The Leo Wanta Caper
Is there a warrant for the arrest of Tony Blair?by Sol Aris 
(Copyright 2008, Sol Aris - All Rights Reserved)
An unusually intelligent reader from the James Randi forum has conducted a thorough investigation of a claim from Story's articles from February 2, 2007, of this year, "U.S. HOUSE BILL TO ABOLISH THE FEDERAL RESERVE" (www.worldreports.org_). The article says that "the US House of Representatives has a Bill to abolish the Federal Reserve (see previous postings) which had been expected to be approved on 1st February" - yet we are shown that the bill was introduced in 2003 and hadn't been heard of since. It becomes apparent that the writer of such words is either deliberately lying, or does not know the first thing either about the US legislative process, or how to find his way around a congressional website. (See forums.randi.org)
Once again, the incongruities were piling up here. What was exactly the story with this Story, who claims to be an economic and political expert with 35-year experience - but makes absolutely ridiculous assertions about International Law and names sums of money which he should well know that do not exist, and also purports to be an advisor to governmental figures and bodies in England and the US - yet is mentioned largely on websites of the neo-fascist fringe? Despite my natural aversion to reading such nonsense, it seemed that there was nothing for it but to take a much closer look at what Mr. Story is actually saying in his (needless to say - horrifically long, drawn-out and repetitive) articles.
Right at the top of his "Paulson Arrested" article, Story says this in the "January 4 Update": "All details of the Paulson arrest scenario and the contents of the Diary coverage on this website, together with all the previous Wanta postings, are pre-approved by Michael C. Cottrell, M.S., Treasurer and Executive Vice President, AmeriTrust Groupe, Inc, and by Ambassador Leo Emil Wanta."
A closer look at the article, as well as Story's "previous Wanta postings", show that evidently the most vital player here, and indeed the SOURCE of all of Story's information about this very puzzling international affair, is this Leo Wanta. Although for some reason he prefers all his statements to be made by his "treasurer" Cottrell, Wanta seems to be the origin of the information and the foremost player in this drama, and if we want to get to the bottom of what is happening here, he would be the first person to ask. When I began looking for information about him, however, it quickly became apparent that Wanta is an extraordinarily strange and elusive character.
 Leo Wanta
Christopher Story refers to Wanta as the Somali Ambassador to Canada and Switzerland. Curiously enough, the Somali nation does not exist as a recognized sovereign state and has no central government or any other feature associated with it - such as the office of "Ambassador" to foreign countries. Story has repeatedly stated on his website that he will not be replying to any inquiries questioning Wanta or his information - and we must therefore search other sources for proof of the latter's credibility.
A thorough scan of the information available on the Internet about this man shows that he is a most slippery character, a convicted con-man on one hand, yet persistently appearing in various shadowy governmental and conspiracy contexts, invariably dealing with very large sums of money.
His earliest mention on the Internet is in some Usenet postings from 1997 (now "Google Groups"). At that time a man by the name of "J. Orlin Grabbe" posted a series of articles about him on the alt.conspiracy group, some of which were said to have been written that year by Sarah McClendon, a well-known and respected Washington DC reporter, who died in 2003 at the age of 93. (See for example at (groups.google.com)
The original source of McClendon's articles is not provided, and it is thus impossible to check whether she had indeed written and published them (she would've been 87 in 1997). But the article states that Wanta "is credited with bringing down the Soviet Union in the Cold War" with his "purchase of huge sums in Russian rubles".
These assertions are routinely used by all subsequent writers to prove Wanta's involvement with the vast sums of money, which he is purportedly negotiating the return of (which number in the TRILLIONS of dollars.) McClendon's reputation seems to prove that Wanta is indeed real. For example, the most prominent promoter of Wanta's story in recent times, the "alternative reporter" Greg Szymanski has this headline on his website from October 9. 2006: "Even famous White House reporter, Sarah McClendon, put pen and paper to the Wanta story in two 1997 articles". (www.arcticbeacon.com )
A large amount of information about Wanta, including reprints of McClendon's articles and others, is collected on the website of APFN (American Patriot Friends Network), at www.apfn.org . It's not clear whom provided that site with the various original documents reproduced there, and one wonders whether the mentioned J. Orlin Grabbe may've had a hand in this as well.
| Click on the 'NEXT' arrow for page 4 |
 |
|
Today:
Printer
friendly version
