b.s. by the Cheney regime (and now Obama administration picking up where they left off)?

i cant speak for brad but the reason i think the correct count of our votes is the most important thing is i believe in "we the people",and we get our power from our vote

brutal while i would have to agree that many contests are just a neo con and a pretend dem,once in a while someone slips thru that actaully seems to be progressive,(dennis k,jessie v) and don't forget that our taxes are illegally raised with false counting(look at the az rta)and that our cival rights are denied with false counting(prop 8 springs to mind)

so while i am sure many of this community here @ bradblog support your work...what good does it do us to bring it into every conversation?..afterall we know that bobby kennedy had 3 cia enemies present at his assination but to bring it into ever discussion just gives our enemies ammo that they dont need...when brad does an article like this that PROVES digg has been corrupted by neo cons..get the word out...when brad proves in monroe county that votes went backwards..get the word out...our goals are the same,truth,transparency,a true representative democracy...but we have got to operate in the world we have

Karen,
You mean the Dennis Kucinich whose vote was the deciding factor in foisting on the American people this health "reform" bill that was written with the insurance companies in mind? The one with no public option and may as well be called the Health Insurance Company Profit Protection Act of 2010? That Kucinich? The one who clings to the official myth of 9/11 and keeps his criticism carefully within the bounds of what's considered safe for the establishment? He sucks. Kucinich is there to make people like you and me think we have someone who represents our interests. He's what I call a "controlled outlier".

If you think "we the people" have ANY kind of power regarding voting in this country then you need to take a much closer look preferably without rose colored glasses. The ENTIRE American political system is as meaningful as a professional wrestling match. If going down to your local firehouse or school and pulling a magic lever or touching a computer screen were able to change anything in the existing American system then it would be illegal.

Don't get me wrong, I'm glad Brad does what he does to expose some malfeasance here and there. But so much that is wrong with America could have the legs cut out from under it if the official myth of 9/11 was exposed for what it is, a myth. It would in one fell swoop smash the entire twisted Republican worldview. It would show "American exceptionalism" to be the sick joke that it is. It would eliminate the single largest drain on the government's budget, fighting two wars that are meaningless beyond being crass energy resource grabs. It could lead to trials for crimes against humanity for the top leadership of the Cheney regime and maybe show the rest of the world that yes, the U.S. really CAN hold its leadership accountable. Because as it stands now the U.S. has absolutely no credibility when it badmouths anyone else's war criminals. It would get a huge amount of this country's gullible citizenry to stop living in fear, giving them their peace of mind back. It would make air travel no more of a hassle than it was pre-9/11. It would shatter the myth that the Patriot Act is keeping us safe instead of being used for domestic repression, to mainstream police state measures. Imagine if Germany still refused to admit that itself, not Jewish people, were the cause of World War II. In order for America's healing process to begin the 9/11 myth has to be utterly and permanently destroyed and its perpetrators within the U.S. ruling class brought to justice.

In short, by unraveling the myth of 9/11 the U.S. could go a LONG way towards becoming a civilized country, something to be proud of instead of a byword among nations and an example of how NOT to behave. Any other issue, no matter how important it may seem at the time, is quite small and superficial by comparison.

Granted I and everyone else here who wants to see genuine, meaningful American elections within our lifetime wants hand counted paper ballots. But in order for this to amount to more than a mouse fart the following other things need to happen in addition to it:

1. Ban all private money from American politics with no exceptions and scrupulously enforce this ban. Each candidate instead should get a publicly funded standard (and vastly smaller!) sum which he or she can spend whichever way they see fit, e.g. mostly on t.v. commercials, some on signs, mostly on radio ads with some spent on handbills or whatever they think is best. And have much shorter campaigns for example 2 months instead of 2 years. This way candidates are not just puppets of the big businesses in their district and instead of being able to outspend their opponent each candidate will actually have to have the better message. All the hand counted paper ballots in the world won't matter at all if privately funded elections are allowed to continue, the voter will still have no real choice as the candidates will remain just tools of the rich like they are now, together forming the octopus arms of big business doing what is unprofitable or impossible for big business to do on its own for example using another organ of the government (the military and intelligence establishment) to wage wars for a narrow set of heartless economic interests. This won't change a whit until elections are publicly funded.

2. Abolish the Electoral College. Or simply make it for statistical purposes but with no influence on the outcome of the election. Its purpose is to act as a check against the popular vote. It's already nullified the actual results of several different American presidential elections. It is like a dagger pointed at the heart of the idea of democracy and until it is abolished or neutered it will continue to pose a very real threat to the legitimate outcomes of elections.

3. Abolish the Senate and transfer all its duties to the House of Representatives. Because the Senate doesn't correspond at all to the country's population it gives enormous amounts of leverage to small and sparsely populated states, grossly distorting the idea of democracy. It exists only to act as a check against the (potential as yet) will of the people as could theoretically be expressed by the House if it was full of politicians who cared about the average American instead of the average Rockefeller. It's heavily weighted towards conservatism, in preserving the status quo and resisting meaningful change. Far from outliving its usefulness it was never a good idea in the first place and is anathema to genuine democracy. It will only be more so if private money is taken out of politics so the people actually have real representatives, not plastic marionettes, or I should say it will be brought into sharper relief and people will notice the contrast more.

wow...thats lotta change to digest brutal but i just wanna address one point,the healthcare bill

from what i have read and heard 80-85% of premiums have to be spent on that patient"s healthcare or refunded...which should help lower premiums

an older,pre existing condition peop(like me) can only be charged 3 times what a young healthy person is charged...add the first with the 2nd and we may really have an affordable system...and peops in the house are still trying to add the public option

my biggest problem with obama is that he did not prosecute the criminals of the last admin for warrentless wiretapping,the illegal prosecution of padilla(american citizen),lying to go war, and torture..so really we are on same page for the most part...they come at us from all angles,we need to do the same

@Brutal - this is not a 911 forum and hope it does not become one. I am sure there are many such forums out there. I know and avoid many truthers but know they have their own forums where they dissect and regurgitate their "information" all they want. I am grateful that Brad contnues to focus on elections and appreciate that people don't try to hijack it for their own interests.

Karen,
Health care companies' stocks soared immediately upon getting the news that the "reform" bill passed. That should tell you all you need to know about it. Here's the problem with American health care: It's a business, in other words they care about the profit margin with anything else, including the health and well-being of the patient, a distant second. In order to GENUINELY reform it one needs to remove the profit motive from the picture and give universal health coverage to every American. This "reform" bill doesn't even come close. Obama shunned the idea of single payer and actively kept its advocates marginalized from the debate. Even the watered-down public option was removed from the table. Why? Because of opposition from big insurance companies. But at least we can now buy affordable prescription drugs from Canada right? Nope, that's still illegal because Big Pharma made sure of it in their backroom deals with Obama. Obama wasn't out to actually reform health care (or anything for that matter) but to leave the for-profit system in place. "Reform" without single payer isn't reform at all but cosmetic changes. Forcing people who don't have insurance to buy junk plans from private insurance companies isn't reform at all. Kucinich is a sellout.

Kim,
Avoiding the truth isn't going to make it go away, sorry. Believing a myth with all your heart isn't going to do a damn thing to make it true or even possible. Wouldn't it be great if there was a fat man with a flying sleigh to deliver toys to kids all over the world so their parents don't have to buy them? Sure, it would be great but it simply isn't true either. It's a myth. Just like the "nineteen hijackers with boxcutters". In your careful avoidance of people who understand the truth about what happened you've left yourself in a position of complete ignorance regarding the events of that day and, really, ignorance about everything that has followed from it because you don't grasp the causes of subsequent events, instead swallowing a laughably fake pack of lies and asking for seconds. If you had more psychological courage then you would have looked into the details of 9/11 and understood just how bizarre and ridiculous is the myth you're defending but you haven't so I'm going to very briefly spell out for you just what nonsense the official myth requires you to believe. The following are some of the issues that one has to completely disregard and pretend don't exist in order to continue to have faith in the 9/11 official myth:

1. The alleged "hijacker pilots" had no experience whatsoever in flying anything with jet engines and had proven consistently that they were quite incompetent in even flying small propellor engine planes. That they could allegedly jump in the cockpits of jet airliners and fly them like experts strains credulity far past the breaking point.

2. The alleged "hijackers" were to an individual so un-Islamic that they drank liquor heavily, snorted cocaine, ate pork, went to strip bars where they got lapdances and gambled in Vegas. That they would then be so allegedly devoted to Islam as to be willing to sacrifice their lives for their religion and take some "infidels" with them is laughable.

3. Several "hijackers" turned up alive and well days later and demanded an explanation as to why their names and photos were being used in connection to the 9/11 story. Nevertheless the news media still continues with its same "nineteen hijackers" nonsense as if this didn't occur.

4. Several "hijackers" lived in military base housing, one had attended the Defense Language Institute at Monterey, California, several others lived just outside the gates of the N.S.A. in Laurel, Maryland, others lived in close proximity to C.I.A. headquarters and still others lived with an F.B.I. informant. Sound like "Islamic radical hijackers"? Or C.I.A. asset patsies who thought they were in training to be C.I.A. drug smuggling pilots?

5. None of the airline pilots from the alleged four airliners in question were able to enter the simple four-digit code that sends the message "Hey, I'm being hijacked". Not one. I could see one or two out of four being surprised but four for four?

6. The Pentagon was struck in the one wedge that was under renovation at the time meaning comparatively few military personnel were present that morning there instead of the other four wedges. And the one wedge that was struck had recently been structurally reinforced to make it more difficult for a massive fire there to spread elsewhere. And it was the farthest point in the building from Rumsfeld's office. And consider: If one intends to crash into the Pentagon and do the most damage possible one would fly the plane down into the roof, not zoom around and fly just above the ground to strike it in the outside wall. Not to mention that it would be infinitely easier to hit the roof. So wasn't it nice of the "hijacker terrorists" to go out of their way to make sure that when they hit the Pentagon they did so in a way that would inflict the least amount of damage and death possible? So they were humanitarian terrorists then?

7. The "airliner" that crashed into the Pentagon left no wings, no fuselage, no tail section, no luggage etc. on the Pentagon's lawn and the official story literally tells us that the wings folded alongside the fuselage and the whole plane was sucked into the building, then all 255,000 lbs. of airplane vaporized. Yeah.

8. The "airliner" that crashed near Shanksville in Pennsylvania also vaporized itself into nothingness, just a crater in the ground. But wouldn't you know it, even though a great big airliner vanished into thin air they were still able to "find" a "hijacker's" passport, youth hostel card and a bandana in pristine condition? Just like the "hijacker's" passport "found" days after 9/11 near Ground Zero. Wow they should make airplanes and buildings out of paper and plastic so as to be as indestructable as those convenient passports, right?

9. The alleged four airliners had flight manifests that showed them as being extremely under capacity for those alleged four flights. A Boeing 757 and -767 will hold between 180 and 220 passengers depending on configuration. So is it really plausible that two separate airlines would be flying planes that weren't even half full? One even having literally forty-five passengers? Airlines want to stay in business, not bankrupt themselves.

10. The N.I.S.T. and 9/11 whitewash Commission both admitted that the Twin Towers, once the "collapses" started, came down at freefall rate in air. Meaning they expect you to believe that all that solid concrete and steel underneath the uppermost falling mass offered no more resistance to said mass than air. This is preposterous in the real world unless one is talking about controlled demolitions using explosive charges. Which would explain the numerous eyewitness accounts of first responders who said they saw, heard and felt explosions, some even being blown down by the overpressure wave. It would also explain the "collapse" of WTC # 7 building which came down later that day immediately after two parallel lines of puffs of smoke went up the face of the building. Wonder what that was. Maybe demolition charges? Ya think?

11. The most expensive and technologically advance air force the world has ever seen was no more effective that morning, the most important morning of its existence, than if they had been flying ancient biplanes. Part of the reason is that most of the fighter planes in the northeast U.S. had been conveniently sent to Alaska for military exercises scheduled for the morning of 9/11 so they would be far out of the way. (What a strange coincidence, right?)Others that remained were scrambled to intercept with no ammo for their guns and no missiles and instead of being flown straight to Manhattan were flown by a circuitous route taking them out over the Atlantic and eventually to New York. But if it was incompetence then why was the highest ranking Air Force officer, Gen. Myers who was then the acting chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, not fired or court martialed? Instead, a month after 9/11, he was PROMOTED to full chairman.

12. In the week just before 9/11 there were record amounts of "put" options placed on the stock of United Airlines, American Airlines and several companies based in the WTC. Put options are basically betting that a certain stock is going to plummet in value. Was someone just a really really really good guesser?

13. The mayor of San Francicso at the time, Willie Brown, was warned in advance to not fly on September 11, 2001 and to avoid the World Trade Center in New York. More psychics at work I guess.

14. When Bush was in Booker Elementary that morning and was told by Andy Card that "America is under attack by terrorists" then instead of being allowed to remain in that school for over a half hour, even giving a short press conference on its front steps (!), Bush's Secret Service agents SHOULD have immediately whisked him away to a much safer location. Were the official myth of 9/11 true then letting him remain there would have been putting Bush's life at risk, their own lives at risk as well as all those schoolkids. So they would have had to know that Bush wasn't even a possible target that morning, something they would have absolutely no way of even guessing about if 9/11 wasn't an inside job.

15. Bush had war plans for the invasion of Afghanistan on his desk ready to be signed two days before 9/11, even though it would have been politically impossible for the U.S. to have launched the invasion of Afghanistan WITHOUT a 9/11 event. So, is Bush clairvoyent? Or was 9/11 an inside job?

16. Bush and Cheney stonewalled against allowing a commission to investigate 9/11 to even be formed for over a year, only relenting when they were allowed to dictate its scope (no going beyond the official "nineteen hijackers" myth) and the terms by which they themselves would appear before it, namely Bush and Cheney together so their stories can't be contrasted, with their attorneys present, NOT under oath and with no recordings made and no notes allowed to be kept. Now does this sound like the actions of two men with nothing to hide?

These and other bits of evidence all point to one inescapable conclusion: The official story of 9/11 is an impossible myth and by extension the ones forcing this myth down America's throat are the ones responsible. Ignoring it won't change this, it will only make it that much more likely that if there is another false flag attack you will again be a dupe and fall for it. I will give you the benefit of the doubt and presume you haven't bothered to find out the above information because if you have and still choose to drink the official 9/11 kool-aid I would be inclined to feel very sorry for you and recommend that you find someone to look after you as you'd probably be unable to figure out how to go up and down an escalator. So I'll presume you are simply ignorant and not mentally retarded.

Karen,
If you want an accurate view of what the health care "reform" bill is all about, who it benefits and who it screws over then please read this article:

http://pubrecord.org/com...-sell-out-health-reform/

Or these:

http://www.motherjones.c...armas-phony-gift-seniors

http://www.salon.com/opi...7/27/health_care_reform/

http://www.politico.com/.../stories/0809/26180.html

I'm sure you will quickly understand what I mean when I say it is not real reform at all and has been written with Big Pharma and the health insurance companies in mind.

P.S.-- Yes I realize that those three necessary tasks, banning private money from politics and abolishing the Electoral College and Senate, are a lot to digest. But without these being undertaken then we may as well forget about ever having elections in the U.S. that are meaningful and resign ourselves to either 1.refusing to vote because it is a meaningless, controlled process in which our votes do nothing but give false legitimacy to a phony, corrupt, undemocratic process; or 2.pretend that we DO actually have democracy in America and live in a fantasy world.

Because something like conversion to paper ballots that are hand counted will by itself not amount to a hill of beans and will be nothing but a new shade of lipstick on the pig that is the American political process.