Story of the Day

New evidence of unchecked power. Use of predator drones operated remotely by CIA and Pentagon officials, a practice fully sactioned by this White House, is becoming more widespread. The same mode of killing took the lives of at least 18 civilians in Pakistan recently while allegedly targeting Ayman Zawahiri, Al Qaeda's second in command. An incident that has since been forgotten by our mainstream media but continues to fuel anti-American sentiment in Pakistan, ensuring both a fresh crop of terrorist recruits and the further destabilization of that region.

From today's article:

"Little is known about the targeted-killing program. The Bush administration has refused to discuss how many strikes it has made, how many people have died, or how it chooses targets. No U.S. officials were willing to speak about it on the record because the program is classified."

And this was comforting as well:

"The CIA does not even acknowledge that such a targeted-killing program exists, and some attacks have been explained away as car bombings or other incidents. It is not known how many militants or bystanders have been killed by Predator strikes, but anecdotal evidence suggests the number is significant. In some cases, the destruction was so complete that it was impossible to establish who was killed, or even how many people."

Now get the whole story:

CIA Expands Use of Drones in Terror War, by Josh Meyer
The Los Angeles Times

Comments

[buzz19]

I agree that most of the mainstream media have placed the story of the at least 18 dead in Pakistan down the memory hole, but to be fair, the LA Times story you've referenced mentions it and yesterday's lead NY Times editorial was about the Bush administration's lack of explanation to the Pakistani government and their people for this atrocity. My guess is that the European press is still digging into this story, but yes, the American media don't seem capable of staying w/ an important story like this for more than a day or so.

Everyone in the administration and everyone fighting over there is a drone.