From: Jim Ray <liberty@gate.net>
Date: Wed, 21 Aug 1996 23:23:37 +0800
To: cypherpunks@toad.com
Subject: Re: [NOISE]CIA Contra Crack and LA Gangs (fwd)
Message-ID: <199608211235.IAA30204@osceola.gate.net>
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To: cypherpunks@toad.com
Date: Wed Aug 21 08:35:15 1996
Rich Graves wrote:

> On Tue, 20 Aug 1996, Jim Ray wrote:

...

> Oh, I don't think it's impossible or even unlikely that at least
>  some of the
> groups lumped together as "contras" were involved in drug
>  smuggling, and I
> think it's reasonable to have different views regarding how much
>  money was
> involved and who knew what when (my view is very little, and
>  medium). 

Anyone who says "very little" money is involved in any aspect of 
the cocaine importation trade definitely doesn't live in Miami.

>What I
> object to are conspiracy theories along the lines of: 
> 
> 1. The Reagan Administration used the Contras to smuggle crack
>  to the US in
>    a deliberate attempt at genocide against Black people. (I
>  heard this a
>    lot, though seldom in so many words, on KPFK in the mid-80's;
>  the SJ Merc
>    series certainly has this as a subtext.)

I never said that, and I object to calling something a "conspiracy 
theory" just because it's politically inconvenient. People in power 
conspire to get rich and stay in power. Sometimes they use laws 
they write and sometimes they break laws they wrote. This is a fact 
of life, not a conspiracy theory.

> 2. Clinton was a CIA agent involved in the Contra drug-smuggling
>  CaBaL.

He was governor of Arkansas when Reagan was President of the United 
States. Do the search I already gave you, and read the articles.
mena /p cocaine

...

> > It is a major, bipartisan, Watergate-style but bigger 
> > scandal, and the strange bedfellows in the media who were
>  doing a 
> > halfway decent job of covering it [The Wall Street Journal and
> > "High Times" magazine(!)] have fallen strangely silent on the
> > subject as the election approaches. Hmmmmm.
> 
> 4. Anything where vague unsupported asserions are thrown out,
>  followed by
>    a Hmmmmm (sorry).

OK, looks like I have to say it again, and remember this is NOT me, 
it's those conspiracy theorists at CBS News, printed in that 
radical purveyor of vague unsupported asserions...The Wall Street 
Journal:

"The FAA, FBI, Customs, CIA, Justice, DEA and the IRS were
all involved in Mena. They won't say how they were involved,
but they will tell you there is nothing there." -- Bill Plante,
CBS News Correspondent, &  Michael Singer, Producer, CBS News,
New York. [In Tuesday, May 3, 1994's  Wall Street Journal
letters to the editor section.] Look it up.

I am not a journalist, but it sometimes seems I have a better 
institutional memory than they do. This story was covered poorly, 
even though there was/is plenty there, because of politics and 
power masquerading as "national security." The story is there for 
journalists who want to risk covering it, but the trail is getting 
cold, and yes, some loons have latched onto it, due in part to the 
vacuum in "legitimate" media coverage.
[This will be my final word on this subject in this forum.]
<sound of Perry cheering>
JMR

Regards, Jim Ray -- DNRC Minister of Encryption Advocacy

"'Filegate' is starting to make _Ed_ _Meese_ look ethical."
 -- me
 Defeat the Duopoly! Vote "NOTA," not Slick/Dull in November.
 Harry Browne for President. Jo Jorgensen for Vice-president.
 http://www.HarryBrowne96.org/
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