HalliburtonDisney. Some further thoughts on ABC's miniseries of the 9/11 Commission Report (see the post directly below this one), now in production in Toronto.

First, the casting. Having Patricia Heaton, a former Republican Babe of the Week, play Barbara Bodine, the Queen of Baghdad (and former ambassador to Yemen and, famously, obstructionist against John O'Neill's USS Cole investigations there), is partisan typecasting of the laziest sort.

Second, the project's executive producer. As entertaining as it was, Legally Blonde might not be the most qualifying precedent for a six-hour miniseries about 9/11.

Finally, Disney is now starting to behave like Halliburton. Three thousand dead Americans and they're thinking, "What's in it for ABC? How can we monetize it?" You can hear ABC's head of sales yapping: "Have our account executives get in touch with 3M. We can sell this miniseries like the Super Bowl of duct tape commercials." Meanwhile, the network's production drones are thinking: "Developing a six-hour script is hard. Why bother when the Commission does it for you?" (Note: the official screenwriter's previous credits include The Day Reagan Was Shot, another GOP horror movie.) And the director places a call to Central Casting with the direction, sorry, suggestion: Let's have actual Republican babes play the roles of actual Republican operatives.

ABC's 9/11: It's sort of like reality TV, only more tragic.

{ 9:08 AM }

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The 9/11 Commission Report: The Miniseries. Must be seen to be believed — ABC is preparing a 9/11 Commission Report miniseries:

UNTITLED 9/11 COMMISSION REPORT PROJECT (ABC) - Harvey Keitel ("Be Cool"), Patricia Heaton ("Everybody Loves Raymond"), Amy Madigan ("Carnivale"), Shaun Toub ("Crash") and Stephen Root ("NewsRadio") are all set to star in the Alphabet's six-hour, $30-$40 million mini-series, which will detail the events of the recent terror attacks against the United States, including those on 9/11, the 1993 World Trade Center bombing, the U.S.S. Cole and the disrupted millennium attacks. Keitel will play F.B.I. agent (and Al-Qaeda expert) John O'Neill, who died when the first plane hit the World Trade Center on 9/11, with Heaton as Barbara Bodine, the U.S. ambassador to Yemen who clashed with O'Neill; Madigan as a top C.I.A. analyst; Toub as the F.B.I. informant who helped bring down the first WTC attack; and Root as famed White House terrorism guru Richard Clarke.

Production recently began in Toronto* on the project with David L. Cunningham ("To End All Wars") directing from a script by Cyrus Nowrasteh ("Into the West") with Marc Platt executive producing. Serving as advisers to the production are former New Jersey Gov. Tom Keane and former ABC News anchor John Miller. As for specifics about the project, it's understood part one will focus on the 1993 bombing of the WTC; part two on two U.S. embassy bombings, the attack on the U.S.S. Cole and a plot to disrupt millennium celebrations; and part three on the planning for the 9/11 attacks. Platt also has said he isn't aiming for Hollywood-style over dramatization but rather a factual account using the 9/11 Commission Report as the basis. He also confirmed they won't be casting actors for Osama bin Laden, President Clinton or President Bush, choosing rather to use news footage of the trio.

*Filming in Canada — blasphemous, insulting, or ironic? You decide.

Hopefully this production will have at least a nanoparticle of merit, unlike the laughable-if-it-wasn't-tragic propaganda vehicle DC 9/11: Time of Crisis from Showtime.

As Bush's month-long respite from his "hard work," August would be a great time for Comedy Central to dust off the 2001 Trey Parker series That's My Bush.

{ 11:35 AM }

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Jesus doesn't save, he invests. The loud and vulgar Christianization of American politics is serving as an all-purpose distraction from the larger agenda of the Bush dynasty — to siphon off as much public wealth as it can before the people revolt. Case in point is the Carlyle Group, the powerful investment group that has simultaneously included members of both the Bush and bin Laden families.

Now, while you may be resigned to the measly 0.5 percent yield on your savings account, the Carlyle people are aiming higher, much higher, to 25 percent... (WSJ):

The $7.85 billion Carlyle Partners IV [private-equity fund from the Carlyle Group], which closed to new investors in March, raised more money from high-net-worth individuals -- some 23% -- than any of the firm's previous funds.

[...]

Carlyle, for example, told investors it was aiming for a 25% annual return for its Carlyle Partners IV fund...

Twenty-five percent is an outrageously high number these days. It's not as if the cesspool of business stagnation we're living in represents a time of high growth. The American stock markets have been flat for the past five years (as opposed to the 300+ percent increase during Clinton's two terms). How can the Carlyle Group pull off a 25 percent return?

The unsuccessful privatization of Social Security was preceded by the highly successful privatization of the Iraq invasion. The public till is the Bushies' playground, from Junior's stadium experiments with eminent domain to Cheney's no-bid Halliburton contracts. "Private equity" does have a nice ring to it, but unfortunately for the non-high-net-worth individuals among us the Carlyle Group's success is based on policies that remove money from our pockets in the form of cuckoo tax policies and wild-ass invasions of non-threatening countries. The belief of members of this administration is that anything public literally belongs to them.

What does this have to do with Jesus? Not a damn thing. I vaguely remember him mentioning something about "blessed are the poor in spirit: for theirs is the kingdom of heaven." The ownership-society Bushies are vastly more interested in the kingdom of earth, and the wealth that accompanies it — not by saving or investing, but by pirating.

{ 1:10 PM }

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Today's puzzler.

Unscramble the letters below to reveal the name of a treasonous presidential adviser.

LARK OVER

{ 5:09 PM }

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"Despite lack of evidence..." Here is the natural result of faith-based policies — a complete lack of faith in evidence as the basis of any rational decision-making (Jess Bravin, WSJ):

Two Air Force prosecutors quit last year rather than take part in military trials they considered rigged against alleged terrorists held at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba.

Maj. John Carr, then a captain, and Maj. Robert Preston accused fellow prosecutors of ignoring torture allegations, failing to protect exculpatory evidence and withholding information from superiors. Altogether, the actions "may constitute dereliction of duty, false official statements or other criminal conduct," Maj. Carr wrote in a March 15, 2004, email summarizing his complaints to the then-chief prosecutor, Army Col. Fred Borch.

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In his email to Col. Borch, Maj. Carr describes "an environment of secrecy, deceit and dishonesty" in the prosecution office and suggests that despite lack of evidence, officials initially planned to tie the defendants to the most notorious al Qaeda attacks: the U.S. Embassy bombings in Africa, the USS Cole, and the Sept. 11, 2001, strikes on New York and Washington. Such charges were scaled back, he wrote, after Justice Department officials "appeared less than totally comfortable with our theory."

But Borch is backing down from his initial refutation of Carr and Preston: "Col. Borch distributed the Carr and Preston emails throughout his office on March 15, 2004, with a cover note calling the allegations 'monstrous lies.' The next month, Col. Borch was reassigned to the Army's Judge Advocate General's School in Charlottesville, Va., and later retired from the military. He now is court clerk at the U.S. District Court in Raleigh, N.C. 'I've moved on with my life and don't care to discuss the case any more,' Mr. Borch said."

{ 4:54 PM }

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