Posted on 09/25/2003 10:18:36 AM PDT by Rutles4Ever
PARIS (Reuters) - Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld is the Ace of Spades and al Qaeda chief Osama bin Laden a Joker in a provocative pack of French playing cards depicting "the 52 most dangerous American officials."
A riposte to the "most-wanted" cards of Iraqi leaders issued to U.S. soldiers, the deck is the latest commercial offering by a radical thinktank whose conspiracy theory account of the September 11 attacks stormed French bestseller charts last year.
"We've already sold some 2,500 decks. That's not bad considering we couldn't find anyone who was willing to print them at first," said Thierry Meyssan, president of the Paris-based Reseau Voltaire group.
"We were shocked by the indecency of the cards distributed by the U.S. military. It was as if arresting people was some kind of game," Meyssan told Reuters on Thursday.
Two hundred packs of the original Pentagon-devised U.S. cards were sent to U.S. soldiers in Iraq. The American public has since snapped up hundreds of thousands of the decks, which portray Iraqi leader Saddam Hussein as the Ace of Spades.
The French cards bestow that honor not on President Bush but Rumsfeld. Under his mugshot, he is accused of using the September 11 attacks "to increase military budgets and plan an army in space that could completely dominate Earth."
As King of Diamonds -- the suit chosen to represent economic power in the U.S. administration -- Bush is described merely as "head of a baseball club... designated president of the United States by friends of his father at the Supreme Court."
In the 2000 election, the Court stopped a potentially decisive recount in Florida, a move that handed the presidency to Bush.
Osama bin Laden, whose al Qaeda network Washington blames for the September 11 attacks on U.S. landmarks, is a Joker described as "a CIA agent charged...with provoking a clash between the 'Arab-Muslim' and 'Judaeo-Christian' worlds."
Meyssan won notoriety for his book "L'Effroyable Imposture" ("The Appalling Fraud"), which suggested U.S. military insiders were probably behind the September 11 attacks. ($1=0.87 Euro)
Correct me if I'm wrong, but didn't almost every media recount, recounts intended to prove that Bush lost, find that if the recounts had gone as Gore had planned, Bush would have won anyway? I don't count Democrats.com here. There's no way they'd have ever found Bush to have won.
Welcome aboard!!!!!
We're oftentimes a surly bunch . . . but only because we're passionate about our country and the internet and websites like FR has given us silent-majority types an outlet to vent.
You'll like it here. FReepers, by and large, are a compassionate lot. And for those that aren't . . . just ignore us.
They are deliberately misinterpreting the cards. As I understand, the cards are not made of regular playing card material and will not withstand that use. The compact size makes them easy to carry and store. The deck is something of a mnenomic device.
In contrast the French assertions in the American deck are preposterous, dated and took how many months to contrive. Poor Lafeyette is turning in his grave.
The French hate Christians.
PARIS - The ace of spades? Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld gets the honor in a new French deck of cards. President Bush is the king of diamonds and Osama bin Laden the joker. The game takes a jab at the famous deck of cards created for U.S. soldiers hunting down ousted Iraqi leader Saddam Hussein and other leaders from the deposed regime.
President of the United States George W. Bush as King of Diamonds is part of a card deck depicting 'the 52 most dangerous American officials', sold by the French group Reseau Voltaire (Voltaire Network) is seen in this hand out photo. Caption under photograph reads : 'Head of a baseball club and director of Salem bin Laden's oil company (brother of Osama). Designated President of the United States by friends of his father at the Supreme Court before the vote count showed that he lost the elections'. A little over 2, 500 decks have been sold on the internet in recent weeks. (AP Photo/Reseau Voltaire)
"I found it completely indecent to present a manhunt as a game," said Thierry Meyssan, the man behind the French deck. "We thought this card game would allow us to ... explain why we consider the government of George Bush a threat to international security."
Meyssan is the author of a one-time French best seller, "9-11: The Big Lie," claiming that no plane ever crashed into the Pentagon on Sept. 11, and that the attacks were plotted by a faction within the U.S. military.
Now, Meyssan said in a telephone interview, he wants to expose "the 52 most dangerous American officials."
Meyssan heads the Voltaire Network, a left-wing association that put the cards on its Internet site.
A little over 2,500 decks a la francaise have been sold, at $9.20 each, on the Internet in recent weeks, Meyssan said. There are plans to sell the decks in stores soon and translate them into 10 languages, he said.
Each card carries a photo of the official and a text explaining the choice. Bush, as the king of diamonds, is described as "the president of a baseball club."
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