If Israel’s recent large-scale military exercise in the Mediterranean does indeed turn out to be a precursor to an attack on Iran due to the latter’s alleged nuclear plant as many sources suggest, it will only be the latest in a series of hypocritical acts by Western nations, bombing countries such as Iraq into submission whilst amassing nuclear resources themselves, which, of course, are not subject to inspection. Meanwhile, the original whistleblower on Israel’s nuclear arsenal, Mordechai Vanunu, continues to suffer gross infringements on his freedom of movement: “My future plans can only consist of waiting. I am here in East Jerusalem just waiting. Waiting to be free to leave.”

Before a 1986 feature by the Sunday Times, made possible by solid evidence given to a journalist by Vanunu, revealed that Israel had accumulated a huge wealth of advanced nuclear weapons including neutron and hydrogen bombs, the country had denied possessing even a single atom bomb. Whereas Vanunu felt it was only ethically right to reveal Israel’s lies to the world in the hope that other major powers would pressure the country to stop its weapons proliferation, his government decided that he should be punished for his “treachery”.

Born in Morocco in 1954, his family moved to Israel in 1963 where he converted from Judaism to Christianity as a teenager. In 1976 he became a technician at Dimona nuclear plant whilst simultaneously studying philosophy and geography at Ben Gurion University. At this time, he began to have deep misgivings about a number of his country’s policies. Vanunu formed a radical group called "Campus" with four Jews and five Palestinians, and became involved with an organisation known as the Movement for the Advancement of Peace. Consequently, he risked being dismissed for “mixing with Arabs”.

As his disillusionment grew and he began to realise how huge the stockpile of nuclear warheads was at the plant where he was working, his conscience forced him to speak out. He travelled to London to meet with the Sunday Times, but by the time his story was published, he had already been lured to Rome, abducted by agents from the Israeli secret police organisation Mossad and chained up and drugged on board a ship bound for Israel. There, he was sentenced in a secret trial to 18 years imprisonment for treason and espionage, despite not having talked to any foreign power or received any renumeration for his story.

Whilst imprisoned, he claims that the strategy of the Israeli authorities was to break him by using tactics such as eleven years of solitary confinement, giving him razors to slit his wrists, sleep deprivation and forcing his mother to wait for hours on end in the hot sun so that when she was finally allowed in to visit him she would be crying. He also recalls how they attempted to brainwash him, “they interrogated me and kept on trying to modify my brain. They gave me good food on Jewish celebrations but I just threw it in the garbage. They sent me nice Jewish “friends” to talk to me in my cell but I told them that they were spies and to leave me alone.”

In 2004, his sentence served, he was finally released. Yet since then he continues to live under house arrest and has endured further periods of imprisonment for “crimes” such as visiting Bethlehem at Christmas and talking to foreigners. Why does Vanunu continue to be harassed four years after his initial release and when all the information he has was so long ago revealed? Vanunu believes his enforced solitude by the Israeli authorities is part of an attempt to turn him into a “religious fundamentalist”, which would help to justify their harsh treatment of him, and argues that this is true of the portrayal of Arabs in general by Israel, which tries to paint the Palestinians as a terrorist people: “They portray them as religious fundamentalists, while the truth is that the Jews here in Israel are the real religious fundamentalists. They still believe that they are a superior race here in Israel, and that the Arabs are second-class. The Arabs don't have equal rights. Israel doesn't want a real peace, because they don't want to give equal rights to the Arab peoples. That is the reason for Israel wanting to keep its racial superiority by force over all the Arabs. And to justify it they need Islamic fundamentalism."

Indeed, a large part of the effort by Western governments in the “War on Terror” has been to foster fears amongst the population of “Islamic extremism” and “radical Muslims”, whereas their aggressive foreign policies have perhaps served to fan the flames of what they purport to be against. Similarly, Vanunu believes that the Israeli government has attempted to promote religious fundamentalism amongst the Palestinians by “a new type of psychological warfare.” He explains: “When people lose all hope of being free, liberated, no longer living under the occupation, and they have no power whatsoever to change the situation, with Israel putting them under increasing pressure, they are forced to hold and cling on to their connection with God. It is a conspiracy. [The Palestinians] have a very poor standard of living, and no hope. Israel will win by making them into Muslim fundamentalists.”

Does Vanunu regret blowing the whistle on Israel’s nuclear arsenal? “Not at all. One should be prepared to go to the cross for one’s beliefs”. Israel’s treatment of this brave man who has sacrificed his freedom in the fight against nuclear weapons is one more factor amongst a multitude that make a mockery of that country’s claim to be a democracy.

Ingrid Betancourt, a, Colombian presidential candidate in 2002 for the Oxygen Green Party who was taken hostage by the FARC on the 23rd February that year, has finally been freed after six long years of captivity following the success of a risky operation launched by the Colombian military. Together with her, another 14 people have been rescued, aincluding three American military contractors and eleven Colombian policemen and soldiers.

Ingrid had become a worldwide symbol of the Colombian hostage crisis. Having been the most visible prisoner in the hands of the guerrillas, her detention became the target of several solidarity campaigns across the world. Her name is known even to people who have little familiarity with Colombia and its domestic issues, but who came to symphathise for a woman who vied to make her country a better place and was unjustly captured by the guerrillas.

Following her arrival in the Tolemaida air base near Bogotá, she has seemed relatively healthy, though considerably emaciated. Her first speech has been vivid and frank, showing no loss of vitality and tenacity. She has expressed her utmost gratitude to all those who contributed to her liberation, in particular the military, the president of Colombia, and the French government. However, she said her mind is still directed towards all those hostages that are still detained, and 'to all those that will never come back'. Moreover, she pledged to fight for the liberation of those who are still imprisoned.

Her liberation has been welcomed by messages of happiness and congratulations from all over the globe. Sarkozy, who had made her liberation one of the top priorities of his foreign policy, has been among the first to talk to Ingrid on the phone, even though the Élysée seems to have been entirely in the dark with respect to the operation. Ingrid, who holds French citizenship thanks to her ex-husband, a French diplomat, is about to undertake a trip to Paris, where she is expected to meet the President.

The FARC always tried to exploit her detention to snatch some concessions from the Colombian government, such as as the military clearing of an area of the country (Florida and Pradera) in order to establish a humanitarian inter-exchange dialogue. She was part of those high calibre hostages that the insurgents call 'exchangeable', a small group, now reduced to a bit more than 30 persons, held to negotiate the release of imprisoned guerrilla fighters. However, the total number of hostages hovers around 700, with the great majority detained for ransom.

It would be silly not to admit that the democratic security policy and the stubborn insistence on military rescue has this time been able to deliver in terms of the hostages' liberation. But the freeing of Ingrid and the other 14 hostages furnishes a particular insight into the successes of Uribe's strong hand against the insurgent group. The liberation has not come about through a pure manu militari intervention, as the philosophy hitherto deployed by Uribe would have envisaged. Rather, it has happened through a sophisticated infiltration of the highest echelons of FARC's organisation, which tells a great deal about vulnerability of the group.

News about the diminution of FARC's membership (by around 50%) has already become public knowledge in the last year. Plagued by military extermination and demobilisation, as confirmed by the surrender of Katrina, one of the most fearsome female rebels, as well as the recent loss of three members of the Secretariat, the strength displayed by the group in the 1990s is now only a blurred memory.

The dynamic of the operation, named 'Jaque', clearly demonstrates the level of professionalism of the Colombian army and the vulnerability of the FARC. The version supplied by the Defence Minister Manuel Santos and the Armed Forces Commander Freddy Padilla, confirmed by Ingrid upon her arrival, has pointed at the setting up of an elaborate and thorough deception. The different groups holding the 15 hostages were gathered in a place near San Jose del Guaviare, after months of infiltration of the Secretariat and close vigilance on the movements of the commands that held the captives. These groups were driven there under the supposed order of FARC's leader, Alfonso Cano, with the goal of moving the hostages to a safer place with an helicopter. In reality, the message was issued by infiltraters, who immobilised without a single shot the few insurgents on board little after the camouflaged helicopter departed for the supposed transfer.

Beyond any conjectural machination, the happy liberation of Ingrid Betancourt comes as pure oxygen to Mr. Uribe and his government. The deep waters that were making the project of a second re-election – a potential third mandate- a distant and difficult horizon, are now swept away by the advent of the news that had been awaited for years. Despite the huge popularity obtained thanks to his war on the FARC, a recent scandal had seriously undermined the credibility of the government.

The so-called Yidisgate has directly questioned the legitimacy of the current executive. Yidis Medina, a formed Congressman, has been condemned by the Supreme Court to almost 4 years of home arrests for the selling of her vote in a decisive parliamentary discussion in 2005 that eventually led the modification of the constitution, which permitted the re-election of the President. The vote was fundamental, but the favours promised by various officers of the government were not accomplished, leading Yidis to confess.

The political temperature rose last week as the Supreme Court has officially asked the Constitutional Court to revise the legitimacy of 2006 elections, as these were the fruit of a violation of the rule of law: “It is incompatible with the social and democratic rule of law that...an altered juridic act, with criminal connotations, has validity and executability.” Uribe's answer has been prompt, asking for a referendum to confirm the elections that guaranteed him a second term, but his discomfort in the face of an unexpected crisis was evident.

The political future of Colombia seems again to be dictated by the successes of Uribe against the insurgents. However, the scenario is anything but predictable, and the landscape is in the making. Different factors make for different developments: will the FARC accept a negotiated solution or will they keep their arms providing Uribe a strong political weapon? Will the Yidisgate lead to a major fallout? Will Uribe manage to further modify the rules of the game and guarantee himself a second re-election? Will Ingrid Betancourt re-enter politics with the high profile conferred by her long captivity? And, if so, on which side? Her first words lend themselves to different interpretations. These are all elements which offer little certainty in the coming months.

Note: Bronwen Maddox is the Chief Foreign Commentator of the Times. Oliver Kamm, the Times' columnist, is a founding member of the right wing Henry Jackson Society and a proponent of interventionism in foreign policy. The following letter follows the Medialens' correspondence with them regarding the NIE and the IAEA report on Iran.

I am writing in relation to your article of 17th June in the Times, "The wrong timing is right for tougher sanctions with Iran" and your subsequent correspondence with the Medialens. There are very serious inaccuracies and untruths in your article, as there are in your reply to Medialens. You mention that you have "written extensively on the NIE", it is evident however that your reading on the subject is limited, sparse and badly sourced. In your own words, the "daily, short running commentary on current news", makes it possible to get away with both inadequate knowledge and intentional distortions.

The phrasing of the NIE gave "too little" attention to "the fact that there had been a weapons design programme" because there was no such "fact" and the supposed "evidence' behind the claim, according to the US and European intelligence and the IAEA experts, was hugely suspect! The allegations regarding Iranian weapons programme – which is stated to have ceased after 2003 - are based on a supposed Iranian "stolen laptop", which was first mentioned by Colin Powel in late 2004. According to German officials heavily involved with intelligence gathering, this came from the discredited Iranian MEK, the listed terrorist group that after serving Saddam during the Iran-Iraq war, is now sponsored by the US and Israeli terrorist states to terrorise and destabilise Iran. The source of the alleged laptop is believed to be the Israeli Mossad!

The information on the laptop was treated with high skepticism by the US and European intelligence as well as the IAEA who seriously questioned its authenticity in 2005. The inclusion of these unsubstantiated and highly suspect allegations was demanded by the US in the February 2008 report of the IAEA because the report was to declare the successful outcome of the IAEA-Iran Plan which had cleared all six outstanding issues which had been used as the basis of suspicion by the US to refer Iran's file to the Security Council and the demands for suspension of enrichment. This would have removed any justification for keeping Iran's file in the Security Council and the continuation of the sanctions resolutions.

However, contrary to your assertion regarding the IAEA's latest report of 26th May, and despite its harsh language under US's heavy arm-twisting and thuggery, the factual and technical information in the report confirm that there is no evidence of a weaponisation programme and indeed no deviation from the NPT guidelines. The report stresses in paragraph 24 that "[T]he Agency currently has NO INFORMATION – apart from the uranium metal document – on the actual DESIGN OR MANUFACTURE BY IRAN OF NCULEAR MATERIAL COMPONENTS OF A NUCLEAR WEAPONS or of certain other key components, such as initiators, or on related nuclear physics studies. As regards the uranium metal document found in Iran, Pakistan has confirmed, in response to the Agency's request (GOV/2007/58 paragraph.25), that an identical document exists in Pakistan." In relation to the former, this means that the IAEA does not consider the US's evidence of "alleged studies" as containing any valid information. This is the reason for the NIE's placing "too little" emphasis on Iran's alleged weaponisation work because it does not stand scrutiny! In relation to the latter (uranium mental), this is the document Iran itself had handed to the IAEA stating that it had been received in 1987 without having been requested by Iran, amongst documents pertaining the design information for P1 centrifuges for uranium enrichment.

Again on the "alleged studies" the report says, "The Agency received much of this information only in electronic form and was not authorised to provide copies to Iran".

In Para 21, in relation to the studies on Green Salt and Shahab-3 missile warheads, the report specifies that "Although the Agency had been shown the documents that led it to these conclusions, it was not in possession of the documents and was therefore unfortunately unable to make them available to Iran". In other words, Iran was expected to disprove allegations in documents that the IAEA itself did not have or was not allowed to show to Iran.

The continuation of enrichment is Iran's right under the Nuclear Non-proliferation Treaty of which Iran is a signatory. In relation to the installation of the improved IR-2 and IR-3 centrifuges, the Agency notes that "Code 3.1 of the Subsidiary Arrangements General Part", required the upgrades to be "communicated to the Agency sixty days before the modifications were scheduled to be completed". The report makes it clear, however, that "Iran has not implemented the modified text of its Subsidiary General Part, Code 3.1 on the early provision of design information" and that it was "under no obligation to have done so".

The agency also reports on Iran's refusal so far "as a transparency measure" to provide "access to additional locations" related to "the manufacturing of centrifuges, R&D on uranium enrichment, and uranium mining." It is notable that this area would have been covered by the Additional Protocol, which allows more intrusive and extensive inspections, including of non-nuclear sites, but to which Iran is not a signatory. However, as stated in the IAEA report of 22nd February, Iran has expressed willingness to implement both of these requirements of the Additional Protocol as confidence building measures"if the nuclear file is returned from the Security Council to the IAEA" because the resolution of the "outstanding issues" in the IAEA-Iran Workplan had removed the given concerns for reporting Iran's file to the Security Council. It was the US' lawless refusal which sabotaged Iran's implementation of the Additional Protocol.

The report reiterates that "The Agency has been able to continue to verify the non-diversion of declared nuclear material in Iran. Iran has provided the Agency with access to declared nuclear material and has provided the required nuclear material accountancy reports in connection with declared nuclear material and activities".

Finally, the IAEA concludes the report by "emphasis[ing]" ", in its summary, "that the Agency has not detected the actual use of nuclear material in connection with the alleged studies".

The IAEA director, Dr. El-Baradei, stressed at the World Economic Forum in Egypt on 8th May that the international community had no evidence of the nuclear weapons intentions in Iran, and in reference to Israel's criminal posturing of recent days to pre-emptively attack Iran, Dr El-Baradei has issued warning against the "great danger to the Middle East and the world" posed by US/Israeli warmongering, stressing that "I don't believe that what I see in Iran today is a current, grave and urgent danger".

Your reveling in your article that "Iran's economic predicament has worsened, given its need to import petrol, the vulnerability of its poorest people to rising food prices and its failure to develop other sources of income", although coming from the Times, still does not fail to induce outrage and repulsion at the degree of callous disregard to human suffering.

The sanctions in Iraq, according to the figures from Unicef, had killed over a million innocent civilians of malnutrition and disease as a prelude to the 2003 illegal invasion. These sanctions were imposed on the pretexts of the same fabricated evidence and charges of non-existent WMD.

The US instigated EU sanctions on Iran's largest bank, Melli, and the attempt to place embargo on Iranian gas and oil sector, are not only of that same genocidal genre that target the population, but betray deep cynicism at the heart of US/EU's supposed "diplomacy". This "wrong timing" in Brown's announcement of sanctions, you view as "right", came at a time Iran had received Solana's package and expressed willingness to study the proposals, having also offered a comprehensive "Constructive Package of Proposals" of its own to be considered. The humiliating, bullish and outright illegal sanctions by the US and UE against Iran at this time are directed at sabotaging the diplomatic process.

And you are alarmingly aware that sanctions hurt the weakest of the population. In Iraq, the sanctions devastated the infra-structure, destroyed workers' bargaining power and made the population hostage to state hand-outs. Denis Halliday, the then Assistant Secretary General of the UN, and head of the "Oil for Food" programme in Iraq, resigned from his post in protest at the "genocidal effect" of sanctions. His successor Hans Von Sponek too resigned in protest. Denis Halliday said in his resignation letter to the UN, "I am resigning because the policy of economic sanctions is totally bankrupt. We are in the process of destroying an entire society. It is as simple as that …. Five thousand children are dying every month… ".

Politicians and their media assassins make regular references to the "fears" and "concerns" of "International community", and ascribe the decisions made by a small number of veto-yielding powerful states, using political manipulation, coercion and threats, to the "will of the international community". As recorded in John Pilger's seminal work, "The New Rulers of the World" (Verso, 2002), Halliday said in relation to the Security Council imposed sanctions on Iraq and its unrepresentative decisions as against the UN General Assembly's one nation one vote, that the "Genocide in Iraq is the test of our will. All of us have to break the silence: to make those responsible, in Washington and London, aware that history will slaughter them".

Despite the Venezuelan Environment Ministry’s proclamation of sweeping restrictions on mining in southeastern Venezuela’s Imataca Forest, Toronto-based Crystallex and Spokane, Washington-based Gold Reserve, Inc. have told investors that the ministry might grant them permits to open new gold mines in the Imataca if the companies promise social investments and environmental reparations.

According to company statements released Tuesday, Crystallex and Gold Reserve met with a group of Environment Ministry officials who informed the companies of “the decision taken by the government to reconsider the permitting process for both projects, subject to meeting certain criteria.”

The ministry had denied key environmental permits to both companies in late April, citing environmental concerns and protests from indigenous groups in the region.

Now, if the companies invest in social projects in the region where the mines are located, “mitigate the impact” of their projects, repair environmental damage caused by illegal miners in the region, and improve “remediation” plans for when mine life expires, the permit denial might be reversed, the companies said Tuesday.

Crystallex said it obtained minutes which reveal that the Ministry of Basic Industries and Mining (MIBAM) “confirmed support for Crystallex” in a June 4th meeting with the Economic Development Commission of the Venezuelan National Assembly (AN).

According to Crystallex, the minutes also reveal that the commission sought to resolve the “lack of coordination between the various government branches” that has affected the issuance of permits, and recognized that Crystallex has complied with all other legal requirements thus far in the process.

“It is too early for Crystallex to forecast how this issue will be resolved, but it is encouraged by the support from the Venezuelan Government and National Assembly,” concluded the company, whose statement was titled “Crystallex and Ministry of Environment Begin Discussions.”

Likewise, Gold Reserve President Doug Belanger stated, “We believe it is premature to predict the outcome of this initiative by the government.”

The ministry’s renewal of permit discussions seems to contrast with its ban on open-pit mining in the Imataca Forest proclaimed May 15th by Environment Minister Yubirí Ortega, who had specified that “neither private or public companies will for now exploit Imataca’s gold.”

After denying an appeal by Crystallex in late May, Ortega reiterated last weekend that only underground vein exploitation will be permitted, and that this is part of Venezuela’s plans to “favor national interests over foreign interests" and "save and take ownership of what is ours.”

Ortega has not said mining bans shall be permanent, but instead explained that “for the moment we do not need to exploit these minerals; as the president says, we don't need diamonds or gold, or coal.”

Belanger expressed wariness about the government’s mixed messages, telling investors Tuesday, “Although we are enthusiastic with [the Environment Ministry’s] initiative, we are also trying to reconcile Environmental Minister Ortega's statements related to the potential banning of open pit mining in the Imataca Forest Reserve.”

Despite the caution expressed in the company statements, Crystallex stocks shot up 66% and Gold Reserve stocks rose 35% in value following Tuesday’s announcements.

In an interview with Venezuelanalysis.com, a deputy on the Environment Commission of Venezuela’s National Assembly affirmed Wednesday that definitely no new mining concessions are on the government’s agenda for the Imataca Forest, and that all current mining concessions are currently undergoing “profound revision.”

This has the mining industry in the Imataca region “semi-paralyzed,” the deputy expressed. The deputy also assured that the government definitely plans to uphold the 3.8 million hectare (9.4 million acre) Imataca’s status as a national forest reserve.

The Las Cristinas Mine from which Crystallex hopes to extract an estimated 17 million ounces of gold is owned by Venezuela’s state mining corporation, the Venezuelan Corporation of Guayana (CVG), but has been contracted to Crystallex since 2002. Crystallex’s permits to begin operations were never granted, though.

Gold Reserve acquired the property where it hopes to invest more than $1 billion and extract 10.2 million ounces of gold from the Las Brisas mine in 1992.

Last April, the government nationalized the Andean region’s largest steel plant, SIDOR, which is located in Bolívar state near the Imataca Forest, in order to bring an end to a 15-month collective contract struggle between the workers and the management, and to take control of “strategic” natural resources.

Shortly after this, workers at the nearby Isidora gold mine owned by Idaho-based Hecla Mining Company, which is the largest gold producer in Venezuela, blockaded a major highway and clamored for nationalization of the mines, citing “the constant violations of human rights being carried out by the management of this company.”

After Rodolfo Sanz announced that Hecla`s contract would undergo revision, Hecla sold its subsidiaries in Venezuela to the Russian firm Rusoro for $25 million. The government has made no further statements about the projects formerly owned by Hecla.

The Venezuelan government’s desire to become the majority partner in mixed enterprises in charge of mining projects was first expressed in 2005, the year President Hugo Chávez declared a “big turnaround” in the nation’s mining policy.

James Suggett writes for Venezuela Analysis.

The campaign rhetoric between Barack Obama (D-IL), John McCain (R-AZ), Bob Barr (Libertarian Party), and Ralph Nader (Green Party) will fly fast and thick - no different from any other election year - Presidential races are like that and as the money needed to elect increases, so will the institutionalized nature of the electoral beast.

It will also ensure that the voices of tertiary parties are left silenced under the mountain of campaign fundraising achieved by the dominant 2 Party system.

Unless, of course, we see broad and sweeping electoral reform and serious transparency in practice. And again, it’s a classic Joseph Heller Catch 22 situation; more money means access to more money, ensuring the status quo never be budged.

In the meantime, many questions emerge about how election campaigning away from the podium and glare of the big-money media machines will be conducted. It’s much harder to hold a candidates’ feet to the fire when a campaign becomes plagued with allegations of underhandedness and inuendo away from the cameras.

While John McCain is certainly no shining example of rhetorical consistency (from referring to Falwell and Roberston as “agents of intolerance” in 2000 to almost sycophantic, backpedalling deference in 2006/7 in an attempt to secure their endorsements), Barack Obama has set high standards for his own campaign and may have painted himself in a corner by doing so.

And this issue emerges in the ethically malleable underbelly of such things as phone bank campaigning and push polling tactics, surrogates, and the ever present 527’s.

Sadly Barack Obama’s campaign may be busy pushing that ethical envelope at this very minute. In another city and from another country. By this we mean outsourced Push Polling.

What IS Push Polling?

After certain allegations emerged in 2000’s Republican South Carolina primary, some definition was required for voters who may have have almost certainly been exposed to it in the past but had no idea what it was that they had been exposed to. Campaign staffers from both the McCain and GW Bush camps we not inclined to let the matter ride.

CNN, defining Push Polling in thier Feb 10th, 2000 All Politics campaign coverage, said that “Push-polling” refers to a practice where callers represent themselves as a non-partisan member of a polling organization, then provide negative information about a candidate in an effort to discourage voting.”

More accurately however, Kathy Frankovic, Director of Surveys for CBS News, explains that… ”Fundamentally, what people label a push poll isn’t a poll at all. A push poll is political telemarketing masquerading as a poll. No one is really collecting information. No one will analyze the data. You can tell a push poll because it is very short, even too short. (It has to be very short to reach tens of thousands of potential voters, one by one). It will not include any demographic questions. The “interviewer” will sometimes ask to speak to a specific voter by name. And, of course, a push poll will contain negative information - sometimes truthful, sometimes not - about the opponent.”

By their very nature, this style of polling, which isn’t really polling, essentially misleads the respondent and subtly damages the image of intended victim and/or party.

Some license-taking push polling has emerged as recently as 2006. In a race for retiring Sen. Bill Frist’s (R-TN) seat, Rep. Harry Ford Jr (D-TN) faced former Chatanooga Mayor Republican Bob Corker. Corker, using subtle (or overt, depending on one’s definition) racism in questions (ie: his visiting a Playboy Ranch), not to mention the jaw-dropping anti-Ford Jr. TV ads (ie:pretend blonde bimbo:”Harry! Call me.” as she mimes a possible future cell phone communique intimating a tryst).

Even former Republican Senator from Maine, Bill Cohen, expressed to CNN that the GOP sponsored TV spot was “a very serious appeal to a racist sentiment.”

And of course, it doesn’t take much to understand how ‘Swift Boating’ became part of the popular lexicon.

As history shows, if a campaign can cripple a voter’s faith in a candidate, it can undermine that candidate’s likelihood in recieving their vote. And that is the basic method to the madness.

But it takes a cursory look at the GOP’s 2000 primary race to understand where the modern regimen of Push Polling grew, well fertilized (manured) by pol-operatives.

Richard Davis, a campaign organizer for Senator McCain’s run against G.W. Bush recounted for the Boston Globe in a pre-campaign Op Ed piece dated Mar.21,2004, that “Anonymous opponents used “push polling” to suggest that McCain’s Bangladeshi born daughter was his own, illegitimate black child…”

The McCain campaign, riding high on a 19 point win over Bush in New Hampshire, found an agressive adversary in thier main opponent.

”What followed was a primary campaign that would make history for its negativity”, Davis remembers. With few substantive differences between Bush and McCain, the campaign was bound to turn personal. The situation was ripe for a smear.” Certainly some deja vu to be considered in the recent Obama-Clinton battle royale!

The bottom line? A question asked of race-sensitive South Carolinian voters:“Would you vote for someone who fathered an illegitimate black child ?” If you guessed that Karl Rove had something to with the strategy in question, you wouldn’t be wrong. That Rove was dismissed from Bush Sr.’s says something for Father George. That Bush Jr. loves Rove as his “Turd Blossom” says nothing for the son.

Davis continues in his op ed piece, ” In the conservative, race-conscious South, that’s [a black illegitimate child] not a minor charge. We had no idea who made the phone calls, who paid for them, or how many calls were made. Effective and anonymous: the perfect smear campaign.”

More importantly, Davis notes “Campaigns have various ways of dealing with smears. They can refute the lies, or they can ignore them and run the risk of the smear spreading. But “if you’re responding, you’re losing.” Rebutting tawdry attacks focuses public attention on them, and prevents the campaign from talking issues.”

That’s almost a political aphorism these days. With the modern, well funded campaign machine, “attack response” teams are de riguer. Obama has gone so far as to employ a team and a website/media component to deal with echo chamber allegations that he is a “secret Muslim” and attacks on his patriotism.

Something that becomes an even more pressing issue than ever, and that’s the responsibility of the media to not allow these various allegations to go unchecked once, twice, and a third time at least. To paraphrase Bill Moyers’ recent appearance at the NCMR (National Conference on Media Reform) that occured in Minneapolis, MN this past June 6-8, it’s ‘incumbent on the 4th column to not become the Filth Column’.

Davis concluded in his op ed that these strategies that cheapen the democratic process need to be addressed by the candidates themselves in a top-down fashion.

”The only way to stop the expected mud-slinging in 2004 is for both President Bush and Senator Kerry to publicly order their supporters not to go there. But if they do, their behavior would be the exception, not the rule.”

But that was 2004, and we are all to painfully aware of what has continued as business-as-usual.

Maybe Obama’s supporters can “be the change we’ve been waiting for” by making these standards the new norm, - in the process have people reveal distasteful and unfair tactics that could emerge from the McCain camp. At the very least it would differentiate Obama from McCain and further illustrate that a McCain administration could be an extension of the Bush policies.

But that means Obama needs to look into the script and the cheaper allegations Obama would have voters possibly believe.

Sven Eric Balabanoff Writes for http://globalpundit.org/

As the second term of President George W. Bush comes to an end, the majority of Americans are unhappy with the job he has done and that of Congress and the Supreme Court. Fuelled by this desire for change, the 2008 contest for the Democratic presidential nomination has shown that candidates who most symbolise a new approach to politics are the ones who are going to be most successful in the early twenty-first century.

Beyond the obvious and important manifestations of this need for change, the first black or female president, three key trends have also emerged. Firstly, it has become evident that the Democratic Party is moving away from policy driven campaigns in favour of those focusing on emotional appeals. Secondly, this campaign has signified a trend for more centrist politics, a factor which has also led to the nomination of John McCain as the Republican candidate. Lastly, the internet has played a noteworthy part in each campaign, both in terms of raising money and through the influence of the commentary written on the web.

By examining the differences between the campaigns of Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama it is possible to ascertain that the candidate who became less involved in detailed policy explanations and focused instead on constructing a clear and emotional message of change was more successful. This led to what many thought would be a strength for Clinton – being the wife of one of the most popular presidents in recent times – turning out to be a weakness by associating her with the past. It was also clear that the more she talked emotionally, such as in the New Hampshire primary, the more votes she polled.

While Obama mastered the personal narrative and emotional style required to attract voters, there was also a trend amongst all the Democrat candidates to adopt this style. His campaign, though, was based, more than any previous Democrat, around who he was and where he had come from, leading him to talk about his life rather than his ideas; something which Republican candidates have been doing successfully for decades.

This has not been the case in the past for Democratic candidates, who have tended to believe that emotional campaigns are inherently manipulative. Rejecting this notion signifies an end to the politics of the previous century, when the Republicans concentrated their campaigns on appealing to the emotions of the American people whereas the Democrats relied on rational argument and detailed policies.

In his book, The Political Brain, Drew Westen explains how the emotional parts of the brain override the rational and how this has led to the failure of the majority of Democrat presidential candidates. ‘You can slog it out for those few millimetres of cerebral turf that process facts, figures and policy statements’ in the way Al Gore and John Kerry did or ‘ you can take your campaign to the broader neural electorate,’ in the way we have seen Obama and to a lesser extent Clinton doing.

Whilst the candidates have tried to avoid drawn-out policy debates, when they have revealed their specific ideas these have been designed to appeal to the centre ground. For Obama this began in 2004 when, in a speech to the Democratic convention, he called for an end to the bickering of partisan politics. The New York Times reported that Obama ‘moved from his leftist Hyde Park base to more centrist circles; he forged early alliances with the good-government reform crowd only to be embraced later by the city’s all-powerful Democratic bosses; he railed against pork-barrel politics but engaged in it when needed; and he empathized with the views of his Palestinian friends before adroitly courting the city’s politically potent Jewish community.’

The 2008 primaries have also signified that the traditional sources of political news, while still the most important, are now being rivalled by those online, with 24% of Americans regularly learning something about this campaign from the internet. Moreover, the figure is 42% for voters aged 18-29, a sign that in the future the internet will be as significant as broadcast and print media to the success of political campaigns.

Not only is the internet providing people with a new medium from which to receive news, it is also breaking exclusive stories, utilising information from citizen journalists close to the campaign trail. Exemplifying this, the Huffington Post exclusively reported Obama’s comments that ‘it's not surprising then they [citizens in small-town Pennsylvania] get bitter, they cling to guns or religion … as a way to explain their frustrations.’ The resultant controversy threatened to damage Obama’s campaign and candidates must realise that as more people start blogging and setting up political websites their comments are going to come under greater scrutiny.

Whether the contest for the Democratic nomination heralds a new era, where people can rise to the top in politics or business without their race or sex being an issue, is impossible to deduce. Over thirty years ago Margaret Thatcher’s victory in the British Parliamentary Election was heralded by some as a symbol of the end of sexism in Britain. Yet, since then, none of the main parties have had a female leader and there pay inequality between men and women remains rife. In the past, however, the election of a non-white or female president was never a serious possibility, so while the extent of this campaign’s impact on society remains to be seen, it is already a significant step towards equality.

What the primaries and the early stages of the presidential election campaign have signified is a change in the way elections in America will be fought in the early twenty-first century. American politics will be about the battle for the centre ground, where key swing voters decide election results. Both parties will be appealing to the emotions of these voters, as Democratic politics becomes less about detailed policies and more about personality. What has also been evident is the role that the internet has played in the campaign strategies and success and failure of Obama and Clinton. As this century progresses it seems certain that these three changes will grow in significance, shaping American politics in the future.

The Bush administration has once again ratcheted up the drum beating of a "Preemptive War" against Iran, based on the presumption of the now familiar sabre-rattling pretext of the country developing 'weapons of mass destruction.' Many see the administration's motive as a dire desire of
passing on the White House baton to another neo-conservative warmonger, John McCain, as Bush's successor in the November elections. While the court of public opinion worldwide, including many in the US, is unanimously against the waging another bloody war of aggression, which would be
costly to all sides concerned, President Bush - at least on the surface - seems to have been orchestrating another false image of 'an international coalition': relying on the support of his political allies in Europe, Israel and the Middle East.

To date there has been repeated number of unannounced inspections (more than 3,000) and copious live camera surveillance by the International Atomic Energy Agency of so-called nuclear sites in Iran; Iran, unlike other intransigent regimes in the region, has signed onto the Non-Proliferation Treaty and the United Nations conventions for nuclear non-proliferations. There is no proven evidence to substantiate claims by the Bush administration that the Iranian nuclear development - which Iran
states is for peaceful energy and medical applications - has, or is, leading toward the development of nuclear weapons.

The struggle for democracy, modernisation and socio-cultural and political reform in Iran has laboured on for more than 100 years, hindered by external intervention largely by the hand of the Americans since World War II, and their cronies within Iran, with theexpress aim of exploiting the natural resources and strategic position of the country. The first democratically elected Iranian prime minister, Dr Mohammad Mosadegh, an acclaimed lawyer who nationalised Iranian oil and defended Iran's sovereignty against the Anglo-American Oil consortium was overthrown by a Central Intelligence Agency-sponsored coup in 1953. That coup was followed by the reluctant return of the Shah to, in-effect, reinstall the absolute monarch on the Persian Peacock throne, a throne that had been abolished 50 years earlier. The modest degree of domestic reform and international engagement achieved in Iran during the 1990's, has now been replaced by some of the harshest repressive measures seen since the midst of the revolutionary fervor of the late 1970s. The credit for most of the socio-political regression belongs to Bush and his consistent and denigrating labelling of Iran as a member of the 'Axis of Evil'. Add to that his ideologically inflaming rhetoric of the 'Battle of Armageddon' and that the result has been, in essence, resurrecttion of ultra-, and neo-conservatives everywhere. The current annual US financing of up to $100m (£50.45m) of covert ethnic unrest has also resulted in the further disenfranchisement of the political hierarchies of the Middle East region.

The press and media as well as the populace in both the US and Iran, therefore, remain vigilant by expressing their conscientious objections to war and terrorism, and repression and bloodshed, and have staunchly advocated demands for negotiations, justice and peace. If these talks do
not happen we may be facing a calamitous outcome that could engulf the entire Middle East, thereby pushing the price of oil astronomically high(higher than July 3 2008's crude oil high of $146 a barrel), and an economic contraction would follow brining further hardship to the wider
populace. As treacherous as the long-term intertwined national interests of the Americans, the Iranians, and the Israelis may be the can harmoniously achieve credibility and economic competitiveness for the US. The could mark legitimate security and progress for Israel, and homegrown democracy, justice and development for Iran - on the basis mutually respectful
multilateral negotiations. The time, to resort to the human basics of logic and reason, rationale and justice, over belligerence and confrontation, and hegemony and adventurism, is far overdue. This paradigm, as counterintuitive as it may seem to the sold-out political powerhouses and lobbying think-tanks, is nonetheless, congruent with the longing aspirations of the peoples of the US, Israel and Iran who have reaffirmed their desires for change.

Even as the government admits to a £10 billion black hole in its finances caused by its gifting of tax back to businesses to plug their pensions holes, it looks set to U-turn on its policy to close corporation tax loopholes costing the exchequer tens of billions more every year.

Threats from major UK companies to relocate overseas or into tax havens has prompted a move to revise corporation tax rules following high-profile complaints that the UK’s taxation levels are significantly higher than elsewhere in the EU.

Pharmaceuticals giant Shire recently announced it would relocate to Ireland to take advantage of the low tax regime there.

While UK law stipulates a basic corporation tax of 28%, corporations on average pay closer to 22%, with some of the largest paying significantly under this figure.

A simplification of the rules mooted by the treasury last year would have closed loopholes which at present allow huge levels of tax evasion.

The UK has recently come under fire for itself maintaining more tax havens under British rule than anywhere else in the world, something which campaign groups argue has directly led to tens of thousands of deaths.

Corporate tax avoidance is thought to cost £25 billion every year – more than twice the amount these major companies were gifted by the government in tax breaks to allow them to refill the pension pots they themselves had emptied.

In two years, the same amount would pay for the total line of credit currently being offered to major banks as part of the credit crunch - £50 billion is being underwritten in loans to maintain the flow of money through the economy.

The same banks, along with a host of other companies, are already benefiting from government handouts this year to the tune of £10 billion, as they pour money into pension funds to keep them afloat.

This money, rather than coming from profits or business chiefs who were the investors who caused the problem, is being paid in from taxes.

Pension deficits have soared by more than £100bn in the past year, the Pension Protection Fund said recently.

Meanwhile, as the Treasury struggles to maintain its financial balance, fears are rising that the pensioners themselves could be at risk of falling prey to the 10p tax band changes which the government have proposed.

Up to 420,000 pensioners with small private pensions of up to £1,000 a year could start having to pay tax of £200 a year from next April, under new plans – potentially raising around £80 million a year.

Rob Ray writs for www.freedompress.org.uk