The Great American Novel by Martyn Joseph Also a film being made called The Great American Novel

Because the Bilderberg Group runs the world,That, for Example, the U.S. is really a one party system with two different factions, though you think it's two parties
President Bil Clinton who was voted in twice as a very popular President who had a public image and still does as the people representing, being described as the New Domocrat to sort out problem the other party caused...but as to all comes to light now Bill Clinton appears to have been working with and suported into office by the same groups that the previous and future USA Presidents were members of and supported by groups like:
The Bilderberg Group, The Freemasons, The Catholic Mafia, The Trilateral Commission, The Council On Foreign Relations and The Skull and Bone Society etc.
Note that President Bill Clinton was Preceded by George H. W. Bush senior

George H. W. Bush

41st President of the United States

In office
January 20, 1989 – January 20, 1993

Vice President Dan Quayle

Preceded by Ronald Reagan

Succeeded by Bill Clinton

43rd Vice President of the United States

In office
January 20, 1981 – January 20, 1989

President Ronald Reagan

Preceded by Walter Mondale

Succeeded by Dan Quayle

11th Director of Central Intelligence

In office
January 30, 1976 – January 20, 1977

President Gerald Ford

Preceded by William E. Colby

Succeeded by


41st President of the United States
In office January 20, 1989 – January 20, 1993
Vice President	Dan Quayle
Preceded by	Ronald Reagan
Succeeded by	Bill Clinton
43rd Vice President of the United States
In office January 20, 1981 – January 20, 1989
President	Ronald Reagan
Preceded by	Walter Mondale
Succeeded by	Dan Quayle
11th Director of Central Intelligence
In office January 30, 1976 – January 20, 1977
President	Gerald Ford
Preceded by	William E. Colby
Succeeded by

and

Succeeded by George W. Bush

Presidency of George W. Bush

43rd President of the United States

In office
January 20, 2001 – January 20, 2009

Vice President Dick Cheney

Preceded by Bill Clinton

Succeeded by Barack Obama

Born July 6, 1946 (age 63)
New Haven, Connecticut

Political party Republican

Spouse(s) Laura Bush

Residence Crawford, Texas

Occupation Businessman (Oil, Baseball),President of the United States

Religion United Methodist

Signature

Presidency of George W. Bush

43rd President of the United States
In office January 20, 2001 – January 20, 2009
Vice President	Dick Cheney
Preceded by	Bill Clinton
Succeeded by	Barack Obama

Born	July 6, 1946 (age 63) New Haven, Connecticut
Political party	Republican
Spouse(s)	Laura Bush
Residence	Crawford, Texas
Occupation	Businessman (Oil, Baseball),President of the United States
Religion	United Methodist
Signature

who are the most well known Presidents to be members of, suported by and involved heavily by groups like:
The Bilderberg Group, The Freemasons, The Trilateral Commission, The Council On Foreign Relations and The Skull and Bone Society etc.

42nd President of the United States
Bill Clinton

In office January 20, 1993 – January 20, 2001
Vice President	Al Gore
Preceded by	George H. W. Bush
Succeeded by	George W. Bush

As clearly evidenced and described by Western Australia author Stephen Carew-Reid in his series of books called The Triumph of Truth ( Who's Watching The Watchers?)

power groups such as the Catholic Mafia and the Freemasons, who Stephen Carew-Reid clearly proves is his books,

Stephen Carew-Reid speaking at a Melbourne High School Old Boys lunchon in Melbourne about his experiences of over 5,000 court hearings in the Magistrates, Local, District, Supreme Federal and High Courts in Australia arguing with the judiciary. Even though Stephen Carew-Reid has no formal legal qualifications other than a Bachelor of Commerce Degree in which he majored in law subjects, economic, accounting and business management subjects, he has a lor more actual court room experience in all courts in Australia that all his friends he went to university and school with that became qualified lawyers and has bee up against the best legal grains in the country. When Stephen Carew-Reid issued his large action for conspiracy to defraud his family and himself for $100 million against 69 of the most influential people and organisation in the legal, political, business, public trustee, government, court, prosecution, police ans other circles in Western Australia in the Federal Court of Australia in Canberra ( the capital city of Australia known as the Australian Capital Territory-ACT) the defendants included Supreme Court Judges, magistrates, senior police, senior crown prosecutors, senior government and political people,powerful billionaire business people, powerful high level public Trustees, senior accountants, lawyers and barrsiters and others including the John Howard the Prime Minister of Australia at the time. It was this legal action that prompted these powerful people and organisations to take the drastic step of have Stephen Carew-Reid falsely arrested in Canberra and flown to Western Australia by Government Royal Australian Air Forrce (RAAF) plane to an RAAF base at Pierce in Perth Western Australia and taken before a Freemason Judge, Justice Wiliaims who instead of setting a trial date where Stephen Carew-Reid had the opportunity to defend these false charges,against him, Justice Williams made an order to have Stephen Carew-Reid sent to a mental institution to have try and have him permanently declared insane so that he could not longer speak out against these people and what he had said his his books could permanently buried. Stephen Carew-Reid has stated in his new 9th Volume of his book series The Triumph of Truth-Who Is Watching The Watchers, after the first 8 volumes were wrongfully and illegally removed out of the Western Australian State Battye Library and the original manuscripts were stolen by Freemason Queensland Police from a friend's home in the Gold Coast, Queensland in a robbery organised by the Police, that sending some to an insane asylum, as an alternative way than killing that person, is another method powerful secret society members used to silence a critic that try to publicly expose them.

"Provocative, frightening, informative, humorous- Your view and knowledge of the way the legal, police, political, public trustee business circles operate in Western Australia will never be the same.. after reading these volumes...A must real for present and budding legal eagles, police, politicians, litigants in person, anyone interested in and/or studying the law or the legal system, high school students, also anyone wanting to search for the truth and/or just interested in a book that is about a unique situation where one takes on City Hall which has unlimited resources and gives them a run for it's money - with little and very little resources to fight City Hall with. It has been described as a real David V Goliath affair, and also described by Ian Wilson, Western Australian solicitor, as one of the greatest legal debacles he has ever seen in his legal practice. Ian Wilson tried to negotiate an amicable settlement many years ago without success. The Public Trustee and the Western Australian Government felt there were simply too powerful and untouchable to bother with negotiating in a reasonable manner. Now they are among 69 respondents, including judges, magistrate, senior police, senior prosecutors, senior politicians, well known lawyers and barristers, public trustee accountants and managers, court officers etc., being sued in The Australian Federal Court for conspiracy to defraud the Carew-Reid Family, who are asking $100 million in damages.. Volume 2-Edition 3 is about 1,100 pages plus photos........" Australian Weekend News publishers of The Triumph of Truth (Who's Watching The Watchers?)
The Triumph of Truth (Who Is Watching The Watchers?) by Stephen Carew-Reid volumes one to nine, original manuscripts of the first 8 volumes stolen by Queensland Police in Australia to try and cover up the information in these volumes
and illegally removed from the Western Australian Batye Resource Library without any court order from pressure from State Government Law Office
http://usaweeklynews.com/TriumphOfTruth_Book.php http://www.usaweekendnews.com/TriumphOfTruthBookStolen.html
Click here to check the strange justice in Australia http://usaweeklynews.com/Mickleberg_Conspiracy.php

I understand that is the way the former Chief of the CIB, Donald Hancock loved to refer to himself, using the monicker, Hard Man. In fact nothing could be further from the truth. This bloke was best referred to as a businessman licensed to carry arms. His main claim to fame was the fact he had the Mickelberg brothers convicted of the Mint Swindle. History has now seen them exonerated and paid compensation. Instead of taking the way of the hard men, Hancock and his cohorts took the short easy way. There was not enough evidence for a conviction, so take the law into your own hands and manufacture some! There were two competing sets of rules for this high ranking and highly rank cop, one for him and his feckless lot and another for the rest of the community. Cop it sweet.Infamously Hancock was once recorded by Ray and Peter Mickelberg on a covert tape that is illuminating of his techniques, bullying and scornful disregard for lawful conduct. It was played to the High Court of Australia.Hancock went to his grave as the only murder suspect over the shooting of a man in the back from ambush at night in the dark from a distance, all allegedly over a few words to a barmaid. The barmaid was Hancock’s daughter working in the family pub. There was a farcical inquiry led by his old drinking buddies and as they went round and round the garden like pet ducks all the evidence disappeared and Hancock walked away, free.

Mint robbers were framed Sydney Morning Herald By Liza Kappelle June 11 2002
A former police officer has admitted that he and another detective lied and faked evidence during the trial of the Mickelberg brothers for the Perth Mint gold swindle 20 years ago. The West Australian Attorney-General, Jim McGinty, said yesterday that Anthony Lewandowski had given an affidavit to the Director of Public Prosecutions admitting he and the former CIB chief Don Hancock, who was murdered last year, had lied and fabricated evidence to convict the Mickelbergs. Raymond, Peter and Brian Mickelberg were convicted in 1983 of swindling $650,000 worth of gold from the mint. Raymond, a former SAS soldier, was released from jail in 1991 after serving eight years of a 20-year sentence. Peter served six years of a 14-year sentence. Brian Mickelberg had his conviction overturned after nine months in jail. He died in a helicopter crash in 1986.

See: http://www.usaweeklynews.com/TriumphOfTruth_Book.php - http://www.whoiswatchingthewatchers.com/ http://usaweekendnews.com/TriumphOfTruthBookStolen.html

As clearly evidenced and described by Western Australia author Stephen Carew-Reid in his series of books called The Triumph of Truth ( Who's Watching The Watchers?)

power groups such as the Catholic Mafia and the Freemasons, who Stephen Carew-Reid clearly proves is his books, have controlled Western Australian political, social and economic life is Western Australia since it was settled by the British in the late 1880's. As can be seen by reading Stephen Carew-Reid's series of books called The Triumph of Truth ( Who's Watching The Watchers? these powerful groups have also use the same method of backing both both political parties when it suits they to make sure one of their people obtain power. This is has been a well proven successful method over centuries to control the outcome of elections while make the general public truly believe that their vote makes a difference. The idea is that one party with a particular leader and support staff make decision that become unpopular tit he general public so that a change of parties is demanded by the voters at the next election. Then these powerful groups simply find a suitable candidate in main alternative party and put their main financial support in getting that candidate elected with slogans like "It's time For A Change" etc. It is all rather easy for them to do this when the time is right. It is easy fro them to judge the mood of the public when the public simply have had enough of the old leader making bad decisions and demand a change. It all looks like a real change publicly, but behind the scenes the all the different lo leaders controlling the different political parties all have the same boss. The publicly elected leaders appear to be running the country but behind the scenes the country in run by the faceless controllers of the secret societies such as

The Bilderberg Group, The Freemasons, The Catholic Mafia, The Trilateral Commission, The Council On Foreign Relations and The Skull and Bone Society etc.

In reality running the a country like the USA and other countries is just a business for them and the president is their appointed managing director of that particular company they call USA Limited. The controllers of the secret societies are the shareholders, as with all companies have the real power, When a director,president, prime minister etc either becomes too unpopular ot be able to effectively run the company and/or does not do what they say, the director,president, prime minister etc is organised to either have that person removed by the people by having another director elected from the other political party, or he is quietly asked to resign for ill health etc, and if he refuses to resign, they either have an assassination attempt on his life to give him a clear warning as to what will be next, or if the situation is urgent is is actually assassinated as in the case of John Fitzgerald "Jack" Kennedy.

John F. Kennedy

35th President of the United States
In office January 20, 1961 – November 22, 1963
Vice President	Lyndon B. Johnson
Preceded by	Dwight D. Eisenhower
Succeeded by	Lyndon B. Johnson
United States Senator from Massachusetts
In office January 3, 1953 – December 22, 1960
Preceded by	Henry Cabot Lodge, Jr.
Succeeded by	Benjamin A. Smith
Member of theU.S. House of Representatives from Massachusetts's 11th district
In office January 3, 1947 – January 3, 1953
Preceded by	James Michael Curley
Succeeded by	Thomas P. O'Neill, Jr.

Ronald Reagan

40th President of the United States
In office January 20, 1981 – January 20, 1989
Vice President	George H. W. Bush
Preceded by	Jimmy Carter
Succeeded by	George H. W. Bush

Jimmy Carter

39th President of the United States
In office January 20, 1977 – January 20, 1981
Vice President	Walter Mondale
Preceded by	Gerald Ford
Succeeded by	Ronald Reagan

John Fitzgerald "Jack" Kennedy (May 29, 1917 – November 22, 1963), often referred to by his initials JFK, was the 35th President of the United States, serving from 1961 until his assassination in 1963.After Kennedy's military service as commander of the Motor Torpedo Boat PT-109 during World War II in the South Pacific, his aspirations turned political. With the encouragement and grooming of his father, Joseph P. Kennedy, Sr., Kennedy represented Massachusetts's 11th congressional district in the U.S. House of Representatives from 1947 to 1953 as aDemocrat, and served in the U.S. Senate from 1953 until 1960. Kennedy defeated then Vice President and Republican candidate Richard Nixon in the 1960 U.S. presidential election, one of the closest in American history. He was the second-youngest President (after Theodore Roosevelt), the first President born in the 20th century, and the youngest elected to the office, at the age of 43. Kennedy is the first and only Catholic president, and is the only president to have won a Pulitzer Prize. Events during his administration include the Bay of Pigs Invasion, the Cuban Missile Crisis, the building of the Berlin Wall, the Space Race, the African American Civil Rights Movement and early events of theVietnam War.

Kennedy was assassinated on November 22, 1963, in Dallas, Texas. Lee Harvey Oswald was charged with the crime but was shot and killed two days later by Jack Ruby before he could be put on trial. The FBI, the Warren Commission, and theHouse Select Committee on Assassinations concluded that Oswald was the assassin, with the HSCA allowing for the probability of conspiracy based on disputed acoustic evidence. The event proved to be an important moment in U.S. history because of its impact on the nation and the ensuing political repercussions. Today, Kennedy continues to rank highly in public opinion ratings of former U.S. presidents.

John F. Kennedy

35th President of the United States

In office
January 20, 1961 – November 22, 1963

Vice President Lyndon B. Johnson

Preceded by Dwight D. Eisenhower

Succeeded by Lyndon B. Johnson

United States Senator
from Massachusetts

In office
January 3, 1953 – December 22, 1960

Preceded by Henry Cabot Lodge, Jr.

Succeeded by Benjamin A. Smith

Member of theU.S. House of Representatives
from Massachusetts's 11th district

In office
January 3, 1947 – January 3, 1953

Preceded by James Michael Curley

Succeeded by Thomas P. O'Neill, Jr.

Then the vice president who is actually working for the secret societies automacily becomes president and then it is business as usual, with one of their men in power to on behalf the secret societies, know will tow the line and do what they say. The fact is that John Fitzgerald "Jack" Kennedy was appointed and working with another powerful secret society that has lost a lot of its power in recent years, even though still very powerful called the "Catholic Mafia". Its seems that it is almost impossible to become the president of the USA without working with and being supported by one or more of the powerful secret societies. One needs their money, powerful contacts and personal protection to become the president of the USA. It seems a pipe dream that an individual with genuine aims and ideals for the population can just put his hand up and say, "hey I ma a good guy who wants it fix things for everyone and I want ot be president of the USA" without to support of one or more of these power secret societies. If he or she tried, they would either run out of money, be created to be some sort of monster by the main stream press which is controlled by the secret societies such as Rupert Murdoch and his all powerful News Corp media machine, Conrad Black, before he went to prison for fraud, be quietly warned that his family,, friends and himself is in physical danger, have a nasty accident like a plane crash, motor car accident , be poisened by an undetectable drug in htheir dring that gives you a heart attack a couple of days later without any trace of the drug that causes a heart attack ( as happen to Lorry Connel a Western Australian Business man who threatened to expose all his powerful backers (see Stephen Carew-Reid's books The Triumph of Truth -Who is Watching The Watchers?) etc or simply have them shot..as they say "there are many ways to skin a cat"

Ronald Reagan

40th President of the United States

In office
January 20, 1981 – January 20, 1989

Vice President George H. W. Bush

Preceded by Jimmy Carter

Succeeded by George H. W. Bush

Jimmy Carter

39th President of the United States

In office
January 20, 1977 – January 20, 1981

Vice President Walter Mondale

Preceded by Gerald Ford

Succeeded by Ronald Reagan

If you look at who has been the president of the USA since the 1970's we have Jimmy Carter who was working for and supported by the powerful secret societies, then Ronal Regan who started off potentially being a loose cannon tot he Secret Society Bosses, having originally stated publicly that if he was elected president of the USA he would have secret societies investigated and would not allow George W Bush to be in his team, yet suddenly turned around and announced George W Bush as his running mate as his vice president if elected, and a few months after he was elected there was an assassination attempt of his life. So form that time on Ronald Regan would have towed the line tot he Secret Society Bosses and was in effect a" lame duck president" waiting for the time when George W Bush took over as President of the USA. The rest is history, George W Bush become president of the USA, the Bill Clinton, and then George Bush Junior, who were all clearly working for and supported by the bosses of the secret societies. Then it was clear that the public was not going to vote for another term of nay president what was representing the Republican Party because George Bush Junior became the most unpopular USA president in history both in and out of the USA. It seems fairly obvious that the secret society bosses only put up John McCain to run for president for the USA on behalf of the Republican Party, so there was someone for Hillary Clinton and/or Barrack Obama to run against, and put very little money behind his presidential campaign as they knew he would lose anyway. Because of obvious al well publicised public back lash against the polices of George Bush Junior and the Republican Party, no matter who run against John McCain and the Republican Party, they Democtratic Party had to win the 2009 USA Presidential Election, it was just a matter by how many votes.

It is clear that Hillary Clinton works along with Bill Clinton for the Secret Society bosses and completely own their wealth and power and constant protection against all forms of private and/or public attacks, from very humble beginnings to these people. It is noted that even tough Hillary Clinton did to win the presidential nomination race against Barrack Obama on behalf of the Democratic party, Hillary Clinton was quickly appointed, by Barrack Obama tot he most senior and most powerful public office as Secretary of State. there can be no doubt that orders came form above ( the bosses of the secret societies) to have Hillary Clinton appoint as Secretary of State, so that she is in the While House anyway in a most powerful position. In may ways Hilliary Clinon has potentially as much or more power than tha Presiednt Barrch Obama without having to take any of the political backlash if any of the politicla polcies cause major public problems. All bad public press for any of the Domocratic Party policies will all fall on Barrack Obama, not Hillary linont, even thjoygh tghe posies migth well have been suggested by Hillary Clinton on behalf of teh Secret Society Bosses.

Again, one has to say, even if Barrack Obama appears to be genuine and wanting to do the right thing by the people of the USA and the world in general as the man in charge of the most powerful position in the world, as president ( Director of USA Limited on behalf of the Secret Society Bosses) of the USA, one has to "believe in fairies" if you think for one minute, one way or another Barrack Obama's sudden rise to fame, power, and fortune, to be appointed to the most powerful job in the world, has not in some way been agreed upon, ordained and/or supported in some way by the bosses of the secret societies. Even if Barrack Obama appears to be his owen man to a great extent, one has to look closely at the people that are in his senior administration to see who much Barrack Obama can be his own man and carry on running the USA without listening to what the powerful bosses of the secret societies tell him to do. This can be done is a very suttle manner without Barrach Obmama know who and where these policies suggestion and ideas come from as they can all be introduced to him by his mist senior advisor Hillary Clinton and no doubt others in his a senior administration who have been appointed because of their close links,or membership of the secret.

As Stephen Carew-Reid also clearly shows in his series of books called The Triumph of Truth ( Who's Watching The Watchers?) power groups such as the Bilderberg Group, the Skull and Bones Society, The Freemasons, the Catholic Mafia, the Trilateral Commission and the Council On Foriegn Relations, who Stephen Carew-Reid clearly proves is his books, (See: http://www.usaweeklynews.com/TriumphOfTruth_Book.php - http://www.whoiswatchingthewatchers.com/ http://usaweekendnews.com/TriumphOfTruthBookStolen.html ) often make sure that their selected people are appointed to senior public service positions in a new government, who can not be sacked by the people once they are appointed, are not in the public lime light when it comes ot policy decisions and any back lash over them, but on a day ot day basis are the ones really running the country, as the president , prime minister, managing director, what ever name they have as head person of the country is simply too busy attending public meetings and being the public face of the running of the country to be actually running the county. They have to rely on the senior public servants to do most if not all of the work, and make many day to day decisions , and also rely on them for policy suggestions and investigations reports to support such suggested policy decisions etc. Author Stephen Carew-Reid argues in his books that the reality of the situation is that is in most large government, semi-government and/or private organisations, the second in charge and or senior advisor assistant ends up being the real controller, while the head person is out attending all the official public meeting, dinners, flying all around the would, leaving all the and day to day running of the organisation and all the real work and decisions to me done and made be the second in charge.

In the real world one does not have to be a conspiracy advocate to have the view running the world has become one big business, with each county being in effect a separate subsidiary company to the heard company that controls all the major lending to these countries to the tune of hundreds of trillions of dollars and the appointed heads of major countries are in effect the locally appointed director to help control the local operation. Those that have ownership and control of the major lending groups that have put most countries, big and small into debt to them for hundreds of Trillions of dollars need to make sure this debt is managed to their satisfaction. This is just normal business as far as they are concerned. Thus it makes common sense that they would not want to have their biggest company USA Limited and effectively Head office run by people they have not approved of. However, As the people of the USA have to be seen to have the voting power to to decide who is elected as their president of the USA, they have to pay what ever game they need to play to satisfy the peoples wishes and their own at the same time. They thus have to use secret societies like the Skull and Bones Society, the Freemansons, the Council on Foreign Relatations, the Bilderberg Group and other methods like the Rhodes Scholarship ( considered to be one of the most prestigious and elite educations scholarships in the world) to groom, analyse,select, and/or weed out those suitable and/or not suitable for their future person to put in powerful positions as senior judges, prime ministers, presidents, senior public servants. police comissioners etc. So when the tie comes they have hundreds, if not thousands of people in all walks of life, social, religious, political and economic standing, that have been groomed and selected and ready and willing and able to serve their cause in return for fame, power, public social standing and financial wealth far beyond their wildest dreams for themselves and their families. The families and people in charge of these secret societies use education organisations like the prestigious Rhodes Scholarship to select the brightest students at a young and impressionable age of 18-20 to attend a sort of finishing school university where their minds and brainwashed in a very suttle way into believing the common cause of these in charge of the secrete societies and make all the right connections at a young age to be used as they progress in society to eventually become a leader in their field. whether it be a senior justice, a prime minister, president, commissioner of police and/or some other senior public servant or powerful businessman and/or business woman in society. The clever part of al this is that those being groomed have no idea they are being groomed and manipulated and it all happens in a very natural way and they end up all mixing with only those that believe and support the same ideals and not mixing in the wider population where they may be influenced to thinking in other ways.

In the real world one does not have to be a conspiracy advocate to have the view running the world has become one big business, with each county being in effect a separate subsidiary company to the heard company that controls all the major lending to these countries to the tune of hundreds of trillions of dollars and the appointed heads of major countries are in effect the locally appointed director to help control the local operation. Those that have ownership and control of the major lending groups that have put most countries, big and small into debt to them for hundreds of Trillions of dollars need to make sure this debt is managed to their satisfaction. This is just normal business as far as they are concerned. Thus it makes common sense that they would not want to have their biggest company USA Limited and effectively Head office run by people they have not approved of. However, As the people of the USA have to be seen to have the voting power to to decide who is elected as their president of the USA, they have to pay what ever game they need to play to satisfy the peoples wishes and their own at the same time. They thus have to use secret societies like the Skull and Bones Society, the Freemansons, the Council on Foreign Relatations, the Bilderberg Group and other methods like the Rhodes Scholarship ( considered to be one of the most prestigious and elite educations scholarships in the world) to groom, analyse,select, and/or weed out those suitable and/or not suitable for their future person to put in powerful positions as senior judges, prime ministers, presidents, senior public servants. police comissioners etc. So when the tie comes they have hundreds, if not thousands of people in all walks of life, social, religious, political and economic standing, that have been groomed and selected and ready and willing and able to serve their cause in return for fame, power, public social standing and financial wealth far beyond their wildest dreams for themselves and their families. The families and people in charge of these secret societies use education organisations like the prestigious Rhodes Scholarship to select the brightest students at a young and impressionable age of 18-20 to attend a sort of finishing school university where their minds and brainwashed in a very suttle way into believing the common cause of these in charge of the secrete societies and make all the right connections at a young age to be used as they progress in society to eventually become a leader in their field. whether it be a senior justice, a prime minister, president, commissioner of police and/or some other senior public servant or powerful businessman and/or business woman in society. The clever part of al this is that those being groomed have no idea they are being groomed and manipulated and it all happens in a very natural way and they end up all mixing with only those that believe and support the same ideals and not mixing in the wider population where they may be influenced to thinking in other ways.

Please note much of the above ideas and infromation has been extracted from the series of Books written by Stephen Carew-Reid called "The Triumph of Truth -Who Is Watching the Watchers?" which were considered so contraversial and so damaging to the powerful people he has written about in these books, involved in the secret socities is Western Australia, and the Western Australian Government, corrupt judges, magistrates, senior barristers, lawyers, court officers, senior police, corrupt business people, corrupt public trustee and government lawyers and barristers and other powerful people in the main two secret societies running Western Australia being the Freemasons and the Catholic Mafia, that even though the books have been purchased with public money by the State Batye Resource Library for Western Australia, without any court order of any sort and/or even a court application even being apllied for, senior Western Australian State Crown Law Officers attended the State Batye Resource Library for Western Australia with an "off the record conversation", and demanded to the State Librarian that agreed ot purchas ethe books originally for teh library, to have all copies of these books the state libray purchased destroyed, and all traces of these books taken off the Libray computers and records, so that no traces of these bookswill ever show as ever having being in the libray and/or purchased by the library. Thn a sort time later the original manuscripts o fthese books,that were just about to beused to be made into a series of movies, television documentaries where stolen by the Queensland Police, who were also Freemasons. Corrupt authorites in Australian flew Stephen Carew-Reid from Canberra by Royal Australian Air Force (RAAF) cargo plane in company of 60 SAS commandoes to Western Australian Pierce Airforce Base, where he was attempting to get court orders from the Federal and High Courts of Australia, to protect himself from corrupt officials in Western Australia. When Stephen Carew-Reid arrived on Fruday afternoon at RAAF Base at Pirce, he was taken to a polci elickupo in East Pert, Western Australia, held in ustody without any medical assistance in a small conrete cell. Then, on the Monday morning taken in front of a Freemasin Judge Justice Williams, where a false false charges where loaid against him that had no legal and/or factual basis, who said "You do not look very well today Mr Carew-Reid, so I will make orders that you be sent to Graylands Mental Insitution to have you assessed my doctors to see his you are mentally fit to stand trial for these charges" ,in an attemot to have him declared insane. Threw the Grace of God, what is right and the greater power of the universe as explained in his latest volume of the Triumph of Truth -Who is Watching The Watchers? Stephen Carew-Reid describes how he servived all this to write his nineth volume of his book form the USA where he now lives with his brother who moved there in 1980, The Triumph of Truth - Who Is Watching the Watchers?, of which a copy has been provided ot INL News.com prior to formal publishing of the book in early 2010.

1. William Jefferson Blythe, III, in 1950 at age four. Known at the time as Billy, he did not formally adopt his stepfather's name until age fourteen 2. Clinton's official White House portrait.
3. White House Photo President Bill Clinton 4. The impeachment trial of President Bill Clinton in 1999, Chief Justice William H. Rehnquist presiding. 5. Clinton speaking at a rally for his wife at Dickinson College.
6. Clinton attended the School of Foreign Service at Georgetown University inWashington D.C., receiving a degree in 1968, during which he ran for Presidentof the Student Council.
7. Clinton, as the newly electedGovernor of Arkansas meeting with President Jimmy Carter in 1978.. 8. Bill Clinton Boyhood Home inHope, Arkansas

1. Clinton reading with a child in Chicago, September, 1998.
2. Governor and Mrs. Clinton attend the Dinner Honoring the Nation's Governors in the White House with President Ronald Reagan and first ladyNancy Reagan, 1987. Though Governor Clinton had little to do with national politics at the time, Hillary Rodham had, several years previously, clashed over Legal Services Corporation funding with President Reagan as the organization's chair, a position she was appointed to by President Carter.
3. Hillary Clinton re-enacts being sworn in as a U.S. Senator by Vice President Gore as Bill and Chelsea Clinton observe 4.Clinton with former PresidentGeorge H. W. Bush in January 2005
5. Bill Clinton with AmbassadorHarry Schwarz who negotiated lifting the remaining sanctions onSouth Africa 6. Statue of Clinton playing golf 7. William J. Clinton Presidential Center and Park, Little Rock, Arkansa

Bill Clinton with Ross Perot, Independent, and President George H. W. Bush, Republican, in a national debate.

Clinton receiving the 2000Charlemagne Prize for his work toward European integration.

Clinton, along with George W. Bush, Laura Bush, George H. W. Bush, Condoleezza Rice, andAndrew Card pay their respects to Pope John Paul II before the pope's funeral.

William Jefferson "Bill" Clinton (born William Jefferson Blythe III, August 19, 1946) was the 42nd President of the United States from 1993 to 2001. He was the third-youngest president; only Theodore Roosevelt and John F. Kennedy were younger when entering office. He became president at the end of the Cold War, and as he was born in the period after World War II, he is known as the first Baby Boomer president His wife, Hillary Rodham Clinton, is currently the United States Secretary of State. She was previously a United States Senator from New York, and also candidate for the Democratic presidential nomination in 2008. Both are graduates of Yale Law School. Clinton was described as a New Democrat and was largely known for the Third Way philosophy of governance that came to epitomize his two terms as president.His policies, on issues such as the North American Free Trade Agreementand welfare reform, have been described as centrist Clinton presided over the longest period of peace-time economic expansion in American history, which included a balanced budget and a reported federal surplus. Based on Congressional accounting rules, at the end of his presidency Clinton reported a surplus of $559 billion. On the heels of a failed attempt at health care reform with a Democratic Congress, Republicans won control of the House of Representatives for the first time in forty years Two years later, in 1996, Clinton was re-elected and became the first member of the Democratic Party since Franklin D. Roosevelt to win a second term as presidentLater he wasimpeached for obstruction of justice, but was subsequently acquitted by the U.S. Senate. Clinton left office with an approval rating at 66%, the highest end of office rating of any president since World War II.Since then, he has been involved in public speaking and humanitarian work. Clinton created the William J. Clinton Foundation to promote and address international causes such as treatment and prevention of HIV/AIDS and global warming. In 2004, he released his autobiography My Life, and was involved in his wife Hillary's 2008 presidential campaign and subsequently in that of President Barack Obama. In 2009, he was named United Nations Special Envoy to Haiti.

Early life and career

Bill Clinton was born William Jefferson Blythe, III, in Hope, Arkansas. His father, William Jefferson Blythe, Jr., was a traveling salesmanwho died in an automobile accident three months before Bill was born Following his birth, in order to study nursing, his mother Virginia Dell Cassidy (1923–1994), traveled to New Orleans, leaving Bill in Hope with grandparents Eldridge and Edith Cassidy, who owned and operated a small grocery store. At a time when the Southern United States were racially segregated, Bill's grandparents sold goods oncredit to people of all racial groups In 1950, Bill's mother returned from nursing school and shortly thereafter married Roger Clinton, who together with his brother owned an automobile dealership in Hot Springs, Arkansas The family moved to Hot Springs in 1950.

Although he assumed use of his stepfather's surname, it was not until Billy (as he was known then) turned fourteen that he formally adopted the surname Clinton as a gesture toward his stepfatherClinton says he remembers his stepfather as a gambler and an alcoholic who regularly abused his mother and, at times, his half-brother Roger, Jr. Clinton intervened multiple times with the threat of violence in order to protect them.

In Hot Springs, Clinton attended St. John's Catholic Elementary School, Ramble Elementary School, and Hot Springs High School - where he was an active student leader, avid reader, and musicianHe was in the chorus and played the tenor saxophone, winning first chair in the state band'ssaxophone section. He briefly considered dedicating his life to music, but as he noted in hisautobiography My Life:

"Sometime in my sixteenth year I decided I wanted to be in public life as an elected official. I loved music and thought I could be very good, but I knew I would never be John Coltrane or Stan Getz. I was interested in medicine and thought I could be a fine doctor, but I knew I would never be Michael DeBakey. But I knew I could be great in public service.^"

In 1963, two influential moments in Clinton's life contributed to his decision to become a public figure. One was his visit to the White House to meet President John F. Kennedy, as a Boys Nation senator.The other was listening to Martin Luther King's 1963 I Have a Dream speech (he memorized Dr. King's words).

With the aid of scholarships, Clinton attended the Edmund A. Walsh School of Foreign Service at Georgetown University in Washington, D.C., receiving a Bachelor of Science in Foreign Service (B.S. F.S.) degree in 1968. He spent the summer of 1967, the summer before his senior year, working as an intern for Arkansas Senator J. William Fulbright.^[15] While in college he became a brother of Alpha Phi Omegaand was elected to Phi Beta Kappa. Clinton was also a member of Youth Order of DeMolay, but he never actually became aFreemason^.He is a member of Kappa Kappa Psi's National Honorary Band Fraternity, Inc. Upon graduation he won a Rhodes Scholarship to University College, Oxford where he studied Philosophy, Politics and Economics, though as a result of switching programs and leaving early for Yale, he did not obtain a degree there.He developed an interest in rugby union, playing at Oxford and later for the Little Rock Rugby club in Arkansas. While at Oxford he also participated in Vietnam War protests, including organizing an October 1969 Moratorium event.In later life he admitted to smoking cannabis at the university, but famously claimed that he "never inhaled".

During his college years, Clinton's political opponents claim he used the political influence of a U.S. Senator who employed him as an aide to avoid being drafted into the Vietnam War.Col. Eugene Holmes, an Army officer who was involved in Clinton's case, issued a notarized statement during the 1992 presidential campaign: "...I was informed by the draft board that it was of interest to Senator Fullbright's office that Bill Clinton, a Rhodes Scholar, should be admitted to the ROTC program... I believe that he purposely deceived me, using the possibility of joining the ROTC as a ploy to work with the draft board to delay his induction and get a new draft classification." Clinton did not join the ROTC program, but the temporary ROTC status prevented him from being drafted. This was not illegal, but it became a source of criticism from conservatives and some Vietnam veterans. After Oxford, Clinton attended Yale Law School and obtained a Juris Doctor (J.D.) degree in 1973. While at Yale, he began dating law student Hillary Rodham, who was a year ahead of him. They married on October 11, 1975, and their only child, Chelsea, was born on February 27, 1980. During Yale, Clinton took a job with the McGovern campaign and was assigned to lead McGovern's effort in Texas. He spent considerable time in Dallas, Texas, at the McGovern campaign's local headquarters on Lemmon Avenue where he had an office. There, Clinton worked with Ron Kirk, who was later elected mayor of Dallas twice, future governor of Texas Ann Richards, and then unknown television director (and future filmmaker) Steven Spielberg.

The Great American Novel by Martyn Joseph
Click here to listen to the song The Great American Novel

The Great American Novel
is also the title of a new movie being made by The Fringe Shows Have Talent Team. Some of their websites are
www.fringeshowshavetalent.com www.edinburghfringefest.com

Click here to here another related song is Stick in Babyoln by Geronimo...

This sing is one of the songs formt he Emerge Fest Collections Music CD Volume one out on Wijat Records www.wijatrecords.com
Also please note that Gerominon's Skull is one of the skulls that is used in the initiation rituals in Yales famous Skull and Bones Society
where many powerful people are gromed for the powerful positions such as presidents of the USA, Bankers and many other powerful positions in society,

History of Secret Societies in America Part 1A

History of Secret Societies in America Part 1B

This song by Martyn Joseph seems ot sum up a lot of what anti Bilderberg, Trilateral Commission, Council for Foreign Relations, the Skull and Bones Society and the Freemason campainers like Alex Jones and Jil Tucker are trying to say...which also seems ot be the growing sentiment of of many of the American people

The Great American Novel
by Martyn Joseph

I was born and raised in Norfolk, a land that once was free, In a land that poured it's love out on the morning,
and I grew up in the shadows..... of your silos filled with grain, but you never helped to fill my empty spoon....
When I was ten you murdered law with your court room politics, And you leant to make your lies sound like the truth,
But I know you better now and I will never fall for all your tricks, You have lost the one advantage of my youth,

You killed a black man at midnight just for taking to your daughter, Then you made his wife your mistress and you left them without water,
and the sheets your wore upon your face was the sheets your chidren slept on, every meal time your say a little prayer...

you so not beleive but you keep on.. and your money says in God We Trust, Its against the law to pray at a school,

You say you beat the Russians to the moon, and I say starved children to do it.

We're all half way across the ocean now - in wars that aren't our own, Whilst we're winning there's.... we're gonna lose the one at home,
Do you really think that the only way to bring about some peace - is to sacrifice those chidren and kill all our enemies,

Politicians they make their speaches, then the newsmen take their notes, they will then exagerate false issues before they shove it down out throats,
Is it really up to them then if this country sinks or floats, and I wonder who would lead us there if none of us would vote,

My lips are chapped and my phone is tapped - I'm just wispering through the fence, you know every move I make or was that just co-incidence
Do you promise... to make my life just a little less like jail, If I promise to make tapes and slides and send them by email

Yeh your money says in God We Trust, Its against the law to pray in school, You say you beat the Russians to the moon, yeh well
I say starved millions to do it.

You say all men are equal - all men are brothers, Then why are the rich more equal than the others?
Don't ask me for the answers...I've only found one.. A man needs his darkness when he follows the sun

Chorus
Your money says in God We Trust, Its against the law to pray in school,
You say you beat the Russians to the moon, and I say starved children to do it.
We're all half way across the ocean now - in wars that aren't our own, Whilst we're winning there's.... we're losing the one at home,

Alex Jones the founder of PrisonPlanet.com and Inforwars.com speaking to the participants of the Bilderberg Meeting 10th June, 2008 held in Ottawa, telling them that he and the rest of the human race ar not their slaves and the they will not succeed in their aims to enslave the human race and carry out 80% reduction in population and rule the world with a one world government run by them......Alex Jones attended the Biderberg Meeting in company with

Jim Tucker ,the well known anti Builderberg Campagner
who says he is determinined to make sure the general public know who attendd the Bilderberg Meetings and what their agends is at .it seems fairly obvious to any outside observer that the organisers and participants of the yearly Bilderberg Meetings which started in 1954 in the Hotel Bilderberg, have been trying desperately to keep these meetings, the participants and the agendas of the meetings as secret as possible.. however a growing group of interested people are now joining Alex Jones and Jim Tucker at attend all the Bilderberg Meetings, or gte as close to them as hunamly possible to film and document who comes and goes at these Bilderberg Meetings which as can bee seen by the information below are attended by many of the most powerful and well connected people in business, economic, political and social circles...there is a growing concern by the general public that those involved with organising and attending the Bilderberg meetings and related organisation like the Trilateral Commission, the Council On Foreign Relations and the Freemasons are in reality already a world shadow government, that really runs the world by manipulating who is elected and/or gains power by other means of most countries in the world, and controls who economic, social, monetary and political policies that they want each world government leader to put in place in each country..One of the methods even in democracies like the USA, that those involved with organising and attending the Bilderberg meetings and related organisation like the Trilateral Commission, the Council On Foreign Relations and the Freemasons can make sure one of the people they want to be in power in the USA, is elected into office, is by effectively backing both major parties that are running for election so that no matter which party and or which candidate is finally elected as the President of the USA, that person will be effectively working for them as they have back every candidate and party that has any chance of winning the election. Anyway way of making sure one of their people gain the position of president of the USA is to have one of their people to be selected as the running mate to the potential president elect, and have the actual president assassinated.......is that regard the assassination of President Kennedy making one of their people

USA President Lyndon B. Johnson
a founding senior member of the Bilderberg Group, The Trilaterial Commission, the Council on Foreign Relations and a Freemason, president comes into serious question....

Shift+R improves the quality of this image. Shift+A improves the quality of all images on this page.

President Ronald Regan is another example..originally Ronald Regan had made it publicly clear that he was not going to have George Bush Senior as his running mate because of his membership of secret societies such as the Bilderberg Meeting and related organisations like the Trilateral Commission, the Council On Foreign Relations and the Freemasons and if elected was going to have an official investigation into secret societies in the USA. .however all of a sudden he changed his mind and announced that he was going to make George Bush Senior his running mate in the Presisential Elections which meant that is Ronald Regan won the USA Presidential Elections and became President of the USA, which he did, that would mean George Bush Senior would automaticly become the Vice President oft eh USA..then not long after Ronald Regan became President of the USA he was shot and had the bullet hit just a few inches .tot he left Ronald Regan would have died and George Bush Senior would have become the uSA President a lot sooner than he did..again... this raises much suspicion as to whether the that those involved with organising and attending the Bilderberg meetings and related organisation like the Trilateral Commission, the Council On Foreign Relations and the Freemasons had anything to do with the successful assassination of President Kenney and the attmpted Assasination of President Ronal Regan.....one has ot wonder if who President Barrack Obama is really working for ... and with that those involved with organising and attending the Bilderberg meetings and related organisation like the Trilateral Commission, the Council On Foreign Relations and the Freemasons were involved behaind the scenes in master minding the success election of President Barrack

Secret Societies Clip 2A

Secret Societies Clip 2B

Secret Societies Clip 3A

Secret Societies Clip 3B

Secret Societies Clip 4A

Secret Societies Clip 4B

Bilderberg Group History Clip 2

Bilderberg Group History Clip 3

Bilderberg Group History Clip 4

Bilderberg Group History Clip 5

Bilderberg Group History Clip 6

Bill Clinton as Governor of Arkansas

Further information: Arkansas gubernatorial election, 1978

After graduating from Yale Law School, Clinton returned to Arkansas and became a professor at the University of Arkansas. A year later, he ran for the House of Representatives in 1974. The incumbent, John Paul Hammerschmidt, defeated Clinton by a 52% to 48% margin. Without opposition in the general election, Clinton was elected Arkansas Attorney General in 1976.

Clinton was elected Governor of Arkansas in 1978, having defeated the Republican candidate Lynn Lowe, a farmer from Texarkana. He became the youngest governor in the country at age thirty-two. He worked on educational reform and Arkansas's roads, with wife Hillary leading a successful committee on urban health care reform. However, his term included an unpopular motor vehicle tax and citizens' anger over the escape of Cuban refugees (from the Mariel boatlift) detained in Fort Chaffee in 1980. Monroe Schwarzlose ofKingsland in Cleveland County, polled 31% of the vote against Clinton in the Democratic gubernatorial primary of 1980. Some suggested Schwarzlose's unexpected voter turnout foreshadowed Clinton's defeat in the general election that year by Republicanchallenger Frank D. White. As Clinton once joked, he was the youngest ex-governor in the nation's history. Further information: Arkansas gubernatorial election, 1980

Clinton joined friend's Bruce Lindsey's law firm of Wright, Lindsey and Jennings, though he spent most of the next two years working on his re-election campaign. Clinton was again elected governor and kept his job for ten years. Further information: Arkansas gubernatorial election, 1982

He helped Arkansas transform its economy and significantly improve the state's educational system. He became a leading figure among the New Democrats The New Democrats, organized within the Democratic Leadership Council (DLC) were a branch of the Democratic Party that called for welfare reform and smaller government, a policy supported by both Democrats and Republicans. He served as Chair of the National Governors Association from 1986 to 1987, bringing him to an audience beyond Arkansas. Clinton made economic growth, job creation and educational improvement high priorities. For senior citizens, he removed the sales tax from medications and increased the home property tax exemption. In the early 1980s, Clinton made reform of the Arkansas education system a top priority. The Arkansas Education Standards Committee, chaired by Clinton's wife, attorney and Legal Services Corporation chair Hillary Rodham Clinton, succeeded in reforming the education system, transforming it from the worst in the nation, into one of the best. This has been considered by many the greatest achievement of the Clinton governorship. Clinton and the committee were responsible for state educational improvement programs, notably more spending for schools, rising opportunities for gifted children, an increase in vocational education, raising of teachers' salaries, inclusion of a wider variety of courses, and mandatory teacher testing for aspiring educators. The Clinton's personal and business affairs during the 1980s included transactions which became the basis of the Whitewater investigation, which dogged his later presidential administration.After extensive investigation over several years, no indictments were made against the Clintons related to the years in Arkansas.

He defeated a total of four Republican candidates for governor, Lowe (1978), White (1982 and 1986), and businessmen Woody Freeman of Jonesboro (1984) andSheffield Nelson of Little Rock (1990).

Democratic presidential primaries of 1988

In 1987 there was media speculation Clinton would enter the race after then-New York Governor Mario Cuomo declined to run and Democratic front-runner Gary Hart withdrew owing to revelations of marital infidelity. Clinton decided to remain as Arkansas governor (following consideration for the potential candidacy of Hillary Rodham Clinton for governor, initially favored, but ultimately vetoed, by the First Lady) For the nomination, Clinton endorsed Massachusetts Governor Michael Dukakis. However, he gave the opening night address at the 1988 Democratic National Convention, which was nationally televised, but it was criticized for length Presenting himself as a moderate and a member of the New Democrat wing of the Democratic Party, he headed the moderate Democratic Leadership Council in 1990 and 1991.^,

1992 presidential campaign

Due to his youthful appearance he was often called the "Boy Governor". In the first contest, the Iowa caucus, he finished a very distant third to Iowa Senator Tom Harkin. During the campaign for the New Hampshire Primary reports of an extramarital affair with Gennifer Flowers surfaced. As Clinton fell far behind former Massachusetts Senator Paul Tsongas in the New Hampshire polls,following the Super Bowl, Clinton and his wife Hillary went on 60 Minutes to refute the charges. Their television appearance was a calculated risk but Clinton regained several delegates. He finished second to Tsongas in the New Hampshire primary, but after trailing badly in the polls and coming within single digits of winning, the media viewed it as a victory. On election night, Clinton labeled himself "The Comeback Kid". He ended leading New Hampshire by a large percentage. Winning the big prizes of Florida and Texas and many of the Southern primaries gave Clinton a sizable delegate lead. However, former California Governor Jerry Brownwas scoring victories and Clinton had yet to win a significant contest outside of his native South. With no majo Southern state remaining, Clinton targeted the New York primary, which contained a large number of delegates. He scored a resounding victory in New York City and won, shedding his image as a regional candidate. Having been transformed into the consensus candidate, he secured the Democratic Party nomination, finishing with a victory in Jerry Brown's home state of California. Clinton won the 1992 presidential election (43.0% of the vote) against Republican incumbent George H. W. Bush (37.4% of the vote) and billionaire populist Ross Perot, who ran as an independent (18.9% of the vote) on a platform focusing on domestic issues; a significant part of Clinton's success was Bush's steep decline in public approval. Because Bush's approval ratings were in the 80% range during the Gulf War, he was described as unbeatable. However, when Bush compromised with Democrats in an attempt to lower Federal deficits, he reneged on his promise not to raise taxes, hurting his approval rating. Clinton repeatedly condemned Bush for making a promise he failed to keep.By election time, the economy was souring and Bush saw his approval rating plummet to slightly over 40%. Finally, conservatives were previously united by anti-communism, but with the end of the Cold War, the party lacked a uniting issue. When Pat Buchanan and Pat Robertson addressed Christian themes at the Republican National Convention, with Bush criticizing Democrats for omitting God from their platform, many moderates were alienated.Clinton then pointed to his moderate, "New Democrat" record as governor of Arkansas, though some on the more liberal side of the party remained suspicious.Many Democrats who supported Ronald Reagan and Bush in previous elections switched their allegiance to Clinton. His election ended twelve years of Republican rule of the White House, and twenty of the previous twenty-four years. The election gave Democrats full control of the United States Congress. It was the first time this had occurred since the Jimmy Carter presidency in the late 1970s. However, during the campaign questions of conflict of interest regarding state business and the politically powerful Rose Law Firm, at which Hillary Rodham Clinton was a partner, arose. Clinton maintained questions were moot because all transactions with the state were deducted prior to determining Hillary's firm pay.Further concern arose when Bill Clinton announced that, with Hillary, voters would be getting two presidents "for the price of one".

Presidency, 1993–2001

First term, 1993–1997

Clinton was inaugurated as the 42nd President of the United States on January 20, 1993. In his inaugural address he declared:

Our democracy must be not only the envy of the world but the engine of our own renewal. There is nothing wrong with America that cannot be cured by what is right with America.

Shortly after taking office, Clinton signed the Family and Medical Leave Act of 1993, which required large employers to allow employees to take unpaid leave for pregnancy or a serious medical condition. While this action was popular, Clinton's attempt to fulfill another campaign promise of allowing openly homosexual men and women to serve in the armed forces garnered criticism from the left (for being too tentative in promoting gay rights) and from the right (who opposed any effort to allow homosexuals to serve). After much debate, Congress implemented the "Don't ask, don't tell" policy, stating as long as homosexuals keep their sexuality secret, they may serve in the military. Some gay rights advocates criticized Clinton for not going far enough and accused him of making his campaign promise to get votes and contributionsThese advocates feel Clinton should have integrated the military by executive order, noting President Harry Truman used executive order to racially desegregate the armed forces. Clinton's defenders argue an executive order might have prompted the Democratic Senate to write the exclusion of homosexuals into law, potentially making it harder to integrate the military in the future.Later in his presidency, in 1999, Clinton said he did not think any serious person could say the way the policy was being implemented was not "out of whack. The Clinton administration launched the first official White House website on October 21, 1994It was followed by three more versions, resulting in the final edition launched in 2000. The White House website was part of a wider movement of the Clinton administration toward web-based communication. According to Robert Longley, "Clinton and Gore were responsible for pressing almost all federal agencies, the U.S. court system and the U.S. military onto the Internet, thus opening up America's government to more of America's citizens than ever before. On July 17, 1996, President Clinton issued Executive Order 13011 - Federal Information Technology, ordering the heads of all federal agencies to fully utilize information technology to make the information of the agency easily accessible to the public." Also in 1993, Clinton controversially supported ratification of the North American Free Trade Agreement by the U.S. Senate. Clinton, along with most of his Democratic Leadership Committee allies, strongly supported free trade measures; there remained, however, strong intra-party disagreement. Opposition chiefly came from anti-trade Republicans, protectionist Democrats and supporters ofRoss Perot. The bill passed the house with 234 votes against 200 opposed (132 Republicans and 102 Democrats voting in favor, 156 Democrats, 43 Republicans, and 1 independent against). The treaty was then ratified by the Senate and signed into law by the President on January 1, 1994.^{[47] Clinton signed the Brady Bill into law on November 30, 1993, which imposed a five-day waiting period on handgun purchases. He also expanded the Earned Income Tax Credit, a subsidy for low income workers.^{[29] One of the most prominent items on Clinton's legislative agenda was the result of a taskforce headed by Hillary Clinton, which was a health care reform plan aimed
at achieving universal coverage via a national healthcare plan. Though
initially well-received in political circles, it was ultimately doomed
by well-organized opposition from conservatives, the American Medical Association, and the health insurance industry. However, John F. Harris, a biographer of Clinton's, states the program failed because of a lack of co-ordination within the White House.^[29] Despite
his party holding a majority in Congress, the effort to create a
national healthcare system ultimately died. It was the first major
legislative defeat of Clinton's administration.^[3]^[29] Two months later, after two years of Democratic Party control, the Democrats lost control of Congress in the mid-term elections in 1994, for the first time in forty years. In August 1993, Clinton signed the Omnibus Budget Reconciliation Act of 1993,
which passed Congress without a Republican vote. It cut taxes for
fifteen million low-income families, made tax cuts available to 90% of
small businesses,^[48] and raised taxes on the wealthiest 1.2% of taxpayers.^[49] Additionally, through the implementation of spending restraints, it mandated the budget be balanced over a number of years. Senators Ted Kennedy, a Democrat, and Orrin Hatch, a Republican, teamed up with Hillary Rodham Clinton and her staff in 1997 and succeeded in passing legislation forming the Children's Health Insurance Program,
the largest (successful) health care reform in the years of the Clinton
Presidency. That same year Hillary Clinton shepherded the Adoption and Safe Families Act through Congress and two years later Rodham Clinton succeeded in helping pass the Foster Care Independence Act. Bill Clinton supported both bills as well, and signed both of them into law.}}

Travelgate controversy Main articles: White House travel office controversy and White House FBI files controversy

When several longtime employees of the White House Travel Office were fired, the White House travel office controversy began on May 19, 1993. A whistleblower's letter, written during the previous administration, triggered an FBI investigation, which revealed evidence of financial malfeasance. Independent Counsel Kenneth Starrinvestigated the firings and found no evidence of wrongdoing on the Clintons' part.^[50]

The White House FBI files controversy of June 1996 arose around improper access to FBI security-clearance documents. Craig Livingstone, head of the White House Office of Personnel Security, improperly requested, and received from the FBI, background report files without asking permission of the subject individuals; many of these were employees of former Republican administrations. In March 2000, Independent Counsel Robert Ray determined that there was no credible evidence of any criminal activity. Ray's report further stated "there was no substantial and credible evidence that any senior White House official was involved" in seeking the files.^[51]

Death penalty Further information: Capital punishment in Arkansas and Capital punishment by the United States federal government

The application of the federal death penalty was expanded to include crimes not resulting in death, such as running a large-scale drug enterprise, by Clinton's 1994 Omnibus Crime Bill. During Clinton's re-election campaign he said, "My 1994 crime bill expanded the death penalty for drug kingpins, murderers of federal law enforcement officers, and nearly 60 additional categories of violent felons."^[52]

While campaigning for U.S. President, then-Governor Clinton returned to Arkansas to see that Ricky Ray Rector would be executed. After killing a police officer and a civilian, Rector shot himself in the head, leading to what his lawyers said was a state where he could still talk but didn't understand the concept of death. According to Arkansas state and Federal law, a seriously mentally impaired inmate cannot be executed. The courts disagreed with the claim of grave mental impairment and allowed the execution. Clinton's return to Arkansas for the execution was framed in a New York Times article as a possible political move to counter "soft on crime" accusations.^[53]^{[54] According to some sources Clinton was a death penalty opponent in his early years who switched positions.^[54] During Clinton's term, Arkansas performed its first executions since 1964 (the death penalty was re-enacted on March 23, 1973).^[55] As Governor, he oversaw four executions: one by electric chair and three by lethal injection.
However, Clinton was the first President to pardon a death row inmate
since the federal death penalty was reintroduced in 1988.^[56] Federal executions were resumed under his successor George W. Bush.}

1996 Assassination attempt: Law professor Ken Gromley's book The Death of American Virtue, due for publication in February 2010, reveals that Clinton escaped a 1996 assassination attempt inthe Philippines by terrorists working for Osama bin Laden.^[57] He was saved shortly before his car was due to drive over a bridge where a bomb was planted, during his visit to the Asia Pacific Economic Cooperation forum in Manila in 1996. Gromley said he was told the details of the bomb plot by Louis Merletti, a former director of the Secret Service. Clinton was scheduled to visit a local politician in central Manila, when secret service officers intercepted a message suggesting that an attack was imminent. A transmission used the words "bridge" and "wedding", supposedly a terrorists code word for assassination. The motorcade was re-routed and the US agents later discovered a bomb planted under the bridge. The report said the subsequent US investigation into the plot "revealed that it was masterminded by a Saudi terrorist living in Afghanistan named Osama bin Laden". Gromley said "It remained top secret except to select members of the US intelligence community. At the time, there were media reports about the discovery of two bombs, one at Manila airport and another at the venue for the leaders' meeting" ^[58].

Second term, 1997–2001

In the 1996 presidential election, Clinton was re-elected, receiving 49.2% of the popular vote over Republican Bob Dole (40.7% of the popular vote) and Reform candidate Ross Perot (8.4% of the popular vote), becoming the first Democrat to win presidential reelection since Franklin Roosevelt. The Republicans lost a few seats in the House and gained a few in the Senate, but overall retained control of the Congress. Clinton received 379, or over 70% of the Electoral College votes, with Dole receiving 159 electoral votes.

Lewinsky scandal Main article: Lewinsky scandal

Clinton's sexual relationship^[59] with a 22-year-old White House intern named Monica Lewinsky led to the Lewinsky scandal.^[29] In alame duck session after the 1998 elections, the House voted to impeach Clinton, based on allegations Clinton lied about his relationship with Lewinsky in a sworn deposition in the Paula Jones lawsuit. This made Clinton only the second U.S. president to be impeached after Andrew Johnson.

Impeachment and trial in the Senate Main article: Impeachment of Bill Clinton

The House held no serious impeachment hearings before the mid-term elections. Though the mid-term elections held in November 1998 were at the 6-year point in an 8-year presidency (a time in the electoral cycle where the party holding the White House usually loses Congressional seats) the Democratic Party gained several seats.^[29] To hold impeachment proceedings, the Republican leadership called a lame duck session in December 1998. While the House Judiciary Committee hearings ended in a straight party line vote, there was lively debate on the House floor. The two charges passed in the House (largely on the basis of Republican support but with a handful of Democratic votes as well) were for perjury and obstruction of justice. The perjury charge arose from Clinton's testimony about his relationship to Monica Lewinskyduring a sexual harassment lawsuit (later dismissed, appealed and settled for $850,000)^[60] brought by former Arkansas state employee Paula Jones. The obstruction charge was based on his actions during the subsequent investigation of that testimony. The Senate later voted to acquit Clinton on both charges.^[61] The Senate refused to convene to hold an impeachment trial before the end of the old term, so the trial was held over until the next Congress. Clinton was represented by Washington law firm Williams & Connolly. The Senate concluded a twenty-one day trial on February 12, 1999, with the vote on both counts falling short of the Constitutional two-thirds majority requirement to convict and remove an office holder. The final vote was generally along party lines, with no Democrats voting guilty. Some Republicans voted not guilty for both charges. On the perjury charge, fifty-five senators voted to acquit, including ten Republicans, and forty-five voted to convict; on the obstruction charge the Senate voted 50-50.^[62]

Military and foreign events

Numerous military events occurred during Clinton's presidency. The Battle of Mogadishu also occurred in Somalia in 1993. During the operation, two U.S. MH-60 Black Hawk helicopters were shot down by rocket-propelled grenade attacks to their tail rotors, trapping soldiers behind enemy lines. This resulted in an urban battle that killed 18 American soldiers, wounded 73 others, and one was taken prisoner. There were many more Somali casualties. Some of the American bodies were dragged through the streets and broadcasted on television news programs. In response, U.S. forces were withdrawn from Somalia and later conflicts were approached with fewer soldiers on the ground.

In 1995 U.S. and NATO aircraft attacked Bosnian Serb targets to halt attacks on U.N. safe zones and to pressure them into a peace accord. Clinton deployed U.S. peacekeepers to Bosnia in late 1995 to uphold the subsequent Dayton Agreement. In response to the 1998 al-Qaeda bombings of U.S. embassies in East Africa that killed a dozen Americans and hundreds of Africans, Clinton ordered cruise missile strikes on terrorist targets in Afghanistan and Sudan. He was subsequently criticized when it turned out that a pharmaceutical plant in Sudan (originally claimed to be a chemical warfare plant) had been destroyed. To stop the ethnic cleansing and genocide^[63]^[64] of Albanians by nationalist Serbians in the former Federal Republic of Yugoslavia's province of Kosovo, Clinton authorized the use of American troops in a NATO bombing campaign against Yugoslavia in 1999, named Operation Allied Force. General Wesley Clark was Supreme Allied Commander of NATO and oversaw the mission. With United Nations Security Council Resolution 1244, the bombing campaign ended on June 10, 1999. The resolution placed Kosovo under UN administration and authorized a peacekeeping force.^[65] NATO claimed to have suffered zero combat deaths,^[66] and two deaths from an Apache helicopter crash.^[67] Opinions in the popular press criticized pre-war genocide claims by the Clinton administration as greatly exaggerated.^[68]^[69] A U.N. Court ruled genocide did not take place, but recognized, "a systematic campaign of terror, including murders, rapes, arsons and severe maltreatments".^[70] The term "ethnic cleansing" was used as an alternative to "genocide" to denote not just ethnically motivated murder but also displacement, though critics charge there is no difference.^[71] Slobodan Miloševic, the President of Yugoslavia at the time, was eventually charged with the "murders of about 600 individually identified ethnic Albanians" and "crimes against humanity."^[72]

In Clinton's 1998 State of the Union Address, Clinton warned Congress of Iraqi dictator Saddam Hussein's possible pursuit of nuclear weapons:

Together we must also confront the new hazards of chemical and biological weapons, and the outlaw states, terrorists and organized criminals seeking to acquire them. Saddam Hussein has spent the better part of this decade, and much of his nation's wealth, not on providing for the Iraqi people, but on developing nuclear, chemical and biological weapons and the missiles to deliver them. The United Nations weapons inspectors have done a truly remarkable job, finding and destroying more of Iraq's arsenal than was destroyed during the entire gulf war. Now, Saddam Hussein wants to stop them from completing their mission. I know I speak for everyone in this chamber, Republicans and Democrats, when I say to Saddam Hussein, "You cannot defy the will of the world," and when I say to him, "You have used weapons of mass destruction before; we are determined to deny you the capacity to use them again.^[73]

To weaken Saddam Hussein's grip of power, Clinton signed H.R. 4655 into law on October 31, 1998, which instituted a policy of "regime change" against Iraq, though it explicitly stated it did not speak to the use of American military forces.^[74]^[75] The administration then launched a four-day bombing campaign named Operation Desert Fox, lasting from December 16 to December 19, 1998. For the last two years of Clinton's presidency U.S. aircraft routinely attacked hostile Iraqi anti-air installations inside the Iraqi no-fly zones. Clinton's November 2000 visit to Vietnam was the first by a U.S. President since the end of the Vietnam War.^[76] Clinton remained popular with the public throughout his two terms as President, ending his presidential career with a 65% approval rating, the highest end-of-term approval rating of any President since Dwight D. Eisenhower.^[77] Clinton also oversaw a boom of the U.S. economy. Under Clinton, the United States had a projected federal budget surplus for the first time since 1969.^{[78] After initial successes such as the Oslo accords of the early 1990s, Clinton attempted to address the Arab-Israeli conflict. Clinton brought Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Barak and Palestinian Authority Chairman Yasser Arafat together at Camp David.^[29] Following
the peace talk failures, Clinton stated Arafat "missed the opportunity"
to facilitate a "just and lasting peace." In his autobiography, Clinton blames Arafat for the collapse of the summit.^[79]^[80]^[81] The situation broke down completely with the start of the Second Intifada.^[29]}

Whitewater controversy Main article: Whitewater (controversy)

The Whitewater controversy was an American political controversy that began with the real estate dealings of Bill and Hillary Clinton and their associates, Jim andSusan McDougal in the Whitewater Development Corporation, a failed business venture in the 1970s and 1980s.

In November 1993 David Hale, the source of criminal allegations against President Bill Clinton in the Whitewater affair, claimed that Bill Clinton, while governor of Arkansas, pressured him to provide an illegal $300,000 loan to Susan McDougal, the partner of the Clintons in the Whitewater land deal.^{[82] A U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission investigation
did result in convictions against the McDougals for their role in the
Whitewater project, but the Clintons themselves were never charged, and
Clinton maintains innocence in the affair.}

Attempted capture of Osama bin Laden

Capturing Osama bin Laden has been an objective of the United States government since the presidency of Bill Clinton.^[83] It has been claimed that on three separate occasions in 1996, 1998, and 2000, while the Clinton Administration had begun pursuit of the policy, the Sudanese government allegedly offered to arrest and extradite Bin Laden as well as to provide the United States detailed intelligence information about growing militant organizations in the region, including Hezbollah and Hamas^[84], and that U.S. authorities allegedly rejected each offer despite knowing of bin Laden's involvement in bombings on American embassies in Kenya and Tanzania.^[84] However, the 9/11 Commission found that although "former Sudanese officials claim that Sudan offered to expel Bin Laden to the United States", "we have not found any reliable evidence to support the Sudanese claim.".[85]

Law license suspension

Clinton was ordered to pay $25,000 in fines to Arkansas state's bar officials and his Arkansas law license was suspended for five years.^[86] The agreement came on the condition that Whitewater prosecutors would not pursue federal perjury charges against him.^[87] Clinton was suspended by the Supreme Court in October 2001, and, facing disbarment from that court, Clinton resigned from the Supreme Court bar in November.^[88]

Troopergate Main article: Troopergate (Bill Clinton)

Troopergate is the popular name of a scandal involving allegations by two Arkansas state troopers that they arranged sexual liaisons for then-Governor Bill Clinton. The allegations by state troopers Larry Patterson and Roger Perry were first reported by David Brock in the American Spectator in 1993. The troopers were paid for their stories. The story mentioned a woman named Paula, a reference to Paula Jones. Brock later admitted journalistic dishonesty and apologized.

Pardons and campaign finance Main articles: Bill Clinton pardons controversy and 1996 United States campaign finance controversy

Clinton issued 141 pardons and 36 commutations on his last day in office on January 20, 2001.^[29]^[89] Most of the controversy surrounded Marc Rich and allegations that Hillary Clinton's brother, Hugh Rodham, accepted payments in return for influencing the president's decision-making regarding the pardons.^[90] Some of Clinton's pardons remain a point of controversy.^[91] The 1996 United States campaign finance controversy was an alleged effort by the People's Republic of China (PRC) to influence the domestic policies of the United States, prior to and during the Clinton administration and also involved the fundraising practices of the administration itself.^[92]

Legislation and programs

Major legislation signed

February 5, 1993 - Family and Medical Leave Act of 1993
August 10, 1993 - Omnibus Budget Reconciliation Act of 1993 - Raised income tax rates; income tax, top rate: 39.6%; corporate tax: 35%
September 21, 1993 - creation of the AmeriCorps volunteer program
November 30, 1993 - Brady Bill
September 13, 1994 - Violent Crime Control and Law Enforcement Act, part of an omnibus crime bill, the federal death penalty was expanded to some 60 different offenses (see Federal assault weapons ban)
February 1, 1996 - Communications Decency Act
February 8, 1996 - Telecom Reform Act: eliminated major ownership restrictions for radio and television groups.
February 26, 1996 - Personal Responsibility and Work Opportunity Reconciliation Act, a welfare reform bill
March 14, 1996 - authorized $100 million counter-terrorism agreement with Israelto track down and root out terrorists.
April 9, 1996 - Line Item Veto Act^[93]
April 24, 1996 - Antiterrorism and Effective Death Penalty Act
August 20, 1996 - Minimum wage Increase Act
September 21, 1996 - Defense of Marriage Act, allowed states to refuse recognition of certain same-sex marriages, and defined marriage as between a male and female for purposes of federal law.
August 5, 1997 - Taxpayer Relief Act of 1997
October 28, 1998 - Digital Millennium Copyright Act
October 31, 1998 - Iraq Liberation Act

Major legislation vetoed

national budget
H.R. 1833, partial birth abortion ban

Twice vetoed welfare reform before signing
the Private Securities Litigation Reform Act. Congress overrode the veto, however, to enact the bill into law.

Proposals not passed by Congress

Health care reform
Campaign finance reform (1993)

Initiatives

Tried to get Ehud Barak of Israel and Yasser Arafat of the Palestinian National Authority, to agree to a final settlement agreement.
Initiated the Don't ask, don't tell policy toward gays in the military, 1993.
Reversed a ban on senior Sinn Féin politicians entering the U.S.
Proposed a national challenge to end the racial divide in America, the One America Initiative

MASONIC PRESIDENTS OF THE UNITED STATES
George Washington, 1st President, 1789 - 1797, Commanding General during American Revolution, made a Mason August 4, 1753, in Fredericksburg Lodge (now No. 4), A. F. & A. M., Fredericksburg, Virginia.
      James Monroe, 5th President, 1817 - 1825, made a Mason November 9, 1775, in Williamsburg Lodge (now No. 6), A.F. & A.M., Williamsburg, Virginia.
      Andrew Jackson, 7th President, 1829 - 1837 Harmony Lodge No. 1, Nashville, Tennessee, an Honorary Member of Federal Lodge No. 1, F. & A.M., Washington, D.C., and Jackson Lodge No. 1, F. & A.M., Tallahassee, Florida. In 1822 and 1823 he served as the Grand Master of Masons in Tennessee.
      James Knox Polk, 11th President, 1845 - 1849, made a Mason September 4, 1820, in Columbia Lodge No. 31, F. & A.M., Columbia, Tennessee.
      James Buchanan, 15th President, 1857 - 1861, made a Mason January 24, 1817, in Lodge No. 43 (it has no name), F. & A.M., Lancaster, Pennsylvania.
      Andrew Johnson, 17th President, 1865 - 1869, made a Mason during May, 1851, in Greeneville Lodge No. 119 (now No. 3), F. & A.M., Greeneville, Tennessee.
      James Abram Garfield, 20th President. 1881, made a Mason November 22, 1864, in Columbus Lodge No. 30 F. & A.M., Columbus, Ohio.
      William McKinley, 25th President, 1897 - 1901, made a Mason May 3, 1865, in Hiram Lodge No. 21, A.F. & A.M., Winchester, Virginia.
      Theodore Roosevelt, 26th President, 1901 - 1909, made a Mason April 24, 1901, in Matinecock Lodge No. 806, F. & A.M., Oyster Bay, New York.
      William Howard Taft, 27th President, 1909 - 1913 - Chief Justice Supreme Court 1921 - 1930, made a "Mason at Sight" in an "Occassional Lodge" called for that purpose on February 18, 1909, in the Scottish Rite Cathedral, Cincinnati, Ohio, by Charles S. Hoskinson, Grand Master of Masons in Ohio.
      Warren Gamaliel Harding, 29th President, 1921 - 1923, made a Mason August 27, 1920, in Marion Lodge No. 70, F. & A.M., Marion, Ohio.
      Franklin Delano Roosevelt, 32nd President, 1933 - 1945, made a Mason November 28, 1911, in Holland Lodge No. 8, F. & A.M., New York, New York, the same Lodge in which George Washington, the Nation's first President, held Honorary membership.
      Harry S. Truman, 33rd President, 1945 - 1951, made a Mason March 18, 1909, in Belton Lodge No. 450, A.F. & A.M., Belton, Missouri. He served as the Grand Master of Masons of Missouri in 1940.
Initiated: February 9, 1909, Belton Lodge No. 450, Belton, Missouri.
In 1911, several Members of Belton Lodge separated to establish Grandview Lodge No. 618, Grandview, Missouri, and Brother Truman served as its first Worshipful Master. At the Annual Session of the Grand Lodge of Missouri, September 24-25, 1940, Brother Truman was elected (by a landslide) the ninety-seventh Grand Master of Masons of Missouri, and served until October 1, 1941. Brother and President Truman was made a Sovereign Grand Inspector General, 33º, and Honorary Member, Supreme Council on October 19,1945 at the Supreme Council A.A.S.R. Southern Jurisdiction Headquarters in Washington D.C., upon which occasion he served as Exemplar (Representative) for his Class. He was also elected an Honorary Grand Master of the International Supreme Council, Order of DeMolay. On May 18, 1959, Brother and Former President Truman was presented with a fifty-year award, the only U.S. President to reach that golden anniversary in Freemasonry.
      Gerald R. Ford, Jr. 38th President, 1974 - 1977. He was raised to the Sublime degree of Master Mason on May 18, 1951 in Columbia Lodge No. 3, F. &.A.M., of Washington, D.C., as a courtesy for Malta Lodge No. 465, F. & A.M. of Grand Rapids, Michigan.
      Lyndon Baines Johnson 1908-1973. 36th President, 1963 - 1969. Entered Apprentice degree Johnson City Lodge No. 561, Johnson City, Texas October 30, 1937. Did not advance.

Freemasonry

Freemasonry · Grand Lodge · Masonic Lodge · Masonic Lodge Officers · Grand Master · Prince Hall Freemasonry · Regular Masonic jurisdictions

History of Freemasonry · Liberté chérie ·Masonic manuscripts

Please click here here for a list of notable Freemasons. Freemasonry is a fraternal organisation which exists in a number of forms worldwide. Throughout history some members of the fraternity have made no secret of their involvement, while others have not made their membership public. In some cases, membership can only be proven by searching through the fraternity's records. Such records are most often kept at the individual Lodge level, and may be lost due to fire, flood, deterioration, or simple carelessness. Grand Lodge governance may have shifted or reorganized, resulting in further loss of records on the member or the name, number, location or even existence of the Lodge in question. In areas of the world where Masonry has been suppressed by governments, records of entire Grand Lodges have been destroyed. Because of this, masonic membership can sometimes be difficult to verify. Standards of "proof" for those on this list may vary widely; some figures with no verified Lodge affiliation are claimed as Masons if reliable sources give anecdotal evidence suggesting they were familiar with the "secret" signs and passes, but other figures are rejected over technical questions of irregularity in the Lodge that initiated them. Where available, specific Lodge membership information is provided; where serious questions of verification have been noted by other sources, this is indicated as well.

Bilderberg Group Video 1

Bilderberg Video Two

Bilderberg Club

Hotel de Bilderberg, Oosterbeek, the Netherlands - scene of the first Bilderberg Conference in 1954

Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke leaving the 2008 Bilderberg Conference

The Bilderberg Group, Bilderberg conference, or Bilderberg Club is an unofficial, annual, invitation-only conference of around 130 guests, most of whom are persons of great influence in the fields of politics, business, banking, and media. Each conference is under intense secrecy and security, with the last meeting guarded by police, security services, military helicopters and even fighter jets.^[1]^[2]

The group meets annually at hotels or resorts throughout the world—for two consecutive years in Europe followed by a year in theUnited States or Canada. This tradition appeared to be broken in 2008 when the meeting was held in Chantilly, Virginia, so as to give easier access to those associated with the US elections. The 2009 Bilderberg meeting took place from 14-16 May in Athens, Greece.^[3]

Participants

The steering committee does not publish a list of attendees, though some participants have publicly discussed their attendance. Historically, attendee lists have been weighted towards politicians, bankers, and directors of large businesses.^[16]

Heads of state, including Juan Carlos I of Spain and Queen Beatrix of the Netherlands, have attended meetings.^[8]^[17] Prominent politicians from North America and Europe are past attendees. In past years, board members from many large publicly-traded corporations have attended, including IBM, Xerox, Royal Dutch Shell, Nokia and Daimler.^[8]

The 2009 meeting participants in Greece included: Greek prime minister, Kostas Karamanlis; Finnish prime minister, Matti Vanhanen^[18]; Sweden foreign minister, Carl Bildt; U.S. State Department number two, James Steinberg; U.S. Treasury Secretary,Timothy Geithner; World Bank president, Robert Zoellick; European Commission head, José Manuel Barroso; Queen Sofia of Spain; and Queen Beatrix of the Netherlands.^[19]

European Union

In a European Parliament session in Brussels, Mario Borghezio, an Italian member of European Parliament, questioned the nominations of Bilderberg and Trilateralattendees for the posts of EU President and EU foreign minister.^[20]^[21]

In 2009 the group had a dinner meeting at Castle of the Valley of the Duchess in Brussels, in the 12th of November, with the participation of Herman Van Rompuy, who later became the President of the European Council. The newspaper De Tijd (and several others afterwards) reported that, at this meeting, Van Rompuy showed support for a European green tax: "Van Rompuy told the elite club that the European government leaders are increasingly becoming proponents of Europe tapping off green income, so that the contributions of member states to the EU can be decreased." ^[22] ^[23] ^[24]

Conspiracy theories

Because of its secrecy and refusal to issue news releases, the group is frequently accused of secretive and nefarious world plots.^[25] Critics include the John Birch Society,^[26] the Canadian writer Daniel Estulin, British writer David Icke, American writer Jim Tucker and radio host Alex Jones.

Bilderberg founding member and, for 30 years, a steering committee member, Denis Healey has said:^[27]

“

To say we were striving for a one-world government is exaggerated, but not wholly unfair. Those of us in Bilderberg felt we couldn't go on forever fighting one another for nothing and killing people and rendering millions homeless. So we felt that a single community throughout the world would be a good thing.

”

According to the American Friends of Bilderberg, the 2008 agenda dealt "mainly with a nuclear free world, cyber terrorism, Africa, Russia, finance, protectionism, US-EU relations, Afghanistan and Pakistan, Islam and Iran".^[12]

Origins of conspiracy theories

Jonathan Duffy, writing in BBC News Online Magazine states:

“

No reporters are invited in and while confidential minutes of meetings are taken, names are not noted... In the void created by such aloofness, an extraordinary conspiracy theory has grown up around the group that alleges the fate of the world is largely decided by Bilderberg.^[28]

”

According to the investigative journalist Chip Berlet, the origins of Bilderberger conspiracy theories can be traced to activist Phyllis Schlafly. In Berlet's 1994 reportRight Woos Left, published by Political Research Associates, he writes:

“

The views on intractable godless communism expressed by Schwarz were central themes in three other bestselling books which were used to mobilize support for the 1964 Barry Goldwater campaign. The best known was Phyllis Schlafly's A Choice, Not an Echo, which suggested a conspiracy theory in which the Republican Party was secretly controlled by elitist intellectuals dominated by members of the Bilderberger group, whose policies would pave the way for global communist conquest.^[29]

”

Before the 2001 meeting, a report in the Guardian stated:

“

...the press have never been allowed access and all discussions are under Chatham House rules (no quoting). Not surprisingly, such ground rules, while attracting publicity-shy financiers, have also fuelled the fantasies of conspiracy theorists. The truth is probably more mundane: powerful people like meeting each other, but they argue that they need privacy if there is to be serious, honest discussions: the G8 summits are a graphic example of how all the meaningful exchanges are kept well away from the pre-prepared final communiques drawn up by civil servants.^[30]

Recent meetings

Recent meetings:

2005 (5–8 May) at the Dorint Sofitel Seehotel Überfahrt in Rottach-Egern, Germany^[31]
2006 (8–11 June) at the Brookstreet Hotel in Kanata, Ottawa, Ontario, Canada^[32]
2007 (31 May – 3 June) at the Ritz-Carlton Hotel,^[33] in Sisli, Istanbul, Turkey.
2008 (5–8 June) at the Westfields Marriott in Chantilly, Virginia, United States^[12]^[34]
2009 (14–16 May) at the Astir Palace resort in Athens, Greece^[3]^[1]

References

^ ^a ^b "Guardian.co.uk Charlie Skelton's Bilderberg files". Retrieved 15 May 2009.
^ "Guardian.co.uk Charlie Skelton's Bilderberg files". Retrieved 17 December 2009.
^ ^a ^b "The most powerful elite will meet in Athens". GRReporter. 23 March 2009. "the club will organize its meeting in Athens between 14 and 16 May"
^ ^a ^b Hatch, Alden (1962). "The Hôtel de Bilderberg". H.R.H.Prince Bernhard of the Netherlands: An authorized biography. London: Harrap. ISBN B0000CLLN4. "The idea was to get two people from each country who would give the conservative and liberal slant"
^ ^a ^b Valerie Aubourg (June 2003). Organizing Atlanticism: the Bilderberg Group and the Atlantic Institute 1952-63.
^ ^a ^b ^c Rockefeller, David (2002). Memoirs. Random House. pp. 412. ISBN 0-679-40588-7.
^ ^a ^b "Inside the secretive Bilderberg Group". BBC News. 29 September 2005. Retrieved 5 August 2008.
^ ^a ^b ^c "Bilderberg Meeting of 1997 Assembles". PR Newswire. 13 June 1997.
^ "Parliamentary questions: Answer given by Mr Prodi on behalf of the Commission". European Parliament. 15 May 2003.
^ Entry for Conrad Black, The International Who's Who. Europa Publications. 2000.
^ "Bilderberg: List of Invitees". United States Department of Defense. 31 January 1996. Retrieved 6 June 2009.
^ ^a ^b ^c "Bilderberg Announces 2008 Conference". BusinessWire. 2008. Retrieved 7 June 2008.
^ Marcus Klöckner (17 May 2009). "Bilderberg meetings remain a mystery". Stars and Stripes.
^ ^a ^b "Twenty-fifth Bilderberg meeting held". Facts on File World News Digest. May 14, 1977. "Alec Douglas-Home, the former prime minister of Great Britain, chaired the conference, replacing Prince Bernhard of the Netherlands, who had previously headed the Bilderberg invitation committee. (Prince Bernhard had resigned all public positions after the 1976 Lockheed scandal.)"
^ Who's Who. 1999.
^ Caroline Moorehead (18 April 1977). "An exclusive club, perhaps without power, but certainly with influence: The Bilderberg group". The Times.
^ Mark Oliver (4 June 2004). "The Bilderberg group". The Guardian.
^ "Prime Minister Vanhanen and Minister of Finance Katainen to attend Bilderberg Conference". Finnish Government. 13 May 2009.
^ "Bilderberg Group Meets In Athens Amid Tight Security". NASDAQ.
^ http://www.ilvelino.it/articolo.php?Id=997488
^ "Premier steekt nek uit op Bilderberg-diner". HP/De Tijd. 21 November 2009. Retrieved 22 November 2009.
^ "Premier steekt nek uit op Bilderberg-diner". DE TIJD. 14 November 2009. Retrieved 20 November 2009.
^ "Herman Van Rompuy, front-runner for presidency, wants EU-wide tax". TIMES ONLINE. 17 November 2009. Retrieved 20 November 2009.
^ "Van Rompuy shows his hand at Bilderberg Group dinner". Flanders Today. 14 November 2009. Retrieved 20 November 2009.
^ "Right Woos Left"
^ Chip Berlet (1994). "Right Woos Left: John Birch Society". PublicEye.org.
^ Ronson, Jon (10 March 2001). "Who pulls the strings? (part 3)". The Guardian. Retrieved 14 May 2009.
^ Jonathan Duffy (3 June 2004). "Bilderberg: The ultimate conspiracy theory". BBC News.
^ Chip Berlet (1994). "The New Right & The Secular Humanism Conspiracy Theory".
^ Bunting, Madeleine Weekend break for the global elite guardian.co.uk Friday 25 May 2001 [1]
^ "Asia Times Online :: Asian News, Business and Economy.". Retrieved 22 August 2007.
^ Panetta, Alexander (2006). "Secretive Bilderbergers meet". www.thestar.com. Toronto Star Newspapers Limited. Retrieved 12 June 2006.
^ What was discussed at Bilderberg?, Turkish Daily News, 5 June 2007, accessed on 18 August 2007
^ "Balkenende to Meet Bush in Washington". NIS News Bulletin. 2008. Retrieved 25 May 2008.
^ "Japan–U.S. Relations—Past, Present and Future". The Daily Yomiuri. December 8, 1991. "Rockefeller: The idea (of creating the Trilateral Commission) was incorporated in a speech that I made in the spring of 1972 for the benefit of some industrial forums that the Chase held in different cities around Europe,... Then Zbig (Zbig Brzezinski) and I both attended a meeting of the Bilderberg Group ... and was shot down in flames. There was very little enthusiasm for the idea. I think they felt that they had a very congenial group, and they didn't want to have it interfered with by another element that would--I don't know what they thought, but in any case, they were not in favor."

External links

"Inside the secretive Bilderberg Group". BBC News. 29 September 2005. Retrieved 5 August 2008.
"Elite power brokers meet in secret". BBC News. 15 May 2003. Retrieved 5 August 2008. BBC News 15 May 2003
Guardian article on the group - an excerpt from Jon Ronson's book Them
CTV.ca - Shadowy group meets amid secrecy in Ottawa
Bilderberg reports at Wikileaks
"Our Man at Bilderberg: in pursuit of the world's most powerful cabal". Guardian. 13 May 2009. Retrieved 24 May 2009.

Bilderberg Group The group meets annually at hotels or resorts throughout the world—for two consecutive years in Europe followed by a year in the United States or Canada. This tradition appeared to be broken in 2008 when the meeting was held in Chantilly, Virginia, so as to give easier access to those associated with the US elections. The 2009 Bilderberg meeting took place from 14-16 May in Athens, Greece. Origin: The original Bilderberg conference was held at the Hotel de Bilderberg, nearArnhem in The Netherlands, from 29 May to 31 May 1954. It was initiated by several people, including Denis Healey and Józef Retinger, concerned about the growth of anti-Americanism in Western Europe, who proposed an international conference at which leaders from European countries and the United States would be brought together with the aim of promoting understanding between the cultures of the United States and Western Europe. Retinger approached Prince Bernhard of the Netherlands, who agreed to promote the idea, together withBelgian Prime Minister Paul Van Zeeland, and the head of Unilever at that time, the Dutchman Paul Rijkens. Bernhard in turn contacted Walter Bedell Smith, then head of the CIA, who asked Eisenhower adviser Charles Douglas Jackson to deal with the suggestion. The guest list was to be drawn up by inviting two attendees from each nation, one of each to represent conservative and liberal points of view. Fifty delegates from 11 countries in Western Europe attended the first conference along with 11 Americans.
The success of the meeting led the organizers to arrange an annual conference. A permanent Steering Committee was established, with Retinger appointed as permanent secretary. As well as organizing the conference, the steering committee also maintained a register of attendee names and contact details, with the aim of creating an informal network of individuals who could call upon one another in a private capacity. Conferences were held in France, Germany, and Denmark over the following three years. In 1957, the first US conference was held in St. Simons, Georgia, with $30,000 from the Ford Foundation. The foundation supplied further funding for the 1959 and 1963 conferences.

ORGANIZATIONAL STUCTURE:

Meetings are organized by a steering committee with two members from each of around eighteen nations. Official posts, in addition to a chairman, include an Honorary Secretary General. There is no such category in the group's rules as a "member of the group". The only category that exists is "member of the Steering Committee". In addition to the committee, there also exists a separate advisory group, though membership overlaps.Entry forConrad Black, Dutch economist Ernst van der Beugel took over as permanent secretary in 1960, upon Retinger's death. Prince Bernhard continued to serve as the meeting's chairman until 1976, the year of his involvement in the Lockheed affair. The position of Honorary American Secretary General has been held successively by Joseph E. Johnson of the Carnegie Endowment, William Bundy of Princeton, Theodore L. Eliot, Jr., former U.S. Ambassador to Afghanistan, and Casimir A. Yost of Georgetown's Institute for the Study of Diplomacy. A 2008 press release from the American Friends of Bilderberg stated that "Bilderberg's only activity is its annual Conference. At the meetings, no resolutions are proposed, no votes taken, and no policy statements issued" and noted that the names of attendees were available to the press. The Bilderberg group unofficial headquarters is the University of Leiden in the Netherlands.

Chairmen: Prince Bernhard of the Netherlands (1954–1975); Alec Douglas-Home (1977–1980), Walter Scheel, Eric Roll (1986–1989), Lord Carrington (1990–1998), Étienne Davignon

Participants:The steering committee doesn't publish a list of attendees, though some participants have publicly discussed their attendance. Historically, attendee lists have been weighted towards politicians, bankers, and directors of large businesses.

Heads of state, including Juan Carlos I of Spain and Queen Beatrix of the Netherlands, have attended meetings. Prominent politicians from North America and Europe are past attendees. In past years, board members from many large publicly-traded corporations have attended, including IBM, Xerox, Royal Dutch Shell, Nokia and Daimler.
The 2009 meeting participants in Greece included: Greek prime minister, Kostas Karamanlis; Finnish prime minister, Matti Vanhanen; Sweden foreign minister, Carl Bildt; U.S. State Department number two, James Steinberg; U.S. Treasury Secretary, Timothy Geithner; World Bank president, Robert Zoellick; European Commission head, José Manuel Barroso; Queen Sofia of Spain; and Queen Beatrix of the Netherlands.
European Union: In a European Parliament session in Brussels, Mario Borghezio, an Italian member of European Parliament, questioned the nominations of Bilderberg and Trilateral attendees for the posts of EU President and EU foreign minister.
In 2009 the group had a dinner meeting at Castle of the Valley of the Duchess in Brussels, in the 12th of November, with the participation of Herman Van Rompuy, who later became the President of the European Council. The newspaper De Tijd (and several others afterwards) reported that, at this meeting, Van Rompuy showed support for a European green tax: "Van Rompuy told the elite club that the European government leaders are increasingly becoming proponents of Europe tapping off green income, so that the contributions of member states to the EU can be decreased."

Because of its secrecy and refusal to issue news releases, the group is frequently accused of secretive and nefarious world plots. Critics include the John Birch Society, the Canadian writer Daniel Estulin, British writer David Icke, American writer Jim Tucker and radio host Alex Jones.
Bilderberg founding member and, for 30 years, a steering committee member, Denis Healey has said:
According to the American Friends of Bilderberg, the 2008 agenda dealt "mainly with a nuclear free world, cyber terrorism, Africa, Russia, finance, protectionism, US-EU relations, Afghanistan and Pakistan, Islam and Iran".
Origins of conspiracy theories: Jonathan Duffy, writing in BBC News Online Magazine states: This secrecy, and lack of reporters in attendance was also noted by Guardian writer Charlie Skelton in his reports on the 2009 conference held in Athens, Greece. Skelton himself was detained by police on three occasions for taking photographs in the vicinity of the conference resort.
According to the investigative journalist Chip Berlet, the origins of Bilderberger conspiracy theories can be traced to activist Phyllis Schlafly. In Berlet's 1994 report Right Woos Left, published by Political Research Associates, he writes
Recent meetings: 2005 (5–8 May) at the Dorint Sofitel Seehotel Überfahrt in Rottach-Egern, Germany

2006 (8–11 June) at the Brookstreet Hotel in Kanata, Ottawa, Ontario, Canada
2007 (31 May – 3 June) at the Ritz-Carlton Hotel, What was discussed at Bilderberg?, Turkish Daily News, 5 June 2007, accessed on 18 August 2007 in Sisli, Istanbul, Turkey.
2008 (5–8 June) at the Westfields Marriott in Chantilly, Virginia, United States
2009 (14–16 May) at the Astir Palace resort in Athens, Greece

Ford Foundation

The Ford Foundation is a private foundation incorporated in Michigan and based in New York City created to fund programs that were chartered in 1936 by Edsel Ford and Henry Ford.
The foundation makes grants through its New York headquarters and through twelve international field offices. In fiscal year 2007, it reported assets of $13.7 billion and approved $530 million in grants for projects that focused on strengthening democratic values, community and economic development, education, media, arts and culture, and human rights.

History The Ford Foundation was chartered on January 15, 1936 in Michigan byEdsel Ford and two Ford Motor Company executives "to receive and administer funds for scientific, educational and charitable purposes, all for the public welfare". During its early years, the foundation operated in Michigan under the leadership of Ford family members and their associates, and supported such organizations as the Henry Ford Hospital, Greenfield Village and Henry Ford Museum, among others.

After the deaths of Edsel Ford in 1943 and Henry Ford in 1947, the presidency of the Ford Foundation fell to Edsel's eldest son, Henry Ford II. Under Henry Ford II's leadership, the Ford Foundation board of trustees commissioned a report to determine how the foundation should continue. The committee, headed by California attorney H. Rowan Gaither, recommended that the foundation should commit to promoting peace, freedom, and education throughout the world. It provided funding for various projects, including the pre-existing network,National Educational Television, which went on the air in 1952. However, the Ford Foundation, with the help of the Corporation for Public Broadcasting shut it down and replaced it with the Public Broadcasting Service in October 1970. The board of directors decided to diversify the foundation's portfolio and gradually divested itself of its substantial Ford Motor Company stock between 1956 and 1974. Through this divestiture, the Ford Motor Company became a public company in 1956.

Map of countries by the number of politicians, which have attended one or more conferences organized by the Bilderberg Group

List of Bilderberg participants

The following is a list of prominent persons who have attended one or more conferences organized by the Bilderberg Group. The list is currently organized by category. It is not a complete list and it includes both living and deceased people. Where known, the year(s) they attended are denoted in brackets.

Royalty

Queen Beatrix of the Netherlands (1997, 2000)^[1]^[2]
Prince Bernhard of the Netherlands (1954, 1975)^[3]^[4]
Prince Charles, Prince of Wales, United Kingdom (1986)^[5]^[6]
Juan Carlos I of Spain, King of Spain (2004)^[7]
Prince Philippe, Prince of Belgium (2007)^[8]
Prince Phillip, Duke of Edinburgh, United Kingdom (1965, 1967)^[9]^[10]
Queen Sofía of Spain^[11]

^{Politics

United States

George W. Ball (1954, 1993),^[12]^[13] Under Secretary of State 1961-1968, Ambassador to U.N. 1968
Sandy Berger (1999),^[14] National Security Advisor, 1997-2001
Hillary Rodham Clinton,^[15] 67th United States Secretary of State
Douglas Feith (2004),^[16] U.S. Under-secretary of Defense
Timothy Geithner,^[17] Treasury Secretary
Richard N. Haass (1991, 2003, 2004),^[16]^[18] president, Council on Foreign Relations
Lee H. Hamilton (1997),^[1] former US Congressman
Christian Herter,^[19] (1961, 1963, 1964, 1966), 53rd United States Secretary of State
Charles Douglas Jackson (1957, 1958, 1960),^[20] Special Assistant to the President
Joseph E. Johnson^[21] (1954), President Carnegie Endowment for International Peace
Henry Kissinger^[18] (1957, 1964, 1966, 1971, 1973, 1974, 1977, 2008),^[22] 56th United States Secretary of State
Jessica T. Mathews (2004),^[16] president of the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace
Colin Powell (1997),^[1] 65th United States Secretary of State
Condoleezza Rice,^[15] 66th United States Secretary of State
Walter Bedell Smith (1954-1957),^[23]^[24] former White House Chief of Staff, Director of the CIA, U.S. Ambassador to the Soviet Union
Lawrence Summers,^[17] Director of the National Economic Council
Paul Volcker,^[17] Chair of the President's Economic Recovery Advisory Board

Presidents

Bill Clinton (1991),^[25]^[26] President 1993-2001
Gerald Ford (1964, 1966),^[3]^[27] President 1974-1977

Senators

Tom Daschle,^[15] Senator from South Dakota 1987-2005
John Edwards (2004),^[16]^[28]^[29] Senator from North Carolina 1999-2005
Dianne Feinstein (1991),^[12] Senator 1992-current, Mayor of San Francisco 1978-1988
Chuck Hagel (1999, 2000),^[30] Senator from Nebraska 1997-2009
Sam Nunn (1996, 1997),^[1] Senator from Georgia 1972-1997

Governors

Jon Corzine (1995 - 1997,^[1] 1999, 2003, 2004),^[16] Senator 2001-2006, Governor of New Jersey 2006-current
Rick Perry (2007),^[31] Governor of Texas 2000-current
Mark Sanford (2008),^[32] Governor of South Carolina
Douglas Wilder (1991),^[12] Governor of Virginia

United Kingdom

Paddy Ashdown (1989),^[33] former leader of Liberal Democrats, High Representative for Bosnia and Herzegovina
Ed Balls (2006),^[34] former Economic Secretary to the Treasury and advisor to British Prime Minister Gordon Brown and is currently Secretary of State for Children, Schools and Families (2007-present)
Peter Carington, 6th Baron Carrington (Steering Committee member) ,^[35] former Foreign Secretary
Kenneth Clarke (1993,^[36] 1998,^[37] 1999,^[38] 2003,^[39] 2004,^[40] 2006,^[41] 2007,^[42] 2008),^[43]^[44] Chancellor of the Exchequer 1993-1997, Shadow Secretary of State for Business, Enterprise and Regulatory Reform 2008-current
Robert Gascoyne-Cecil (Viscount Cranborne) (1997),^[1] Leader of the House of Lords 94-97
Denis Arthur Greenhill, Lord Greenhill of Harrow (deceased) (1974),^[45]) former Head of Foreign and Commonwealth Office
Denis Healey (founder and Steering Committee member),^[35] former Chancellor of the Exchequer
Peter Mandelson (1999,,^[46] 2009^[47] Business Secretary (2008-present)
John Monks (1996),^[48] former TUC General Secretary
George Osborne (2006,^[49] 2007,^[49] 2008^[50] 2009^[51]) Shadow Chancellor of the Exchequer (2004-Present)
David Owen (1982),^[52] former British Foreign Secretary and leader of the Social Democratic Party
Enoch Powell, (deceased) (1968),^[53] MP and Ulster Unionist
Malcolm Rifkind (1996),^[48] former Foreign Secretary
Eric Roll (1964, 1966, 1967, 1973-1975, 1977-1999) (Bilderberg Steering Committee),^[54] Department of Economic Affairs, 1964, later Bilderberg Group Chairman

Prime Ministers

Tony Blair (1993),^[25]^[36] Prime Minister 1997-2007
Gordon Brown (1991),^[26] Prime Minister 2007-current
Edward Heath,^[3] Prime Minister 1970-1974
Alec Douglas-Home (1977-1980),^[55] Chairman of the Bilderberg Group, Prime Minister 1963-1964
Margaret Thatcher (1975),^[56] Prime Minister 1979-1990

Belgium

Paul-Henri Spaak, Former Prime Minister^[57] (1963)

Netherlands

Ruud Lubbers, Former Prime Minister^[58]
Wim Kok, Former Prime Minister^[58]
Jan-Peter Balkenende, Prime Minister ^[58]
Paul Freeman, Director of Direction ^[58]

France

Gaston Defferre (1964),^[59] member of National Assembly and mayor of Marseille (at the time)
Georges Pompidou, Former Prime Minister of France, Former President of the French Republic ^[58]

Portugal

Francisco Pinto Balsemão (1981, 1983-1985, 1987-2008),^[8] former Prime Minister of Portugal, 1981-1983 and CEO of Impresa media group
Jorge Braga de Macedo (Portuguese) (1991-2008), former Finance Minister, 1991-1993; Professor of Economics and Director of the Center for Globalization and Governance in New University of Lisbon^{[citation needed]}

Finland

Eero Heinäluoma (2006),^[60] former Chairman of the Finnish Social Democratic Party and he was the Minister of Finance between 2005 and 2007
Jyrki Katainen (2007, 2009),^[61]^[62] chairman of Finnish National Coalition Party (Kokoomus) and the current Minister of Finance
Sauli Niinistö (1997),^[1] former Minister of Finance (Finland), Speaker of Parliament
Matti Vanhanen (2009),^[62] Prime Minister chairman of (Suomen Keskusta)

Iceland

Bjarni Benediktsson ^[63] (1965, 1970 etc.),^[64] Mayor of Reykjavík 1940-47, Foreign Minister 1947-55, editor of The Morning Paper 1956-59, Minister of Justice and Ecclesiastical Affairs 1959-63, Prime Minister 1963-70
Björn Bjarnason ^[63] (1974, 1977),^[65] Assistant editor of The Morning Paper 1984-1991, Minister of Education 1995-2002, Minister of Justice and Ecclesiastical Affairs 2003, 2009
Davíð Oddsson ^[63] (ca. 1991-1999), Mayor of Reykjavík 1982-1991, Prime Minister 1991-2004, Foreign Minister 2004-2005, Central Bank governor 2005-2009, editor of The Morning Paper as of september 2009
Einar Benediktsson ^[63] (ca. 1970), ambassador: OECD 1956-60, UK 1982-1986, European Union et al. 1986-1991, NATO 1986-1990, United States et al. 1993-1997, etc.^[66]
Geir Haarde,^[67] Central Bank economist 1977-1983, member and chairman of the Parliament's Foreign Affairs Committee 1991-1998, Minister of Finance 1998-2005, Foreign Minister 2005-2006, Prime Minister 2006-2009
Geir Hallgrímsson ^[63] (ca. 1974-1977^[65],^[68] 1980^[69]), Mayor of Reykjavík 1959-72, Prime Minister 1974-78, Foreign Minister 1983-1986, Central Bank governor 1986-1990
Hörður Sigurgestsson,^[63] former CEO of shipping line Eimskipafélag Íslands
Jón Sigurðsson ^[63] (1993), IMF Board of Directors 1974-1987, Minister of Justice and Ecclesiastical Affairs 1987-88, Industry and Commerce 1988-93, Central Bank governor 1993-94, Nordic Investment Bank governor 1994-2005 ^[70]

Germany

Guido Westerwelle (2007),^[71] Chairman of the Free Democratic Party of Germany and Minister of Foreign Affairs of Germany.
Helmut Schmidt, West German Chancellor ^[3]

Poland

Józef Retinger (1954 to 1960), Founder and secretary of Bilderberg Group^[4]^[72]

Canada

Jean Chretien (1996),^[48] Prime Minister of Canada, 1993-2003
Stephen Harper (2003),^[73] Prime Minister of Canada, 2006-current
Mike Harris,^[73] Premier of Ontario 1995-2002
Bernard Lord,^[73] Premier of New Brunswick 1999-2006
Paul Martin (1996),^[48] Prime Minister of Canada, 2003-2006
Frank McKenna (2006),^[74] Canadian Ambassador to the United States 2005-2006, Premier of New Brunswick 1987-1997

Sweden

Carl Bildt (2006),^[75] (2008),^[76] (2009), Minister of Foreign Affairs 2006-
Anders Borg (2007),^[77] Minister of Finance 2006-
Thorbjörn Fälldin (1978),^[22] Prime Minister 1976-1978
Maud Olofsson [2008),^[78] Minister of Industry 2006-
Fredrik Reinfeldt (2006),^[79] Prime Minister 2006-

Norway

Siv Jensen (2009) - Seen in Alex Jones' Blueprint movie.

EU Commissioners
European Union Commissioners who have attended include:

Frederik Bolkestein (1996, 2003),^[80] former European Commissioner
Pascal Lamy (2003)^[80]
Peter Mandelson (1999),^[46] (2009),^[47] former European Commissioner for Trade 2004-2008

UN, WTO, NATO and other International Organizations

Alexander Haig (1978),^[22] NATO Commander 1974-1979 (US Secretary of State 1981-1982)
Lyman Lemnitzer (1963),^[57] Supreme Allied Commander NATO 1963-1969

Military

Colin Gubbins^[81] (1955, 1957, 1958, 1963, 1964, 1966), head of the British SOE

Financial institutions

Ben Bernanke (2008,^[32] 2009),^[47]Chairman of the Board of Governors of the United States Federal Reserve
Jamie Dimon, CEO and chairman of JPMorgan Chase & Co^[82]
Wim Duisenberg, former European Central Bank President ^[58]
Timothy Geithner, (2004),^[16]) president of the Federal Reserve Bank of New York
Gordon Richardson,^[83](1966, 1975) former Governor of the Bank of England
William J McDonough (1997),^[1] former President, Federal Reserve Bank of New York
Jean-Claude Trichet (2009),^[84] President of the European Central Bank 2003-current
Paul Volcker (1982, 1983, 1986, 1987, 1988, 1992, 1997),^[1] former Chairman of the Federal Reserve
Siegmund Warburg (1977)^[83]
Peter Weinberg (2004),^[16] CEO of Goldman Sachs International
James Wolfensohn (2004),^[16] president of the World Bank

Major corporations

Percy Barnevik (1992-1996, 1997,^[1] 2001), former CEO of ASEA
Michel Bon,^[85] former CEO of France Telecom
Anders Bjoergerd,^[86] former deputy CEO of Sydkraft AB
Lord Browne of Madingley (1995, 1997,^[1] 2004), Chief Executive BP
Louis V. Gerstner, Jr.,^[87] IBM Chairman
H. J. Heinz II (1954),^[21] CEO of H. J. Heinz Company
André Lévy-Lang, (French)^[85] former CEO of Paribas
Indra K. Nooyi (2004),^[16] CEO of PepsiCo
Jorma Ollila (1997,^[1] 2005, 2008), Chairman of Royal Dutch Shell and Nokia Corporation
Paul Rijkens (Dutch) Former Chairman of Unilever ^[58]
Jürgen E. Schrempp (1994-1996, 1997),^[1] 1998, 1999, 2001-2005, 2006, 2007), former CEO of DaimlerChrysler
Hans Stråberg (2006),^[88] CEO of Electrolux
Peter Sutherland (1989-1996, 1997,^[1] 2005), former Chairman of BP
Martin Taylor^[1] (1993-1996,^[48] 1997), former CEO, Barclays
Hinesh C. Parmar, (2008, 2009) President of ParmarCorp.
Otto Wolff von Amerongen,^[1] Chairman Otto Wolff GmbH.
Jacob Wallenberg (2006),^[89] Chairman of Investor AB

University, institute and other academic

C. Fred Bergsten (1971, 1974, 1984, 1997),^[1] President, Peterson Institute
Thierry de Montbrial,^[85] Director of the Institut Français des Relations Internationales

Media

Nicolas Beytout, (French)^[85] Editor of Le Figaro (France)
Conrad Black (1981, 1983, 1985-1996)^[48](1997),^[90] columnist and publisher, now in prison
William F. Buckley, Jr. (1996),^[91] columnist and founder of National Review
Will Hutton^[25] (1997), former CEO of The Work Foundation and editor-in-chief for The Observer
Andrew Knight (1996),^[35]^[48] journalist, editor, and media baron
George Stephanopoulos (1996, 1997),^[48] Former Communications Director of the Clinton Administration (1993-1996), now ABC News Chief Washington Correspondent

References

^ ^a ^b ^c ^d ^e ^f ^g ^h ⁱ ^j ^k ^l ^m ⁿ ^o ^p ^q "Bilderberg Meeting of 1997 Assembles". PR Newswire. 13 June 1997.
^ Video showing DSK, Queen Beatrix and James Wolfensohn among others at Bilderberg 2000
^ ^a ^b ^c ^d Welcome to ActivePaper
^ ^a ^b "Obituary - Prince Bernhard of the Netherlands". The Times. December 3, 2004. "Bernhard’s visits abroad provided the background for an enterprise which interested him greatly, the Bilderberg conferences at which, from 1954 onwards, statesmen, businessmen and intellectuals from Europe and America had private discussions once or twice a year. The idea of the conferences originated with Dr Joseph H. Retinger as a counter to the anti-Americanism in Western Europe."
^ Jon Ronson (March 28, 2001). "Exposed: The Secret Club Of Powermongers Who Really Rule The World". The Mirror. "Prince Charles and Bill Clinton have been to sessions."
^ Jean Stead (April 28, 1986). "Prince Charles attends meeting on South Africa". The Guardian (London). "The 34th Bilderberg conference ended at Gleneagles Hotel, Perthshire, yesterday after a debate on the South African crisis attended by Prince Charles. He arrived for the economic debate on Saturday and stayed overnight at the hotel."
^ Mark Oliver (June 4, 2004). "The Bilderberg group". The Guardian.
^ ^a ^b "'High Priests Of Globalization' In Istanbul". Turkish Daily News. May 31, 2007. "The Turkish state minister and chief negotiator, Ali Babacan, United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) Administrator Kemal Dervis, the Association of Turkish Industrialists and Businessmen (Tusiad) Chairwoman Arzuhan Dogan Yalcindag, Koc Holding Executive Board President Mustafa Koc and the Bogazici University rector, Prof Dr Ayse Soysal, will attend the meeting on behalf of Turkey. Queen Beatrix of the Netherlands, Queen Sofia of Spain, Crown Prince Philippe of Belgium, Greek National Economy and Finance Minister Yeoryios Alogoskoufis, former Prime Minister Francisco Pinto Balsemao of Portugal, former Foreign Minister Michel Barnier of France, Foreign Minister Carl Bildt of Sweden, Finance Minister Anders Borg of Sweden, Foreign Trade Minister Frank Heemskerk of the Netherlands, Finance Minister Jyrki Katainen of Finland, former US secretary of state, Henry Kissinger, Agriculture Minister Christine Lagarde of France, Justice Minister Michael McDowell of Ireland, International Monetary Fund (IMF) Managing Director Rodrigo de Rato, the EU commissioner for enlargement, Olli Rehn, and the US ambassador to Turkey, Ross Wilson, are among foreign guests of the meeting. Meanwhile, tight security measures were taken in and around the Ritz Carlton Hotel, the venue of the meeting."
^ "Duke Of Edinburgh In Como Talks". The Times. April 03, 1965. p. 7. "The Duke of Edinburgh took part today in the opening session of the Bilderberg meeting at the Villa d'Este on Lake Como."
^ "Court Circular". The Times. April 03, 1967. p. 12.
^ Official List of Participants for the 2009 Bilderberg Meeting
^ ^a ^b ^c "World Leaders Attended Secret Bilderberg Meeting, The Spotlight Reports". PR Newswire. July 16, 1991. "Michael Boskin, chairman of the President's Council of Economic Advisors, is listed as sharing one session with Karl Otto Pohl, president of the Deutsche Bundesbank. (Boskin refused to answer The Spotlight's inquiries about what he said). Jack F. Matlock, U.S. ambassador to the Soviet Union, was also listed on a panel exploring developments in the USSR. Robert B. Zoellick, under-secretary of state designate for economic affairs was listed on still another panel, as was Thomas W. Simons, U.S. ambassador to Poland. David Rockefeller, former chairman of the Chase-Manhattan Bank and a leading Bilderberger, was reported as pushing for expanded free trade through both the Mexico and GATT (General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade) negotiations now under way. John S. Reed, chairman of Citibank's parent corporation, was also on the list. Two U.S. governors, Douglas Wilder of Virginia and Bill Clinton of Arkansas are on the list with Diane Feinstein, the ex-mayor of San Francisco who lost a 1990 bid for governor of California. Sens. John Chafee (R-R.I.) and Bennett Johnston (D-La.) are on the list of the American delegation, by far the largest at Baden-Baden. Top industrialists, lawyers, and diplomats dominate the list. The only U.S. labor leader was Lynn Williams, president of the United Steelworkers of America. Arthur Dunkel, director general of GATT, which is currently shaping a completely free trade world in Geneva, and Etienne Davignon, former vice chairman of the European Community, were listed. Queen Beatrix of the Netherlands and Queen Sophia of Spainwere also on the list with the prime ministers of Belgium, Luxemburg and Netherlands and the federal chancellor of Austria. The press lords listed included Conrad Black, the Canadian publisher who recently purchased London's Daily Telegraph and the Jerusalem Post. George Ball, former undersecretary of state, was said to cause an "uproar" when he warned that a Mideast peace conference, if held, would "explode" in the present volatile political climate in that region. Harlan Cleveland, another former high State Department official, was reported to have privately urged the overthrow of the Persian Gulf monarchies as the first step toward a Mideast peace."
^ "George W. Ball Papers, 1880s-1994" (PDF). Princeton University Library. Archived from the original on 2007-06-24.
^ "Text Of Remarks By National Security Advisor Samuel R. Berger To The Bilderberg Steering Committee; "Strengthening The Bipartisan Center: An Internationalist Agenda For America"". Federal News Service. November 4, 1999.
^ ^a ^b ^c Are the people who 'really run the world' meeting this weekend?
^ ^a ^b ^c ^d ^e ^f ^g ^h ⁱ Bilderbergers celebrate half a century of intrigue, secrecy. 20. The New American. June 28, 2004. ISSN 08856540. "Attendees from the U.S. this year reportedly included: Senators Jon Corzine (D-N.J.) and John Edwards (D-N.C.); Melinda Gates, wife of Microsoft founder Bill Gates; Donald Graham, chairman and CEO of the Washington Post Company; Richard N. Haass, president of the Council on Foreign Relations; Timothy Geithner, president of the Federal ReserveBank of New York; Douglas Feith, U.S. Undersecretary of Defense; Walter Isaacson, president and CEO of the Aspen Institute; Jessica T. Mathews, president of the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace; Indra K. Nooyi, president and CEO of Pepsico; Peter Weinberg, CEO of Goldman Sachs International; and James Wolfensohn, president of the World Bank.".
^ ^a ^b ^c Bilderberger Conspiracy
^ ^a ^b Kenneth Maxwell (2004). "The Case of the Missing Letter in Foreign Affairs:: Kissinger, Pinochet and Operation Condor". David Rockefeller Center for Latin American Studies. Archived from the original on 2007-03-11.
^ "Herter, Christian Archibald, 1895-1966. Papers: Guide.". Houghton Library, Harvard.
^ Aubourg, Valerie (2003). "Organizing Atlanticism: the Bilderberg group and the Atlantic institute, 1952- 1963". Intelligence and National Security 18:2: 92–105.
^ ^a ^b Hatch, Alden (1962). H.R.H.Prince Bernhard of the Netherlands: An authorized biography. London: Harrap. ISBN B0000CLLN4.
^ ^a ^b ^c "Western Issues Aired". The Washington Post. April 24, 1978. "The three-day 26th Bilderberg Meeting concluded at a secluded cluster of shingled buildings in what was once a farmer's field. Zbigniew Brzezinski, President Carter's national security adviser, Swedish Prime Minister Thorbjorrn Falldin, former secretary of state Henry Kissinger and NATO Commander Alexander M. Haig Jr. were among 104 North American and European leaders at the conference."
^ "The Real Aims of the Bilderberg Club". BBC Summary of World Broadcasts. April 6, 1982.
^ Jasper, William F. (July 12, 2004). Rogues' gallery of EU founders: the emerging European superstate, now moving forward under the EU, is the result of a deliberate scheme put into motion many years ago by powerful planners and plotters. 20. The New American. p. 15. ISSN 08856540. "Attendees at the founding Bilderberg meeting (1954), for example, included: David Rockefeller, global banker and later chairman of the CFR; Dean Rusk, president of the Rockefeller Foundation and later U.S. Secretary of State; Joseph E. Johnson, president of the Carnegie Endowment; C.D. Jackson, head of Time, Inc.; Gen. Walter Bedell Smith, former head of the OSS, precursor to the CIA; and Lord Dennis Healey, Labor Party leftist and later British Chancellor of the Exchequer.".
^ ^a ^b ^c Bill Hayton (29 September 2005). "Inside the secretive Bilderberg Group". BBC.
^ ^a ^b "Clinton; Tony and Gordon just have to work this out; The former president, who is expected to play a starring role at the Labour conference, talks to Toby Harnden about the party; its future and its leadership contest". The Spectator. September 16, 2006. p. 14. "In fact, Clinton, then governor of Arkansas and considered a rank outsider for the 1992 presidential race, first met Brown in June 1991 at the Bilderberg conference in the Black Forest resort of Baden-Baden. By all accounts, the two clicked."
^ Mark Rich (2008). Hidden Evil. ISBN 9781435750104.
^ U.S. Sen. John Edwards at Bilderberg. (06-JUN-04) UPI NewsTrack
^ The Nation: Conspiracy Theorists Unite; A Secret Conference Thought to Rule the World
^ Jackie Kucinich (May 12, 2005). "World leaders attend meeting that they won't talk about". The Hill. p. 4. "Several members of Congress have been said to be on the guest list in the past, including Sens. Kay Bailey Hutchison (R-Texas), Chris Dodd (D-Conn.), Jon Corzine (D-N.J.), Chuck Hagel (R-Neb.) and Evan Bayh (D-Ind.). Sen. John Edwards (D-N.C) took a break from the campaign trail to attend the meeting last year. Hagel's office confirmed that he had attended the conference in 1999 and 2000."
^ Christy Hoppe (Thursday, May 31, 2007), Perry off to secret forum in Turkey, The Dallas Morning News, retrieved 2009-07-21
^ ^a ^b "Why is our governor visiting this group". The Augusta Chronicle. June 19, 2008. p. 8. "Some of the names on the list are intriguing. Some of the well-known names include:Ben Bernanke - chairman, Board of Governors, Federal Reserve System; Condoleezza Rice - U.S. secretary of state; James A. Johnson - tasked with choosing U.S. Sen. Barack Obama's running mate; Paul Wolfowitz - with the Institute for Public Policy Research. The one name that stands out in my opinion this year is South Carolina Gov. Mark Sanford."
^ Ian Aitken (May 26, 1989). The Guardian (London). "Mr Paddy Ashdown is not yet wholly at ease with the trappings of office, even if the office in question is only that of leader of the Social and Liberal Democrats. Attending the Bilderberg Conference of European political leaders in Spain last week, he was deeply impressed by the splendour of the official cars and the intensity of the security precautions laid on for his arrival. Reaching the conference headquarters at last, he sank into a chair and said to his neighbour: 'Hello, I'm Paddy Ashdown.' The neighbour smiled diffidently, put out his hand, and said: 'Hello, I'm the King of Spain.'"
^ Telegraph.co.uk Taxpayers foot bill for Ed Balls 'junket'. Daily Telegraph
^ ^a ^b ^c "Who pulls the strings?". The Guardian. 10 March 2001.
^ ^a ^b "Memorandum submitted by the Parliamentary Commissioner for Standards - Complaint against Mr Kenneth Clarke". United Kingdom Parliament. 11 July 1997. "Mr Clarke subsequently explained that he and Mr Blair considered that they were attending the conference as representatives of the Government and the Opposition respectively, and stated that 'I was quite confident that I was at the time meeting the rules applying to Ministers, and it did not occur to me that the new rules concerning registration could apply to this visit'."
^ House of Commons - Register of Members' Interests, Commons Publications, 2 December 1998, retrieved 2009-07-21
^ "Register of Members' Interests". 9 June 1999. "3-6 June 1999, to Portugal, to attend Bilderberg meetings. I paid for my own air fare; the hotel accommodation for three nights was paid for by the organisers."
^ "Register of Members' Interests". 21 May 2003. "15-18 May 2003, to Versailles, France, to attend a Bilderberg Conference. I paid for my own air fare; the hotel accommodation for three nights was paid for by the organisers."
^ "Register of Members' Interests". 8 June 2004. "3-6 June 2004, to Stresa, Italy, to attend Bilderberg Conference. I paid for my own air fare; the hotel accommodation for three nights was paid for by the organisers.",
^ House of Commons - Register of Members' Interests
^ Kenneth Clarke MP, Rushcliffe (TheyWorkForYou.com)
^ "Register of Members' Interests - Kenneth Clarke". United Kingdom Parliament. 16 June 2008.
^ "Kenneth Clarke:Full register of members' interests". The Guardian. "5-8 June 2008, to Chantilly, Virginia, USA, to attend Bilderberg Conference. Hotel accommodation paid for by the conference sponsors. (I paid my travel costs.) (Registered 12 June 2008)"
^ "'Atlantic world' theme for Bilderberg conference". The Times. April 19, 1974. p. 6.
^ ^a ^b [http://www.publications.parliament.uk/pa/cm199900/cmregmem/memi19.htm British House of Commons - Register of Journalists' Interests
^ ^a ^b ^c "Our man at Bilderberg". The Guardian. 19 May 2009. "Mandelson's office has confirmed his attendance at this year's meeting: "Yes, Lord Mandelson attended Bilberberg. He found it a valuable conference.""
^ ^a ^b ^c ^d ^e ^f ^g ^h John Deverell (May 31, 1996). "Vast array of international VIPs talk things over at secretive Bilderberg '96 in King City". The Toronto Star. "Lord Carrington, Conference chairman; former NATO secretary-general; Francisco Pinto Balsemao, Former prime minister of Portugal; Queen Beatrix, Netherlands; Lloyd Bentsen, Former treasury secretary, U.S.; Carl Bildt, The High Representative Sweden; Conrad Black, Chairman, Hollinger, Canada; Frits Bolkestein, Liberal party leader, Netherlands; Jean Chretien, Prime minister of Canada; Etienne Davignon, Executive chairman, Societe Generale de Belgique, Belgium; Stanley Fischer, International Monetary Fund; Charles Freeman, Former assistant secretary of defence, U.S.; Mike Harris, Premier of Ontario; Richard Holbrooke, Former assistant secretary of state, U.S.; Peter Job, Chief executive, Reuters Holding, Britain; Lionel Jospin, Socialist party leader, France; Henry Kissinger, Former U.S. secretary of state; Andrew Knight, News Corp., Britain; Winston Lord, Assistant secretary of state, U.S.; Paul Martin, Finance minister, Canada; Philippe Maystadt, Finance minister, Belgium; John Monks, Union leader, Britain; Mario Monti, European commissioner; Sam Nunn, U.S. senator; William Perry, Defence secretary, U.S.; Jan Petersen, Conservative party leader, Norway; Malcolm Rifkind, Foreign secretary, Britain; Renato Ruggiero, Director-general, World Trade Organization; Mona Sahlin, Member of parliament, Sweden; Klaus Schwab, President, World Economic Forum; Queen Sofia, Spain; George Soros, President, Soros Fund Management, U.S.; George Stephanopoulos, Senior adviser to the president, U.S.; Peter Sutherland, Former director-general, GATT and WTO, Ireland; J. Martin Taylor, Chief executive, Barclays Bank, Britain; Alex Trotman, Chairman, Ford Motor, U.S.; John Whitehead, Former deputy secretary of state, U.S.; James Wolfensohn, World Bank president."
^ ^a ^b "Register of Members' Interests - George Osborne". United Kingdom Parliament. 3 July 2007.
^ "Register of Members' Interests - George Osborne". United Kingdom Parliament. 16 June 2008.
^ "Register of Member' Interests - George Osborne". United Kingdom Parliament. 27 May 2009.
^ Ronson, Jon (10 March 2001). "Who pulls the strings? (part 3)". The Guardian. Retrieved 2009-07-04. ""During the Falklands war, the British government's request for international sanctions against Argentina fell on stony ground. But at a Bilderberg meeting in, I think, Denmark, David Owen stood up and gave the most fiery speech in favour of imposing them. Well, the speech changed a lot of minds. I'm sure that various foreign ministers went back to their respective countries and told their leaders what David Owen had said. And you know what? Sanctions were imposed.""
^ "Heath asks nation to be calm, fair, responsible, constructive". The Times. April 29, 1968. p. 2. "The outstretched hand of Mr. Powell was rejected by the leader of a coloured delegation which tried to present a petition to him today at the ski lodge at Mont Tremblanc Quebec, where Mr. Powell was attending the seventeenth annual Bilderberg conference."
^ "Register of Lords Interests - Lord Roll of Ipsden". United Kingdom Parliament. 1 October 2004. Archived from the original on 2008-02-07.
^ "Twenty-fifth Bilderberg meeting held". Facts on File World News Digest. May 14, 1977. "Alec Douglas-Home, the former prime minister of Great Britain, chaired the conference, replacing Prince Bernhard of the Netherlands, who had previously headed the Bilderberg invitation committee. (Prince Bernhard had resigned all public positions after the 1976 Lockheed scandal.)"
^ "News in Brief". The Times. April 26, 1975. p. 5. "Mrs Thatcher, the Conservative leader and Mr Healey, the Chancellor of the Exchequer, were among participants in the twenty second Bilderberg Conference."
^ ^a ^b "Secret Meeting Held in Cannes". The Washington Post. March 30, 1963.
^ ^a ^b ^c ^d ^e ^f ^g Geschiedenis: Bilderberg-conferentie 1954
^ "American Trip By M. Defferre Hope Of Meeting The President". The Times. Friday, Mar 20, 1964. p. 13. "The main purpose of M. Defferre's visit however, is to attend the annual Bilderberg Colloquy at which leaders of western thought are invited to speak their minds in the strictest secrecy."
^ Valtiovarainministeriö: Heinäluoma Bilderberg-kokouksessa Ottawassa
^ Valtiovarainministeriö: Katainen Bilderberg-kokoukseen Istanbuliin
^ ^a ^b Tiedote
^ ^a ^b ^c ^d ^e ^f ^g "Alþýðuflokksmaður boðinn í fyrsta sinn á Bilderbergfund". Morgunblaðið (The Morning Paper). 24 April 1993.
^ Vefur Reykjavíkurborgar - Vefur Bjarna Benediktssonar
^ ^a ^b Björn Bjarnason 13.9.2001
^ Samtíðarmenn 2003
^ Alþingi - 112. löggjafarþing, 277. fundur, fyrirspurn: greiðsla kostnaðar á fundaferðum ráðherra (Icelandic)
^ Alþingi - 100. löggjafarþing, 88. fundur, 357. mál, utanríkismál (Icelandic)
^ Wikileaks - Bilderberg meeting report Aachen, 1980
^ Alþingi - Æviágrip: Jón Sigurðsson (Icelandic)
^ Westerwelle traf Gül - EU-Beitritt im Zentrum der Gespräche (German) Free Democratic Party of Germany. 30 May 2007.
^ Sir Edward Beddington-Behrens (June 13, 1960). "Obituary - Mr. Joseph Retinger". The Times. p. 12.
^ ^a ^b ^c Glen Mcgregor (May 24, 2006). "Ottawa to host top-secret meeting -- or maybe not: Rumours run rampant that ultra-influential Bilderberg to come here". Ottawa Citizen. "Several Canadian political figures have spoken at Bilderbergs, including prime ministers Pierre Trudeau and Jean Chretien, New Brunswick premiers Bernard Lord and Frank McKenna, and former Ontario premier Mike Harris. Prime Minister Stephen Harper's office would not say yesterday whether he has been invited to attend the rumoured Ottawa meetings. Mr. Harper attended the 2003 conference in Versailles, France."
^ Robert Benzie (June 12, 2006). "Ontario to build nuclear reactors". The Toronto Star.
^ Svenska Dagbladet Näringsliv 2009-11-12
^ Svenska Dagbladet Näringsliv 2009-11-12
^ Svenska Dagbladet Näringsliv 2009-11-12
^ Svenska Dagbladet Näringsliv 2009-11-12
^ Svenska Dagbladet Näringsliv 2009-11-12
^ ^a ^b "Answer given by Mr Prodi on behalf of the Commission". European Parliament. 15 May 2003.
^ Valerie Aubourg (June 2003). Organizing Atlanticism: the Bilderberg Group and the Atlantic Institute 1952-63.
^ Official List of Participants for the 2009 Bilderberg Meeting
^ ^a ^b Caroline Moorehead (18 April 1977). "An exclusive club, perhaps without power, but certainly with influence: The Bilderberg group". The Times.
^ Charlie Skelton (May 18, 2009). "Our man at Bilderberg: I should be ashamed". Guardian. "He shows me another: a long-range shot of two happy globalists in an inflatable doughnut ring and Speedos, skidding about behind a powerboat. If only the image was sharper we might see Peter Mandelson snatching a chat with Jean-Claude Trichet, the president of the European Central Bank. "So how do we sell ... splooosh! ... wooo! ... the abolition of the pound to the ... sploosh! ... electorate? Again! Again! Once more round the bay!""
^ ^a ^b ^c ^d Bruno Fay's blog on Le Monde
^ Bilderberg-Mirror.org.uk
^ STLtoday - St. Louis Post-Dispatch Archives
^ Svenska Dagbladet Näringsliv 2009-11-12
^ Svenska Dagbladet Näringsliv 2009-11-12
^ "Prufrock: Rulers of the world prepare to expel Black". The Sunday Times. February 15, 2004. "The final straw came this month when Black said he would sue Henry Kissinger andRichard Perle, both directors of Hollinger and fellow Bilderbergers. Now he is going to be pressed to leave the group."
^ "Leaders' meeting exclusive, secret: Chance for relaxed discussions". Hamilton Spectator (Ontario, Canada). June 1, 1996.

Categories: International nongovernmental organizations | Bilderberg Group | Lists of businesspeople}

George H. W. Bush

HW Bush as 41st President of the USA; Young George H. W. Bush taking his first steps at his grandfather's house in Kennebunkport, Maine, circa 1925; George Bush in his TBM Avengeron the carrier USS San Jacinto in 1944
Bush campaigns in Omaha, Nebraska, 1988; President Bush visited American troops in Saudi Arabia on Thanksgiving Day, 1990; Bush with President Ronald Reagan;

1.Bush, along with George W. Bush, Laura Bush, Bill Clinton,Condoleezza Rice, and Andrew Card pay their respects to PopeJohn Paul II before the pope's funeral, 2005
2.President Ronald Reagan endorses Bush in May 1988 at the President's dinner in Washington, DC; First Lady Nancy Reagan is at left and Barbara Bush on the right
3.Bush with President Dwight D. Eisenhower 4. Chief Justice William Rehnquistadministering the oath of office to Bush during Inaugural ceremonies at the United States Capitol, January 20, 1989
5. From left to right: (standing) President Carlos Salinas, President Bush, Prime Minister Brian Mulroney; (seated) Jaime Serra Puche, Carla Hills, and Michael Wilson at the NAFTA Initialing Ceremony, October 1992

1. Bush (far right) in the Nashua debate with Reagan (far left) and the moderator 2. Bush in Nashua, New Hampshirein 1987 3, Bush delivers a eulogy to Ronald Reagan, June 11, 2004 in theWashington National Cathedral
4, Bush speaks on the telephone regarding Operation Just Cause with General Brent Scowcroft and Chief of Staff John H. Sununu, 1989
5. George H. W. Bush with son George W. Bush dedicating the U.S. Embassy in Beijing, People's Republic of China, August 8, 2008

George Herbert Walker Bush (born June 12, 1924) was the 41st President of the United States (1989-1993). He was also Ronald Reagan's Vice President (1981–1989), a congressman, an ambassador, and Director of Central Intelligence.

In office: January 20, 1989 – January 20, 1993; His Vice President: Dan Quayle; Preceded by President : Ronald Reagan Succeeded by President: Bill Clinton

43rd Vice President of the United States: In office: January 20, 1981 – January 20, 1989 President at the time: President Ronald Reagan;

Preceded by: Walter Mondale Succeeded by: Dan Quayle

11th Director of Central Intelligence In office: January 30, 1976 – January 20, 1977 President at the Time: Gerald Ford

Preceded by: William E. Colby Succeeded by: Adm. Stansfield Turner

Chief of the U.S. Liaison Office to the People's Republic of China In office: September 26, 1974 – December 7, 1975

President at the Time: Gerald Ford Preceded by: David K. E. Bruce Succeeded by: Thomas S. Gates, Jr.

48th Chairman of the Republican National Committee In office: 1971 – 1973 President at the time: Richard Nixon Preceded by: Charles W. Yost Succeeded by: John A. Scali

Member of the United States House of Representatives from Texas's 7th congressional district In office January 3, 1967 – January 3, 1971

Preceded by:John V. Dowdy Succeeded by: Bill Archer

Born: June 12, 1924 (age 85); Birth name: George Herbert Walker Bush; Political party: Republican; Spouse(s): Barbara Pierce Bush

Children: George Walker Bush; Pauline Robinson Bush; John Ellis Bush, Neil Mallon Bush; Marvin Pierce Bush; Dorothy Bush Koch; Alma mater; Yale University (B.A.);

Occupation; Businessman (oil); Military Service: Service/branch: United States Navy;Rank: Lieutenant (junior grade); Years of : 1942–45 Unit: Fast Carrier Task Force;

Awards: Distinguished Flying Cross; Air Medal (3); Presidential Unit Citation; Alma mater: Yale University (B.A.); Religion: Episcopalianism;

Signature:

Website: George Bush Presidential Library and Museum

Bush was born in Massachusetts to Senator and New York Banker Prescott Bush and Dorothy Walker Bush. Following the attacks on Pearl Harbor in 1941, at the age of 18, Bush postponed going to college and became the youngest naval aviator in the US Navy at the time.^[1] He served until the end of the war, then attended Yale University. Graduating in 1948, he moved his family to West Texas and entered the oil business, becoming a millionaire by the age of 40.

He became involved in politics soon after founding his own oil company, serving as a member of the House of Representatives, among other positions. He ran unsuccessfully for president of the United States in 1980, but was chosen by party nominee Ronald Reagan to be the vice presidential nominee; the two were subsequently elected. During his tenure, Bush headed administration task forces on deregulation and fighting drug abuse.

In 1988, Bush launched a successful campaign to succeed Reagan as president, defeating Democratic opponentMichael Dukakis. Foreign policy drove the Bush presidency; military operations were conducted in Panama and the Persian Gulf at a time of world change; the Berlin Wall fell in 1989 and the Soviet Union dissolved two years later. Domestically, Bush reneged on a 1988 campaign promise and after a struggle with Congress, signed an increase in taxes that Congress had passed. In the wake of economic concerns, he lost the 1992 presidential election to DemocratBill Clinton.

Bush is the father of George W. Bush, the 43rd President of the United States, and Jeb Bush, former Governor of Florida. He is the most recent president to have been a World War II veteran, and the most recent president to have fought in a war prior to being elected.

Early Years: George Herbert Walker Bush was born at 173 Adams Street in Milton, Massachusetts^[2] on June 12, 1924. The Bush family moved from Milton toGreenwich, Connecticut shortly after his birth.

Bush began his formal education at the Greenwich Country Day School in Greenwich.^[3] Beginning in 1936, he attended Phillips Academy in Andover, Massachusetts,^[3] where he held a large number of leadership positions including being the president of the senior class and secretary of the student council, president of the community fund-raising group, a member of the editorial board of the school newspaper, and captain of both the varsity baseball and soccer teams.^[4]

World War II: Following the attack on Pearl Harbor in December 1941, Bush decided to join theUS Navy,^[1] so after graduating from Phillips Academy earlier in 1942,^[4] he became a naval aviator at the age of 18.^[3] After completing the 10-month course, he was commissioned as an ensign in the U.S. Naval Reserve at Corpus Christi, Texas on June 9, 1943, just three days before his 19th birthday, which made him the youngest naval aviator to that date.^[1]

He was assigned to Torpedo Squadron (VT-51) as the photographic officer in September 1943.^[1] The following year, his squadron was based on the USS San Jacinto as a member of Air Group 51, where his lanky physique earned him the nickname 'Skin'.^[5] During this time, the task force was victorious in one of the largest air battles of World War II: the Battle of the Philippine Sea.^[1]

After Bush's promotion to Lieutenant Junior Grade on August 1, the San Jacinto commenced operations against the Japanese in the Bonin Islands. Bush piloted one of four Grumman TBM Avenger aircraft from VT-51 that attacked the Japanese installations on Chichijima.^[6] His crew for the mission, which occurred on September 2, 1944, included Radioman Second Class John Delaney and Lieutenant Junior Grade William White.^[1] During their attack, the Avengers encountered intense anti-aircraft fire; Bush's aircraft was hit by flak^[7] and his engine caught on fire.^[1] Despite his plane being on fire, Bush completed his attack and released bombs over his target, scoring several damaging hits.^[1] With his engine afire, Bush flew several miles from the island, where he and one other crew member on the TBM Avenger bailed out of the aircraft;^[7] the other man's parachute did not open.^[1] It has not been determined which man bailed out with Bush^[1] as both Delaney and White were killed as a result of the battle.^[7] Bush waited for four hours in an inflated raft, while several fighters circled protectively overhead until he was rescued by the lifeguard submarine USS Finback.^[1] For the next month he remained on the Finback, and participated in the rescue of other pilots.

Bush subsequently returned to San Jacinto in November 1944 and participated in operations in the Philippines^[1] until his squadron was replaced and sent home to the United States. Through 1944, he flew 58 combat missions^[7] for which he received the Distinguished Flying Cross, three Air Medals, and the Presidential Unit Citation awarded to San Jacinto.^[1]

Because of his valuable combat experience, Bush was reassigned to Norfolk Navy Base and put in a training wing for new torpedo pilots. He was later assigned as a naval aviator in a new torpedo squadron, VT-153. Upon the Japanese surrender in 1945, Bush was honorably discharged in September of that year.

Marriage and college years: George Bush married Barbara Pierce on January 6, 1945, only weeks after his return from the Pacific. Their marriage produced six children: George Walker Bush (born 1946), Pauline Robinson Bush ("Robin", 1949–1953, died of leukemia), John Ellis "Jeb" Bush(born 1953), Neil Mallon Bush (born 1955), Marvin Pierce Bush (born 1956), and Dorothy Bush Koch (born 1959).^[8]

Bush had been accepted to Yale University prior to his enlistment in the military,^[9] and took up the offer after his discharge and marriage. While at Yale, he was enrolled in an accelerated program that allowed him to graduate in two and a half years, rather than four.^[9] He was a member of the Delta Kappa Epsilon fraternity and was elected president. He also captained the Yale baseball team, and as a left-handed first baseman, played in the first two College World Series.^[9] As the team captain, Bush met Babe Ruth before a game during his senior year. Late in his junior year he was, like his father Prescott Bush (1917), initiated into the Skull and Bones secret society. He graduated as a member of the Phi Beta Kappa from Yale in 1948 with a Bachelor of Arts degree in economics.^[10]

Oil venturesAfter graduating from Yale, Bush moved his family to West Texas. His father's business connections proved useful when he ventured into the oil business, starting as a sales clerk^[11] with Dresser Industries,^[12] a subsidiary of Brown Brothers Harriman. His father had served on the board of directors there for 22 years. Bush started the Bush-Overby Oil Development company in 1951^[13] and co-founded the Zapata Petroleum Corporation, an oil company which drilled in the Permian Basin in Texas, two years later. He was named president of the Zapata Offshore Company, a subsidiary which specialized in offshore drilling, in 1954.^[11] The subsidiary became independent in 1958, so Bush moved the company from Midland, Texas to Houston.^[12] He continued serving as president of the company until 1964, and later chairman until 1966, but his ambitions turned political.^[12] By that time, Bush had become a millionaire.^[11]

Political career (1964–1980)

Congressional years: Bush served as Chairman of the Republican Party for Harris County, Texas in 1964, but wanted to be more involved in policy making, so he set his stakes high: he aimed for a US Senate seat from Texas.^[12] After winning the Republican primary, Bush faced his opponent, incumbent Democrat Ralph W. Yarborough. Yarborough attacked Bush as a right-wing extremist, and Bush lost the general election.^[14]

Bush did not give up on elective politics and was elected in 1966 to a House of Representatives seat from the 7th District of Texas, defeating Democrat Frank Briscoe with 57% of the vote;^[15] he became the first Republican to represent Houston.^[12] His voting record in the House was generally conservative:^[12] Bush opposed the public accommodations contention in the 1964 Civil Rights Act, and supported open-housing legislation, something generally unpopular in his district.^[12] He supported the Nixon administration's Vietnam policies, but broke with Republicans on the issue of birth control.^[12] Despite being a first-term congressman, Bush was appointed to the powerful House Ways and Means Committee,^[11] where he voted to abolish the military draft.^[11] He was elected to a second term in 1968.^{[16] In 1970, Nixon convinced Bush to relinquish his House seat to again run for the Senate against Ralph Yarborough, a fierce Nixon critic. In the Republican primary, Bush easily defeated conservative Robert J. Morris, by a margin of 87.6 percent to 12.4 percent.^[17]However, former Congressman Lloyd Bentsen, a more moderate Democrat and native of Mission in south Texas, defeated Yarborough in the Democratic primary.^[11] Yarborough then endorsed Bentsen, who defeated Bush, 53.4 to 46.6 percent.^[18] Nixon came to Texas to campaign in Longview for Bush and his gubernatorial ticket-mate, Paul Eggers, a Dallas lawyer who was a close friend of U.S. Senator John G. Tower.^[19]}

1970s Ambassador to the United Nations: Following his 1970 loss, Bush was well known as a prominent Republican businessman from the "Sun Belt", a group of states in the Southern part of the country.^[11]Nixon noticed and appreciated the sacrifice Bush had made of his Congressional position,^[12] so he appointed him Ambassador to the United Nations.^[10] He was confirmed unanimously by the Senate, and served for two years, beginning in 1971.^[12]

Chairman of the Republican National Committee: Amidst the Watergate scandal, Nixon asked Bush to become chairman of the Republican National Committee in 1973.^[10] Bush accepted, and held this position when the popularity of both Nixon and the Republican Party plummeted.^[20] He defended Nixon steadfastly, but later as Nixon's complicity became clear, Bush focused more on defending the Republican Party, while still maintaining loyalty to Nixon.^[12] As chairman, Bush formally requested that Nixon eventually resign for the good of the Republican party.^[12] Nixon did this on August 9, 1974; Bush noted in his diary that "There was an aura of sadness, like somebody died... The [resignation] speech was vintage Nixon — a kick or two at the press — enormous strains. One couldn't help but look at the family and the whole thing and think of his accomplishments and then think of the shame... [ Ford's swearing-in offered] indeed a new spirit, a new lift."^[21]

Envoy to China Gerald Ford, Nixon's successor, appointed Bush to be Chief of the US Liaison Office in the People's Republic of China. Since the United States at the time maintained official relations with the Republic of China on Taiwan and not the People's Republic of China, the Liaison Office did not have the official status of an embassy and Bush did not formally hold the position of "ambassador", though he unofficially acted as one. The time that he spent in China — 14 months — were seen as largely beneficial for US-Chinese relations.^{[12] After Ford's accession to the presidency, Bush was under serious consideration for being nominated as Vice President. Senator Barry Goldwater of Arizona declined to be considered and endorsed Bush, who, along with his supporters, reportedly mounted an internal campaign to get a nomination.^{[citation needed]} Ford eventually narrowed his list to Nelson Rockefeller and Bush. However, White House Chief of Staff Donald Rumsfeld reportedly preferred Rockefeller over Bush.^[22] Rockefeller was finally named and confirmed.}

Director of Central IntelligenceIn 1976, Ford brought Bush back to Washington to become Director of Central Intelligence. He served in this role for 357 days, from January 30, 1976 to January 20, 1977.^[23] The CIA had been rocked by a series of revelations, including those based on investigations by Senator Frank Church's Committee regarding illegal and unauthorized activities by the CIA, and Bush was credited with helping to restore the agency's morale.^[24] In his capacity as DCI, Bush gave national security briefings to Jimmy Carter both as a Presidential candidate and as President-elect, and discussed the possibility of remaining in that position in a Carter administration^[25] but it was not to be.

Other positions After a Democratic administration took power in 1977, Bush became chairman on the Executive Committee of the First International Bank in Houston.^[26] He later spent a year as a part-time professor of Administrative Science at Rice University^[27] in the Jones School of Business beginning in 1978, the year it opened; Bush said of his time there, "I loved my brief time in the world of academia."^[27] Between 1977 and 1979, he was a director of the Council on Foreign Relations foreign policy organization.^[28]

1980 presidential campaign: Bush had decided in the late 1970s that he was going to run for president in 1980;^[22] in 1979, he attended 850 political events and traveled more than 250,000 miles (400,000 km) to campaign for the nation's highest office.^[22] In the contest for the Republican Partynomination, Bush stressed his wide range of government experience, while competing against rivals Howard Baker, Bob Dole, John Anderson (who would later run as an independent), Phil Crane, John Connally, and the front-runner Ronald Reagan, former actor andGovernor of California.^{[22] In the primary election, Bush focused almost entirely on the Iowa caucuses, while Reagan ran a more traditional campaign.^[22] Bush represented the centrist wing in the GOP, whereas Reagan represented conservatives. Bush famously labeled Reagan's supply side-influenced plans for massive tax cuts "voodoo economics." His strategy proved useful, to some degree, as he won in Iowa with 31.5 percent to Reagan's 29.4 percent.^[22] After the win, Bush stated that his campaign was full of momentum, or "Big Mo".^[22] As a result of the loss, Reagan replaced his campaign manager, reorganized his staff, and concentrated on the New Hampshire primary. The two men agreed to a debate in the state, organized by the Nashua Telegraph, but paid for by the Reagan campaign. Reagan invited the other four candidates as well, but Bush refused to debate them, and eventually they left.^[22] The debate proved to be a pivotal moment in the campaign; when the moderator, John Breene, ordered Reagan's microphone turned off, his angry response, "I am paying for this microphone Mr. Greene" [sic], struck a chord with the public.^[22] Bush ended up losing New Hampshire's primary with 23 percent to Reagan's 50 percent.^[22] Bush lost most of the remaining primaries as well, and formally dropped out of the race in May of that year.^{[22] With his political future seeming dismal, Bush sold his house in Houston and bought his grandfather's estate in Kennebunkport, Maine, known as "Walker's Point."^[29]At the Republican Convention, however, Reagan selected Bush as his Vice Presidential nominee, placing him on the winning Republican presidential ticket of 1980.}}

Vice Presidency (1981–1989): See also: Presidency of Ronald Reagan

As Vice President, Bush generally took on a low-profile while recognizing the constitutional limits of the office; he avoided decision-making or criticizing Reagan in any wa

Presidency of George W. Bush

43rd President of the United States: In office: January 20, 2001 – January 20, 2009:

Vice President	Dick Cheney

Preceded by: Bill Clinton Succeeded by: Barack Obama Born: July 6, 1946 (age 63); New Haven, Connecticut; Political party: Republican Spouse(s): Laura Bush

Residence: Crawford, Texas; Occupation:well known publicly as a failed Businessman (Oil, Baseball), and a drunk, womaniser and gambler: President of the United States

Religion: United Methodist Signature:

The Presidency of George W. Bush began on his inauguration on January 20, 2001 as the 43rd President of the United States of America. The oldest son of former president George H. W. Bush, George W. Bush was elected president in the2000 general election, thus becoming the second second-generation president (after John Quincy Adams), succeeding his father after just one other president, and with just two terms between them. The Supreme Court's decision in Bush v. Goreeffectively resolved the 2000 presidential election in favor of Bush by allowing the Florida Secretary of State's previous certification of Bush as the winner of Florida's electoral votes to stand. Florida's 25 electoral votes gave Bush, theRepublican candidate, 271 electoral votes, defeating Democratic candidate Al Gore in a close and controversial election. Bush was re-elected in 2004, and his term ended on January 20, 2009. As president, Bush pushed through a $1.3 trillion tax cut program and the No Child Left Behind Act, and also pushed forsocially conservative efforts such as the Partial-Birth Abortion Ban Act and faith-based welfare initiatives. Nearly 8 millionimmigrants came to the United States from 2000 to 2005 – more than in any other five-year period in the nation's history.^[1]Almost half entered illegally.^{[2] After the terrorist attacks on September 11, 2001, Bush declared a global War on Terrorism and, in October 2001, ordered an invasion of Afghanistan to overthrow the Taliban, destroy Al-Qaeda, and to capture Osama bin Laden. In March 2003, Bush received a mandate from the U.S. Congress to lead an invasion of Iraq, asserting that Iraq was in violation of UN Security Council Resolution 1441.^{[3] Bush also initiated an AIDS program that committed $15 billion to combat AIDS over five years and is credited for saving millions of lives.^[4] His record as a humanitarian can also be tied to help enroll as many as 29 million of Africa's poorest children in schools.^[5] Unfortunately, some of Bush's humanitarian efforts failed to address larger picture items, such as with his AIDS fight, stressed only abstinence.^{[6] On his second full day in office, Bush implemented the Mexico City Policy; this policy required any non-governmental organization receiving US Government funding to refrain from performing or promoting abortion services in other countries.^[7] Also in 2002, President Bush withdrew funding from the United Nations Population Fund (UNFPA), a key player in promoting family planning in the developing world.^{[8] Running as a self-described "war president" in the midst of the Iraq War,^[9] Bush won re-election in 2004,^[10] as hiscampaign against Senator John Kerry was successful despite controversy over Bush's prosecution of the Iraq War and his handling of the economy.^[11]^{[12] His second term was highlighted by several free trade agreements, the Energy Policy Act of 2005 alongside a strong push for offshore and domestic drilling, the nominations of Supreme Court Justices John Roberts and Samuel Alito, a push forSocial Security and immigration reform, a surge of troops in Iraq, which was followed by a drop in violence, and several different economic initiatives aimed at preventing a banking system collapse, stopping foreclosures, and stimulating the economy during the recession.^[13]^[14]}}}}}After his re-election, Bush received increasingly heated criticism, even from former allies. His worldwide and domestic popularity decreased^[18] due to the war and other issues such as the federal response to Hurricane Katrina, the NSA warrantless surveillance controversy, record budget deficits affecting the administration, and the 2008 subprime mortgage crisis. As president, Bush received some of the highest approval ratings in American history as well as some of the lowest, and he left office as one of the most unpopular Presidents in history.^[19]^{[20] Bush's Cabinet had included figures that were prominent in past administrations, notably former Secretary of State Colin Powell, who had served as United States National Security Advisor under Ronald Reagan. Former Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld had served as White House Chief of Staff and Secretary of Defense under Gerald Ford; Rumsfeld's successor, Robert Gates, served as Director of Central Intelligence under George H.W. Bush. Vice President Dick Cheney served as Secretary of Defense under George H. W. Bush.Bush placed a high value on personal loyalty and, as a result, his administration had high message discipline. He maintained a "hands-off" style of management. "I'm confident in my management style. I'm a delegator because I trust the people I've asked to join the team. I'm willing to delegate. That makes it easier to be President," he said in an interview with Diane Sawyer on ABC in December 2003. Critics allege, however, that Bush is willing to overlook mistakes^[34] made by loyal subordinates.There was only one non-Republican in Bush's cabinet: Secretary of Transportation Norman Mineta, the first Asian American cabinet secretary, who had previously served as Secretary of Commerce under Bill Clinton, is a Democrat. Mineta resigned from Bush's cabinet on July 7, 2006 to pursue "other challenges".^[35] Mary Peters, a Republican, was nominated and confirmed to succeed him as Transportation Secretary. At least one other non-Republican was apparently offered a position in the administration but declined. CNN reported that in the transition to his second term, Bush offered the positions of Ambassador to the United Nations and subsequently Secretary of Homeland Security to Senator Joe Lieberman, then a Democrat and currently an "Independent Democrat".^{[citation needed] In 2006, Bush replaced long-time chief of staff Andrew Card with Joshua Bolten and made major staff and cabinet changes with the intention of revitalizing his Administration.^{[36]On November 8, 2006 (the day after the Democrats took back Congress in the midterm elections), Bush announced plans to replace Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld with former CIA Director Robert Gates. Gates was confirmed by the United States Senate on December 6 and took office as the 22nd Secretary of Defense on December 18.^[37]}}}

Cabinet meeting

Attorney General: Bush's first Attorney General, John Ashcroft, was politically controversial, but widely viewed as competent. Ashcroft resigned days after Bush's 2004 re-election. Bush's second Attorney General was Alberto Gonzales. In addition to his work on providing guidelines for detainee interrogation methods prior to his appointment,^[38]^[39] he claimed there was no right to Habeas Corpus.^[40] Michael Mukaseysucceeded Gonzales and was the country's 81st Attorney General.

Labor: Bush's first nomination for Secretary of Labor was Linda Chavez. This nomination came under attack when evidence came to light that she had given money to an illegal immigrant from Guatemala who lived in her home. Chavez claimed that the woman was not an employee and she had merely provided her with emergency assistance due to the domestic abuse the woman had been facing at the time.^[41] Chavez's nomination was withdrawn.

Energy: ush's first Secretary of Energy, Spencer Abraham, was controversial at the time of his 2001 appointment because as a senator he co-sponsored S.896, a bill to abolish the United States Department of Energy, in 1999.^[42] Samuel Wright Bodman III, Sc.D. is the United States Secretary of Energy and was previously Deputy Secretary of the U.S. Treasury Department.

Homeland Security:When Tom Ridge announced his decision to resign as Secretary of Homeland Security, Bush's first choice to replace him was Bernard Kerik, who served as Police Commissioner of the City of New York during the September 11, 2001 attacks. Kerik's nomination raised controversy when it was discovered that he had previously hired an undocumented worker as a nanny and housekeeper. After a week, Kerik pulled his nomination and Bush went on to nominate Michael Chertoff.^[43]

Advisors and other officials:

Deputy Secretary of Defense – Paul Wolfowitz (2001–2005), Gordon R. England (2005–2009)
CIA Director - George Tenet (2001–2004), John E. McLaughlin (acting, 2004), Porter J. Goss (2004–2006), Michael Hayden (2006–2009)
FBI Director - Louis Freeh (2001), Thomas J. Pickard (acting, 2001), Robert S. Mueller (2001–2009)
NASA Administrator - Sean O'Keefe (2001–2005), Michael D. Griffin (2005–2009)
FAA Administrator - Marion Blakey (2002–2007), Robert A. Sturgell (acting) (2007–2009)
FDA commissioner - Mark McClellan (2002–2004), Lester Crawford (2005), Andrew von Eschenbach (2005–2009)
National Security Advisor - Condoleezza Rice (2001–2005), Stephen Hadley (2005–2009)
Deputy National Security Advisor for Iraq and Afghanistan - Meghan O'Sullivan (?–2007), Douglas Lute (2007–2009)
Ambassador to the United Nations - John Negroponte (2001–2004), John Danforth (2004); John R. Bolton (2005–2006), Zalmay Khalilzad (2007–2009)
FCC Chairman - Michael Powell (2001–2005), Kevin Martin (2005–2009)
White House Deputy Chief of Staff - Joe Hagin (2001–2008), Joshua Bolten (2001–2003), Harriet Miers (2003–2004), Karl Rove(2005–2007), Joel Kaplan (2006–2009)
Director of National Intelligence - John Negroponte (2005–2007), John Michael McConnell (2007–2009)
White House Counsel - Alberto R. Gonzales (2001–2005), Harriet Miers (2005–2007), Fred Fielding (2007–2009)
White House Press Secretary - Ari Fleischer (2001–2003), Scott McClellan (2003–2006), Tony Snow (2006–2007), Dana Perino(2007–2009)
Assistant to the President – Lewis Libby (2001–2005)
Advisor - Karen Hughes (2001–2002) Appointed in 2005 to rank of Ambassador and Under Secretary of State for Public Diplomacy and Public Affairs in the State Department, left that position in 2007.
Personal aide (body man) - Blake Gottesman (2000–2006)

Defence force nominations and appointments

Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff – Richard B. Myers (2001?–2005), Peter Pace (2005?–2007), Michael Mullen (2007?–)
Chief of Staff of the United States Army – Peter Schoomaker (2003–2007), George W. Casey, Jr. (2007?–)
Chief of Staff of the United States Air Force – John P. Jumper (2001–2005), T. Michael Moseley (2005–2008)
Chief of Naval Operations – Michael Mullen (2005–2007), Gary Roughead (2007–)

Supreme Court nominations and appointments

Bush nominated the following people to the Supreme Court of the United States:

John G. Roberts – 2005, was first nominated for Associate Justice replacing Sandra Day O'Connor; after the death of Chief Justice William Rehnquist, Bush nominated him for the position of Chief Justice. Confirmed: 78–22
Harriet Miers – 2005, was nominated upon the elevation of John G. Roberts as the Chief Justice. Her nomination was later withdrawn.
Samuel Alito – 2006, nominated in 2005 upon the withdrawal of Harriet Miers. Confirmed: 58-42
Court of Appeals nominations and appointments
- Jeffrey R. Howard - 1st Circuit (2002); Barrington Daniels Parker, Jr. - 2nd Circuit (2001), Reena Raggi - 2nd Circuit (2002), Richard C. Wesley - 2nd Circuit (2003), Peter W. Hall - 2nd Circuit (2004), Debra Ann Livingston - 2nd Circuit (2007), D. Brooks Smith - 3rd Circuit (2002), Michael Chertoff - 3rd Circuit (2003), D. Michael Fisher - 3rd Circuit (2003), Franklin Stuart Van Antwerpen - 3rd Circuit (2004); Michael A. Chagares - 3rd Circuit (2006), Kent A. Jordan - 3rd Circuit (2006), Thomas M. Hardiman - 3rd Circuit (2007), Roger L. Gregory - 4th Circuit (2001), Dennis W. Shedd - 4th Circuit (2002), Allyson Kay Duncan - 4th Circuit (2003), G. Steven Agee - 4th Circuit (2008), Edith Brown Clement - 5th Circuit (2001), Edward C. Prado - 5th Circuit (2003), Priscilla Owen - 5th Circuit (2005), Jennifer Walker Elrod - 5th Circuit (2007), Leslie H. Southwick - 5th Circuit (2007), Catharina Haynes - 5th Circuit (2008), Julia Smith Gibbons - 6th Circuit (2002), John M. Rogers - 6th Circuit (2002), Jeffrey S. Sutton - 6th Circuit (2003), Deborah L. Cook - 6th Circuit (2003), David W. McKeague - 6th Circuit (2005), Richard Allen Griffin - 6th Circuit (2005), Susan Bieke Neilson - 6th Circuit (2005), Raymond M. Kethledge - 6th Circuit (2008) , Helene N. White - 6th Circuit (2008), Diane S. Sykes - 7th Circuit (2004), John Daniel Tinder - 7th Circuit (2007), William J. Riley - 8th Circuit (2001), Michael Joseph Melloy - 8th Circuit (2002), Lavenski R. Smith - 8th Circuit (2002), Steven M. Colloton - 8th Circuit (2003), Raymond W. Gruender - 8th Circuit (2004), William Duane Benton - 8th Circuit (2004), Bobby E. Shepherd - 8th Circuit (2006), Richard R. Clifton - 9th Circuit (2002), Jay Bybee - 9th Circuit (2003), Consuelo Maria Callahan - 9th Circuit (2003), Carlos T. Bea - 9th Circuit (2003), Milan D. Smith, Jr. - 9th Circuit (2006), Sandra Segal Ikuta - 9th Circuit (2006), N. Randy Smith - 9th Circuit (2007), Harris L. Hartz - 10th Circuit (2001), Terrence L. O'Brien - 10th Circuit (2002), Michael W. McConnell - 10th Circuit (2002), Timothy M. Tymkovich - 10th Circuit (2003), Neil M. Gorsuch - 10th Circuit (2006), Jerome A. Holmes - 10th Circuit (2006), William H. Pryor, Jr. - 11th Circuit (2004), John G. Roberts, Jr. - D.C. Circuit (2003), Janice Rogers Brown - D.C. Circuit (2005), Thomas B. Griffith - D.C. Circuit (2005), Brett M. Kavanaugh - D.C. Circuit (2006), Sharon Prost - Federal Circuit (2001), Kimberly Ann Moore - Federal Circuit (2006)
- Political philosophy
  
  The guiding political philosophy of the Bush administration has been termed neoconservative. The specific elements of neoconservative leadership have been itemized in policy papers by leading members of the Project for a New American Century, and is represented in the editorial perspective of the political journal the Weekly Standard. Administration officials chosen from the membership of the Project for a New American Century (PNAC) began with the selection of the candidate for vice president, Dick Cheney. Others included Richard Armitage, Zalmay Khalilzad, Lewis "Scooter" Libby, Richard Perle, former U.S. Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld, and Paul Wolfowitz. In 1998, members of the PNAC, including Rumsfeld and Wolfowitz, wrote to President Bill Clinton urging him to remove Saddam Hussein from power using US diplomatic, political and military power. In September 2000, the PNAC issued a report entitled Rebuilding America's Defenses: Strategies, Forces, and Resources For A New Century, proceeding "from the belief that America should seek to preserve and extend its position of global leadership by maintaining the preeminence of U.S. military forces." The group stated that when diplomacy or sanctions fail, the United States must be prepared to take military action. The PNAC argued that the Cold War deployment of forces was obsolete. Defense spending and force deployment must reflect the post-Cold War duties that US forces are obligated to perform. Constabulary duties such as peacekeeping in the Balkans and the enforcement of the No Fly Zones in Iraq put a strain upon, and reduced the readiness of US forces. The PNAC recommended the forward redeployment of US forces at new strategically placed permanent military bases in Southeast Europe and Southeast Asia. Permanent bases would ease the strain on US forces, allowing readiness to be maintained and the carrier fleet to be reduced. Furthermore, PNAC advocated that the US-globalized military should be enlarged, equipped and restructured for the "constabulary" roles associated with shaping the security in critical regions of the world.^[44]

Environmental record

George W. Bush’s environmental record began with promises as a presidential candidate to clean up power plants and reduce greenhouse gas emissions. In a speech on September 29, 2000 in Saginaw, Michigan, Bush pledged to commit two billion dollars to the funding of clean coal technology research. In the same speech, he also promised to work with Congress, environmental groups and the energy industry to require a reduction of the emissions of sulfur dioxide, nitrogen oxide, mercuryand carbon dioxide into the environment within a “reasonable period of time.”^[45] He would later reverse his position on that specific campaign pledge in March 2001 in a letter to Nebraska senator Chuck Hagel, stating that carbon dioxide was not considered a pollutant under the Clean Air Act, and that restricting carbon dioxide emissions would lead to higher energy prices.^[46]

In 2001, Bush appointed Philip A. Cooney, a former lobbyist for the American Petroleum Institute, to the White House Council on Environmental Equality. Cooney is known to have edited government climate reports in order to minimize the findings of scientific sources tying greenhouse gas emissions to global warming.^[47]

In March 2001, the Bush administration announced that it would not implement the Kyoto Protocol, an international treaty signed in 1997 in Kyoto, Japan that would require nations to reduce their greenhouse gas emissions, claiming that ratifying the treaty would create economic setbacks in the U.S. and does not put enough pressure to limit emissions from developing nations.^[48] In February 2002, Bush announced his alternative to the Kyoto Protocol, by bringing forth a plan to reduce the intensity of greenhouse gasses by 18 percent over 10 years. The intensity of greenhouse gasses specifically is the ratio of greenhouse gas emissions and economic output, meaning that under this plan, emissions would still continue to grow, but at a slower pace. Bush stated that this plan would prevent the release of 500 million metric tons of greenhouse gases, which is about the equivalent of 70 million cars from the road. This target would achieve this goal by providing tax credits to businesses that use renewable energy sources.^{[49] In late November 2002, the Bush Administration released proposed rule changes that would lead to increased logging of federal forests for commercial or recreational activities by giving local forest managers the ability to open up the forests to development without requiring environmental impact assessments and without specific standards to maintain local fish and wildlife populations. The proposed changes would affect roughly 192,000,000 acres (780,000 km²) of US forests and grasslands. Administration officials claimed the changes were appropriate because existing rules, which were approved by the Clinton administration two months before Bush took office, were unclear.^[50]}

In November 2004, Bush administration officials asked the United Nations to allow US industries to use an additional 458 tons of methyl bromide, an ozone-destroying pesticide that was slated for elimination by the 1987 Montreal Protocol on Substances that Deplete the Ozone Layer. The additional increase request brings the US’s total exemption for the year 2005 to 9,400 metric tons of methyl bromide, more than all other nations’ requests combined, and well over the 7,674 metric tons used by US agribusiness in 2002.^[51]

In January 2004, Interior Secretary Gale Norton approved a move to open nearly 9,000,000 acres (36,000 km²) of Alaska's North Slope to oil and gas development, citing claims from the energy industry that nearly 13 billion barrels (2.1×10⁹ m³) of oil could be extracted from the region. The North Slope neighbor's the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge, a sanctuary and habitat for migratory birds, whales, seals and other wildlife. Reports from the U.S. Geological Survey, however, estimate that less than one-third of the reported 13 billion barrels (2.1×10⁹ m³) is economically recoverable in the entire 23,500,000-acre (95,000 km²) National Petroleum Reserve.^[52]

In July 2005 the Environmental Protection Agency decided to delay the release of an annual report on fuel economy. The report shows that automakers have taken advantage of loopholes in US fuel economy regulations to manufacture vehicles that are less fuel-efficient than they were in the late 1980s. Fuel-efficiency had on average dropped six percent during that period, from 22.1 miles per gallonto 20.8 mpg. Evidence suggests that the administration’s decision to delay the report’s release was because of its potential to affect Congress’s upcoming final vote on an energy bill six years in the making, which turned a blind eye to fuel economy regulations.^[53]

In May 2006, the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Association (NOAA) allegedly blocked release of a report that suggested global warming had been a contributor to the frequency and strength of hurricanes in recent years. In February, NOAA (part of the Department of Commerce) set up a seven-member panel of climate scientists to compile the report. The panel’s chair, Ants Leema, received an e-mail from a Commerce Department official asking for the report to not be released as it needed to be made “less technical.”^[54] NOAA would later go on to say that the report was not released because it “was not complete” and was in reality not a report, but a “two-page fact sheet about the issue.”^[55]

Legacy

In 2006, 744 professional historians surveyed by New York-based Siena College regarded Bush's presidency as follows: Great: 2%; Near Great: 5%; Average: 11%; Below Average: 24%; Failure: 58%. Thomas Kelly, professor emeritus of American studies at Siena College, said that "In this case, current public opinion polls actually seem to cut the President more slack than the experts do." Similar outcomes were retrieved by two informal surveys done by the History News Network in 2004 and 2008.

Proponents may argue that accomplishments such as the President's AIDS program, reform of education by the federal government with the No Child Left Behind Act, no more foreign terrorist attacks on American soil after the September 11th attacks, the creation of Medicare Part D, and sending 29 million African children to school will allow Bush to have a positive legacy. Critics may argue that theeconomic crisis of 2008, the NSA warrantless surveillance controversy, his response to Hurricane Katrina, the ballooning deficit, the planning of the Iraq War, handling of the Guantanamo Bay detaineesand other terror suspects, and calls by Democrats for possible investigation and prosecution for war crimes committed under his name will leave him as one of the worst Presidents ever.^[56] In response to a question on his popularity, Bush remarked "I know I gave it my all for eight years, and I did not sell my soul for the sake of popularity. And so when I get back home and look in the mirror, I will be proud of what I see."^[57]

On January 15, 2009, Bush gave a nationally televised farewell address in the East Room of the White House. He defended many of his decisions and cited the fact that he had kept the country safe since September 11, 2001 as a major accomplishment. Bush stated that "I have always acted with the best interests of our country in mind. I have followed my conscience and done what I thought was right." He also said that the United States must continue promoting human liberty, human rights, and human dignity around the world. One of his final lines was "We have faced danger and trial, and there's more ahead. But with the courage of our people and confidence in our ideals, this great nation will never tire, never falter and never fail."^[58]^[59]

Major Legislation signed under President George W Bush

2001: May 26: The 2001 Bush Tax Cuts [HR 1836] (through reconciliation procedure); June 7: Economic Growth and Tax Relief Reconciliation Act of 2001; September 18: Authorization for Use of Military Force; September 28: United States-Jordan Free Trade Area Implementation Act; October 26: USA PATRIOT Act; November 28: Internet Tax Nondiscrimination Act; 2002: January 8: No Child Left Behind Act; March 9: Job Creation and Worker Assistance Act of 2002; March 27: Bipartisan Campaign Reform Act of 2002; May 13: Farm Security and Rural Investment Act of 2002^{[21]; July 30: Sarbanes-Oxley Act of 2002; October 16: Joint Resolution to Authorize the Use of United States Armed Forces Against Iraq; November 25: Homeland Security Act of 2002; 2003: March 11: Do-Not-Call Implementation Act; April 30: PROTECT Act of 2003 (Prosecutorial Remedies and Other Tools to end the Exploitation of Children Today Act) (see also Age of consent); May 23 : The 2003 Bush Tax Cuts [HR 2] (through reconciliation procedure); May 27: United States Leadership Against HIV/AIDS, Tuberculosis and Malaria Act of 2003; May 28: Jobs and Growth Tax Relief Reconciliation Act of 2003; September 3: United States-Chile Free Trade Agreement Implementation Act; September 3: United States-Singapore Free Trade Agreement Implementation Act; November 5: Partial-Birth Abortion Ban Act of 2003; December 3: Healthy Forests Restoration Act of 2003; December 8: Medicare Prescription Drug, Improvement, and Modernization Act of 2003; December 16: Controlling the Assault of Non-Solicited Pornography and Marketing Act (CAN-SPAM); 2004: April 1: Unborn Victims of Violence Act (Laci and Conner’s Law); July 17: United States-Morocco Free Trade Agreement Implementation Act: August 3: United States-Australia Free Trade Agreement Implementation Act; 2005: February 18: Class Action Fairness Act of 2005; April 20: Bankruptcy Reform Act of 2005; May 11: Tax Increase Prevention and Reconciliation Act of 2005 [HR 4297] (through reconciliation procedure); August 2: Dominican Republic-Central America-United States Free Trade AgreementImplementation Act; August 8: Energy Policy Act of 2005; August 10: Safe, Accountable, Flexible, and Efficient Transportation Equity Act of 2005(SAFETEA); October 26: Protection of Lawful Commerce in Arms Act; December 21 : The Deficit Reduction Act of 2005 [H. Con Res. 95] (through reconciliation procedure); 2006: January 11: United States-Bahrain Free Trade Agreement Implementation Act March 9: USA PATRIOT Improvement and Reauthorization Act; July 27: Adam Walsh Child Protection and Safety Act; August 17: The Pension Protection Act of 2006^{[22]; September 30: Iran Freedom and Support Act; October 4: Department of Homeland Security Appropriations Act, 2007^{[23]; October 17: Military Commissions Act of 2006; October 26: Secure Fence Act of 2006}}}

Legislation vetoed

President Bush vetoed 12 pieces of legislation, four of which were overturned by congress:

July 19, 2006: Stem Cell Research Enactment Act of 2006
May 1, 2007: H.R. 1591, U.S. Troop Readiness, Veterans' Care, Katrina Recovery, and Iraq Accountability Appropriations Act of 2007
June 20, 2007: Stem Cell Research Enactment Act of 2007
October 3, 2007: State Children's Health Insurance Program Expansion H.R. 976
November 2, 2007: Vetoed H.R. 1495, Water Resources Development Act of 2007. Overridden by House, 361-54 (277 votes needed). Overridden by Senate, 79-14 (62 needed), and enacted asPub.L. 110-114 over President's veto.
November 13, 2007: Vetoed H.R. 3043, Departments of Labor, Health and Human Services, and Education, and Related Agencies Appropriations Act of 2008. Override attempt failed in House, 277-141 (279 votes needed).
December 12, 2007: Vetoed H.R. 3963, Children's Health Insurance Program Reauthorization Act of 2007.^[24] Override attempt failed in House, 260-152 (275 votes needed).
December 28, 2007: Pocket Vetoed H.R. 1585, National Defense Authorization Act for Fiscal Year 2008.^[25] A later version of the bill that changed a minor provision of which the President disapproved was quickly passed by Congress (H.R. 4986) and was enacted with the President's approval as Pub.L. 110-181 on January 28, 2008.
March 8, 2008: Vetoed H.R. 2082, Intelligence Authorization Act for Fiscal Year 2008.^[26]^[27] Override attempt failed in House, 225-188.
May 21, 2008: Vetoed H.R. 2419, 2007 U.S. Farm Bill.^[28]^[29] Overridden by House, 316-108 (283 votes needed). Overridden by Senate, 82-13 (64 votes needed). Enacted as Pub.L. 110-234 over the President's veto. Due to a clerical error, this act was repealed by Pub.L. 110-246.
18 June 2008: Vetoed H.R. 6421, 2007 U.S. Farm Bill, re-passed by Congress to correct a clerical error in HR 2419.^[30]^[31] Overridden by House, 317-109 (284 votes required). Overridden by Senate, 80-14 (63 votes needed). Enacted as Pub.L. 110-246 over the President's veto.
July 15, 2008: Vetoed H.R. 6331, Medicare Improvements for Patients and Providers Act.^[32]^[33] Overridden by House, 383-41 (283 votes required.) Overridden by Senate, 70-26 (64 votes required).Enacted as Pub.L. 110-275 over the President's veto.
GW The Bush Cabinet
Cabinet Meeting

President: George W. Bush; 2001–2009; Vice President: Dick Cheney: 2001–2009; Secretary of State: Colin Powell: 2001–2005; Condoleezza Rice: 2005–2009;

Secretary of Treasury: Paul O'Neill: 2001–2002; John Snow: 2003–2006; Henry Paulson: 2006–2009; Secretary of Defense: Donald Rumsfeld: 2001–2006; Robert Gates:2006–2009

Attorney General: John Ashcroft: 2001–05; Alberto Gonzales: 2005–07; Michael Mukasey: 2007–09; Secretary of the Interior: Gale Norton: 2001–06; Dirk Kempthorne:2006–09

Secretary of Agriculture: Ann Veneman: 2001–05; Mike Johanns: 2005–07; Ed Schafer:2008–09; Secretary of Commerce: Donald Evans:2001–05; Carlos Gutierrez:2005–09

Secretary of Labor: Elaine Chao: 2001–2009; Secretary of Health and Human Services: Tommy Thompson: 2001–2005; Michael Leavitt: 2005–2009;

Secretary of Education:Rod Paige: 2001–05; Margaret Spellings:2005–09;

Secretary of Housing and Urban Development: Mel Martinez:2001–03;Alphonso Jackson: 2003–08; Steve Preston: 2008–2009

Secretary of Transportation: Norman Mineta: 2001–2006; Mary Peters:2006–2009; Secretary of Energy: Spencer Abraham: 2001–2005; Samuel Bodman: 2005–2009

Secretary of Veterans Affairs: Anthony Principi: 2001–05; Jim Nicholson: 2005–07; James Peake: 2007–09;

Secretary of Homeland Security: Tom Ridge:2003–05; Michael Chertoff: 2005–2009; Chief of Staff: Andrew Card: 2001–2006; Joshua Bolten; 2006–2009;

Administrator of the Environmental Protection Agency: Christine Todd Whitman: 2001–2003; Michael Leavitt: 2003–2005; Stephen Johnson:2005–2009

Director of the Office of Management and Budget: Mitch Daniels: 2001–2003; Joshua Bolten: 2003–2006; Rob Portman: 2006–2007; Jim Nussle: 2007–2009

Director of the Office of National Drug Control Policy: John Walters; 2001–2009;

United States Trade Representative: Robert Zoellick: 2001–2005; Rob Portman:2005–2006; Susan Schwab: 2006–2009

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