There's no need for one when you have only to pick up a newspaper or turn on the news for the latest installment in the "War on Terror."

It's obvious that you suck in evrything that you read in the morning papers as gospel truth.

Good luck to you! :rock:

Ok, I'll assume this is meant tongue in cheek since my position has never been the mainstream one ;)

Just strengthens the point.

Which point is that?

Let's learn by example:
If these meetings were secret, who revealed them?

Name the executives present?

Who are the witnesses that claim 1st hand knowledge that the emphasis was on the US meeting domestic petroleum demands?

What this the main topic or a side point? If a side point, just about what percentage of these meetings was devoted to this topic? And was it discussed as a goal or a potential effect/outcome? Hint: context matters. :yep:

Please document all of this. I'm sure the next Bob Woodward would love the limelight.

Fair enough, this is easy to do and I'll append sources at the end of my post for your own confirmation. First:

The Bush Administration’s struggle to keep secret the workings of Cheney’s Energy Task Force has been ongoing since early in the President’s tenure. The General Accounting Office, the investigative arm of Congress, requested information in spring of 2001 about which industry executives and lobbyists the Task Force was meeting with in developing the Bush Administration's energy plan. When Cheney refused disclosure, Congress was pressed to sue for the right to examine Task Force records, but lost. Later, amid political pressure building over improprieties regarding Enron’s colossal collapse, Cheney's office released limited information revealing six Task Force meetings with Enron executives. (1)


Since May 2001, the administration has repeatedly refused to turn over the documents the General Accounting Office seeks: lists of people present at each meeting of the national energy task force, and lists of the people who met with each member of the task force, including the date, subject and location of each meeting.

In February, the office sued Mr. Cheney for the documents.

Last summer, the administration turned over 77 pages of documents to the accounting office related to the costs of the task force. But Mr. Walter said those documents did not provide the identities of the industry executives who had advised the task force. (2)

However the identies of the participants are beginning to emerge; a partial list:

Alan Huffman, who was a Conoco manager until the 2002 merger with Phillips, confirmed meeting with the task force staff.

[snip]

According to the White House document, Rouse met with task force staff members on Feb. 14, 2001. On March 21, they met with Archie Dunham, who was chairman of Conoco. On April 12, according to the document, task force staff members met with Conoco official Huffman and two officials from the U.S. Oil and Gas Association, Wayne Gibbens and Alby Modiano.

On April 17, task force staff members met with Royal Dutch/Shell Group's chairman, Sir Mark Moody-Stuart, Shell Oil chairman Steven Miller and two others. On March 22, staff members met with BP regional president Bob Malone, chief economist Peter Davies and company employees Graham Barr and Deb Beaubien. (3)

Last week former State Department Chief of Staff Lawrence Wilkerson dropped a bombshell. “What I saw,� he said, discussing the inner workings of the Bush administration and its run-up to war, “was a cabal between the vice president of the United States, Richard Cheney, and the secretary of Defense, Donald Rumsfeld on critical issues that made decisions that the bureaucracy did not know were being made.�

[snip]

More illuminating was when Wilkerson spoke to one of the dark, and largely hidden secrets of the Bush administration. He discussed earlier “policy planning about actually mounting an operation to take the oilfields in the Middle East.� While Wilkerson didn’t mention the specific timing of these policy planning discussions, he didn’t really have to. (4)

There were many meetings and undoubtedly many points. The context is in how much these meetings shaped US policy, who were the winners and losers, and why were such lengths taken to conceal even the particpants of an energy task force? Some "context" for you:

A key task-force meeting, sources tell Time, was held by Cheney in the White House on May 3. Among attendees were two lobbyists for electric utilities: former Montana Governor and now G.O.P.chairman Marc Racicot and former G.O.P.chairman Haley Barbour. Two weeks later, Cheney's report gave the lobbyists much of what they wanted, including a re-evaluation of a costly clean-air rule, called the new-source review, which requires new pollution controls when power plants are expanded. While he was lobbying for these energy interests, Barbour was also raising at least $250,000 for a May 21 G.O.P.gala honoring President Bush. The group of utilities Barbour was representing, led by Southern Co., gave $150,000 to the event. The night before the gala, Cheney held a glitzy reception at the vice-presidential mansion for hundreds of the fete's sponsors and longtime party donors.

Another company that had entree to the Cheney task force was Peabody Energy, a coal behemoth whose holding company and top officer have given nearly $200,000 to the President and his party since Bush took office, including $25,000 for the May gala. Sources say Peabody chairman Irl Engelhardt and other energy executives met in March with two task-force members, Energy Secretary Spencer Abraham and Bush economic adviser Larry Lindsey. Cheney's group also heard in March from officials from the nuclear-energy industry—whose trade association, the Nuclear Energy Institute, contributed $100,000 to the Bush event. Both coal and nuclear power got major endorsements in the task-force report. (5)

Some of these sources I linked to more for convenience than because they're authoritative. The truthout link, for example, is actually to a NY Times article that they're mirroring but to view the original you need a NY Times login. If you have one they link to it on their page. I've also included the Washington Post and Time.

All of the articles are worth reading in full to see the big picture. Beyond that you'll have to do your own research as I generally don't do other people's as none of this is "news" to me. At any rate there's a pattern here and you only need to read the news or watch it on TV, and add in a bit of critical thinking, to see it. Of course its much easier to simply deride people as being conspiracy nuts.




Sources:

1. http://www.projectcensored.org/publications/2005/8.html

2. http://www.truthout.org/docs_02/09.3...ey.argue.p.htm

3. http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn...111501842.html

4. http://flyer.blogmemphis.com/?p=5

5. http://www.time.com/time/nation/arti...198862,00.html

There is nothing documented there. Not a single source quote. You are parroting what they are parroting. Polly wanna cracker?
Note that this news article states:

From February to May last year, Mr. Cheney and the task force held a series of meetings with as many as 400 people from 150 corporations, trade associations, environmental groups and labor unions, to devise a new energy policy for the nation. The task force report recommended more drilling for oil and gas, and promoted the need to build 1,300 to 1,900 electric plants to meet the nation's projected energy demand over the next two decades.

Sounds slighlty different than "secretive Cheney meets with oil tycoons to dominate the oil world, doesn't it?
So this article mentions separate meetings with literally a handful of oil industry reps, while the previous article you linked to mentions meetings with 400 people from 150 different organizations.

And your point is? :zzz:
I love the way we can assume the "specific timing of these policy planning discussions."

And was this discussion within the administration in the context of a determined plan or a "what-if" scenario? Mr. Wilkerson doesn't seem to say and neither do all those that repeat him, yet they all assume what you want to here. Context? Context, anyone?

Incidentally, go googling for "Strategic Assessment 1999", the report prepared for the US Joint Chiefs of Staff and the Secretary of Defense under the Clinton administration. Looks like earlier presidents pictured such scenarios as well. Surprise!
What we have here are the usual political connections and networking. Annoying yet totally unexiting.

I've got to go now. I'll leave it for others to assess themselves what's true here versus what are puff pieces.

It sufficed to answer your question concisely. The contributors are cited at the top of the article and its only a summary of the many other articles written on the same subject.
I didn't write that headline. But why keep it all so secret? Why only begin to turn things over in bits of pieces after demands from the GAO, Congress, and a succession of lawsuits?
I don't know if an exhaustive list has been compiled - that's the problem with secrecy - but those were some of the participants.

Yeah we're all assuming the same thing. The context is in the administration's actions.
Okay... reports prepared by the US Joint Chiefs of Staff and the Secretary of Defence are one thing. If they're done with the input and collaboration of Big Oil then that's another. Or do you not see the difference?

I guess this is what it comes down to: you read about that, shrug your shoulders and think business as usual. I read the same thing, conclude that at a minimum there's the appearance of impropriety, and wonder just how much legislation is being written and how much policy is being determined by big corporate money - just how many politicians are bought and paid for? With so many republicans either recently indicted, convicted, or being investigated on corruption charges its not like this is purely an excercise in abstract thinking.

Here's a recent piece of news that caught my eye, as it ties into what I've been saying here about opportunism and profiteering. Of course, you're free to dismiss it as coincidence, but here are some quotes:

"Bush's Uncle Earned Millions in War Firm Sale


WASHINGTON — As President Bush embarks on a new effort to shore up public support for the war in Iraq, an uncle of the commander in chief is collecting $2.7 million in cash and stock from the recent sale of a company that profited from the war.

[snip]

A report filed with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission shows that William H.T. Bush collected just under $1.9 million in cash plus stock valued at more than $800,000 from the sale of Engineered Support Systems Inc. to DRS Technologies of New Jersey.

[snip]

Before DRS purchased it, Missouri-based ESSI experienced record growth as a result of expanded U.S. military contracts — many to supply U.S. efforts in Iraq and Afghanistan.

[snip]

Bush, known as "Uncle Bucky" in the president's family, joined ESSI's board in 2000, several months before his nephew became president"

Full article: http://www.latimes.com/news/nationwo...ck=1&cset=true

That might be merely a curiousity were it not for the fact that GWH Bush was also part of the Carlyle Group (before retiring in 2003), which has extensive holdings in arms companies. With two of his family members so involved in Arms companies while the country under his direction is fighting two wars (the most costly of which, by far, was purely an optional undertaking no matter how you spin it), we move out of the realm of the curious and into something - to me - a little shadier.

So are you accusing someone of insider trading, rigging bids or going to war for profiteering?

This is really unimpressive.

Stock tip: Allied Defense Group (ADG).

I'm suggesting:

a. Bush intended to invade Iraq long before March/03 and with or without any international support.

b. The reasons for the invasion had nothing to do with those given prior to it (WMD) nor after (liberation).

c. Iraq had no connection to 9/11 and was not a central front in the War on Terror until the US turned it into one.

d. That based on the above invading Iraq did nothing to further achieve anything in the War on Terror, but rather it diverted considerable manpower, money, and other resources away from it.

e. That therefore this administration seems to consider the War on Terror to be little more than a sideshow whose aim is only to ensure that American citizens and the Democratic opposition (for whom dissent equates being "soft on terror", and worse) give the government free reign to do as it pleases. To quote Goering, since its as true now as it was then: "The people can always be brought to the bidding of the leaders. That is easy. All you have to do is tell them they are being attacked and denounce the pacifists for lack of patriotism and exposing the country to danger. It works the same way in any country."

f. Finally we arrive at the real agenda of this administration: war for profit and nothing else. Their speeches, their actions only serve one of two aims: either to keep the people distracted by the sideshow and subservient to their agenda, or to directly further that agenda by pushing through legislation and Executive Orders that keep the profits coming to the right family members, friends, lobbyists, and campaign contributors.

No proof. Indeed suggestive is the right word.
No proof.
I suggest you start looking up the quotes from people like Clinton (both Mr. & Mrs.), Albright and even Kerry that all publicly announced their assessments that Iraq was an immediate threat to the US and others.
There is a separate argument here as to the strategy employed but military blunders aren't usually anything but just that.
Yada! Yada! Now the old Goering quote. Bu****ler! Bu****ler!

By the way, I am not a fan of Bush, I think there are tons of US military and intel failures and things are not coming up roses in Iraq.
Your delirious rantings are typical of people who what a story to convey the facts rather than the facts conveying the story. Once again, pathetic.

First off, quoting Goering doesn't equate to calling Bush Hitler. Nowhere on this forum have I ever done so.

Secondly, I will happily debate with anyone who has an opposing view to my own (as clearly we do), provided they can do it with civility. However, your persistent habit of attacking me personally (in this thread and others) by calling my posts "delirious rantings" and "pathetic" makes further debate with you pointless and I have no intention of continuing it.

School wins Muslim dress appeal
 

@ The Avon Lady:
I know you're a fierce debater, but words like "Your delirious rantings" and "pathetic" are a little bit too offensive and personal towards scandium. Please choose your words more carefully.

The two of you are also quite off topic...

Abraham

(with moderator cap on)

edit: I didn't know scandium's reply yet when I posted this.

Well said and well done in not dropping down to that level. :yep:

My apologies to Scandium and everyone else. Even though it might appropriate for SubSim, I went overboard. :down:
:lost: