HTN to become Sports Century, Focus on Non-Mainstream Sports
Sports Illustrated, May 1997 Edition
Rupert Murdoch’s Hughes Television Network has rebranded as Sports Century following the signing of a deal with the WNBA and renewing deals with MLS[1]. The channel will focus on sports other than the mainstream ones, such as soccer, women’s sports, and non-US sports, to include the World Cup. Industry insiders are divided on whether Sports Century can compete with giants like ESPN and Turner, but many are sanguine that by grabbing the lesser-watched sports that they will gain a specific and neglected core audience.
CEFTA Expands, adds Baltics, Romania, Bulgaria
The Times of London, June 4th, 1997
Warsaw – In a new twist to the “Eastern Question”, the Central European Free Trade Agreement, or CEFTA, has expanded to include the former Soviet Bloc states of Romania and Bulgaria and the three former USSR breakaway Baltic Republics of Estonia, Latvia, and Lithuania. This expansion creates a contiguous free trade zone from the Baltic Sea to the Black Sea with some Western-leaning member states of Yugoslavia, like Croatia and Slovenia, reportedly urging Belgrade to join the agreement. While ostensibly a local trade alliance, CEFTA’s close economic ties to the EU make Moscow nervous even as they expand fossil fuel pipelines through the CEFTA member states. And a rarely-commented-upon defensive coordination clause included in the CEFTA bylaws hints at the beginnings of a defensive alliance, with most Eastern Watchers assuming Moscow to be the principal perceived antagonist in a future conflict. This quasi-alliance also stands between the USR and its non-contiguous Kaliningrad Oblast, adding to the stakes.
No official comments have come out of Moscow, where President Boris Yeltsin is facing increasing criticism from the right, but reports of a special closed-door session of the Duma and Cabinet hint to Moscow taking this very seriously indeed.
Times analysts believe that Moscow can do little about this at the moment but fume, but the issue will no doubt increase the stakes in the East. US President Al Gore called the move “a positive step towards economic recovery in Eastern Europe,” and send Secretary of State Andrew…
Cont’d on A3.
Federation For Sale: The Systemic Corruption of the USR
Newsweek, May 5th, 1997
Moscow – These gilded, towering corridors once saw the footfalls of Czars and their ministers. Peter and Catherine the Great plotted conquests and modernization schemes. Nicholas II made his ill-fated war strategy here. Lenin and Stalin and Khrushchev all made plans against the Capitalist West here. From silk-clad aristocrats to uniformed commissars, these have been the halls where power was meted out and influence peddled. And now a new power walks these halls: rich, connected businessmen in suits.
Some of them had little but the right familial connections when they were made into one of the world’s richest men. They may be the second-born son of a political ally or the new son-in-law of an FSB operative or Army General. But now they may be the proud owners of Caspian oil fields or municipal utilities. Such has been the post-Soviet “liberalization” of the economy. Experience and training mean less than having the right friends in high places. And the USR Federal Government has been willing to sell their former State-Owned infrastructure assets and resource rights for pennies on the dollar, robbing the USR citizens of what could have been a communal right[2].
Some have already called them “Oligarchs”, a small circle of ultra-wealthy, well-connected men who wield a disproportionate amount of power and influence. Many have ties to organized crime. Many of them receive positions of high office as well, though most don’t need these positions, for when several top Duma representatives have dined in your mansion on the Black Sea and you regularly share drinks with President Boris Yeltsin and Prime Minister Boris Nemtsov, what you need and want tend to happen anyway.
“Moscow has developed a very specific ‘pay for play’ system,” said economist George Saxon. “Connected men buy and sell connections and influence. State employees and elected officials sell off state-owned assets for a pittance in exchange for a kickback. There are no rules, no investigations, and no prosecutions, save for the occasional player who bit the hands that fed him.”
Such corruption is common in the member states and republics as well, with similar oligarchs walking the corridors of power in Kyiv, Minsk, Almaty, Ashgabat, and Baku, among others. “Rule of Law is a buyable asset,” said one anonymous source, who called the system “corruption personified”.
Many of these rising Oligarchs have begun investing in the west. Real estate, stock investments, and yachts appear to be the latest craze, and some have reportedly been eying sports teams. The acquiescence of western financial institutions to this systemic abuse has been deemed “problematic” by many watchdogs.
And more disturbing yet, the USR’s “privatized” arms manufacturers, who right now continue to flood the world with cheap weapons from small arms to armored vehicles to anti-aircraft missile systems, threaten to continue to destabilize the world order and fuel terrorism and insurgency.
Cont’d on Pg. 23…
Three Dead, Five Injured in Disneyland Gate Shooting
LA Times, July 10th, 1997
Anaheim – Three people, including the alleged shooter, are dead following gunfire at the entry gate to Disneyland. The suspect, armed with two automatic pistols, opened fire into the crowds lined up at the gates, killing two and injuring three others, including two children, before being shot and killed by responding security. Police and the FBI are investigating the event as a possible terrorist attack. We will report more details as they emerge[3].
NY AG Killed in Upstate Shooting
New York Times, August 13th, 1997
Rochester – New York State Attorney General Kathy Burstein (D-NY) was shot and killed today in an apparent assassination. A single suspect[4] has been captured, his name not yet released by authorities. Armed with a handgun, the suspect worked his way through the crowd at a campaign event in support of the re-election campaign of Senator Geraldine Ferraro (D-NY), whom some suspect was the primary target of the assassin. “Ferraro is a noted liberal and feminist,” said one source, “and has long been the subject of angry attacks in right wing internet outlets. The fact that we have a Republican governor, who could pick a Republican replacement until the 1998 election, could be a factor as well.”
Others cite Burstein herself as the target, an outspoken Lesbian woman whom many suspect planned to run for Governor. Certainly her dogged prosecution of firearms possession has made her a frequent target of criticism by Second Amendment advocates. NYC Assistant AG…
Cont’d on A2.
Explosion at Airbase in Saudi Arabia Kills Twelve Americans
The New York Times, August 23rd, 1997
Dhahran – A truck loaded with explosives detonated at the gate to the King Abdulaziz Air Base in Saudi Arabia, killing or injuring several US Service members, most of them Security Police, and several people living in adjacent structures. The truck, which carried an estimated 3000 to 5000 pounds of explosives, was attempting to enter the base, presumably intending to attack a more concentrated target, such as US barracks or command centers. No one has yet claimed responsibility, though already many are blaming Al Qaida, the Afghanistan-based terrorist organization behind the January 13th attacks on three civilian airliners with man-portable antiaircraft weapons, though they deny responsibility[5].
The attack commenced at 2:32 AM Saudi Time when…
Cont’d on A2.
Suspected Terror Plot Disrupted at US/Mexico Border
The San Antonio Express, September 29th, 1997
Eagle Pass – US Customs and Border Patrol Agents in cooperation with Mexican Federal Police disrupted a weapons-smuggling attempt with suspected links to Al Qaida last night. The pre-dawn raid, acting on an anonymous tip, captured Zacarias Moussaoui, a French citizen believed to have links to Islamic terrorism, who was meeting with a group of Mexican citizens believed to be a part of the Sinaloa Drug Gang. Captured at the scene were several “Grouse” man portable air defense (MANPAD) weapons, Kalashnikov style assault rifles, rocket propelled grenades, hand grenades, explosives, and other weapons. It is suspected that Moussaoui planned to use the weapons to attack civilian targets, likely to include domestic civil aircraft, most of which have not yet been fitted with the jammers now common on international flights.
“We have seen a marked increase in the availability of such military grade weapons near the border in recent years[6],” said Border Patrol Sergeant Javier…
Cont’d on A2.
“Who Says Who’s a Terrorist?”
The Politics of Domestic and International Terrorism
Newsweek, November 2nd, 1997 Edition
“He’s a violent, woman-objectifying religious fanatic with a sincere hatred of the US Government and its policies,” said Security Expert Damian Blanc in a speech at the World Security Forum 1997. “He’s well-armed, angry, motivated, and intent on imposing his fanatical religious views upon the rest of us, by violence if necessary.
“Now, am I talking about Ahmed from Al Qaida or Sammy from the Sword of Liberty? Taliban, or Tali-baptist?”
Blanc drew deserved criticism from many sides with this inflammatory statement, but it did manage to capture the ironic crux of the debate now playing out in the halls of Congress as the left and right debate what constitutes the greater threat: the domestic terrorism of SoL and its imitators and allies or the foreign terrorism of Al Qaida and Hezbollah. It’s a debate that on the surface would seem to be pretty obvious: both are a serious, even existential threat to American civilians. And yet domestic politics has muddied the waters as some members of the Republican Party, increasingly reliant on its nativist wing with the rise of the Reform Party and its controversial shunning of Pat Buchannan, try to downplay the domestic threat. Many parts of the US South, West, and Midwest are to at least some degree culturally and politically in alignment with the White Christian Nationalism at the heart of SoL and its fellow Militant White Nationalist Organizations, in spirit if not in practice. And while most of them condemn the groups’ tactics, they at least can sympathize with its worries and fears of “losing ground” to the “other” as the share of non-white citizens increases relative to whites and the number of Americans who self-identify as Christian steadily decreases[7].
“It’s a Catch-22,” said an anonymous Republican strategist. “If they condemn SoL it could cost them in the primaries, particularly when they’ve been heavily Gerrymandered, but if they modulate their position [on SoL] it can screw them in the general [election]. It’s best to just downplay the threat and change the subject. And for Dems in solid red areas, they face the opposite conundrum. It’s little surprise that so many are going Stripeback,” he added, referring to the trend of some candidates in more solidly conservative or liberal areas to ally with the Reform Party.
“Osama Bin Laden threw them a lifeline,” said an obviously bitter James Carville. “With a scary brown Muslim face to pin to terrorism, it gives the Newts and the Bucks [nativists in the Gingrich or Buchannan mold] a chance to point out the mote in someone else’s eye while ignoring the beam in their own. The messed-up thing is that this just might give us some common ground when talking border security and immigration! Stopping guns at the border benefits all, both for obvious reasons and for partisan political ones.”
Behind closed doors, however, Republicans are scared. They know that this is a losing issue for them on the national scale, even as it can be a winner on the local level. “We can’t be the party that apologizes for terrorism,” said one GOP lawmaker. “Besides, many of us were here when the FBI bombing happened. We could feel the shockwave. That bomb could just as easily have been blown up outside the Capitol or the Congressional Offices. But how do you call it out in the local election without cutting your own throat?”
They also fear that if they don’t play along to some degree, whoever comes next could be worse. “Besides,” said the same lawmaker, “we could lose our seats to some actual SoL sympathizer or conspiracy theorist, and then those lunatics would have a voice in Congress! Can you imagine a sitting US representative talking about International Jewish conspiracies or other John Birch madness or spouting KKK talking points on White Replacement?”
But other GOP voices are speaking out. Arizona Senator John McCain specifically called out his fellow Republicans for their, in his words, “wishy-washy” take on SoL. “They [SoL] can call themselves ‘Patriots’ and ‘Christians’ all they want,” he said in a controversial speech at the RNC. “The truth is that they’re neither. They’re murderous savages, no better than Bin Laden. And any true Conservative Republican should reject them without hesitation.”
Florida GOP Senator Jeb Bush expressed similar sentiments, albeit in less confrontational terms. “The heart of the issue is that we, as Republicans and Conservatives, need to speak to the concerns that have led so many Americans to in some way sympathize with these groups, even as we reject the groups themselves. We need to address the loss of jobs and the erosion of morality that have left so many Americans desperate and afraid. We need to address immigration in a meaningful way. We need to secure our borders, not just against rockets but against drugs and human trafficking. In short, we need to stop brushing aside the problem and go after the root causes.”
Other Republicans have attacked the Democrats for using the SoL as a political wedge issue. “The Dems would have you believe that there’s no difference between a conservative evangelical and a KKK terrorist,” said South Carolina Representative Lindsey Graham. “They’ll try to tar brush us all as cut from the same cloth. It’s dishonest and reprehensible. How can you make common cause with people who regularly call you a terrorist?”
“Yeah, Lindsey, no [expletive deleted],” said Detroit lawyer and political activist Keith Ellison in response, a Muslim who many speculate is considering a political run. “As a Muslim man, I have a better idea than you think about what it’s like to work with people who ‘regularly call you a terrorist’. Have you tried not tar brushing all Muslims for the actions of Osama? Maybe not smear Amir from Dearborn who had nothing to do with Dhahran? Consider this God’s wake-up call that it’s time to judge people by their character, not their labels.”
The issue has also caused a growing rift within the American Christian community itself, one with clear racial and generational divides. At this year’s Southern Baptist Convention, 19-year-old Enoch McAllister of Knoxville, Tennessee, who sported a T-Shirt saying “Real Christians Reject Violence and Hate”, told us, “The SoL has rejected the very core tenants of the Gospels, which encourage us to love our enemies, reject violence and vengeance, and turn the other cheek. The way we deliver the Good News is through compassion and service, not bombs and bullets.” When asked about recent statements by the Reverend Jerry Falwell, a keynote speaker at the Convention, which overtly implied that the SoL’s victims had ‘brought God’s wrath upon themselves,’ McAllister simply sighed, shook his head, and said, “I’ll be praying for him.”
But as the debate over the politics of religion and terrorism continues, some see hope for a mutually beneficial outcome. “Right now, we have entire segments of the agricultural industry that are wholly or largely dependent upon non-citizen labor,” said Colorado Reform party member and former Vice Presidential candidate Dick Lamm. “We have an outdated immigration system that stymies getting our farmers the labor that they need while simultaneously incentivizing the cross-border smuggling that also transports guns and drugs. Is it not time for a grand compromise?”
Lamm was joined in his calls for an immigration/border security compromise by McCain, who saw the opportunity for…
Cont’d on Pg. 23.
[1] Idea by
@El Pip.
[2] A severe lack of Rule of Law or traditions of just institutions make the collapsing USSR subject to corruption in just about any timeline. Here Nemtsov is the recipient of the largess rather than Putin. How will this play out? Stay tuned.
[3] The shooter will be determined to be a mentally ill man who frequented far right message boards and will be deemed a Lone Wolf.
[4] Will be determined to be a Lone Wolf shooter, though he was “influenced” by right wing online message boards.
[5] Yes, this timeline’s
Khobar Towers bombing. Here the rocket attacks against airliners and availability of cheap USR-made weapons means that the US and Saudis put up hard physical barriers (walls) rather than fences, expecting rocket attacks. This results in preventing the bombing per our timeline, forcing the attackers to settle for the only available “soft target”, the front gate. As per our timeline blame will be initially assigned to Al Qaida but eventually linked to Iran and Hezbollah.
[6] YURI!!!!
[7] This is in alignment with our timeline, not unique to this one. According to a recent
Pew Research study, the number of Americans who self-identified as “Christian” has dropped steadily since the early 1970s, from 90% in ’72 to about 64% today, mostly from native-born Americans leaving the Christian Church, not due to non-Christian immigration, with trends indicating it could be below 50% by 2070.
