Accusations made by From the Wilderness ...
I woke up this morning to a link sent to me from a reader about a publication called From the Wilderness. The group has a whole bunch of stuff for sale about Bush and the government's prior knowledge to the Sept. 11 attacks [http://www.fromthewilderness.com/]
I especially like the pdf file of the full page ad that was published in the Washington Post last week: ["Pay no attention to that man behind the curtain"]
There is some pretty good stuff here. However, these tactics seem all too eerily familiar.
After the election of Bill Clinton in 1992, rightwing groups tore into the president about some of the heinous things he reportedly did - or allowed to occur - as governor of Arkansas. Attacking the Clintons became a cottage industry as videos, magazines, and books were published and sold implicating them in just about everything imaginable.
From funding the Contras and helping the CIA with their drug-running efforts out of an airport in Mena, Ark.; to allegations of rape, sexual assault, and improper use of state troopers for the procurement of sex for Clinton; to banking and criminal activities in the Whitewater failed land deal and beyond, including fraudulent Small Business Administration loans and the Park-o-Meter scandal; the allegations of financial improprieties with Tyson [Chicken] Corp. and Hillary’s manipulation of the commodities markets; and the shenanigans at the Rose Law firm, the attacks against the former president and his obnoxious wife were relentless and endless.
There was even a Clinton Death List - listing hundreds of accidental deaths around the Clintons.
These few examples don’t even include some of the things that went on while they were in the White House including the Vince Foster suicide/murder allegations; the death of DNC chairman Ron Brown; the Craig Livingstone “Filegate” scandal; the health care plan symposiums - held in secret, similarly to Cheney’s energy hearings - in which the public records still have never been released; the charges of manipulating the pharmaceuticals markets; etc.
After almost six years of attacks funded by conservative and religious organizations and spread like wildfire through talk radio advertising, the militia movement, gun owner groups, and underground magazines, Clinton finally was tripped up. He foolishly - and destructively - lied under oath in the Paula Jones sexual harassment depositions and lied about his relationship with Monica Lewinsky which eventually led to his impeachment. When Hillary appeared on the “Today” soon after talking about a “vast rightwing conspiracy” against her husband, she was pilloried for it, even though there was some validity to the claims. Unfortunately, Clinton held on and was not removed from office.
However, there was also validity to the claims that the Clintons were involved in some pretty bad things. Many people in their inner circle - from Clinton’s Lt. Gov. Jim Guy Tucker; to Rose Law firm partner Webster Hubbell; to “hot pants” Susan MacDougal and her late-husband Jim who used the Madison Guaranty as his own personal slush fund, helping Clinton fund his campaigns and conquer the fairer gender - all faced jail time for basically knowing the Clintons and being involved in their scandals. All of this stuff has been pretty well documented in numerous books, videos, and magazine articles.
[As an aside, I would recommend people read Martin Gross’ very easy read “The Great Whitewater Fiasco” and Roger Morris’ amazing “Partners in Power” published by Henry Holt, to get a better grip on some of these scandals. You also might want to check out the more conspiratorial but still excellent “Compromised: Clinton, Bush, and the CIA” by Terry Reed and John Cummings.]
The Clintons however, sans the president’s zipper problems, escaped prosecution for their involvement in the crimes despite the overwhelming evidence. Shit, she was elected Senator of New York [!] and people still think her husband is God's gift to the Democratic Party!
However, more importantly, the media, the American public, the women's groups, and most liberals, ignored these charges and scandals with many saying they didn’t care about what the Clinton’s did in the past or who he was making semen deposits into in the oval office.
Now, we have these vile - and yet very realistic and plausible - charges against Bush and his friends, cohorts, staffers, and handlers that they allowed Sept. 11 and the deaths of thousands of Americans in order to gut the Bill of Rights, expand American imperialism overseas, and control the oil fields and drug fields of Iraq and Afghanistan. These charges - as conspiratorial as they may seem - are not beyond belief and most in the rest of the industrialized and “free” world believe the charges, hence the massive outpouring of opposition to Bush and his invasion of Iraq.

But there are some striking similarities between the charges against the Clintons and the charges against Bush.
The partisan nature of both - and the denial of both by the organizations behind each president - is the same. Democrats denied the charges against the Clinton’s; the republicans will deny - or ignore - the charges against Bush and Co. I would bet that if the democrats even hint a conspiracy that Bush allowed Sept. 11 to occur, and the American people grab a hold of it in much the same way that they grabbed on to the Clinton accusations, the military will probably be called out to restore “order” to the nation and we'll never see our much needed regime change.
Then, there is the media ignoring the charges.
Sure, the leftists involved in forwarding many of these Bush conspiracies can rightly complain about the media ignoring their pretty outlandish allegations. For the most part, these same leftists were silent about Clinton’s stuff. But absent the swirling dynamic around the sex issue, the Whitewater stuff was pretty much ignored - which elevated the “liberal media conspiracy” that rightwingers are now using to make mucho cash and manipulate the majority of normal, hardworking Americans who are seeing their lives being robbed right before their eyes. So, the leftists can complain all they want but they shouldn’t be surprised. The media, for the most part, protected Clinton for doing more than what Nixon was run out of town on a rail for.
Another similarity includes the pushing the purchase of gold and precious metals as a reliable and safe investment opportunity.
On the From the Wilderness site, there is a link urging people to buy gold. Anyone who has studied or followed the militia movement or other rightwing, conservative, or religious organizations, hear some of the same urgings.
This leads me to the last question and point: Is this just a cottage industry producing videos, magazines, and books by scheming entrepreneurs against whatever or whoever, regardless of party affiliation or political view, to make a lot of money? Or is this something more sinister? Who knows, but it will be interesting to see what happens.
Having said all this, I can truly say that nothing surprises me anymore. In this world which can often contain so much pure evil - in the board rooms, churches, state houses, playing fields, and neighborhoods of America - it shouldn’t surprise you either.

My token line for people of late has been, When Bush campaigned as a “compassionate conservative,” we didn’t know he meant “friendly fascist.” These charges against Bush and Co. don't surprise me at all. Hey, I believed much of the Clinton stuff but that was only because I was involved in the 1992 primary process and saw firsthand just how despicable Bill and Hillary Clinton and their friends were. I also examined evidence about their terrible record in Arkansas and didn’t believe them when they held hands and mouthed the words “Don’t stop thinking about tomorrow.” Many of us were still trying to get a hold on the truth of yesterday.

Whether this group or others will be able to build the case against Bush remains to be seen. But whatever happens, one thing is for sure: The people selling videos, books, and magazines are going to make a serious chunk of money.