The Alan Sondheim Mail Archive

---------- Forwarded message ----------
Date: Tue, 14 Jul 2009 21:00:47 -0700
From: Craig McKie <craig@mckie.ca>
To: stuff-it@vancouvercommunity.net
Subject: [stuff-it] Cheney Death Squads E04

Sy Hersh reiterates; they assassinated people.

======

Seymour Hersh stands by Cheney hit squad claim

"I said what I said, they can always say what they say"

Renowned investigative journalist Seymour Hersh, who said that former
Vice President Dick Cheney ran a secret assassination ring outside the
purview of Congress, is standing by his claim in light of a recent New
York Times report that appears to cover similar ground.

Benjamin Sarlin at The Daily Beast spoke with the veteran reporter,
who is presently in South Asia, for a Tuesday report. When asked about
US officials playing down the functionality of the hit squad in the
Times article, Hersh replied tersely.

"I said what I said, they can always say what they say," Hersh told
Sarlin. "The last time they said 'the government doesn't torture';
this time it's 'the government doesn't assassinate.'"

Hersh noted that "his words in Minnesota were exaggerated in the
press" and didn't break any news he hadn't already reported himself
earlier.

Beyond his own reporting, Hersh added that President Bush's own
speeches provided evidence of secret assassinations.

"Go read George Bush's January 2003 State of the Union speech," he
said. "He's talking and he says we've captured and detained 3,000 Al
Qaeda members and other terrorists�crazy numbers�and said some of them
will never bother us any more. And Congress cheers."

And Hersh's summary is just about right. The Daily Beast notes Bush's
full statement, via CNN:

     "All told, more than 3,000 suspected terrorists have been arrested
in many countries," the former president said. "And many others have
met a different fate. Let's put it this way: They are no longer a
problem to the United States and our friends and allies."

-- Mike Sheehan and Stephen C. Webster
http://rawstory.com/blog/2009/07/seymour-hersh-stands-by-cheney-hit-squad-claim/

=== and in other news

Doctors to challenge David Kelly suicide finding

     * Jenny Percival
     * The Guardian, Monday 13 July 2009


A team of 13 doctors is set to mount a legal challenge in a bid to
overturn the "flawed" finding that government scientist David Kelly
killed himself. Their report rejects Lord Hutton's conclusion that
Kelly, 59, died from blood loss after cutting his wrist with a
gardening knife. The report's authors, including retired consultant in
orthopaedic and trauma surgery David Halpin, said a cut to the ulnar
artery was "highly unlikely" to have caused enough bleeding to kill.
Kelly's body was found six years ago after he was exposed as a source
of a BBC report on the grounds for going to war in Iraq.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/politics/2009/jul/13/david-kelly-hutton-report-challenge