Anthrax suspect dies in apparent suicide

[chiggerbit]

Does Hauer have connections to Bioport or one of the competetitor companies? Don't have time to look.

[seemslikeadream]

Does Hauer have connections to Bioport or one of the competetitor companies? Don't have time to look.

http://www.fromthewilderness.com/free/w ... auer.shtml

[Democracy Now and The Nation have purposefully chosen to omit critical facts about Jerome Hauer and BioPort in Jeremy Scahill’s coverage of the ongoing controversy surrounding the Bush Administration and its public health policies – especially as they relate to the stockpiling of vaccines.

These publications made a conscious choice to portray Jerome Hauer as a martyr targeted by the Bush administration while ignoring the fact that Hauer now sits on the Board of one of the most controversial pharmaceutical corporations on the planet, BioPort. This company produces an anthrax vaccine that has a proven track record of being deadly and injurious. BioPort is linked to the Bin Laden Family and may be owned in part by The Carlyle Group.

Let’s take a look at the real story. – FTW]

JEROME HAUER NOW ON BIOPORT BOARD OF DIRECTORS

Democracy Now & The Nation Completely Blow the REAL Story

by
Michael Kane



Photo of Jerome Hauer from
http://www.cphp.pitt.edu/upcphp/images/ ... 0Hauer.jpg


© Copyright 2005, From The Wilderness Publications, www.fromthewilderness.com. All Rights Reserved. This story may NOT be posted on any Internet web site without express written permission. Contact admin@copvcia.com. May be circulated, distributed or transmitted for non-profit purposes only.

December 15, 2005 1500 PST (FTW): When FTW published TOTAL HEALTH TYRANNY on November 2, 2005, one of the story’s bullet points read, “Jerome Hauer leaves HHS: where, oh where will he turn up?” Hauer was named as a “person of interest” pertaining to the crimes of 9/11 by Michael Ruppert in Crossing the Rubicon.

On November 3, 2005, a Google-news search pulled up a POGO blog entry that stated the following:

Jerome Hauer, the former head of HHS's [Health and Human Services] biodefense program, is now on the Board of Emergent Biosolutions, Bioport's parent company. [emphasis added]1

Bioport is an extremely controversial pharmaceutical company that manufactures a despicable anthrax vaccine linked to deaths and injuries in the U.S. military. After years of litigation, the vaccine can no longer be administered to soldiers on a mandatory basis. Recent legislation – referred to as Bioshield 2 or BARDA – is attempting to grant complete liability bail-outs to specific pharmaceuticals labeled “countermeasures.” BioPort is positioning itself to gain immunity from litigation if its anthrax vaccine is massively deployed for emergency mandatory vaccination of civilians.

That November 3 POGO post links to this post from October 13:

Especially critical of Simonson [the current head of the Department of Health and Human Services’ biodefense program] has been Jerome M. Hauer, who previously held Simonson's position and is now a consultant for several biodefense firms (Hauer is yet another administration official who has passed through the revolving door. Hauer now sits on the board of directors of Emergent Biosolutions, the parent company of Bioport, the primary manufacturer of the Defense Department's anthrax vaccine. Bioport did not get the primary Bioshield anthrax vaccine contract for the Strategic National Stockpile, instead an upstart competitor, VaxGen, won. Bioport has been critical of Bioshield and of VaxGen.) [emphasis added]2

This is extremely significant. Hauer is critical of Secretary Simonson for not filling the Strategic National Stockpile (SNS) with millions of vaccines in short order. Hauer then leaves HHS to take a very clear stance in support of BioPort’s discredited anthrax vaccine, in apparent opposition to VaxGen’s “next generation” anthrax vaccine.

VaxGen has recently announced delays in the production of their anthrax vaccine. They will deliver 75 million doses to the U.S. Government’s SNS later than expected – by the fourth quarter of 2006. Right when this is announced Hauer jumps to VaxGen’s competitor BioPort. Hauer is supporting a vaccine that is certain to cause injury and even death if deployed to tens of millions of people.

The controversial nature of BioPort’s anthrax vaccine was surely a key factor in their loss of a $280 million government contract to VaxGen. The safety and efficacy of the VaxGen vaccine is not yet publicly known.

According to Insight Magazine, the CEO of BioPort, Fuad El-Hibri, is friends with the Bin Laden family.3 The Carlyle Group has never disclosed whether or not they own a stake in BioPort.4 Both before and after 9/11, the Bin Laden family owned a stake in Carlyle.

On the morning of September 11, 2001, Shafiq bin Laden – Osama bin Laden’s brother – was meeting with George Herbert Walker Bush in Washington D.C.’s Ritz Carlton Hotel on official Carlyle business.5

If Jerome Hauer ultimately becomes a member of BARDA, we can now see whose interests he will ultimately represent.

DEMOCRACY NOW, THE NATION, AND JEREMY SCAHILL
On November 9, 2005, The Nation published an article by Jeremy Scahill titled “Germ Boys and Yes Men.” The report is very strange in what it says and what it doesn’t.
Scahill shows that Dick Cheney’s office – especially his former chief of staff Lewis “Scooter” Libby, whose nickname is “germ boy” – was obsessed with preemptively vaccinating the entire country for smallpox. When Hauer was at HHS he opposed this, stating that a focus on smallpox alone was causing officials to lose sight of the totality of threats.

But on November 10, when Scahill was interviewed by Amy Goodman on Democracy Now (a show he co-produces), he said a deal was reached between Cheney’s office and Hauer where the smallpox vaccine would be offered to half a million soldiers and 50,000 first responders. So there was no safety and efficacy dispute between Hauer and Cheney’s office; the only area of contention was about the number of people who were to be inoculated for smallpox.

What is astonishingly, and inexplicably, left out of Scahill’s report is that Jerome Hauer is now on the Board of Directors of BioPort and that their anthrax vaccine is deadly and injurious. But the following exchange between he and Amy Goodman shows it is damn near impossible that Scahill is unaware of these facts:

AMY GOODMAN: And very quickly, who has been the beneficiary, the corporation, of dealing right now?

JEREMY SCAHILL: Well, Amy, that perhaps is something that doctors who have been working on this can address directly, because it's interesting how -- there's one company called Bioport, which manufactured anthrax vaccine, that literally made a killing off of these vaccines. And there are a number of companies that have profited directly. But this is -- the political story here is about Scooter Libby coming up against a guy who is truly a public health professional, the Vice President's office coming up against a guy who was truly a public health professional, and then apparently targeting him because he had dared to stand up against them. [emphasis added]

Here Scahill reveals to us that he is aware of the BioPort anthrax vaccine and its track record of death and injury. But rather than explain what “literally made a killing off of these vaccines” specifically means to the large listening and viewing audience tuned into Democracy Now on November 10, 2005, he glosses right over it as if it was somehow unimportant. Anyone who is not familiar with the history of BioPort’s despicable anthrax vaccine would have no clue what Scahill was referring to.
So why does he skirt this issue in both his report and the interview?

JEREMY SCAHILL: -- the political story here is about Scooter Libby coming up against a guy who is truly a public health professional [Jerome Hauer], the Vice President's office coming up against a guy who was truly a public health professional, and then apparently targeting him because he had dared to stand up against them. [emphasis added]

It’s politics.

As is par for the course on both the left and the right, the truth dies in politics. Medical investigator Liam Scheff pointed out to this reporter that Democracy Now has a political agenda against Bush and Cheney, and if Jerome Hauer (a Democrat) can be used to further that agenda, then so be it.

Unfortunately it is actually Scahill and Democracy Now who are being used. It would be nice to say The Nation is being used as well, but their track record does not allow FTW to be so kind [see Crossing the Rubicon, chapter 17]. BioPort is never mentioned in The Nation report – not once.

Scahill ends his report by trashing VaxGen, BioPort’s primary competitor:

…more than 80 percent of the nearly $1 billion allocated under the program has gone to a scandal-plagued company that has never successfully produced an FDA-licensed vaccine. In November 2004 California-based VaxGen was handed one of the largest government vaccine contracts in history. The company is largely known for its failed AIDS vaccine, and just a few months before VaxGen won the Bioshield contract, the Nasdaq took the unusual step of delisting it from trading because of financial irregularities. So why did it get the contract? "I have no idea why VaxGen was selected," admits Henderson, who remains chair of the influential Secretary's Advisory Council at HHS. "It's not for me to decide whether it's a good idea or not." But it was for Simonson and his staff. And as with many Bush Administration contracts, several signs point to cronyism as the deciding factor--among them: VaxGen CEO Lance Gordon is a longtime associate of one of Simonson's top deputies on Bioshield, Dr. Phil Russell, former chief of Army medical research.

All of this information is basically correct, but Scahill exposing the dirty laundry of VaxGen yet not their competitor. Why? The fact that BioPort is never mentioned properly throughout Scahill’s report or in the Democracy Now interview, while Jerome Hauer is repeatedly praised, effectively makes this a great piece of PR for BioPort.

In absolutely no way does FTW support BioPort or VaxGen. We recognize that the BioPort vaccine has a proven track record of injury and death that must never be overlooked for any reason. It should also be noted that we reported on VaxGen’s sordid past back in March of 2004.6

Scahill continually references the fact that the Bush administration was lying about Iraq having the capability to attack the U.S. with weaponized smallpox, yet he leaves out the fact that immediately after 9/11 Jerome Hauer was making the exact same claims, helping to propel Bush’s call to war [see Crossing the Rubicon, page 426, referencing Newsday, September 22, 2001, article by Laurie Garret].
Scahill details widely circulating claims that Stewart Simonson, who recently took over Hauer’s position as head of the biodefense department at HHS, is “the next Michael Brown.” Formerly a lawyer for Amtrak, Simonson has no experience in public health whatsoever. Judith Miller is mentioned in Scahill’s report for her close relationship with Cheney’s office. She participated in a bio-terror drill titled “Dark Winter,” which simulated a smallpox attack on American soil. Cheney and Libby took special interest in this exercise, and Libby was interviewed by Miller in her epic book, “Germs,” where she reported his view of weaponized smallpox at length. Those are some of the points Scahill makes in the proper context.

Jeremy Scahill’s report for The Nation can be read here: http://www.thenation.com/doc/20051128/scahill
The Democracy Now transcript quoted above can be read here: http://www.democracynow.org/article.pl? ... 10/1527211

WHO IS JEROME HAUER?
Jerome Hauer is a Bio-Warfare expert who is well known in New York City for having created former mayor Rudolph Giuliani’s Office of Emergency Management (OEM) in World Trade Center 7 – the building that inexplicably imploded in a freefall on September 11, 2001, without having been hit by an airplane. Hauer’s corporate affiliations include SAIC, Batelle, CSC-DynCorp, Hollis-Eden, and one of the nation’s most powerful private investigative and security firms Kroll Inc., among others. Now BioPort has been added to his resume.

On the eve of 9/11, in NYC, Hauer was having drinks with his close friend, the recently retired FBI Agent and “Osama-Chaser,” John O’Neil. At that time O’Neil was the head of security at the World Trade Center complex, a position Hauer had helped him to get. O’Neil died in the World Trade Center on 9/11, and it was Hauer who identified his body.

Hauer was quoted by Newsday staff writer Laurie Garrett on her personal blog as saying, “John O’Neill was head of the FBI’s counterterrorism branch in Washington. He led every important investigation you can name — the USS Cole, Tanzania, Kenya bombings. He retired three weeks ago. I helped him get the job as head of security for the World Trade Center.And the irony is, the guy he chased for most of his career killed him.”

See Crossing the Rubicon, chapter 23, pages 421-426 for references and more information on Hauer.


http://anthraxvaccine.blogspot.com/2007 ... rd-of.html
Monday, June 18, 2007
Emergent Biosolutions/Bioport Board of Directors; How to sell to the US Government
Joe M. Allbaugh. Mr. Allbaugh was Chief of Staff to President George W. Bush from 1995 through 1999 when he was Governor of Texas. Mr. Allbaugh was later Director of the Federal Emergency Management Agency.

Louis Sullivan, MD. Dr. Sullivan served as Secretary of Health and Human Services in the cabinet of President George H.W. Bush from March 1989 to January 1993.

Jerome Hauer. Mr. Hauer served as acting assistant secretary for public health emergency preparedness of HHS from June 2002 to November 2003 and as director of the office ... of public health preparedness of HHS from May 2002 to June 2002. He also is said to have been responsible for putting the NYC Emergency Center in the World Trade Center prior to 9/11/2001.

Sue Bailey, D.O. Dr. Bailey served as Assistant Secretary of Defense for Health Affairs under President Clinton, where she headed the $17 billion military medical system, coordinating the care for 8 million beneficiaries. After leaving the Defense Department, she became the head of the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration.

From http://www.safetyforum.com/hoarlist/

"Sue Bailey, acting NHTSA administrator during the final months of the Clinton Administration, was the government's most visible official during congressional hearings and the controversy that swirled around defective Firestone Wilderness tires and the role of the Ford Explorer in more than 200 American deaths. While questions remained about the safety of the Explorer, Bailey became a consultant to Ford. Ford wanted Bailey on-board because "this is a public health issue, and she is an expert on public health issues," according to Ford spokesman Jason Vines."

Zsolt Harsanyi, PhD. Zsolt P. Harsányi Ph.D. has been President of Porton International, a pharmaceutical company, since 1984. He has benefited from spinoff of technology developed at Porton Down, the UK's equivalent of Fort Detrick, as did Emergent's major stockholder, Fuad El-Hibri.

Ronald Richards. Mr. Richard served as Chief Operating Officer and managing partner of In-Q-Tel, the CIA's Venture Capital Fund, for 15 months.


Admiral William Crowe, former Chairman of the Board., was also a former head of the Joint Chiefs of Staff and Ambassador to the United Kingdom. He has sold the Bioport shares he was given to act in this capacity, and is no longer affiliated with Emergent Biosolutions/Bioport. Reporter Bob Evans discussed how Bioport came to "earn" windfall profits.

[Nordic]

http://www.wtop.com/?sid=1456275&nid=25

Attorney: Ivins never knew he was 'the suspect'

WASHINGTON - As the government pegs the blame for the 2001 deadly attacks on one Army biologist, the attorney for scientist Bruce Ivins says his client never knew he was "the suspect" in the attacks.

"We were never informed or advised that an indictment was imminent of him," attorney Tom DeGonia tells WTOP. DeGonia's broadcast interview is Ivins' lawyers' first interview since Ivins committed suicide.

[Jeff]

Thanks to the lurking tipster for this...

Ivins was allegedly a poster on Above Top Secret, where he disclosed his obsession with the sorority:

http://www.thesmokinggun.com/archive/ye ... hrax8.html

Though ATS seems strangely quiet about it:

http://www.abovetopsecret.com/forum/thread379556/pg1

Also, the cited post doesn't appear to be found on ATS. (There is this thread about the sorority, but nothing from his alleged username.)

On edit: Apparently the explanation from ATS is the post was made on their old "anonymous board" which it seems was deleted in its entirety eight months ago.

[Wilbur Whatley]

Microbiologist says she was stalked by Ivins

By BEN NUCKOLS, Associated Press Writer 1 hour, 37 minutes ago

BALTIMORE - A microbiologist claims she was stalked for decades by Bruce Ivins, the suspect in the deadly anthrax mailings of 2001 who, according to court documents, was obsessed with the sorority she joined in college.

Nancy L. Haigwood and her former husband, Carl J. Scandella, also think Ivins may have wanted to get close to her when he moved in down the street from the couple in the suburbs of Washington in the early 1980s. . . .
http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20080809/ap_ ... estigation


*********
I've been quite vehement that I thought it was an FBI frame job against Ivins. All the so-called evidence so far has seemed laughly incomplete and incredible to me. But the above article may put things in a new light. Unlike the crazy social worker, this witness seems credible. In many ways it would be a relief if it was just this one lone guy. In any event, after this I'm back to reserving judgment.

[hava1]

ITAMAR SHALIT, MD
Director, Pediatric Infectious Disease Unit, Schneider Children's Medical Center
Dr. Shalit obtained his MD from Tel Aviv University Sackler School of Medicine, completed a fellowship in Pediatric Infectious Diseases at the University of Oklahoma and an MPA Degree at Harvard University. Dr. Shalit brings to BioLineRx years of experience in research and clinical trials including collaborations with international pharmaceutical companies such as Bayer AG, Smith-Klein-Beecham, Eli Lilly, Glaxo Group Research and Miles Pharmaceuticals. Dr. Shalit has a broad background in R&D both in his former capacity in R&D positions in the IDF Medical Corps, and as a researcher and consultant to various companies, VCs and incubators. His main areas of research include the study of immunomodulatory effects of quinolones, the study of anti-inflammatory and signal transduction mechanisms and study of novel anti-fungal agents and their combinations. Dr. Shalit is a long-standing member of several Israel Ministry of Health committees focusing on designing the national vaccination program, preparedness against bio-terrorism and eradication of poliomyelitis. Dr. Shalit received a Certificate of Appreciation from the World Health Organization (WHO) for his contribution and outstanding efforts and success in poliomyelitis eradication in Israel. Dr. Shalit is the author of over 70 publications in leading scientific journals and chapters in textbooks and currently serves as the Chairman of the Israeli Society for Infectious Diseases.

http://www.biolinerx.com/aboutUsScientific.asp

This guy, ITamar Shalit, is also mentioned re the "anthrax vaccine" corruption in Israeli bio=warfare program.

It is strange, IMHO, that these scientists are allowed to make private big money out of their knowledge, which they obtain via their gov work. This doc is accused by the "guinea pig" soldiers, as yet another one having conflict of interests. the soldiers were and are not told what their "vaccine" contains to date. Apparently, not because its a state secrets BUT to protect industrial secrets. amazing

THis also brings to mind a Brittish BBC detective series I watched which actually "predicted" the Ivins scenario. Its that series about the "special intel unit" which is quite popular. The story I saw was about a "terror attack" committed via internet (the terrorist hacks vital computer systems, like a pharmaceutical production line, banks, and then traffic lights ) and leaves "radical moslem" threats...and leads them to a moslem group. Gradually it turns out its one of their own computer experts who just wanted to make loads of money and retire. But they trick him by poisoning the diamonds he demands as ransom. He touches the diamonds and dies. (which can give a clue as to how Ivins might have been "suicided", maybe his tylenol capsules were poisoned with something invisible, some poison). I remember watching this chapter and wondering where the f..k they got this idea.

The insider in that plot was motivated by greed, after most of his colleagues retired to the private market and made lots of money and remained a gov employee, and wanted to retire with a small fortune as well.

[Nordic]

I've been quite vehement that I thought it was an FBI frame job against Ivins. All the so-called evidence so far has seemed laughly incomplete and incredible to me. But the above article may put things in a new light. Unlike the crazy social worker, this witness seems credible. In many ways it would be a relief if it was just this one lone guy. In any event, after this I'm back to reserving judgment.

Why? What does his obsession, romantic, sexual, or otherwise, have to do with him turning into a mass-murder terrorist using anthrax?

Absolutely nothing.

Hm, let's see, say I'm the FBI and I want to pin this on some patsy. Who would I choose to be the patsy? The boring, infallible guy? Or the troubled, obsessive freak?

I'll take troubled obsessive freak for $500, Alex.

This is what spooks do. They get dirty people to do their dirty work, and conversely, when they want to frame people, they pick the most easily framed, those with personal problems, issues, mental health problems. If you're gonna "suicide" someone, hell, pick someone who's depressed and with personal problems for God's sake!

[8bitagent]

Thanks to the lurking tipster for this...

Ivins was allegedly a poster on Above Top Secret, where he disclosed his obsession with the sorority:

http://www.thesmokinggun.com/archive/ye ... hrax8.html

Though ATS seems strangely quiet about it:

http://www.abovetopsecret.com/forum/thread379556/pg1

Also, the cited post doesn't appear to be found on ATS. (There is this thread about the sorority, but nothing from his alleged username.)

On edit: Apparently the explanation from ATS is the post was made on their old "anonymous board" which it seems was deleted in its entirety eight months ago.

Ivins posted on the world's most famous conspiracy forum? Oh man, that's too much.

Georgewashington's Blog has been having a steady stream of great
articles that explores various sides of the anthrax case that blow it wide open:
http://georgewashington.blogspot.com/

[stickdog99]

Microbiologist says she was stalked by Ivins

By BEN NUCKOLS, Associated Press Writer 1 hour, 37 minutes ago

BALTIMORE - A microbiologist claims she was stalked for decades by Bruce Ivins, the suspect in the deadly anthrax mailings of 2001 who, according to court documents, was obsessed with the sorority she joined in college.

Nancy L. Haigwood and her former husband, Carl J. Scandella, also think Ivins may have wanted to get close to her when he moved in down the street from the couple in the suburbs of Washington in the early 1980s. . . .
http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20080809/ap_ ... estigation


*********
I've been quite vehement that I thought it was an FBI frame job against Ivins. All the so-called evidence so far has seemed laughly incomplete and incredible to me. But the above article may put things in a new light. Unlike the crazy social worker, this witness seems credible. In many ways it would be a relief if it was just this one lone guy. In any event, after this I'm back to reserving judgment.

What does being strangely obsessed with a sorority have to do with mass murdering media and political figures?

[mentalgongfu2]

What does being strangely obsessed with a sorority have to do with mass murdering media and political figures?

It's called the oogie-boogie factor. A classic rhetorical and media technique.

[timetunneler]

Microbiologist says she was stalked by Ivins

By BEN NUCKOLS, Associated Press Writer 1 hour, 37 minutes ago

BALTIMORE - A microbiologist claims she was stalked for decades by Bruce Ivins, the suspect in the deadly anthrax mailings of 2001 who, according to court documents, was obsessed with the sorority she joined in college.

Nancy L. Haigwood and her former husband, Carl J. Scandella, also think Ivins may have wanted to get close to her when he moved in down the street from the couple in the suburbs of Washington in the early 1980s. . . .
http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20080809/ap_ ... estigation


*********
I've been quite vehement that I thought it was an FBI frame job against Ivins. All the so-called evidence so far has seemed laughly incomplete and incredible to me. But the above article may put things in a new light. Unlike the crazy social worker, this witness seems credible. In many ways it would be a relief if it was just this one lone guy. In any event, after this I'm back to reserving judgment.

It probably still is a frame job. Whenever the FBI and the government need to dig up that some guy likes himself some college "tail" to prove he is "bad".... well it just shows you they are desperate.

It's ridiculous. The truth of the matter is that Ivins was probably chosen (if he truly was involved) BECAUSE he has certain weaknesses that can be exploited by those manipulating him. He probably was not working alone. Same thing with the 9/11 hijackers. FBI released all of this information that the 9/11 hijackers liked tits and ass. Just the FBI doing what it does best... dredging up information to blackmail people into compliance. They did it with MLK Jr... even tried to get him to kill himself like they did to Ivins. (If that is what they did)

It is being done to John Edwartds IMHO(the blackmail stuff). Can you imagine what would have happend if he was the presidential nominee? I wonder now if they have something on Obama.

The truth of the matter is the US government is riddled through and through with a blackmail machine born in the late 60s with the aid of the likes of FBI, South Korean Intelligence Bo Hi Pak and his "Little Angels", Right wing Mailing lists, Craig Spence and his fuck house rigged with two way mirrors, mics and hidden cameras, Moon and the Times and boy hos in the White House, Jeff Gannon in the White House... a whole right wing machine that seeks to cripple the left into inaction by blackmailing them so that they can install a Nazi in the white house.

Anyone remember how James Earl Ray had ordered the video editing equipment, the 8mm camera and the 20 foot remote control?

Who still doesn't get what this is all about? How everything is being controlled? And why NOTHING ever gets done? Who doesn't get it???

[StarmanSkye]

Crissakes ... He 'wins' the nation's highest civilian honor presented personally by top brass White himself, and then despite mounting 'suspicion' of his involvement is allowed to keep his highest security clearance and keep working with bio-warfare germs. Spells "SET_UP" to me, fer shure. Poor sap, tho no doubt without his own ethically-challenged decisions and motivations and goals, even with some sincere desire to protect the nation's people -- more than the rotton-filthy SOBs who under deep-secrecy worked behind his cover as a disinfo feint & fall-guy front -- that's what the manipulatred, strained evidence aka alotta circumstantial hypothisesizing and speculation, fudging up the by-now cold tracks the real perps invariably left, likely intersecting the White House, Pentagon, London, Tel Aviv, Wall Street, Tokyo, Denver, Texas A&M, Harvard, NY Times, Wash. Post, Fox News (sic), Brezinski, Rumsfeld, Kissinger, Cheney, Sec. State Rice, US security council, and so forth.

'Sacrificed' for the 'greatest good' according to the Fed Security State Combine -- or whatever else ya wanna call it, ie. Shadow Government, though it's tentacles are invariably transnationalized, corporatized, racketeered, offshored, outsourced, in-house, Federalized, locally-represented, militarized, semi-autonomous, extensively-networked, etc.

[seemslikeadream]

The Case Still Isn't Closed


When the FBI publicly branded the late Dr. Bruce Ivins as the anthrax killer, it unsealed court affidavits suggesting a possible motive for the mailing to one target: NBC anchor Tom Brokaw. According to the affidavits, Ivins was angry about repeated Freedom of Information Act requests from Gary Matsumoto, identified as "an investigative journalist who worked for NBC News" who was looking into Ivins's work on an anthrax vaccine. "Tell Matsumoto to kiss my ass," the affidavit says Ivins wrote in an Aug. 28, 2001, e-mail, noting that was "weeks" before the Sept. 18, 2001, anthrax mailing addressed to Brokaw. But Matsumoto told NEWSWEEK the FBI never interviewed him as part of its investigation. If it had, he says, he could have told them he'd actually left NBC News five years earlier. At the time he was bombarding Ivins's lab with FOIA requests, he was employed by ABC. "They're trying to connect dots that don't connect," he said.

http://www.newsweek.com/id/151784

[Jeff]

The truth of the matter is that Ivins was probably chosen (if he truly was involved) BECAUSE he has certain weaknesses that can be exploited by those manipulating him.

I agree. I think there's a quote up-thread from one of his colleagues, saying the FBI kept pressing until it found the weakest point, and Ivins was the most fragile, and they broke him.

[seemslikeadream]

http://www.democraticunderground.com/di ... 89x3768930

Did Anthrax Powder Come from Dugway Proving Ground?
Posted by AntiFascist on Sun Aug-10-08 02:05 AM

Searching the web, I've come across some interesting information regarding the nature of the anthrax traced to Dr. Ivins.

First of all, it may be important to note that Ivins co-authored a research paper outlining the use of aerosolized anthrax on rhesus monkeys, so in fact he was using live anthrax spores in aerosolized form on live subjects to test effectiveness of anthrax vaccines:

http://www.anthrax.osd.mil/documents/li ... mental.pdf



...

B.anthracis challenge

Spores of the virulent B. anthracis Ames strain
were harvested from shaking broth ... After minute respiratory volumes
were measured, animals were exposed in a head-only chamber to a spore
aerosol generated by a three-jet Collison nebulizer.

Note, this alone does NOT prove that Dr. Ivins handled powdered anthrax in his facility as part of his testing, but could he have been testing weaponized anthrax on the rhesus monkeys?

The following blog questions whether the material in the flask was already treated with advanced materials (weaponized):

http://achievingourcountry.blogspot.com ... -case.html

Several crucial pieces of information are missing here. First, we don't have the amount of material that is in RMR-1029 or its status in terms of processing with regard to purity or possible processing to weaponize it. In later sections of the warrant, Ivins is said to also refer to this flask interchangeably as "Dugway Ames Spores -- 1997", so it is entirely possible that the spores in RMR-1029 are treated with advanced materials.

...

So we do know that the material in RMR-1029 is highly purified. We still don't know if it is treated in any way to make it more dangerous. We also know that the flask is "large" but still have no idea how much material is there.

This New Scientist article from 2002 notes:

http://www.newscientist.com/article/dn2 ... train.html

So strain D seems to have come from Dugway. The difference between D and the attack strain is not great - there are 36 adenines in a row, instead of 35 - but Keim's team made doubly sure by sequencing that part of the D strain's genome.

This New Scientist article dated Aug. 7, 2008 notes that Ivins was the sole custodian of spores produced by the Army at Dugway:

http://www.newscientist.com/channel/bei ... news_rss20

Crucially, they say Ivins was "sole custodian" of a single batch of spores of the Ames strain of anthrax, produced at the army's Dugway facility in Utah in 1997 and stored in a containment lab at USAMRIID.

Then there is this odd claim!

The documents say little about the most difficult step in the process – producing a fine, dry spore powder. They say Ivins simply grew fresh bacteria from the batch for each round of mailings, then dried them.

Their only basis for this claim is that two envelopes addressed to the media also contained a common soil bacterium, which they say got in during culture.

There are other ways such a contaminant could get in, however. The Dugway material should already have been powdered, and the attacker could simply have packaged it, which would have required little skill.

Finally, as I have noted in previous posts, there is this Baltimore Sun article from 2001 where it is noted:

http://www.ph.ucla.edu/epi/bioter/anthr ... pores.html

Most anthrax testing at Dugway, in a barren Utah desert 87 miles southwest of Salt Lake City, is done using the killed spores to reduce the chance of accidental exposure of workers there. But some experiments require live anthrax, milled to the tiny particle size expected on a battlefield, to test both decontamination techniques and biological agent detection systems, the sources say.

...

Anthrax is also grown at the U.S. Army Medical Research Institute of Infectious Diseases at Fort Detrick, where it is used chiefly to test the effectiveness of vaccines in animals. But that medical program uses a wet aerosol fog <see research article above> of anthrax rather than the dry powder used in the attacks and at Dugway, according to interviews and medical journal articles based on the research.

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Scientists familiar with the anthrax program at Dugway described it to The Sun on the condition that they not be named. The offensive program made hundreds of kilograms of anthrax for bombs designed to kill enemy troops over hundreds of square miles. Dugway's Life Sciences Division makes the deadly spores in far, far smaller quantities, rarely accumulating more than 10 grams at a time, according to one Army official.

Scientists estimate that the letter sent to Senate Majority Leader Tom Daschle originally contained about 2 grams of anthrax, about one-sixteenth of an ounce, or the weight of a dime. But its extraordinary concentration - in the range of 1 trillion spores per gram - meant that the letter could have contained 200 million times the average dose necessary to kill a person. Dugway's weapons-grade anthrax has been milled to achieve a similar concentration, according to one person familiar with the program.