Visit with Susan

Yesterday, I drove to NYC and visited Susan. It was quite an interesting experience. I got there at 1:00 PM visiting hours closed at 2:00 PM and for while I thought I was going to get turned away, but after waiting an hour for folks who were already in the visiting room to leave, they put us in an elevator and I got to spend about an hour talking with her, one-on-one.

She looks better than I've ever seen her, and she definitely has her wits about her, but it also seems that she is as mixed up as ever about what can be done with her case. She is not alone. Her father has been telling people that she can get out anytime simply by agreeing to accept medication from a private doctor of her choosing. This is not true. It is not even on the table, and she has already proposed exactly that.

Liz Fink points out that there are rules the court must and will observe. Susan has to "cool out" and accept that she really is incompetent and needs what ever help others will give her.

It's pretty clear that Susan will be returned to Carswell for medication after the hearing of the 13th. The only thing that will prevent that would be if somebody were to come forward for the funding for a private institution. Her father's friend Joan Berlin was one of her hopes, but it seems her father may have poisoned that well with his claims that Susan did have an out and that only her being stubborn was preventing her release. Why would anybody contribute with a father making such claims?

Her father told me that Susan took a loan from the family trust to purchase her house, and the father seemed anxious to liquidate the house so that the trust can be repaid an applied to other needs in the family. In short, the father seems as responsible as anybody for Susan being declared incompetent.

I do not accept the claims of some that Susan's lawyer is corrupt or evil. It is clear to me that, while it may have been a mistake to go the incompetency route, any lawyer who has Susan as a client would find themselves in "over their head." Susan is just unmanageable and untrusting of all authority figures. Sanford did a marvelous job in the defense portions of the hearing, and can play the cards that remain as well as anybody.

While it is clear that the judge doesn't like the situation Susan is in and may be sympathetic to her plight, he will not break the rules for her. We can talk about injustice: How this seems like double jeopardy, that she must prove herself competent first, and then get to have a trial, and the Justice Department being able to treat her in a manner indistinguishable from common criminal punishment before she has been found guilty. We can talk about whether the State is imposing a form of religion by setting itself up as the arbiter of mental competency when critics become bothersome or embarrassing. Nevertheless, I have to be somewhat sympathetic to the interests of the State as well. You cannot have free agents taking up with foreign intelligence services and doing business with state sponsors of terrorism. If we prosecute the rich who pursue such profits, then we must also prosecute the more naive among us who succumb to such overtures.

Watching Judge Mukasey run the courtroom was one of the pleasures of this whole ordeal, for me. Susan has the benefit of some very professional people and a fundamentally well-intentioned court system that she would not have in many other countries. I'm not sure that my admiration carries over to the Justice Department, but I understand the prosecutor when he protests that "These are serious charges. We have video tapes of her accepting payments from the Iraq Intelligence Service when we were about to go to war." I don't envy him his role.

If I have a criticism it would be for the way our government has allowed the Federal Bureau of Prisons to operate without a lot of oversight--even outsourcing it to corporations who operate under a profit motive where there is probably even less accountability. Our prisons do not commend us. We need to listen to people who work within them and make some of the improvements that I'm sure they will have to suggest.

Bills

Well, I'm about done with Susan, myself. Just got my cell phone bill, must have missed it for last month. Susan knows that I have free nights and weekends, and she knows that I teach on Monday and Wednesday nights from six until ten. I can't tell you how many times I've received calls during classroom hours when the phone has been silent all day, and it now dawns on me that she never calls after 9:00 when the time is free. Of course, this would have been easier when she was still in Texas.

Bottom line, I have a bill that exceeds $700 and need to come up with about $300 to keep the phone from being turned off. Probably, I'll take that out of the rent that I pay to her.

The demands to do things to call people to go on her computer and look up who else....

When I do call folks, who she is so urgent for me to call, such as Mrs. Berlin, who is wealthy enough to pay for Susan's care in a private facility, the word I get back is that they don't want to talk to her.

Someone asked me what Susan had done to get into trouble, and it wasn't just that she wrote letters. She accepted money from Iraq. The prosecution says they have video tapes of her accepting money from Iraq Intelligence. That would be an illegal transaction. Iraq was on the list of nations that supported terrorism, and as I understand it Sadaam Hussein funded some of the rewards to families of suicide bombers.

Iraq Intelligence had a habit of filming such things. She claims the money was reimbursement for expenses.

It is likely that there was some corruption in the Iraq government, and that the narration of the tapes says something different in their language than what Susan thought was going on. It seems feasable, in my mind, that Iraq Intelligence Service members were padding their expense accounts and bolstering their status reports by claiming that Susan was a spy for them, or that they were recruiting her.

I will also say that she had a lot emotionally invested in her peace efforts. Her anger over the invasion was emmense. The prosecution claims that she agreed with an undercover agent, posing as a Lybian intelligence officer, to assist Iraq troops behind their lines after the American invasion. Now, I'm pretty sure that she wasn't taken in by the undercover agent. Her friend, Park Godfrey, has told me that he remembers her describing the agent as a flake, wondering what his real game was, and saying that there was half a chance that he was FBI.

There is a part of me that lives in tension. Knowing that our invasion was a breach of international law, I must respect even enemies who defend the opposing position. At the same time, the need for loyalty to ones own country should not necessarily be cast off with every mistake.

Nonetheless, Susan is entitled to a trial. Even if she is guilty, she did not trade in secrets and contributed nothing substantial. Neither was she in a position to do so. It may be argued that the FBI's intervention prevented further crimes, but one of the roles of law enforcement is to intervene early when citizens are headed down an illegal road.

Maybe they did.

Susan and Lockerbie, Another Twist

Last Wednesday, as I was riding my motorcycle to work, I was rear-ended by a car and thrown from my motorcycle. I sustained what I thought were minor injuries. I had a headache, and felt stiff in many places. A visit to the ER, and a few days later, I realize that something has my mind playing games on me. Of course, if I were paranoid, I would think that as there is no way to control what an injury might do to someone, the trick would be to have an accident, then administer some drug through using a skin penetrating agent. Chances are that it's just a concusion, and if it were serious I think the ER doctor would have caught it.

But, over the weekend, I get a call from Scotland. Someone with ties to the old Lockerbie case says that the conviction we got on the Lybians is coming apart at the seams. He thinks Susan is being railroaded like other people associated with the original Lockrebie trial. I had heard about there having been a number of mysterious deaths & disapearances, and he reminded me of some of that.

Moreover, he knows the another person who had called me from Europe and downplayed Susan's connections to the CIA and DIA. "Don't believe a word," he says. "I think he works for MI-6. I watch my back, you better watch yours."

Great. I'm living inside a spy novel.

For what it is worth, I know one or two people who've had clerk type positions in the CIA, and probably rubbed elbows with others while traveling in the State Department--yes, I can tell a funny story about pissing some of them off, not knowing who they were. My impression is that they do not get involved in cover-ups and do not admire collegues who run rogue operations. That's how they got the Church Commission on their backs, probably. Most of them, like most government workers, want to be admired for the job they do, want to go home at the end of the day and believe they've done something useful. While the political appointees may be a slightly different story, something like Lockerbie has persisted through several changes in political leadership.

Still, my caller reminded me that the current leadership has a lot of the folks who were in the leadership, then.

Joy.

Founder of Delta Force: "There is no real threat to the US in the world"

Founder of Delta Force: "There is no real threat to the US in the world"

This is an increadible read.

From the page: "Another Prominent Military Figure Denounces NeoCons, Iraq, War on Terror
Delta Force founder joins ranks who say there is no real threat to the US and war is based on lies

Steve Watson / Infowars | March 27 2006

Retired Command Sergeant Major Eric Haney, founding member of the military's elite covert counter-terrorist unit, Delta force, has stated publicly for the record that he sees the war in Iraq as an "Utter debacle" based on intentions by the Bush administration that were "not what they stated" and that "there is no real threat to the U.S. in the world"."

Quoting from BitPlayer's online Blog:

"Now HERE'S a guy with credibility! One of the founders of our own Delta Force! Not some asshole actor who is just looking for publicity. I know, I know, we should be happy when ANYONE joins the fight for truth. But, how much can Crusty the Clown add to the debate? Or, some actor for that matter!"

Rip off?

Now, it just dawns on me. I have seen no proof that the letters that Susan wrote to Andy Card were ever delivered. He says that he never saw them.

If Susan never really delivered them--she says that she hand delivered them to his house--and is simply saying so out of delusion, then she never actually did anything for Iraq. She took money from them, but....

Could it be that we are prosecuting her for ripping off our enemy?

What is worse, taking money for your expenses from an enemy and doing nothing for them, or as some in government do, taking a salary from your own country and doing nothing substantial for it?

Nuts

Susan just called and in the course of the call re-described her relationship with Richard Fuisz, once perhaps of the CIA, and Paul of the DIA. She talked about meeting twice a week with Paul, and at least weekly with Richard for nine years.

Then I got an overseas call from the Scotish journalist who I told you, puts them together. Well, he puts them together but not like that. His last conversation with Richard Fuisz was several years ago and it was Richard asking him, if he had any pull with Susan, to get her to quit calling him.

In the light of this, I have to re-examine what I've been thinking. Susan is certainly not an evil person, but I had considered her problems to be more exagerations than fabrications. Now, it seems I have to accept that much that has stirred me up about her case is questionable.

9/11 was an inside job?

Everybodys Gotta Learn Sometime 1.0 - Google Video [google.com]
Well worth the watching.

Susan's cat, Lulu waits for Susan's return

Phone call from Susan Lindauer

Susan called, after I got home from class, last night.

Her view is that the government does not want her claiming that she was working as an asset for our intelligence agencies. They will medicate (with medicine that has unpleasant side effects but does nothing to eliminate delusions) until she stops claiming to be an asset. Problem is, that is her defense and without a defense they will then imprison her.

Wouldn't you freak out? Your government is talking about torturing you until you agree to go to prison. Forget the rights against cruel and unusual punishment, the right against self incrimination, the right to a speedy trial....

Carswell, in one of their first reports to the judge made the claim that she was claiming to be a CIA agent. That did not fly. She is very clear on the difference between an agent and an asset. The court knew that.

When Susan heard people like our President saying we needed to do everything that we could to fight terrorism and capture the people responsible for 9/11, she marched off to use what ever contacts she had overseas. Perhaps she has delusions of grandiosity, but we also know that her connections to Richard Fuisz, who represented himself to be CIA to journalists who met him with Susan at the Lockerbie trial, and Paul, of the DIA, who was also in attendance are well documented in the Scottish and European coverage of Lockerbie. Can we be sure that someone like Dr. Fuisz was not taking advantage of or feeding her delusions?

One might think that we would have some sworn-in testimony concerning those relationships before torture to force her to deny them commences.

This whole Carswell episode seems to me to be torture: Cruel and unusual punishment before there is a trial. The eagerness of Carswell doctors to employ medicines that good evidence says do not work to treat delusions such as Susan's, and that by all accounts can have very unpleasant side effects.... I am left thinking that this is the culture in which the reservists who were caught torturing Iraqis in abu ghraib were created. These are self-styled patriots who neglect to consider that they are handling someone who is innocent until proven guilty. They regard her as a terrorist--someone who is fair game for what ever games they have in mind, and one quickly discerns from their abbreviated attempts to diagnose her, throwing her conditions into the category of unspecified psychosis, that they are more intent upon inflicting their procedures than in the health of patients or the pursuit of truth. These seem to me to be small-minded sadists who pass themselves off as medical professions, a breed who have been with the human race for too long.

Years ago, when I was in boot camp, we had service week. This was a week of long hours working in the mess hall at boot camp. Maybe it was actually two weeks. It was Hell. We had a chief who ran one of the shifts that everyone called "Little Hitler." He enjoyed the title and would terrorize recruits. I remember being called into his office before a gathering of a few other recruits and him flattering me about my blue eyes and youthful appearance. I was glad to get out of his office when their amusements turned to someone else. A few days later, I pulled from the sack of scrub uniforms that we drew from for work clothes, a jersey that had a battle efficiency "E" on the arm. I wore it that day and other recruits were quick to notice it. They didn't know whether they were suppose to salute me or not, but if I gave an order they jumped-to. At first, I employed my new found power by reorganizing the food line, getting people to put down their laden trays then come back through the separate salad and dessert kiosks rather than trying to fit two more plates onto their trays. It was an improvement that lasted only as long as somebody stood at the line and instructed. Then I saw a fellow recruit picking up two plates of cookies, sliding the contents of one onto the other and departing with double rations. How I delighted in sounding the alarm and delivering a cookie thief to "Little Hitler" for treatment.

We need to be very careful, whenever we entrust others with power, that we protect them from its corrupting influence. The Federal Bureau of Prisons is its own fiefdom. Judges have little influence there. Your elected representatives have little influence. You can see that they are corrupted as they treat all who come there alike: whether they are convicted or pre-trial and innocent by our tradition of innocent until proven guilty. Their visitors are limited by prison rules (and her Uncle was three times denied visiting rights during visiting hours), their phone calls also, they have no Internet Access, and they are ordered not to make any contact with the press. These are fellow Americans who we have allowed to become, in too many ways, evil.

Carl Jung said, "Show me a sane man and I will cure him for you."

Susan Lindauer's Trial: The Defense Witness

Susan's CJA attorney, Sanford Talken, called Dr. Goldstein from Columbia College of Physicians and Surgeons. Among Dr. Goldstein's credits was the fact that he was the Medical Director of the Supreme Court Psych. Clinic in 1970 to 1974.

Dr. Goldstein had his own diagnosis of Susan: Delusional Disorder, mixed type. This was different from the diagnosis that the Justice Department asserted, that was provided by the doctors who observed her within the Federal Bureau of Prisons, at Carswell. Carswell, we learned last Thursday, had diagnosed her as suffering from: Psychotic Disorder, not otherwise specified.

A delusional disorder of mixed type, Dr. Goldstein explained, included firmly held convictions that are irrational. Delusions of persecution and delusions of grandiosity are exhibited by patients with this medical condition. He pointed out that the delusions are irrational, but not bizarre--they are typically things that could be feasible as opposed to things that are impossible. It might be possible that somebody is trying to hurt you, but if you fear that and they really are not, then it is irrational. Bizarre would be believing that Martians are trying to hurt you.

Grandiose delusions could be thinking one has special talents, capabilities, relationships, and even spiritual gifts. The DSM code for the disease is DSM IV-TR.

Dr. Goldstein asserted that this was a proper diagnosis because it matched all of Susan's symptoms. His testimony described Carswell's diagnosis as a "Wastebasket" diagnosis. "Psychotic disorder not otherwise specified," he pointed out, "is a diagnosis that can be used if one cannot reach a more specific diagnosis.

He then testified about the article that Carswell had brought forward to justify their request for medicating Susan. The article, he pointed out, was not a publishing of scientific conclusions that were the result of any kind of double-blind testing or clinical trials such as one might expect. Rather the article was a review of other articles that described experiences some have had with patients being medicated. The problem with relying on such an article is that it is not scientifically rigourous. The number of patients described in the underlying articles was very small, too small a sample for good statistical conclusions. Most significantly, relying upon such alegorical evidence, one can be sure one is hearing mostly the good news about such treatments, as negative results tend not to become the subject of doctors publishing about their work. Moreover, the author of the article summarizing the medical treatments pointed out in his own disclaimers that the studies he had cited had very little to say about effect upon psychotic delusions.

He then went through the side effects of the medicines. They weren't pretty. Among the non-serious side effects was a category called EPS that included muscle spasms, Parkinsons-like symptoms, and other things extremely annoying to a patient. These were called non-serious because they, while extremely annoying, were not permanent or fatal. There were also fatal side effects.

Dr. Goldstein asserted that there is no medication that will effective treat Susan's condition. He concluded that as there were no benefits of such treatment and big risks that such a prescription should not be carried out.

It struck me that Susan's resistance to being medicated was perhaps more sane than the rush to medicate of doctors at Carswell. She might have delusions, but she is not stupid. It also caught my attention that the doctor, in describing delusions of grandiosity said they were merely irrational not bizarre, as one could have special spiritual capabilities. He said it pretty fast and didn't dwell upon it, but I wondered how we scientifically discern between actual spiritual gifts and imagined ones. Did Moses really see a burning bush? I'll go onto consider whether, if God talks to humans in ways that can seem delusional, it follows that by devine design there might be few possible countermeasures, and for good reason.

On cross examination, the prosecutor asked (hoping for an affirmative answer) whether side effects could be prevented by controlling dosage and monitoring. He was not prepared for Dr. Goldstein's negative reply. The evidence on side effects of psychotropic drugs shows that dosage is not much of a factor in whether or not side effects occur, although it might limit their severity, thus reducing some risk. He pointed out that once a fatal side effect has occured it may be too late.

It seemed to me that the point and methods of forcible medication is to inject time-released medicines. Monitoring for symptoms that develop due to exposure time would require a thouroughness and a level of professionalism that I would not expect to find in the Federal Bureau of Prisons. Private facilities are subject to accreditation and quality reviews by different regulatory entities. Medical facilities with the FBOP are reportedly not subject to such review and by many accounts a "nightmare." As we are allowing them to treat, in some cases, people like Susan who are not yet convicted of any crime, it seems to me that this borders on malpractice and malfeasance on the part of those who manage such systems. It is sort of like cruel and unusual punishment prior to a even having a trial--torture that one must survive to get to trial. How convienient to the Justice Department and the FBOP contractors that they can punish and make money on punishing citizens with mental disabilities indefinitely because the drugs they would inflict upon the delusional patient will NEVER render them fit for trial!

You should have seen the prosecutor's reaction to the testimony during cross-examination. His emotional follow-up questions drew objections from the defense that were quickly sustained. Once the judge asked him if wanted to phrase a proper question or withdraw it. He plunged ahead then quickly drew another objection.

He asked things like:

"You mean that if she has a medical condition that cannot be treated, we should just let her go?"

"You mean that the government should just let people walk around with medical conditions that we cannot treat?"

This gave me considerable insight into the culture and mindset of our Justice Department. Interesting to me, also, that there are people walking around who need psychotroopic medication, who without treatment have illnesses that will result in crimes, but the government is more interested in providing profits to political business constituents and punishing criminals than in providing a common medical program that will promote the common good and dissuade such crimes before they occur.

The judge then inquired of the prosecution whether, since Susan has served time in Carswell that might count toward any future ordered sentance, and because the illness she suffered from was the likely nexus of her crimes thus further mitigating any future sentance whether the risks of medication for what little sentance might result were worth it. The prosecutor grew quite flustered and reiterated the charges, describing actions that Susan still claims she carried out acting as an asset for those she knew in our inteligence community. Just because one is delusionsal doesn't mean one cannot or should not try to serve ones country.

Susan may have been close to being released on bail while awaiting trial, but because the judge asked questions of the defense witness that were not asked of prosecution witnesses, there will be a delay while the same questions are posed to the prosecution witnesses, and defense gets to review them. The hearing will be continued on June 6th. Meanwhile, Susan will be held in New York and not sent back to Carswell.

Fund raising for Susan

Some of you may remember, in March of 2004, Andy Card's second cousin being arrested for letters she wrote to him conveying infomation from Iraq diplomats. Because of those letters, and her accepting expense reimbursements for trips to meet with those diplomats, the Bush Justice Department accused her of being an unregistered agent of Iraq Intelligence Service. Currently, she is in prison without having been tried and convicted.

Her court appointed attorney and the prosecutor agreed to argue that she was incompetent to stand trial. The court then sent her to Carswell FMC, in the Federal Bureau of Prisons to see whether she could be made fit for trial. Last Thursday, a hearing began in Judge Mukassey's Federal Court, the Southern District of New York, to approve the Justice Department's request to forcibly medicate her. Obstensibly, this is to render her fit for trial. However, it is somwhat clear they have no specific diagnosis for her other than "psychotic not otherwise specified" and literally proposed, in court, that as they could not determine a cause for her condition could only treat the symptoms. It gets worse. They went on to describe medications that had been proven 50% effective in two studies treating similar symptoms of patients with different diagnosis: one study with 15 people, another with only 1. Under cross-examination, they admit that some of the side effects of such medication are known to be fatal.

It seems that the Republican party and the Justice Department, in order to punish somebody who had the temerity to work for the end of sanctions and the suffering it was causing in Iraq (she had studied under a professor at Smith who argues against the effectiveness of such methods), is attempting to do to Susan what they did to Martha Mitchell during Watergate.

We need donations.

Liz Fink, a famous lawyer who defended the Attica inmates and recently won a substantial judgement for them, is interested in representing Susan. We need to raise about $25,000 so that she can say that she really is Susan's attorney, and so that we can get the public defender whose poor choice of a twinky defense (over Susan's objections and requests for a regular trial and traditional defense) out of the mix. We also will need the funds to get her into a Private facility, somewhere, and that can run another $100,000 a year! But first things first.

If you want to donate to my gas and travel expenses, you can do that over PayPal, but please don't send money until we know what to do with it. Just let me know if you can help, please.

I've posted links to news about Susan on my web site www.jbfields3.com/jbf.htm and am blogging her affairs at http://jayspolitics.blogspot.com

Any other ideas are welcom.

Psychology Today: NATURE'S PATH TO INNER PEACE

Psychology Today: NATURE'S PATH TO INNER PEACE

I sent the above link to Susan's lawer. It references a Dr. Kaplan so I looked up his web site and sent it, also.

http://www-personal.umich.edu/~skap/

Dr. Kaplan's website says that he works at the University of Michigan and has published several books describing how nature and exposure to nature aids mental health.

It seems to me that this doctor has a lot more credibility than anybody who has testified so far.

Susan: to be continued

Friends of Susan attending the hearing, yesterday. It was pretty depressing. Obviously, the federal institution has taken a toll on her and done nothing to treat her except insist on medications, which she refuses.

Her hearing will be continued on Tuesday.

Some of us are trying to raise money for a private attorney: Liz Fink. Meeting Liz at the hearing was the one spot of hope, in the day. There have been times when justice has prevailed for those incarcerated, as it did for the Attica prisoners who Liz represented.

The picture I came away with is that we have a prison system, run by for-profit enterprises, and a forensic psychology industry run by drug companies. The psychiatrists who testified seemed to be people who had only worked within the prison system or within academic circles. I heard nothing about any of their own patients who had ever been healed by their intended therapies. Their responses to the risks of side-effects for medication, some of which it turns out can be fatal or result in additional paranoia and distrust, were clearly disingenious and evasive.

It seemed to me there was a hunger, among the professionals testifying, for Susan to become a patient. The opinion of many, including some with direct experience in federal mental facilitis, is that if Susan gets sent to Carswell it is likely she will die there. The parallels with Martha Mitchell, during Watergate, are just numbing. Remember, that it was Susan's Republican father who first raised the claims that she was delusional and suicidal, and that all of the medical reports find she is not suicidal. Susan, herself, reports that the doctors in Carswell very gleefully described what they would do to her upon her return, pointing out one of the more catatonic inmates as an example of her inability to prevent them.

The situation is not entirlye without hope. The judge is regarded to be a good judge.

If funds become available to pay for private medical care, it can be prescribed instead of Carswell. But we're talking about $100,000+ a year, paid monthly.

Susan, it turns out, was declared incompetent to stand trial by a Psychiatrist appointed by the court. I'm told that this was a pretty poor strategy for a defense attorney. Susan did not wish to pursue her defense, in that manner, repeatedly requested that her attorney contact witnesses and mount a real defense. We determined that the psychiatrists who found her claims delusional had not contacted her witnesses, either. One of them, Park Godfrey, attended the hearing but was given no opportunity to testify.

No doubt, a prison sentence would be preferable to the grey uncertainty of being a guinea pig for the experiments these doctors have in mind. Should, by some miracle, she be restored to competency, in their estimation, she will then be subject to the same prison sentences as she is now.

Of course, all the studies about the usefulness of medications are based upon trials funded by grants from drug companies. How many non-drug methods do you think have been studied?

No mention of what we are recently learning about the need for patients to be exposed to nature, rather than institutional confines.

Very depressing.

The basis for the diagnosis of "psychosis not otherwise defined" was mostly the writings in her journals from previous years. It seems that if someone has religious visions, or speaks with angels, and admits it, even privately, this can become the basis for the state's intervention in your life. Moses and the burning bush is not going to be allowed by the powerful in this modern age.

My interview on P.I.D. Radio - The Strange Case of Susan Lindauer (Part 3)

P.I.D. Radio � Archive � P.I.D. Radio 4/27/06: J Fields - The Strange Case of Susan Lindauer (Part 3)

My interview on P.I.D. Radio - The Strange Case of Susan Lindauer (Part 2)

P.I.D. Radio � Archive � P.I.D. Radio 4/26/06: J Fields - The Strange Case of Susan Lindauer (Part 2)

My interview on P.I.D. Radio - The Strange Case of Susan Lindauer (Part 1)

P.I.D. Radio � Archive � P.I.D. Radio 4/25/06: J Fields - The Strange Case of Susan Lindauer (Part 1)

Susan Knew...

A few evenings ago, I received a call from Toronto, from Park Godfrey, the professor who was boarding with Susan while the FBI was conducting it's targeted investigation against her. He substantiated what she had told me, that she knew this was no Libyan agent, that he didn't check out. She figured there was at least half a chance that he was some newbie trying to make a mark in the FBI. She found it very odd that he wanted her to deposit documents that were publicly available in a clandestine manner rather than coming to her door for them as she requested.

You have to consider how desperate counter intelligence folks in the FBI were to show that they could accomplish anything. Sort of like an inept small-town police department that has to arrest a black man to be the token victim when one of their white women cries rape, and then the court and jurors who don't have the backbone to put a stop to it before there is a hanging. Well, this isn't a small town court. Things may turn out differently.

I think a lot of us are tired of being told lies by rich people who think they are the ruling class and that we'll believe anything. I think a whole lot of us liked it better when we were at least trying to be the land of the brave and the good guys in the world. Bombing the cities of developing countries from 60,000 feet counts as strength perhaps, but not much in the way of courage.

I also think that Bush, senior, knew that the world might be a more managable place with Sadaam Husein stuck with the problems of Iraq. Anytime oil prices went up, we could just loosen sanctions a little to keep the rest of the oil-prducing world in line. Are we really better off?

Coverage of Susan's plight is picking up

Coverage of Susan's plight is picking up on the eve of her hearing.

I'm very grateful to Greg Szymanski, Janet Phelan, and Mark Bilk for stimulating more conversation. Tomorrow will be an interesting day for all of us. I keep wondering what it all means to our country.

Global_Media_Lightning_Headlines : Message: — �"IRAQ No Threat & Invasion Was Illegal," Susan Lindauer, Andy Card's Cousin gets 6 Mo.Psych Eval. (inmate #56064-054.) - Pan Am Flight 103-an Inside Job �