Bush Told Cheney to Discredit Diplomat Critical of Iraq Policy

· Vice-president told to put out classified information
· No instruction to out CIA agent, says president
by Suzanne Goldenberg

President George Bush directed his vice-president, Dick Cheney, to take personal charge of a campaign to discredit a former ambassador who had accused the administration of twisting prewar intelligence on Iraq, it emerged yesterday.
The revelation by the National Journal, a respected weekly political magazine, that Mr Bush took a personal interest in countering damaging allegations by the former ambassador, Joe Wilson, reveals a White House that was extraordinarily sensitive to any criticism of its prewar planning. It also returns the focus of the criminal investigation into the outing of a CIA agent to the White House only weeks after the senior aide Karl Rove was told he would not face prosecution.

Seek roots of terror, Afghan leader urges

Well, in case the President hasn't heard yet because everybody else has.

BB

By David Pilling in Tokyo and Rachel Morarjee in Kabul
Published: July 5 2006 22:13 | Last updated: July 5 2006 22:13
Hamid Karzai, president of Afghanistan, called on the international community on Wednesday to rethink its war on terror, saying that its present strategies were “going in circles”.

An inconvenient car

Another brick in the wall of colusion and denial by American big business.

DIRECTOR WONDERS WHY GENERAL MOTORS PULLED GAS-SAVING EV1 OFF THE MARKET
By Glenn Whipp
Los Angeles Daily News
As befits its title, ``Who Killed the Electric Car?'' begins with a funeral, a mock one, held at a real cemetery. It ends with an inquiry, one that implicates oil companies, auto manufacturers, the federal government, the California Air Resources Board and, yes, even you and me for murder of an automobile that looks like a winner in these gas-gouging days.

There were several makes of electric cars, but Chris Paine's trenchant documentary focuses primarily on General Motors' EV1. Launched in 1996, the car was fast and quiet, ran without exhaust, required no gas or oil changes and was so popular that dealers kept a waiting list with tens of thousands of names.