A PLAN FOR ENDLESS CHAOS

George W. Bush announced this week that he has a plan to end the war in Iraq. But it was really just more of the same...be patient he told the country, this kind of endless war on terror takes time. We've heard it all before.

The Bush team might play the shell game with us in 2006 by bringing home a few troops but in the end the permanent bases will remain and so will active U.S. engagement for control of Iraq. According to the "strategy plan" document Bush released after his speech this week at the Naval Academy, while the U.S. military presence "may become less visible, it will remain lethal and decisive, able to confront the enemy whereever it may organize."

It was disclosed yesterday that the Pentagon has given a Bush supporter a $100 million contract to plant stories in the Iraq media that have been written by the U.S. military. The Washington-based public relations firm, called the Lincoln Group, is working with the Pentagon's "Special Operations Command" to place favorable stories about the war and rebuilding in the Iraqi media as a way to turn the growing opposition to U.S. occupation around. I guess the hope is that they can do like they do in the U.S. -- influence the public with a compliant and subservient media. So if they have to spend some taxpayer $$$ to pull it off, well why not. It's all for freedom and democracy.

As I was watching the NBC news report on this story last night they concluded the spot by interviewing a journalism professor from a major U.S. university. He commented that if the U.S. wanted freedom and democracy in Iraq, then this program of planting stories and deceiving the people would fundamentally UNDERMINE their development of a truly free media and would UNDERMINE the development of real democracy.

I think the phony media stories though clearly reveal the real U.S. intentions for Iraq. It is not about democracy and freedom. It is about control and domination of the people so the U.S. can extract their oil and water - their primary national resources.

Bush is repeating his lies over and over again in hopes that people will just be worn down and give up - both in Iraq and here at home. We can not, and will not, allow this to happen. Our opposition must grow as the Bush lie machine cranks out even more of its garbage. Now is the time to step on the anti-war pedal and push even harder.