Kellogg Brown & Root, the company chosen last month by the Pentagon to extinguish oil well fires in Iraq, has a long history of supporting the same terrorist regimes vilified by the Bush administration and on at least one occasion defrauded the United States government to the tune of $2 million, according to public documents.

Halliburton, headed by Dick Cheney before he became vice president, and it’s KBR subsidiary did business with some of the world's most notorious governments and dictators - in countries such as Azerbaijan, Indonesia, Iran, Iraq, Libya and Nigeria. The company has routinely skirted U.S. sanctions placed on these countries and lobbied the U.S. government to lift sanctions so it could set up new partnerships and create new business opportunities in these countries.

Still, the Pentagon awarded the Iraqi oil well contract to KBR without competitive bidding; a move that some Democratic lawmakers in Congress said was based on favoritism because of Cheney’s ties to the company.

Is This Media manipulation on a grand scale?
The photographs tell the story...
http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/article2842.htm

A tale of two photos
http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/article2838.htm

Wider angle view of the pulling down of the Saddam statue
http://www.scoop.co.nz/mason/stories/HL0304/S00117.htm

The stage-managed events in Baghdad's Firdos Square
http://www.wsws.org/articles/2003/apr2003/fird-a12.shtml

Is Killing Part of Pentagon Press Policy?
http://www.fair.org/press-releases/iraq-journalists.html

'Chaotic' situation at Baghdad hospital
http://www.middle-east-online.com/english/?id=5106

In times of war, journalists can serve as vital witnesses for the people of the world. So it's especially sinister when governments take aim at reporters and photographers.

A few weeks ago, when I was talking with a CNN cameraman, he recalled an overseas stint to cover events in the West Bank. Anger was evident in his voice: "The Israelis were shooting at us."

When military forces are assaulting civilians, commanders often try to prevent media from telling true stories with pictures and words. Governments that maim and kill civilians are routinely eager to stop journalists from getting too close to the action. Those who persist are vulnerable to retribution.

For a long time now, the U.S. government has been hostile toward the Al-Jazeera television network. Widely watched in the Arab world, Al-Jazeera's coverage of the war on Iraq has been in sharp contrast to the coverage on American television. As Time magazine observed: "On U.S. TV it means press conferences with soldiers who have hand and foot injuries and interviews with POWs' families, but little blood. On Arab and Muslim TV it means dead bodies and mourning."

Join the Columbus MeetUp for Presidential candidate and former Vermont Governor, and physician Howard Dean. Meetings are the first Wednesday of the month. Go to http://dean2004.meetup.com/ to join the 100-plus local activists working to win the nomination for Dean.  Learn more about Dean by visiting www.deanforamerica.com. Rally for Dean when he visits Columbus in May! For immediate info on local action contact: Steve Chaffin (lawbug@direcway.com). Dean in his own words: “What in the world are so many Democrats doing supporting the President’s unilateral intervention in Iraq?” “I’m tired of listening the fundamentalist preachers!” and “I want my country back!”