A BUZZFLASH READER CONTRIBUTION
by Ilene Proctor

Q: How Can A Man Become a National Best Selling Author Without Ever Being Reviewed By The Mainstream Media?

A: The Internet and Progressive Radio Caused This Media Sensation

WATCH OUT WASHINGTON! HERE COMES Vincent Bugliosi’s The Prosecution of George Bush for Murder.

Make no mistake, things have been done to America in these recent years that are unwise, unjust, unconscionable, unacceptable and un-American by President George Bush who pursues his partisanship, his profiteering, his perjury, his pardons and his power that are frankly, according to best-selling author Vincent Bugliosi, unpardonable.

In The Prosecution of George W. Bush for Murder, Bugliosi presents a tight, meticulously researched legal case that puts George W. Bush on trial in an American courtroom for the murder of nearly 4,000 American soldiers fighting the war in Iraq. Bugliosi sets forth the legal architecture and incontrovertible evidence that President Bush took this nation to war in Iraq under false pretenses-a war that has not only caused the deaths of American soldiers but also over 100,000 innocent Iraqi men, women, and children; cost the United States over one trillion dollars thus far with no end in sight; and alienated many American allies in the Western world.

A BuzzFlash Review

Make no mistake, the hourglass is running out of sand for the darker impulses of this decider of our national politics and his destructive policies.

In The Prosecution of George W. Bush for Murder (Vanguard Press, 2008), Bugliosi, the man who successfully prosecuted Charles Manson for murder, argues convincingly that President George W. Bush's conduct in taking the US military to war against Iraq under false pretenses in March of 2003 qualifies him to be prosecuted for murder in any state in the nation. Written in an in-your-face gutsy style, Bugliosi manifestly maps out Bush's destiny.

Despite a virtual press blackout, Vincent Bugliosi's book has became a national best seller and is fast becoming a cult fave amongst outraged Constitution loving, Bill-of-Rights adherents, Declaration of Independence followers, Democrats, Republicans, Libertarians, Greens and Independent Americans alike.

One of the first references to Iraq made by the Bush administration after 9/11 was made on October 15, 2001, by then Secretary of State Colin Powell when he told the press: "Iraq is Iraq, a wasted society for 10 years. They're sad. They're contained ..." If that were the case, how were they supposed to be a threat to the world's strongest military power?

Bugliosi calls our attention to the fact that after Bush had started talking about the possibility of war with Iraq, he said that his decision will be based on the "latest intelligence." What he never said, of course, is that on October 1, 2002, the classified 2002 National Intelligence Estimate issued by the CIA and other US intelligence agencies said that Saddam was NOT an imminent threat to the US.

Not long after that, on the afternoon of October 7, 2002, then CIA director George Tenet delivered a letter to Senator Bob Graham (D-Florida), Chairman of the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence, saying "Baghdad for now appears to be drawing a line short of conducting terrorist attacks with conventional or CBW (chemical or biological weapons) against the United States." That evening Bush delivers a speech to the nation at the Museum Center in Cincinnati, Ohio in which he called Saddam Hussein a "great danger to our nation."

Then there is the infamous reference to Saddam's supposed quest for uranium in Africa in the President's 2003 State of the Union speech, which was based on documents which beltway insiders believed to be forgeries. In October of 2002 George Tenet told Deputy National Security Advisor Stephen Hadley that the president "should not be a fact witness on this issue," and the reporting on it was "weak."

However, for many, the conclusive evidence that Bush knew Saddam was no threat to this country, and therefore an attack on Iraq was unjustified, was the following. Back in March 2003, Bush said that if Saddam Hussein did not give up his weapons of mass destruction, Iraq would face war. But earlier, in a January 31 closed-door meeting, Bush told his British buddy Tony Blair that the attack would take place even if no WMDs were found. Indeed, George and Tony candidly conceded that the discovery of such weapons was unlikely.

This deliberate deception is revealed in a confidential five-page memo written by David Manning, Blair's top foreign-policy advisor, who was at the meeting.

Manning records that both Bush and Blair were uptight that the WMDs were not going to be found, so George W. offered another fabrication to give them an excuse to attack. He suggested that the U.S. would paint one of our own surveillance planes in the colors of the United Nations and fly it over Iraq, hoping that Saddam would be provoked into shooting it down. Then the U.S. and Brits could invade, claiming that they were retaliating for Saddam's attack on the UN.

Ultimately, Bush and Blair stuck with the WMD lie, apparently assuming that the war would be quick, a new Iraqi democracy would spring up, and no one would remember all that WMD stuff.

Meanwhile, more than 4,000 Americans have died, Iraq is a bloody mess, and George W. says his war of lies will continue indefinitely.

In addition to providing us with the legal rationale and possible jurisdiction for such a prosecution of the President, Bugliosi also provides examples of how monstrously callous Bush has been since the war began in March of 2003. He provides several pages of photographs of scenes of carnage from Iraq juxtaposed with pictures of a grinning, clowning President Bush, having the time of his life. He also provides several quotes from President Bush made during a variety of stages in the war showing that the President was more concerned about running, fishing or going to a ball game than about the thousands killed in the war that he started. As Bush said in a press conference on December 4, 2007, he's been feeling "pretty good about life."

In the Acknowledgments section of the book, Bugliosi provides a valuable insight into the world of book publishing when he claims that many people at the largest publishing houses in the country told him that although they agreed with the conclusions in the book, and thought that the book would make money, they wanted to have nothing to do with it out of fear. It was, they said, "too hot to handle." In fact two liberal law professors of his acquaintance were scared to even look at the book! Bugliosi claims that this is all due to the climate of fear created by the current right wing in America, which brands anyone who believes George Bush's actions to be criminal as a "pro-terrorist," "anti-American" sufferer of "Bush Derangement Syndrome." One is hard-pressed to disagree with him.

In a political environment where impeachment of President Bush is "off the table," those who wish to bring the man to justice may have to look to the courts, but the question is, of course, who would step up and prosecute him? There are not too many prosecutors today who posses Bugliosi's passion for justice. Even if no charges are ever actually filed against Bush, at least The Prosecution of George W. Bush for Murder stands as an historical record of one more American President's mendacity on the issues of war and peace.

Bush's ascent to power has meant tragedy, failure and death. His arrogance and his administration's imperial grandeur have alienated what Jefferson called the decent opinion of mankind. His tactics have been pursued with contempt for alternate views, corruption of our democratic system, and condescension toward those who know far more about military affairs than he does.

While deliberately deceiving his nation into war, Bush championed the politics of fear, desperately seeking to frighten the people to justify his attacks on freedoms guaranteed by statute and constitution.

Like no administration before it, team Bush has mastered the media with its use of psychological research, coupled with the modern means of communication, to muster mass support for his elite agenda. With Bush as the prime player, his administration staged photo ops whose choreographed drama and camera-ready visuals ("Mission Accomplished"!) were intended to play to the emotions and overrule objections; reducing complicated geopolitical issues to black-or-white dualisms: Good Team America vs. the Axis of Evil.

The Bush administration represents the apotheosis of government by spin control. The philosophical takeaway here is the historical shift from the Enlightenment, whose commitment to reasoned debate and empirical truth used to be the cornerstone of our little experiment in democracy, to the faith-based worldview of fundamentalism -- not just the Christian fundamentalism of the religious right, but fundamentalisms of every sort.

The Iraq War came about, in large part, because of a harmonic convergence of personal passions, political agendas and ideological crusades, all faith-based rather than fact-driven. Bush, Bugliosi reminds us, is a man who "convinces himself to believe what suits his needs at the moment" and who "to this day ... seems unbothered by the disconnect between his chief rationale for war and the driving motivation behind it. Empowered by God to democratize the Middle East and police the globe as part of the constabulary duties of the Last Action Superpower, Bush has clearly delighted in establishing a star-spangled imperium. America's an empire now, and when we act, we reinforce Bush's own reality.

Today, Bush is busy covering up his dirty laundry, all the while planning for the next war. But Bugliosi is hot on his case, and the clock is ticking, the day is coming, when a grateful nation will soon celebrate Bush's complete and total removal from the high councils of government, once and for all, and hopefully, one day, be called to judgment by an awakened America for the great tragedy he has wrought.

The Prosecution of George W. Bush for Murder

A BUZZFLASH READER CONTRIBUTION

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