Press Gang

While all eyes are on the candidates the most astonishing sideshow is being staged by the U.S. Media.

Every candidate but two have made the pilgrimage to AIPAC and pledged obeisance to Israel and accepted their reward - even Obama:

http://www.cjnews.com/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=13849&Itemid=86

As a result there is very little difference between the frontrunners of either party on the major issues - Iraq, Iran, torture, Habeus Corpus and the power of lobbies.
The two standouts are Kucinich and Paul.

Despite Paul's astonishing feat of twice breaking all records for fundraising, his consistent, overwhelming victories in online polls and his respectable 10% polling in the Iowa Primary (compared with Giuliani's 3%) the major networks have excluded him from debates and there is a virtual boycott of him in the press. Watch the others gang up on him when he has the audacity to suggest that American foreign policy might have something to do with attacks on the U.S.:
http://www.crooksandliars.com/2008/01/05/gop-new-hampshire-debate-ron-paul-battles-fellow-gop-candidates-on-iraq-terrorism/

Mitt Romney's Islamophobic rant is particularly nauseating when he exhorts Paul to read what the "Jihaadists" write, demonstrating that he (Romney) has certainly not done so - see "Who said it" below.
Incidentally,
http://www.crooksandliars.com/

is a fairly cool site.

Similarly with Kucinich who is taking legal action:

http://www.crooksandliars.com/2008/01/06/dennis-kucinich-slams-abc-for-exclusion-from-debate/

Both of these candidates favour cessation of U.S. foreign adventures.

Yesterday the British Sunday Times became the first major newspaper to carry the story of whistleblower Sibel Edmonds. This story is bigger than Ben Hur - Edmonds has been gagged for five years and the crimes she alleges reach into the heart of the Bush administration and are substantiated by many of her former colleagues.

http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/world/middle_east/article3137695.ece

Today there is nothing whatsoever in the American press about this story. The silence is deafening. It is as if the Sydney Morning Herald broke a story alleging corruption in the highest echelons of our Government and the NZ Herald simply ignored it.

Larisa Alexandrovna has the names:

http://www.atlargely.com/2008/01/sibel-speaks-pa.html

More here:

http://letsibeledmondsspeak.blogspot.com/2008/01/sibel-names-names-in-pictures.html

...and here:

http://www.dailykos.com/story/2008/1/6/112413/4231/854/431373

Given the media's treatment of these stories is it any wonder that America elects governments that work against it's own best interests? Kucinich and Paul have little hope of making it to the White House but minor parties can often have a big influence as the majors pick up on their policies in an effort to win the swinging voter. In this case however, the media blackout serves to obliterate the message, effectively disenfranchising a large chunk of the electorate.
Perhaps the upside is that America has been largely unsuccessful in bringing this form of "democracy" to those countries it has invaded.