Pulling Imran Khan off a plane in Canada, and making him miss his Eid fundraising lunch in New York, is pretty crass of the United States, a country that claims its foreign policy is motivated by freedom. The idea that low level US immigration operatives needed clarificiation on Khan’s well-known views on killings by US drones in Pakistan is plainly nonsense. But this wasn’t routine or an error; Khan wasn’t questioned at a desk on arrival in New York, he was pulled off a plane by US operatives in Canada. It was an exercise in humiliation.
But if you look under this event you find some interesting, creepy crawly creatures.
From the Toronto Sun report linked above:
The American Islamic Leadership Coalition from Phoenix, Ariz. wrote to Secretary of State Hillary Clinton earlier this week, pressuring her to revoke the U.S. visa granted to Khan because of his sympathetic views towards the Taliban.
The American Islamic Leadership Coalition followed this up with a press release with the notably un-Islamic contact name of Gregg Edgar of Gordon C James Public Relations.
From Wikipedia on Gordon C James:
James grew up in Phoenix, Arizona and moved to Iowa in 1969 where he served several years in the Iowa National Guard. James worked in the real-estate management business in Des Moines, renting space to presidential candidates in town for the caucuses. In 1978, he met and rented space to former President of the United States George H. W. Bush (then Ambassador Bush).[1]
After the 1988 election James worked as Lead Advance Representative at the White House for two years under President George H.W. Bush and Director of Invitations and Ticketing for the 51st Presidential Inaugural Committee.[2] James was also employed as deputy director of events for the 54th and 55th Presidential Inauguration.[3] In 1990 he founded the public relations firm Gordon C. James Public Relations.
In 2004, James was employed by former U.S. Deputy Chief of Staff Karl Rove to improve U.S. public relations in Iraq during the transition of governments.[4] For more than five months he served as the Director of Advance and Special Events in the Office of Strategic Communications and Director of the Presidential Palace Studio for the Coalition Provisional Authority in Baghdad, Iraq. While there he advised Ambassador Paul Bremer and was responsible for coordinating the Ambassador’s relations with Western and Pan-Arab media outlets and produced several events including the signing of the Tal (Iraq’s Declaration of Independence) and 100 Days to Sovereignty, the countdown to the transfer of power from the CPA to newly founded Iraqi government.[5]
In 2004 James assisted in several political stops with the Bush-Cheney campaign and in 2005, he was employed as lead advance representative for President George H.W. Bush and President Bill Clinton’s tour of the Tsunami-hit regions of Indonesia.[6]
James has traveled to five continents as a lead advance representative for President George W. Bush and First Lady Laura Bush.
There are some Muslims in the American Islamic Leadership Coalition. In Phoenix with Gordon C James is M Zuhdi Jasser, of Syrian origin but for eleven years a medical officer in the US Navy. And the AILC has another interesting Syrian, leader of “The Reform Party of Syria”, Farid Ghadry. The AILC website includes the quote:
“Gossip is he is the next president of Syria”
Ghadry lives in Washington and is the author of such fascinating blog posts as “Israel Builds for Nobel Prizes, Arabs are Suicide Bombers”.
Like the Quilliam Foundation in the UK, doubtless the AILC has hoovered up plenty of public funds for its useful work for the security services. BUt the idea that it genuinely represents a strand in Islamic thinking is ludicrous. It is marvellous what being an establishment shill can do for your media profile though. Zuhdi Jasser addressed his largest mass rally of supporters – highly optimistically estimated by the media as three dozen – in a New York rally in support of NYPD’s controversial surveillance and agent provocateur operations against Muslims. Rather than laughing at it, the tame mainstream media covered it infinitely better than they cover anti-war rallies 1,000 times larger, and portrayed it as a genuine sign of Muslim community support for the surveillance.
Just as none of the mainstream media reporting the current Imran Khan story – most of whon quote the AILC – say anything about who the AILC really are. What do people working in the mainstream media think the purpose of their existence actually is?
“Jobs for the boys and girls at the FSA!”
http://rowans-blog.blogspot.co.uk/2012/10/jobs-for-boys-and-girls-at-fsa.html
“Yet Another Disappearing DWP Document, Now The PIP Tender Goes Missing”
http://johnnyvoid.wordpress.com/2012/10/18/yet-another-disappearing-dwp-document-now-the-pip-tender-goes-missing/
“Emma Harrison Mauled Over Work Programme Disaster”
http://johnnyvoid.wordpress.com/2012/10/26/emma-harrison-mauled-over-work-programme-disaster/
Thanks Dissident X for getting that info, Weird that Company Check said that there was no such information??
This is a search on the first name. Just like those Russian dolls, one within another and so on. I guess that all the others will reveal similar info.
http://www.cdrex.com/peter-alexander-coates/924921.html
Plasma Resources is probably connected with the hiving off of the Blood Transfusion Service.
That Imran Khan was a Taliban sympathiser was news to me. But I found a Guardian article confirming it:
http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2012/oct/14/imran-khan-taliban-afghanistan-islam
As far as I’m concerned Canada and everyone else is right to ban Taliban sympathisers from entering, since the Taliban are no good. So IK is lucky he got in at all.
It’s not as simple as that Abe. Think of Khan in the same terms as Romney: a privileged and rather off-planet populist who will say anything to increase his electoral support. It’s a sad reflection on the total failure of US policy in the region that growing numbers of young Pakistanis see the Taleban as a righteous cause. Khan reflects this, also the very genuine Pakistani concern re. drone attacks. And yes, he would like an Islamic state. He’s seen how the alternative works.
But as Suhayl says, the airport incident will raise his profile usefully back home, so no great damage was done.
from the url, apparently originally headlined: “We need a rule book for drones”. don’t agree with everything written, but worth reading all:
Washington Post Opinion: Kurt Volker: What the U.S. risks by relying on drones
(Kurt Volker was U.S. ambassador to NATO from July 2008 to May 2009. He is executive director of the McCain Institute for International Leadership at Arizona State University and a senior adviser to the Atlantic Council of the United States)
Third, our monopoly on drone warfare will not last. Others, from European allies to Russia, China and Iran, are acquiring and beginning to use drones for surveillance — eventually, they will use them for killing as well. What would we say if others used drones to take out their opponents — whether within their own territory or internationally? Imagine China killing Tibetan separatists that it deemed terrorists or Russia launching drone strikes on Chechens. What would we say? What rules would we urge them to abide by?
Then there is the question of national identity: What do we want to be as a nation? A country with a permanent kill list? A country where people go to the office, launch a few kill shots and get home in time for dinner? A country that instructs workers in high-tech operations centers to kill human beings on the far side of the planet because some government agency determined that those individuals are terrorists? There is a “Brave New World” grotesqueness to this posture that should concern all Americans.
This is not to say that the United States should never use drones for targeted attacks. We should. But we should also be creating standards and practices that are entirely defensible, even — and perhaps especially — if others were to adopt them…
http://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/we-need-a-rule-book-for-drones/2012/10/26/957312ae-1f8d-11e2-9cd5-b55c38388962_story.html
Abe Rene, your comments and the Guardian article are somewhat headline-grabbing, which might be expected from a Zionist-funded rag. He does not support the Taliban’s shooting of the young girl Malala who seeks education for women. He could not comment on that shooting, as the article reveals, because of fear for his supporters. The important facts are that the Taliban are fighting a Jihad, in their eyes, but what is even more important is that their ranks are growing. The question is why? The answer is the United States of America and their indiscriminate drone bombing of the region.
I think I can guess where you’re coming from.
Komodo
I read Sufi propaganda against what you call an extreme and intolerant sect. The definition of sufism in my understanding is the worship of worship itself, instead of worship/practising of Allah’s commands from the Qur’an and Ahadith’. That means they feel almost holier than God himself, while simultaneously dis-respecting other people’s basic human rights.
One of those commands from the Quran and Ahadith is for Muslims to be intolerant of certain practices and beliefs, but another is for us humans to be tolerant of eachother as humans, because most people follow what’s in front of their nose from culture and family without re-considering their belief.
As I see it the intolerance is a political game in which Muslims pretend to be intolerant by being nasty to eachother and thereby gaining the trust and material benefits of Zionists and other bastards who have money and power and who hate Islam.
I make no distinction between those who buy the life of this world in exchange for the life of the next, by making sects, Sufism, Salafism, Salawufism, Sufiyalafism, Bahai or Wahabi.
The Saudi administration is the best qualified linguistically to be the custodian and interpreter of the Qur’an and it fulfils that role diligently.
All the sects use the same Qur’an. They derive their differences from the propositions of non-Muslims. As I wrote above, Al-CIAda is used by the West as a false-flag task force and as a scapegoat and justification for breaking international law – almost in the same breath.
The rhetoric against ‘Saudi Wahabism’ is entirely from the West and entirely unhelpful. The need to re-consider one’s beliefs applies to Muslims and non-Muslims alike. Insults hinder the process.
I see that the math, defeating spam, is getting more complicated. Are we supposed to take home lessons in the future?
Nevermind,
thanks for the reference to Najibullah whose short rule was brutaly terminated by his castration, performed by those not sufficiently grateful for better schooling and health service. He was first of all an appointee of the Soviet Union (one does not have to be a marxist for such an appointment, total obedience usually suffices) and as a head of the KHAD, the Afghani secret service, had to occasionally perform something useful for his masters. It should be obvious to any normally thinking person that if you want to keep dissatisfied inhabitants happy then you have to throw them few bombons, like free schooling or health service. The communists in SU understood this game well, unlike the tories who think that financially-strangulated schools and castrated NHS will help them winning the next election.
Finally, (I really hope that we have finished this topic) the concept of “Islamic communist state”, that you mentioned, seems unlikely for those not believing in chimeras.
I’m allowed to be intolerant of Wahhabis, Guano. They’re intolerant of me. I’m not even a Muslim. From outside then, I see Islam as being the usual complex (found in old-established religions) of divergent versions claiming a common inspiration. In which different interpretations of the same writ and traditions occur. I grant you, Saudi Arabia is linguistically qualified to be the guardian of the holy places. I am not so sure its theology is as pure as its Arabic. That is not for me to judge, obviously, but for the ummah. Nevertheless, the readiness with which Sunni and Shi’a can be set at one anothers’ throats with the minimum of prompting from the US and Israel is worrying.
Re. the Sufis, I am a great fan of Rumi, and the Platonic variants of Islam. Incidentally.
…but don’t you regard Baha’i as a heresy? For it surely is.
A-level Captcha for Karel:
How many patriarchs were present at the Fourth Lateran Council of 1213-1215?
Waddya expect, GlennBeck & Co, presstitutes !!
Guest – The FSA… from Rowan’s blog
“I too share your observation that there appears to be a lack of political will to curb the City,we have to remember that so many of the people who have made shed-loads of money in the City are very friendly with MPs and ministers, some of whom have dabbled in the corridors of Mammon themselves.
There is an incestuous relationship between Threadneedle St and Parliament Square, and the politicos cannot help but admit that they are looking to the City to get us out of the mess they got us into. I do believe that Osborne et al are listening intently to the ‘chaps’ who are telling them that they mustn’t regulate them too heavily otherwise they might just go abroad.
I don’t think the Government has the wit to be able to look closely at what is going on inside the FSA and ask itself the serious question, ‘…what kind of fuking people are they employing to do this specialised job…’ But then it was always the same with the Civil Service in so many areas of Whitehall, huge incompetence, vast number of jobs for the boys, keep your nose clean, be a safe pair of hands and don’t rock the boat and you will get your gold-plated pension, your putty medal and your seat in some cosy non-exec role.
So the Government aren’t going to intervene at all.”
USS Enterprise final homecoming ceremonies Nov 27th to Dec 1st – to be decommissioned over two years after 50 years of service. Need to commence 15 day return voyage from the PG any time now unless…..?!! Mohammed does not want to go to Pearl Harbour Mountain, instead the Pearl Harbour Mountain has to come to him, right under his very nose !! 20,000 sailors (and 90 ships) sacrificed enough reason for a nuclear strike. Conventional war with Iran (800k standing army + 13m reserves) is simply not workable.
English Knight,
The ‘power of intention’ froze that scenario – the world is getting wiser by absolute or intrinsic exchange of information.
Initially, they think their purpose is to inform the public.
Then they begin to realise that actually their job is to create and maintain an illusion.
Then that they are serving the purposes of forces acting against the common good.
Then that they have to choose between career success and their moral values.
Therefore, the mainstream media is self-selecting for people who put their own interests before those of the majority.
….and anybody who has achieved a high position in the mainstream media is an untrustworthy whore.
Enterprise is on its way. Stennis and Eisenhower now in/around PG. No-one’s pulling out, EK.
Mark; “power of intention” Are you referencing Castaneda? If so, that would be ‘intent’.
Who’s Left? Who’s Right? We have all been trammeled and stone-bruised to the Right of center, but remember; go far enough Right and you’re Left, again.
“….and anybody who has achieved a high position in the mainstream media is an untrustworthy whore.”
A Node;
It’s like metal refining. All the shit rises to the top. Rarely, can good folks survive the ruthless gauntlet. Sociopaths have the advantage.
Komodo,
I suspect, none as it was held in Rome. But cannot exclude that some were not counted as they hid under the tables to play with 5 yr. old cardinals. Some probably enjoyed themselves in the inimitable Jimmy-Savile style, others may have prefered more innocuous activities.
I suspect that all these antispam numbers are a part of a cabala plot to take over all our higher brain functions. Only lizard-like tectum will then remain intact to allow watching BBC. The gates of heaven will remain closed to whomever designed this act of sacrilege.
Fatally for your theory, Karel, I don’t watch BBC. There were 71. Wait till the Captcha discovers *i*…
Romney’s strategy in a nut-shell (borrowed from Glengarry Glen Ross)…
‘Always-Be-Lying” cuz second place just gets you a set of steak-knives.
http://www.thedailybeast.com/articles/2012/10/29/f-you-dishonesty-romney-and-jeep.html
Test
@ Mark Golding re your comment – “there appears to be a lack of political will to curb the City”.
.
And for the same reason that we won’t get the true story as to why the Savile case was covered-up for 50 years, or why I am having so much difficulty getting basic justice – the high establishment does not consider curbing the City to be in its own interests and our politicians know to always toady to the interests of the establishment. Any politician who doesn’t toady to the high establishment’s view is likely to find himself targeted for smears, negative articles in the press, etc. In my view the basic problem is the absence of a free press.
Wendy, at 11:06am, 29.10.12:
What makes you suggest that I am “pro-American” and what makes you want to bracket me with Tarek Fatah (no offense to Mr Fatah, whom I do not know)? As I said, Pakistan is complex. Unless we try to understand that complexity, both historically and wrt now, we will not be able to understand events in the region. I was trying to explain some of that complexity. Imran Khan is not the same as the Taliban. But neither, I think, is he an agent of liberation for the people of Pakistan. I really do hope that Falcon (at 6:20am on 29.10.12) is correct and that I am wrong. I hope Imran is boxing clever. But I am skeptical. Imran Khan watched Obama’s 2008 campaign very carefully. Think of that.
It’s difficult to discern human complexity when that complexity is stridently emotional. For that matter it’s hard to understand those from one’s own culture.
@ Mark Golding : “there appears to be a lack of political will to curb the City”.
The City appoints the politicians. The City controls the politicians. And the City removes the politicians if they go off message.
The political will is the City’s will.
Ben Franklin – No shamans involved there – I am talking loosely about cause and effect where the ’cause’ is usually misunderstood.
Part of the ‘million dollar experiment’ referenced by Steve Pavlina that is trying to prove one way or the other whether the intention-manifestation model works. I happen to believe it does!