Human beings ARE free.

When shit that hits the fan hits home: the random acts of Police in Louisville, Kentucky - UPDATED 10/31/2009

2009-10-28T05:04:00.008-04:00

Good morning friends,

Please pardon the crudeness of my language, but at the moment crude language is about all that seems to fit my mood. About 3 hours ago I had the pleasure of standing on my front stoop watching 2 policeman point guns at my friend as he and another friend arrived at my home in the Clifton neighborhood of Louisville, Kentucky. From what I can tell so far they were being pulled over for a traffic violation. But, to keep matters clear I will describe only what I saw and nothing that I'm guessing at. Here is my experience:

I was sitting in the rear room of my long, shotgun-style house when I heard yelling outside. At first I thought nothing of it--I thought it was probably just some latenight partiers making their way home from a local bar. As the yelling continued and intensified, I became concerned and walked to the front door to see what was the matter. When I opened the door I saw two police officers with guns drawn and aimed standing to the left and to the right of my front sidewalk that goes from my front door out toward the street. I also saw the car they were driving parked in one of the parking spaces on the street. Both guns were pointed at one of my two arriving friends; he was standing with his back facing me (and the police officers; I was behind them all) near the vehicle with his hands up. At a distance I heard the voice of my other arriving friend talking to other officers at another car (that was the last I heard of that friend). The police were shouting orders at my (other) friend at whom the gun was drawn. Whatever they were saying was pretty much unintelligible to me from my vantage point, but from what I could hear it did include a nice drizzle of cursing. My friend (with 2 guns that I could see still pointed at him) walked in reverse towards one of the officers, who I could by then make out was saying something along the lines of, "walk towards my voice" (or "Just walk towards my fucking voice!"--probably closer). After cop #1 got handcuffs on my friend, cop #2 finally stopped aiming his gun. By around this time I had calmed a little and took count of the police cars present and counted 7 (seven). After my friend was searched, the police proceeded to interrogate him for approximately 30 minutes as he stood in front of one of their vehicles, of course handcuffed all the while. There were 4-6 cops surrounding him at all times. (Still couldn't see what was going on with my other friend; tree blocking my view.) Finally, they put him in the back of one of their cars and drove away. I presume my other friend was taken away in another one of the cars.

Okay, done with the quick recollecting... I'll probably recount some more details (like the fun conversation I had with the cops) a little late, but I wanted to get the critical points down quickly and with clarity while the event is still fresh in my head. The final points I'd like to mention now are...

AT NO POINT DID I SEE MY FRIEND WHO HAD THE GUNS TARGETED ON HIM MAKE ANY VIOLENT MOVES.
AT NO POINT DID I SEE HIM DO ANYTHING OTHER THAN COOPERATE WITH THE POLICE OFFICERS.
YET GUNS WERE DRAWN AND AIMED AT A LIVING HUMAN BEING--APPARENTLY OVER A TRAFFIC VIOLATION.

Fucked up, eh?
Good times in Louisville.
Thanks for listening.
To sleep now until the judge makes his decision at 7 am about pretrial shit.

Best wishes to every free being on this Earth... Goodnight.

UPDATE: Saturday, 31 October 2009 - Both friends released Thursday late afternoon after spending about 36 hours in jail. All charges (they managed to rack it up to four!!!! separate charges) on my friend who had the guns targeted on him were, in fact, traffic-related.

OUR QUIET CORNER

2009-05-31T13:55:00.005-04:00

The other blogspots and websites around the world continue to show an amazing amount of traffic visiting their sites. I think it is fantastic when some of my favorite sites are getting people to stop and read their articles and commentaries over the mainstream press and their compromised lies and propaganda. I also think it's interesting that only a few people ever visit our site. It's like our quiet little corner in cyberspace. For those few that stop by and those that have comeback, thank you. It is our pleasure to share our thoughts and interests with you as this bizarre world unfolds.

NEWS and PROPAGANDA

2009-05-31T12:28:00.001-04:00

Drones could face legal challenge in US
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American human rights activists might legally challenge the US military’s use of Predator drones in Afghanistan and Pakistan. The spy planes are virtually invisible when flying overhead. “That’s the spooky thing about the Predator,” terrorism expert Neil Livingstone says. Human rights activists point out that there’s no warning to innocent civilians in the targeted area. “This is not only a violation of the international laws of war,” says Gabor Rona, of Human Rights First, a US-based group. “It’s bad policy.” The laws of war allow individuals engaged in hostilities to be targeted in an armed conflict but strictly prohibit actions against those not engaged.

http://atheonews.blogspot.com/2009/05/drones-could-face-legal-challenge-in-us.html

65 years in jail for providing charity (to Palestinians that is)
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This week five men from the holy land foundation were sentenced to prison terms [...] If you funnel money to the Israeli terrorist army, it is tax-deductible in the US. And if you funnel money to any Palestinian group, you serve time in jail....

http://www.uruknet.info/?p=m54710&hd=&size=1&l=e

Abbas's forces kill Hamas militant in raid
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QALQILYA: A Hamas militant was killed and two Palestinian policemen were injured in exchanges of gunfire in the Israeli-occupied West Bank on Sunday, Palestinian security officials said.
The clashes erupted when security forces loyal to President Mahmoud Abbas's Fatah faction, which administers the West Bank, raided a neighbourhood in the city of Qalqilya to arrest gunmen of the rival Hamas group, which rules the Gaza Strip.
The officials named the militant as Mohammad Yasin and said policemen were combing the area in a search for more gunmen. Witnesses said several Hamas gunmen holed up in buildings had ignored calls to surrender.

http://www.thenews.com.pk/updates.asp?id=79149

US, Israel fanning Indo-Pak tensions, says Qadhafi
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‘The Pakistanis are told that their enemy is the Hindus, not the Jews or Christians, and therefore their bomb should be directed towards them, the Pakistanis’ immediate enemy, and not anyone else,’ writes Mr Qadhafi.
‘Similarly, the Indians are led to believe their real enemy is Pakistan and that the Pakistani bomb was directed towards them rather than the Israelis or Americans.’
The Libyan leader claims that this policy aims to preoccupy Pakistan with India and India with Pakistan. ‘Perhaps this is why America has not been willing to contribute to solving the Kashmiri problem, whereas the Israelis will try to keep it always flammable.’

http://www.dawn.com/wps/wcm/connect/dawn-content-library/dawn/news/world/13+us+israel+fanning+indo-pak+tensions-za-07

Iran defuses bomb in plane
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Iranian security officials defused a bomb planted on a domestic passenger plane, officials said on Sunday, the latest incident of violence ahead of next month's presidential election.
"Last night, 15 minutes after the plane with 131 passengers took off, flight security guards found a handmade bomb placed in the lavatory," Fars said. "The plane landed immediately at Ahvaz airport and the bomb was defused."
The incident occurred just two days after 25 people were killed in a powerful bomb attack on a mosque in Zahedan in southeastern Iran claimed by a shadowy Sunni rebel group.

http://www.thenews.com.pk/updates.asp?id=79184

STOP GIVING THEM IDEAS!!!

2009-05-30T22:46:00.004-04:00

{It has been scientifically proven that re-gifting is O.K.}
_______________________________________

Chavez gift for Obama: Lenin's writing
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Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez is reported to be ready to present to his US counterpart the first Soviet leader's instructions on political direction of the working class.

http://www.presstv.ir/detail.aspx?id=96538&sectionid=351020704

Books, letter to be used in case against Suu Kyi
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Several items left by an uninvited American visitor, including a book on the Mormon faith and a letter, could be used to convict and imprison Burma pro-democracy leader Aung San Suu Kyi on charges of violating her house arrest

http://www.ctv.ca/servlet/ArticleNews/story/CTVNews/20090523/suukyi_trial_090523/20090523?hub=World

Mexico's president given George Orwell's 1984 by the Queen
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At Buckingham Palace, Felipe Calderon was presented with a first edition of George Orwell's nightmarish book, which tells of a totalitarian regime and coined the concept Big Brother.

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/uknews/5077917/Mexicos-president-given-George-Orwells-1984-by-the-Queen.html

U.S. MANAGING MURDER IN IRAN

2009-05-30T12:04:00.004-04:00

Jundullah claim responsibility for Iran blast
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The Jundullah terror group has claimed responsibility for a terrorist attack that killed at least 25 people in southeastern of Iran.

http://www.presstv.ir/detail.aspx?id=96453&sectionid=351020101

ABC News Exclusive: The Secret War Against Iran
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A Pakistani tribal militant group responsible for a series of deadly guerrilla raids inside Iran has been secretly encouraged and advised by American officials since 2005, U.S. and Pakistani intelligence sources tell ABC News.
The group, called Jundullah, is made up of members of the Baluchi tribe and operates out of the Baluchistan province in Pakistan, just across the border from Iran.
It has taken responsibility for the deaths and kidnappings of more than a dozen Iranian soldiers and officials.

http://blogs.abcnews.com/theblotter/2007/04/abc_news_exclus.html

Preparing the Battlefield
The Bush Administration steps up its secret moves against Iran.
by Seymour M. Hersh
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Congress agreed to a request from President Bush to fund a major escalation of covert operations against Iran, according to current and former military, intelligence, and congressional sources. These operations, for which the President sought up to four hundred million dollars, were described in a Presidential Finding signed by Bush, and are designed to destabilize the country’s religious leadership.

http://www.newyorker.com/reporting/2008/07/07/080707fa_fact_hersh

DISPARITIES and CRUSADES

2009-05-29T23:57:00.004-04:00

Israelis get four-fifths of scarce West Bank water, says World Bank
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The region faces a fifth consecutive year of drought this summer, but the World Bank report found huge disparities in water use between Israelis and Palestinians, although both share the mountain aquifer that runs the length of the occupied West Bank. Palestinians have access to only a fifth of the water supply, while Israel, which controls the area, takes the rest, the bank said.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2009/may/27/israel-palestinian-water-dispute

America still pursues military engagement over a peace strategy
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Some opponents of the Iraq War, including me, believe that a fundamental - and deeply misguided - objective of the war from the outset has been to create a long-term military base (or bases) in Iraq, ostensibly to protect oil routes and oil concessions.
The worries are even worse in Afghanistan. Among other problems, the US relies heavily on drones and bombers, leading to a high civilian death toll, which is inflaming public attitudes against the US. After one recent disaster, in which more than 100 civilians died, the Pentagon immediately insisted that such bombing operations would continue.

http://news.xinhuanet.com/english/2009-05/22/content_11417757.htm

Secret Memos Reveal Bush Saw Iraq War as ‘Christian’ Crusade
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Former Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld sent President George Bush top-secret wartime memos with cover sheets that mixed Scripture and battle photos to cast the Iraq invasion as a holy Christian crusade, the journal CQ reports.
“Rumsfeld, not known to be religious, appeared to be trying to manipulate the Bible-quoting Bush into believing that invading Iraq was God’s will. “Commit to the LORD, whatever you do, and your plans will succeed—Proverbs 16.3,” appeared on an April 1, 2003 report over a photo of a U.S. soldier near a highway sign pointing to Baghdad. The next day, U.S. troops reached the Iraqi capital.
“Open the gates that the righteous nation may enter, the nation that keeps the faith—Isaiah 26.2,” appeared on an April 3, 2003 memo over a photo of a U.S. tank entering Baghdad.
Four months later, during a summit in Egypt, the Palestinian foreign minister said Bush told him he was on “a mission from God” and was getting commands directly from the Lord.

http://americanfreepress.net/html/bush_crusade_179.html

2009-05-29T17:10:00.000-04:00

Plain & Simple.
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After all in your minds, it is not called an armed invasion and occupation...you call it an "unfortunate mistake", "an unnecessary war" at best, and preach to me and us that we should forgive, while you're still there, physically there "visiting" us and while you persist in the lie...
And in those sick, sick, minds of yours, you justify it all with "we are here to help."
Do you know why you do that ? I will tell you why. It is because you have this amazing propensity to LIE TO YOURSELVES...you are in fact the PEOPLE OF THE LIE.

http://arabwomanblues.blogspot.com/2009/05/plain-simple.html

Setting back the 9/11 Truth Movement a Decade
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And that's what Alex Jones managed to do in the documentary, "New World Order" that aired yesterday evening on the Independent Film Channel.
Jones came across as an out of control, paranoid, delusional nut case who sees conspiracies behind every corner that are waiting to take him down.
Here's what Robert Lloyd of the LA Times said about Jones in "New World Order."
Jones is a self-inflating showboat who gets energy from hearing himself speak; he has cast himself as the star and main target in a conspiracy thriller he sees following him everywhere: a shirtless biker hanging around the Washington Mall is certainly Secret Service; the fire alarm that goes off in his hotel can only be a "setup."
And from the "Paper of Record," the New York Times, in their article Conspiracy Theorists Examined
The most prominent of the filmmakers’ subjects, the radio host Alex Jones, who is based in Austin, Tex., rails against the powers that be — all of them — in a manner that reinforces every cliché of the conspiracy theorist loon: paranoid, megalomaniacal, delusional, sweaty. The documentary’s most action-packed scene finds Mr. Jones throwing a major hissy fit when his hotel fire alarm goes off, thereby proving, without a shadow of a doubt, that “they” are trying to suppress his revelations.
And for once, I agree with the NYT. Between his bug-eyed facial features and waving his arms like a whirling dervish, Jones looked like someone who had escaped the confines of his straightjacket.
...the producers of this hit piece focused on the fringe elements of the 9/11 Truth Movement, from interviewing some Idaho militia types to the Florida Jesus freak that didn't seem to be playing with a full deck.
But it's the most visible and best known character, Jones who manages to trash the 9/11 Truth Movement thru his hysterics and acting like he has no control over his emotions.
Thanks Alex, for helping trash the 9/11 Truth Movement, you did a bang up piece for Tyranny, Death and Destruction. Your handlers must be proud!

http://careandwashingofthebrain.blogspot.com/2009/05/setting-back-911-truth-movement-decade.html

Blackmail... Gold... U.S. hiring mosque bombers ?

2009-05-29T13:39:00.001-04:00

Report: Iranian official accuses U.S. of hiring mosque bombers
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"Three people involved in the terrorist incident have been arrested," Jalal Sayyah, deputy provincial governor of the province near the border with Pakistan, was quoted by Iran's semi-official Fars news agency as saying.
He said that according to the obtained information, the people behind the terrorist act was hired by the United States.
The explosion rocked a crowd mosque in Zahedan, killing 23 people and wounding 125 others so far, according to Fars news agency.

http://news.xinhuanet.com/english/2009-05/29/content_11453593.htm

Hitmen Contracts to Bust COMEX
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The financial cartel dominated by the United States and United Kingdom is soon to suffer some serious blows. The list of their financial crimes is as magnificent as it is long. Its list of victims is as prominent as it is long. The harbored resentment is great by many global players. They waited patiently for the Obama Admin to install a new group, but the old group remains due to a revolving door from the same smoky club, dominated by Goldman Sachs once more. Their influence, if not bribery, of the USCongress is in continuation, sufficient for unwanted obsequious approval. The regulatory agencies are from the same encrusted chambers replete with stench. The Coup d’Etat of the USGovt financial offices has not changed with Obama, who sounds like a refreshing leader but who is actually a marionette under control by those who selected him, favored him with publicity, then enabled his election. Nothing has changed except the rhetoric of change and the pace on the path to bankruptcy for a few icon firms like General Motors and Chrysler, if not the desperate cries from the 50 states suffering from insolvency. More prominent failures will follow, since nothing has been remedied. The channeled funds directed to Wall Street firms continue unabated. The bread crumbs to Main Street and the people continue unabated. Even the war continues unabated. Forget not that Marie Antoinette once said “Let them eat cake” before the French Revolution and the Storming of the Bastille. Today, the Bastille is the entire USEconomy where insolvent Americans are stuck.

http://news.goldseek.com/GoldenJackass/1243519200.php

The Clinton Team and Blackmail
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Filegate is, of course, the still-unresolved scandal of the FBI's illegal transfer to Clinton political operatives in the White House of the secret, personal background files of at least 900 Republican former officials. Those files, security experts say, are filled with raw, unverified information of the most personal and often lurid kind. Schippers says he believes the White House or its designees used leads from some of those files to blackmail law-makers on Capitol Hill. Congress, despite his urging, has failed to probe the matter.

http://findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_m1571/is_23_16/ai_62896460/

{We here at HUMAN BEINGS ARE FREE feel compelled to state our position on the decisions and actions taken by the people elected to their office through the votes of the citizens they represent, and whose decisions and actions are compromised through personal blackmail as an excuse...FUCK YOU!}

NEWS and PROPAGANDA

2009-05-29T12:08:00.001-04:00

Gunmen attack Ahmadinejad election campaign centre
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Updated at: 2145 PST, Friday, May 29, 2009
TEHRAN: Gunmen attacked President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad's election campaign centre in the southeastern Iranian city of Zahedan on Friday, wounding three people including a child, the official IRNA news agency said.

http://www.thenews.com.pk/updates.asp?id=79028

Iran mosque blast bears 'US, Israel thumbprints'
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“The bomb tragedy that occurred yesterday in the city of Zahedan is awash with Israeli and US fingerprints,” said Tehran's Interim Friday Prayers Leader, Ayatollah Ahmad Khatami.
“Without a doubt, it was a scheme to drive a wedge between the Shia population and the Sunni minority in Iran,” he added.

http://www.presstv.ir/detail.aspx?id=96389&sectionid=351020101

Calls for war crimes inquiry over 20,000 civilian deaths in Sri Lanka
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Sri Lanka faced new calls for a war crimes inquiry today after an investigation by The Times revealed that more than 20,000 civilians were killed – mostly by the army – in the latter stages of the war against the Tamil Tigers.
“This is an exaggerated story. Whoever has put up this report has been paid by the LTTE,” he told The Times.
“There can’t be any civilians killed by government forces in that area. How can the UN know about this? It had no people on the ground.” The UN, however, described its figures as “well-informed estimates”, adding that it did not have “precise, verifiable numbers” because of a lack of access to the conflict zone and the camps holding refugees from the area.

http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/world/asia/article6387782.ece

Manipulation: How Financial Markets Really Work
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In other words, let foxes guard the henhouse to keep inventing new ways to extract gains (a "free lunch") in increasingly larger amounts - "in the interest of helping to contain systemic risk factors and promote greater stability."
Or as Orwell might have said: instability is stability, creating systemic risk is containing it, sloping playing fields are level ones, extracting the greatest profit is sharing it, and what benefits the few helps everyone.
Michel Chossudovsky explains that: "triggering market collapse(s) can be a very profitable undertaking.

http://www.globalresearch.ca/index.php?context=va&aid=13773

2009-05-29T10:51:00.001-04:00

Another Outrage

By Cindy Sheehan

May 26, 2009 "AfterDowningSt" -- Last week, after being bombarded with pseudo-patriotic images of graveyards, gravestones and flags, I decided to begin posting images of maimed and killed Iraqis, but especially children and transform the mega-pseudo-patriotic Memorial Day to Remembrance of Victims of US Empire Day.
I got a great response to this and my friend and videographer, Clifford Roddy put together a short film called: finaledit, with the images I posted and with images that he took at a national cemetery in Santa Fe, NM where we were together for my Myth America book tour. I have a Cindy Sheehan You Tube page so we posted it there.
The video was just yanked off of You Tube because it “violates the terms of service” but even before it was yanked, it had a warning: “This video is unsuitable for children.”
The pictures of the dead and maimed Iraqi children were gruesome. War is gruesome. War is never pretty but the Iraqi war has been “Sanitized for your protection.” It’s not enough that adult males have been tortured but thousands of women and children have also been imprisoned and cruelly treated.
I think it’s pretty gruesome that the US Military has held up to 6000 juveniles in its torture prisons in the Middle East and there has been rape and torture reported to individuals as young as 10 years old! How can any human being torture another human being, much less a child? These kinds of stories remind me of the most horrendous slasher movies that I can think of, but they are not the pretend product of twisted fantasy, but factual and mind-blowingly real.
Former US Soldier, Steven Green, was recently given life in prison without the possibility of parole for the 2007 rape, mutilation and murder of a 14-year-old girl in Mahmoudiya, Iraq. Not only was Green the ringleader in the rape and murder; the squad also killed her family.
Unfortunately, even though Green was a “bad apple,” the situation we find ourselves in is an entire salad of rotten fruit and incidences like this one are not uncommon, but rarely reported.
Once when I was in Amman, Jordan speaking with prominent Iraqis, a Sheikh told me that US soldiers burst into his home, severely beating him and raping his wife, all in the presence of his 14-year-old son. The Sheikh told me that it was his son’s fondest dream to kill US Soldiers. Can you imagine this happening to your family? What if something like this happened in your home? You’re sitting around watching American Idol, or some crap like that, and Iraqis break into your home and terrorize and brutalize your family? I am sure you would all just chalk it up to “freedom and democracy” and be happy to go about your miserable lives comforted by the fact that your country was being occupied and destroyed for your own good.
During the US-UN-Clinton led sanctions against Iraq, the UN estimates that over 500,000 children died from starvation, disease, or violence. 500,000 Iraqi children would be like 5,000,000 US children dying. Former UN Ambassador under Clinton called that sacrifice for US Empire by the children of Iraq “worth it.” Over one million people have died in Iraq since Bush's invasion in 2003 and most of that figure counts women and children.
I have spoken to men who were still in their teens who were sodomized with broom handles in Guantanamo. I have seen the horrific photos of the US’s inhumanity to man and cannot forgive my country for the terror it has unleashed on the world. I can’t stand the fact that our government operates with such craven cowardice and has harmed so many people while Americans revel in blissful ignorance.
Young people who never get a chance to live their lives have their lives snuffed out so corporations can profit and politicians can earn their John Wayne, muy macho credentials and I wish that we could get a movement going that would be as large and as angry about weddings parties being blown up in Iraq-Af-Pak as they are about inequality in marriage rights here in the US. Please don’t email me with hostility because I wrote about marriage equality: I am 100% for marriage equality, but I am also 100% for people living to be able to be married whether they are gay or straight. Lives are in the balance and our inaction is tipping the scale in the wrong direction.
I am sorry (sarcasm) that our video “violated” You Tube’s terms of service, but the occupations of Iraq and Afghanistan not only violate my terms of service, but international law.

NEWS and PROPAGANDA

2009-05-29T01:20:00.001-04:00

Bomb blast rocks Iranian city of Zahedan
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A bomb planted in a mosque in a southeastern Iranian city near the border with Pakistan and Afghanistan has reportedly caused civilian casualties.
At least twenty people have been killed in the bombing in the city of Zahedan while more than fifty five others have been injured

http://www.presstv.ir/detail.aspx?id=96311&sectionid=351020101

Sri Lanka avoids war crimes probe, slams West
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Sri Lanka's Human Rights Minister Mahinda Samarasinghe dismissed Western criticism as "double standards." "They are opposed to the independent action we took to counter and defeat, but they are silent about what is happening in Iraq, Afghanistan and in Gaza,"

http://www.hurriyet.com.tr/english/world/11747933.asp?gid=237

Hamas condemns US charity members’ prison terms
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...some 8,000 Palestinians remained imprisoned by Israel. These included 300 children and 550 people held without charge or trial under so-called administrative detention, including some held up to six years in this way. In a related development, a senior Hamas official criticised as politically motivated and unjust the prison sentences handed down by a US court to members of a Muslim charity that sent aid to the Palestinian group.
Hamas’ deputy political leader, Moussa Abu Marzouk, said on Thursday that two of the men who were sentenced were relatives of the group’s top leader, Khaled Mashaal. The US designated Hamas as a terrorist organisation in 1995, making it illegal to offer the group support.
A court in Dallas, Texas, on Wednesday sentenced two founding members of what was once the largest US Muslim charity to 65 years in prison each for funnelling millions of dollars to Hamas. Three other members were sentenced to prison terms ranging from 15 to 20 years for conspiracy.

http://www.thenews.com.pk/daily_detail.asp?id=180031

UN expert: US failing to properly probe war crimes
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"There have been chronic and deplorable accountability failures with respect to policies, practices and conduct that resulted in alleged unlawful killings - including possible war crimes - in the United States' international operations,"

http://hosted.ap.org/dynamic/stories/U/UN_US_MILITARY_KILLINGS?SITE=AP&SECTION=HOME&TEMPLATE=DEFAULT&CTIME=2009-05-28-16-27-15

ON FREEDOM(part11)

2009-05-28T23:59:00.005-04:00

I lament this world, and relament what could have been had not layers of lies and illusion been sublimated, perpetuated, growing and swelling with each new birth and every new communicative device serving as instruments of propaganda and oppression. If I have a lot of money, or imagine that I have control over people because they do what I tell them to do, or I trace my historico-geneological thread back to some family of authority, blood of royalty, aliens from another planet or dimension, I am still a brand new, free being. The world has never seen me before now. I am independant of all expectations that could have been recorded. The many ways that I can conduct my behavior, or choose my actions in this world are too numerous to quantify. I exist now. I can think, be honest, comport the freedom that I am. Or I can merely calculate, lie, and act as though I am under the control of others. Elites, secret cabals, masters of the universe are old fictions that have been reinforced with new energy today and constitute for some a basis for reawakening. After years of dormancy, these illusions free beings entertain of gods on earth controlling the world, many accept. For some it is a true though, hidden fact newly discovered again. Stories of brainwashing, mind control, and computers that think, are all about creating wonder and fear of their power. Computers don't think, they calculate, they can not empathize, nor can they doubt. How can a mind be controlled? How can you accept that a mind can be defined? I at first thought brainwashing may have it's origins in christianity as in washing the sinful dirt from, but christians are concerned with a different organ. Descartes imagined for reason's sake, a chimera creating illusion after illusion, so that one may even question their own existence. He doubted such impossible illusions, and in his doubting he realized that no matter what illusions may be brought to bare he was not tricked into forgetting that he was not a slave to illusions. He would not accept illusions any longer from either his Jesuit pedagogues, nor ghosts of the imagination. Rene Descartes was free. Like you and I now.

2009-05-28T23:56:00.001-04:00

Elsa Rassbach interviews André Shepherd, a U.S. soldier applying for asylum in Germany
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In Nuremberg, the chief U.S. prosecutor, Robert H. Jackson, stated: "To initiate a war of aggression, therefore, is not only an international crime; it is the supreme international crime differing only from other war crimes in that it contains within itself the accumulated evil of the whole." In opening the trial on behalf of the United States, he stated that "while this law is first applied against German aggressors, this law includes and if it is to serve a useful purpose it must condemn aggression by any other nations, including those which sit here now in judgment." What does Nuremberg mean to you?

The Nuremberg statutes are the foundation of many U.S. soldiers' refusal of the Iraq war, and to some extent of the Afghanistan war. The United States with its Allies after World War II crafted these laws stating that even though you’ve gotten orders to commit crimes against humanity, you don’t have to follow them, because every person has their own conscience. That was more than 60 years ago. Today the U.S. government seems to be under the impression that those rules do not apply to it.

http://www.uruknet.info/?p=m54648&hd=&size=1&l=e

More ON FREEDOM (part 3.1): The Beauty Of A Changing Mind, or How To Resist Slavery

2009-05-27T23:15:00.002-04:00

More ON FREEDOM (part 3.1): The Beauty Of A Changing Mind, or How To Resist Slavery

A response to: ON FREEDOM (part 3) by Relament, posted 6 May 2009

I ask an Other: "Do you believe in abortion?"; "Do you believe in God?"; "Are you a republican or a democrat?" … or maybe even, “Do you love me?” Relament points out, I think keenly, to the reinforcement of illusions through the language of acceptance. When we ask someone “Do you believe in x?”—what exactly is it that we are asking? Are we asking what they think, in that very moment, about whatever is the subject matter of that question; or are we rather inquiring into what may be called the essence of what that person is/thinks? Do we accept that what they tell us in that moment, in fact, can only be of and at that moment? Or do we often record that data for future reference, which we will refer to when we want to hold them in that position? Do we celebrate when someone changes their mind, or do we condemn them for it?

Many of us, raised to create worlds of pre-defined roles and beliefs and actions and attitudes, are rudely-but-beautifully awakened when our perspective finally embraces that the world (because it is created/contains Free Beings) is not form (or essence or soul), but Change. The world is Fluid. It is Dynamic. It is Responsive. It is CREATED. By us! It is NOT rigidly categorizable… divisible… nor is it predictable (because of those damn pesky free beings, including me!).

I’m totally just mooching off of Relament’s positions now… but I shall scream alongside: “Hesitation… Illusion… Embarrassment… Be Gone!” If the alternative is (falsely-apparently) Secure Slavery, I’ll err on the side of Fanatic Freedom.

Image by Sergio | http://www.flashquake.org/archive/vol5iss1/

More ON FREEDOM (part 2.1): The Truth of Freedom; The Fallacy of Rights

2009-05-27T22:29:00.007-04:00

More ON FREEDOM (part 2.1): The Truth of Freedom; The Fallacy of Rights
A response to: ON FREEDOM (part 2) by Relament, posted 7 May 2009

Forget standing up for your rights! BE free-ly! The ongoing debate over the "loss of freedom" in the US is a dangerous misnomer. Freedom IS, and cannot be taken away. RIGHTS, therefore, are not the same as freedom, as they can be taken away. Rights, in fact, do not even exist in the real, immediate sense that Freedom does. Are YOU not Freedom Incarnate? I shan't even acknowledge that it is possible for others to grant and withdraw permission for my actions... they can't have any of the freedom that I create. As some may try to maintain the illusion of destruction, I shall continue the creation of my free life.

Image from public domain

Over 60,000 Georgians rally on Independence Day

2009-05-27T07:12:00.001-04:00

Tens of thousands of Georgian protesters rallied on Tuesday in Georgian capital city of Tbilisi, demanding President Mikhail Saakashvili's resignation, according to reports reaching here.

http://news.xinhuanet.com/english/2009-05/27/content_11440173.htm

2009-05-27T06:28:00.003-04:00

This is a piece I found from August, 2008, that Aphorista wrote. I really liked it and just wanted to re-post it. She screamed this during the Georgian attack on S. Ossetia...

COMMENTARY: Shout NO to WAR! Stop the INSANITY! Who started this Russian-Georgian-Ossetian conflict? Does it really matter? I can tell you this, with certainty, it was not the bulk of the people of Russia, nor was it the bulk of the people of Georgia, nor was it the bulk of people of Ossetia who wanted and started this conflict. It is the very few who call themselves leaders, elite from the rest, that bomb and starve the rest of us, or send our brothers and sisters away to become killers. The warring in this world of ours is increasing everyday. When will the people of all of these warring nations scream "NO!" loudly enough for the warring leaders to listen? It is time to make our own demands. We cannot continue to participate in a system of such death and destruction. I cannot even begin to speak to the Russian people, or the Georgian and Ossetian people, perhaps they have seen this warring coming on for a long time, just as the people in this nation are now watching the build-up to a war against Iran. All I can say is, there is more than enough that the American population must demand of the US government in terms of change, and there likewise appears to me, from my very limited perspective into Russian-Georgian-Ossetian affairs, to be more than enough that must be demanded of those governments by their peoples as well. Although, the United States does clearly take the cake when it comes to most wrongdoing.

We the people, of the world, must unite to stop these wars. The warmongers simply cannot do it without us. If we refuse to participate, they immediately become impotent. Protesting is a start; embarrassing them and forcing them to put their political careers on the line is a start. But it is direct action, and direct non-action, REFUSAL to participate in our own enslavement and the killing of human beings, that is the only truly effective method. It is that sort of action that I believe is the required level of action to enact any real change.

Yes, the first step is education, or rather, depropagandization. It is not that American people are stupid for not having seen this coming; it is not that the American people are so dumb that we do not have the capacity understand what is really going on. It is that most of us, as individuals, have allowed ourselves become so propagandized, so comfortable with the state of affairs as they are presented to us by the almost-utterly-united media-government complex, that we are willing adopt a laissez faire attitude, even when our own best judgment conflicts with it. But I believe We Can Change. But one must be willing to re-evaluate almost everything that he has come to believe over the course of his life that has been fed to him by the religious, governmental, and perhaps most of all, corporate institutions.

At least that's my story, and perhaps it is similar to yours. For me it is a constant battle for the truth. Now I'm more fully coming to understand how the truth can be utterly obscured by dogmatic frameworks of thought: religious beliefs of all varieties; patriotism and unquestioned trust in one's government; unquestioned trust in science and technology; or the belief that these world mega-corporations are just the result of really successful, but perfectly legal and right, entrepreneurial business. All of these fallacies have, at times in my life, blinded me from seeing truth that was right in front of my face. I feel like for the first time, though I read him first 10 years ago, that I truly understand Descartes' method, if not his conclusions. As opposed to beginning my thinking from basis points that I already have determined to be "true," I should always begin thinking with the fullest skepticism that I am able to muster. And this is most important when those foundations are buried deep, such as, "There is a God," and "My government is basically Good." To question foundations is not the same as discarding them, but once one begins questioning them with a fully skeptical attitude and honesty, one may be surprised by what is discarded and also by what is not discarded. Knowledge based on any authority other than OUR OWN will always lead us astray, just as self-developed dogmas can do the same damage. Minds open to all possibility, but accepting very few, if any, things as absolute, are the minds that are best prepared to seek out the truth, and best prepared to act on it.

But on to part 2, beyond educating ourselves we must take action (now!) to at least slow the appalling death count due to warring and economic enslavement. I cannot give recommendations for others, but there are many tactics, and each of us should use our own creativity, our own free being, to find out what it is about each of us as individuals that can do something to effect this change. For some it is writing and "digg"-ing, trying to literally bombard the internet, with so much information that even the individuals who are most blinded to truth by propagandization cannot help but come across alternative perspectives. For others, it may be a much more homegrown approach, trying to develop one's community into a more self-sustaining group that can live beyond the collapse of the imperialistic system. For others, it is constant letter-righting to the editors of major publications, to their city councilmen, and to their representatives in state and local government, urging them to do the right thing, and more importantly, forcing their wrongdoing into the public eye by copying those letters to everyone. For others, it may be union and strike leadership, helping the rest of us reduce our dependency on the corporate system, the corporate system which is killing on our behalf. And for those working in military, industrial, governmental complexes that they judge to be doing wrong, I hope their goal is to GET OUT if they cannot do something substantive to stop the killing from within the system NOW.

All of these approaches are necessary, and there are INFINITELY more that can and MUST be added to the list. Each free person no doubt has a unique way of communicating and acting that can aid the cause of peace. But they all add up to, as I see it, two basic parts: education and action. And both of these essentially boil down into this mantra for me: FREE DIALOG AND REFUSAL TO PARTICIPATE IN OUR OWN ENSLAVEMENT AND THE KILLING AND ENSLAVING OF OTHERS...that is, BEING FREELY, ALL WAYS, ALL THE TIME! Human beings are free. Yes, it is hard to act freely after living a life of what you thought was freedom, but was actually enslavement. But it is possible because we are already free--we just must uncover that freedom that is buried under our own propagandization. I hope I am living proof. I strive to be free. I strive everyday to question more, be more skeptical, and in the process discern a little more truth, and behave in my full capacity as a being of choice. Being free can be intimidating, but it is absolutely necessary. Please join us in fighting for liberty under the law, and freedom in our lives. Do what you determine is right!

2009-05-26T19:34:00.002-04:00

ON FREEDOM(part10)

2009-05-26T13:53:00.001-04:00

The 'State', does not exist. I read about the existential threat to the state. Loyalty oaths to the state. Mandatory service to the state. There is no reason to allow the existence of the state in any serious discussion. Free beings lie a lot, that happens, and people forget things, but even if I decide to play a game for a few hours, I am quite aware that I don't have to play the game. I am free to stop acting, wishing, and hoping. I can leave the fake world of illusions, which only occurs when I choose it to occur. I am not speaking of vibrations, frequencies, or other solipsistic notions. This is not red pills or blue pills or rabbit-holes, it's not a case of dual worlds. It's chosen illusions. Peer-pressure, traditions, culture, and history are choices not determinations. I can say that a neurologist, a psychiatrist, a priest, a profiler, an expert in DNA analysis, and my Mother determines what my character can do or not do if I want to play a game. Freedom is not simple. Occam's razor doesn't apply to free beings. I choose when I want to stop playing because I am free. The only existential threats are to free beings. Loyalty oaths are threats, as are mandatory services. Threats to free beings.

NEWS and PROPAGANDA

2009-05-26T00:04:00.004-04:00

Israel: anger over proposed laws
*****************************
Israel's far-right foreign minister Avigdor Lieberman calls for new laws to force Israeli Arabs to swear loyalty to the Jewish state and make it illegal to commemorate the Nakba.

http://www.reuters.com/news/video?videoId=105169&videoChannel=1

Do Not Waste Your Time in Palestine, Obama
****************************************
In the West Bank and even in Gaza, the Palestinian public opinion expressed anger at the continued ignorance of illegal “President” Abbas. Everybody knows that President Abbas wants no reconciliation with Hamas, he does not want a Fatah conference to be held, he does not want Presidential, and Parliamentary elections. These are the demands by the US and Israel, which Abbas implements against the will of the majority of the Palestinians...

http://www.kawther.info/wpr/2009/05/24/do-not-waste-your-time-in-palestine-obama

WHY OBAMA MAY NOT WANT ANY MORE TORTURE PICTURES RELEASED
************************************************************************
"Some of the worst things that happened you don't know about, okay? Videos, um, there are women there. Some of you may have read that they were passing letters out, communications out to their men. This is at Abu Ghraib . . . The women were passing messages out saying 'Please come and kill me, because of what's happened' and basically what happened is that those women who were arrested with young boys, children in cases that have been recorded. The boys were sodomized with the cameras rolling. And the worst above all of that is the soundtrack of the boys shrieking that your government has. They are in total terror. It's going to come out."

http://prorev.com/indexa.htm

Somalia fighting
**************
More than two weeks of fighting between pro-government forces and insurgents in the Somali capital have left at least 208 people dead and 700 wounded, a government minister said.

http://www.thenews.com.pk/daily_detail.asp?id=179495

Japan panel wants "first strikes" against enemies: report
**************************************************
A Japanese ruling party panel is to propose that pre-emptive strikes against enemy bases be allowed despite the country's pacifist constitution

http://www.reuters.com/article/worldNews/idUSTRE54O04S20090525

Act 4 – Building 7 and Flight 93: The Grand Finale that Wasn’t
*************************************************************************
This is the story of Flight 93 and Building 7; the Grand Finale of their 9/11 Shock Opera that never took the stage. This was their biggest mistake and therefore our best chance at exposing the authors for the criminals and terrorists that they are.
Enron, WorldCom, Global Crossing… all of these investigations, and many others, came to a sudden end as crucial records were lost when Building 7 fell at 5:20pm, Sept. 11th 2001.

http://willyloman.wordpress.com/2009/05/25/911-shock-opera-act-4-%E2%80%93-building-7-and-flight-93-the-grand-finale-that-wasn%E2%80%99t/#more-5941

REMEMBERING U.S. INVASIONS for memorial day

2009-05-25T00:52:00.006-04:00

That Grenada invasion
*********************
... the initial justifications proved to be demonstrably false. The major justification... was the protection of 800 American students at the US-run St George's University. US officials falsely claimed that the island's only airport was closed, offering the students no escape. In reality, scores of people left the island on charter flights the day before the invasion; scheduled flights had ceased as a direct result of pressure by US officials. After limiting the ability of Americans to depart, the US then used their presence as an excuse to invade.

http://www.jamaica-gleaner.com/gleaner/20081024/cleisure/cleisure2.html

The Invasion of Haiti
*********************
This is a context that a lot of people don't understand when looking at what's going on over there. None of this could have happened without the complicity of the United States, without the facilitation by the United States, without the funding and support of the United States, and the icing on the cake is the fact that at the last minute, American military personnel, with weapons, enter the Presidential residence and tell the President - the democratically elected President of Haiti, elected with 92% of the vote, that he has to leave. Not that 'we're here to protect you because there's paramilitaries marching here coming to get you right now', but that 'the paramilitaries are on their way: they're going to kill you and your family. Your option is to stay here and die, or to leave with us on an airplane, to god knows where'. For Colin Powell and some of the other Administration Servants to sit there and say that this constitutes a voluntary departure or, not coercion....it defies belief.

http://www.zmag.org/znet/viewArticle/8523

A LIST OF
USA Invasions, Bombings,
Military Aid, Political Interventions
and Sanctions
*************************************
The USA frequently interferes in nations' elections. At the same time it is against the law to interfere in USA elections. The USA often insists on countries having United Nations inspections for weapons programs while denying access for its own extensive chemical, nuclear and biological armoury. The USA will use the international legal system when it suits but ignore its resolutions if they go against the USA. This behaviour is reported around the world leading to much anger and resentment at the USA. Little of this gets reported to the USA public however.
The USA has, by far, bombed more countries than any other nation. Sometimes the United Nations approves. If it does not, the USA will bomb anyway. Many countries are subject to unilateral economic sanctions by the USA. Cuba is a good example. The USA will not only impose sanctions but often cajoles and bullies other countries to follow it. Again, the United Nations is used if possible, and ignored if not.

http://www.krysstal.com/democracy_whyusa02.html

NEWS and PROPAGANDA

2009-05-24T12:44:00.001-04:00

At least 300 human skeletons found in Aligarh, India
************************
“Children while playing generally come here to get their ball. A child came here and saw a skull. He got scared and ran away. We then came here and saw that behind the jail there is not one but thousands of skulls here. Digging is being done and at least 200-300 skulls have been recovered. Let’s see how many more will be found. I believe the number can even reach 2000-3000,” said Amit Shrivastav, a local.

http://www.thenews.com.pk/updates.asp?id=78510

India likely to move on U.S. military pact
****************************
India's new ruling coalition, freed of pressure from its former communist allies, is expected to move forward soon on a military logistics deal with the United States that would help U.S. operations in the region. Prime Minister Manmohan Singh's former communist allies opposed the agreement, saying Indian military bases could become permanent ports of call for the U.S. military engaged in unilateral operations in the region.

http://www.reuters.com/article/worldNews/idUSTRE54N0AF20090524

India: China bigger threat than Pakistan
****************************
The world’s two most populous nations fought a brief but brutal war over their 3,500 km (Himalayan border in 1962, and both sides claim the other is occupying big but largely uninhabited chunks of their territory.
India has also been pursuing closer relations with the United States, something that worries China.

http://www.dawn.com/wps/wcm/connect/dawn-content-library/dawn/news/world/07-china-bigger-threat-than-pakistan-indian-air-force-chief-ha-04

Deadly bombing hits Mogadishu base
*********************
At least 53 people are believed to have died in the violence since Friday morning, when Somali forces launched attacks on several areas of Mogadishu which are controlled by the opposition forces.

http://english.aljazeera.net/news/africa/2009/05/200952412389527287.html

Israeli soldiers caught looting
*******************************
There seems no end to the business initiative of the Givati Brigade. This brigade gained international notoriety when - following the massacre of Palestinian civilians in Gaza - it put out T-shirts showing its snipers aiming at the belly of a pregnant Palestinian woman, with the snappy caption of “1 shot - 2 kills.”
But, the Givatis are not new to notoriety. For this is the brigade established in 1948 from the veterans of the Irgun terrorist gang. Among other outrages, Irgun Gang was responsible for the bombing of the King David Hotel in 1946 and the massacre of Palestinians at Deir Yassin in 1948.

http://www.presstv.ir/detail.aspx?id=95855&sectionid=351020202

NEWS and PROPAGANDA

2009-05-23T12:45:00.003-04:00

South Korean ex-president jumps to his death
***********************
"...he was sorry for disappointing the nation."

http://www.presstv.ir/detail.aspx?id=95707&sectionid=351020405

Man shoves would-be suicide jumper off bridge for holding up traffic
***************************
"I pushed him off because jumpers like Chen are very selfish. Their action violates a lot of public interests," Mr Lai was quoted as saying by the China Daily newspaper.

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/asia/china/5372890/Man-shoves-would-be-suicide-jumper-off-bridge-for-holding-up-traffic.html

Microsoft halts IM services to Iran, Cuba, Sudan, Syria and North Korea
***********************
According to a statement published Friday on the Microsoft website, Internet users in Cuba, Iran, Sudan, Syria and North Korea who wish to use instant messaging services will be gifted with Error 810003c1 and a message box that will say "We are unable to sign you in to the .NET Messenger Service."
"Microsoft has discontinued providing Instant Messenger services in certain countries subject to United States sanctions," the statement explains

http://www.presstv.ir/detail.aspx?id=95735&sectionid=351020101

Facts and Myths about Obama's Preventive Detention Proposal
***********************
It's important to be clear about what "preventive detention" authorizes. It does not merely allow the U.S. Government to imprison people alleged to have committed Terrorist acts yet who are unable to be convicted in a civilian court proceeding. That class is merely a subset, perhaps a small subset, of who the Government can detain. Far more significant, "preventive detention" allows indefinite imprisonment not based on proven crimes or past violations of law, but of those deemed generally "dangerous" by the Government for various reasons (such as, as Obama put it yesterday, they "expressed their allegiance to Osama bin Laden" or "otherwise made it clear that they want to kill Americans"). That's what "preventive" means: imprisoning people because the Government claims they are likely to engage in violent acts in the future because they are alleged to be "combatants."

http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/article22688.htm

Mogadishu street fighting kills 45, wounds 182
*****************************
Somali government forces attacked rebel strongholds in Mogadishu on Friday, triggering battles across the capital that killed at least 45 people, the highest daily death toll for months.
Neighboring states and Western security forces fear Somalia, which has been mired in civil war for 18 years, could become a haven for terrorists linked to al-Qaeda.

http://www.alarabiya.net/articles/2009/05/22/73560.html

Israel government too extreme to make peace: Syria's Assad
*********************************
"The failure of the peace process so far has clearly shown that Israel is the obstacle. How can a state that was founded on illegal occupation and continues to murder the original inhabitants work toward peace?" Assad said.

http://www.reuters.com/article/worldNews/idUSTRE54M0OV20090523

George Galloway’s Letter to the Charity Commission about Viva Palestina
********************************
During Israel’s 22-day attack on virtually defenceless Palestinian civilians in Gaza – condemned by virtually everyone in the world from the United Nations to the Pope and including the British government – an organization The Zionist Federation took out a full page advert in the Jewish Chronicle on 9th January asking readers to send “care packages” to “our [ie Israeli] soldiers fighting on the front line” in Gaza and to send charity vouchers to a British registered charity Operation Wheelchairs Committee (charity number 263089) for the same purpose.

http://intifada-palestine.com/

2009-05-23T11:43:00.003-04:00

A note to Aphorista...

While I go through and criticize the layers of illusions that I find to prevail in one form or another covering up freedom, you clearly expressed being free in your response to part1 of 'On Freedom':
"How may I uncover those hidden illusions I hold of which I am not aware?
Be. New. In this moment. Now. No Illusion-Shattering Required."

ON FREEDOM(part9)

2009-05-23T10:40:00.004-04:00

From crusades choosing which gods will be worshiped, to the latest athlete thanking one of their personal gods for choosing them to score a goal, free beings have said 'no, thank you' to freedom in favor of oppression, slavery, and ignorance. There are even those who create gods that they say represents freedom, with ritualized gratitude following therein. God, jesus, satan, the gift-givers of the imagination, brought into the world to help free beings forget about their freedom. The theists love and/or fear gods and obediently worship and praise their creations. The atheists are not happy with gods and rebel against the notion by even claiming in front of everyone that gods don't exist because god just wouldn't act that way if he did exist. The agnostics don't know if there are gods and don't decide on the matter because 'anything is possible'. All three positions drink at the same bar. Many free beings go into that bar for spirits and souls, but it is just a bar. After a few drinks all three positions can be quite dangerous to be around. Lying, hating, and clueless all intoxicated with their limits, their burdens, and their ignorance, disclose power and expose weakness in one another until they part. They sleep with angels and demons and fantastic possibilities awaiting at their door ready to tie another one on. There are as many reasons as there are circumstances in ones life for negating freedom to live at that bar. In liberating myself from gods the world did not welcome me with a celebration. The world closes and opens as always. There is no one and nothing to thank for realizing that I have always been free.

NEWS and PROPAGANDA

2009-05-22T19:58:00.002-04:00

Sanctions Proposed Against Eritrea
********************
The UN's Inter Governmental Authority on Development (IGAD) asked the Security Council to impose 'tough' sanctions on Eritrea Thursday due to its call for the ouster of the Transitional Federal Government of Somalia. Eritrean President Isaias Afwerki is quoted saying "this so-called [Somali] government is not a government in terms of legitimacy. It cannot even influence one very small neighbourhood in Mogadishu, let alone Somalia."

http://atheonews.blogspot.com/2009/05/sanctions-proposed-against-eritrea.html

Deadly battles in Somali capital
****************************
At least seven people have been killed after Somali government forces launched an attack in an attempt to drive opposition fighters from the capital, Mogadishu.
Witnesses said at least four members of al-Shabab, an armed group, and a journalist from Shabelle Radio, a local independent station, were among the victims of Friday's clashes.
"They have recaptured four police stations between here and the palace, and they are advancing further."
But al-Shabab rejected the claims of military success.
"...our fighters are defending themselves," Sheikh Ali Mahmoud Rage, a spokesman for al-Shabab, said. "They have not not taken any positions from us."
Reporters confirmed that several bodies had been left on the ground and at least eight civilians injured while trying to escape.
Sources at two Mogadishu hospitals told Reuters that they received a total of 85 wounded civilians on Friday.
In the past 10 days, more than 100 people have been killed and 46,000 have been displaced as the fighting has escalated.
Earlier this week an East African group called on the UN to impose an aerial and maritime blockade on Somalia to prevent the opposition fighters from acquiring more weapons.

http://english.aljazeera.net/news/africa/2009/05/200952271510325.html

Sept. 11 Commission official selected to head US National Intelligence Council
*************************************
National Intelligence Director Dennis Blair has tapped the deputy director of the Sept. 11 Commission to head the top U.S. office for intelligence analysis.
Blair's first choice, Charles Freeman, bowed out of consideration two months ago under congressional criticism for his public comments about Israel and allegations about his ties to foreign governments.

http://wire.antiwar.com/2009/05/21/sept-11-commission-official-to-lead-intel-group/

Senate O.K.'s $91 Billion in War Funds
***************************
The Senate approved $91 billion in funding for the wars in Afghanistan, Iraq and Pakistan yesterday, with all senators but three voting for the bill. This, along with a House vote last week in favor of $97 billion

http://www.truthout.org/052209J?n

Obama's War: Drunk, Bored Trigger Happy Mercenaries Kill Afghan Civilians
*************************************************************************
For those of you who have been following the intricacies of the various ongoing Blackwater/Xe scandals (hard to keep up with indeed), the situation unfolding in Kabul is certainly on your radar. In short, four Blackwater/Xe operatives working for Paravant LLC, a subsidiary of Blackwater/Xe are alleged to have fired on a civilian car they say they saw as a threat, killing at least one Afghan civilian.

http://www.uruknet.info/?p=m54479&hd=&size=1&l=e

Two Sides of the Same Coin... Heads-Heads
***************************
This baby was the victim of an air strike, a bombing that killed her entire family and leveled her modest home to the ground. My father pointed at this heartbreaking baby and said, "Sibel, this is war. This is the real face of war. This is the result of war. Do you think anything can justify this? I want to replace the glamorous exciting phony images of those war movies in your head. I want you to remember this for the rest of your life and stand against this kind of destruction…"

http://www.bradblog.com/?p=7172#more-7172

No, I Do Not Support "The Troops"
********************
Our national catechism tells us that America is Good -- and that America's murders are Good Murders. You may not say otherwise.

http://powerofnarrative.blogspot.com/

Biden in the Balkans: US asserts interests in shattered region
******************************
Jones declared that, “Americans are not satisfied with the Brussels leadership in the Balkans” and criticized a number of European countries that are calling for a delay in the accession of more Balkan states to the EU and NATO.

http://www.globalresearch.ca/index.php?context=va&aid=13700

More ON FREEDOM: Empathy & Imagination | Being With & Being Alone | Freedom Overcomes Illusions

2009-05-21T23:27:00.004-04:00

More ON FREEDOM (part 1.1): Empathy & Imagination | Being With & Being Alone | Freedom Overcomes Illusions
A response to: ON FREEDOM (part 1) by Relament, posted 6 May 2009

The capacity and desire to “imagine anything and any situation” is an essential component of the endeavour we call empathy. Empathy an endeavour, rather than an emotion or a mode of determination, because trying to feel and understand the mind of an other is an intrinsically endless occupation. We can reach and pull, question and answer, dig until our nailbeds bleed, yet one can never fully explore the unplumbable depth that is each and every human being. Relament is a battery of empathetic tools and empathetic desire. I can think of no one I have conversed with in my life who has made more of a charter out of Empathy than he. Yet… at this moment… he chooses to be (pretty much) alone, even while still on his empathetic quest. Odd choice? Perhaps! Is that oddness a bad thing? Hell no! We each choose, and thereby create, our freedom. The world of free beings IS an odd place, and that’s just alright with me…

But what are the limits of one's freedom? (We’re not gods; or are we?); or rather, does freedom have limits?; or rather, am I not establishing the limits of (my) freedom through my choices? To take a bit of a tangent from Relament's thesis, let me say that what I have found to be the case in this life is that any and every limit to freedom, once recognized and subsequently ignored, is then no longer a limit. We can argue nature vs. nurture vs. freedom and independence all day, but it is in reflection combined with action that we can eliminate those limits that, once boiled down, are merely habits which are malleable and under our control, if we choose to remain (un-)conscious of them. We create our own limits and our own freedom. Our freedom is limited only by how we are willing to, and actually do, ACT.

Illusions [can be] --> Limits [are] --> Choices [create (enrich or inhibit)] --> Freedom / Life!

What illusions are necessary (if any)? What illusions are dissolvable (if not all)?
What illusions are desirable to me (if any)? What illusions do I desire to shed (if not all)?
How may I uncover those hidden illusions I hold of which I am not aware?

Be. New. In this moment. Now. No Illusion-Shattering Required. Human Beings ARE Free!

2009-05-21T10:33:00.002-04:00

Iraq's deadly attacks kill 65 people
************************************
The most deadly attack on Thursday was in Baghdad's southern district of Doura when a suicide bomber detonated at the crowded popular market of Athoriyin, killing 12 civilians and wounding 25 others, a police source said. The bomber targeted U.S. soldiers on patrol at the entrance of the marketplace, the source said, quoting police reports as saying that three U.S. soldiers were killed in the attack and five others wounded. Thursday's attacks followed a deadly car bombing near a popular restaurant in Baghdad's northwestern neighborhood of Shualaa on Wednesday evening, killing up to 40 people and wounding 83 others, the police said.

http://news.xinhuanet.com/english/2009-05/21/content_11414917.htm

Back to Black...by Layla Anwar
______________________
Useless... Totally useless... How fast I move back into black...it always amazes me. The only comfortable color, the only color I feel safe in, ever since you liberated me, ever since you liberated us... Summer is at our doorstep, all colorful. I go through the yearly motions. Hide the Winter, bring out the Summer...clothes. A task I have been postponing for ever. A ritual I have been postponing for ever... Winter, Spring, Summer and Fall. Mark the seasons, I tell myself...mark them. Make that passage...it's Summer knocking on your door. I stare out of my window and I say - yes it is summer knocking... Winter, Spring, Summer and Fall...the seasons have become all the same...a question of variation of temperature. That's it. Some days are colder and some are hotter...But they're all the same. I gathered all the good will I could muster, I opened my wardrobe and was aghast to see the amount of black clothes I had. Black sweaters, black trousers, black dresses, black jeans, black skirts, black...black, black and black... Is that why I dress up my blog in colors ? I thought to myself. Is that why I splash it with colors, trying to give it Life ? Hello, we are still here. Hello there is a living voice here. Hello can you hear me ? Can you hear me ? Can you hear me through megabytes of cyberspace ? Can you hear me in the Black ? Do you ? Am I coming loud and clear ? Or are you like the clothes hanging in my wardrobe, dusty with the passing days, stuck in the Winter of your minds ? It's Summer knocking on my door...Bring me the colors. Let them in, one by one...Pink, Yellow, Green, Lilac, Blue...Carry them in baskets and adorn them with hand picked flowers from fresh springing meadows... Let me smell the earth again. Let me smell the sun. Let me smell life...again. Wait, I will make myself beautiful for you. I am hiding my black winter clothes and bringing out my colored summer ones. Look at the pattern. Feel the fabric. Do you see that flowered dress ? Look at this one, it's pure white silk. And what about that one - it's embroidered with the finest of blue... Look, look, they're all out, waiting to be worn...waiting to be born again... I promise no dust. I promise no fuss. I promise to be a good girl. No procrastination. No laziness. No stalling. No... Oh, here you are, knocking on my door. What flowers did you bring ? What do they smell like ? Is Summer hidden in them, in between their stalks, in between their petals ? Will you greet me with embraces and kisses, like in the old days ? I open the door... A dwarf stares at me...holding an old rusty tray and a list of names...encrypted on burned paper... Over 40 dead today, he said. An explosion. It happened at 7 pm, just when the Sun was setting and when a cool breeze made it safe... I shut the door in his face. I shut the door. I leave my winter clothes spread on the floor, like skeletons... waiting to find a corpse to dress...I shut the door and leave them lying there, pieces of fragmented red, pieces of fragmented black...I leave them lying there...in between seasons with no name...in between life and death... I leave them there...in the grey of my life, of our life... I leave them there, for another Spring, another Summer, another...Winter. And am back to Black.

http://www.uruknet.info/?p=m54443&hd=&size=1&l=e

2009-05-20T01:26:00.003-04:00

Just a Suggestion... by Layla Anwar
*********************
"I have a suggestion to President Obooma and his administration, a suggestion that will end the "war on terror" once and for all, and will make the whole world a safer place...

This is what I propose.

Why surge in Afghanistan when you can surge in Pakistan ? Commit a few thousands of your bravest boys and girls, in the Northern Provinces. Do not content yourselves with air power. You need to be physically there. You know, fight the fight.

The reason am suggesting that - is because first, I would like you to see for yourselves, the beautiful scenery in the Swat valley and second, since you are so used to John Wayne's cowboy style approach to things, I found an equal for your duels. The Pakistani Pashtuns. You may consider them a local variation of John Wayne.

Îf you think that the Iraqi "insurgents" are merciless, that the Afghan Talibans are lethal, you really ought to try the Pashtuns. They are rough, tough and take no shit from nobody. Just like your John Waynes.

Don't rely on the Pakistani government. Go for it yourselves, no one can scratch your own backs like your own nails. Try it, it will be fun, a cakewalk.

I can promise you that the Pashtuns there will welcome you with flowers and candies, just like they did in Afghanistan and just like we did in Iraq. But they are more hospitable than us. Wallah, they will even make you dance the Hulahoop, on one leg. Ya'ani, you know -- a break dance.

Come on be a sport. Do it, for the sake of the "war on terror." So we can finally be rid of YOUR terror once and for all."

http://arabwomanblues.blogspot.com/2009/05/just-suggestion.html

2009-05-20T01:03:00.000-04:00

Who's Next for Dinner ?
***********************
Which country in the Arab world, the news hardly ever cover and in which there is a serious battle going on ?

http://arabwomanblues.blogspot.com/2009/05/whos-next-for-dinner.html

2009-05-19T23:23:00.003-04:00

Hamas says new gov't boosts political chaos
************************
"This government will remain illegal and illegitimate and we will not recognize it or deal with it," Barhoum added.
The new government, led by the Western-backed Salam Fayyad, was sworn in in the West Bank city of Ramallah earlier in the day. It excludes Hamas which won the parliamentary elections in 2006.
Barhoum said that excluding Hamas in the government "meets the U.S. and Israeli desires which are against the interests of the Palestinian people and their rights."

http://news.xinhuanet.com/english/2009-05/20/content_11403652.htm

Israeli war jets strike on several Gaza Strip targets, one wounded
********************************************
Israeli warplanes on Tuesday night carried out a series of airstrikes on several targets in the Palestinian Gaza Strip, wounding one person and causing severe damages to two buildings, medics and witnesses said.
Earlier Tuesday, witnesses said that F16 warplanes hovered over Rafah town and then two explosions were heard after two bombs fired by the warplanes struck the borderline area and destroyed tunnels used by Palestinians for smuggling.
The Palestinians dug thousands of tunnels after Israel tightened its blockade on the enclave and prevented products to enter through crossings between Israel and Gaza. The tunnels are used for smuggling goods, food, medicine and fuels.
But Israel said that Hamas, which rules the Gaza Strip, and other militant groups are using the tunnels to smuggle weapons from Egypt into Gaza, used for carrying out attacks against Israel.

http://news.xinhuanet.com/english/2009-05/20/content_11403775.htm

Unexceptional Americans: Why We Can’t See the Trees or the Forest
*****************************************
More importantly, torture has been routinely practiced from the early days of the conquest of the national territory, and continued to be used as the imperial ventures of the “infant empire” — as George Washington called the new republic — extended to the Philippines, Haiti, and elsewhere. Keep in mind as well that torture was the least of the many crimes of aggression, terror, subversion, and economic strangulation that have darkened U.S. history, much as in the case of other great powers.
Accordingly, what’s surprising is to see the reactions to the release of those Justice Department memos, even by some of the most eloquent and forthright critics of Bush malfeasance: Paul Krugman, for example, writing that we used to be “a nation of moral ideals” and never before Bush “have our leaders so utterly betrayed everything our nation stands for.” To say the least, that common view reflects a rather slanted version of American history.

http://willyloman.wordpress.com/2009/05/19/unexceptional-americans-why-we-cant-see-the-trees-or-the-forest/

The tortured world of US intelligence By Roger Morris
*******************************************************************
This is a vintage American chronicle with dramatic settings and dark secrets. The cast ranges from hearty boosters in Kansas to bitter exiles on the Baltic, from doomed agents dropped behind Russian lines across Eurasia to Islamic clerics car-bombed in the Middle East - all in a family saga of long-hidden paternity... such a sweeping history - the history, in this case, of that blind deity of havoc, the CIA - cannot come condensed or blog-sized. It is, necessarily, without apology, a long trail a-winding.

http://atimes01.atimes.com/atimes/Middle_East/IF23Ak03.html

NEWS and PROPAGANDA

2009-05-19T15:33:00.001-04:00

US 'supports borderline terrorists against Iran'
*************************
"The United States is promoting terrorism behind [Iran's] western frontiers... They [the US government] directly finance operations and organize terrorist movements to undermine the Islamic Republic," Ayatollah Khamenei said on Tuesday.

http://www.presstv.ir/detail.aspx?id=95222&sectionid=351020101

Obama's Animal Farm
Bigger, Bloodier Wars Equal Peace and Justice
******************************
"The Deltas are psychos. You have to be a certified psychopath to join the Delta Force", a US Army colonel from Fort Bragg once told me back in the 1980's. Now President Obama has elevated the most notorious of the psychopaths, General Stanley McChrystal, to head the US and NATO military command in Afghanistan. McChrystal's rise to leadership is marked by his central role in directing special operations teams engaged in extrajudicial assassinations, systematic torture, bombing of civilian communities and search and destroy missions.

http://informationclearinghouse.info/article22642.htm

Brazil president arrives in Beijing
*******************
One item expected to come up in talks is a proposal by the Brazilian president for China and Brazil to conduct bilateral trade through each nation's currency, cutting out the US dollar as an intermediary.

http://english.aljazeera.net/news/asia-pacific/2009/05/200951841033800562.html

Little Known Military Thug Squad Still Brutalizing Prisoners at Gitmo Under Obama
********************************************************
Jeremy Scahill reports the Obama administration is continuing to use a notorious military police unit at Guantanamo that regularly brutalizes unarmed prisoners, including gang-beating them, breaking their bones, gouging their eyes and dousing them with chemicals. This force, officially known as the Immediate Reaction Force, has been labeled the "Extreme Repression Force" by Guantanamo prisoners, and human rights lawyers call their actions illegal.

http://www.uruknet.info/?p=m54388&hd=&size=1&l=e

U.S. Contractors Fired at Kabul Car
********************
Four U.S. contractors affiliated with the company formerly known as Blackwater Worldwide fired on an approaching civilian vehicle in Kabul this month, wounding at least two Afghan civilians, according to the company and the U.S. military.

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB124239900599924043.html#mod=rss_US_News

Israel Preparing for Attack Again?
***************
The four-day military drills, which will end on Thursday, were aimed at testing the Israeli squadron's airborne assault operations, infiltration attempts and special forces missions.
Political analysts say the newly-staged military drills are a harbinger of another Israeli bombing mission on Gaza.

http://irish4palestine.blogspot.com/2009/05/israel-preparing-for-attack-again.html

The Netanyahu government approves construction of new settlement
*****************************
The new settlement plan was seen by several Palestinian and international officials as a clear Israeli message to the US administration that the country does not intend to halt the construction and expansion of settlements in the occupied West Bank.

http://obamboozled.blogspot.com/2009/05/netanyahu-government-approves.html

Ethiopia denies reports troops in Somalia
******************
"This is a totally fabricated story. We have no plans to go into any of Somalia's territory," Wahade Belay, spokesman for Ethiopia's Foreign Ministry, told Reuters in Addis Ababa.
Citing witnesses in the area, all the main Somali language websites and radio stations were on Tuesday running stories saying there had been an Ethiopian incursion.

http://www.reuters.com/article/homepageCrisis/idUSLJ094558._CH_.2400

ON FREEDOM(part8)

2009-05-19T14:16:00.003-04:00

I live in a world where worship and slavery has been in a struggle with freedom and responsibility for the moral conscious of free beings for centuries. The avoidance of freedom and responsibility has been a tragic banality, with ever more elaborate fictions continuously introduced. The individual is supposed to adapt and belong. Verily, the theories provided to the new minds of this world are made to oppress. Self-consciousness is triggered through inadequacy and embarrassment. Trying something new has become declaring something to be, subject to hypocrisy and ridicule. Free beings just trying anything without approval and acceptance, is deluded and dangerous. What do genetic codes, evolutionary theories, and gods have to do with freedom? What does race, nationality, and mankind have to do with free beings? It is all very clever determinations for those wanting to be slaves, and those wanting to be obeyed and worshiped. From the tenured professor at a university, to an emperor of a continent, free beings have been participating in mutual oppression of the moral conscious for quite a long time.

WAR, RESISTANCE, and PROPAGANDA

2009-05-18T11:10:00.002-04:00

Heroic Resistance of 75 Year old Iraqi
****************
HEYET in its statement said: “The duty to fight against the invaders is national, legal and humane responsibility.

http://www.heyetnet.org/eng/amsinews/4405-heroic-resistance-of-75-years-old-iraqi.html

Turkish president should stand trial- court/NTV
******************
As president, Gul enjoys immunity.
'It is the rule in the Turkish Republic's constitution and laws that everyone should stand trial,' the court said in its ruling.
Gul's office was not immediately available for comment.

http://www.dawn.com/wps/wcm/connect/dawn-content-library/dawn/news/world/06-turkish-president-should-stand-trial-court-ntv-rs-02

US bill links military aid to A Q Khan
******************
If adopted, it will place Pakistan in a very uncomfortable position. To qualify for US military assistance, Pakistan will have to produce Dr. A.Q. Khan before American interrogators. Islamabad will also have to pledge to monitor all future activities of the nuclear scientist who is seen as a hero at home but as a villain in the West.

http://www.dawn.com/wps/wcm/connect/dawn-content-library/dawn/news/pakistan/11-us-bill-links-military-aid-to-a-q-khan--02

Record bombs dropped in Afghanistan in April
********************
Air Force, Navy and other coalition warplanes dropped a record number of bombs in Afghanistan during April, Air Forces Central figures show.
In the past month, warplanes released 438 bombs, the most ever.
April also marked the fourth consecutive month that the number of bombs dropped rose.

http://www.navytimes.com/news/2009/05/airforce_april_airstrike_050409w/

Time to stop US barbarism in Middle East and Afghanistan
**************************
According to Muriel Kane, "Lieutenant-General Stanley McChrystal will be taking over command of US forces in Afghanistan, pending Senate approval." McChrystal headed the Joint Special Operations Command (JSOC) that previously reported to Dick Cheney, with no congressional oversight.
Kane notes: "Famed investigative reporter Seymour Hersh recently described the JSOC as an "executive assassination wing" controlled for many years by the office of former Vice-President Dick Cheney."
Jeremy Scahill says: "Pentagon officials are spinning another cover-up," following the bombing that killed up to 130 people in Afghanistan. He also reports: "...as many as 2,000 [Afghans] poured into the streets of the provincial capital, chanting ‘Death to America’.”
Disgustingly, the Pentagon attempted to blame the Taliban for the murders, saying that they had done the killing with grenades.

http://www.redress.cc/americas/pjballes20090517

Arab world has no problem with Iran: Amr Moussa
*********************
“We do not regard Iran as the main issue. Actually, the Arab world does not have any problem with Iran… The main problem and major threat to the region and Arabs is Israel’s nuclear activity,” he said during a meeting on the Middle East peace process in Shuneh, Jordan.

http://www.tehrantimes.com/index_View.asp?code=194813

NEWS and PROPAGANDA

2009-05-17T07:02:00.001-04:00

In imperialist 'surge,' Washington pushes Pakistan into war
*************************
The reason Pakistan’s government had opted for negotiations, and not open confrontation was the difficulty of winning a sustained battle in the tribal area. The rugged terrain in the mountainous area with few roads makes the conditions unfavorable for Pakistan’s military. Additionally, while the fighters in the tribal region are highly motivated, the motivation of Pakistan’s military forces is suspect.

http://www.uruknet.info/?p=m54315&hd=&size=1&l=e

Make Internet safe for everyone: UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon
***********************
“The theme of this year’s observance is "Protecting Children in Cyberspace”. Children and young people are among the most prolific users of the Internet and mobile devices. As they surf through cyberspace seeking information and entertainment and building social networks, they are also among the most vulnerable to exploitation. Without safeguards, their precious lives are at grave risk in the vicious world of cybercriminals and paedophiles that prey on easy targets.

http://www.irna.ir/En/View/FullStory/?NewsId=491066&idLanguage=3

Hezbollah capable of ruling Lebanon if wins election
*************************
A tight race is expected between the opposition led by Hezbollah and the Western-backed majority, who Nasrallah accused of being behind the country's sectarian problems.
“We Hezbollah have always rejected the division of Lebanon and we shall always maintain this,” he said.

http://www.tehrantimes.com/index_View.asp?code=194715

Leftists, nationalists confront each other in downtown Kiev
*****************************
The first all-Ukraine social-nationalist congress is scheduled to be held there on Saturday.
The Communist Party blamed the revival of neo-fascism on the president “whose regime from its very first day has been seeking to rehabilitate and impose fascism”.

http://www.itar-tass.com/eng/level2.html?NewsID=13946331

Two Emirates companies to pump gas to Nabucco from N.Iraq
**************************
The Western-backed Nabucco pipeline aims to lessen Europe's dependence on Russian gas and is opposed by Moscow. Until now, the $10 billion pipeline project had plenty of willing buyers in Europe but little gas to sell.

http://www.hurriyet.com.tr/english/world/11669320.asp?gid=237

Swat is just the start: Zardari
****************
Pakistani army claims to have killed more than 750 militants over the past two weeks, a report from Amnesty International claimed that 700,000 people remain trapped in Swat. According to the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees, 987,000 displaced people registered in the last two weeks, on top of 500,000 who fled fighting last summer.
“We need to develop our capability and we need much more support,” said Zardari. “We need much, much more than the $1 billion [military aid] we’ve been getting, which is nothing. We’ve got 150,000 troops in [the tribal areas] - just the movement of that number would cost $1 billion.”

http://www.nation.com.pk/pakistan-news-newspaper-daily-english-online/Politics/17-May-2009/Swat-is-just-the-start-Zardari

ON FREEDOM(part7)

2009-05-16T13:30:00.002-04:00

'I have a box. Only I can know of it's contents.' Is this the genesis of communication? This metaphor leads thinking into a cage. Possession, ownership, what is mine in this world. Generation after generation, seem to easily know what freedom is and discontinues any thoughts on the subject. Their high values wrapped around 'things'. Enchanted to the point of illusion. Possessing things become their sole inspiration to imagine. They begin to enjoy the cage, while immediately forgetting that they had built it. Free beings revere adapting. They create metaphysical constructs where 'freedom' becomes interchangeable with 'control'. 'I have a box, and I will use language to describe the contents', deforms language. Language becomes a game filled with secrets, lies, laws, possessions, and oppression. What can I do? What can I imagine?, becomes, What do I have? What can I get? How do I stop?

NEWS and PROPAGANDA

2009-05-16T11:10:00.003-04:00

Barack Obama, Murderer and War Criminal-in-Chief
***********************
We can now see unequivocally and in full, bloody daylight the nature of the "change" that Obama has brought to the operations of Empire. Obama will alter nothing in those operations, except to expand them and make them still more murderous. But because Obama has been heralded as the exponent of "hope" and "change," and because the majority of Americans exhibit an endless capacity for crediting the most meaningless of slogans, many people will continue to struggle to convince themselves that somehow things might have been worse had he not been elected.

http://powerofnarrative.blogspot.com/2009/05/barack-obama-murderer-and-war-criminal.html

US drone attack kills more Pakistanis
***********************
At least 15 Pakistani people have been killed as a US drone fired missiles into alleged al-Qaeda and Taliban targets in near Pakistan-Afghanistan border. Several persons were trapped under the debris of the seminary building after the attack. US spy planes were still hovering over the region creating panic and fear among the residents.

http://www.presstv.ir/detail.aspx?id=94924&sectionid=351020401

North Korea: New Europe?
***********************
South Korea thinks its Stalinist neighbour should receive aid from the London-based lender, set up in 1991 to help former communist countries make the transition to market economies.

http://blogs.reuters.com/macroscope/2009/05/16/north-korea-new-europe/

Nigerian military says 200 militants killed in Delta State
***********************
WARRI, Nigeria, May 15 (Xinhua) -- At least 200 militants have been killed in the recent clash with the Nigerian military in the oil rich southeast Delta State.
http://news.xinhuanet.com/english/2009-05/16/content_11381986.htm

US drone strike kills 25 in Mir Ali
**********************
The official put the death toll at 25, raising the figure from 10 militants who were reported killed earlier on Saturday.

http://www.thenews.com.pk/updates.asp?id=77837

Scouts Train to Fight Terrorists, and More
**************************
“This is about being a true-blooded American guy and girl,” said A. J. Lowenthal, a sheriff’s deputy here in Imperial County, whose life clock, he says, is set around the Explorers events he helps run. “It fits right in with the honor and bravery of the Boy Scouts.”

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/05/14/us/14explorers.html?_r=3

Israel Real Threat-Not Iran
****************************
The Chief Palestinian negotiator, Saeb Erekat, has slammed Israel's deliberate attempt to portray Iran as a threat to the region. "There is a line in Israel saying that Iran is a danger to the region. This is absurd and unacceptable", Erekat said at the World Economic Forum on the Middle East in Jordan.

http://irish4palestine.blogspot.com/2009/05/israel-real-threat-not-iran.html

Torture/Abuse Photos Ridiculed by Rush, Kept From View by Obama, Posted on The BRAD BLOG
******************************
These are said to be among the photos of prisoner abuse/torture whose release Obama has determined to block. Some of them were obtained, and posted several years ago, by The Sydney Morning Herald

http://www.bradblog.com/?p=7151

NEWS and PROPAGANDA

2009-05-15T14:37:00.002-04:00

Pentagon Preparing For War With The Enemy
*******************
"My flight in the backseat of a Lancer [MiG-21] is a good opportunity to look at different aircraft and it's a real privilege and an honor. I want to see what they see from their cockpit, and view a new angle of understanding against our adversaries."

http://www.globalresearch.ca/index.php?context=va&aid=13614

A Nation of Freedom or a Nation of Soldiers?
*******************
It’s a bad sign of how far off track the Obama presidency has gone that some of the most far right Republican politicians in Congress are thanking President Obama for continuing George W. Bush’s attacks against the Constitution. One such noxious thank you came yesterday from U.S. Representative Marsha Blackburn of Tennessee. Blackburn congratulated Obama on his decision to resist a Freedom of Information Act petition, and refuse to reveal photographs that show acts of barbaric torture by the American government.

http://irregulartimes.com/

On Israeli Human Rights Violations in the Occupied Palestinian Territory No. 19/2009 (07 - 13 May 2009)
**********************************
Five Palestinian civilians, including two children and one woman, were wounded by IOF gunfire
IOF conducted 15 incursions into Palestinian communities in the West Bank. IOF arrested 12 Palestinian civilians in the West Bank, and four in the Gaza Strip IOF arrested the mother of an allegedly wanted Palestinian. IOF have continued to impose a total siege on the OPT and have isolated the Gaza Strip from the outside world. IOF troops positioned at military checkpoints in the West Bank arrested five Palestinian civilians, including a child and a girl. IOF have continued settlement activities in the West Bank and Israeli settlers have continued to attack Palestinian civilians and property. Israeli settlers attacked Palestinian civilians and their property. At least 110 donums[1] were annexed to "Burkan" settlement in the northern West Bank.

http://www.uruknet.info/?p=m54276&hd=&size=1&l=e

So Long Since Dreaming Made Sense
********************
There had been the Reagan Revolution and the enshrinement of greed, rapaciousness, and materialism as the state religion. There had been the beginnings in 1991 of the long war to gain control of the planets oil supplies. There had been the period of the most "Republican" Democrat ever to occupy the White House, a man so vapid and devoid of character that he sought nothing of his office beyond his own sexual gratification. There had been the eight years of the most utter hopelessness and despair as the United States of America moved as close to fascism and the end of constitutional government as it has ever been.

http://informationclearinghouse.info/article22613.htm

Mission Accomplished
********************
President Barack Obama appears to be endorsing the Bush administration’s larger mission — to turn the American presidency into an elected monarchy. By refusing to enforce the laws against torture, he not only violated his oath of office; he joined George W. Bush in declaring that CIA operatives can commit crimes with impunity, provided that a government lawyer gives them a permission slip.

http://dissidentvoice.org/2009/05/mission-accomplished/

Scared Somalis running out of food as battles rage
***************************************
MOGADISHU, Somalia (AP) -- Hundreds of foreigners fighting alongside Somali Islamic insurgents have driven this week's fierce battles against government forces, which have killed more than 100 people, the U.N. envoy to Somalia said Friday. Concern that the government might fall is mounting.

http://hosted.ap.org/dynamic/stories/A/AF_SOMALIA?SITE=AP&SECTION=HOME&TEMPLATE=DEFAULT&CTIME=2009-05-15-12-21-54

Pakistan Pounds Swat, Over One Million Refugees Registered
********************************
The bad news doesn’t stop there. Another 500,000 IDPs are waiting to be formally registered. On top of that, another million civilians are trapped inside the Swat Valley because of the military’s curfew.

http://news.antiwar.com/2009/05/14/over-one-million-refugees-from-swat-valley-registered/

Sri Lanka rejects cease-fire pleas
**********************************
"We are not going to succumb to international pressure to stop the offensive," said Media Minister Lakshman Yapa Abeywardena. "In Pakistan and Afghanistan there are similar conflicts but no one is asking them to have a peace agreement or a cease-fire," Abeywardena said.

http://www.hurriyet.com.tr/english/world/11651533.asp?gid=237

ON FREEDOM(part6)

2009-05-15T11:01:00.003-04:00

Empathy is a profound way of maintaining continual awareness and understanding of freedom. I am free. The other beings I live with in this world are also free. By understanding freedom, I understand others. Empathy begins the moral and ethical conduct of interacting with the other free beings of this world. It is quite deceptive to think of empathy, and from there perhaps moral conduct, as a reciprocal contract of necessity. It is more like introducing thought and reasoning into the world. Empathy has no affinity with the bargaining and profit scheme of 'the golden rule', or the revenge/reward scenario of 'what comes around, goes around'. I have empathy for the plight of other free beings without assuming or hoping other free beings will reward me for it.

PROPAGANDA, HYPOCRISY, and NEWS

2009-05-12T11:13:00.004-04:00

US blames Taliban for phosphorous weapons
*******************
The US military spokesman Col. Gren Julian said that the military did not use white phosphorus in the battle, adding that "if it was used at all it had to be the insurgents."

http://www.presstv.ir/detail.aspx?id=94417&sectionid=351020403

Soldier homicide 'shocks' Obama
*******************
"My heart goes out to the families and friends of all the service members involved in this horrible tragedy," AFP quoted his Monday statement as saying.

http://www.presstv.ir/detail.aspx?id=94400&sectionid=3510203

Three Worst Reasons to Delay Putting Cheney in Prison
********************
On Sunday, Cheney said: "The fact of the matter is that these [torture] techniques that we're talking about are used on our own people. In the SERE program that in effect trains our people with respect to capture and evasion and so forth, and escape, a lot of them go through these same exact procedures." If this were true, participants in the SERE program would be kidnapped and tortured by people willing to kill them. They would be waterboarded believing they might be drowned. This would be done upwards of 100 times. They would be hung by their wrists, beaten, electroshocked, deprived of sleep, stripped naked and exposed to cold, attacked by dogs, slammed against walls, kept in isolation, and in many cases killed, in many other cases driven insane.

http://www.globalresearch.ca/index.php?context=va&aid=13567

US to borrow 46 cents for every dollar spent
****************
WASHINGTON (AP) -- The government will have to borrow nearly 50 cents for every dollar it spends this year, exploding the record federal deficit past $1.8 trillion under new White House estimates. Budget office figures released Monday would add $89 billion to the 2009 red ink - increasing it to more than four times last year's all-time high as the government hands out billions more than expected for people who have lost jobs and takes in less tax revenue from people and companies making less money.

http://hosted.ap.org/dynamic/stories/U/US_OBAMA_BUDGET?SITE=AP&SECTION=HOME&TEMPLATE=DEFAULT&CTIME=2009-05-11-21-10-57

Pakistan: 700 Militants Killed in Past Four Days Thousands More to Die, According to Zardari
**************
The final number will doubtlessly rise, as President Asif Ali Zardari estimated around 3,000 members of the assorted factions in the valley, while the army has said it is more like 4,000 to 5,000. Whatever the case, Malik reiterated the promise of President Zardari that all of them would be killed in the end.

http://www.uruknet.info/?p=m54176&hd=&size=1&l=e

Prisoner Who Tied Iraq to Al-Qaeda Found Dead in Libyan Jail
******************************
"This news resolves, in the grimmest way possible," Worthington writes, "questions that have long been asked about the whereabouts of Ibn al-Shaykh al-Libi, perhaps the most famous of 'America's Disappeared' - prisoners seized in the 'War on Terror,' who were rendered not to Guantánamo but to secret prisons run by the CIA or to the custody of governments in third countries - often their own - where, it was presumed, they would never be seen or heard from again."

http://www.bradblog.com/?p=7133

Eight killed in US drone strike in S. Waziristan
**********************
At least eight persons have been killed in US spy plane missile strike in South Waziristan tribal region on Tuesday. A foreign news agency has confirmed the missile strike in the region in which eight persons have been killed. A US spy plane fired missiles over a target in South Waziristan’s western mountainous terrain of Sarakhora on Tuesday morning.

http://www.nation.com.pk/pakistan-news-newspaper-daily-english-online/Regional/Islamabad/12-May-2009/Eight-killed-in-US-drone-strike-in-S-Waziristan

Pelosi, Impediment to Torture Investigation? Pelosi, Resign.
***********************
Information continues to dribble out regarding Nancy Pelosi’s early knowledge that the U.S. Government under George W. Bush was torturing the people it had indefinitely detained without charge. Over the weekend, after Nancy Pelosi issued excuses embarrassingly based on her ignorance of law, poor leadership or credulity, Republican members of Congress issued ominous references to documents they say will prove the Speaker of the House knew quite a lot about the waterboarding torture being used by the Bush administration and was even “involved in policy formulation.”

http://irregulartimes.com/index.php/archives/2009/05/11/pelosi-impediment-to-torture-investigation-pelosi-resign/

Iraqi parliament asks government to forego water deals with Turkey
************************
BAGHDAD - Iraq’s parliament on Tuesday called on the government to forego partnership agreements with Turkey, Syria and Iran unless they affirm Iraq’s right to a bigger share of water in the Tigris and Euphrates rivers. Iraq is suffering from a major drought. The effects have worsened because of poor water management and dams that block the flow of the two rivers - the country’s main water source.

http://www.hurriyet.com.tr/english/world/11633612.asp?gid=237

The Bomb Iran Faction
*********************
There is clearly a faction of the power elite that is, and has for some years been pressing, for a U.S. military attack on Iran. It is not advocating a war, at least openly, or an occupation of that vast nation; rather, it is advocating an operation similar in concept to the Israeli attack on Iraq’s French-built Osiraq nuclear reactor in 1981. In a word, it is both advocating an Israeli-like action and justifying it explicitly as one on behalf of Israel.

http://www.counterpunch.org/

ON FREEDOM(part5)

2009-05-11T19:24:00.005-04:00

How does one identify oneself with property? What is a self but an imaginary figure that owns a body? When the expression, "My person" is uttered, the floodgates open. It is a subtle expression introducing ownership. This is a common linguistic problem that can be blamed for all manner of
possession. A linguistic problem it remains, for existence is prior to language. Language is a way to communicate to the other free beings in this world. At it's inception, language reaches toward others. But we are not language, we create language to communicate to others. Language could have only been created as an expression of thought, an expression of empathy.

NEWS and PROPAGANDA

2009-05-10T17:48:00.002-04:00

Was Nuremberg a temporary convenience?
***********************
Paul J. Balles calls on the Obama administration to bring to justice the sadistic, supremacist psychopaths who seemed to take delight in torturing their illegally-held prisoners at Guantanamo and those who authorized them to practise their depravity. Marjorie Cohn writes: “The memos justify 10 techniques, including banging heads into walls 30 times in a row, repeated facial and abdominal slapping, dietary manipulation, and dousing with cold water as low as 41 degrees.” She adds: They allow shackling in a standing position for 180 hours, sleep deprivation for 11 days, confinement of people in small dark boxes with insects for hours and waterboarding to create the perception they are drowning. Moreover, the memos permit many of these techniques to be used in combination for a 30-day period. They find that none of these techniques constitutes torture or cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment.

http://www.redress.cc/americas/pjballes20090507

What good is America? The dead can’t give an opinion
**************
There’s a good question: “What does the USA contribute to the world?” Let’s leave aside the US delusion that it brings democracy and freedom to a benighted world. Americans like doing one thing and they do it a lot: they like creating dead foreigners and travel all over the world to do it.

http://www.redress.cc/americas/cking20090506

Obama Uses The Israeli Defense – “Human Shields”
*********************
I’m not sure, but I don’t think even BushCo stooped this low. I suppose we now see even more of Zionist Rahm’s influence on Obama. An Israeli code of ethics in war and truth is emerging from the Obama White House. “A joint U.S.-Afghan investigation confirmed that an unspecified number of civilians died in a southern Afghan battle, but the initial findings released Saturday appeared to blame Taliban militants who used locals as “human shields.”

http://willyloman.wordpress.com/2009/05/09/obama-uses-the-israeli-defense-human-shields/

‘I’m here to understand what you mean by Taliban’
*****************
In Pakistan, I’m here to understand what they mean by this term. When we say we must fight the Taliban or must defeat them, what does it mean? I’m here to understand what you mean when you say Taliban. Do you mean a militant? Do you mean an ideology? Exactly what is it that is being fought? That needs to be clarified.

http://www.dawn.com/wps/wcm/connect/dawn-content-library/dawn/news/pakistan/arundhati-roy-sal-02

Afghans see signs U.S. military used white phosphorus
************************
Allegations that white phosphorus or another chemical may have been used threatens to deepen the controversy over what Afghan officials say could be the worst case of civilian deaths since the 2001 U.S. invasion that ousted the Taliban regime. The incident in Farah drew the condemnation of Karzai who called for an end to airstrikes.

http://www.tehrantimes.com/index_View.asp?code=194273

CRIMES and PROPAGANDA

2009-05-09T21:54:00.001-04:00

After US Strikes, Afghans Describe
"Tractor Trailers Full of Pieces of Human Bodies"
****************
It also bears remembering that the US track record of thoroughly "investigating" US massacres is pathetic. The UN said there was convincing evidence that last year's US attack on the village of Azizabad in western Afghanistan killed 90 civilians, but the military only acknowledged 30 civilian deaths.
Jessica Barry, a spokesperson for the ICRC said, "With more troops coming in, there is a risk that civilians will be more and more vulnerable."

http://informationclearinghouse.info/article22578.htm

Comment to the article above...
**********
Of course, the USA could never inflict a civilian casualty.
Of course, it is the Taliban (or whatever the "enemy" of the day happens to be.
How can anyone question our motives ? Aren't we god's people ?
Like the nursery rhyme says about little girls. "We are made of sugar, spice, and everything nice". Why can't those Afghans (Iraqis - Iranians - Palestinians - Cubans - Venezuelans etc etc etc) see this.
The USA is sick, sick, sick. As a people, we have no shame. It has always been thus, and will always be so.
Marie Kelly | 05.09.09 - 4:54 pm |

http://informationclearinghouse.info/article22578.htm

US Drone Kills at Least 10 in South Waziristan
Locals Report as Many as 45 May Be Dead in Latest Strike
**********************
Officials admit, however, that the toll is likely to rise, and local residents say the building hit - the village high school, had a large number of people in it at the time. They are claiming that as many as 45 people, including women and children, were killed in the attack.

http://news.antiwar.com/2009/05/09/us-drone-kills-at-least-10-in-south-waziristan/

Senate Will Move on Hate Crimes Bill; Critics Claim Bill Simply Unnecessary
*******************
“In addition to posing a litany of constitutional problems, today’s legislation alarmingly overturns the cornerstone of equality in our justice system by placing a higher value on one life over another,” said Rep. Paul Broun (R-Ga.) on the House floor. “In no way could I support a bill that more harshly punishes criminals who kill a homosexual, transvestite or transsexual than criminals who kill a police officer, a member of the military, a child, or a senior citizen.”

http://americanfreepress.net/html/hate_crimes_bill_177.html

ON FREEDOM(part4)

2009-05-09T12:44:00.003-04:00

Free beings cannot expect consistent or reliable conduct from others, simply because everyone is free to choose.
The illusion of being secure in a world of free beings has moved from deflective thinking, to artificially induced forgetfulness. Government, religion, and continuous fear have given rise to oppression, slavery, and first-strike mentality. Group thinking is prevalent throughout this life, as free beings fantasize about being secure. It is all so confusing, that one has to admit to years and years of adjustment to what has merely always been the case.

WAR and PROPAGANDA

2009-05-09T07:08:00.003-04:00

Exodus from NW Pakistan
************************
ISTANBUL - Pakistan warplanes continued to pound Taliban hideouts in the troubled Swat Valley Friday where the government sent fresh troops with orders to "eliminate" extremists as hundreds of thousands fled in terror and other trapped residents appealed for a pause in the fighting so they could escape.

http://www.hurriyet.com.tr/english/world/11612070.asp

U.S. drone fires missiles into Pakistan
*******************
"At least four missiles were fired near Sarorogha village but we have no reports where they struck or if there are any casualties," said an intelligence official in the region on the Afghan border.

http://www.reuters.com/article/worldNews/idUSTRE5480N120090509

Civilians hit as Pakistan army battles Taliban
********************
MINGORA, Pakistan (AP) -- Doctors rushed to treat an influx of wounded Pakistani civilians Saturday as thousands of troops backed by bomb-dropping warplanes sought to purge Taliban militants from a northwestern valley. A suspected U.S. missile strike killed nine people, mostly foreigners, in another militant stronghold near the Afghan border, officials said.

http://hosted.ap.org/dynamic/stories/A/AS_PAKISTAN?SITE=AP&SECTION=HOME&TEMPLATE=DEFAULT&CTIME=2009-05-09-06-40-57

Pakistan: Now or Never?
*******************
Foreign Policy Journal quotes U.S. Congressman Ron Paul as criticising the Obama administration for continuing the drone missile attacks first started under President George W. Bush. “We are bombing a sovereign country,” it quotes him as saying. “Where do we get the authority to do that? Did the Pakistani government give us written permission? Did the Congress give us written permission to expand the war and start bombing in Pakistan?” he asked.

http://blogs.reuters.com/pakistan/2009/05/08/pakistan-from-refugee-exodus-to-high-tech-drones/

Afghanistan: NATO Should ‘Come Clean’ on White Phosphorus Release Report on Attack in Which Child Burned
**********************
"White phosphorus causes horrendous burns and should not be used in civilian areas," said Marc Garlasco, senior military analyst at Human Rights Watch. "NATO should immediately make public the results of its investigation into this incident."

http://www.uruknet.info/?p=m54085&hd=&size=1&l=e

UN probes Gaza crimes despite Israel fury
*******************
Israeli Gaza war crimes include the use of deadly white phosphorus shells in densely populated civilian areas. While Tel Aviv initially denied using the controversial weapon, mounting evidence later forced officials to admit having employed the shells.

http://www.presstv.ir/detail.aspx?id=94097&sectionid=351020202

Angry Iraqis demand death for brutal US soldier
***********************
MAHMUDIYA, Iraq: Relatives of an Iraqi girl who was raped and killed along with her family by a US soldier urged that he be given the death penalty on Friday. Private 1st Class Steven Green was convicted in a Kentucky court on Thursday of raping Abeer Qassim Hamza al-Janabi, 14,and killing her and her family in Mahmudiya, 30 km south of Baghdad, in 2006. He faces a possible death sentence.

http://www.thenews.com.pk/daily_detail.asp?id=176618

Imran asks Brown to rein in British ‘terrorists’
************************
In an open letter sent to Mr. Brown on Thursday, which was also sent to the Tehran Times, Imran Khan wrote: “I want to urgently bring to your attention the activities of a British citizen, Mr. Altaf Hussain who was granted this status after he fled from Pakistan as a fugitive from justice. At the time of his arrival in London, he was facing 234 registered criminal cases against him, including 44 murder charges and 18 torture charges.

http://www.tehrantimes.com/index_View.asp?code=194071

ON FREEDOM(part3)

2009-05-08T11:28:00.002-04:00

Free beings have been corrupted with illusions. Reinforcement of illusions is done through the language of acceptance. We ask others, what it is they believe in? We ask them to believe in something. We ask them to stop doubting, stop investigating, stop being free. We say to each other to accept and believe, to forget that you are free. To lie about being free as if it were something to be embarrassed about.

NEWS and PROPAGANDA

2009-05-08T08:23:00.003-04:00

Villagers list 147 dead in Afghan strike
**********************
KABUL (Reuters) - Residents of two villages hit earlier this week by U.S. air strikes have prepared lists with the names of 147 people killed in the attacks, the deputy governor of the province where the strikes took place said.

http://www.reuters.com/article/worldNews/idUSTRE5471NL20090508
______________________________________________________

On regret
******************
Hours after Secretary of State Hillary Clinton "apologized" for US airstrikes that may have killed as many as 130 people in Afghanistan, NBC News is reporting that the US military is preparing to blame the deaths of several Afghan families—that were reportedly killed in US bombing raids this week in Farah Province—on Taliban fighters.
Hillary Clinton has expressed "deep regret" that American jets bombed two villages in western Afghanistan
...of course, clinton and obama want to create more such occasions for regret given their desire to place more american troops on afghan soil,

http://www.uruknet.info/?p=m54063&hd=&size=1&l=e
___________________________________________

China voices concern over growing US influence
************************
Talking to reporters during a visit to the Islamabad Chambers of Commerce and Industry, the Chinese envoy said the ‘outside influence’ was growing in the region.
‘These are issues of serious concern for China,’ he said, adding that China was concerned over the US policies and the presence of a large number of foreign troops in the region.

http://www.dawn.com/wps/wcm/connect/dawn-content-library/dawn/news/pakistan/12-china-voices-concern-over-growing-us-influence--bi--09
_______________________________________________

Lavrov: Tehran-Moscow cooperation in conformity with regulations
***********************
According to the Minister, the issue of supply of weapons by Russia to Iran, in particular, air defense systems, was touched upon during his meeting with US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton that was held a few hours before the press briefing.

http://www.irna.ir/En/View/FullStory/?NewsId=475370&IdLanguage=3
______________________________________________________

Report: U.S. denies Israeli access to F-35 computer system
****************************
According to the report, the Americans are concerned that by allowing Israel to independently repair the computers, the Israel Air Force (IAF) will get its hands on the classified technology used to make the plane.

http://news.xinhuanet.com/english/2009-05/08/content_11337054.htm
_____________________________________________________

Germany: Lieberman visit disappoints MPs
****************
During talks with members of the German parliamentary foreign affairs committee on Thursday Lieberman also said the peace process had been little more than a waste of money.

http://www.adnkronos.com/AKI/English/Politics/?id=3.0.3292909295
_____________________________________________________

Calls persist in U.S. for prosecution of "torture memo" authors
******************************
The authors -- Jay Bybee, now a federal judge; John Yoo, now a law professor; and Steven Bradbury, who has left the Justice Department -- defined "torture" as brutality causing organ failure and death.
Democrats countered that torture includes any type of pain or suffering inflicted to obtain intelligence or a confession. Many of them seek to punish the three attorneys for legally sanctioning practices that defy international norms on the treatment of prisoners.

http://news.xinhuanet.com/english/2009-05/08/content_11335664.htm
______________________________________________________

British lawmakers' expense claims revealed
**********************
LONDON (AP) -- British Prime Minister Gordon Brown claimed thousands of pounds for a cleaner while other ministers claimed for gardeners, beds and television sets, a newspaper revealed Friday, a disclosure certain to fuel public outrage over lawmaker excess.

http://hosted.ap.org/dynamic/stories/E/EU_BRITAIN_LAWMAKER_EXPENSES?SITE=AP&SECTION=HOME&TEMPLATE=DEFAULT&CTIME=2009-05-08-07-11-35

ON FREEDOM (part2)

2009-05-07T10:49:00.002-04:00

I live in a country where free beings have confused freedom with rights. Free beings have spoken and written about how free this country is. They now speak of how freedom is being taken away from them. Others cannot take away ones freedom. I can act as though I am not free. It is acting, it is lying. Freedom is something I have been born into and may endeavor to understand within the short period of my existence. Forgetting this and lying about this occurs, often.

DISCOVERIES?

2009-05-06T20:48:00.003-04:00

^^^^^^^^^^^

No time limit for US in Afghanistan
********************
Pelosi told reporters. "The legislation that will come before the committee this week and the Congress next week has no timeline or anything like that."
"How long will it take?" Pelosi said. "I don't know, but it is essential to our security that we fight terrorism there."

http://www.presstv.ir/detail.aspx?id=93847&sectionid=3510203
_______________________________________________________________

Israel would inform, not ask US before hitting Iran
*******************
“Whether or not Israel got the green light from Washington to attack Iran is almost immaterial, as everybody in the region would believe that the US was complicit,” said Karim Sadjadpour of the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace. One US diplomat envisaged Israeli Defence Minister Ehud Barak telephoning Pentagon chief Robert Gates, unannounced, “to give a heads-up and explain” once the mission were under way.

http://www.dailytimes.com.pk/default.asp?page=2009\05\07\story_7-5-2009_pg20_4
_________________________________________________________________________________

Georgia war games strain NATO-Russia relations
**************************
The exercises indicate that NATO will continue to support Georgia, to which the alliance has promised eventual membership, Litovkin said. He said the exercises also sent Moscow the message that NATO had no interest in its opinions.

http://news.xinhuanet.com/english/2009-05/07/content_11325890.htm
__________________________________________________________________

Hobbits 'are a separate species'
*************************
The team, which discovered the tiny remains in Liang Bua cave on Flores, contends that the population belongs to the species Homo floresiensis - separate from our own grouping Homo sapiens.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/science/nature/8036396.stm

ON FREEDOM (part 1)

2009-05-06T14:37:00.008-04:00

What and how I post follows a simple strategy: Perhaps I am free. I can freely imagine anything and any situation, as long as I am informed. I try to get away and be alone, to contemplate the whole idea of being free. Being around people, at first, had limited the idea of freedom. Then I started to realize that the limits of freedom were being chosen by me, in order to get, or maintain getting, what I want. But, realizing this, was to be aware that I am free.
A good example of a limit that I choose, is choosing to live. Schopenhauer said that I am subservient to the will to live. An involuntary volition, to maintain life. Others have added an instinct to survive. I don't agree. I don't agree with the many examples these people cite in nature when reacting to an immediate transgression is an example of this will or instinct to live. Because I want pain to stop does not mean that I'm fighting for survival. I have seen a film of a man, who has lit himself on fire, and while overwhelmed with flames, and skin dissolving from his limbs, he continues to try to kneel, and keep his hands together in some expression of prayer. He chose to do this. A wolf , who's leg is trapped, chews his leg off. The wolf chooses to get away from the trap. I can't infer some involuntary will or instinct to live.
In a world where everyone is free, there are illusions, but none are necessary. The world has always been filled with free beings.

2009-05-06T12:03:00.002-04:00

THE SPEECH OF TRUTH

On April 20th, 2009, the sitting president of Iran, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, stood up before a world conference in Geneva, amid heckling, applause, and tense anticipation and proceeded to give what is now known as "The Speech of Truth". In a world where statesmen use such platforms for blatant propaganda and banal, meaningless rhetoric, people around the world have been reduced to listening to mere horoscopes and having to interpret familiar lies from governments officials around the world as subtle diplomacy. But on this fine day in April something new happened, something entirely unexpected and never heard in the "free" countries of the world...the truth. So shocking was this to the western delegates, that they immediately walked out, in tandem, almost covering their ears lest they be offended by sounds they only hear uttered in private amongst each other in their secret clubs and meetings. It was the rarest of rare moments, and if you missed it, then you missed what free speech can do to clowns dressed in suits who only know of one singular reaction to such abusive noise...EXIT!

[Full text] President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad's speech at the Durban Review Conference, Geneva 2009 http://www.blogger.com/post-create.g?blogID=1216692965976424186

NEWS and PROPAGANDA

2009-05-06T11:46:00.003-04:00

Lebanese minister: Arabs commend Ahmadinejad for remarks on Zionists
**************************
Both the Zionist regime and their western allies have been discredited but they refuse to accept the logical speeches by Iranian president, he said.

http://www.irna.ir/En/View/FullStory/?NewsId=473366&idLanguage=3
___________________________________

Israel brushes off call to sign nuclear arms pact
***********************
JERUSALEM (Reuters) - Israel brushed off Wednesday a U.S. call to sign the nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty, saying it saw no indication that the Obama administration wanted to revise the secrecy around the assumed Israeli atomic arsenal. The arrangement allows Israel to skirt a U.S. ban on funding states that proliferate weapons of mass-destruction. It can thus enjoy some $3 billion in annual defense aid from Washington.

http://www.reuters.com/article/worldNews/idUSTRE5453TD20090506
_________________________________________

Mumbai attack accused says not guilty of charges
******************************
Police say Kasab was one of 10 gunmen who landed in Mumbai by boat from Pakistan and rampaged through several of the city's landmarks including the main train station, two luxury hotels and a Jewish center over three days. Charges were also laid Wednesday against Fahim Ansari and Sabahuddin Ahmed, two Indians accused of being members of the Pakistan-based Lashkar-e-Taiba militant group and of conducting reconnaissance of the Mumbai landmarks before the attack.

http://www.reuters.com/article/topNews/idUSTRE5452XW20090506

2009-05-06T03:29:00.001-04:00

Opposition to Give 72-Hour Deadline to Mikheil Saakashvili Tomorrow
**********
‘Saakashvili will be given 72-hour deadline to satisfy will of people about his resignation and start dialogue with opposition on the issue of peaceful and constitutional transmission of government. If the demand is not satisfied, central routes will be picketed by cars on 11 May, spots of picketing will be declared on 10 May’,

http://www.geotimes.ge/index.php?m=home&newsid=16331

CHANGE

2009-05-06T02:47:00.002-04:00

Dozens Died In Afghanistan Air Strikes, ICRC Says
*****************************
KABUL-- Dozens of people, including women and children, were killed in U.S.-led air strikes while sheltering in homes from a battle May 4 and May 5 in western Afghanistan, the International Committee of the Red Cross has said.

http://www.rferl.org/content/Dozens_Died_In_Afghanistan_Air_Strikes_ICRC_Says/1622389.html
___________________________________________________________

AFGHANISTAN: ‘US air-raid kills over 100 civilians in Farah’
******************************
Dr Atiqullah, a resident of the village, told they had so far retrieved 123 dead bodies from beneath the debris of the destroyed homes by using tractors.

http://www.uruknet.info/?p=m53995&hd=&size=1&l=e

FOLLOWERS and CRIMINALS

2009-05-06T01:43:00.003-04:00

Australia’s role in the American Inquisition.
*********************
The revelations of a once secret 2006 report by the International Committee of the Red Cross on the use of torture and "cruel, inhuman, or degrading punishment" on prisoners at Guantánamo and secret CIA jails came as a shock to many. This is odd, because anyone with a keyboard, modem and half a brain, quickly discovered that in the panicky aftermath of 9/11, the West had forged a pact with the Devil. It was not only Dick Cheney who felt the call of the dark side - it was virtually the entire governing class of America, Britain and Australia. Yes, even Australia, a former penal colony that started life as Britain’s Guantanamo.

The Torturer’s Apprentice
http://informationclearinghouse.info/article22552.htm
___________________________________________
Christians vs atheists
**********************************

The Federal Bureau of Prisons does have statistics on religious
affiliations of inmates.  The following are total number of
inmates per religion category:

Response              Number      %
----------------------------  --------
Catholic               29267   39.164%
Protestant             26162   35.008%
Muslim                  5435    7.273%
American Indian         2408    3.222%
Nation                  1734    2.320%
Rasta                   1485    1.987%
Jewish                  1325    1.773%
Church of Christ        1303    1.744%
Pentecostal             1093    1.463%
Moorish                 1066    1.426%
Buddhist                 882    1.180%
Jehovah Witness          665    0.890%
Adventist                621    0.831%
Orthodox                 375    0.502%
Mormon                   298    0.399%
Scientology              190    0.254%
Atheist                  156    0.209%
Hindu                    119    0.159%
Santeria                 117    0.157%
Sikh                      14    0.019%
Bahai                      9    0.012%
Krishna                    7    0.009%

The results of the Christians vs atheists
in prison investigation.
http://www.holysmoke.org/icr-pri.htm
___________________________________

CONFLICTS OF INTEREST

2009-05-05T21:37:00.006-04:00

This is for Michelle...

Hillary R. Clinton

In the late 1970s, the Clintons and McDougals buy land in the Ozarks with mostly borrowed funds. The Clintons get 50% interest with no cash down. The plot, known as Whitewater, is fifty miles from the nearest grocery store. The Washington Post will report later that some purchasers of lots, many of them retirees, "put up houses or cabins, others slept in vans or tents, hoping to be able to live off the land." HRC writes Jim McDougal, "If Reagonomics works at all, Whitewater could become the Western Hemisphere's Mecca." More than half of the purchasers will lose their plots thanks to the sleazy form of financing used.

The McDougals will be among a number of close HRC's friends and business associates who will end up in jail. Others include her law partner Webster Hubbell and financial middle man David Hale.

Two months after commencing the Whitewater scam, Hillary Clinton invests $1,000 in cattle futures. Within a few days she has a $5,000 profit. Before bailing out she earns nearly $100,000 on her investment. Many years later, several economists will calculate that the chances of earning such returns legally were one in 250 million.

Hillary Clinton makes a $44,000 profit on a $2,000 investment in a cellular phone franchise deal that involves taking advantage of the FCC's preference for locals, minorities and women. The franchise is almost immediately flipped to the cellular giant, McCaw.

Jim McDougal tries to prevent state agencies from shutting down his S&L, which has been providing cash for the Whitewater operation. According to the Washington Times, Ms. Clinton is put on a $2000 a month retainer by the S&L. Ms. Clinton will later claim not to have received any retainer nor to have been deeply involved with Madison.

During the 1992 campaign, Hillary Clinton defends her role in the Madison Guarantee S&L scandal by saying, "I suppose I could have stayed home and baked cookies and had teas. But what I decided to do was pursue my profession, which I entered before my husband was in public life." Forgotten, however, is what inspired this homily: accusations that Ms. Clinton had represented Whitewater business partner Jim McDougal's S&L before her husband's government. Here's what the New York Times reported on March 17, 1992: "Hillary Clinton said today that she did not earn 'a penny' from state business conducted by her Little Rock law firm and that she never intervened with state regulators on behalf of a failed Arkansas savings and loan association. . . "

Records will show that she did, in fact, represent Madison before the state securities department. After the revelation, she says, "For goodness sakes, you can't be a lawyer if you don't represent banks."

Susan McDougal recalls Ms. Clinton coming in and drumming up the business. Ms. McDougal tells the Washington Post: "The problem was finances, her finances." The Washington Times quotes an unnamed Clinton business associate who claims the governor used to "jog over to McDougal's office about once a month to pick up the [retainer] check for his wife." Jim McDougal's version of the story, according to the LA Times, is that Clinton asked him to throw some legal work his wife's way to help the Clintons out of a financial crunch: "I hired Hillary because Bill came in whimpering that they needed help."

Hillary Clinton writes Jim McDougal enclosing a power of attorney for him to sign "authorizing me to act on your behalf with respect to matters concerning Whitewater Development Corporation." Another power of attorney is enclosed for Susan McDougal. The power of attorney includes the right to endorse, sign and execute "checks, notes, deeds, agreements, certificates, receipts or any other instruments in writing of all matters related to Whitewater Development Corporation." This letter, uncovered in 1993 by Jerry Seper of the Washington Times, directly contradicts the claim of the Clintons that they were "passive shareholders" in Whitewater.

From a 1996 Chicago Tribune editorial: "The legal issues will sort themselves out in time. But one thing has become all too clear. Bill and Hillary Clinton and their aides have made a concerted effort to deceive official investigators and the American public with half truths and outright lies . . . It's not clear what the Clintons want to conceal, but it's clear that they have made extraordinary efforts to do so."

The American Spectator reports in 1996 that on her Asian tour, Hillary Clinton told New Zealand television that she had been named after Sir Edmund Hillary. Sir Edmund, however, was an unknown beekeeper the year of Mrs. Clinton's birth.

The Spectator also reports that HRC served on the board of a corporation about which serious questions have been raised concerning its role in the pre-Gulf War arms pipeline to Iraq.

A drug dealer donates $20,000 to the DNC, attends a Christmas reception hosted by Hillary Clinton, has his photo taken with the Clintons and Al Gore and then -- three weeks later -- is arrested for smuggling 6,000 pounds of cocaine into the United States. It should have come as no surprise to anyone involved. After all, Jorge Cabrera had already served two prison sentences -- one for trying to bribe a grand jury witness and the other for filing a false income tax return. Later he will be back in the news when a businessman pleads guilty to laundering $3.5 million for Cabrera between 1986 and 1996.

"I see the White House is like a subway -- you have to put in coins to open the gates." -- Clinton contributor Johnny Chung talking about the $50,000 he gave Hillary Clinton's top aide while seeking VIP treatment at the White House.

Spilling some of the beans on her "close friend" Ron Brown, Nolanda Hill tells Prime Time Live that Brown used drugs while Commerce Secretary and considered taking a big payoff from Vietnam to get trade restrictions lifted but dropped the idea when he got a tip that FBI was on the case. Hill also says that Brown thought it was Hillary who placed John Huang in a Commerce Department job. Huang left the Lippo Group -- with a golden parachute of around $800,000 -- to work for Commerce. Brown orders a top secret clearance for Huang. While at Commerce, Huang visits the White House about 70 times, is briefed 37 times by the CIA, views about 500 intelligence reports, and makes 281 calls to Lippo banks.

A federal judge issues a fine for a quarter million dollars because, "The Executive Branch of the government, working in tandem, was dishonest with this court." At issue is the composition of Hillary Clinton's health task force, a body stacked with those from the medical industry who would gain most from its faux reforms.

Number of times Hillary Clinton says "I don't recall" or its equivalent in a statement to a House investigating committee: 50. Number of paragraphs in this statement: 42

Starr decides not to pursue the FBI file matter after an investigation that included a nine-minute interview with HRC over tea and coffee. FBI Director Louis Freeh calls the handling of the FBI tapes an "egregious violation of privacy . . . without justification."

"Mr. Starr also botched the investigation into the White House's illicit use of confidential FBI files on 900 Republican opponents. He used FBI agents to probe misconduct involving the FBI itself. Needless to say, they came up empty handed. A civil suit on behalf of the victims has since uncovered evidence that the purloined files were part of a campaign of political espionage ordered by Hillary Clinton herself. The dirt in the files, including raw data on congressional leaders, was fed into computers.

Presumably it was later used for blackmail, or fed to media surrogates for the systematic smearing of Republicans." -- Ambrose Evans-Pritchard, London Telegraph.

After quitting the Justice Department and before going to jail, Hubbell is a busy man. He meets with Hillary Clinton, and follows up by getting together with major scandal figures John Huang, James Riady, and Ng Lapseng. Riady and Huang go to the White House every day from June 21 to June 25, 1994 according to White House records. Hubbell has breakfast and lunch with Riady on June 23. Four days later -- and one week after Hubbell's meeting with Hillary -- the Hong Kong Chinese Bank, jointly owned by Lippo and the Chinese intelligence services, send $100,000 to Hubbell.

"Through discovery in its civil lawsuit against the Clinton Commerce Department, Judicial Watch also has found evidence that President Clinton condoned and participated in a scheme, conceived by First Lady Hillary Rodham Clinton and approved by the President, to sell seats on U.S. Department of Commerce trade missions in exchange for political contributions. ~~~ In addition to the illegal sale of taxpayer financed services, such as seats on trade missions, for political contributions, the President and Mrs. Clinton have illegally solicited and received monies directly from private citizens and others. The creation and use of legal defense funds is not only prohibited under federal law, but they have proved to be a means whereby lobbyists, influence peddlers and foreign powers have tried to influence the Administration, contrary to U.S. national security interests. In sum, Judicial Watch has uncovered a pattern of conduct by this President and his agents that indicates he has run, in effect, a criminal enterprise from the White House to obtain and maintain hold on the Office of the President of the United States. Indeed, he is likely in violation of the Racketeering Influenced and Corrupt Organizations Act (RICO). " -- Judicial Watch

"Communist Party cadres should study the speeches of Hillary Clinton because she offers a very good example of the skills of propaganda. Her sentences are short and stimulating. That's why she gets a lot of applause. But Chinese people have a habit of giving long speeches in which the sentences are long and tedious." -- Yu Quanyu, director of the Chinese Academy of Social Studies, in Ideological and Political Work Studies.

Former White House FBI agent Gary Aldrich reports that Hillary Clinton told the Secret Service agents in public to "stay the fuck back, stay the fuck away from me! Don't come within ten yards of me or else!" When her guards have argued with her, she had said, "Just fucking do as I say, okay?"

Hillary Clinton and David Watkins move to oust the White House travel office in favor of World Wide Travel, Clinton's source of $1 million in fly-now- pay-later campaign trips. The White House fires seven long-term employees for alleged mismanagement and kickbacks. The director, Billy Dale, charged with embezzlement in the HRC-organized frame-up, will be acquitted in less than two hours by the jury.

White House-assigned FBI agent Gary Aldrich agrees to help trim the Christmas tree in the Blue Room. Aldrich is surprised to find a small clay ornament of 12-lords-aleaping. Among the things that were aleaping on the 12 lords are their erections. Also provided by Hillary Clinton and her staff: ornaments made of drug paraphernalia such as syringes and roach clips, three French hens in a menage á trois, two turtle doves fornicating, five golden rings attached to a gingerbread man's ear, nipple, belly button, nose, and penis.

Hillary Clinton's attempts to conceal the fact that she had $120,000 of editorial help in preparing a book-like substance.

Billing records documenting HRC's work on the Castle Grande development scam are discovered in the family quarters of the White House. HRC says she has no idea how they got there.

Judicial Watch sues Hillary Clinton in a $90 million lawsuit on behalf of the 900 persons whose FBI files were taken by the White House. She is also a defendant in a shareholder suit filed against Loral and others over the sale of slots on public trade missions. The FBI files case is expected to reach trial next year.

A FEW OF HILLARY CLINTON'S GREATEST HITS http://www.uhuh.com/clinton/hrc-hits.htm

NEWS and PROPAGANDA

2009-05-05T10:45:00.001-04:00

Georgia uncovers military plot
******************************
According to Shota Utiashvili, this plan was coordinated with Russia and it at least aimed at disrupting the NATO military training scheduled for May 6 in Georgia and beginning of large-scale military plot in the country.

http://www.geotimes.ge/index.php?m=home&newsid=16349

Georgian mutiny quelled
************************
A mutiny in a Georgian tank battalion ended after negotiations with President Saakashvili. The military revolted following the Interior Ministry’s allegation of planned coup d’etat.

http://www.russiatoday.com/Top_News/2009-05-05/Georgian_mutiny_quelled.html

NEWS snd PROPAGANDA

2009-05-05T10:18:00.001-04:00

China military build-up seems U.S.-focused: Mullen
************************************
"They are developing capabilities that are very maritime focused, maritime and air focused, and in many ways, very much focused on us," he told a conference of the Navy League, a nonprofit seamen's support group, in Washington.
"They seem very focused on the United States Navy and our bases that are in that part of the world."

http://www.reuters.com/article/politicsNews/idUSTRE54363X20090504
______________________________________________________________________

Abusive Border Patrol Agents w/ Nun Chucks at NM Checkpoint
************************************
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KFS7oZtE8Ks&eurl=http%3A%2F%2Fburningbabylon.wordpress.com%2F&feature=player_embedded
______________________________________________________________________

EU takes aim at Canada, bans seal products
************************************
STRASBOURG, France (AP) -- The European Parliament voted to ban imports of seal products Tuesday, including fur coats and even omega-3 pills, trying to force Canada to end the annual seal hunt that animal rights groups call barbaric.

http://hosted.ap.org/dynamic/stories/E/EU_EU_CANADA_SEAL_HUNT?

OCCUPATIONS and CRUSADES

2009-05-04T13:03:00.002-04:00

Who ran the Bush White House?: Christians
*********** **************
********************* ***********************

General Boykin is an evangelical Christian, a General in the United States Army and the undersecretary of defense for intelligence. Much of his time has been devoted to giving speeches extolling the virtues of his God and putting down that of others. He has told audiences, among other things that Christians worship "a real God" and non-Christians revere "an idol." He has described Mr. Bush's battle in Iraq as a battle against Satan who "wants to destroy us as a Christian army." He has said that Islamic terrorists would only be defeated if "we come at them in the name of Jesus." Commenting on the capture of Somali warlord, Osman Ato, he told one audience that: "Well, you know what, I knew that my God was bigger than his. I knew that my God was a real God and his was an idol." Following Mr. Ato's capture the general went into his cell and said: "Mr. Ato, you underestimated our God." He correctly told one audience that "[T]he majority of Americans did not vote for him [Bush]." Ignoring the role of the United States Supreme Court he went on to say, less correctly that: "He's in the White House because God put him there for a time such as this."

God and the Bush Administration
http://www.counterpunch.org/brauchli10132004.html
********************

The very first act of the new Bush administration was to have a Protestant Evangelist minister officially dedicate the inauguration to Jesus Christ, who he declared to be "our savior." Invoking "the Father, the Son, the Lord Jesus Christ" and "the Holy Spirit," Billy Graham's son, the man selected by President George W. Bush to bless his presidency, excluded the tens of millions of Americans who are Muslims, Jews, Buddhists, Shintoists, Unitarians, agnostics and atheists from his blessing by his particularistic and parochial language.

Bush Starts Off by Defying the Constitution
http://www.bluecorncomics.com/bushleag.htm
********************

George W. Bush has used the word "Crusade" to describe his war against the people he calls "evildoers." Bush clearly believes that the United States of America is a Christian nation, and that the government should be used to promote Christian religious projects.
General Wesley Clark reports in his latest book that the White House has drawn up a list of exclusively Muslim nations to target as enemies over the next four years (Afghanistan, Iraq, then Syria, Lebanon, Libya, Iran, Somalia and the Sudan - two down, six to go).
Bush says that he's fighting against terrorism everywhere, yet refuses to touch Christian terrorist groups, even those that are organizing within the United States. Bush seems only interested in fighting Muslim terrorists.
In Iraq, a government-paid chaplain has been baptizing American soldiers as Christians in exchange for giving them water to take showers.

The signs of a holy war are undeniably present.
http://www.irregulartimes.com/holywarriorbush.html
*******************

OCCUPATION and CRUSADES

2009-05-04T09:15:00.002-04:00

UN asks Taliban to elect Afghan President
*************************************
"Call it reconciliation, or the peace process, whatever you want, but I believe that the opposition should know that those who want to take part in the election and respect the constitution should have an option to do that," Eide said, according to the British weekly the Observer.

http://www.presstv.ir/detail.aspx?id=93477&sectionid=351020403
****** ******

Taliban call U.S. olive branch a 'lunatic idea'
http://www.nationalpost.com/arts/story.html?id=1452169
_________________________________________________________

'Witness for Jesus' in Afghanistan
***********************************
In one recorded sermon, Lieutenant-Colonel Gary Hensley, the chief of the US military chaplains in Afghanistan, is seen telling soldiers that as followers of Jesus Christ, they all have a responsibility "to be witnesses for him".
"The special forces guys - they hunt men basically. We do the same things as Christians, we hunt people for Jesus. We do, we hunt them down," he says.
"Get the hound of heaven after them, so we get them into the kingdom. That's what we do, that's our business."

http://english.aljazeera.net/news/asia/2009/05/200953201315854832.html
***** *****

Evangelism and World Domination
*****************************************
"Since Christians are right and everyone else is wrong, Christians are mandated to expand their cult to try to include everyone in the world. They want Christian controlled governments to enforce their Christian way of life on the masses and have the authority to punish the non-believers. The idea of personal rights and liberties is contrary to surrendering your life and free will to Jesus and doing "his work" as dictated by the church. After all, if you're not serving Christ, you're serving Satan, and you are the tool of the Devil and serving an evil purpose. So the idea of personal liberty and free thinking is the same as giving rights to Satan to be evil. Something God would never approve of, but seems powerless to stop. The omnipotent creator seems to have to rely on us mere mortals to do his work for him, and we, according to Christianity, have that task of winning souls over to Christ. So it's ok to repress the heathen non-believers because we heathens are the enemy of God. Obviously, Satan is working through me right now making me write this, and you're being influenced by Satan in reading it. Pray that you don't believe a word I say!"

Christianity Sucks:
A Frank Discussion on Dealing with Christians
http://www.churchofreality.org/opinion/christian.htm

NEWS and PROPAGANDA

2009-05-04T08:07:00.001-04:00

Iran says its nuclear program should be treated like Japan’s
************************************************************
“Japan spent a considerable number of years to build confidence in the nuclear field and we are making a similar effort,” Manouchehr Mottaki said in a joint press conference with his Japanese counterpart Hirofumi Nakasone.
“During those years Japan was never asked to suspend or freeze its work.” He added all countries working in this field should be treated similar to Japan.

http://www.tehrantimes.com/index_View.asp?code=193637
_______________________________________________________

On Censorship.
**************
Freedom House remarked in its report that the worst cases for Journalistic censorship in the Middle East are : Libya, Tunisia, Jordan, Iran...
Oddly enough and maybe it is not so odd, Iraq was not listed in the Freedom House report. There was a small paragraph saying that the situation in Iraq has improved in as far as Journalists are concerned - they don't murder them anymore.
HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA. Fucking Jokers.
I want to ask Freedom House how much Freedom is there under Occupation ?
Maybe Freedom House needs to read about what it's like to live under Occupation.
Occupation idiots !

http://uncensoredarabwomanblues.blogspot.com/
_____________________________________________

President Obama Won't Rule Out Torture
**************************************
"That's the responsibility I wake up with and it's the responsibility I go to sleep with. And so I will do whatever is required to keep the American people safe."

http://www.globalresearch.ca/index.php?context=va&aid=13474
______________________________________________________________

NEWS and PROPAGANDA

2009-05-03T12:16:00.001-04:00

Inconsistencies Arise in CFO Suicide Story
**************************************
Initially, a law enforcement official speaking on condition of anonymity told the Associated Press that Kellermann hanged himself.’
Other news agencies ran with this account, but then Sabrina Rock, a Fairfax County police spokesman, confirmed to the AP that Kellermann was dead, but she could not confirm that he committed suicide despite WUSA reporting that Fairfax police told them it was suicide.
Stranger yet, police spokesman Lucy Caldwell told All Headline News editor Linda Young via telephone on April 22 that “other people were present at the home at the time of Kellermann’s death, and that there was a gun and a gunshot wound.”

http://americanfreepress.net/html/cfo_suicide_story_176.html
_________________________________________________

Dem Rep Harman Did Urge Times Not To Publish Wiretapping Expose!
***************************************************************
Dem Rep Jane Harman did in fact urge The New York Times not to publish its big expose of Bush-era warrantless wiretapping, apparently before the 2004 election, potentially changing the election’s outcome and the course of history, according to a statement from the paper.

Congresswoman Harman spoke to Washington Bureau Chief Phil Taubman in late October or early November, 2004, apparently at the request of General Hayden. She urged that The Times not publish the story. She did not speak to me, and I don’t remember her being a significant factor in my decision. In 2005, when we were getting ready to publish, Phil met with a group of congressional leaders familiar with the eavesdropping program, including Ms. Harman. They all argued that The Times should not publish. The Times published the story a few days later.

http://theplumline.whorunsgov.com/political-media/dem-rep-harman-did-urge-times-not-to-publish-wiretapping-expose/

And today, Harman wrote to Attorney General Eric Holder expressing outrage that she had been wiretapped.
"This abuse of power is outrageous and I call on your Department to release all transcripts and other investigative material involving me in an unredacted form," Harman wrote. "It is my intention to make this material available to the public."

Jane Harman's Wiretapped Conversations
http://voices.washingtonpost.com/washingtonpostinvestigations/2009/04/jane_harmans_mysterious_conver.html

THE INFORMATION UNDERGROUND INTERVIEWS CYNTHIA MCKINNEY, BLOWS THE LID OFF OF THE ISRAEL LOBBY
http://whatreallyhappened.com/
___________________________________________________________

GI Special 7E3: "Taliban In Every Village" [ 3 May 2009 ]
***************************************************
“The people who are fighting with the Taliban are the brothers, uncles and relatives of those killed by the Americans. They have joined the Taliban and are fighting because they want to avenge their brothers, fathers or cousins.

“There are now Taliban in every village; many of them have rejoined the movement after the savage attacks carried out by Americans.”

http://www.uruknet.info/?p=m53915&hd=&size=1&l=e
___________________________________________________
A Dossier on Civilian Victims of United States' Aerial Bombing of Afghanistan
http://cursor.org/stories/civilian_deaths.htm

____________________________________________________

Handful of Taliban can’t harm Pakistan: Malik
***********************************************
LONDON: Interior Minister Rehman Malik has said a handful of Taliban cannot pose danger to the existence of Pakistan and the perception regarding occupation of Islamabad by them is unfounded and baseless.

http://www.thenews.com.pk/top_story_detail.asp?Id=21902

NEWS AND PROPAGANDA

2009-05-02T10:48:00.005-04:00

The MSM would like us to think that Obama and his administration has assuaged international tensions by reaching out to former foes and asking for a new start. This is not so. Obama gives speeches... and that's all. The difference between the Obama administration and the Bush administration is the spelling. Like the WMD's and Osama Bin Laden, everyone is looking for change...

Fidel Castro snubs US terrorism list
http://www.presstv.ir/detail.aspx?id=93181&sectionid=351020702

Chavez slams US terror report on Venezuela
http://www.presstv.ir/detail.aspx?id=93301&sectionid=351020704

Ahmadinejad questions West claims on democracy
http://www.irna.ir/En/View/FullStory/?NewsId=462129&idLanguage=3

NEWS and PROPAGANDA

2009-05-01T20:42:00.001-04:00

While the mainstream media tries to distract us...

U.S. to Drop Spy Case Against Pro-Israel Lobbyists
http://willyloman.wordpress.com/2009/05/01/killin-the-story-with-a-friday-release-obamas-justice-department-drops-charges-against-aipac-spies/

The Israel Lobby's Power Comes from The American Ruling Class
http://www.newdemocracyworld.org/War/Lobby.htm

PRO-ISRAEL PAC CONTRIBUTIONS TO 2008 CONGRESSIONAL CANDIDATES
http://www.wrmea.com/archives/November_2008/pdfs/nov08pac-charts.pdf

12 arrested after alleged 'Easter bomb plot' released without charge
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/newstopics/politics/lawandorder/5200543/12-arrested-after-alleged-Easter-bomb-plot-released-without-charge.html

Bush Son Had Dinner Plans With Hinckley Brother Before Shooting

2009-05-01T19:49:00.003-04:00

http://www.hereinreality.com/hinckley.html

This is a test!

2009-05-01T19:08:00.000-04:00

Aphorista joining Human Beings Are FREE!

"A MESSAGE FROM THE MINISTRY OF HOMELAND SECURITY" NPR's 'History Scrub' of U.S. Fault in Afghanistan [editorial]

2009-02-21T16:29:00.006-05:00

Article: "NPR's 'History Scrub' of U.S. Fault in Afghanistan"
Source: Fairness & Accuracy in Reporting / fair.org
Excerpt(s): "A rather major problem with nearly all of NPR's reporting" has been identified by NPR Check blogger Mytwords (2/18/09) and named the "history scrub." The definition: "If the essential background history to a story reflects poorly on the actions of the U.S. government--that history will be deleted, scrubbed, sanitized--sent down the memory hole." The key example given is a February 17 All Things Considered in which host Michelle Norris "blandly explains that thousands more U.S. troops are headed off to Afghanistan and doesn't even chuckle in noting that the United States Institute of Peace [tee-hee] released some new policy recommendations for Afghanistan"...
Link to Full Story: http://www.fair.org/blog/2009/02/19/nprs-history-scrub-of-us-fault-in-afghanistan/

THEY CAN RUN, BUT THEY CAN'T HIDE! WE KNOW! The Mercenaries Previously Known as Blackwater [news story & book referral]

2009-02-20T14:44:00.008-05:00

Article: "The Mercenaries Previously Known as Blackwater"
Source: PRwatch.org (orig. source The Washington Post)
Excerpt(s): First it was Blackwater USA. Then it was Blackwater Worldwide. Now, it's "Xe" (pronounced "Zee"). The private military company has repeatedly tried to re-brand, after numerous controversies from the killing of civilians in Nisoor Square in Baghdad; to its no-bid contracts in Iraq, Afghanistan and New Orleans, post-Katrina; to its hiring troops with ties to repressive regimes, like that of former Chilean dictator Augusto Pinochet. The company says its latest name change is meant to reflect a new focus. Blackwater / Xe spokesperson Anne Tyrrell said, "We've taken the company to a place where it is no longer accurately described as Blackwater." Its subsidiaries also have new names: Blackwater Airships is now Guardian Flight Systems, Blackwater Target Systems is GSD Manufacturing, and Blackwater Lodge and Training Center is the U.S. Training Center. The company has also shed its famous (or infamous) bear-paw and crosshairs logo. The new head of Blackwater / Xe, Gary Jackson, told employees, "Xe will be a one-stop shopping source for world class services in the fields of security, stability, aviation, training and logistics," reports the Wall Street Journal.
Links to Full Story: http://www.prwatch.org/node/8214 and http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/02/13/AR2009021303149.html
Click on image of bookcover above right to read more [link to Amazon.com preview] about the origins and recent practices of Blackwater in Jeremy's Scahill's well-researched book (highly recommended--though he still takes it a bit easy on them...).

Erik Prince, founder of Blackwater & imperialistic aristocrat
(Image by The Washington Post / click on image for original source)

U.S. EMPIRE FLEXES MILITARY MIGHT MORE AS ECONOMIC SITUATION DEGRADES Russia & U.S. remain (intentionally) ambiguous in alliance-making [news story]

2009-02-19T14:22:00.004-05:00

Article: "Russia says U.S. may go beyond European missile plans"
Source: Russian News & Information Agency
Excerpt(s): MOSCOW, February 19 (RIA Novosti) - Moscow is not ruling out that Washington may go further than its missile defense plans for Central Europe, Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov said on Thursday. "We have not yet received a clear answer, a denial at least, to our question whether the U.S. plans to deploy a fourth and fifth missile defense site," Lavrov said upon his return from Bahrain.
Link to Full Story: http://en.rian.ru/russia/20090219/120227905.html
Picture from Russian News & Information Agency (RIA Novosti)

ANOTHER MONEY SWINDLER TRIES TO HIDE FROM WORLD'S REPROACH "Sir" Allen Stanford nowhere to be found after stealing $8b+ [news story & video]

2009-02-19T13:59:00.003-05:00

Article: "Stanford charges spark run on banks"
Source: Guardian.co.uk
Excerpt(s): The criminal investigation into the business empire of the cricket tycoon Sir Allen Stanford sowed panic in the Caribbean and Latin America yesterday as governments and investors scrambled to uncover the extent of the alleged $8bn fraud. The prime minister of Antigua warned of "catastrophe" for the nation, depositors rushed to withdraw funds in bank branches around the region, and authorities in Colombia, Panama, Peru and Venezuela began their own investigations into the Texas billionaire's financial dealings... On Tuesday the US securities and exchange commission accused Stanford of fraudulently selling $8bn (£5.6bn) in high-yield certificates of deposit. It sought to freeze assets and appoint a receiver. But the tycoon himself was nowhere to be found and US marshals were reportedly unable to serve him with court orders. Sources at the SEC confirmed they were searching for the billionaire, who has not been seen in public since news of alleged fraud broke. Stanford International Bank has 30,000 clients in 131 countries, as well as advisers in 30 US offices. Antigua, a sleepy island with a population of 70,000, forming half of a Caribbean nation with Barbuda, risks being the worst hit. It was here that Stanford set up his headquarters in a 30,000 sq ft Georgian-style hilltop building...
Link to Full Story (and video): http://www.guardian.co.uk/sport/2009/feb/18/allen-stanford-banks-caribbean

WORLD ECONOMIC CASCADE-FAILURE CONTINUES... More Venezuelans and Mexicans added to list of pan-American fraud victims [news story & video]

2009-02-19T13:47:00.004-05:00

Article: "Latin Americans fret as Stanford crisis spreads"
Source: Reuters
Excerpt(s): CARACAS, Feb 18 (Reuters) - Well-off Mexican pensioners joined middle-class Venezuelans in a frantic quest on Wednesday to track down their savings as the fraud scandal enveloping U.S. broker Stanford Group Co spread to Latin America. Crowds flocked to Stanford offices in Caracas and Mexico City and telephone lines buzzed as harried Stanford staff fielded calls round-the-clock about frozen accounts. Regulatory authorities moved on the bank's assets in Ecuador and Panama and its Colombian brokerage unit halted stock trading. "I heard the news and came straight down," said Caracas resident Josefina Moreno, who said her son had about $10,000 invested. "We've had money here for 2 years, and I want it back." The U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) has accused billionaire Allen Stanford, a high profile cricket promoter, and two Stanford executives of fraudulently selling $8 billion in high-yield certificates of deposit in a scheme that stretched around the world from Texas and Antigua. Venezuelan investors alone could have more than $2 billion invested in the scheme.
Link to Full Story: http://www.reuters.com/article/marketsNews/idUSN1845098120090218
Picture of "Sir" Allen Stanford from Guardian.co.uk

Related (brief) video from Reuters:

END THE SIEGE OF GAZA NOW Israeli tanks enter Gaza City [news story]

2009-02-18T21:28:00.000-05:00

Article: "Israeli tanks enter Gaza City"
Source: Press TV
Excerpt(s): Israeli tanks backed by helicopters have crossed the border with the Gaza Strip, triggering clashes in Gaza City. Witnesses told AFP that the military forces entered Gaza City early Thursday with Palestinian fighters exchanging fire with them. The military forces however left the strip after the fighters fired antitank rockets at them. No casualties have been reported in the attack. There was no comment by the Israeli military on the incident.
Link to Full Story: http://www.presstv.ir/Detail.aspx?id=86072&sectionid=351020202

MARTIALLING LAW FRENCH-STYLE France sends police to quell Guadeloupe riots [news story]

2009-02-18T21:15:00.002-05:00

Article: "France sends police to quell Guadeloupe riots"
Source: Agence France-Presse
Excerpt(s): POINTE-A-PITRE, Guadeloupe (AFP) - - France dispatched hundreds of police reinforcements to its Caribbean island of Guadeloupe on Wednesday as a month-long strike over the rising cost of living descended into deadly riots. Union representative Jacques Bino, aged in his 50s, was shot dead overnight when he drove up to a roadblock manned by armed youths in Pointe-a-Pitre, the island's main city. It was not immediately clear who shot him, but he was the first victim of the escalating violence on Guadeloupe, normally a tourist-friendly island but crippled since January 20 by a general strike. "There were no police nearby," said local prosecutor Jean-Michel Pretre... The conflict has exposed race and class divisions on the island, where the local white elite wields power over the black majority. The economy is largely in the hands of the "Bekes," the local name for whites who are mostly descendants of colonial landlords and sugar plantation slave owners of the 17th and 18th centuries. A Socialist opposition leader, Malikh Boutih, said it was "shocking" to watch a police force "almost 100 percent white, confront a black population" and drew a parallel with the 2005 suburban riots in France. "There are no concrete buildings, there are palm trees, but it's the same dead-end, the same 'no future' for young people, with joblessness and a feeling of isolation," Boutih said. Unions launched a strike on the neighbouring French island of Martinique on February 5 also to press for higher salaries and measures to bring down the prices of basic goods.
Link to Full Story: http://sg.news.yahoo.com/afp/20090219/twl-france-guadeloupe-martinique-strike-6b0205e.html
Picture from Agence France-Presse, originally captioned: A map of Guadeloupe. France mobilised police reinforcements Wednesday after an activist was killed in Guadeloupe as the month-long strike on the French Caribbean island descended into rioting.

Our 400th post: Human beings ARE free: NEW FEATURE (very original) Quote Of The Day!

2009-02-18T15:32:00.004-05:00

"All of our neo-liberal economies made the same exact bet, we put all our economic eggs in one collateralized debt basket. That we could just trade debt forever and nobody would ever have to produce or work another day in their lives. And now we are all having to unwind this one way bet at the same time by electronically injecting trillions of fresh fiat credit into the global financial corpse. Got gold?"
~ Max Keiser, money guru & funny man extraordinaire, 24 Nov 2008

Source: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/max-keiser/who-could-have-predicted_b_145920.html

A letter. [update 12 Feb 08]

2009-02-08T07:10:00.004-05:00

UPDATE 12 Feb 08: Solution forthcoming within 24 hrs. if it kills me... Press on each day! ~Human beings are FREE!

Dear Fellows being,

I must extend a heartfelt apology to all of y’all for the lack of new content on the blog as of late. Excuses that one (not me, of course!) might give for this lack are several and significant, BUT to cut all that off short, here I will just vent my anger over the rate at which I burn through computers and be done with it: AAAAAARRGGHHHH!

All right! … moving along NOW.

Be that as it is, updates to HBAF are (yet again) temporarily on hold while this resource issue is rectified.

Thank you again for your continued visits, referrals, and especially for your commentary (including criticism!) and notes of encouragement. Let’s keep cranking up the pressure on the gears of the so-called “machine”; as for these bloggers in particular, we’ll be back ASAP! Please do keep us in mind. Best wishes to everyone!

Sincerely,
Free human beings in Louisville, Kentucky and Beyond

The Oracle with Max Keiser - 06 February 2009 - 4 parts [video]

2009-02-08T02:53:00.000-05:00

THE U.S.-ISRAELI ALLIANCE Unusually Large U.S. Weapons Shipment to Israel: Are the US and Israel Planning a Broader Middle East War? [editorial]

2009-01-26T12:04:00.004-05:00

Article: "Unusually Large U.S. Weapons Shipment to Israel: Are the US and Israel Planning a Broader Middle East War?"
Source: GlobalResearch.ca / Michel Chossudovsky
Excerpt(s): A very large delivery of US weaponry to Israel consisting of 3,000 tons of "ammunition" is scheduled to sail to Israel. The size and nature of the shipments are described as "unusual": "Shipping 3,000-odd tons of ammunition in one go is a lot," one broker said, on condition of anonymity. "This (kind of request) is pretty rare and we haven't seen much of it quoted in the market over the years," he added. "Shipping brokers in London who have specialized in moving arms for the British and U.S. military in the past said such ship charters to Israel were rare. (Reuters, Jan 10, 2009) The Pentagon has entrusted a Greek merchant shipping company to deliver the weapons to Israel: "The U.S. is seeking to hire a merchant ship to deliver hundreds of tons of arms to Israel from Greece later this month, tender documents seen by Reuters show. The U.S. Navy's Military Sealift Command (MSC) said the ship was to carry 325 standard 20-foot containers of what is listed as "ammunition" on two separate journeys from the Greek port of Astakos to the Israeli port of Ashdod in mid-to-late January. A "hazardous material" designation on the manifest mentions explosive substances and detonators, but no other details were given.(Ibid) It is worth noting that a similar unusually large shipment of US ordinance to Israel was scheduled in early December: "Tender documents indicate that the German ship hired by the US in early December also carried a massive cargo of weapons that weighed over 2.6 million kg [2600 tons] and filled up to 989 standard 20-foot containers to Ashdod from North Carolina." (Press TV, 10 Jan 2009) Are These Large Shipments of Ordinance Connected to the Invasion of Gaza?... (in depth research and editorial, highly recommended)
Link to Full Story: http://www.globalresearch.ca/index.php?context=va&aid=11743
Picture from Global Research, originally captioned: GBU-28

RELATED YOUTUBE VIDEO: GBU-28 "Bunker Buster" Laser-Guided Bomb (~1 min.):

YouTube description: The Guided Bomb Unit 28 (GBU-28) is a 5,000 pound / 2268 kg. laser-guided "bunker busting" bomb nicknamed "deep throat" produced originally by the Texas Instruments division Defense Systems and Electronics Group (division since sold to Raytheon). It was specifically developed for US Military use in Operation Desert Storm to penetrate hardened Iraqi command centres located deep under ground. However, only two of these weapons were dropped in Desert Storm, both by F-111Fs. The initial batch of GBU-28s were built from modified 8 inch/203 mm. artillery barrels (principally from deactivated M110 howitzers), but later warheads were purpose-built. They weigh 4,700 pounds/2132 kg. and contain 630 pounds / 286 kg. of high explosive. The operator illuminates a target with a laser designator and then the munition guides to a spot of laser energy reflected from the target. The bomb underwent critical testing in Nevada at the Tonopah Test Range, a major test facility for United States Department of Energy funded weapon programs. It proved capable of penetrating over 30 metres (100 ft) of earth or 6 metres (20 ft) of solid concrete. The GBU-28 is unique in that the total development time from conception to the first drop test took only 12 weeks, and the weapon went into active service after only one test drop. The first foreign sale of the GBU-28 was the acquisition of 100 units by Israel, authorized in April 2005. Delivery of the weapons was accelerated at the request of Israel in July 2006. According to Israeli Military sources, Iran or Syria are possible targets for the weapons.

NEW WORLD ORDER INVENTIONS--SERIOUSLY, THINK WHAT YOUR BANK KNOWS ABOUT YOU: Wiretaps Combined w/ Credit Card Records of U.S. Citizens [news story]

2009-01-25T03:02:00.005-05:00

Article: "NSA Whistleblower: Wiretaps Were Combined with Credit Card Records of U.S. Citizens"
Source: Blog.Wired.com/27bstroke6/
Excerpt(s): NSA whistleblower Russell Tice was back on Keith Olbermann's MSNBC program Thursday evening to expand on his Wednesday revelations that the National Security Agency spied on individual U.S. journalists, entire U.S. news agencies as well as "tens of thousands" of other Americans. Tice said on Wednesday that the NSA had vacuumed in all domestic communications of Americans, including, faxes, phone calls and network traffic. Today Tice said that the spy agency also combined information from phone wiretaps with data that was mined from credit card and other financial records. He said information of tens of thousands of U.S. citizens is now in digital databases warehoused at the NSA. "This [information] could sit there for ten years and then potentially it marries up with something else and ten years from now they get put on a no-fly list and they, of course, won't have a clue why," Tice said. In most cases, the person would have no discernible link to terrorist organizations that would justify the initial data mining or their inclusion in the database...
Link to Full Story: http://blog.wired.com/27bstroke6/2009/01/nsa-whistlebl-1.html

NEW WORLD ORDER INVENTIONS--OBAMA'S FAKE "CHANGE"! HE'S ON "U.S. CORP."'s SIDE! Obama Admin.: Wiretapping Legal Challenge Must Die [news story]

2009-01-25T02:55:00.004-05:00

Article: "Obama Administration: Wiretapping Legal Challenge Must Die"
Source: Blog.Wired.com/27bstroke6/
Excerpt(s): SAN FRANCISCO -- The Obama administration urged a federal judge on Friday to stay enforcement of a ruling favoring the plaintiffs in a lawsuit challenging President George W. Bush's warrantless eavesdropping program. Justice Department special counsel Anthony Coppolino told U.S. District Judge Vaughn Walker during a 60-minute hearing here that the appellate courts should review his Jan. 5 decision allowing classified evidence into the case, a position the Obama administration took in court documents the day before. Without the classified evidence, Coppolino said, the government wins the case by default, and two American lawyers who claimed they were unlawfully spied upon can't pursue their lawsuit.
Link to Full Story: http://blog.wired.com/27bstroke6/2009/01/obama-administr.html
Picture from Blog.Wired.com/27bstroke6/.

NEW WORLD ORDER INVENTIONS--SERIOUSLY, THINK ABOUT WHAT SHIPPING PEOPLE MEANS: Mystery Prison Buses in Arizona Desert [news story]

2009-01-25T02:49:00.002-05:00

Article: Mystery Prison Buses in the Desert
Source: GlobalResearch.ca
Excerpt(s): "On a recent visit to Tucson, Arizona, where I was invited to give a presentation on monetary reform, I was disturbed by a story of strange goings on in the desert. A little over a year ago, it seems, a new industrial facility sprang up on the edge of town. It was in a remote industrial zone and appeared to be a bus depot. The new enterprise was surrounded by an imposing security fence and bore no outward signs identifying its services. However, it soon became apparent that the compound was in the business of outfitting a fleet of prison buses. Thirty or so secondhand city buses were being reconfigured with prison bars in the windows and a coat of fresh paint bearing the “Wackenhut G4S” logo on the side..."
Link to Full Story: http://www.globalresearch.ca/index.php?context=viewArticle&code=BRO20090122&articleId=11951

NEW WORLD ORDER INVENTIONS--SERIOUSLY, THINK ABOUT WHAT YOUR CELL PHONE CAN DO: NSA Targeted Journalists, Snooped All U.S. Communications [news story]

2009-01-25T02:45:00.002-05:00

Article: "Whistleblower: NSA Targeted Journalists, Snooped on All U.S. Communications"
Source: Blog.Wired.com/27bstroke6/
Excerpt(s): Just one day after George W. Bush left office, an NSA whistleblower has revealed that the National Security Agency's warrantless surveillance program targeted U.S. journalists, and vacuumed in all domestic communications of Americans, including, faxes, phone calls and network traffic. Russell Tice, a former NSA analyst, spoke on Wednesday to MSNBC host Keith Olbermann. Tice has acknowledged in the past being one of the anonymous sources that spoke with The New York Times for its 2005 story on the government's warrantless wiretapping program. After that story was published, President Bush said in a statement that only people in the United States who were talking with terrorists overseas would have been targeted for surveillance. But Tice says, in truth, the spying involved a dragnet of all communications, confirming what critics have long assumed. "The National Security Agency had access to all Americans' communications," he said. "Faxes, phone calls and their computer communications. ... They monitored all communications."
Link to Full Story: http://blog.wired.com/27bstroke6/2009/01/nsa-whistleblow.html

NEW WORLD ORDER INVENTIONS--SERIOUSLY, THINK ABOUT WHAT YOUR TV CAN DO: Digital TV & Mandatory RFID Microchipping [news story]

2009-01-25T02:41:00.002-05:00

Article: "Digital TV & Mandatory RFID Microchipping"
Source: Educate-Yourself.org
Excerpt(s): If you do not believe the threat of involuntary microchipping is real, please take a moment to read over the following disquieting developments. Taken together, they reveal a focused effort to promote human microchipping. The time to nip this trend in the bud is now...
Link to Full Story: http://educate-yourself.org/cn/ottdigitaltvandmicrochips20jan09.shtml

AMERICA! WATCH ICELAND... THIS IS WHAT ECONOMIC COLLAPSE LOOKS LIKE Prime Minister Steps Down amid Violent Protests [news story]

2009-01-25T02:22:00.004-05:00

Article: "Prime Minister Steps Down amid Violent Protests"
Source: Spiegel.de
Excerpt(s): Icelandic Prime Minister Geir Haarde on Friday called early elections following violent protests on the streets of Reykjavik. Meanwhile, Europe's top politicians are on edge following clashes in Bulgaria, Latvia, Lithuania, Hungary and Greece.
Link to Full Story: http://www.spiegel.de/international/europe/0,1518,603244,00.html
Picture from Spiegel.de, originally captioned: There has been a wave of anti-government protests across Europe in recent weeks as the impact of the financial crisis begins to be felt. Here, a demonstrator bangs a pot in Reykjavik.

AMERICA! WATCH ICELAND... THIS IS WHAT ECONOMIC COLLAPSE LOOKS LIKE Icelandic gov't becomes 1st to be brought down by credit crunch [news story]

2009-01-25T02:18:00.003-05:00

Article: "Icelandic government becomes first to be brought down by the credit crunch"
Source: DailyMail.co.uk
Excerpt(s): The government of Iceland today became the first to be effectively brought down by the credit crunch. After several nights of rioting over the financial crisis, Prime Minister Geir Haarde, surrendered to increasing pressure and called a general election for May. A poll would not normally be held until 2011. Haarde also revealed that he had been diagnosed with a malignant tumour of the oesophagus and would not seek re-election. 'I have decided not to seek re-election as leader of the Independence Party at its upcoming national congress,' he told a news conference. The global financial crisis hit Iceland, which has a population 320,000, in October, triggering a collapse in its currency and financial system under the weight of billions of dollars of foreign debts incurred by its banks. The economy is set to shrink 10 percent this year and unemployment is surging.
Link to Full Story: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/worldnews/article-1126682/Icelandic-government-brought-credit-crunch.html
Picture from Reuters, originally captioned: Quit: Iceland's Prime Minister Geir Haarde called a general election for May. He also revealed he has cancer and will not be standing for re-election.

EVEN "GREEN" COMPANIES WANT MONOPOLY Whole Foods, Lanny Davis, and the Attack on the FTC [news story]

2009-01-25T02:07:00.002-05:00

Article: "Whole Foods, Lanny Davis, and the Attack on the FTC"
Source: CorporateCrimeReporter.com
Excerpt(s): Whole Foods CEO John Mackey telling his board of directors: "By buying them we will ... avoid nasty price wars in Portland (both Oregon and Maine), Boulder, Nashville, and several other cities which will harm our gross margins and profitability. OATS may not be able to defeat us but they can still hurt us. Furthermore, we eliminate forever the possibility of Kroger, Super Value, or Safeway using their brand equity to launch a competing national natural/organic food chain to rival us .... [Wild Oats] is the only existing company that has the brand and number of stores to be a meaningful springboard for another player to get into this space. Eliminating them means eliminating that threat forever, or almost forever."
Link to Full Story: http://www.corporatecrimereporter.com/wholefoods012109.htm

CONTINUING REVOLUTIONARY MOVES IN S. AMERICA Bolivia: After Rallies for New Constitution, Morales Nationalizes Oil Company [news story]

2009-01-25T02:03:00.002-05:00

Article: "Bolivia: After Rallies for New Constitution, Morales Nationalizes Oil Company"
Source: MRZine.MonthlyReview.org
Excerpt(s): On Thursday, January 22, the last day of campaigning for the new constitution before the document is set to a vote on Sunday, January 25th, representatives from Bolivia's diverse social movements convened in downtown La Paz. The rally, located in the Plaza Murillo, marked the end of over two years of meetings, conflicts and mobilizations to, as President Evo Morales often says in speeches, "constitutionalize" much-needed changes. The following day, Morales nationalized the Chaco oil company. All of the previous weeks' marches for the constitution seemed to gather in the plaza, culminating in fireworks, cheers, and music. At a central stage, acts alternated between speeches of representatives of the various social movements present and musical performances by groups from around the country, including Afro-Bolivian dances and political hip-hop from La Paz. Members of the Bartolina Sisa women's organization spoke, along with miners, neighborhood council members, retirees, students, and campesino and indigenous leaders. The presence of such diverse groups underscored the importance of Bolivian social movements' participation in the process of change carried out in collaboration with the government. As Sacha Llorenti, the Vice Minister of the Coordination of Bolivian Social Movements told TeleSUR, "The structural transformations that the country is going through cannot be understood without recognizing [the role of] the social movements, the popular organizations of this country."
Link to Full Story: http://mrzine.monthlyreview.org/dangl240109.html

OBAMA'S GUANTANAMO ORDER LEGALLY MEANINGLESS / DETAINEES MAY STILL BE HELD INDEFINITELY, TORTURED Obama's orders on Guantanamo and torture [video]

2009-01-25T01:41:00.005-05:00

Obama orders on Guantanamo and torture (~10.5 min.):

Note from HBAF: Now, Ratner may overall have a positive sixth sense about Obama's recent Guantanamo "shut down" order, but as we here at HBAF see it, and as the legal language shows, Obama's "shut down" orders are meaningless. There is not legal language changing the fact that people are and will be held indefinitely... this is not even coming close to the CONSTITUTIONALLY REQUIRED re-institution of habeus corpus (put to rest during the Bush regime). This guy is definitely being suckered by (or is trying to suckers us into) Obama's progressive-seeming, but completely hollow, manner. Please note in particular that at ~6 minutes into this video the question of accountability is asked, and Ratner cites "hope," and "good reporting," as some means of holding the executors of these laws accountable, then says that the question has been put to rest, without showing in any way how these executive orders have any checks and balances. He has far too much too good to say about Obama's hollow changes for someone who calls himself a constitutionalist. Don't be deceived by the smile (or the suave language)! Obama is no different than the other schmucks that have been running this country for 100 years.

Description from TheRealNews: Michael Ratner (President, Center for Constitutional Rights) comments on Obama's executive orders, loopholes, and the prosecution of Bush/Cheney. 24 January 2009. TheRealNews.com

TIMELINE / WAR ON PAKISTANIS / OBAMA IS NOT A PEACEMAKER U.S. bombs Pakistan, 18 reported dead [news story]

2009-01-25T01:13:00.000-05:00

Article: "U.S. bombs Pakistan, 18 reported dead"
Source: TheStar.com / Associated Press
Excerpt(s): ISLAMABAD, Pakistan – Suspected U.S. missiles killed 18 people on the Pakistan side of the Afghan border today in the first such attacks on the militant stronghold since President Barack Obama took office, Pakistani officials said. At least five foreign militants were among those killed in the strikes by unmanned aircraft in two parts of the frontier region, an intelligence official said without naming them. There was no information on the identities of the others. Pakistan's leaders had expressed hope Obama might halt the strikes, but few observers expected he would end a tactic that U.S. officials claim has killed several top al-Qaida operatives and is denying the group a safe haven on the Pakistani side. The United States has staged more than 30 missile strikes inside Pakistan since August – a barrage seen as a sign of frustration in Washington over Islamabad's failed efforts to curb militants it blames for violence in Afghanistan. Pakistan publicly protests the strikes in the northwest as violations of its sovereignty that often kill civilians and undermine its own campaign against insurgents also accused of launching bloody attacks on targets inside Pakistan. But many observers believe the government secretly agrees with the tactic and may provide intelligence on the targets, noting that Islamabad's admitting to assisting the attacks would be politically damaging. The first attack today took place in the village of Zharki in North Waziristan, when a single drone fired three missiles in the space of 10 minutes, the security officials said.
Link to Full Story: http://www.thestar.com/News/World/article/576172

TIMELINE / WAR ON PAKISTANIS / OBAMA IS NOT A PEACEMAKER Pakistan urges Obama to halt drone attacks {1/24/09 11:13pm pst} [news story]

2009-01-25T01:07:00.002-05:00

Article: "Pakistan urges Obama to halt drone attacks"
Source: Dawn.net
Excerpt(s): ISLAMABAD: Pakistan on Saturday lodged a strong protest with the Obama administration over continuing drone attacks terming it as an ‘infringement of its sovereignty’ and called for a review of the policy. ‘Yesterday’s attack in the Waziristan area which caused civilian causalities is a matter of great concern. These concerns have been conveyed to the US side,’ Foreign Office Spokesman said in a statement. Although, Foreign Office was reluctant to reveal who made the protest, but sources claim the outrage was communicated by Foreign Secretary Salman Bashir to the US Ambassador Anne W Patterson. President Asif Zardari also conveyed Pakistan’s concerns in a meeting with US Ambassador Anne Patterson. The two successive missile strikes in North and South Waziristan three days after the new administration assumed office is being taken as an indication that President Obama has endorsed drone attacks in Pakistan’s territory. President Obama during his campaign for the White House had called for attacks against high-value targets in Pakistan.
Link to Full Story: http://www.dawn.net/wps/wcm/connect/Dawn%20Content%20Library/dawn/news/pakistan/pakistan-urges-obama-to-halt-drone-attacks-szh
Picture from Reuters, originally captioned: US President Barack Obama listens as Richard Holbrooke, the US envoy to Pakistan and Afghanistan, speaks at the State Department in Washington, Jan 22, 2009. — Reuters

TIMELINE / WAR ON PAKISTANIS / OBAMA IS NOT A PEACEMAKER Obama wants air strikes into Fata to continue {1/25/09 4:38am pst} [news story]

2009-01-25T00:54:00.003-05:00

Article: "Obama wants air strikes into Fata to continue: NYT"
Source: Dawn.net
Excerpt(s): WASHINGTON: Hours after US missiles killed 20 people in Fata, President Barack Obama convened a meeting of his top national security advisers and endorsed the decision to continue drone strikes into Pakistan. The US media, quoting unidentified official sources, reported that the first meeting of Mr Obama’s National Security Council focused on Pakistan and Afghanistan. The New York Times reported on Saturday that the decision to attack alleged terrorist targets in Fata on Friday 'dispelled for the moment any notion that Mr Obama would rein in the Predator attacks.' The Washington Post noted that the strikes 'offered the first tangible sign of President Obama's commitment to sustained military pressure on the terrorist groups' in Fata. At his daily White House briefing, press secretary Robert Gibbs declined to answer questions about the strikes, saying, 'I'm not going to get into these matters.' Remotely piloted Predator drones operated by the Central Intelligence Agency have carried out 28 missile attacks in Fata since last summer, killing at least 132 people. The NYT, quoting Pakistani officials, reported that as many as 100 of them were civilians.
Link to Full Story: http://www.dawn.net/wps/wcm/connect/Dawn%20Content%20Library/dawn/news/world/obama+wants+air+strikes+into+fata+to+continue-rs
Picture from , originally captioned: US President Barack Obama is introduced to speak by Secretary of State Hillary Clinton at the State Department in Washington. -Reuters

TIMELINE / WAR ON PAKISTANIS / OBAMA IS NOT A PEACEMAKER US releases $101m for anti-terror fight {1/25/09 9:18am pst} [news story]

2009-01-25T00:50:00.003-05:00

Article: "US releases $101m for anti-terror fight" (i.e. Obama pays off Pakistan)
Source: Dawn.net
Excerpt(s): WASHINGTON: The United States has reimbursed $101 million to Pakistan for its efforts to fight Al Qaeda and Taliban militants along the Pakistan-Afghan border. Diplomatic sources told Dawn that the payment came from the US Coalition Support Fund set up to help US allies in the war against terror.
With the transfer of the amount on Friday, the US has now made reimbursement for expenditures that Pakistan incurred up to April 2008. The United States still owes about a $1 billion to Pakistan for the expenses incurred during the last eight months. The payments are made under a new procedure approved recently. Under the procedure, the government of Pakistan submits its claim to the Office of the US Defence Representative in Pakistan, who forwards it to the US Central Command in Tampa, Florida.
Link to Full Story: http://www.dawn.net/wps/wcm/connect/Dawn%20Content%20Library/dawn/news/world/us-releases-101m-for-anti-terror-fight--qs
Picture from Reuters, originally captioned: The US still owes about a billion dollars to Pakistan for expenses incurred during the last eight months. — Reuters

"STERLING ON THE RUN, BANKERS ON THE RUN" Max Keiser 's BBC show THE ORACLE January 23rd, 3rd episode [video]

2009-01-25T00:24:00.001-05:00

Max Keiser 's BBC show THE ORACLE January 23rd 2009 part 1of2 (~11 min.):

YouTube description: guests are : Sameh El Shahat, Stacy Herbert, Matthew Curtin; sujects are : banks problems of citigroup, bank of America, barclays, royal bank of Scotland, northern rock, Gordon Brown blames the foreigners; Jim Rogers says uk pound is doomed; greek riots; Marcus Schrenker captured faked his own death; SPAM sales are up big time; president Barack Obama; run on the british pound by April 2009 and the euro by December 2009

Max Keiser 's BBC show THE ORACLE January 23rd 2009 part 2of2 (~10 min.):

YouTube description: guests are : Sameh El Shahat, Stacy Herbert; sujects are : the Baltic Dry Index; importance of letters of credit in the shipping industry; empty shelves in "big box" stores of Los Angeles; Hank Paulson becomes an icon to university students and anti-capitalist activists around the world; crude oil price and Saudi Arabia; OPEC = organization of potentially explosive countries!; contango explained

Third/final prediction was cut . . . not by Stacy or Max . . . exclusive for you from MaxKeiser.com! The Oracle's missing (third) prediction (~1 min.):

GEORGE CARLIN NOT KIDDING AROUND "This country is finished" on Countdown w/ Keith Olbermann [video]

2009-01-24T15:49:00.003-05:00

*THIS COUNTRY IS FINISHED* GEORGE CARLIN ON COUNTDOWN (~7.5 min.):

23 October 2007 Countdown

THE SOBER CONFIDENCE OF A MAN WHO KNOWS WHAT HE IS TALKING ABOUT Ron Paul on Obama's inauguration speech [video]

2009-01-24T12:30:00.001-05:00

Dr. Paul on Obama's inauguration speech. 01/20/09 (~3.5 min.):

ADMONISHING ISRAEL IN THE COURTS & PARLIAMENTS OF THE WORLD (GREAT SPEECHES!) Galloway: West has DOUBLE STANDARDS when it comes to Israel [video]

2009-01-24T12:05:00.001-05:00

George Galloway "The West has DOUBLE STANDARDS when it comes to Israel":

YouTube description: George Galloway's powerful speech in the House of Commons debate on Gaza, Thu 15 Jan 2009 (5.30pm), highlighting the hypocrisy and brazen double-standards of Western foreign policy towards Israel policies, including assassinations and other war crimes. George Galloway: "I say to the Chair of the Foreign Affairs Committee, who is not in his place, that the international community is not impotent, but merely feigns impotence as an excuse for its failure to carry out its duties. Although the Minister's words were more robust, he essentially masked the same inaction as the languid and complacent Foreign Secretary, who performed in front of us on Monday ....."

ADMONISHING ISRAEL IN THE COURTS & PARLIAMENTS OF THE WORLD (GREAT SPEECHES!) Buchanan Accuses Israel of Creating 'Concentration Camp' [video]

2009-01-24T11:55:00.002-05:00

Buchanan Accuses Israel of 'Blitzkrieg,' Creating 'Concentration Camp':

YouTube description: Transcript from MSNBC's "1600 Pennsylvania Avenue" (8 Jan. 2009) PAT BUCHANAN: Well, the difference is, in my judgment, Afghanistan, that was--al Qaeda was responsible for bringing down those towers. If the Afghans had dealt with them, given us Osama Bin Laden, then we would not have gone in. We had a justification. That was an act of war. The Israelis have been hit for six months with these little rockets that didn't kill anybody. It was outrageous, cruel and stupid, and they triggered a blitzkrieg against the Palestinians in Gaza, which in my judgment is an Israeli concentration camp, where a million-and-a-half people are locked up, cannot come out or go in. They've been controlling food, electricity, fuel. And the innocent people in Gaza are the ones suffering. SHUSTER: Concentration camp? Doesn't that diminish the significance of the real concentration camps? BUCHANAN: I'm not talking about a death camp. I'm talking about what the British had in concentration camps in South Africa, and what the Spanish had in Cuba, and what others have had where they bring all these people, lock 'em in there, and treat them with great cruelty, and a humanitarian disaster, despite what Tzipi Livni says. CLIFF MAY: The people of Gaza could have peace tomorrow, and they could have an independent state the day after. All it would take would be for Hamas to do two things. One: stop the missiles. You cannot have any country, even a country like Israel, simply accept that, OK, for the rest of our lives--and this has been going on for years now--we accept that they are going to be firing missiles at us. Some of them are small, some of them are bigger, they'll get bigger. But we accept this as a fact of life; we deserve to be hit with missiles. All Hamas would have to do is say: no more missiles starting tomorrow; we understand. And by the way, we accept Israel as a state, as a neighbor. Now, Hamas cannot do that because of its religious convictions that infidels may not, anywhere in the Middle East, be in power.

Note from HBAF: Buchanan is a double-edged sword at best, but in most of this clip he is spot on... I will give credit where due, but in the context of all the words I've heard come out of his mouth, it's interesting to ponder what kind of mind can produce such clear, strong positions in the midst of so much confusion.

ADMONISHING ISRAEL IN THE COURTS & PARLIAMENTS OF THE WORLD (GREAT SPEECHES!) UK MP Kaufman: They are not simply war criminals, they are fools [video]

2009-01-24T11:45:00.000-05:00

UK Jewish MP: Israel acting like Nazis in Gaza:

YouTube description: "Israel was born out of Jewish Terrorism" Tzipi Livnis Father was a Terrorist" Astonishing claims in the House of Parliament. SIR Gerald Kaufman, the veteran Labour MP, yesterday compared the actions of Israeli troops in Gaza to the Nazis who forced his family to flee Poland. During a Commons debate on the fighting in Gaza, he urged the government to impose an arms embargo on Israel. Sir Gerald, who was brought up as an orthodox Jew and Zionist, said: "My grandmother was ill in bed when the Nazis came to her home town a German soldier shot her dead in her bed. "My grandmother did not die to provide cover for Israeli soldiers murdering Palestinian grandmothers in Gaza. The present Israeli government ruthlessly and cynically exploits the continuing guilt from gentiles over the slaughter of Jews in the Holocaust as justification for their murder of Palestinians." He said the claim that many of the Palestinian victims were militants "was the reply of the Nazi" and added: "I suppose the Jews fighting for their lives in the Warsaw ghetto could have been dismissed as militants." He accused the Israeli government of seeking "conquest" and added: "They are not simply war criminals, they are fools."

ADMONISHING ISRAEL IN THE COURTS & PARLIAMENTS OF THE WORLD (GREAT SPEECHES!) Ron Paul: Israel Created Hamas! [video]

2009-01-24T11:25:00.000-05:00

Ron Paul: Israel Created Hamas!:

January 09, 2009 C-SPAN

ADMONISHING ISRAEL IN THE COURTS & PARLIAMENTS OF THE WORLD (GREAT SPEECHES!) Kucinich: Were Israel's Security Needs Influenced By The U.S. Calendar?

2009-01-24T10:34:00.003-05:00

WATCH THIS ONE FIRST Kucinich: Were Israel's Security Needs Influenced By The U.S. Calendar?:

January 22, 2009 C-SPAN

Israel's War Crimes On The Record !! - Kucinich Documents:

January 09, 2009 C-SPAN

Kucinich: 50 Percent of the Population of Gaza Under 14 Years of Age!:

January 13, 2009 C-SPAN

UNDERSTAND WHY GAS PRICES DROPPED AND WHY THEY WILL SKYROCKET AGAIN... Max Keiser on the oil price manipulation in Wall Street [video]

2009-01-21T16:04:00.004-05:00

Max Keiser on the oil price manipulation in Wall Street (~10 min.):

Human beings ARE free.

When shit that hits the fan hits home: the random acts of Police in Louisville, Kentucky - UPDATED 10/31/2009

OUR QUIET CORNER

NEWS and PROPAGANDA

STOP GIVING THEM IDEAS!!!

U.S. MANAGING MURDER IN IRAN

DISPARITIES and CRUSADES

Blackmail... Gold... U.S. hiring mosque bombers ?

NEWS and PROPAGANDA

NEWS and PROPAGANDA

ON FREEDOM(part11)

More ON FREEDOM (part 3.1): The Beauty Of A Changing Mind, or How To Resist Slavery

More ON FREEDOM (part 2.1): The Truth of Freedom; The Fallacy of Rights

Over 60,000 Georgians rally on Independence Day

ON FREEDOM(part10)

NEWS and PROPAGANDA

REMEMBERING U.S. INVASIONS for memorial day

NEWS and PROPAGANDA

NEWS and PROPAGANDA

ON FREEDOM(part9)

NEWS and PROPAGANDA

More ON FREEDOM: Empathy & Imagination | Being With & Being Alone | Freedom Overcomes Illusions

NEWS and PROPAGANDA

ON FREEDOM(part8)

WAR, RESISTANCE, and PROPAGANDA

NEWS and PROPAGANDA

ON FREEDOM(part7)

NEWS and PROPAGANDA

NEWS and PROPAGANDA

ON FREEDOM(part6)

PROPAGANDA, HYPOCRISY, and NEWS

ON FREEDOM(part5)

NEWS and PROPAGANDA

CRIMES and PROPAGANDA

ON FREEDOM(part4)

WAR and PROPAGANDA

ON FREEDOM(part3)

NEWS and PROPAGANDA

ON FREEDOM (part2)

DISCOVERIES?

ON FREEDOM (part 1)

[Full text] President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad's speech at the Durban Review Conference, Geneva 2009 http://www.blogger.com/post-create.g?blogID=1216692965976424186

NEWS and PROPAGANDA

CHANGE

FOLLOWERS and CRIMINALS

CONFLICTS OF INTEREST

NEWS and PROPAGANDA

NEWS snd PROPAGANDA

OCCUPATIONS and CRUSADES

OCCUPATION and CRUSADES

NEWS and PROPAGANDA

NEWS and PROPAGANDA

NEWS AND PROPAGANDA

NEWS and PROPAGANDA

Bush Son Had Dinner Plans With Hinckley Brother Before Shooting

This is a test!

"A MESSAGE FROM THE MINISTRY OF HOMELAND SECURITY" NPR's 'History Scrub' of U.S. Fault in Afghanistan [editorial]

THEY CAN RUN, BUT THEY CAN'T HIDE! WE KNOW! The Mercenaries Previously Known as Blackwater [news story & book referral]

U.S. EMPIRE FLEXES MILITARY MIGHT MORE AS ECONOMIC SITUATION DEGRADES Russia & U.S. remain (intentionally) ambiguous in alliance-making [news story]

ANOTHER MONEY SWINDLER TRIES TO HIDE FROM WORLD'S REPROACH "Sir" Allen Stanford nowhere to be found after stealing $8b+ [news story & video]

WORLD ECONOMIC CASCADE-FAILURE CONTINUES... More Venezuelans and Mexicans added to list of pan-American fraud victims [news story & video]

END THE SIEGE OF GAZA NOW Israeli tanks enter Gaza City [news story]

MARTIALLING LAW FRENCH-STYLE France sends police to quell Guadeloupe riots [news story]

Our 400th post: Human beings ARE free: NEW FEATURE (very original) Quote Of The Day!

A letter. [update 12 Feb 08]

The Oracle with Max Keiser - 06 February 2009 - 4 parts [video]

THE U.S.-ISRAELI ALLIANCE Unusually Large U.S. Weapons Shipment to Israel: Are the US and Israel Planning a Broader Middle East War? [editorial]

NEW WORLD ORDER INVENTIONS--SERIOUSLY, THINK WHAT YOUR BANK KNOWS ABOUT YOU: Wiretaps Combined w/ Credit Card Records of U.S. Citizens [news story]

NEW WORLD ORDER INVENTIONS--OBAMA'S FAKE "CHANGE"! HE'S ON "U.S. CORP."'s SIDE! Obama Admin.: Wiretapping Legal Challenge Must Die [news story]

NEW WORLD ORDER INVENTIONS--SERIOUSLY, THINK ABOUT WHAT SHIPPING PEOPLE MEANS: Mystery Prison Buses in Arizona Desert [news story]

NEW WORLD ORDER INVENTIONS--SERIOUSLY, THINK ABOUT WHAT YOUR CELL PHONE CAN DO: NSA Targeted Journalists, Snooped All U.S. Communications [news story]

NEW WORLD ORDER INVENTIONS--SERIOUSLY, THINK ABOUT WHAT YOUR TV CAN DO: Digital TV & Mandatory RFID Microchipping [news story]

AMERICA! WATCH ICELAND... THIS IS WHAT ECONOMIC *COLLAPSE* LOOKS LIKE Prime Minister Steps Down amid Violent Protests [news story]

AMERICA! WATCH ICELAND... THIS IS WHAT ECONOMIC *COLLAPSE* LOOKS LIKE Icelandic gov't becomes 1st to be brought down by credit crunch [news story]

EVEN "GREEN" COMPANIES WANT MONOPOLY Whole Foods, Lanny Davis, and the Attack on the FTC [news story]

CONTINUING REVOLUTIONARY MOVES IN S. AMERICA Bolivia: After Rallies for New Constitution, Morales Nationalizes Oil Company [news story]

OBAMA'S GUANTANAMO ORDER LEGALLY MEANINGLESS / DETAINEES MAY STILL BE HELD INDEFINITELY, TORTURED Obama's orders on Guantanamo and torture [video]

TIMELINE / WAR ON PAKISTANIS / OBAMA IS *NOT* A PEACEMAKER U.S. bombs Pakistan, 18 reported dead [news story]

TIMELINE / WAR ON PAKISTANIS / OBAMA IS *NOT* A PEACEMAKER Pakistan urges Obama to halt drone attacks {1/24/09 11:13pm pst} [news story]

TIMELINE / WAR ON PAKISTANIS / OBAMA IS *NOT* A PEACEMAKER Obama wants air strikes into Fata to continue {1/25/09 4:38am pst} [news story]

AMERICA! WATCH ICELAND... THIS IS WHAT ECONOMIC COLLAPSE LOOKS LIKE Prime Minister Steps Down amid Violent Protests [news story]

AMERICA! WATCH ICELAND... THIS IS WHAT ECONOMIC COLLAPSE LOOKS LIKE Icelandic gov't becomes 1st to be brought down by credit crunch [news story]

TIMELINE / WAR ON PAKISTANIS / OBAMA IS NOT A PEACEMAKER U.S. bombs Pakistan, 18 reported dead [news story]

TIMELINE / WAR ON PAKISTANIS / OBAMA IS NOT A PEACEMAKER Pakistan urges Obama to halt drone attacks {1/24/09 11:13pm pst} [news story]

TIMELINE / WAR ON PAKISTANIS / OBAMA IS NOT A PEACEMAKER Obama wants air strikes into Fata to continue {1/25/09 4:38am pst} [news story]

TIMELINE / WAR ON PAKISTANIS / OBAMA IS NOT A PEACEMAKER US releases $101m for anti-terror fight {1/25/09 9:18am pst} [news story]