If this story gains "legs", and I hope to hell it does, then my guess is any investigation will follow all of the links you've mentioned when the public gets hard data and begins to understand what may have happened here. If this doesn't get people pissed, then I'm wondering what will.

That photo editor worked for the supermarket tabloid publishing company owned by an "ex" CIA person. It is the same town where the flight school that trained hijackers" is located,also owned by an "ex" CIA person.

For years they have used the tabloids to spread lies, memes, disinformations and distractions. Everyone who goes through a checkout line gets the headlines at eye level - far more effective than billboards.

So why did THAT photo editor have to be killed?

Where does that path lead? Probably down yet another rabbit hole.

Thanks. I hope everyone reads it. To whet lurker/commenter interest:

The crucial point about all these memos and executive orders is that they predate the December 2001 approach by officials of the Department of Defense looking -- against all national and international laws, treaties and covenants then in effect -- how to torture prisoners held by the United States. Keeping the "timeline" safely within the July 2002 parameter provides a veneer of legal cover, as flimsy as it might be (since torture is always illegal, and it's not clear that even the Bybee, Yoo, and other memos will protect administration officials against prosecution for war crimes, at least by international tribunal).

While I am no attorney, I strongly believe the December 2001 origin of the timeline exposes officials in the U.S. government to prosecution for war crimes by both domestic and international bodies. Congressional officials, and first among them the members of the Senate Armed Services Committee, have not seen fit to seriously address their watchdog role, satisfying themselves with toothless votes of censure, limited hang-out investigations, and a refusal to pursue impeachment against Bush and Cheney.

A Call to Activists, Attorneys, and Journalists

The December 2001 Baumgartner documents are not going to be declassified, at least not in any timely way, unless public pressure is put upon the government to do so. One little blogger is not going to be enough to push back against bureaucratic inaction and/or obstructionism. Why important reporters and/or press or bloggers have not picked up on this is beyond me, but I will withhold judgment on that score for the time being, if only the delay in coverage is remedied soon.

The smoking gun is out there. And even if these documents do not turn out to be the smoking gun I think they are, the need to know our history for the last seven years, to come to terms with how the U.S. became a torturing nation, demands that we know the truth.

Since Glenn and others have made clear for some time that this is an important unresolved issue involving more than a suggestion of complicity and unreported knowledge of criminal conduct on the part of government officials, WHERE IS THE CONGRESSIONAL INVESTIGATION? It's already almost seven years later, the clock is ticking on this criminal administration, and the Congress does virtually nothing about anything despite an alleged Democratic majority.

In the 1970s given these circumstances there would have been a dozen select committees.

We need a movement to dump the leadership and demand action on this and numerous other matters clearly calling for investigation, even after the new administration takes office.

[our reznit eedjit Sh**ter]: Actually Clinton was the initial impetus for blaming Iraq.

Wow. He was smart enough to blame Iraq in 1998 for acts that wouldn't occur for another three years! With prescience like that, we can hardly afford not to have him back watching out for the country again ... the 22nd Amendment be damned (or repealed).

Cheers,

After years of White House propaganda, e.g. every statement is efficiently politicized, why would anyone put an ounce of faith in the public statement that Mr. Ivins was going to be charged but committed suicide first?

Remember Padilla? He was falsely charged by the government, with the aid of our vigilant press, for conspiring to build a dirty bomb. Ooops.

Mr. Ivins unfortunate death was a handy excuse to bury the true story. As Glenn Greenwald points out, a massive effort should get underway to find out who planted the story about the Iraqi anthrax, and who told DC insiders to take Cipro before the anthrax attacks occured.

This one stinks to high heaven. No surprise if it leads back to the WH.

Note the anthrax letter that Greenwald has posted: the childish handwriting and misspellings, the apparent intent to make it look like a foreigner wrote it. The ideological verbiage in the second letter about Jews, America, and Islam drives home the point even more unsubtly. Yet the date on the letter is clearly written in American fashion, putting the month before the day. If I am not mistaken, no other country does this.

The attacks occurred in the interim between the Authorization of the Use of Force and the Patriot Act. The two political targets were the Senate Majority Leader, who could move "internal security" legislation to the floor, and the chairman of the judiciary committee, who could report such "internal security" legislation. What a remarkable coincidence.

was either produced or pilfered a long time ago ... when things were much more casual, a souveneir perhaps.

My memories of college science classes in the 1970s is of a whole lotta stuff that would be under lock and key today... and there was stuff under lock and key then, fwiw, but second and third level students were trusted...

I have no trouble imaging a tiny test tube in a box, in another box, in another box ... forgotten, remembered, etc. until remembered at a time of extreme anger.

I think the bad handling (the traces, the leaks, etc.) VERY MUCH suggest someone else ... not this guy ... someone with some knowledge but rusty technique...

The AP story on Ivins now has this little nugget:

He had a long history of homicidal threats, according to papers recently filed in local court by a social worker.

But our "anonymous but credible" (who am I to disagree?) says he was the kindest, bravest, most generous man he ever knew? And intelligent.

What's going on?