The Killing Silence of Alan Greenspan
by William Hughes
(Wednesday, October 3, 2007)
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The Bush-Cheney Gang lied the country into the Iraq War. Now, Alan
Greenspan, the ex-Chairman of the Board of Governors of the Federal Reserves,
has admitted: Everyone knows the Iraq War was largely about oil! Greenspan
should be forced to testify, under oath, before a Grand Jury and/or the House
Judiciary Committee about this amazing disclosure. The American people are
entitled to the truth and the liars should be punished.
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Our lives begin to end the day we become silent about things that
matter.
-- Martin Luther King, Jr.
He held one of the highest positions that can be bestowed on a public
servant. Im referring to Alan Greenspan, the former Chairman of the Board of
Governors of the Federal Reserve (1987-2006). After leaving office, he penned a
tell-all book that filled his pockets with mega-greenbacks. Its entitled, The
Age of Turbulence. In it, he made this shocking statement: It is politically
inconvenient to acknowledge what everyone knows: the Iraq War is largely
about oil. Translation: Greenspan consciously chose to remain silent about
what he now reveals was one of the true reasons for the Iraq War--oil! Why
didnt he resign his office and come clean with the American people that a
massive fraud, a war based on serial lies, was being perpetrated on them by the
Bush-Cheney Gang? [1] As of todays date, 3,808 U.S. troop have died in that
conflict.
Is Greenspan also suggesting that his fear of feeling politically
inconvenient, was more important to him than exposing the cover story of the
Bush-Cheney Gangs rush to war as a lie? What did Greenspan mean, too, when he
wrote that everyone knows that the Iraq War is largely about oil? Who in
this present administration didnt know the conflict was largely about oil?
Were President George W. Bush, V.P. Dick Cheney, Donald Rumsfeld, Colin Powell,
Condi Rice, John Bolton and Paul Wolfowitz all in the loop? Greenspan should be
subpoenaed before a Federal Grand Jury and/or the House Judiciary Committee and
required to give testimony under oath with respect to his amazing disclosure.
It is a federal crime for President Bush, (and his V.P. Cheney, too), to lie to
the U.S. Congress. Both of them have insisted repeatedly that the war in Iraq
was about Saddam Hussein having WMDs, ties to al-Qaeda, and a connection to the
9/11 tragedy. We now know their cover story was a
smokescreen and a lie. (1) So, what were the real reasons for the war? The
American people are entitled to straight answers and the liars deserve to be
severely punished.
In fact, H. Res. 333, authored by Rep. Dennis J. Kucinich (D-OH), which calls
for the impeachment of the grossly callous Cheney, now has 21 sponsors. In
Article 1 of that historic document, it is charged that Cheney, Halliburtons
favorite gofer, deliberately fabricated a threat of Iraqi weapons of mass
destruction in order to justify the invasion, destruction and occupation of
that beleaguered country. [2] It is estimated that a million Iraqis have died
in that blood stained conflict and that another 3.7 million have been made
refugees. It is arguable that the Iraq War is a War of Aggression under the
holdings of the Nuremberg Tribunal, and that it constitutes a War Crime. [3]
Rep. Kucinich has also attacked the dastardly scheme of the Bush-Cheney Gang
to privatize Iraqs huge oil reserves. Under the plot, about 65 percent of
Iraqs oil would go to the global oil companies, especially the U.S. and the
British-based ones. He has labeled it a theft and a War Crime. [4] Rep.
Kucinich has been supported in his efforts to block this skullduggery by many
Iraqi Oil Workers, the AFL-CIO and U.S. Labor Against the War. [5]
Back to Greenspan. If he is required to testify under oath--and I think he
should be--and if his testimony shows that Cheney was one of the culprits who
knew the war was largely about oil, it could begin a steamroll in the House
of Representatives for the V.P.s impeachment, and eventual removal from public
office for committing High Crimes and Misdemeanors. Cheney, after his ouster,
might also face a criminal indictment, and if convicted, imprisonment. If
anything, the Houses passage of Article of Impeachment against Cheney could
stop this criminally reckless administration from nuking Iran and starting
WWIII. [6]
Another question comes up: How could Greenspan sleep at night knowing that so
much death and mayhem in Iraq was happening, not because of a purported need
for regime change, but because a Special Interest, Big Oil, wished to
enrich its bottom line? And, what exactly did Greenspan mean when he said the
Iraq War was largely about oil? What else did he know it was about? When I
mention Special Interests, like the Military Industrial Complex and the
Israel Lobby, does that refresh his memory?
In his tome, Sorrows of Empire, Professor Chalmers Johnson made the case
for those three cited Special Interests coming together to push for the illegal
and immoral Iraq War. In his follow-up book, Nemesis: The Last Days of the
American Republic, he detailed the disastrous consequences of the militarism
let loose by the Bush-Cheney Gang, not only for its many victims, but for our
fading Republic. He sees our fate for years to come embracing perpetual war, a
collapse of constitutional government, endemic official lying, and
disinformation and finally bankruptcy.
There is a passage in Professor Johnsons book, Nemesis, that has relevance
to Greenspans failure to speak out. He quotes a question from a Canadian
political commentator, Adam Young. Mr. Young asked: How did the chief
magistrate of a confederated republic degrade into the global tyrant we
experience today, part secular pope, part military despot, part
pseudo-philsopher-king and full-time overbearing global gangster? Let me
submit that Bush had a lot of accomplices, along with Cheney, in and outside
the government. Author Johnson puts the blame partly on the atrophying of the
legislative and judicial branches. He also added how an imperial presidency
and the rabid militarism (737 military bases located in 130 countries) have
turned many of the organs of our free press into Pravda-like mouthpieces.
I submit that Greenspan, and others of his ilk, are clearly part of this
problem. Like other White House intimates, he had a high duty to tell the truth
about the real reasons why the Bush-Cheney Gang was taking the country into
war. If he didnt want to come clean himself, he could have told his wife,
Andrea Mitchell, a senior correspondent for NBC-TV News. And, if he did tell
her, and she didnt want to go on record about it, she could just as easily
given that information to one of her favorite elected politicians--Sen. Arlen
Specter (R-PA). Mitchell and Specter knew each other when Specter was a
District Attorney in Philadelphia, PA, and she was then a reporter for a local
television station.
Instead, Greenspan failed miserably in his primary obligation to the people.
He had a fiduciary responsibility to his fellow Americans that he ignored.
Greenspan went along with the White Houses flagrant deceptions, even after
Irving Scooter Libby was convicted of lying to a Grand Jury and to the FBI.
[7] And the lies of the Bush-Cheney Gang just go on and on. Bushs Surge ploy
is just another big lie. Today, Bush and Cheney are lying about why we need to
attack Iran. The lies are so pervasive, that novelist Norman Mailers quote
rings even truer. He said: Each day a few more lies eat into the seed from
which we were born.
I say: Damn the malicious lies of the Bush-Cheney Gang, and damn weasels,
like Greenspan. He went along with the liars and the lies of the Bush-Cheney
Gang, because he insisted that it was politically inconvenient to tell the
American people the full truth. Meanwhile, our brave troops are continuing to
die in the Iraq War, while more than 27,000 have come home after being
seriously wounded. And, on top of all that, the country is wasting $8 billion a
month in the Iraq hell hole. And, all for what? DAMNABLE LIES
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