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After a long spell of inactivity, PNAC.info is back in action...
Contents:
1. Back in Action
2. Thanks
3. The Latest Updates
4. Getting Serious
1. Back in Action - the PNAC.info re-launch
As many of you have noticed, there hasn't been very much new posted at
the PNAC.info site in quite some time. And to call that an understatement
would be an understatement in itself.
There's not much I can do about that except to apologize for letting
the site languish for so long. Any way I can think of to explain or
justify the situation sounds belabored to me, and while there are many
practical and technical reasons for the delay, the bottom line is that it was my
responsibility, and I have not met that responsibility for some time. I
most definitely apologize.
As I hope you've gathered by now, PNAC.info
is back on the job--and ready to finish what we started! (More about just
what that means in #4 below.)
The site has been moved to a new software, and all of the old entries
have been imported. The visual style is very different than before. For
now, the home page has many of the same elements as the old version, so
that folks don't get too disoriented. In the coming weeks, the site will be
evolving from that setup, growing into more of a functional powerhouse. For
now, the good news is that it's back, it's looking slick, and it's got new
updates -- with many, many more to come.
Let's just say I aim to make it worth the wait. :-)
2. Thanks
First, I want to thank the handful of folks who responded to the old
on-site plea for
contributions to get the site updated and expanded. Your support helped
get PNAC.info fixed up and back on the job.
Second, I want to thank all the people who have linked to and
referenced PNAC.info in the two and a half years since it's been launched.
I've only been able to go back a few months in the logs so far, but it's
safe to say that hundreds and hundreds of websites have linked to ours,
and that's not counting posts on forums and message boards, or blog
comments. Just under 250 of those sites are now thanked on our web site,
via the link list on the right side of the page. There are probably at least
another 250 links still to be reciprocated. It's been great to see how
frequently PNAC.info is being mentioned or discovered. New people are
linking to the site every day.
Keep in mind that I haven't directly asked for links or promotion help
since the first month or so, back in April 2003--so all this
word-spreading has been done by folks taking the initiative on their own.
Thanks everyone!
Last, I want to thank all the folks around the Internet who have taken
up the cause of spreading the word about the PNAC, the neoconservative
movement, and its connections with the current administration, and with
America's foreign policy. There are literally dozens of websites and focus
areas dedicated to educating folks about this stuff now, and it's safe to
say that it has made a difference. Awareness of these issues is much more
widespread than it was two years ago, and while I can't summarize all the
new developments within one sentence, let's just say that the
neoconservatives are not in as strong of a position as they were when this
site started, or when we were last updating it. All of the sites set up to
alert people and spread the word have to get some of the credit for that.
3. The Latest Updates at PNAC.info
Picking up where we left off, the following is another article about
conservatives shedding their confidence in the effort to bring democracy
to the Middle East via the war in Iraq. This article serves up more than
our last
entry on this subject, however, in that it focuses in part on
remarks made at a conference hosted by the American Enterprise Institute
(AEI), an organization closely associated with the PNAC.
The title of this article is fairly misleading in my opinion�the
so-called �conservatives� in this article don�t appear to me to be
deserting the war campaign, at least not based on what is reported.
There is clearly a lot of disappointment as to how the war has been
conducted and doubt about Iraq�s future prospects, but I didn�t read
anyone say that they oppose the war or think the U.S. should exit
anytime soon.
To their credit, that is in line with the neoconservative angle on
the Iraq war. Under the neoconservative framework, Iraq really
has to be won by the U.S.� or at least needs to be a
demonstrable success of some sort. (If for no other reason than because
it was supposed to be a �show of power� that would result in a
greater level of respect/fear for the U.S. throughout the Middle East,
and in troublesome regimes around the globe.)
...
Click here to read the
full entry at the site
The situation with Syria is getting hotter by the day now, and we've
got a series of entries highlighting the major items of the past month:
Part
1: Clashes at the Border
The New York Times reports on military clashes between U.S. and Syrian
troops over the past year.
Part
2: U.S. Weighed Military Strikes; Syria Gets Surly
Newsweek reports that the U.S. recently debated launching military strikes inside Syria against camps used by insurgents operating in neighboring Iraq.
Meanwhile, Syria is fed up with being bad-mouthed in public, and is
backing away from cooperating as a result.
Part 3: Rep. Ron Paul- �Prepare for a broader war in the Middle East�
Republican Congressman Ron Paul from Texas highlights the main reasons to
be worried about an expansion of the war in Iraq into Syria, with his
usual vigor and principled passion, in a speech entitled "We Have
Been Warned".
Part
4: Syria: U.S. troops killed Syrian soldier
While giving a tour to show off his country's border security measures,
Major General Amid Suleiman of Syria told reporters that Syrian border
guard troops have been fired upon on more than one occasion, and killed on at least one, by U.S.
soldiers. �Incidents have taken place with casualties on my surveillance troops,� he said, near the Euphrates river border crossing between Syria and Iraq. �Many US projectiles have landed here. In this area alone, two soldiers and two civilians have been killed by the American attacks.�
Read all these stories at the new
PNAC.info home page
Please forward this e-mail update to people who are concerned about
U.S. foreign policy. Thank you.
4. Getting Serious, or not
Hobby...or Powerhouse? Which will it be?
You probably don't need to be told about the importance of the
"neoconservative" influence on U.S. foreign policy and American
politics. If you're on this list, you've probably already connected a dot
or two. But let's review anyway:
- Lewis "Scooter" Libby, the administration official
indicted in the "Plamegate" CIA leak case, and a major
operative in Dick Cheney's push for the war in Iraq, is also a top
neocon-- a former student and longtime colleague of Paul Wolfowitz, and a founding member of
the PNAC. His public trial is likely to span the next year or so, and
centers, in essence, on how key neoconservative war supporters used
faulty intelligence to beef up the case for war, and then used their
positions of power to try and punish those that looked to expose that
practice.
- Syria. The stories above are just a slice of the bigger picture in
Syria. In the past two days, that picture has been getting much
bigger, quickly. On Friday, the U.N. Security Council passed
a resolution demanding that Syria cooperate with Lebanon's
investigation of the assassination of its Prime Minister earlier this
year (in which high Syrian officials have been named as suspects), or
face unspecified consequences. The resolution came at the request of
the United States. That same day, Syrian officials said
they would allow unmonitored interrogations of said suspects,
essentially promising compliance with the resolution. Also on Friday,
Iran's president chimed in publicly, saying that the pressure being
put on Syria is "unacceptable"
and pledging
his country's support and alliance. And most recently, a
major U.S. military offensive was launched near the Iraq/Syria
border, to try
and seal off a main route for foreign fighters entering the country.
- Iran, long on the PNAC's radar (and part of the so-called "axis
of evil"), has a new president, and from the looks of it, he's spoiling
for a fight, at least with Israel. Combine that with his
aggressive public support of the beleaguered Syria, and with the
ongoing debate over Iran's possible development of nuclear weapons,
and it's clear that there are the seeds of a possible "perfect
storm" of geopolitical saber-rattling in the region.
Consult your world map if the geography is not fresh in your mind.
It goes kind of like this (left to right/west to east):
Israel--Syria--Iraq--Iran--Afghanistan.
(current U.S. quagmires are in bold, nations we're agitating against
are in italics)
- Meanwhile, Secretary of State Condoleeza Rice has recently made the
rounds in Congress and on the talk
shows) to sell the idea that the remaking of the Middle East has
been a necessary part of the new agenda since the 9-11 attacks, making
it clear that the Bush administration is not wavering from its neocon-influenced
foreign policy posture.
- And of course, the situation in Iraq continues its schizophrenic
progression, wherein the post-Saddam government gains increasing
responsibility and authority over a nation of violence and
dysfunction--one which, more and more people agree, may be on its way
to becoming a failed state, or stuck in a civil war, or a pawn of
Iran.
In other words, the biggest issues of concern to the PNAC and
neoconservatives connect to almost all of the United States' current front-burner
foreign policy concerns. And behind most of the news stories about the
above issues is the fact that there are folks who are trying to shape and
direct America's policies and actions toward a certain kind of future-- a
"New American Century", if you will. They are doing this shaping from
positions of power in the White House and elsewhere, and they are doing it
from positions of influence like the Weekly Standard, the op-ed pages, and
as pundits and guests on the TV news programs.
And not enough is being done to oppose this trend. While the neocon
viewpoint has been undone in many ways by Iraq's failure to live up to
their dreams, and the credibility and integrity of neocon policymakers has
been stained by the CIA leak scandal, the fact remains that there is much
more momentum on that side of the debate than on any opposing side. And
I'm not talk about left vs. right, or Democrats vs. Republicans. I'm
talking specifically about the battle over this one set of issues--
American empire, preventative wars, a "unipolar" world,
"The New American Century", reshaping the Middle East, and so
on.
More than just a watchdog
PNAC.info has always been intended to be more than just a watchdog,
sounding the alarms and shining light on the truth. It was intended to be
more like a bulldog, with its teeth clamped down firmly onto the pantleg
of the neoconservative movement, refusing to let go until we wear them
out, and the battle is done.
Make no mistake, the neoconservative foreign policy approach is a bad
idea. It's bad for America, and it's bad for the world. The
neoconservatives who aim to shape public opinion can be countered, both on
the small points and on the larger issue. And the neocons who seek to
shape public policy can be influenced, or simply rejected.
Most importantly, the big debate over just what kind of century we do
want can be brought into the mainstream, where it can be openly and
deliberately considered, and won in the favor of a sane and sustainable
foreign policy that is good for the world, and for the U.S.
Sounds pretty good, right? Well, that's what PNAC.info is "back in
action" to do.
In the site's first incarnation, we got a couple of key steps
done--namely, attaching our site to the subject of the PNAC out on the web
(like a bulldog on a pantleg), and documenting "the rise of the
neocons" in a way that wasn't from a liberal viewpoint, or a form of
"Bush-bashing". And of course, building traffic and links to the
site. The site was successful on all three of those fronts. Frankly, that
was the easy part.
When you boil it all down, PNAC.info got stalled because it was a
hobby, at least as far as time commitment was concerned. It was never a
hobby in terms of belief and dedication--I've always intended for it to be
that bulldog on their pantleg--but economic concerns prevented me from
being able to properly develop it beyond its initial foundation at the
time.
Which brings me finally to the point of this item, which is to make
sure that history does not repeat itself-- either here at PNAC.info, or in
the world at large. I'm seeking your support to make sure that PNAC.info
can be the powerhouse that it needs to be, not the hobby that it was.
Our initial fundraising goal is $2000 -- that will be enough to
get us well on our way to 2006, and to do things like setting up a
non-profit organization, adding new important areas to the website, and
managing volunteers, in addition to posting
more and more updates and analysis of the steady flow of neocon news and
opinion that's out there.
I'm hoping to raise at least $500 of that goal through this appeal, via
credit card and PayPal donations. Your $50
donation would go a long way toward making that happen, and clearing
the way for an aggressive counter-campaign to get rolling. If $50 at once is too
much to afford, please consider setting up a monthly donation of $5,
$10,
or $15.
Or a one-time donation of $10,
$20,
or $30.
PNAC.info is in a unique position to help move the
"anti-neoconservative" movement forward, due to our position on
the political spectrum as well as our positioning on the Internet. And
I'm ready and willing to make sure that we (that is, everyone opposed to
the neoconservative approach) make the most of it.
Please help make sure we can do just that, by making a contribution today.
Thanks for your time and interest.
Be well, be free,
Lance Brown
Project Coordinator
PNAC.info - Exposing the Project for The
New American Century
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