JERRY STARR Author of The Lessons of the Vietnam War, Starr said today: “The U.S. government is openly manipulating the construction of the Iraqi government. For the past half century, the U.S. has intervened in elections on behalf of candidates and parties considered most responsive to U.S. interests, including Iran and Guatemala in 1954, Vietnam…

On Monday the New York Times reported on the “White House Memo” — secret minutes, taken by a high British official, of a White House meeting between President Bush and British Prime Minister Tony Blair in January 2003. Highlights of the memo were first published this year in January in the book Lawless World: America…

LARRY BIRNS Birns is director of the Council on Hemispheric Affairs based in Washington. He said today: “Immigration is a bilateral issue very much involving Mexico, and must be addressed as such, with comprehensive strategies that treat not just the symptoms (illegal workers in the U.S.) but the illness as well (Latin America’s lack of…

CHARLIE SAVAGE Savage is Justice Department correspondent for the Boston Globe. In a piece published Friday headlined “Bush Shuns Patriot Act Requirement,” Savage reported: “When President Bush signed the reauthorization of the USA Patriot Act this month, he included an addendum saying that he did not feel obliged to obey requirements that he inform Congress…

ROBERT PARRY In early 2005, Parry wrote the article “Bush’s ‘Death Squads,’” which examined the “Salvador Option” in Iraq, referring to the 1980s U.S. government’s “supporting El Salvador’s right-wing security forces, which operated clandestine ‘death squads’ to eliminate both leftist guerrillas and their civilian sympathizers.” Parry is editor of ConsortiumNews.com. He broke many of the…

DAHR JAMAIL Jamail, who has spent extensive time in war-torn Iraq, is author of the recent article “Iraq: Permanent U.S. Colony.” He said today: “Bush refuses to set a timetable for withdrawal from Iraq because he doesn’t intend to withdraw. He doesn’t intend to because he’s following a larger plan for the U.S. in the…

At this morning’s news conference, responding to a question from journalist Helen Thomas about the real reason for initiating the Iraq war, President Bush said: “I didn’t want war. … No president wants war. … And the world said, ‘Disarm, disclose or face serious consequences.’ And therefore, we worked with the world. We worked to…

KATHARINE GUN Gun is available for a limited number of interviews. Shortly before the U.S./U.K. invasion of Iraq, in early 2003, Gun was a British government employee when she leaked a U.S. intelligence memo indicating that the U.S. had mounted a spying “surge” against delegations on the U.N. Security Council in an effort to win…

NANCY LESSIN Lessin is co-founder of Military Families Speak Out, which is protesting the war with 50 events in 26 states listed on their web page. She can put media in touch with their members around the country. Lessin said today: “As we commemorate the third year of this war that should never have happened,…

Today, the Bush administration releases a major national security strategy document which reaffirms the U.S. policy of so-called “preemption” and depicts Iran and its nuclear program as major threats. Many advocates of striking at Iran’s nuclear facilities cite Israel’s 1981 bombing of an Iraqi nuclear facility. The following specialists are available for interviews: RICHARD WILSON…