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New Selective War on Terrierism?
En passant - this [link|http://www.indybay.org/newsitems/2006/10/02/18317482.php| nugget]; why, some of the principals hang out in Box's old stomping grounds..
Americas | International
Fri 10/6 is 30th Anniv of US Terrorism - Cuban Civilian Airliner w 73 People Killed
by Commemorate Their Deaths

Monday Oct 2nd, 2006 11:14 PM

From Robert Parry's Consortium News; the story of US terrorism and how Bush protects US based terrorists.

For instance, the Bush administration took no action in early April 2006, when a Spanish-language Miami television station interviewed Cuban terrorist Orlando Bosch, who offered a detailed justification for the 1976 mid-air bombing of a Cubana Airlines flight that killed 73 people, including the young members of the Cuban national fencing team.

Bosch refused to admit guilt, but his chilling defense of the bombing \ufffd and the strong evidence that has swirled around his role \ufffd left little doubt of his complicity, even as he lives in Miami as a free man, protected both in the past and present by the Bush family.

The Bush administration also has acted at a glacial pace in dealing with another Cuban exile implicated in the bombing, Luis Posada Carriles, whose illegal presence in Miami was an open secret for weeks in early 2005 before U.S. authorities took him into custody, only after he had held a press conference.

But even then, the administration has balked at sending Posada back to Venezuela where the government of Hugo Chavez \ufffd unlike some of its predecessors \ufffd was eager to prosecute Posada for the Cubana Airlines murders.

Summing up George W. Bush\ufffds dilemma in 2005, the New York Times wrote, \ufffdA grant of asylum could invite charges that the Bush administration is compromising its principle that no nation should harbor suspected terrorists. But to turn Mr. Posada away could provoke political wrath in the conservative Cuban-American communities of South Florida, deep sources of support and campaign money for President Bush and his brother, Jeb.\ufffd [NYT, May 9, 2005]

Bush Family Ties

But there\ufffds really nothing new about these two terrorists \ufffd and other violent right-wing extremists \ufffd getting protection from the Bush family.

For three decades, both Bosch and Posada have been under the Bush family\ufffds protective wing, starting with former President George H.W. Bush (who was CIA director when the airline bombing occurred in 1976) and extending to Florida Gov. Jeb Bush and President George W. Bush.

The evidence points to one obvious conclusion: the Bushes regard terrorism \ufffd defined as killing civilians to make a political point \ufffd as justified in cases when their interests match those of the terrorists. In other words, their moral outrage is selective, depending on the identity of the victims.

That hypocrisy was dramatized by the TV interview with Bosch on Miami\ufffds Channel 41, which was cited in articles on the Internet by Venezuela\ufffds lawyer Jos\ufffd Pertierra, but was otherwise widely ignored by the U.S. news media. [For Pertierra\ufffds story, see Counterpunch, April 11, 2006]

\ufffdDid you down that plane in 1976?\ufffd asked reporter Juan Manuel Cao.

\ufffdIf I tell you that I was involved, I will be inculpating myself,\ufffd Bosch answered, \ufffdand if I tell you that I did not participate in that action, you would say that I am lying. I am therefore not going to answer one thing or the other.\ufffd

But when Cao asked Bosch to comment on the civilians who died when the plane crashed off the coast of Barbados in 1976, Bosch responded, \ufffdIn a war such as us Cubans who love liberty wage against the tyrant [Fidel Castro], you have to down planes, you have to sink ships, you have to be prepared to attack anything that is within your reach.\ufffd

\ufffdBut don\ufffdt you feel a little bit for those who were killed there, for their families?\ufffd Cao asked.

\ufffdWho was on board that plane?\ufffd Bosch responded. \ufffdFour members of the Communist Party, five North Koreans, five Guyanese.\ufffd [Officials tallies actually put the Guyanese dead at 11.]

Bosch added, \ufffdFour members of the Communist Party, chico! Who was there? Our enemies\ufffd\ufffd

\ufffdAnd the fencers?\ufffd Cao asked about Cuba\ufffds amateur fencing team that had just won gold, silver and bronze medals at a youth fencing competition in Caracas. \ufffdThe young people on board?\ufffd

Bosch replied, \ufffdI was in Caracas. I saw the young girls on television. There were six of them. After the end of the competition, the leader of the six dedicated their triumph to the tyrant. \ufffd She gave a speech filled with praise for the tyrant.

\ufffdWe had already agreed in Santo Domingo, that everyone who comes from Cuba to glorify the tyrant had to run the same risks as those men and women that fight alongside the tyranny.\ufffd [The comment about Santo Domingo was an apparent reference to a strategy meeting by a right-wing terrorist organization, CORU, which took place in the Dominican Republic in 1976.]

\ufffdIf you ran into the family members who were killed in that plane, wouldn\ufffdt you think it difficult?\ufffd Cao asked.

\ufffdNo, because in the end those who were there had to know that they were cooperating with the tyranny in Cuba,\ufffd Bosch answered.

In an article about Bosch\ufffds remarks, lawyer Pertierra said the answers \ufffdgive us a glimpse into the mind of the kind of terrorist that the United States government harbors and protects in Miami.\ufffd

The Posada Case

Bosch was arrested for illegally entering the United States during the first Bush administration, but he was paroled in 1990 by President George H.W. Bush at the behest of the President\ufffds eldest son Jeb, then an aspiring Florida politician.

Not only did the first Bush administration free Bosch from jail a decade and a half ago, the second Bush administration has now pushed Venezuela\ufffds extradition request for his alleged co-conspirator, Posada, onto the back burner.

The downed Cubana Airlines flight originated in Caracas where Venezuelan authorities allege the terrorist plot was hatched. However, U.S. officials have resisted returning Posada to Venezuela because Hugo Chavez is seen as friendly to Castro\ufffds communist government in Cuba.

At a U.S. immigration hearing in 2005, Posada\ufffds defense attorney put on a Posada friend as a witness who alleged that Venezuela\ufffds government practices torture. Bush administration lawyers didn\ufffdt challenge the claim, leading the immigration judge to bar Posada\ufffds deportation to Venezuela.

In September 2005, Venezuela\ufffds Ambassador Bernardo Alvarez called the 77-year-old Posada \ufffdthe Osama Bin Laden of Latin America\ufffd and accused the Bush administration of applying \ufffda cynical double standard\ufffd in its War on Terror.

Alvarez also denied that Venezuela practices torture. \ufffdThere isn\ufffdt a shred of evidence that Posada would be tortured in Venezuela,\ufffd Alvarez said, adding that the claim is particularly ironic given widespread press accounts that the Bush administration has abused prisoners at the U.S. military base in Guatanamo Bay, Cuba.

Theoretically, the Bush administration could still extradite Posada to Venezuela to face the 73 murder counts, but it is essentially ignoring Venezuela\ufffds extradition request while holding Posada on minor immigration charges of entering the United States illegally.

Meanwhile, Posada has begun maneuvering to gain his freedom. Citing his service in the U.S. military from 1963-65 in Vietnam, Posada has applied for U.S. citizenship, and his lawyer Eduardo Soto has threatened to call U.S. government witnesses, including former White House aide Oliver North, to vouch for Posada\ufffds past service to Washington.

[More . . .]
So many details; so little attention span..

New Those aren't terrorists - they're freedom fighters!
     Selective War on Terrierism? - (Ashton) - (1)
         Those aren't terrorists - they're freedom fighters! -NT - (inthane-chan)

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