The latest Neo-lie making the rounds is that Gaddafi's agreement to eliminate all WMD programs in his country is because he was in fear of Bush due to the Iraq war.
The story has its origin in a London Telegraph story which claims:
"A spokesman for Mr Berlusconi said the prime minister had been telephoned recently by Col Gaddafi of Libya, who said: "I will do whatever the Americans want, because I saw what happened in Iraq, and I was afraid.""
This is third-hand hearsay; it's not even momentarily credible. The deniability of this account is built right in to the statement. And it will be denied once it has done it's work, or as soon as Gaddafi denies it happened. Even the language gives the statement the lie. Gaddafi would never say such a thing, even in a private conversation with the Italian PM. The quote is transparently bullshit.
The 'mistake' will be blamed on the spokesman and that will be that. But in the mean time, conservative hacks have been given all the amunition they need. Already they are crowing about how Dean's claim that the Lybian agreement is the result of long negotiations and mulitlateral involvement is rejected by Gaddafi's 'own words'. Rush gets in on the act between Vicodins, and the Washington Times' Bill Sammon takes a swing at Dean, too. I predict that by tommorrow this specious "quote" from Gaddafi will be the main dish in the sliced Dean buffet.
Never mind that the source of the "quote" is a man who believes passionately in Bush's terroristic vision, and goes even further to suggest that the US remake the UN to allow pre-emptive attack of every 'dictatorship' if they do not reform to our standards of 'liberty' and observance of human rights. Just read the article in which the Gaddafi quote supposedly occurs, and you will see the ravings of a lunatic proposing to make over the international system into a distopia in which certain countries are empowered by international law to police the internal affairs of all others.
Berlusconi favors the initiation of "an era in which a "community of democracies" intervenes in the internal affairs of countries ruled by despots." Doesn't sound too radical until one considers how that is to be accomplished.
"We are able, with Russia and America, to look at the states of the world and assess the dignity of the people and we give them democracy and liberty. Yes! By force if necessary, because that is the only way to show it is not a joke. We said to Saddam, do it or we come. And we came and we did it."
I have found it deliciously ironic that men like Bush and Berlusconi, who may be the men least respectful of the Democratic process to ever hold public office in democratic nations, should advocate such a radical adgenda of spreading the system they abuse and despise. The irony drops away when you dispose of the rhetorical flourishes.
In Berlusconi's vision the facade of this New World Order drops away, allowing us to see the true goal though the chinks. Though still wrapped in the rhetoric of 'human rights', 'liberty', and 'democracy' it becomes very apparent that the actual goal is to pry open the economies of all nations to free trade. Not content to crack open markets around the world with trade regimes and the power of the IMF and World Bank, Burlesconi boldly takes the final, inevitable step into universal direct coersion of every nation to adopt the capitalist, corporatist, standardless, regulation-free model of economic existence.
Bush's vision is similar, though less breathtakingly universal in scope. Bush would cherry-pick the most despised nations having the most promising natural resource bases for his program; Burlesconi would have the world. Ironic that such a clear vision of Militant Free Trade Corporatism spreading itself by naked force should come from Italy, the land which birthed the name of this political agenda: facsism.