After Boston bombing, Australian media ramps up “war on terror”
Peter Symonds: After Boston bombing, Australian media ramps up “war on terror” - The response of the Australian media and political establishment to the state of siege imposed on Boston following the April 15 bombings is a clear indication that the ruling elites are prepared to use the same kind of anti-democratic methods in Australia. In the extensive media coverage, the unparalleled military-police lockdown of a major American city in order to hunt down a single 19-year-old youth allegedly responsible for the bomb blasts was barely mentioned, let alone criticised. It was the photographs, rather than the words, that gave a glimpse of what was taking place—heavily-armed police and national guard troops in combat gear, armoured humvees patrolling the streets, “suspects” being handcuffed. The military and police-state methods that have been used for more than a decade to terrorise the populations of Afghanistan and Iraq—curfews, house-to-house searches, roadblocks, the shutdown of transport—are now being deployed in the United States. Yet the imposition of what is tantamount to martial law in Boston and the trampling on democratic rights is not questioned in the slightest by Australian politicians or in the media.
Keith Jones: Canadian government unveils “terror plot” as it adopts draconian new law - Canadian authorities boasted Monday afternoon that working in concert with the FBI and other U.S. national security agencies they had broken up a terrorist conspiracy involving an Iranian-based al-Qaeda cell. The announcement, made at a Royal Canadian Mounted Police (RCMP) press conference, came just as the House of Commons was set to debate new anti-terrorism legislation that would give the state draconian new powers. [...] The little that has been revealed leaves no doubt that the timing of the arrests was a calculated political decision, made in close consultation with the highest levels of the U.S. government, and with the aim of stampeding the public on both sides of the border into accepting police-state measures.
Tony Cartalucci: US-Canada Claim Iran-Al Qaeda Ties Despite US Funding Al Qaeda in Iran for Years