Wednesday, July 9, 2008 UPDATE: ABC NEWS have now changed their report, without even noting the change in the update time of the article, which remains 9:20. It seems the corporate media are perfectly happy to cover up their own mistakes with no acknowledgement whatsoever.
USA Today has now reported Ventura’s denial, a story which includes ABC News’ original headline, which has now been amended with a question mark, as has the text of the story with no notification of the change.
Why ABC News reported that Ventura was running is a mystery, as nowhere in the NPR interview (screenshot below) does Ventura state that he has decided to run.
Former Minnesota Governor Jesse Ventura has exclusively told Prison Planet that an ABC News report which claims that Ventura will launch a run for the Senate is a “total lie” and a “flat out misrepresentation.”
ABC News’ Senior National Correspondent Jake Tapper claims in a story today, “In an interview with NPR’s David Welna that ran today former Gov. Jesse “The Body” Ventura, Ind-Minn., says he will run for Senate, challenging incumbent Sen. Norm Coleman, R-Minn., whom Ventura defeated for governor in 1998, as well as Democratic nominee and former Saturday Night Live humorist Al Franken.”
Syndicated radio show host Alex Jones called Ventura this morning and confirmed that the report was completely inaccurate.
Ventura told Jones the report was a “total lie” and a “flat out misrepresentation,” adding that he would announce his decision before the July 15th filing deadline.
Ventura explained that NPR’s Welna asked why he would run for Senate if he ultimately came to that decision. Ventura did not state that he would run for Senate in the interview.
Tapper’s report appeared on the Drudge Report this morning and has not been amended at time of press. Could the fraudulent pre-empting of Ventura’s announcement be a political ploy to deflate his eventual entrance into the race or is it merely a case of shoddy journalism on behalf of the corporate media?
Former Governor Ventura made headlines earlier this year when he appeared on The Alex Jones Show to share his concerns about the official 9/11 story and his contention that WTC 7, the building that was not hit by a plane but collapsed in its own footprint within 7 seconds on 9/11, was intentionally demolished.
Ventura appears in Alex Jones’ new film The 9/11 Chronicles Part One: Truth Rising. His latest book Don’t Start The Revolution Without Me has been a bestseller on the New York Times list.
Boxun News, a Chinese-language Web site based outside China, reported that an unnamed expert has claimed that there was a nuclear explosion near the epicenter of the Sichuan earthquake, based on witness reports and the discovery of concrete rubble believed to have come from an underground military installation. The news of this nuclear explosion has raised questions about the cause of the earthquake.
Mr. He, a local resident, stated that when the earthquake occurred on May 12, people saw something erupt from the top of a mountain next to the valley, “It looked like toothpaste being squeezed out,” said He. “No, it wasn’t [magma]. It was these concrete pieces. The eruption lasted about three minutes.”
According to a China News Services (CNS) report on May 31, 2008, paramedics from People’s Liberation Army (PLA) hospitals and psychologists from Beijing onsite May 23 found concrete debris at the bottom of a valley near the epicenter. The half-mile-wide valley was covered with debris 10 - 20 inches thick, covering the valley floor for almost 1.5 miles.
No major construction was occurring in the area at the time of the earthquake.
The thickness of the concrete pieces seemed to match that used in China’s underground military bases, according to Boxun’s expert. He explained that while there are documented cases that earthquakes cause volcanic eruptions, there are no accounts of eruptions ejecting concrete.
Based on the CNS report and timing of the eruption at the scene, there seemed to be no evidence of natural volcanic activity. The expert stated he was certain a nuclear explosion shattered the underground concrete structures, hurling debris into the air.
At least one of China’s nuclear military bases is located in Mianyang City, Sichuan, near the epicenter.
Chinese Internet surfers commented that right after the quake military Special Forces blocked traffic heading toward the epicenter on the mountain, and men in white chemical protective clothing in military vehicles were also spotted driving toward the mountain. Rescue personnel near the epicenter were all military, according to witnesses.
The expert believes the nuclear explosion was not confined to the underground test area and has caused radiation contamination, stating that in a call to Beijing he recommended authorities accept help from other countries, seal the area, find and provide help to those who had been exposed to contamination during the rescue work, and take emergency measures to prevent water contamination.
The expert believes that the nuclear explosion caused the recent 8.0 magnitude Sichuan earthquake in China. However, other experts referenced by Boxun withheld judgment as to whether the explosion caused the earthquake or the earthquake the explosion.
Over the past five years the name Mohammed Al-Qahtani - Detainee 063 at Guantanamo - has been indelibly associated with the Bush Administration’s efforts to justify extreme measures in the ‘war on terror.’ This Saudi national was apprehended in Afghanistan in late 2001 and taken to Guantanamo in early 2002, included in a group labelled as the “worst of the worst.” His identity got a full airing in June 2004, as the Administration struggled to contain the fallout from the Abu Ghraib pictures. Alleged to be the 20th hijacker, the Administration pinned on this man its justification for the abandonment of a longstanding prohibition on the use of cruelty by the military.
On June 22nd 2004, two of the Administration’s most senior lawyers - White House Counsel Alberto Gonzales and Defense Department General Counsel Jim Haynes - stood before the world’s media and laid out the official story to explain the move to aggressive interrogation: it occurred as a result of a bottom-up request from an aggressive combatant commander at Guantanamo; it was implemented within the law and on the basis of careful legal advice; and it produced useful and important results. Al Qahtani was living proof that coercion worked. Gonzales and Haynes stood alongside Daniel Dell’Orto (who has recently been appointed as Acting General Counsel at DoD, following Haynes’ move to Chevron, where he now works as lawyer) as he introduced Al Qahtani as the man who explained the move to abuse: a person in whom the Pentagon had “a considerable interest,” who had “been trained to resist our interrogation techniques” and, most significantly, who gave up important information when subjected to new techniques authorised by Rumsfeld on December 2nd 2002. This included information on Jose Padilla (the alleged “dirty bomber”) and Richard Reid (the shoe bomber). The message was unambiguous: Al Qahtani was a bad man, aggressive interrogation works.
A few weeks later, the 9/11 Commission Report described Al Qahtani as a “candidate hijacker,” explaining the circumstances in which he was denied entry to the US in August 2001. The narrative persisted, and Al Qahtani’s name was frequently wheeled out in defence of the Administration’s actions. In his efforts to secure appointment to the federal bench, in July 2006 Jim Haynes relied on him to fend off attacks - unsuccessfully, as it turned out - to justify his role in recommending to Secretary Rumsfeld techniques of interrogation that violated Common Article 3 of the Geneva Conventions. He was “the 20th hijacker,” Haynes told the Senate Judiciary Committee and a man who had shown “considerable skill in resisting established techniques”. Further, he had provided “significant additional information” as a result of the abusive interrogation. No ambiguity there.
A few weeks ago, on February 11th 2008, the Department of Defense announced that Al Qahtani would join five others in facing a military commission on various criminal charges, including murder, attacking civilians and terrorism. The death penalty would be sought. The allegations were thin on detail and - strikingly - made no reference to any information obtained after the new techniques were used. The announcement was consistent with what, by then, I had already been told: the abusive interrogation of Al Qahtani produced nothing of value.
The Administration raised the stakes on Al Qahtani. He was presented as the kind of uniquely dangerous person for whom the programme of detention and interrogation was designed, proof that the established rules were quaint and obsolete, that new rules and techniques were needed, and that they worked.
Then, earlier this week, the Administration dropped a jaw-dropping bombshell: the charges against Al Qahtani were dropped. Proceedings against five other would continue, but the Pentagon official in charge of war crimes cases declined to authorise charges against Al Qahtani. What happened?
No explanation was given for the abrupt change of direction. That in itself is telling. There is no plausible reason that can be sold or spun. For the truth is that Al Qahtani was subject to abuse that most likely rises to the level of torture, in circumstances that are notoriously public around the world. From November 23rd, 2002, over a period of fifty four days, Al Qahtani was subject to aggressive interrogation at the instance of the highest echelons of the Administration. I describe the circumstances in TORTURE TEAM, and in an article published in VANITY FAIR last month, explaining how Donald Rumsfeld and his team came to be involved. On December 2nd 2002 Rumsfeld signed a memo prepared for him by Jim Haynes, authorising the use of new techniques. It is a famous memo, the one in which Rumsfeld inquires, in his own hand, as to why standing during interrogation is limited to four hours since he stands for eight or more hours a day.
I journeyed around America, meeting many of the principal characters involved in the decision-making process. I describe the real reason why the Geneva Conventions were set aside, as Doug Feith confirmed, to allow aggressive interrogation; how Al Qahtani’s treatment amounted to a war crime (a point alluded to by Justice Anthony Kennedy in the Supreme Court’s seminal judgment of 2006 that overturned the Administration’s decision to set aside the Geneva Conventions); how the decision to move to aggressive interrogation came from the top down and not, as the Administration had claimed, from the ground up; how decision-making at the Joint Chiefs was short-circuited by Haynes; how those at the top may face war crimes investigations abroad, unless the US gets its house in order; and how Al Qahtani’s interrogation provided no meaningful information.
Against this background, the House Judiciary Committee has recently embarked on a series of hearings to examine the role of senior Administration lawyers in promoting aggressive interrogations. Last week I testified before a Sub-Committee, with three other witnesses, and the Sub-Committee has now invited senior lawyers to appear before it. Most have agreed to do so voluntarily (although not David Addington, who was Vice President Cheney’s counsel back in 2002 and now serves as his chief of staff: he has been issued with a subpoena to force him to appear). The next hearing is scheduled for June 26, and more are expected to follow in efforts to get to the truth. The treatment of Al Qahtani lies at the heart of the Committee’s inquiry.
It is a grim story, of decision-making driven by fear and ideology and incompetence, a story of crime and of cover-up. It seems likely that the charges against him were dropped because proceedings before a military commission would have turned the spotlight on his treatment and - even more dangerously - on those most senior individuals - politicians and political appointees - with whom responsibility lies. The abuse of Al Qahtani has backfired, as many down at Guantanamo predicted it would. The truth as to his involvement, if any, in the events of September 11th will not be established. He will no doubt linger in a limbo of legal uncertainty in the bowels of Guantanamo or whatever other place may be found for him, a totemic figure whose treatment will be invoked by those who seek to harm the United States.
This unhappy story has brought America’s fine tradition of military valour into disrepute. It has provided no added protection to this country, or any other, or any other advantages. To the contrary, it will serve to inflame public opinion abroad, and undermine the very objective of national security that was sought, making it more difficult to respond to the real threat of international terrorism. If the House Judiciary Committee does nothing else, it must move to establish the facts, to identify those who are responsible for this mess, to make sure lessons are learnt so it doesn’t happen again. The lesson of torture is clear. It does not work.
Philippe Sands is a barrister and professor of law at University College London. He is author of TORTURE TEAM: THE RUMSFELD MEMO AND THE BETRAYAL OF AMERICAN VALUES (Palgrave Macmillan), www.tortureteam.com
It is interesting that we have all the news about Britney, Lindsay, and of course, the latest on what the publicity hound Rev. Wright has just said which can be replayed for hours and hours, analyzed, dissected and discussed endlessly by serious looking idiots errr… pundits.
So, lets see how the peace negotiations are going in Israel. We sent an envoy there don’t you know (I bet you don’t… sad, but realistic).
The American bodyguards of a Bush administration envoy who was dispatched to the region to monitor the implementation of the road map engaged in a violent confrontation with right-wing Israelis who sought to disturb a visit to Hebron on Friday, Israel Radio reported.
One of the rightists is reported to have driven his jeep into the convoy accompanying General William Fraser. Subsequently, one of the vehicles in the convoy heavily collided with the jeep, according to Israel Radio.
Re-read the last paragraph. A crazed settler drove a jeep into the American envoy’s convoy, violently colliding with a car.
Now, a standard procedure in a situation like that is to:
1) avoid the incoming car and
2) open fire on it, to disable it
Because a speeding car which is driving straight towards you, in the Middle East, almost certainly can mean a suicide bomber.
Now, imagine for a second what would happen if an American envoy was in Hamas controlled territory, and a crazed Arab guy drove a jeep into one of the diplomatic convoy’s cars.
The bodyguards would probably open fire immediately, killing the driver and making a shishka-bob out of the car, while the cars of the convoy themselves swerved and drove away at full speed - after all, who knows if there isn’t a bomb in that car?
But most importantly, whatever would happen during the incident, you can be sure that the US TV “news” would be informing about this incident 24/7, the pundits would discuss the incident endlessly, while calling Hamas a terrorist organization that has no control over the territory it polices.
But the incident happened in Israel, and involved a bunch of Israeli settlers, so - no TV reports. No outrage. Nothing happened at all, according to the TV news - focus on Rev. Wright, that’s what Americans need to see!
A fracas ensued between the guards and the rightists before the Americans decided to cut the visit short, Israel Radio reported.
A fracas? Does that mean that the settlers engaged the bodyguards in hand to hand combat or a shoving match? Why didn’t the bodyguards use their guns and/or tasers?
And where the hell was the Israeli police/Army anyway?
Keep in mind, the incident was serious enough so that the American envoy cut his mission to Israel and run back to the USA.
So what will happen now?
Well, the incident will NOT be reported on American TV “news”, instead we will get the smiling mug of Rev. Wright - again, for 20th night in a row.
Israel will get its $5+ billion “aid” money this year, as it gets it every single year.
And, while before, in the days of the Liberty Incident, Israel at least apologized to America when it did an outrage towards this country, these days don’t expect this. Israel will simply ignore this and pretend nothing happened - it’s not like our president or our Congress people will ask Israel about this incident, much less nicely ask Israel to explain things, or perhaps ask it to apologize for assaulting an American envoy…
No, the last one is pure science fiction - which American politician would even dare to utter under his breath something along the lines of “Perhaps we should ask Israel to explain the incident which just happened, when the American peace envoy was attacked by Israeli citizens. We need answers, and we need an official apology from Israel for this disgraceful behaviour!”.
Well, any politician who would say something like that would be labeled by the TV pundits an anti-semite, as clearly going overboard, overreacting and criticizing our greatest friend and ally in the world, and the AIPAC and the rest of the pro-Israel Lobby in the USA would mark him and give moneys to his opponent during his next election.
I wonder how the professional pro-Israel apologists will try to spin this one, as they bury the story in digital media.
Luke Rudkowski of We Are Change caught up with President Jimmy Carter today at a Barnes & Noble bookstore located in Manhattan.
After Rudkowski referenced Operation Ajax and the CIA orchestrated overthrow of Mohammed Mosaddeq in Iran in 1953 via staged terror attacks, he asked Carter if he feared a staged-provocation for war with Iran.
Carter responded, “No, I don’t think lately that war is as likely as it was six months ago,” adding, “I hope not.”
The wife of Roland Carnaby, the mysterious man who claimed he was an “intelligence officer” with the CIA who was shot dead by the Houston Police after a high-speed chase, has filed a lawsuit claiming the police “violated” Carnaby’s civil rights.
The suit, filed Friday in the U.S. District Court in Houston, claims the HPD officers “violated Carnaby’s right to protection from unreasonable search and seizure and his right to due process”.
Carnaby life and death at age 52 was thrust into the limelight on Tuesday morning when he was pulled over on Texas 288 near Orem for speeding. It was when Carnaby produced a CIA “badge” that Carnaby now had less than an hour to live, that he would wind up dead along the side of the road near the Galleria Mall. Carnaby’s attorney, Kenneth Booten, said Carnaby’s death had a “smell factor”.
“All of this has a smell factor,” Brooten said. “What was the justification for the use of deadly force? Was this man a felon that was fleeing the scene of an armed robbery? Had he pulled a gun on them previously? That’s a public policy issue. That affects every person who drives around Houston or lives there.”
Booten also said Carnaby’s death was an assassination.
“All of this other stuff (about Carnaby’s mysterious life) is all very interesting, but it is of no consequence when you consider a man is dead and he died handcuffed and nobody tried to stop the bleeding or anything,” Brooten said. “You know what you call that? You call that an assassination.”
According to the Houston Chronicle, when the patrolman who pulled Carnaby over decided to verify whether Carnaby’s CIA badge was real, Carnaby then used his cell phone to contact an acquaintance, someone who worked in the Houston Police Department Internal Affairs.
The officer who pulled him over asked Carnaby for the number to contact at the CIA to verify employment and the name of Carnaby’s supervisor. Carnaby wasn’t able to provide any answers. Instead Carnaby chose to call one of his “buddies” at HPD’s Internal Affairs.
DBKP is not sure what his “buddy” told the patrol officer. The officer, still suspicious of the “CIA” badge, contacted HPD’s criminal investigation and major defender division and was told that Carnaby was not a real CIA agent. The officer was also told to “find something to arrest Carnaby on” that he couldn’t arrest the man just for speeding.
We’re not sure but shouldn’t impersonating a CIA officer be an “arrestable” offense”?
When the officer discovered Carnaby had a permit to carry a concealed weapon but had not shown it, the officer asked Carnaby to step out of his vehicle. It was then that Carnaby took off.
Carnaby’s attorney maintains a “paranoia” defense of his dead client claiming Carnaby, a “professional” had reasons to believe he was being “set-up” by the cops.
“Maybe he thought he was being set up. That’s speculation only,” he said. “The answer is no, I don’t know. But there are multiple reasons why an experienced professional would feel threatened. And given the actions after the shooting, maybe his instinct was correct.”
We find this is rather interesting as the CIA has issued a statement denying Carnaby has ever worked for the agency, not even as a “contract” employee. It might behoove Booten to verify if his client was indeed a CIA agent or that he was a long-term fake and fraud who had woven a series of lies, falsehoods, and strategic friendships in order to bolster his fake CIA persona.
Carnaby’s final actions, of running from the cops after the officer refused to let him go after he had flashed a “CIA” badge does not denote a “professional”. Carnaby had assiduously worked for years building up “friendships” in the intelligence arena. Carnaby was the President of an Intelligence organization, Association for Intelligence Officers. We’re still not sure whether the organization whose headquarters are in Washington, D.C. verified whether its members are bonafide.
DBKP found a website that had an “article” written about Carnaby. We pasted an entire post from the site because of fears the site may “disappear”. We’ve wondered why the MSM hasn’t investigated the info posted about Carnaby.
Premel’s Intel Chief Retires
Following the first series of interviews Alan Premel gave with Channel 1 in Moscow, the first series was posted online last week and i have already seen two other additional stories which tie in with Premel and his dealings with the private firm in Houston. This is one and let me find the other.
One of the CIA’s former counter-terrorism chiefs and pioneers in covert operations, Roland Carnaby retires.
In the past few months, Mr. Carnaby, who has led a private intelligence firm in Houston, Texas has been delegating more and moredaily responsibilities to his lietenants and is completing his succession planning, say people familiar with the matter. A decision about his departure could come within weeks, though the situation remains fluid, say these people.
Alan Premel, 32 years old, whom CIA recruited in 1997 and whom Carnaby personally recruited in 2002 to work with the private intelligence firm in Houston has emerged as the leading candidate to succeed him, added these people. A spokesperson familiar with the retirement plans stated that Premel and his current worries with the US Senate over allegations and ties to the CIA’s Rendition program and his recent resignation from CIA amid a slew of disclosure cases pulls him out of the race for President and chief of such a power position within the intelligence community.
The departure of Mr. Carnaby, 52, would mean the loss of CIA’s most experienced, talented and high profile clandestine officers in management. Few executives who helped pioneer the commercialization of private intelligence and private security firms have remained on top for as long, except for some who can also claim founder titles, such as Patriot Oil, and Pan-American Shipping and Consulting Group.
Mr. Carnaby’s retirement would come at a critical point for CIA. Any efforts to reveerse the slow-down at his private firm could involve drastic changes that may be more palatable under a new CEO like Premel. Mr. Premel, at CIA, was very instrumental in many changes at CIA as a successful supervisor in the Balkans. His management experience at CIA is 25 years behind Carnaby’s but with the firm already warning investors in recent months that it will be raising fees in the absence of Mr. Carnaby.
Mr. Premel wrestled with how to reverse the declining momentum before having to exit left stage last summer from the firm after his public disclosure. The firm’s third quarter numbers, a key barometer of the firm’s health fell 63% without Premel. Before leaving he implemented some changes that were never fully set into motion causing the down-turn after his sudden departure.
The timing of Mr. Carnaby’s retirement is of his own choosing, say people familiar with the situation, unlike Premel’s pre-mature departure which came 20-years too soon say experts. Not long after he jonied CIA, Roland Carnaby declared that no one person should stay in the same cover in covert operations more than two years. A standard practice used by the firm. This philosophy has accredited the firm with a lot of success claims Mr. Premel in his interview with CNN’s David Ensor late of last year.
Under James Pavitt and Roland Carnaby, the firm has become the intelligence community’s most successful private consulting business on counter-terrorism, security consulting and intelligence gathering where they pioneered a way for private officers to carry out day to day functions in the field, relay them back to CIA, DoD, DIA or other foreign agencies. In 2004, Mr. Premel streamlined a way for collecting, compliling and disseminating vast amounts of data and breaking it down by himself. The process which is only done by one person, Mr. Premel himself is the work of what 7-9 officers would typically do.
When Carnaby and Premel shared the reigns from 2004-2007, they have delivered more than 10 consecutive quarters of sequential revenue growth. Profit increase every year and the company now has 248 licensed contract officers working for the firm globally, and $297 million in classified contracts over 5 continents. Those figures are up from the firms $18 million in 1997.
To maintain momentum, Mr. Premel, using $40 million from a settlement with CIA, purchased a private lending company in Houston as well as acquiring a private shipping business and a private internet ticketing business.
There were missteps: Last year, the firm took a $80.4 million write-down for its purchase of a private airline business in DC, Houston and Vegas. And threats loomed when recruitment of some of the firm’s top and most talented officer’s. To keep top talent, Mr. Carnaby and Mr. Premel kicked in an extra $2.4 million for salaries and bonuses to keep the firm afloat.
Mr. Carnaby has long planned for his eventual exit, say people familiar with the matter. He often rotated top officer’s into different operational roles as a way to groom potential successors and to give the board a slate of candidates from which to choose.
In his departing emails to friends, firm and CIA colleagues, Mr. Carnaby wrote how much he was pleased by the professionalism and careers of each and all of the persons who have served under him and with him during his 32-year tenure in the US Intelligence Community. Source - DBKP
We have no idea who wrote the previous article about Carnaby. It was written at Blogger and there was no info as to who wrote it. The writer never named the “company” that Carnaby owned nor the sources for the “story”.
Carnaby’s widow’s suit maintains that the HPD violated Carnaby’s civil rights. The police maintain that after an hour long chase with speeds in excess of 100mph and having to ram Carnaby’s Jeep SUV to get his stopped, Carnaby refused to step out of his car. The cops had to smash the passenger side window, that when Carnaby got out he reached back into the car and was then shot to death.
The police found two pistols and a shotgun in his vehicle after the car was impounded for a search.
Was Carnaby’s shooting an “assassination” as his attorney Booten maintains?
We find this incredible, an “assassination” on the streets of Houston, that Carnaby, a supposed “experienced professional” had every right to be “nervous”.
We say balderdash. All Carnaby faced was a trip to the pokey in the back seat of a patrol car while the cops sorted out whether he was a real CIA man or not. If he was a fake, and chances are 99.9999% that he was, he could have faced criminal charges for impersonating a CIA officer. But he did face something else, something that might have made him run, not only from the cops, but from the intricate web of lies that he’d built over the years.
Carnaby had a house full of CIA “plaques” and “citations”. Carnaby had friends bamboozled into believing he was a CIA agent, that his life was full of intrigue and espionage. So far no one has been able to put together the man’s real life other than strange little “tidbits”. How he had befriended an auto dealer whom he bought several cars from who said that Carnaby would stop by and show off his weapons arsenal or his “karate and knife” skills. How Carnaby could speak seven languages.
Carnaby’s friends maintain that the CIA would “deny” Carnaby was an agent because that was how the CIA “worked”. How cool is that? The perfect ruse. Claim you’re a CIA agent and then maintain that if anyone ever checks up on you the CIA will always deny you’re an agent, cause it’s just so “secret”.
The CIA has firmly denied Carnaby was not, nor ever has been an agent nor has worked for the organization.
Carnaby’s past needs to be thoroughly fisked. How did the man support himself and his family? Will his wife, through her lawsuit, be deposed and asked these types of questions? Who was the woman Carnaby was purportedly engaged to when he died? His wife has denied he was single. How may aliases did Carnaby have and was he engaged in businesses claiming he was a CIA agent and were those businesses a scam?
Where did he obtain the fake CIA badge, the CIA plaques and commendations? When did he begin to tell people he was an intelligence agent. We know the end of Carnaby’s story but we do not know the beginning. The surprise is how many people in the CIA and intelligence world that he was able to fool. It’s kind of scary, in this day and age of the war on terror that someone may have been hobnobbing with the intelligence elite but have been perpetrating a massive fraud.
So in a way, Carnaby’s wife’s lawsuit may just provide some of these answers. We wish the intrepid reporters down in Houston would be a little more inquisitive about Carnaby’s life and dig a little deeper than kiddie pool shallow.
Not only this guy’s life but also his death are truly mysterious, an enigma, a field day for conspiracy freaks. Was Carnaby a real CIA man so deep undercover that the CIA would be willing to deny his existence? Did the Houston PD “assassinate” Carnaby because he was an “experienced professional who had reason to be nervous”?
Or was Carnaby a long time fraud whose house of fake CIA cards were about to come tumbling down last Tuesday morning, when one cop refused to fall for his fake badge thus potentially exposing Carnaby’s lifelong charade?
Time and hopefully some good investigative reporting will tell.
The mother of Pat Tillman is speaking out about her son’s death in her first television interview, to be broadcast this Sunday on 60 Minutes.
Tillman, a pro football player, joined the military after 9/11 and was killed in action in Afghanistan in 2004. The Army initially lauded him as a hero who had died storming a hill in the face of enemy fire and even awarded him the Silver Star. They only revealed five weeks later that he had actually died by friendly fire.
The Tillman family has spent years trying to get at the facts of what happened and who was responsible for the cover-up. Even today, they are not convinced it was as innocent an accident as the military claims.
“When I heard it was a friendly fire, I felt terrible for these soldiers,” Mary Tillman stated. “I still do to a degree, but I don’t think it was the horrible accident that they like to play this out. I think there was huge negligence involved here.”
According to the Army, Tillman was firing across a valley at enemy fighters on the other side, but Rangers on the road below thought he was shooting at them and fired back.
A dozen officers and Rangers were disciplined for the incident, but Mary Tillman is still not satisfied. According to CBS, “She points to inconsistencies, including that his uniform was burned after his death, which is against regulations, and that the coroner refused to sign the autopsy for months because his analysis of Tillman’s gunshot wounds was not consistent with the Army’s original story.”
“This isn’t about us,” Mary Tillman told CBS. “This is about what they’ve done to the public. This was a public deception.”
A corporate jet owned by a principal in a trendy Meatpacking District hotel reportedly made several mysterious flights over the years to the U.S. military installation in Guantanamo Bay where terror suspects are held.
The jet was managed and offered for charter by a company owned by the hotelier’s business associate.
Yesterday, a lawyer for an ex-worker at the air-charter company said his client knew that up to 80 percent of the firm’s rentals of its fleet of planes involved “confidential, governmental flights.”
Ex-employee Mark Billey said there were “governmental people, armed people. He did recall flights to Long Beach where they did have a lot of U.S. Marshals,” according to the lawyer, Ian Friedman, who spoke to Billey in an Ohio federal prison yesterday.
Billey - who worked at the company for six months until his arrest in April - is awaiting trial on unrelated kiddie-sex charges.
The intrigue surrounding the corporate craft, a Gulfstream II, deepened last Monday, when the plane crashed in Mexico’s Yucatan peninsula carrying 3.6 tons of cocaine.
The Gulfstream had been owned by Hotel Gansevoort proprietor William Achenbaum from 2001 until Aug. 30 of this year - more than three weeks before the plane crashed.
The plane was reportedly sold to Florida aircraft broker Donna Blue Aircraft, which then promptly peddled it to another man, Clyde O’Connor, for $2 million.
When Achenbaum owned the plane, it was managed by a Long Beach, Calif., company, Air Rutter International, which offered it for charter.
Air Rutter is owned by Arik Kislin of Long Island, who according to the Hotel Gansevoort’s liquor license is also a principal in the hotel.
Earlier this year, The Post reported that a Manhattan company Kislin ran in the 1990s had sponsored a U.S. visa sought by an alleged Russian mob hit man.
During the time that Kislin’s associate, Achenbaum, owned the plane, it made trips in 2003, 2004 and 2005 to the U.S. military base in Guantanamo Bay in Cuba, the McClatchy Newspapers group reported.
Bill Cripe, general manager of Air Rutter International, denied the plane flew to Guantanamo during charters and that the company leased
