Cursor's Media Patrol - July 1, 2005

A Newsweek report that a radical imam allegedly kidnapped by CIA agents in Italy before the invasion of Iraq, was "a key figure in a jihadi network supplying foreign fighters for Ansar Al-Islam," leads to speculation that "as the Bush administration was leaking its plans for war back in the summer of 2002, planning was equally advanced for a jihadist response..."

With Ahmadinejad predicting that "The wave of the Islamic revolution will soon reach the entire world," Michael Tomasky asks, will John Bolton "be a point man for our next war?"

A Zogby Poll found that 42% of all respondents -- and 25% of Republicans -- said they "would favor impeachment proceedings if it is found the President misled the nation about his reasons for going to war with Iraq."

The Capital Times editorializes that President Bush's Iraq speech "was written and delivered with the intent of deceiving the American people into believing things that were never true," and an Arab News commentary asks: 'Are two shadowy characters holding US hostage in Iraq?'

Knight Ridder reports that June was 'one of the deadliest months for U.S. troops in Iraq,' and Fred Kaplan argues that even with a million service men and women, the U.S. Army isn't big enough to "fulfill the Bush administration's global dreams."

Warning of a "viral asteroid on a collision course with humanity," Mike Davis says all Americans "have been placed in harm's way by the Bush regime's bizarre skewing of public-health priorities." And a Foreign Affairs analysis predicts that if a flu pandemic struck today, "borders would close, the global economy would shut down ... and panic would reign." Time for a Flu Wiki.