Maureen Dowd, "My So-Called C.I.A. Life": Hollywood, Langley and the Funeral Business All Involve Plots

We have slain a large dragon. But we live now in a jungle filled with a bewildering variety of poisonous snakes. And in many ways, the dragon was easier to keep track of.

- R. James Woolsey, Director of Central Intelligence, 1993–1995

Not unlike "A Game of Thrones," the snakes remain, but the dragon is on its way back. Thank you, Barack and John. Thank you, Vladimir.

"Homeland"? I don't think I can bring myself to watch it.

In her latest New York Times op-ed entitled "My So-Called C.I.A. Life" (http://www.nytimes.com/2013/09/15/opinion/sunday/dowd-my-so-called-cia-life.html?_r=0), Maureen Dowd describes a meeting between the actors and writers of "Homeland" and some "C.I.A. folk" at Langley:

"Alex Gansa, the co-creator and show runner of 'Homeland,' called the two-hour meeting at Langley with his stars, writers and executives and a flock of C.I.A. officers 'a frank and free exchange about the entertainment business and the intelligence business that revealed a lot of parallels.' He added dryly, 'We both build sets. We both play roles. And we both brainstorm, about operations on their side and storylines on ours.'"

A lot of parallels? I don't know anything about the CIA, and I know little about Hollywood. My one attempt at a screenplay some 15 years ago - involving a CIA effort to destroy a certain Middle East atomic weapons facility carved into a mountain - was ultimately rejected. Of course, both Langley and Hollywood involve plots, as does the funeral business.

But I wonder how many of the stars and writers of "Homeland" are suffering from PTSD as a result of their association with the show?

I wonder how many of the stars can truly imagine what it is for a field agent to be stressed beyond human limits, alone and without a director waiting to cry, "Let's call that a wrap!," thereby putting an end to his or her unbearable anxiety. The long-term effects of such anxiety? Obviously, it varies from one individual to the next.

I also wonder if anyone from "Homeland" is familiar, for example, with the circumstances surrounding the death of an American hero named William Francis Buckley in 1985, after his capture by Hezbollah in Lebanon?

Perhaps, if they wish to sleep nights, they're better off not knowing.

Roger Cohen's Deluded "U.S. Illusions in Lebanon"

In his op-ed of today's date entitled "U.S. Illusions in Lebanon" (http://www.nytimes.com/2010/12/14/opinion/14iht-edcohen14.html?_r=1&partner=rssnyt&emc=rss), Roger Cohen writes:

"For the United States to shun any contact with Hezbollah amounts to trying to play the Middle Eastern chess game without several pieces.

. . . .

My sense is the passage of time — as well as bungling and inconsistencies — has rendered justice impossible in the Hariri murder. Lebanese stability is precious and tenuous: It trumps justice delayed, flawed and foreign.

. . . .

Is anyone listening in D.C.? It’s time to drop either-or diplomacy to address a many-shaded reality."

In essence, Cohen is telling us that if Saad Hariri is willing to forgive the 2005 murder of his father, Rafik, by Hezbollah, the U.S. should also let bygones be bygones. Cohen, however, has a habit of forgetting to mention inconvenient facts.

In 1983, long before Cohen became a U.S. citizen, Hezbollah blew up the Beirut barracks housing the U.S. members of the multinational peacekeeping force in Lebanon, killing 220 Marines, 18 Navy sailors, and three Army soldiers. Attempts at rescuing survivors from the rubble were subsequently hindered by Hezbollah sniper fire.

Cohen also fails to mention the 1984 kidnap and murder of William Francis Buckley by Hezbollah. Buckley, buried in Arlington National Cemetery, was tortured to death by Hezbollah.

Also, no reference by Cohen to Hezbollah's bombing of the Jewish community center building in Buenos Aires in 1994, which killed 85 people and injured hundreds. Why should Roger sully his argument with such trivial details?

Cohen spent the better part of 2009 attempting to convince us that Iran is "not totalitarian", while ignoring Iran's brutal oppression of Baha'is, Kurds, Sunnis, women, homosexuals, dissidents and journalists, and never broaching Iran's support of genocide in Darfur. Now, in 2010, he would have the U.S. seek rapprochement with Tehran's hired Hezbollah thugs for the sake of a "many-shaded reality".

Forgive and forget? Sorry, Roger, not in this lifetime. I spent much of 1983 in Lebanon and will never forget the gruesome sight of Hezbollah's victims. Never!

Obama Without a Policy to Curb Iran

Who sprang the leaks?

An article in today's New York Times entitled "Gates Says U.S. Lacks Policy to Curb Iran’s Nuclear Drive," written by David E. Sanger and Thom Shanker, describes a secret three-page memorandum sent by U.S. Defense Secretary Robert Gates to top White House officials warning that the U.S. has failed to develop a long-range policy to contain Iran's nuclear progress:

"One senior official, who like others spoke on the condition of anonymity because of the sensitive nature of the memo, described the document as 'a wake-up call.'

. . . .

Mr. Gates’s memo appears to reflect concerns in the Pentagon and the military that the White House did not have a well prepared series of alternatives in place in case all the diplomatic steps finally failed.

. . . .

Administration officials testifying before a Senate committee last week made it clear that those preparations were under way. So did General Jones. 'The president has made it clear from the beginning of this administration that we need to be prepared for every possible contingency,' he said in the interview. 'That is what we have done from day one, while successfully building a coalition of nations to isolate Iran and pressure it to live up to its obligations.'”

http://www.nytimes.com/2010/04/18/world/middleeast/18iran.html?hp

If Jones is willing to claim that an international coalition, including China, Russia, Pakistan, Iraq, Turkey and France which sent representatives to Iran's nuclear summit last week, has coalesced around Obama, how are we to believe anything else that he says?

But more interesting is the timing of this leak. It comes days after we learned, as the result of another leak from within the U.S., that the Obama administration had denied Israel permission to destroy a convoy carrying Syrian Scud-B missiles to Hezbollah and had assured the Israelis that Senator John Kerry would intervene with Assad to prevent the shipment. Kerry failed, and now both Tehran and Damascus are laughing at the Obama administration, which persists in its claim that "Sending an ambassador to Syria who can press the Syrian government in a firm and coordinated fashion...is part of our strategy to achieve comprehensive peace in the region."

Is there a quiet rebellion within the U.S. military against Obama's efforts to appease tyrannical regimes around the world while undermining confidence in the U.S. deterrent capability?

There are apparently those who remember Hezbollah's 1983 bombing of the U.S. embassy in Beirut, which killed more than 60 embassy personnel and U.S. Marines. There are also those who remember how Hezbollah murdered, in the most horrifying manner imaginable, William Francis Buckley, a U.S. army officer and CIA employee, in 1985.