Keith Olbermann, Hero

I'm so angry about ABC and the producers of "Path to 9/11" trying to "spin" the events of 9/11 to favor this Administration, and by the continued lies being told on the airwaves by the President and Vice President.

Keith Olbermann has put my outrage into words so eloquently that I hope you will go to this website and read the full transcript.

Then, if you would like to ask your local media to read these words, go here and tell them.

A few highlights from the transcript:

Half a lifetime ago, I worked in this now-empty space [ground zero]. And for 40 days after the attacks, I worked here again, trying to make sense of what happened, and was yet to happen, as a reporter.And all the time, I knew that the very air I breathed contained the remains of thousands of people, including four of my friends, two in the planes and — as I discovered from those "missing posters" seared still into my soul — two more in the Towers. And I knew too, that this was the pyre for hundreds of New York policemen and firemen, of whom my family can claim half a dozen or more, as our ancestors. I belabor this to emphasize that, for me… this was, and is, and always shall be, personal.

And anyone who claims that I and others like me are "soft", or have "forgotten" the lessons of what happened here — is at best a grasping, opportunistic, dilettante — and at worst, an idiot — whether he is a commentator, or a Vice President, or a President.

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They [the administration] promised bi-partisanship, and then showed that to them, "bi-partisanship" meant that their party would rule and the rest would have to follow, or be branded, with ever-escalating hysteria, as morally or intellectually confused [actual Cheney quote]; as appeasers; as those who, in the Vice President’s words yesterday, "validate the strategy of the terrorists."

They promised protection, and then showed that to them "protection" meant going to war against a despot whose hand they had once shaken… a despot who we now learn from our own Senate Intelligence Committee, hated Al-Qaeda as much as we did.

The polite phrase for how so many of us were duped into supporting a war, on the false premise that it had ’something to do’ with 9/11, is "lying by implication." The impolite phrase, is "impeachable offense."

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[and referring to the movie last night on ABC]

Yet what is happening this very night? A mini-series, created, influenced — possibly financed by — the most radical and cold of domestic political Machiavellis, continues to be televised into our homes. The documented truths of the last fifteen years are replaced by bald-faced lies; the talking points of the current regime parroted; the whole sorry story blurred, by spin, to make the party out of office seem vacillating and impotent, and the party in office, seem like the only option.

How dare you, Mr. President, after taking cynical advantage of the unanimity and love, and transmuting it into fraudulent war and needless death… after monstrously transforming it into fear and suspicion and turning that fear into the campaign slogan of three elections… how dare you or those around you… ever "spin" 9/11.

Last night, on the fifth anniversary of 9/11, Bush again tried to spin 9/11 by attempting to connect those events with his invasion of Iraq by declaring, "The safety of America depends on the outcome in the streets of Bahgdad."

No, Mr. Bush, the safety of America depends on getting your fundamentalist regime out of office, starting in November.