Why Does Rupert Define This as News Only in Britain?

I guess, in a way, it's proof of the oft-derided claim that Rupert Murdoch really doesn't control his "classy" media -- The Times of London, the Sunday Times, The Australian, now the WSJ -- the way he does his trashy ones -- the Brit and Australian tabloids, the NY Post. But his Times has been hard on a story I only started paying attention to thanks to a commenter on an earlier post: the Sibel Edmonds story. Last Sunday's Times advanced the story substantially: responding to a Freedom of Information Act request for a named file (one which Edmonds, a former FBI translator, says would support her story of American nuke materials making their way to Pakistan and elsewhere through Turkish intermediaries), the FBI denied that the file existed. The Sunday Times, though, says it has an internal document indicating that the file does indeed exist.

The theft of US nuclear secrets, the diverting of them to Pakistan (and, according to Edmonds, Saudi Arabia), the involvement of Israel in the scheme -- all of these would justify as jaw-droppingly newsworthy in a rational journalistic universe. Clearly, that's not where we live.

Comments

[ShanghaiGuy]

I'm experiencing uncomfortable deja-vu -- this sounds too much like the Downing Street Memo business, complete with lack of domestic media coverage.

If these allegations are even fractionally true, our republic has some very serious problems, problems that are going to be difficult to root out and solve - in part because it's so hard to even discover them.

Thanks, Harry!

[TonyL]

The main stream media has LOST THEIR MINDS!! This story has EVERYTHING: political intrigue, war, high crimes involving household names...even a babelicious whistle-blower (Sibel Edmonds) who will pump up TV ratings! It also has the added benefit of being true.

I can just see these creaking old dinosaurs waddling around the newsroom tamping down this story while all their good reporters are trying to run with it...just to cover their old DC cocktail butt-buddies' arses.

No wonder many have concluded that, with the advent of the blogosphere, the Olde Media has simply lost its relevancy.

[gerontion72]

This story should have the entire country outraged.

Thanks, Harry, for keeping it alive.

[Beaux510]

I'm surprised anyone on HuffPo would want to know about this at all. It must be a part of neocon "fearmongering", right? Part of Bush's grand plan to stay in power and put us all in concentration camps, right?

Damned if you do, damned if you don't.

Boy Harry, you're getting serious, what's up? Nice work by the way.

[fact finder]

Rupert is a big part of the problem.

[necromancer]

why don't you ALL do the world a favour & contact Aljazzera English & 'request they do the world a favour & give this item some air time'.
They may oblige, if enough people write. Arn't they the ones going on about 'giving a different perspective', bla bla bla.
Go for it.

[oogabooga]

The first Times article said several well-known higher-ups in the government are being investigated for selling our nuke secrets on the black market to the highest bidder, including Pakistan and Turkey. Will Bush pardon these greedy, soulless traitors?

[Counterglow]

Give this a little time to slip quietly back out of public view. Then, a couple of years from now when there's some kind of serious incident, people who bring the matter up will be summarily dismissed as members of the "Tinfoil Hat Brigade".

How is it that overused cliche goes? "Nothing to see here, people. Move along."

[avergejoe]

there was another story not covered by msm

http://www.timesonline.co.uk/article/0,,2089-2535310,00.html

Revealed: Israel plans nuclear strike on Iran

ISRAEL has drawn up secret plans to destroy Iran’s uranium enrichment facilities with tactical nuclear weapons.

Two Israeli air force squadrons are training to blow up an Iranian facility using low-yield nuclear “bunker-busters”, according to Israeli military sources.

The attack would be the first with nuclear weapons since 1945, when the United States dropped atomic bombs on Hiroshima and Nagasaki.

Under the plans, conventional laser-guided bombs would open “tunnels” into the targets. “Mini-nukes” would then immediately be fired into a plant at Natanz.

“As soon as the green light is given, it will be one mission, one strike and the Iranian nuclear project will be demolished,” said one of the sources.

The plans, disclosed to The Sunday Times last week, have been prompted in part by the Israeli intelligence service Mossad’s assessment that Iran is on the verge of producing enough enriched uranium to make nuclear weapons within two years.

Israeli military commanders believe conventional strikes may no longer be enough to annihilate increasingly well-defended enrichment facilities. Several have been built beneath at least 70ft of concrete and rock. However, the nuclear-tipped bunker-busters would be used only if a conventional attack was ruled out and if the United States declined to intervene, senior sources said.

Israeli and American officials have met several times to consider military action. Military analysts said the disclosure of the plans could be intended to put pressure on Tehran to halt enrichment, cajole America into action or soften up world opinion in advance of an Israeli attack.

Israel has identified three prime targets

# Natanz, where thousands of centrifuges are being installed for uranium enrichment

# A uranium conversion facility near Isfahan where, according to a statement by an Iranian vice-president last week, 250 tons of gas for the enrichment process have been stored in tunnels

# A heavy water reactor at Arak, which may in future produce enough plutonium to produce a bomb

[TomR]

Bradblog has also been covering this:

http://www.bradblog.com/?p=5582

- Tom

[MinM]

One small caveat Harry,

Some have posited the possibility that what Sibel Edmonds actually uncovered was a counter-pr­oliferatio­n operation. Although, given the track record of those allegedly involved, that theory is dubious at best.

[Macready]

Thank you for posting this . . wonder if the MSM do anything much with this information . . . and as for Congress .. . well . .. I have my doubts ... they seem big on talk and following the chimp's directives but short on courage and integrity . . . if our so-called Democratic leadership (pelosi and reid) can even be called Democrats is a debateable point.

[rucognizant]

I have the official Sunday Times article printed out & ready to hand to my legislators this week when they come around to discuss local economic stimulus!
An article from The Case FOr Impeachment; similarly delivered, during the August recess, has netted one of them supporting Kucinich's HR 799,impeachment of Cheney.
"As goes Maine, so goes the Nation."?

[oatmeal]

we know how this works: deny, deny, deny, documents surface, claim-fabrication!, deny, deny, deny, Congress-"what's this?!, America's lose their attention, documents lost in committee, the end.

[DLSteinhardt]

Thanks for trumpeting this! I've spent about 20 of the last 30 hours reading up on this outrage and trying to interest members of Congress and media outlets to share my interest.

Valerie Plame Wilson might only incidentally have been outed to smack down her husband. Shutting down her CIA front, Brewster Jennings, shut down a CIA investigation into ATC (Turkey's AIPAC).

ATC and other Turkish legit and semi-legit organizations are linked to: nuclear secrets and other arms, narcotics, money laundering, compromised Depts. of State and Defense, plus infiltration of the FBI's translation unit--which had previously lacked a Turkish speaker on staff, making Turkish the lingua franca for being overlooked by FBI Counterintelligence pre-9/11.

Edmonds translated planning for the attacks, after the fact. She was hired 9/13/01.

The Administration's whispered response to this? "Shhhh. It's OK-it's a covert operation."

What, to make Turkey's criminal elite the favored nuclear, armament and drug dealers and fronts for our enemies?