[This is the headline over an opinion piece in today's edition of the New York Daily News. It reads as follows:]
Seven months after his release from a Scottish prison on "compassionate" grounds, and four months after prostate cancer was supposed to have killed him, Pan Am Flight 103 bomber Abdelbaset al-Megrahi has had a miraculous turn for the better, death-wise. How very surprising.
Saif Khadafy, son of Libyan dictator Moammar, confirmed that Megrahi, convicted of murdering 270 people at Lockerbie, Scotland, in 1988, is doing much better, thank you very much.
Megrahi "was sick and was released for humanitarian reasons, and was soon in better health and in a good condition," Khadafy told an Arab newspaper. "His future is now in God's hands."
In the same interview, Khadafy is reported to have admitted that securing release for the now "greatly improved" Megrahi had dominated trade talks - including oil deals - between Libya and the government of British Prime Minister Gordon Brown.
Not that there was ever much doubt that amoral commercial opportunism had sent Megrahi home to a triumphant welcome in Tripoli. He has been lionized ever since as a hero, a national treasure. Parents have named newborns after him, and 30,000 well-wishers reportedly have visited the swank villa in the Libyan capital where he lives.
Perhaps Megrahi is, in fact, ill. He generally appears for photos in a wheelchair or assisted by oxygen tubes. So what? If treatments, such as chemotherapy, are extending his life, they should have been administered in the prison to which he was condemned. His days of comfort are a stain that Brown will never escape.
[This article appears just a day after the publication of an editorial to similar effect in the New York Post. Could it be that someone is orchestrating a media campaign?]
Don't these people ever get it?
ReplyDeleteWhatever your beliefs about who really did Lockerbie, and I know my variant is a very particular one, the wider informed public in the UK do not think Mr Megrahi had anything to do with Lockerbie and he was framed by the CIA.
Not so the US.
I go further and say to cover their own responsibility for and complicity in that dastardly crime.
Thus, I welcomed, and most of the people who blog here, I think do, his return to Libya, and it is sad to see so much media space wasted on continuing to pursue the chimera of his guilt, but there is no limit that the Murdoch and other toadying media barons will not sink. Mr Hearst and his yellow-press kind are still amongst us today.
For instance, if an article or book reads "the downing of IR-655 was an accident", you've got the real McCoy, that is the atrocity is seen through American eyes and not Iranian.
The Iranians knew it was deliberate to the point of being entirely predictable - an aggressive, incompetent and insane captain, a new weapons system and radar and poor crew discipline and training.
Then the Americans had to do a deal with the Iranians, and that's what the Glion talks were about.
You can hardly expect the Iranians or the Americans would say "what form of reply would the Iranians be satisfied with in exchange for the Airbus." So they had to be presented as talks about the Lebanese hostages.
Remember the Glion deal was complex; The CIA would invent the whole plot, including the manufacture of an IED and the provision of an insurance bomb, (which exploded 14 seconds after the IED (a space of time I can account for to the nearest second). The first bomb, sufficient to destroy the aircraft, though the CIA were not certain of that, hence the insurance, and the delicate matter of qesas was taken care of by having an Iranian (the name is known) plant the first device.
Then there was the need to develop the cover-up and change its attribution in 1990.
Unpicking all this is taking a lot of time and effort, but be assured it will be done.
Whether the CIA continues to exist after the denouement is an entirely different matter.
Ah, the Americans!
ReplyDeleteA recently deceased superstar had a hit speaking about "starting with the man in the mirror".
Cases of atrocities by the US are to numerous to mention, and casualty figures, compared to Lockerbie's, are usually orders of magnitude higher in the American crimes.
But maybe the best comparable example would be the My Lai massacre, just 20 years before Lockerbie? A lt. Michael Calley was convicted - likewise as the only one - for involvement in the death of 300-500 innocent and defenseless civilians, i.e. a comparable figure.
Sexually abused, beaten, tortured and mutilated - before being murdered, of course.
Such a man served a mere 3 years (out of an original life sentence) - and in house arrest only.
This man was in excellent health when released, and today he runs a jewelery business.
- - -
I can understand that it is too painful and embarrassing for Mr. Duggan's countrymen to open their eyes of whether Megrahi was framed or not.
Whether their investigative bureau who handled the only material piece of evidence can be trusted, when it has been caught bribing the equally material witness with millions of USDs.
But I don't understand this anger towards Megrahi's release.
Hmmm, or maybe this song about "starting with the man in the mirror" wasn't such a big hit after all.
A media campaign indeed. Or a spontaneous 20th of every month mass-reminder that we are all "recoiling" and "convulsing" with horror. (props to Ingram)
ReplyDeleteTo be fair, I suppose some poor confused people really are fairly spitting with rage and impotence, and that does suck for them. It's only going to get worse as the facts settle out.
Hi, SFM. As an American, I remember that was a pretty popular song, tho not nearly as cool as "Bad." Indeed, ordinary citizens who enjoy fresh pop hits are encouraged to better themselves. Washington has however banned the brandishing of mirrors large enough to refelect its own accumulated... I'm not sure what word to use, but good comment.
I hate that article title. Even if there were something corrupt here, is it really the compassion?
ReplyDeleteOn the second article mentioned:
ReplyDeletehttp://www.nypost.com/p/news/opinion/editorials/terrorist_last_laugh_39UyfNOQfzhjRyeGBT9P0J
I popped in and left a comment, to which someone calling himself "himself" made a rather specific response. I tried to respond, but it was not accepted and then all comments disappeared. Then they re-appeared. Hmm... Still back up today. I rather like letting himself has the last word. Quite helpful really...
I tried http://www.nypost.com/p/news/opinion/editorials/terrorist_last_laugh_39UyfNOQfzhjRyeGBT9P0J and after a very long time I got a blank page conatining the single word "GENERIC"
ReplyDeletePerhaps we are going to win.