In Defense of Conspiracy "Theories"
Lisa Pease
JULIAN C. HOLMES
RR #1, Box 3870
Wayne, Maine 04284
(207) 685-9057
(207) 685-4669 (fax)
April 25, 1992
Richard Harwood, Ombudsman
The Washington Post
1150 15th Street NW
Washington, DC 20071
Dear Mr. Harwood,
Though the Washington Post does not over-extend itself in the
pursuit of hard news, just let drop the faintest rumor of a government
"conspiracy", and a klaxon horn goes off in the news room. Aroused
from apathy in the daily routine of reporting assignations and
various other political and social sports events, editors and
reporters scramble to the phones. The klaxon screams its warning: the
greatest single threat to herd-journalism, corporate profits, and
government stability -- the dreaded "CONSPIRACY THEORY"!!
It is not known whether anyone has actually been hassled or
accosted by any of these frightful spectres, but their presence is
announced to Post readers with a salvo of warnings to avoid the
tricky, sticky webs spun by the wacko "CONSPIRACY THEORISTS".
Recall how the Post saved us from the truth about Iran-Contra.
Professional conspiracy exorcist Mark Hosenball was hired to ridicule
the idea that Oliver North and his CIA-associated gangsters had
conspired to do wrong (*1). And when, in their syndicated
column, Jack Anderson and Dale Van Atta discussed some of the
conspirators, the Post sprang to protect its readers, and the
conspirators, by censoring the Anderson column before printing it
(*2).
But for some time the lid had been coming off the Iran-Contra
conspiracy. In 1986, the Christic Institute, an interfaith center for
law and public policy, had filed a lawsuit alleging a U.S.
arms-for-drugs trade that helped keep weapons flowing to the
CIA-Contra army in Nicaragua, and cocaine flowing to U.S. markets
(*3). In 1988 Leslie Cockburn published Out of Control, a seminal
work on our bizarre, illegal war against Nicaragua (*4). The
Post contributed to this discovery process by disparaging the charges
of conspiracy and by publishing false information about the
drug-smuggling evidence presented to the House Subcommittee on
Narcotics Abuse and Control. When accused by Committee Chairman
Charles Rangel (D-NY). of misleading reporting, the Post printed only
a partial correction and declined to print a letter of complaint from
Rangel (*5).
Sworn testimony before Senator John Kerry's Subcommittee on
Terrorism, Narcotics, and International Operations confirmed U.S.
Government complicity in the drug trade (*6). With its coverup of the
arms/drug conspiracy evaporating, the ever-accommodating Post shifted
gears and retained Hosenball to exorcise from our minds a newly
emerging threat to domestic tranquility, the "October Surprise"
conspiracy (*7). But close on the heels of Hosenball and the Post
came Barbara Honegger and then Gary Sick who authored independently,
two years apart, books with the same title, "October Surprise"
(*8). Honegger was a member of the Reagan/Bush campaign and
transition teams in 1980. Gary Sick, professor of Middle East
Politics at Columbia University, was on the staff of the National
Security Council under Presidents Ford, Carter, and Reagan. In 1989
and 1991 respectively, Honegger and Sick published their evidence of
how the Republicans made a deal to supply arms to Iran if Iran would
delay release of the 52 United States hostages until after the
November 1980 election. The purpose of this deal was to quash the
possibility of a pre-election release(an October surprise). which
would have bolstered the reelection prospects for President Carter.
Others published details of this alleged Reagan-Bush conspiracy.
In October 1988, Playboy Magazine ran an expose "An Election Held
Hostage"; FRONTLINE did another in April 1991 (*9). In June, 1991 a
conference of distinguished journalists, joined by 8 of the former
hostages, challenged the Congress to "make a full, impartial
investigation" of the election/hostage allegations. The Post
reported the statement of the hostages, but not a word of the
conference itself which was held in the Dirksen Senate Office Building
Auditorium (*10). On February 5, 1992 a gun-shy, uninspired House of
Representatives begrudgingly authorized an "October Surprise"
investigation by a task force of 13 congressmen headed by Lee Hamilton
(D-IN). who had chaired the House of Representatives Iran-Contra
Committee. Hamilton has named as chief team counsel Larry Barcella, a
lawyer who represented BCCI when the Bank was indicted in 1988
(*11).
Like the Washington Post, Hamilton had not shown interest in
pursuing the U.S. arms-for-drugs operation (*12). He had accepted
Oliver North's lies,and as Chairman of the House Intelligence
Committee he derailed House Resolution 485 which had asked
President Reagan to answer questions about Contra support activities
of government officials and others (*13). After CIA operative John
Hull (from Hamilton's home state). was charged in Costa Rica with
"international drug trafficking and hostile acts against the
nation's security", Hamilton and 18 fellow members of Congress tried
to intimidate Costa Rican President Oscar Arias Sanchez into handling
Hull's case "in a manner that will not complicate U.S.-Costa Rican
relations" (*14). The Post did not report the Hamilton letter
or the Costa Rican response that declared Hull's case to be "in as
good hands as our 100 year old uninterrupted democracy can provide to
all citizens" (*15).
Though the Post does its best to guide our thinking away from
conspiracy theories, it is difficult to avoid the fact that so much
wrongdoing involves government or corporate conspiracies:
-- In its COINTELPRO operation, the FBI used disinformation, forgery,
surveillance, false arrests, and violence to illegally harass
U.S.citizens in the 60's (*16).
-- The CIA's Operation MONGOOSE illegally sabotaged Cuba by
"destroying crops, brutalizing citizens, destabilizing the society,
and conspiring with the Mafia to assassinate Fidel Castro and other
leaders" (*17).
-- "Standard Oil of New Jersey was found by the Antitrust Division of
the Department of Justice to be conspiring with I.G.Farben...of
Germany. ...By its cartel agreements with Standard Oil, the United
States was effectively prevented from developing or producing [for World
War-II] any substantial amount of synthetic rubber", said
Senator Robert LaFollette of Wisconsin (*18).
-- U.S. Government agencies knowingly withheld information about
dosages of radiation "almost certain to produce thyroid abnormalities
or cancer" that contaminated people residing near the nuclear weapons
factory at Hanford, Washington (*19).
-- Various branches of Government deliberately drag their feet in
getting around to cleaning up the Nation's dangerous nuclear weapons
sites (*20). State and local governments back the nuclear
industry's secret public relations strategy (*21).
-- "The National Cancer Institute, the American Cancer Society and
some twenty comprehensive cancer centers, have misled and confused
the public and Congress by repeated claims that we are winning the
war against cancer. In fact, the cancer establishment has continually
minimized the evidence for increasing cancer rates which it
has largely attributed to smoking and dietary fat, while discounting
or ignoring the causal role of avoidable eposures to industrial
carcinogens in the air, food, water, and the workplace." (*22).
-- The Bush Administration coverup of its pre-Gulf-War support of
Iraq "is yet another example of the President's people conspiring to
keep both Congress and the American people in the dark" (*23).
If you think about it, conspiracy is a fundamental aspect of
doing business in this country.
-- Take the systematic and cooperative censorship of the Persian Gulf
War by the Pentagon and much of the news media (*24).
-- Or the widespread plans of business and government groups to spend
$100 million in taxes to promote a distorted and truncated history of
Columbus in America (*25). along the lines of the Smithsonian
Institution's "fusion of the two worlds", (*26). rather than
examining more realistic aspects of the Spanish invasion, like "anger,
cruelty, gold, terror, and death" (*27).
-- Or circumstances surrounding the U.S. Justice Department theft from
the INSLAW company of sophisticated, law-enforcement computer
software which "now point to a widespread conspiracy implicating
lesser Government officials in the theft of INSLAW's
technology", says former U.S. Attorney General Elliot Richardson
(*28).
-- Or Watergate.
-- Or the "largest bank fraud in world financial history" (*29), where
the White House knew of the criminal activities at "the Bank of Crooks
and Criminals International" (BCCI) (*30), where U.S. intelligence
agencies did their secret banking (*31), and where bribery of
prominent American public officials "was a way of doing business"
(*32).
-- Or the 1949 conviction of "GM [General Motors], Standard Oil of
California, Firestone, and E. Roy Fitzgerald, among others, for
criminally conspiring to replace electric transportation with gas-
and diesel-powered buses and to monopolize the sale of buses
and related products to transportation companies throughout the
country" [in, among others, the cities of New York, Philadelphia,
Baltimore, St. Louis, Oakland, Salt Lake City, and Los Angeles]
(*33).
-- Or the collusion in 1973 between Senator Abraham Ribicoff (D-CT).
and the U.S. Department of Transportation to overlook safety defects
in the 1.2 million Corvair automobiles manufactured by General Motors
in the early 60's (*34).
-- Or the A. H. Robins Company, which manufactured the Dalkon Shield
intrauterine contraceptive, and which ignored repeated warnings of
the Shield's hazards and which "stonewalled, deceived, covered up, and
covered up the coverups...[thus inflicting] on women a worldwide
epidemic of pelvic infections." (*35).
-- Or that cooperation between McDonnell Douglas Aircraft Company and
the FAA resulted in failure to enforce regulations regarding the
unsafe DC-10 cargo door which failed in flight killing all 364
passengers on Turkish Airlines Flight 981 on March 3, 1974
(*36).
-- Or the now-banned, cancer-producing pregnancy drug
Diethylstilbestrol (DES). that was sold by manufacturers who ignored
tests which showed DES to be carcinogenic; and who acted "in concert
with each other in the testing and marketing of DES for miscarriage
purposes" (*37).
-- Or the conspiracies among bankers and speculators, with the
cooperation of a corrupted Congress, to relieve depositors of their
savings. This "arrogant disregard from the White House, Congress and
corporate world for the interests and rights of the American people"
will cost U.S. tapayers many hundreds of billions of dollars (*38).
-- Or the Westinghouse, Allis Chalmers,Federal Pacific, and General
Electric executives who met surreptitiously in hotel rooms to fix
prices and eliminate competition on heavy industrial equipment (*39).
-- Or the convictions of Industrial Biotest Laboratories (IBT).
officers for fabricating safety tests on prescription drugs (*40).
-- Or the conspiracy by the asbestos industry to suppress knowledge
of medical problems relating to asbestos (*41).
-- Or the 1928 Achnacarry Agreement through which oil companies
"agreed not to engage in any effective price competition" (*42).
-- Or the conspiracy among U.S. Government agencies and the Congress
to cover up the nature of our decades-old war against the people of
Nicaragua -- a covert war that continues in 1992 with the U.S.
Government applying pressure for the Nicaraguan police to reorganize
into a more repressive force (*43).
-- Or the conspiracy by the CIA and the U.S. Government to interfere
in the Chilean election process with military aid, covert actions,
and an economic boycott which culminated in the overthrow of the
legitimately elected government and the assassination of President
Salvador Allende in 1973 (*44).
-- Or the conspiracy among U.S. officials including Secretary of State
Henry Kissinger and CIA Director William Colby to finance terrorism
in Angola for the purpose of disrupting Angola's plans for peaceful
elections in October 1975, and to lie about these actions to the
Congress and the news media (*45). And CIA Director George Bush's
subsequent cover up of this U.S.-sponsored terrorism (*46).
-- Or President George Bush's consorting with the Pentagon to invade
Panama in 1989 and thereby violate the Constitution of the United
States, the U.N. Charter, the O.A.S. Charter, and the Panama Canal
Treaties (*47).
-- Or the "gross antitrust violations" (*48) and the conspiracy of
American oil companies and the British and U.S. governments to
strangle Iran economically after Iran nationalized the British-owned
Anglo-Iranian Oil Company in 1951. And the subsequent overthrow by
the CIA in 1953 of Iranian Prime Minister Muhammed Mossadegh (*49).
-- Or the CIA-planned assassination of Congo head-of-state Patrice
Lumumba (*50).
-- Or the deliberate and wilful efforts of President George Bush,
Senator Robert Dole, Senator George Mitchell, various U.S. Government
agencies, and members of both Houses of the Congress to buy the 1990
Nicaraguan national elections for the presidential candidate supported
by President Bush (*51).
-- Or the collective approval by 64 U.S. Senators of Robert Gates to
head the CIA, in the face of "unmistakable evidence that Gates lied
about his role in the Iran-Contra scandal" (*52).
-- Or "How Reagan and the Pope Conspired to Assist Poland's Solidarity
Movement and Hasten the Demise of Communism" (*53).
-- Or how the Reagan Administration connived with the Vatican to ban
the use of USAID funds by any country "for the promotion of birth
control or abortion" (*54).
-- Or "the way the Vatican and Washington colluded to achieve common
purpose in Central America" (*55).
-- Or the collaboration of Guatemalan strong-man and mass murderer
Hector Gramajo with the U.S. Army to design "programs to build
civilian-military cooperation" at the U.S. Army School of the
Americas (SOA) at Fort Benning, Georgia; five of the nine soldiers
accused in the 1989 Jesuit massacre in El Salvador are graduates of
SOA which trains Latin/American military personnel (*56).
-- Or the conspiracy of the Comanche Peak Nuclear Plant administration
to harass and cause bodily harm to whistleblower Linda Porter who
uncovered dangerous working conditions at the facility (*57).
-- Or the conspiracy of President Richard Nixon and the Government of
South Vietnam to delay the Paris Peace Talks until after the 1968 U.S.
presidential election (*58).
-- Or the pandemic coverups of police violence (*59).
-- Or the always safe-to-cite worldwide communist conspiracy (*60).
-- Or maybe the socially responsible, secret consortium to publish The
Satanic Verses in paperback (*61).
Conspiracies are obviously a way to get things done, and the
Washington Post offers little comment unless conspiracy theorizing
threatens to expose a really important conspiracy that, let's say,
benefits big business or big government. Such a conspiracy
would be like our benevolent CIA's 1953 overthrow of the Iranian
government to help out U.S. oil companies; or like our illegal war
against Panama to tighten U.S. control over Panama and the Canal; or
like monopoly control of broadcasting that facilitates corporate
censorship on issues of public importance (*62). When the camouflage
of such conspiracies is stripped away, public confidence in the
conspiring officials can erode -- depending on how seriously the
citizenry perceives the conspiracy to have violated the
public trust. Erosion of public trust in the status quo is what the
Post seems to see as a real threat to its corporate security.
Currently, the Post has mounted vituperative, frenzied attacks on
Oliver Stone's movie "JFK", which reexamines the U.S. Government's
official (Warren Commission. finding that a single gunman, acting
alone, killed President John F. Kennedy. The movie also is the
story of New Orleans District Attorney Jim Garrison's unsuccessful
prosecution of Clay Shaw, the only person ever tried in connection
with the assassination. And the movie proposes that the Kennedy
assassination was the work of conspirators whose interests
would not be served by a president who, had he lived, might have
disengaged us from our war against Vietnam.
The Post ridicules a reexamination of the Kennedy assassination
along lines suggested by "JFK". Senior Post journalists like Charles
Krauthammer, Ken Ringle, George Will, Phil McCombs, and Michael
Isikoff, have been called up to man the bulwarks against
public sentiment which has never supported the government's
non-conspiratorial assassination thesis. In spite of the facts that
the Senate Intelligence Committee of 1975 and 1976 found that "both
the FBI and CIA had repeatedly lied to the Warren Commission" (*63)
and that the 1979 Report of the House Select Committee on
Assassinations found that President Kennedy was probably killed "as a
result of a conspiracy" (*64), a truly astounding number of Post
stories have been used as vehicles to discredit "JFK" as just another
conspiracy (*65).
Some of the more vicious attacks on the movie are by editor
Stephen Rosenfeld, and journalists Richard Cohen, George Will, and
George Lardner Jr (*66). They ridicule the idea that Kennedy could
have had second thoughts about escalating the Vietnam War and
declaim that there is no historical justification for this idea.
Seasoned journalist Peter Dale Scott, former Pentagon/CIA liaison
chief L. Fletcher Prouty, and investigators David Scheim and John
Newman have each authored defense of the "JFK" thesis that Kennedy
was not enthusiastic about staying in Vietnam (*67). But the Post
team just continues ranting against the possibility of a high-level
assassination conspiracy while offering little justification for its
arguments.
An example of particularly shabby scholarship and unacceptable
behavior is George Lardner Jr's contribution to the Post's campaign
against the movie. Lardner wrote three articles, two before the movie
was completed, and the third upon its release. In May, six
months before the movie came out, Lardner obtained a copy of the
first draft of the script and, contrary to accepted standards,
revealed in the Post the contents of this copyrighted movie (*68).
Also in this article, (*69). Lardner discredits Jim Garrison with
hostile statements from a former Garrison associate Pershing Gervais.
Lardner does not tell the reader that subsequent to the Clay Shaw
trial, in a U.S. Government criminal action brought against Garrison,
Government witness Gervais, who helped set up Garrison for
prosecution, admitted under oath that in a May 1972 interview with a
New Orleans television reporter, he, Gervais, had said that the U.S.
Government's case against Garrison was a fraud (*70). The Post's
1973 account of the Garrison acquittal mentions this controversy, but
when I recently asked Lardner about this, he was not clear as to
whether he remembered it (*71).
Two weeks after his first "JFK" article, Lardner blustered his
way through a justification for his unauthorized possession of the
early draft ofthe movie (*72). He also defended his reference to
Pershing Gervais by lashing out at Garrison as a writer "of gothic
fiction".
When the movie was released in December, Lardner "reviewed" it
(*73). He again ridiculed the film's thesis that following the
Kennedy assassination, President Johnson reversed Kennedy's plans to
de-escalate the Vietnam War. Lardner cited a memorandum issued by
Johnson four days after Kennedy died. Lardner says this memorandum was
written before the assassination, and that it "was a continuation of
Kennedy's policy". In fact, the memorandum was drafted the day before
the assassination by McGeorge Bundy (Kennedy's Assistant for National
Security Affairs) Kennedy was in Texas, and may never have seen it.
Following the assassination, it was rewritten; and the final version
provided for escalating the war against Vietnam (*74) -- facts that
Lardner avoided.
The Post's crusade against exposing conspiracies is blatantly
dishonest: The Warren Commission inquiry into the Kennedy
Assassination was for the most part conducted in secret. This fact is
buried in the Post (*75). Nor do current readers of this newspaper
find meaningful discussion of the Warren Commission's secret doubts
about both the FBI and the CIA (*76). Or of a dispatch from CIA
headquarters instructing co-conspirators at field stations to
counteract the "new wave of books and articles criticizing the
[Warren] Commission's findings...[and] conspiracy theories ...[that]
have frequently thrown suspicion on our organization" and to "discuss
the publicity problem with liaison and friendly elite contacts,
especially politicians and editors "and to "employ propaganda
assets to answer and refute the attacks of the critics. ...Book
reviews and feature articles are particularly appropriate for this
purpose. ...The aim of this dispatch is to provide material for
countering and discrediting the claims of the conspiracy
theorists..." (*77).
In 1979, Washington journalist Deborah Davis published Katharine The
Great, the story of Post publisher Katharine Graham and her newspaper's
close ties with Washington's powerful elite, a number of whom were with
the CIA. Particularly irksome to Post editor Benjamin Bradlee was a Davis
claim that Bradlee had "produced CIA material" (*78). Understandably
sensitive about this kind of publicity, Bradlee told Davis' publisher
Harcourt Brace Jovanovich, "Miss Davis is lying ...I never produced CIA
material ...what I can do is to brand Miss Davis as a fool and to put
your company in that special little group of publishers who don't give a
shit for the truth". The Post bullied HBJ into recalling the book; HBJ
shredded 20,000 copies; Davis sued HBJ for breach of contract and damage
to reputation; HBJ settled out of court; and Davis published her book
elsewhere with an appendix that demonstrated Bradlee to have been deeply
involved with producing cold-war/CIA propaganda (*79). Bradlee still says
the allegations about his association with people in the CIA are false,
but he has apparently taken no action to contest the xetensive
documentation presented by Deborah Davis in the second and third editions
of her book (*80).
And it's not as if the Post were new to conspiracy work. Former
Washington Post publisher Philip Graham "believing that the function
of the press was more often than not to mobilize consent for the
policies of the government, was one of the architects of what
became a widespread practice:the use and manipulation of journalists
by the CIA" (*81). This scandal was known by its code name Operation
MOCKINGBIRD. Former Washington Post reporter Carl Bernstein cites a
former CIA deputy director as saying, "It was widely known that Phil
Graham was someone you could get help from" (*82). More
recently the Post provided cover for CIA personality Joseph Fernandez
by "refusing to print his name for over a year up until the day his
indictment was announced ...for crimes committed in his official
capacity as CIA station chief in Costa Rica" (*83).
Of the meetings between Graham and his CIA acquaintances at which
the availability and prices of journalists were discussed, a former
CIA man recalls, "You could get a journalist cheaper than a good call
girl, for a couple hundred dollars a month" (*84). One may wish to
consider Philip Graham's philosophy along with a more recent statement
from his wife Katharine Graham, current Chairman of the Board of the
Washington Post. In a lecture on terrorism and the news media, Mrs.
Graham said: "A second challenge facing the media is how to prevent
terrorists from using the media as a platform fortheir views. ... The
point is that we generally know when we are being manipulated, and
we've learned better how and where to draw the line, though the
decisions are often difficult" (*85).
Today, the Post and its world of big business are apparently
terrified that our elite and our high-level public officials may be
exposed as conspirators behind Contra drug-smuggling, October
Surprise, or the assassination of President Kennedy. This fear is
truly remarkable in that, like most of us and like most institutions,
the Post runs its business as a conspiracy of like-minded
entrepreneurs -- a conspiracy "to act or work together toward
the same result or goal" (*86). But where the Post really parts
company from just plain people is when it pretends that conspiracies
associated with big business or government are "coincidence". Post
reporter Lardner vents the frustration inherent in having to
maintain this dichotomy. He lashes out at Oliver Stone and suggests
that Stone may actually believe that the Post's opposition to Stone's
movie is a "conspiracy". Lardner assures us that Stone's complaints
are "groundless and paranoid and smack of McCarthyism" (*87).
So how does the Post justify devoting so much energy to
ridiculing those who investigate conspiracies? The Post has answers:
people revert to conspiracy theories because they need something "neat
and tidy" (*88) that "plugs a gap no other generally accepted theory
fills', (*89. and "coincidence ...is always the safest and most likely
explanation for any conjunction of curious circumstances ..." (*90).
And what does this response mean? It means that "coincidence
theory" is what the Post espouses when it would prefer not to admit to
a conspiracy. In other words, some things just "happen". And,
besides, conspiracy to do certain things would be a crime;
"coincidence" is a safer bet.
Post Ombudsman Richard Harwood, who, it is rumored, serves as
Executive Director of the Benevolent Protective Order of Coincidence
Theorists, (*91) recently issued a warning about presidential
candidates "who have begun to mutter about a press conspiracy".
Ordinarily, Harwood would simply dismiss these charges as "symptoms of
the media paranoia that quadrennially engulfs members of the American
political class" (*92). But a fatal mistake was made by the
mutterers; they used the "C" word against the PRESS! And Harwood
exploded his off-the-cuff comment into an entire column -- ending
it with:"We are the new journalists, immersed too long, perhaps, in
the cleansing waters of political conformity. But conspirators we
ain't".
Distinguished investigative journalist Morton Mintz, a 29-year
veteran of the Washington Post, now chairs the Fund for Investigative
Journalism. In the December issue of The Progressive, Mintz wrote "A
Reporter Looks Back in Anger -- Why the Media Cover Up Corporate
Crime". Therein he discussed the difficulties in convincing editors
to accept important news stories. He illustrated the article with his
own experiences at the Post, where he says he was known as "the
biggest pain in the ass in the office" (*93).
Would Harwood argue that grief endured by journalists at the
hands of editors is a matter of random coincidence? And that such
policy as Mintz described is made independently by editors without
influence from fellow editors or from management? Would Harwood have
us believe that at the countless office "meetings" in which news
people are ever in attendance, there is no discussion of which
stories will run and which ones will find inadequate space? That
there is no advanced planning for stories or that there are no
cooperative efforts among the staff? Or that in the face of our
news-media "grayout" of presidential candidate Larry Agran, (*94) a
Post journalist would be free to give news space to candidate Agran
equal to that the Post lavishes on candidate Clinton? Let's face it:
these possibilities are about as likely as Barbara Bush entertaining
guests at a soup kitchen.
Would Harwood have us believe that media critic and former Post
Ombudsman Ben Bagdikian is telling less than the truth in his account
of wire-service control over news: "The largely anonymous men who
control the syndicate and wire service copy desks and the central wire
photo machines determine at a single decision what millions will see
and hear. ...there seems to be little doubt that these gatekeepers
preside over an operation in which an appalling amount of press
agentry sneaks in the back door of American journalism and marches
untouched out the front door as 'news'" (*95).
When he sat on the U.S. District Court of Appeals in Washington,
Judge Clarence Thomas violated U.S. law when he failed to remove
himself from a case in which he then proceeded to reverse a $10
million judgment against the Ralston Purina Company (*96).
Ralston Purina, the animal feed empire, is the family fortune of
Thomas' mentor, Senator John Danforth. The Post limited its coverage
of the Thomas malfeasance to 56 words buried in the middle of a
1200-word article (*97). Would Harwood have us believe that
the almost complete blackout on this matter by the major news media
and the U.S. Senate was a matter of coincidence? Could a Post
reporter have written a story about Ralston Purina if she had wanted
to? Can a brick swim?
Or take the fine report produced last September by Ralph Nader's
Public Citizen. Titled All the Vice President's Men, it documents "How
the Quayle Council on Competitiveness Secretly Undermines Health,
Safety, and Environmental Programs". Three months later, Post
journalists David Broder and Bob Woodward published "The
President's Understudy", a seven-part series on Vice President Quayle.
Although this series does address Quayle's role with the
Competitiveness Council, its handling of the Council's disastrous
impact on America is inadequate. It is 40,000 words of mostly
aimless chatter about Quayle memorabilia: youth, family, college
record, Christianity, political aspirations, intellectual aspirations,
wealthy friends, government associates, golf, travels, wife Marilyn,
and net worth -- revealing little about Quayle's abilities, his
understanding of society's problems, or his thoughts about justice and
freedom, and never mentioning the comprehensive Nader study of
Quayle's record in the Bush Administration (*98).
Now, did Broder or did Woodward forget about the Nader study? Or
did both of them forget? Or did one, or the other, or both decide not
to mention it? Did these two celebrated, seasoned Post reporters
ever discuss together their jointly authored stories?
Did they decide to publish such a barren set of articles because it
would enhance their reputations? How did management feel about the
use of precious news space for such frivolity? Is it possible that
so many pages were dedicated to this twaddle without people
"acting or working together toward the same result or goal"? (*99)
Do crocodiles fly?
On March 20, front-page headlines in the Wall Street Journal, the
New York Times, USA Today, and the Washington Post read respectively:
TSONGAS DROPPED OUT OF THE PRESIDENTIAL RACE
CLEARING CLINTON'S PATH
TSONGAS ABANDONS CAMPAIGN LEAVING CLINTON
CLEAR PATH TOWARD SHOWDOWN WITH BUSH
TSONGAS CLEARS WAY FOR CLINTON
TSONGAS EXIT CLEARS WAY FOR CLINTON
This display of editorial independence should at least raise questions
of whether the news media collective mindset is really different from
that of any other cartel -- like oil, diamond, energy, (*100) or
manufacturing cartels, a cartel being "a combination of independent
commercial enterprises designed to limit competition" (*101).
The Washington Post editorial page carries the heading:
AN INDEPENDENT NEWSPAPER
Is it? Of course not. There probably is no such thing. Does the
Post "conspire" to keep its staff and its newspaper from wandering too
far from the safety of mediocrity? The Post would respond that the
question is absurd. In that I am not privy to the Post's telephone
conversations, I can only speculate on how closely the media elite
must monitor the staff. But we all know how few micro-seconds it
takes a new reporter to learn what subjects are taboo and what are
"safe", and that experienced reporters don't have to ask.
What is more important, however, than speculating about how the
Post communicates within its own corporate structure and with other
members of the cartel, is to document and publicize what the Post does
in public, namely, how it shapes and censors the news.
Sincerely,
Julian C. Holmes
Copies to: Public-spirited citizens, both inside and outside the news
media, And - maybe a few others.
Notes to Letter of April 25, 1992:
1. Mark Hosenball, "The Ultimate Conspiracy", Washington Post,
September 11, 1988, p.C1
2a. Julian Holmes, Letter to Washington Post Ombudsman Richard
Harwood, June 4,1991. Notes that the Post censored, from the
Anderson/Van Atta column, references to the Christic Institute and
to Robert Gates.
2b. Jack Anderson and Dale Van Atta, "Iran-Contra Figure Dodges
Extradition", Washington Merry-Go-Round, United Feature Syndicate, May
26, 1991. This is the column submitted to the Post (see note 2a)..
2c. Jack Anderson and Dale Van Atta, "The Man Washington Doesn't
Want to Extradite", Washington Post, May 26, 1991. The column (see
note 2b). as it appeared in the Post (see note 2a)..
3a. Case No. 86-1146-CIV-KING, Amended Complaint for RICO
Conspiracy, etc., United States District Court, Southern District of
Florida, Tony Avirgan and Martha Honey v. John Hull et al., October 3,
1986.
3b. Vince Bielski and Dennis Bernstein, "Reports: Contras Send Drugs
to U.S.", Cleveland Plain Dealer, November 16, 1986.
3c. Neal Matthews, "I Ran Drugs for Uncle Sam" (based on interviews
with Robert Plumlee, contra resupply pilot)., San Diego Reader, April
5, 1990.
4. Leslie Cockburn, Out of Control. New York: Atlantic Monthly
Press, 1987.
5a. Peter Dale Scott and Jonathan Marshall, Cocaine Politics,
University ofCalifornia Press, 1991, p.179-181.
5b. David S. Hilzenrath, "Hill Panel Finds No Evidence Linking
Contras to Drug Smuggling", Washington Post, July 22, 1987, p.A07.
5c. Partial correction to the Washington Post of July 22, Washington
Post, July 24,1987, p.A3.
5d. The Washington Post declined to publish SubCommittee Chairman
Rangel's Letter- to-the-Editor of July 22, 1987. It was printed in
the Congressional Record on August 6, 1987, p.E3296-7.
6a. Michael Kranish, "Kerry Says US Turned Blind Eye to Contra-Drug
Trail", Boston Globe, April 10, 1988.
6b. Mary McGrory, "The Contra-Drug Stink", Washington Post, April
10, 1988, p.B1. 6c. Robert Parry with Rod Nordland, "Guns for
Drugs? Senate Probers Trace an Old Contra Connection to George Bush's
Office", Newsweek, May 23, 1988, p.22.
6d. Dennis Bernstein, "Iran-Contra -- The Coverup Continues", The
Progressive, November 1988, p.24.
6e. "Drugs, Law Enforcement and Foreign Policy", A Report Prepared
by the Subcommittee on Terrorism, Narcotics, and International
Operations of the Committee on Foreign Relations, United States
Senate, December 1988.
7a. Mark Hosenball, "If It's October ... Then It's Time for an
Iranian Conspiracy Theory", Washington Post, October 9, 1988, p.D1.
7b. Mark Hosenball, "October Surprise! Redux! The Latest Version of
the 1980 'Hostage- Deal' Story Is Still Full of Holes", Washington
Post, April 21, 1991,p.B2.
8a. Barbara Honegger, October Surprise, New York: Tudor, 1989.
8b. Gary Sick, October Surprise, New York: Times Books, Random
House, 1991.
9a. Abbie Hoffman and Jonathan Silvers, "An Election Held Hostage",
Playboy, October 1988, p.73.
9b. Robert Parry and Robert Ross, "The Election Held Hostage",
FRONTLINE, WGBH-TV,April 16, 1991.
10a. Reuter, "Ex-Hostages Seek Probe By Congress", Washington Post,
June 14,1991,p.A4.
10b. "An Election Held Hostage?", Conference, Dirksen Senate Office
Building Auditorium, Washington DC, June 13, 1991; Sponsored by The
Fund For New Priorities in America, 171 Madison Avenue, New York, NY,
10016.
11a. David Brown and Guy Gugliotta, "House Approves Inquiry Into
'OctoberSurprise'", Washington Post, February 6, 1992, p.A11.
11b. Jack Colhoun, "Lawmakers Lose Nerve on October Surprise", The
Guardian, December 11, 1991, p.7.
11c. Jack Colhoun, "October Surprise Probe Taps BCCI Lawyer", The
Guardian, February 26, 1992, p.3.
12. See note 5a, p.180-1.
13a. See note 4, p.229, 240-1.
13b. Report of the Congressional Committees Investigating the
Iran-Contra Affair, Senate Report No. 100-216, House Report No.
100-433, November 1987, p.139-141.
14a. Letter to His Excellency Oscar Arias Sanchez, President of the
Republic of Costa Rica; from Members of the U.S. Congress David
Dreier, Lee Hamilton, Dave McCurdy, Dan Burton, Mary Rose Oakar, Jim
Bunning, Frank McCloskey, Cass Ballenger, Peter Kostmayer, Jim Bates,
Douglas Bosco, James Inhofe, Thomas Foglietta, Rod Chandler,
Ike Skelton, Howard Wolpe, Gary Ackerman, Robert Lagomarsino, and Bob
McEwen; January 26, 1989.
14b. Peter Brennan, "Costa Rica Considers Seeking Contra Backer in
U.S. -- Indiana Native Wanted on Murder Charge in 1984 Bomb Attack in
Nicaragua", Washington Post, February 1, 1990.
14c. "Costa Rica Seeks Extradition of Indiana Farmer",
Scripps-Howard News Service,April 25, 1991.
15. Press Release from the Costa Rican Embassy, Washington DC, ”On
the Case of the Imprisonment of Costa Rican Citizen John Hull",
February 6, 1989.
16. Brian Glick, War at Home, Boston: South End Press, 1989.
17. John Stockwell, The Praetorian Guard-- The U.S. Role in the New
World Order, Boston: South End Press, 1991, p.121.
18. Hearings Before the Committee on Patents, United States Senate,
77th Cong., 2nd Session (1942)., part I, as cited in Joseph Borkin,
The Crime and Punishment of I.G. Farben, New York: The Free Press,
Macmillan, 1978, p.93.
19. R. Jeffrey Smith, "Study of A-Plant Neighbors' Health Urged",
Washington Post, July 13, 1990, p.A6.
20. Tom Horton, "A Cost Higher Than the Peace Dividend -- Price Tag
Mounts to Clean Up Nuclear Weapons Sites", Baltimore Sun, February 23,
1992, p.1K.
21. "The Nuclear Industry's Secret PR Strategy", EXTRA!, March 1992,
p.15.
22a. Samuel S. Epstein, MD et al, "Losing the War Against Cancer:
Need for Public Policy Reform", Congressional Record, April 2, 1992,
p.E947-9.
22b. Samuel S. Epstein, "The Cancer Establishment", Washington Post,
March 10, 1992.
23a. Hon. Henry B. Gonzalez, "Efforts to Thwart Investigation of the
BNL Scandal", Congressional Record, March 30, 1992, p.H2005-2014.
23b. Hon. David E. Skaggs (CO)., "White House Spin Control on
Pre-War Iraq Policy", Congressional Record, April 2, 1992, p.H2285.
23c. Nicholas Rostow, Special Assistant to the President and Legal
Adviser, Memorandum to Jeanne S. Archibald et al, "Meeting on
congressional requests for information and documents", April 8, 1991;
Congressional Record, April 2, 1992,p.H2285.
24a. Michio Kaku, "Operation Desert Lie: Pentagon Confesses", The
Guardian, March11, 1992, p.4.
24b. J. Max Robins, "NBC's Unaired Iraq Tapes Not a Black and White
Case", Variety Magazine, March 4, 1991, p.25.
25. Emory R. Searcy Jr., Clergy and Laity Concerned, Spring 1991
Letter to "Friends", p.1.
26. Jean Dimeo, "Selling Hispanics on Columbus -- Luis Vasquez-Ajmac
Is Hired to Promote Smithsonian Project", Washington Post, November
18, 1991, p.Bus.8.
27. Hans Koning, "Teach the Truth About Columbus", Washington Post,
September 3,1991, p.A19.
28a. James Kilpatrick, "Software-Piracy Case Emitting Big Stench",
St. Louis Post/Dispatch, March 18, 1991, p.3B. Elliot L. Richardson,
"A High-Tech Watergate", New York Times, October 21,1991.
29. "BCCI -- NBC Sunday Today", February 23, 1992, p.12; transcript
prepared by Burrelle's Information Services. The quote is from New
York District Attorney Robert Morgenthau who is running his own
independent investigation of BCCI.
30. Norman Bailey, former Reagan White House intelligence analyst;
from an interview with Mark Rosenthal of NBC News. See note 29, p.5.
31. Jack Colhoun, "BCCI Skeletons Haunting Bush's Closet", The
Guardian, September 18, 1991, p.9.
32. Robert Morgenthau. See note 29, p.10.
33. Russell Mokhiber, Corporate Crime and Violence, San Francisco:
Sierra ClubBooks, 1989 paperback edition, p.227.
34. See note 33, p.136-7.
35. Morton Mintz, At Any Cost: Corporate Greed, Women, and the
Dalkon Shield, NewYork: Pantheon, 1985. As cited in Mokhiber, see
note 33, p.157.
36. See note 33, p.164-171.
37. See note 33, p.172-180.
38. Michael Waldman, Who Robbed America?, New York: Random House,
1990. The quote is from Ralph Nader's Introduction, p.iii.
39. See note 33, p.217.
40. See note 33, p.235.
41. See note 33, p.277-288.
42. See note 33, p.323.
43. Katherine Hoyt Gonzalez, Nicaragua Network Education Fund
Newsletter, March1992, p.1.
44. William Blum, The CIA -- A Forgotten History, London: Zed Books
Ltd., 1986,p.232-243.
45a. John Stockwell, In Search of Enemies, New York: Norton, 1978.
45b. See note 44, p.284-291.
46. See note 17, p.18.
47a. Letter to President George Bush from The Ad Hoc Committee for
Panama (James Abourezk et al)., January 10, 1990; published in The
Nation, February 5, 1990, p.163.
47b. Philip E. Wheaton, Panama, Trenton NJ: Red Sea Press, 1992,
p.145-7.
48a. Morton Mintz and Jerry S. Cohen, Power, Inc., New York: Bantam
Books, 1977,p.521.
48b. "The International Oil Cartel", Federal Trade Commission,
December 2, 1949. Cited in 48a, p.521.
49a. See note 44, p.67-76.
49b. See note 48a, p.530-1.
50. Ralph W. McGehee, Deadly Deceits, New York: Sheridan Square
Publications, 1983,p.60.
51. HR-3385, "An Act to Provide Assistance for Free and Fair
Elections in Nicaragua". Passed the U.S. House of Representatives on
October 4, 1989 by avote of 263 to 136, and the Senate on October 17
by a vote of 64 to 35.
52. Jack Colhoun, "Gates Oozing Trail of Lies, Gets Top CIA Post",
The Guardian,November 20, 1991, p.6.
53. Carl Bernstein, Time, February 24, 1992, Cover Story p.28-35.
54. "The U.S. and the Vatican on Birth Control", Time, February 24,
1992, p.35.
55. "Time's Missing Link: Poland to Latin America", National
Catholic Reporter,February 28, 1992, p.24.
56a. Jim Lynn, "School of Americas Commander Hopes to Expand
Mission", Benning Patriot, February 21, 1992, p.12.
56b. Vicky Imerman, "U.S. Army School of the Americas Plans
Expansion", News Release from S.O.A. Watch, P.O. Bo 3330, Columbus,
Georgia 31903.
57. 60 MINUTES, CBS, March 8, 1992.
58. Jack Colhoun, "Tricky Dick's Quick Election Fix", The Guardian,
January 29,1992, p.18.
59a. Sean P. Murphy, "Several Probes May Have Ignored Evidence
Against Police", Boston Globe, July 28, 1991, p.1.
59b. Christopher B. Daly, "Pattern of Police Abuses Reported in
Boston Case", Washington Post, July 12, 1991, p.A3.
59c. Associated Press, "Dayton Police Probing Erasure of Arrest
Video", WashingtonPost, May 26, 1991, p.A20.
59d. Gabriel Escobar, "Deaf Man's Death In Police Scuffle Called
Homicide", Washington Post, May 18, 1991, p.B1.
59e. Jay Mathews, "L.A. Police Laughed at Beating", Washington Post,
March 19, 1991, p.A1.
59f. David Maraniss, "One Cop's View of Police Violence", Washington
Post, April 12,1991, p.A1.
>From News Services, "Police Abuse Detailed", Washington Post, February
8, 1992,p.A8.
60. Michael Dobbs, "Panhandling the Kremlin: How Gus Hall Got
Millions", Washington Post, March 1, 1992, p.A1.
61. David Streitfeld, "Secret Consortium To Publish Rushdie In
Paperback", Washington Post, March 14, 1992, p.D1.
62a. See notes 48 and 49.
62b. See note 47b, p.63-76.
62c. "Fairness In Broadcasting Act of 1987", U.S. Senate Bill S742.
62d. "Now Let That 'Fairness' Bill Die", Editorial, Washington Post,
June 24, 1987. The Post opposed the Fairness in Broadcasting Act.
63. David E. Scheim, Contract on America -- The Mafia Murder of
President John F.Kennedy, New York: Shapolsky Publishers, 1988,
p.viii.
64. See note 63, p.28.
65a. Chuck Conconi, "Out and About", Washington Post, February 26,
1991, p.B3.
65b. George Lardner Jr., "On the Set: Dallas in Wonderland",
Washington Post, May19, 1991, p.D1.
65c. George Lardner, "...Or Just a Sloppy Mess", Washington Post,
June 2, 1991,p.D3.
65d. Charles Krauthammer, "A Rash of Conspiracy Theories -- When Do
We Dig Up Bill Casey?", Washington Post, July 5, 1991, p.A19.
65e. Eric Brace, "Personalities", Washington Post, October 31, 1991,
p.C3.
65f. Associated Press, "'JFK' Director Condemned -- Warren
Commission Attorney Calls Stone Film 'A Big Lie'", Washington Post,
December 16, 1991, p.D14.
65g. Gerald R. Ford and David W. Belin, "Kennedy Assassination: How
About the Truth?", Washington Post, December 17, 1991, p.A21.
65h. Rita Kemply, "'JFK': History Through A Prism", Washington Post,
December 20,1991, p.D1.
65i. George Lardner Jr., "The Way it Wasn't -- In 'JFK', Stone
Assassinates the Truth", Washington Post, December 20, 1991, p.D2.
65j. Desson Howe, "Dallas Mystery: Who Shot JFK?", Washington Post,
December 20,1991, p.55.
65k. Phil McCombs, "Oliver Stone, Returning the Fire -- In Defending
His 'JFK' Conspiracy Film, the Director Reveals His Rage and
Reasoning", Washington Post, December 21, 1991, p.F1.
65l. George F. Will, "'JFK': Paranoid History", Washington Post,
December 26, 1991,p.A23.
65m. "On Screen", 'JFK' movie review, Washington Post, Weekend,
December 27, 1991.
65n. Stephen S. Rosenfeld, "Shadow Play", Washington Post, December
27, 1991, p.A21.
65o. Daniel Patrick Moynihan, "The Paranoid Style", Washington Post,
December 29,1991, p.C7.
65p. Michael Isikoff, "H-e-e-e-e-r-e's Conspiracy! -- Why Did Oliver
Stone Omit (Or Suppress!). the Role of Johnny Carson?", Washington
Post, December 29, 1991,p.C2.
65q. Robert O'Harrow Jr., "Conspiracy Theory Wins Converts --
Moviegoers Say 'JFK' Nourishes Doubts That Oswald Acted Alone",
Washington Post, January 2, 1992, p.B1.
65r. Michael R. Beschloss, "Assassination and Obsession", Washington
Post, January 5, 1992, p.C1.
65s. Charles Krauthammer, "'JFK': A Lie, But Harmless", Washington
Post, January 10,1992, p.A19.
65t. Art Buchwald, "Bugged: The Flu Conspiracy", Washington Post,
January 14, 1992,p.E1.
65u. Ken Ringle, "The Fallacy of Conspiracy Theories -- Good on
Film, But the Motivation Is All Wrong", Washington Post, January 19,
1992, p.G1.
65v. Charles Paul Freund, "If History Is a Lie -- America's Resort
to Conspiracy Thinking", Washington Post, January 19, 1992, p.C1.
65w. Richard Cohen, "Oliver's Twist", Washington Post Magazine,
January 19, 1992, p.5.
65. Michael Isikoff, "Seeking JFK's Missing Brain", Washington Post,
January 21,1992, p.A17.
65y. Don Oldenburg, "The Plots Thicken -- Conspiracy Theorists Are
Everywhere", Washington Post, January 28, 1992, p.E5.
65z. Joel Achenbach, "JFK Conspiracy: Myth vs. the Facts",
Washington Post, February 28, 1992, p.C5.
65A. List of books on the best-seller list: On the Trail of the
Assassins is characterized as "conspiracy plot theories", Washington
Post, March 8, 1992, Bookworld, p.12
66. See notes 65n, 65w, 65l, 65b, 65c, and 65i.
67a. Peter Dale Scott, "Vietnamization and the Drama of the Pentagon
Papers". Published in The Senator Gravel Edition of The Pentagon
Papers, Volume V,p.211-247.
67b. Peter Dale Scott, The War Conspiracy -- The Secret Road to the
Second Indochina War, Indianapolis/New York: Bobbs-Merrill, 1972, p.
215-224.
67c. L. Fletcher Prouty, The Secret Team, Copyright 1973. New
printing, Costa Mesa CA: Institute for Historical Review, 1990,
p.402-416.
67d. See note 63, p.58, 183, 187, 194, 273-4.
67e. John M. Newman, JFK and Vietnam, New York: Warner Books, 1992.
67f. Peter Dale Scott, Letter to the Editor, The Nation, March 9,
1992, p.290.
68a. See note 65b.
68b. Oliver Stone, "The Post, George Lardner, and My Version of the
JFK Assassination", Washington Post, June 2, 1991, p.D3.
69. See note 65b.
70. Jim Garrison, On the Trail of The Assassins, New York: Warner
Books, 1988, 315/318.
71. Associated Press, "Garrison, 2 Others, Found Not Guilty Of
Bribery Charge", Washington Post, September 28, 1973, p.A3.
72. See note 65c.
73. See note 65i.
74. See note 67e, p.438-450.
75. John G. Leyden, "Historians, Buffs, and Crackpots", Washington
Post, Bookworld, January 26, 1992, p.8.
76a. Tad Szulc, "New Doubts, Fears in JFK Assassination Probe",
Washington Star,September 19, 1975, p.A1.
76b. Tad Szulc, "Warren Commission's Self-Doubts Grew Day by Day --
'This Bullet Business Leaves Me Confused'", Washington Star, September
20, 1975, p.A1.
76c. Tad Szulc, "Urgent and Secret Meeting of the Warren Commission
-- Dulles Proposed that the Minutes be Destroyed", Washington Star,
September 21, 1975,p.A1.
77. "Cable Sought to Discredit Critics of Warren Report", New York
Times, December 26, 1977, p.A37.
78. Deborah Davis, Katharine The Great, New York: Harcourt Brace
Jovanovich, 1979,p.141-2.
79a. Eve Pell, "Private Censorship -- Killing 'Katharine The
Great'", The Nation, November 12, 1983.
79b. Deborah Davis, Katharine The Great, Bethesda MD: National
Press, 1987. Davis says, "...corporate documents that became
available during my subsequent lawsuit against him [Harcourt Brace
Jovanovich chairman, William Jovanovich] showed that 20,000 copies [of
Katharine the Great] had been "processed and converted into waste
paper"".
79c. Daniel Brandt, "All the Publisher's Men -- A Suppressed Book
About Washington Post Publisher Katharine Graham Is On Sale Again"
National Reporter, Fall 1987, p.60.
79d. Deborah Davis, Katharine The Great, New York: Sheridan Square
Press, 1991. "...publishers who don't give a shit", p.iv-v; bullying
HBJ into recalling the book, p.iv-vi; lawsuit and settlement, p..
80. Benjamin C. Bradlee, Letter to Deborah Davis, April 1, 1987.
See note 79d, p.304.
81. See note 79d, p.119-132.
82. Carl Bernstein, "The CIA and the Media -- How America's Most
Powerful News Media Worked Hand in Glove with the Central
Intelligence Agency and Why the Church Committee Covered It Up",
Rolling Stone, October 20, 1977, p.63.
83a. Daniel Brandt, Letter to Richard L. Harwood of The Washington
Post, September 15, 1988. The letter asks for the Post's rationale
for its policy of protecting government covert actions, and whether
this policy is still in effect.
83b. Daniel Brandt, "Little Magazines May Come and Go", The National
Reporter, Fall 1988, p.4. Notes the Post's protection of the
identity of CIA agent Joseph F.Fernandez. Brandt says, "America needs
to confront its own recent history as well as protect the
interests of its citizens, and both can be accomplished by outlawing
peacetime covert activity. This would contribute more to thesecurity
of Americans than all the counterterrorist proposals and elite strike
forces that ever found their way onto Pentagon wish-lists."
83c. Richard L. Harwood, Letter to Daniel Brandt, September 28,
1988. Harwood's two- sentence letter reads, "We have a long-standing
policy of not naming covert agents of the C.I.A., except in unusual
circumstances. We applied that policy to Fernandez."
84. See note 79d, p.131.
85. Katharine Graham, "Safeguarding Our Freedoms As We Cover
Terrorist Acts", Washington Post, April 20, 1986, p.C1.
86. "conspire", Random House Dictionary of the English Language,
Second Edition Unabridged, 1987.
87. Howard Kurtz, "Media Notes", Washington Post, June 18, 1991,
p.D1.
88. See note 65y.
89. See note 65n.
90. See note 65d.
91. William Casey, Private Communications with JCH, March 1992.
Richard Harwood, "What Conspiracy?", Washington Post, March 1, 1992,
p.C6.
93. p. 29-32.
94a. Washington Post Electronic Data Base, Dialog Information
Services Inc., April 25, 1992. In 1991 and 1992, the name Bill
Clinton appeared in 878 Washington Post stories, columns, letters, or
editorials; "Jerry" Brown in 485, Pat Buchanan in 303, and Larry
Agran in 28. In those 28, Agran's name appeared 76 times, Clinton's
151, and Brown 105. In only 1 of those 28 did Agran's name appear in
a headline.
94b. Colman McCarthy, "What's 'Minor' About This Candidate?",
Washington Post, February 1, 1992. Washington Post columnist McCarthy
tells how television and party officials have kept presidential
candidate Larry Agran out of sight. The Post's own daily
news-blackout of Agran is not discussed.
94c. Scot Lehigh, "Larry Agran: 'Winner' in Debate With Little
Chance For the Big Prize", Boston Globe, February 25, 1992.
94d. Joshua Meyrowitz, "The Press Rejects a Candidate", Columbia
Journalism Review,March/April, 1992.
95. Ben H. Bagdikian, The Effete Conspiracy And Other Crimes By The
Press, NewYork: Harper and Row, 1972, p.36-7.
96a. 28 USC Section 455. "Any justice, judge, or magistrate of the
United States shall disqualify himself in any proceeding in which his
impartiality might reasonably be questioned." [emphasis added]
96b. "Alpo Petfoods, Inc. v. Ralston Purina Co.", 913 F2d 958 (CA DC
1990)..
96c. Monroe Freedman, "Thomas' Ethics and the Court -- Nominee
'Unfit to Sit' For Failing to Recuse In Ralston Purina Case", Legal
Times, August 26, 1991.
96d. Paul D. Wilcher, "Opposition to the Confirmation of Judge
Clarence Thomas to become a Justice on the U.S. Supreme Court on the
grounds of his "JUDICIAL MISCONDUCT", Letter to U.S. Senator Joseph R.
Biden, October 15, 1991.
97. Al Kamen and Michael Isikoff, "'A Distressing Turn', Activists
Decry What Process Has Become", Washington Post, October 12, 1991,
p.A1.
98. January 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 12, 1992, p.A1 each day.
99. See note 86.
100. Thomas W. Lippman, "Energy Lobby Fights Unseen 'Killers'",
Washington Post,April 1, 1992, p.A21. This article explains that
"representatives of the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, the National
Association of Manufacturers and the coal, oil, natural gas,
offshore drilling and nuclear power industries, whose interests often
conflict, pledged to work together to oppose amendments limiting
offshore oil drilling, nuclear power and carbon dioxide emissions soon
to be offered by key House members".
101. "cartel", Webster's New Collegiate Dictionary, 1977.
--
Lisa Pease
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"If you can't get the truth about the past, how can you expect to get the
truth about the present?"
- Jerry Brown, We The People talk show 1/11/96
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