This is my latest letter to the Network News channels, the main ones, CBS, ABC, NBC and PBS. I will probably send this also to the cable news channels, and a modification of this to the major radio programs, but this took long enough to write that this is all I'm doing TODAY. :)


From: Joy
Date: 05/31/05 12:12:06
To: nightly@nbc.com
Subject: Campaign Launched to Demand a Presidential Inquiry




To the staff of NBC News,

The lack of coverage by the major networks of the Downing Street Memo has been appalling. I'm not sure if it's because you are all afraid of the administration, or your corporate owners are sitting on the news, but either way, because the media is not COVERING the NEWS, our soldiers are dying. Your complicity with the lies of the current administration of Neoconservatives make you equally guilty of this travesty. I write to remind you of your responsibility as "journalists" though that title you wear very loosely now.

I long for the days of journalistic integrity when Woodward and Bernstein remembered their duty to be the fourth estate, as a check and balance to curb the tyranny of governmental power, during the Watergate era. Or the days when an unjust war was primarily ended due to the courageous coverage of the Vietnam War by journalists such as the now scape-goated Dan Rather. Where are "journalists" now? Covering stupid, non-stories like Michael Jackson, the "Run-Away Bride" and other infotainment that does not constitute news! Or they are busy making apologies for covering a story that was true (Bush's service record), even if the documents that Rather relied on were probably forged by Karl Rove to release information that they could later discredit. (This btw, is what Karl Rove does, he is a master at Machiavellian techniques, and ABC owes Dan Rather an apology).

The truth is, because of stuff like this, people don't WATCH the NEWS anymore. Because the news has failed in its duty to inform the electorate so they can make informed decisions about issues that effect their lives, from health care, to the environment, to the war, the ratings for news has fallen dramatically. We now get less real news in 24 hours than we used to get in 15 minutes. This is the fault of the consolidated media itself, being owned, essentially by 5 major corporations, who all agree to cover the same non-news stories. Those of us who care about our country now get our news from alternative sources, from liberal radio (which there is very little of) to foreign newspapers like the Guardian or the Sunday London Times, to on-line blogs that frequently cover news stories better than the media does. If you all would do your jobs, your ratings would go up.

Like many Americans and the rest of the world, especially the Iraqis, I knew the administration was deceiving us, but during the build up to war, I only had my instinct to rely on, and then after we started the war, books by people such as Richard Clarke and Paul O'Neil, who were pilloried for speaking truth to power, revealed that Bush had planned this war immediately after 9/11, months before Congressional approval or the UN Resolution. In fact, the Ex British Ambassador to the U.S., Sir Christopher Meyer, revealed over a year ago to the Guardian that Bush and Blair were planning the invasion of Iraq 9 days after 9/11, and he will be coming out with a book soon which will reveal that. I have written about this at my own blog.

Now we have proof of this conspiracy. The latest issue which you have apparently willfully ignored is the Sunday London Times release of the Downing Street Memo, which shows that Bush and Blair conspired to contrive evidence to justify the war in Iraq. But there was no WMD, there was no connection between Saddam and Al Qaeda, and Iraq was not an imminent threat. Colin Powell lied to the UN, Bush lied to Congress and the American people and to the world in his state of the Union address, and Blair lied to his people. Contriving evidence to justify a war is an international war crime, punishable by trial at the Hague. It is also a High Crime under Article II, Section 4 of the United States Constitution, and is thus an impeachable offense. We are now guilty of the killing of over 100,000 Iraqi civilians, 90% of which were women and children (this is now approaching genocide at OUR hands - and now we will see many more deaths as we are now attacking Baghdad), war-profiteering, torture, abuse, rape and murder of defenseless and often innocent Iraqi and Afghanistani prisoners, and the illegal occupation of a sovereign nation. We as a nation have participated in a great evil which we may never be able to atone for. As the media, it is your responsibility to investigate this. I implore you to do your job. Help us to trust you again. The Downing Street Memo is the "smoking gun" of proof that the world was lied to, and the "smoking bullet" is the fact that:

"The RAF and US aircraft doubled the rate at which they were dropping bombs on Iraq in 2002 in an attempt to provoke Saddam Hussein into giving the allies an excuse for war, new evidence has shown.

"The attacks were intensified from May, six months before the United Nations resolution that Tony Blair and Lord Goldsmith, the attorney-general, argued gave the coalition the legal basis for war. By the end of August the raids had become a full air offensive. "
- Sunday London Times

We were at war before most of us even realized it and before our Congress approved military action in Iraq.

Because of this, I am joining with a growing coalition of veterans' groups, peace groups, and political activist groups who have announced a campaign today to urge that the U.S. Congress launch a formal investigation into whether President Bush has committed impeachable offenses in connection with the Iraq war. The campaign focuses on evidence that recently emerged in a British memo containing minutes of a secret July 2002 meeting with British Prime Minister Tony Blair and his top national security officials.

John Bonifaz, a Boston attorney specializing in constitutional litigation, sent a memo to Congressman John Conyers of Michigan , the Ranking Democrat on the House Judiciary Committee, urging him to introduce a Resolution of Inquiry directing the House Judiciary Committee to launch a formal investigation into whether sufficient grounds exist for the House to impeach President Bush.

Bonifaz's memo, made available today at www.AfterDowningStreet.org , begins: "The recent release of the Downing Street Memo provides new and compelling evidence that the President of the United States has been actively engaged in a conspiracy to deceive and mislead the United States Congress and the American people about the basis for going to war against Iraq. If true, such conduct constitutes a High Crime under Article II, Section 4 of the United States Constitution."

In February and March 2003, John Bonifaz served as lead counsel for a coalition of United States soldiers, parents of U.S. soldiers, and Members of Congress (led by Representatives John Conyers, Jr. and Dennis Kucinich) in a federal lawsuit challenging President George W. Bush's authority to wage war against Iraq absent a congressional declaration of war or equivalent action. Bonifaz is the author of Warrior-King: The Case for Impeaching George W. Bush (NationBooks-NY, 2004, foreword by Rep. John Conyers, Jr.), which chronicles that case and its meaning for the United States Constitution.

The organizations forming the AfterDowningStreet.org coalition include: Global Exchange, Gold Star Families for Peace, Democrats.com, Veterans for Peace, Code Pink, Progressive Democrats of America, and Democracy Rising. These organizations, beginning today, will be urging their members to contact their Representatives to urge support of a Resolution of Inquiry.

Americans need to be aware of this so that there is never again a Memorial Day where we pay tribute to soldiers who have died because our government, just as in Vietnam, has lied them into war. 1600+ soldiers have now died, and that's only the official count of those that died on the battlefield, not those who later died off the battlefield from wounds sustained IN battle - they don't "count". Thousands of our troops have been injured, many of them losing arms and legs. Many of them will be psychologically shattered when they return, if not all of them. They are going to need special care when they return. But the Republican Congress keeps cutting their benefits! Where is that in the news?

The story of the Downing Street Memo should get CONSTANT coverage until our government is forced to investigate this. This is a much bigger story than Michael Jackson ever dreamed of being. This is actually bigger than Watergate. This story should be covered at the top of every news story every day. And should be above the fold on the front page of the New York Times, the Washington Post, etc. Not buried in the Op-Ed section or on A18.

This war was unjust, unprovoked, and unnecessary. The Iraqi people did NOTHING to us. We are engaged in a war of aggression against an unarmed nation, because of lies by the criminals in the Bush administration. According to the International Criminal Court, such actions constitute war crimes. Just this weekend, Vice President Dick Cheney on the Larry King Show denied that ANYTHING happened at Guantanimo...that the claims of abuse were just made up by some disgruntled prisoners who were released. This in direct contradiction to the admission that the FBI and Pentagon has made! Apparently, Cheney agrees with Goebbels, tell a lie often enough, and eventually it will be the truth. It's frightening that our Vice President would indulge in such Orwellian and Fascist tactics, and disgusting that Larry let him slide on that.

President Bush has dishonored our troops by never having attended a funeral for a fallen soldier, for not allowing the American people see the coffins of the dead, for not allowing families to meet their dead family members at Dover AFB. The administration is very unpatriotic by cutting hazard pay and benefits, by not giving our troops enough protective armor- so that they have to salvage for it garbage dumps in Iraq - to protect their lives, by shorting them on bullets, by cutting down on medical benefits and eliminating VA benefits and the number of hospitals when the ones that are taking care of the wounded are over-taxed. Bush is NOT a Patriot. He does NOT support the troops or their families who are making considerable sacrifice (many families have lost their homes!) and neither does his party. A Patriot would take care of his soldiers and their families, but Bush and the NeoCon wing of the Congress is doing everything to undermine our soldiers and their families. Check out operationtruth.com to see how our troops are being undermined by the very administration they are taking orders from. This is to say nothing of the amount of money that they are indebting us into for a crime, that is essentially just a way to help war-profiteering companies like Haliburton steal from Iraq and from the people of the US. Close to $9 billion taxpayers dollars have gone "missing" in Iraq... and our soldiers don't have enough armor for their humvees. Where is the story of the missing billions in the media??? There is so much more I could say, but I will close for now.

Do your job, NBC. The lives of our soldiers, of the Iraqi people and our own lives and well-being depend on it. Besides, I know you want to cover real news, it's in your blood. Covering this correctly and completely might help us to regain our status in the world again, and will help us bring our troops home and help to end the bloodshed.

For more information, see www.AfterDowningStreet.org , or contact:

Democrats.com, President Bob Fertik, 718-424-7772, and Washington Director David Swanson, 202-329-7847 (contact Swanson to set up an interview with Bonifaz.)


Joy Williams
1669 Nelson Road, #2
Scotts Valley, CA 95066
831-335-5555