Money Well Spent, Exults Halliburton

Our filthy invasions and occupations may cost 7,000,000,000,000 dollars

"Noble Prize-winning economist Joseph Stiglitz estimates that the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan may cost the US up to USD 7 trillion.
When US troops invaded Iraq in March 2003, the Bush administration predicted that the war would be self-financing and that rebuilding the nation would cost less than USD 2b, but Stiglitz estimates that the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan are costing America more than USD 3 trillion. That estimate from the Noble Prize-winning Sttiglitz also serves as the title of his new book, "The Three Trillion Dollar War", which hits store shelves Friday.
The book, co-authored with Harvard University professor Linda Bilmes, builds on previous research that was published in January 2006. The two argued then and now that the cost to America of the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan is wildly underestimated.
When other factors are added - such as interest on debt, future borrowing for war expenses, the cost of a continued military presence in Iraq and lifetime health-care and counseling for veterans - they think that the wars' costs range from USD 5 trillion to USD 7 trillion."

There Is Much To Do To Make Our Iraq Conquest More Eco-Friendly

Abusive Cops Misuse Law To Cover Their Asses

We are not beating the snot out of this guy, and turn off that goddamned camera
"This past October, when Simon Glik used his cell phone to record Boston police officers making what he thought was an overly forceful arrest on Tremont Street, he didn’t think he would be the one who ended up in the back of a police cruiser. But cops saw Glik using his cell phone’s camera with its sound-recording feature, so they arrested him for breaking the Massachusetts law that prohibits secret electronic recording, deemed “wiretapping.”
(...)
Like many cell phones, Glik’s could record both audio and video, and he held it out in the open, where the recording was not at all secret. Still, his arresting officers relied on the wiretapping statute as the basis for arresting him. As icing on the cake, they piled on charges of disturbing the peace (for taping the scene) and aiding the alleged near-escape of a prisoner (the taping supposedly distracted the police, creating the risk the arrestee would run away, which he did not).

Well, at least those guys are actually on the beat and busting heads for their paychecks.

'Phantom' police on payrolls in Iraq
"BAGHDAD — Iraq's government has spent millions of dollars on "phantom" police officers who left the force or died, but whose names remained on department payrolls while others illegally pocketed their salaries.
An investigation by the Iraqi Interior Ministry in six provinces found that 15-20% of the names on police payrolls there no longer corresponded to active-duty officers."

And this may explain a few things:

Police reject candidate for being too intelligent

Funny How Things Work

Neil Bush accompanies Moonies to meeting with Paraguayan president - apparently leaning on president Duarte to keep land private and out of the public domain. The Moonies own 1,482,600 acres in all in Paraguay. The Bushes and the Moonies are tied at the hip.

"Moon's various organizations and enterprises have large landholdings in northern Paraguay, on the border with Brazil, and the country's Supreme Court rejected in mid-2007 the expropriation of more than 52,000 hectares (128,395 acres) of Moonie-owned land ordered by Congress.
The high court's ruling was harshly criticized by Duarte because the expropriation was intended to help residents of the poor, remote town of Puerto Casado."

What do the Bushistas have to do with Paraguay?

Bush Family Buys 100,000 Acres of Land in Northern Paraguay

"Luis D'Elia, Argentina´s undersecretary for Land for Social Habitat, says the matter raises regional concern because it threatens local natural resources.

He termed it "surprising" that the Bush family is trying to settle a few short miles from the US Mariscal Estigarribia Military Base.
Argentinean Adolfo Perez Esquivel warned that the real war will be fought not for oil, but for water, and recalled that Acuifero Guaraní is one of the largest underground water reserves in South America, running beneath Argentina, Brazil, Paraguay and Uruguay (larger than Texas and California together)."

Only water?

US Military Moves in Paraguay Rattle Regional Relations

"The Mariscal Estigarribia air base is within 124 miles of Bolivia and Argentina, and 200 miles from Brazil, near the Triple Frontier where Brazil, Paraguay, and Argentina meet. Bolivia’s natural gas reserves are the second largest in South America."

mariscal estigarribia air base, bigger than the airport at Asuncion

But Paraguay?

US footprint in Paraguay

"What may have upset many people here is that Paraguay signed an agreement that grants legal immunity to US personnel while on Paraguayan soil."

Fascists have always been welcome, and immune, in Paraguay

"Alfredo Stroessner came to power in 1954, but European correspondents who visited Paraguay during his rule used the term the "poor man's Nazi regime" to describe the Paraguayan government. The parallels may have been more than a coincidence, for many Nazi war criminals, such as Joseph Mengele, had settled there with Stroessner's blessing."

America's "Special Little Buddy" Vows Indiscriminate Slaughter Of Palestinians

As if it isn't happening already.

Israeli minister warns of Palestinian 'holocaust'
"Shoah is the Hebrew word normally reserved to refer to the Jewish Holocaust. It is rarely used in Israel outside discussions of the Nazi extermination of Jews during the second world war, and many Israelis are loath to countenance its use to describe other events."

"We're getting close to using our full strength. Until now, we've used a small percentage of the army's power because of the nature of the territory."

Not Very Bright Thieves Pick Wrong Target

Don't rob a place filled with bikers

"ARMED with machetes and a samurai sword, two balaclava-clad bandits were confident they were about to pull off an easy sting - terrorising senior patrons and young families at a Sydney bowls club.



The robbers raided the club in Terrene St, Regents Park about 8.50pm on Wednesday - ordering patrons at the bar to get on the floor.
To get to the bar the desperadoes had to walk straight past a glassed-off auditorium where about 50 members of the Southern Cross Cruiser Club and their families were discussing how to celebrate their 10-year-anniversary.
Somehow the thieves failed to notice the collection of "cruiser" motorbikes parked in the club's carpark - or the 50 leather-clad bikers inside.
One of the bikers who was at the bar at the time of the attempted robbery rushed back to the sit-down to warn his crew."

watch them piss their pants here

Keeping Time By Earth's Rotations Is Really Messy

Happy 2008 Leap Year Day, when that extra day gets squeezed in to the calendar to fix the discrepancy between the planet's dance and our puny attempt to quantify it.

By the middle ages the western civilizations's Julian calendar was so out of whack with the seasons of the year that something had to be done. Since religious dudes held the most sway back then, pope Gregory VIII finagled with Ceasar's leap year fix by declaring that century years are only leap years if they are divisible by 400, rather than 4. So, the years 1600AD and 2000AD were leap years, but 1700, 1800 and 1900 were not. It made the calendar a little closer to astronomical reality, and won't have to be tweaked for several thousand years.

In order to fix the slow slippage of the seasons though, ten days of the calendar were removed in 1582. A myth started that peasants rioted with pitchforks screaming "give us back our time!" and it seems that never happened, but it's repeated as fact like people believing the world was flat or that Iraq had WMDs. What's interesting was that protestant countries refused to recognize the papal bull so that it must have been quite the circus in international relations. The British colonies didn't adopt the new calendar until 1752 so september looked like this:

By that time eleven days had to disappear for it to work. It created a good deal of confusion. "In the era after the change, dates were written with O.S. (Old Style) or N.S. (New Style) following the day so people examining records could understand whether they were looking at a Julian date or a Gregorian date. While George Washington was born on February 11, 1731 (O.S.), his birthday became February 22, 1732 (N.S.) under the Gregorian calendar." Off course with our penchant for floating holidays that doesn't really matter. When China agreed to use the Gregorian calendar in october of 1949, most of the world was finally on the same page.

And we really don't want to get into leap seconds.

"Put your hand on a hot stove for a minute, and it seems like an hour. Sit with a pretty girl for an hour, and it seems like a minute."

Gaza Invasion Imminent

In less than 24 hours between Feb 27 & 28, 2008, Israel killed 30 Palestinians, 10 of them are babies and children

149 Palestinians killed in two months

Israeli gunships destroy Hamas ministry building

Egypt doubles Gaza border garrison

US Sending 3 Warships to Eastern Mediterranean

Israel prepares for Gaza invasion and slaughter

You Do The Math

Google news, 10:34 AM PST

U.S. Terror Watch List To Have Over A Million Names This July

U.S. Terror Watch List Surpasses 900,000 Names, ACLU Estimates

"The government's centralized terrorist watch list passed the 900,000 name mark this month, according to the ACLU, which estimated the new total by relying on Congressional testimony from the fall that the sprawling list was growing by 20,000 names a month.
(...)
Agencies use the watch list to check persons seeking visas, traveler entering or leaving the country, domestic airline passengers and persons stopped by state, local or federal law enforcement.
(...)
Persons on the list are coded with varying suspected threat levels, so simply being on the watch list doesn't mean one will be arrested when say a person on the list pulled over for speeding. In fact, being on list isn't even enough to ensure that a person is denied a visa or entry into the country, according to the report."

No, but that isn't the purpose of these lists. Having huge databases of names isn't going to protect any of us but will give the fascists a very good understanding of who opposes their takeover of this country. You can bet the farm that this bloated list carries the names of ordinary americans who say, mention in a blog that 9/11 was an inside job, or happen to write a book called Bush's Brain. At the least you'll be detained and grilled, and will probably miss flights at the airport, like this marine who had gunpowder on his boots after returning from Iraq.

After the next false flag act, what they'll do with their lists we'll leave up to the imagination.

Scared Little Wussies Are Afraid Of Free Speech

Air Force Blocks Access to Many Blogs

"The Air Force is tightening restrictions on which blogs its troops can read, cutting off access to just about any independent site with the word "blog" in its web address. It's the latest move in a larger struggle within the military over the value -- and hazards -- of the sites. At least one senior Air Force official calls the squeeze so "utterly stupid, it makes me want to scream."

(...)

"A couple of years back, I fought this issue concerning the Counterterrorism Blog," one Air Force officer tells Danger Room. "An AF [Air Force] professional education course website recommended it as a great source for daily worldwide CT [counterterrorism] news. However it had been banned, because it called itself a blog. And as we all know, all blogs are bad!"

What Accountability?

Why was all the e-mail missing from Cheney's office on key dates in CIA leak probe?

"WASHINGTON: When Special Counsel Patrick Fitzgerald wanted to find out what was going on inside Vice President Dick Cheney's office, the prosecutor in the CIA leak probe made a logical move. He dropped a grand jury subpoena on the White House for all the relevant e-mail.

One problem: Even though White House computer technicians hunted high and low, an entire week's worth of e-mail from Cheney's office was missing. The week was Sept. 30, 2003, to Oct. 6, 2003, the opening days of the Justice Department's probe into whether anyone at the White House leaked the identity of CIA operative Valerie Plame.

That episode was part of the picture that unfolded Tuesday on Capitol Hill, where Democrats on a House committee released new information about one of the Bush White House's long-running issues, its problem-plagued e-mail system."

Wink wink, nudge nudge

Inflexible Religiosity Sows More Destructive Seeds

Can organized religion make the human condition any worse?

God's Own Baby-Killers: Abortions Soar Where Religious Zeal Abounds
Written by Chris Floyd

"George Monbiot reports on a study revealing — surprise, surprise! — that countries with the most fervent religious faith have the greatest number of abortions. As Monbiot notes, this stems directly from one of the primary aims of organized religion: the control of women, especially their fertility. The zealous pursuit of this goal leads to rejection of contraception and sex education, which in turn gives rise to more unwanted pregnancies — hence more abortions. In fact, studies show that the country with perhaps the most "liberal" and "permissive" sexual policies — the Netherlands— has the lowest rate of abortion in the world. Monbiot:

"A study published in the Lancet shows that between 1995 and 2003, the global rate of induced abortions fell from 35 per 1,000 women each year to 29. This period coincides with the rise of the "globalised secular culture" the Pope laments. When the figures are broken down, it becomes clear that, apart from the former Soviet Union, abortion is highest in conservative and religious societies. In largely secular western Europe, the average rate is 12 abortions per 1,000 women. In the more religious southern European countries, the average rate is 18. In the US, where church attendance is still higher, there are 23 abortions for every 1,000 women, the highest level in the rich world. In central and South America, where the Catholic church holds greatest sway, the rates are 25 and 33 respectively. In the very conservative societies of east Africa, it's 39...
I am not suggesting a sole causal relationship: the figures also reflect changing demographies. But it's clear that religious conviction does little to reduce abortion and plenty to increase it. The highest rates of all — 44 per 1,000 — occur in the former Soviet Union: under communism, contraceptives were almost impossible to obtain. But, thanks to better access to contraception, this is also where the decline is fastest: in 1995 the rate was twice as high. There has been a small rise in abortion in western Europe, attributed by the Guttmacher Institute in the US to "immigration of people with low levels of contraceptive awareness". The explanation, in other words, is consistent: more contraception means less abortion.
There is also a clear relationship between sex education and falling rates of unintended pregnancy. A report by the United Nations agency Unicef notes that in the Netherlands, which has the world's lowest abortion rate, a sharp reduction in unwanted teenage pregnancies was caused by "the combination of a relatively inclusive society with more open attitudes towards sex and sex education, including contraception". By contrast, in the US and UK, which have the developed world's highest teenage pregnancy rates, "contraceptive advice and services may be formally available, but in a 'closed' atmosphere of embarrassment and secrecy"....The more effectively religious leaders and conservative [media] anathemise contraception, sex education and premarital sex, the higher abortion rates will go."

Monbiot also points out that while these attitudes cause much suffering in rich nations, "it doesn't compare to the misery inflicted on the poor":

"Chillingly, as the Lancet paper shows, there is no relationship between the legality and the incidence of abortion. Women with no access to contraceptives will try to terminate unwanted pregnancies. A World Health Organisation report shows that almost half the world's abortions are unauthorised and unsafe. In East Africa and Latin America, where religious conservatives ensure that terminations remain illegal, they account for almost all abortions. Methods include drinking turpentine or bleach, shoving sticks or coathangers into the uterus, and pummelling the abdomen, which often causes the uterus to burst, killing the patient. The WHO estimates that between 65,000 and 70,000 women die as a result of illegal abortions every year, while 5 million suffer severe complications. These effects, the organisation says, "are the visible consequences of restrictive legal codes".

Monbiot goes on to note something we have been condemning here and elsewhere for years: that the supposedly "pro-life" policies of George W. Bush and his ideological fellow travellers are directly responsible for killing thousands of the most vulnerable people on earth. As Monbiot says:

"When the Pope tells bishops in Kenya — the global centre of this crisis — that they should defend traditional family values "at all costs" against agencies offering safe abortions, or when he travels to Brazil to denounce its contraceptive programme, he condemns women to death. When George Bush blocks aid for family planning charities that promote safe abortions, he ensures, paradoxically, that contraceptives are replaced with backstreet foeticide. These people spread misery, disease and death. And they call themselves pro-life."

How To Weather The Collapse

Very much worth reiterating, in light of the depreciating dollar, coming widespread war in the middle east and social disintegration.

Closing the 'Collapse Gap': the USSR was better prepared for collapse than the US
by Dmitry Orlov

Excerpt:
"It's important to understand that the Soviet Union achieved collapse-preparedness inadvertently, and not because of the success of some crash program. Economic collapse has a way of turning economic negatives into positives. The last thing we want is a perfectly functioning, growing, prosperous economy that suddenly collapses one day, and leaves everybody in the lurch. It is not necessary for us to embrace the tenets of command economy and central planning to match the Soviet lackluster performance in this area. We have our own methods, that are working almost as well. I call them "boondoggles." They are solutions to problems that cause more problems than they solve.

Just look around you, and you will see boondoggles sprouting up everywhere, in every field of endeavor: we have military boondoggles like Iraq, financial boondoggles like the doomed retirement system, medical boondoggles like private health insurance, legal boondoggles like the intellectual property system. The combined weight of all these boondoggles is slowly but surely pushing us all down. If it pushes us down far enough, then economic collapse, when it arrives, will be like falling out of a ground floor window. We just have to help this process along, or at least not interfere with it."

Addled Man States We'll Be In Iraq For 100 Years The War Will Be Over Soon

Video at Crooks und Liars

Comcast Busted For Hiring “Seat Warmers” To Clog FCC Hearing

Allegations Fly in FCC Hearing Aftermath

"CAMBRIDGE, Mass. (AP) — Comcast Corp. on Tuesday acknowledged hiring people to fill seats before the start of a contentious federal hearing on how the company manages its broadband network, allowing its employees to take those seats when the filled-to-capacity hearing started.
Many people were turned away before Monday's Federal Communications Commission hearing at Harvard Law School, leading critics to accuse Comcast of stifling debate over the company's practice of favoring some forms of Internet traffic over others.
(...)
As Comcast employees arrived, they replaced the hired seat-warmers.
Fitzmaurice declined to say who or how many were hired, how the company found them, or how much they were paid."


comcast seat warmer

Afghanistan, Our Other Raging Success

Yes that "war", the one we hardly ever hear about in the despicable MSM. A total of 771 foreign troops have died in the country since the invasion and occupation in late 2001.
Battles could rage this spring when the weather warms.
During this time, just as in Iraq, Afghanistan has turned into a human hell hole of biblical proportion.


In Afghanistan, Women's Lives Are Worse Than Ever
"The statistics in the report from Womankind, Afghan Women and Girls Seven Years On, make shocking reading. Violent attacks against females, usually domestic, are at epidemic proportions with 87 percent of females complaining of such abuse -- half of it sexual. More than 60 percent of marriages are forced.
Despite a new law banning the practice, 57 percent of brides are under the age of 16. The illiteracy rate among women is 88 percent with just 5 percent of girls attending secondary school.
Maternal mortality rates -- one in nine women dies in childbirth -- are the highest in the world alongside Sierra Leone. And 30 years of conflict have left more than one million widows with no enforceable rights, left to beg on the streets alongside an increasing number of orphans. Afghanistan is the only country in the world with a higher suicide rate among women than men."

Another Record Opium Harvest Predicted
Contrary to to the MSM lie that the Taliban are funded from drugs, in 2000 - 2001 they almost completely eradicated opium growing in the country and the practice came roaring back to life only after the Taliban were routed by the US and NATO.
Mission Accomplished for the CIA.

Aid to this desperately poor country is wasted
Most of the billions poured into the Afghan Black Hole never reach the impoverished populace.
"For all the rhetoric about "helping Afghans to rebuild their country", most aid is currently being distributed as largesse in a vain attempt to consolidate military conquests."

Depleted Uranium Dust - Public Health Disaster For The People Of Afghanistan

US invasion of Afghanistan has led to as many as 6.6 million unnecessary deaths

The Taliban have Kabul in their sights

This was supposed to be america's "good war". It was supposed to be the great big opening salvo against terror and to liberate the Afghan people. It was supposed to showcase america's invincible might. This illegal invasion was soon exposed for the massive war crime it really is and other countries besides the US are bailing out of this filthy mess. The Taliban own most of the country now.The puppet Afghan "government is considered a joke by the Afghanis, who look at Karzai as "the mayor of Kabul".

A prediction - just like the Soviet invasion and occupation, the US and NATO will retreat to heavily fortified bases from where they'll increase savage air strikes that turn the entire country against the occupation. Kabul will erupt and NATO faces the real possibility of getting their asses kicked out of Afghanistsn.

But No Matter, says another insane general. More troops for Iraq and Afghanistan, Defense Department says

got 'em by the balls

Tappyfoot McWidestance Is Looking For A Few Good Men

A firm grasp of politics is a plus.

Diebold Accidentally Leaks Results Of 2008 Election Early

Diebold Accidentally Leaks Results Of 2008 Election Early

Aloha Police State - Surveillance Cameras For Public Housing In Hawaii

Public Housing Could Soon Be Under Surveillance

"The Hawaii Public Housing Authority wants to install security cameras at all public housing projects throughout the state.
The money would come from tax payers."

How about installing surveillance cameras in congress and at the white house instead?

Delusional Corporate Whore Thinks He Can Convince Americans Iraq Is A Sparkling Success

Iraq crucial to campaign success, McCain says

"ROCKY RIVER, Ohio — Sen. John McCain said Monday that to win the White House he must convince a war-weary country that U.S. policy in Iraq is succeeding."

What planet are McCain and his ilk living on? Truly, how pathetically sick do you have to be to think that the burning, toxic charnel house we occupy will help you with your political ambitions? How clueless and idiotic are you if you can take a look at our filthy handiwork and claim it's a marvelous accomplishment that would be a shame to terminate?

By every concievable measure Iraq is one of the most catastrophic human disasters in human history, a bloodthirsty war crime of darkest dimensions that has permanently ruined this country economically, morally and spiritually. The situation in that country is disastrous and about to become mega-cataclysmic. Bizarre creatures like McCain should get nowhere near the halls of power, should be laughed out of the room, should be put someplace where he can do no harm and where he can get the help he desperately needs.

1.2 million Iraqis have been killed violently since the US invasion - that's the equivalent of a 9/11 event every day for over a year.

1 in 6 Iraqis is a refugee - which in the US would mean 50 million

Iraq to Curb Food Rations, Spurring Fear of Hunger

Turkish invasion might break up the country

Baghdad drowning in sewage

Cholera epidemic could sweep Iraq this summer

Birth defects soar due to "depleted" uranium

The First World Trade Center Inside Job

Feb 26, 1993, fifteen years ago, a car bomb went off under WTC One, killing a half dozen people and injuring many more. Only later was it proved that, like we've seen many times since, the FBI had an agent provacateur in the midst of a group that wanted to pull it off.

"According to William Kuntsler, attorney for Ibrahim El-Gabrowny, one of those accused in the larger bombing case, the entire conspiracy was the product of Salem, the government informant."

Unfortunately for the FBI, the agent began taping his conversations with them, probably to cover his ass, a wise move.

"According to attorney Ron Kuby, after Salem was taken into the Witness Protection program on June 24, 1993, he told the feds about the more than 1,000 conversations he had recorded sometime between December, 1991 and June, 1993. Kuby says that while some of these tapes are not significant, others contain substantive dealings with Salem and his FBI handlers. Salem was actually bugging the FBI."

What happened was, the guy organized the bomb plot under the supervision of the FBI, notified them about the bomb and wanted to substitute harmless white powder for the explosive. The FBI told him no.

"When Ron Kuby, one of the defendant's attorneys in the case was questioned about an article which revealed that Salem and the FBI were involved in the bombing, he stated: "The article on the FBl being involved in the World Trade Center bombing actually understated the evidence, believe it or not. The informer, Emad Salem, is actually on tape saying that he built the bomb that ultimately blew up the World Trade Center."

Kuby continued:
"In addition, we have received information that he was visually observed at the scene of the bombing shortly after the bombing took place. Shortly after that, he was admitted to the hospital, suffering from an ear problem that was consistent with exposure to blast. The mastermind is the government of the United States. It was a phony, government-engineered conspiracy to begin with. It would never have amounted to anything had the government not planned it."

Senile Senator Sounds Sincere, Subsequently Switches Sides

Army Wants Shit Vet Care To Look Like Cartoons

Disney paid 800 grand to teach happy face attitudes at Walter Reed

"A year after a scandal erupted over the long-term treatment of soldiers at the hospital, the Army has turned to Disney for help. "Service, Disney Style" is newly required for all military and other government employees at Walter Reed.
Lafferty and her fellow Disney trainer, Mike Donnelly, handed out little plastic Goofy and Mickey Mouse figurines as they led Wednesday afternoon's discussion with the workers -- some in uniform, some in scrubs, some in civilian clothes."

Forget the cockroaches and pools of piss, add some Wal-Mart greeters and everything's fixed:

"Soon greeters will be placed on the first floor of the hospital to help new arrivals find their way around."

It's Quiet Out There, Too Quiet

Where have all the sunspots gone?

"I’m writing this after doing an exhaustive search to see what sort of solar activity has occurred lately, and I find there is little to report. With the exception of the briefly increased solar wind from a coronal hole, there is almost no significant solar activity.
The sun has gone quiet. Really quiet.
It is normal for our sun to have quiet periods between solar cycles, but we’ve seen months and months of next to nothing, and the start of Solar cycle 24 seems to have materialized (as first reported here) then abruptly disappeared. The reverse polarity sunspot that signaled the start of cycle 24 on January 4th, dissolved within two days after that."

The sun seems to have shut down it's internal furnace. Global cooling?

also - Brave New Worlds: Secrets of our solar system

"Today, unmanned spacecraft are finally able to nestle close to the fiery heat of the sun, and fly through the solar system's cold and uncharted outer reaches. They can be found in orbit around five worlds, including the Earth and the Moon. They are plying the space-lanes between the planets, measuring thin swirling clouds of plasma gas and dust spilled from passing comets. They are en route to Pluto, the most distant planet, and are even hoping to land on the shifting sands of a comet. Never before in human history has a generation voyaged so much."

CCTV Busting Infra-Red Headset Makes You Invisible

We'll see a whole lot of useful tips as Big Brother intrudes into our lives.

"A German art project could help the British avoid the oppressive proliferation of surveillance cameras in their country. The I-R.A.S.C is simple, consisting of a circle of infra-red LEDs mounted on a headband. The infra red is invisible to The Man, but will cause CCTV cameras to flare out over the face of the wearer, obscuring his identity and making this the digital equivalent of a hooded sweatshirt.



This is not a production unit, but given that you'd only need a hat, a battery and a few LEDs, you could easily knock one up in the garage."

Under the smokescreen of keeping streets safe, of catching speeders, of saving kids or whatever the hell other lie the scumbags come up with, their intent is to know everything about you and me. Everything.
So we see headlines like Body Fluid Detectors To Catch Lone Drivers In Car Share Lanes.
Haven't they ever heard of water balloons?

So, How Are We Balancing The Checkbook?

From the CIA - Rank Order - Current account balance

Top 5



Bottom 5

Top 3 False Flag Target Cities - Houston, Chicago and Portland

by Captain Eric H. May

"The easiest way to carry out a false flag attack is by setting up a military exercise that simulates the very attack you want to carry out. As I'll detail below, this is exactly how government perpetrators in the US and UK handled the 9/11 and 7/7 "terror" attacks, which were in reality government attacks blamed on "terrorists."

"Tertiary Target: Portland. Portland, called "Little Beirut" by Bush cronies because of its enmity to Bush 41 and Bush 43, only made my top three list last summer, when it was designated as a target for a nuclear attack by successive exercises Noble Resolve and TOPOFF.

(Operations Noble Reserve and TOPOFF were computer-based simulations of a large-scale emergency situations in the Portland area last year.)

The language in an official press release stated the case plainly enough: "Noble Resolve will coordinate with officials in Oregon to model a nuclear attack on Portland." In the course of researching Portland for a series of articles I wrote about the city and its exercises. I discovered that Stanford and Harvard had prepared a detailed nuclear fallout map for it, that national military commanders and state National Guard commanders were telling different stories about what the exercises were trying to accomplish, and that Portland's The Oregonian newspaper was doing everything it could to avoid investigating the frightening anomalies. I wasn't at all surprised that the last day of the exercises found the Homeland Security director Michael Chertoff in downtown Portland, which was largely closed down by an "unexpected" bomb threat."

"Why on earth would those already guilty of high treason, mass murder and war crimes fail to follow up on their earlier efforts? They understand quite well that the Global War is going badly and the Homeland State is becoming onerous, and that only a reapplication of false flag terror will force the American people to proceed with our post-9/11 national insanity."

Movies

Always a good feeling to be vindicated for avoiding certain screen offerings.

"Norbitt" and "I Know Who Killed Me" sweep the Razzies

"SANTA MONICA, Calif. - A year after his Academy Awards dream went up in smoke, Eddie Murphy has not just one consolation prize, but three: Razzie Awards as worst actor, supporting actor and supporting actress for the comedy "Norbit."

The fourth acting "dis-honor" announced at Saturday's Golden Raspberry Awards went to Lindsay Lohan, who actually was voted two worst-actress trophies for the thriller "I Know Who Killed Me," the worst-picture winner in which she played dual roles.

"I Know Who Killed Me" set a new Razzies record with eight awards, including worst screen couple for Lohan in her double role.

(...)

Between them, "Norbit" and "I Know Who Killed Me" won all but one of the Razzies.
"We've never had two films so totally dominate, at least not since the heyday of Sylvester Stallone," Wilson said."

Spooks On Acid Have Way Too Much Time On Their Hands

U.S. Spies Want to Find Terrorists in World of Warcraft

"Be careful who you frag. Having eliminated all terrorism in the real world, the U.S. intelligence community is working to develop software that will detect violent extremists infiltrating World of Warcraft and other massive multiplayer games, according to a data-mining report from the Director of National Intelligence.
The Reynard project will begin by profiling online gaming behavior, then potentially move on to its ultimate goal of "automatically detecting suspicious behavior and actions in the virtual world."

Elmo Doll Threatens To Kill Toddler

Elmo has a dark side

"It sounds like something the talking doll Chucky from the movies might say: "Kill James!" Instead, a Florida family says the threat to their toddler is coming from a talking Elmo doll.
The Bowman family, of Lithia, Fla., said an Elmo doll belonging to their 2-year-old son, James, began to spout death threats towards him after they changed its batteries, TBO.com reports.
The Elmo Knows Your Name Doll started saying "Kill James!" in a sing-song voice, the site reports.
"It's not something that really you would think would ever come out of a toy," James' mother, Melissa, told the site. "But once I heard, I was just kind of distraught."

And here's an ad a little further down the page. It's all becoming clearer now.

Heraldists Want Their Penis Back

Stiff opposition to removing genitalia from emblem

"Sweden's chief heraldists remain dissatisfied with a decision by the Nordic Battlegroup to remove a lion's penis depicted on its coat of arms.

But staff at the National Archives are hopeful that the Nordic Battlegroup will reconsider its position and re-erect the lion's member on its insignia."

Venison's Revenge

When ungulates get ugly


Hunter Gets His Ass Kicked By Deer - Watch more free videos

What Would A Cluster Bomb Do To Your Neighborhood?

Enter your address to see your neighborhood saturated with unexploded bomblets. The kind that just sit there, waiting to get picked up by little kids. You know, what we're using in Iraq and Afghanistan.

It's ALL Just Recycled Blather

Bubble Boy 2.0

McCain thinks Putin is president of Germany

McCain thinks Putin is the president of Germany

Empire Gets A New Colony In The Balkans

Kosovo's 'Independence'

"U.S. imperialist domination does not benefit the occupied people. Kosovo after nine years of direct NATO military occupation has a staggering 60 percent unemployment rate. It has become a center of the international drug trade and of prostitution rings in Europe.
The once humming mines, mills, smelters, refining centers and railroads of this small resource-rich industrial area all sit silent. The resources of Kosovo under NATO occupation were forcibly privatized and sold to giant Western multinational corporations. Now almost the only employment is working for the U.S./NATO army of occupation or U.N. agencies.
The only major construction in Kosovo is of Camp Bondsteel, the largest U.S. base built in Europe in a generation.

Halliburton, of course, got the contract."

Waterboarding Blah Blah Blah

Waterboarding Approval Focus of Justice Investigation

"WASHINGTON — The Justice Department revealed on Friday that its internal ethics office is investigating the department’s legal approval of waterboarding of Al Qaeda suspects by the Central Intelligence Agency and is likely to make public an unclassified version of its report.
The disclosure by H. Marshall Jarrett, head of the department’s Office of Professional Responsibility, was the first public acknowledgment of an internal review of the series of legal memorandums the department has issued since 2002 authorizing waterboarding and other harsh interrogation methods."

Like the occupation and genocide of the Iraqi people, this fake hand wringing and supposed concern just goes on and on. The fact is, waterboarding is on a long, long list of officially winked at torturous and cruel activities stemming back to the earliest days of european conquest in the americas.

"Endless testimonies . . . prove the mild and pacific temperament of the natives. . . . But our work was to exasperate, ravage, kill, mangle and, destroy..."

American empire was built on torture and in less squeamish days it was considered run of the mill activity to treat the wogs as if they weren't human.



Waterboarding (or half drowning) is as american as apple pie and is only one of countless methods the empire uses to subjugate people who oppose it.



This endless, shameless grandstanding is merely for public consumption. The filthy goings on in the empire's dank and fetid dungeons continue despite all the jawboning and hot air and ambiguous, useless blather.



We need to recognize we've become a militarist, morally retarded, spiritual/psychological sewer.

Joe Sixpack Cringes, Billionaires Go On Binges

As Economy Slips, Yacht Sales Skyrocket

"On board is every luxury you could ever imagine. You can lounge in a Jacuzzi on the top deck while you or your crew barbecue. Prefer something less casual? No problem, a deck or two down is your formal dinning room with a table that seats 12."



"Your master suite is large enough to accommodate a king-size bed, walk-in closet and of course your own private bathroom with another Jacuzzi. Fine marble and woodworking adorn every corner of the yacht."



"That's right, while the U.S. economy slows — if not enters a recession — the demand for these toys for the ultrarich has never been stronger."

Quite the club.

Countrywide Treats Bankers to Ski-Resort Trip
"The U.S. home-mortgage industry is in the dumps. That doesn't mean the party is over for mortgage bankers.
"The first items on the agenda for guests arriving Monday evening: Cocktails and ski fittings. Next is dinner at the Spago restaurant, whose menu includes Kobe steak with wasabi potato puree for $105. (For the budget-minded, pan-roasted buffalo filet with Kabocha pumpkin flan is $54.) "

Forget Your Election, He's Our Thug And We Want Him

The chutzpah.

U.S. urges Pakistanis to keep Musharraf, despite election defeat

"ISLAMABAD, Pakistan _The Bush administration is pressing the opposition leaders who defeated Pakistani President Pervez Musharraf to allow the former general to retain his position, a move that Western diplomats and U.S. officials say could trigger the very turmoil the United States seeks to avoid.
U.S. officials, from President Bush on down, said this week that they think Musharraf, a longtime U.S. ally, should continue to play a role, despite his party's rout in parliamentary elections Monday and his unpopularity in the volatile, nuclear-armed nation."

No Water And Electricity? Here's A Comic Book And Newspaper Instead

Your military geniuses at work. Instead of actually helping the Iraqis by fixing the infrastructure to say, provide potable drinking water and clean up that Baghdad sewage lake that is so large it shows up on google earth, they spend their resources on propaganda. Apparently desperately staving off a cholera epidemic this summer takes back seat to telling Iraqis the wonderfulness of collaborating with their occupiers.

Baghdad Now newspaper

Psychopaths To Go On A Murder Spree

Israel 'hatching serial killing plot'

"Israel is planning to assassinate senior figures of Hezbollah, Hamas and even Iran after killing Imad Mugniyah in Syria, a new report says.
The assassination of Mugniyah was only the first in a string of assassinations that Israel is planning to carry out, Israeli sources quoted by a report in the Kuwaiti daily al-Jarida on Wednesday.
"After Mugniyah there will be a second stage and a third stage, which will target Hezbollah and Hamas and perhaps even Iran," the report said.
Mugniyah a Hezbollah top commander was killed in Damascus last week. A Sunday Times report earlier had said that Mossad had killed the senior commander using an explosive device planted in the headrest of the driver's seat in his car.
The sources said that the successful assassination of Mugniyah prompted the Israeli regime to extend the mandate of Mossad head Meir Dagan."

He Was Talking To You, Dim Son

Denzel's warning about torture from 1998's "The Siege"

"Of course, there's cutting.
It's extremely messy."

Anybody Else Suspicious About That Embassy Attack?

Serbs in the Balkans, proxy stand ins for Russians, have been villified since the 80s. Why?

Fascists have drooled for a long time to get their hands on Kosovo, the southern portion of what used to be Yugoslavia. Kosovo is intensely rich in natural resources but the Serbians, being proud nationalists, absolutely reject thie farcical declaration of independence announced earlier this week by Albanian gangsters and their american enablers.

Yugoslavia was systematically dismantled in this manner over decades, hence the term "balkanization". Serb nationalism has always been the target because it's centuries old and is seen as the biggest stumbling block in the path to corporate takeover of Kosovo's vast wealth. Almost 10 years ago an intense propaganda effort was waged against them culminating in the third nuclear war of the twentieth century, when cruise missiles and "depleted" uranium munitions rained down on Belgrade.

With the above in mind I'm taking a jaundiced view of unfolding events because it looks like the ziofascists could have a new Balkan war in store for us. Media trends indicate something's out of whack.

All the corporate whores have the embassy fire as a lead story. Accounts vary wildly about the numbers involved and injuries sustained. A little discussed factoid among all the pretend outrage is that the building was empty except for a skeleton crew of marines, even though the embassy was pelted with rocks last week.
"At the time there appeared to be no police protecting the embassy, but riot police later intervened, firing tear gas."
On cue, "Zalmay Khalilzad, U.S. ambassador to the United Nations, expressed outrage at the "mob attack."
Some 200,000 protesters rallied against their country being torn apart, but as this snippet from Yahoo points out:
"But just a few score rioters -- many wearing balaclavas -- attacked the U.S. embassy for the second time in a week, forcing their way in while police were nowhere to be seen."

There's no doubt that a casual news browser would get a negative opinion of a rioting mob burning an american embassy and it's flag, which is exactly the desired reaction the manipulators want you to have. It's a time tested propaganda technique to deliver a self inflicted wound to justify doing what in other circumstances would be widely seen as untenable.
9/11, anybody?
This is how ziofascism today operates - they set up straw dogs to be crushed, like pretend cross border kidnappings, or phony mortar attacks, or fake "terrorist" bombings, or undercover cops ready for violence to allow baton wielding cops to bust up a protest march.



So we're seeing sputtering outrage, travel alerts, righteous indignation and plenty of anti - serb vitriol. Are we also going to see another Balkan war?

added - from NPR
"February 22, 2008 · Serbian journalist Dejan Anastasijevic tells Steve Inskeep the crowd at the government-sponsored rally in Belgrade on Thursday was mostly peaceful, but small groups of holligans broke off and attacked the U.S. Embassy. He says police apparently were given orders not to confront them."

Dispute Over Guns In Parks

The senate is expected at some point to vote on an excellent bill that

"...combines nearly 60 separate proposals to expand wilderness protection in several Western states and establish the Abraham Lincoln National Heritage Area in Illinois and Niagara Falls Heritage Area in New York state, among dozens of provisions."

There's a controversial amendment sponsored by Sen. Tom Coburn, R-Okla that would overturn a national park ban on firearms. The current law states that visitors, if they're transporting guns in national parks, have to keep them unloaded and "not easily accessible" like in a car trunk. Coburn's amendment would allow gun owners to carry loaded, accessible firearms into national parks and wildlife refuges just as you can carry anyplace else such as national forests and BLM land. This change is holding the bill up while the politicians grandstand and bloviate.

This subject is particularly interesting to me because I'm a shooter who carries weapons and the Mrs and I love to be in our park system as much as we can. So hell, this is my blog so I'll bloviate along with the rest of the bastards.

Aside from the fact this Coburn guy is a repug and is holding the bill up out of spite because he thinks it's full of pork, I'm all for his amendment. To me the only bad thing about it is that it could be a rider someplace else to get the larger bill passed. I don't care who sponsors something I see as a positive thing. McCain is even in on this which is the only time I've ever agreed with the guy on anything.

The usual pro 2nd amendment arguments apply - it doesn't address duck hunting but speaks to society prepared for tyranny, what part of "shall not be infringed" don't you understand, and all the rest. But national parks present a unique venue as a background to the debate.
Weapon ban enthusiasts want to see the parks as pristine , worry free environments where your experience would be sullied and threatened by gun carriers. Well, guess what? There are plenty of guns in national parks. The only people who don't carry there are law abiders who honor the restrictions. This is probably the most important point that anti gunners don't get time after time. Here's how the NYT puts the argument:

"The Coburn amendment is another attempt by the gun lobby to extend laissez-faire gun rights to college campuses, churches and workplaces even as the nation suffers firearm fatalities and rampages that take 30,000 lives a year."

Those campuses, churches and workplaces, just like our national parks, are gun free soft targets, where you might as well put up a sign saying "open for unopposed crime here". All of the mass shootings have been in gun restriction zones, every damn one of them, and there's a reason for that. A wacko, or Cointelpro zombie or or criminal or whoever wants to shed blood won't target a police precinct or your local gun show, he'll feel safer about creating mayhem by going over to a McDonalds that has this posted on the door, won't he?



The national parks have changed drastically in the last couple of decades. There are basically two types of park environments now, each with it's own reason for lawful carry.

The vast majority of visitors congregate at the easiest to get to, most spectacular attractions like Yosemite Valley or the Smokies or the great lodges like at Yellowstone. These places are increasingly extremely crowded which means more trouble with maladjusted individuals, as in more crime. Assaults, rapes, robberies, theft, you name it, the parks are not immune just because they're pretty. These crowded places draw parasites because of easy pickings. It's insane to trust the overstressed and increasingly scarce park rangers because just like the robbery at the local deli, the cops will show up after the fact, not a comforting thought for the victims.

The other area is the place where few people go - the backcountry. Vast wilderness where frankly, you have no business being if you're not prepared for any contingency. You won't encounter too many miscreants away from the populated areas, but of course you might, with the added fun of no longer being at the top of the food chain. Trouble out there, unless you're one who carries a homing beacon and sat communications gear and GPS system, means you're a long way from any help you need. And it's not good to limit your options.

I've travelled extensively through the park system and the wide open spaces. Even worked for the US forest service and fought forest fires for a few years. There's a lot of beautiful country out west and in reality just a small chunk of it is designated as "national park". To unconstitutionally take away your right to defend yourself in that arbitrary space while "allowing" your rights everywhere never did make sense. I and many other trained, conscientious gun enthusiasts shouldn't be restricted if we feel the need to carry weapons.

Did you know the White House is national park territory too?

Skeptics Suspect Sham Satellite Shot

China urges US to provide data on satellite shootdown
"BEIJING - China on Thursday called on the United States to provide relevant data on its shooting down of a damaged US spy satellite."

"Trust us, we hit it and besides that's classified."

Russkies Suspicious Too

Intellectual Devolution R Us

devolution - the process of declining from a higher to a lower level of effective power or vitality or essential quality

Film: U.S. Students Can't Compete in High-Tech World
"Bob Compton, an Indianapolis venture-capitalist-turned-filmmaker, has produced a controversial new documentary called "2 Million Minutes" that looks at how American education falls short in today's global economy.
"What I saw in the K-12 schools absolutely shocked me in both India and China. & I became very concerned about the competitiveness of my own daughters' education," Compton said on "Good Morning America."
He explained that the students he saw in those countries were "two and three years ahead" of his daughters and their peers in America."

Meanwhile, just about one fifth of americans can gaze upon this filthy train wreck of maladministration and still chirp that the Bushistas are doing a heckuva job.

Cop Needs His Torture Fix So He Tasers A Cow

And Films It

"ROGERS, Ark. (AP) — Police are conducting an internal investigation into an allegation that a lieutenant used his stun gun to shock a cow and shared a videotape of the incident with other department employees.
Police Chief Steve Helms said Tuesday the inquiry began after he received a complaint from the group People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals. A letter dated Feb. 11 from PETA representative Stephanie Bell complained that Lt. David Mitchell filmed himself using the electronic stun device on the cow.
Electronic stun guns are used as less-lethal weapons to subdue people who pose a threat to officers.
Bell said in the letter that Mitchell distributed the video as a joke among friends and co-workers and she notes that animal cruelty is a misdemeanor crime in Arkansas."

Here Come Pre Crime Snoops, Informants And Snitches

The Minority Report Lives

"Doctors, teachers and social workers will be told to act as informers to identify potential violent offenders for monitoring by the police and other agencies.
Ministers hope that by spotting binge-drinkers, drug addicts and young gang members early before they commit serious crimes they can be placed on a national database and steered away from offending behaviour.
The plans have been dubbed the Minority Report powers, a reference to the 2002 Tom Cruise movie in which a futuristic "precrime" police unit uses psychics to arrest and imprison criminals just before they carry out attacks."

Can't wait to squash the eye scanning spiders.

As Predicted, Border Wall Is A Disruptive Scam

Homeland Security Won't Explain Why the Mexican Border Wall Bypasses the Rich and Connected

"As the U.S. Department of Homeland Security marches down the Texas border serving condemnation lawsuits to frightened landowners, Brownsville resident Eloisa Tamez, 72, has one simple question. She would like to know why her land is being targeted for destruction by a border wall, while a nearby golf course and resort remain untouched.
(...)
While the border wall will go through her backyard and effectively destroy her home, it will stop at the edge of the River Bend Resort and golf course, a popular Winter Texan retreat two miles down the road. The wall starts up again on the other side of the resort."

Just like everything else that this criminal cabal gets it's hands on, this border fence is a ripoff which has nothing to do with stopping illegal immigration but is all about heavy handed politics and private profit.

The "Secure Fence Act" was passed by congress in 2006 and was immediately criticized as a useless boondoggle of an idea. The negative ramifications to cross border community, indigenous people, wildlife migration and the environment were criminally transpartent to anyone who looked into this fraud. Last summer Vaterland honcho Chertoff cut the length from 700 miles to 370, built in segments along the southern border. People who have tried to find out how the segments are plotted on the map get nowhere, but it's apparent the government is going after easy targets to get the land it needs for this idiocy while bypassing gated communities and billionaires' estates.

The DHS and it's alphabet soup of sub agencies is a monstrous entity, a massive black hole to shove your tax dollars into under the guise of security. This scam to build border obstructions is directed by an entity called SBInet, "a consortium of private contractors led by Boeing Co." Charges of rotten oversight and fraud abound. Here's what Congresscritter Henry Waxman said about this swindle a year ago:

"As of December, the Department of Homeland Security had hired a staff of 98 to oversee the new SBInet contract. This may seem like progress until you ask who these overseers are. More than half are private contractors. Some of these private contractors even work for companies that are business partners of Boeing, the company they are supposed to be overseeing. And from what we are now learning from the department, this may be just the tip of the iceberg."

At least their stinking spy towers aren't operational, but that could be just another ploy to get repair money.

An Epidemic Of Serving And Protecting

An uncooporative woman in handcuffs in the station gets the "turn the camera off and jeez she fell down" treatment, winding up in a pool of blood.
Much more of this and it'll be open season on these beasts.

Movies

The suppressed story of the GI movement to end the war in Vietnam

Sir! No Sir! is a documentary about the anti war movement in the ranks during the Vietnam conflict, an inconvenient piece of history that few people know about. Suffice it to say that our overlords don't want that to change, and have desperately tried to cover up real history with distortion and myth.

I was part of the anti war protests back in the late sixties and early seventies. I was never drafted because of my school deferment and then a high number in that asinine draft lottery. After the Kent State deaths, when national guard troops shot a number of students, I took part in an uprising that took over the school I was attending. My group grabbed the administration building while the Panthers were much smarter - they controlled the student union with the cafeteria and basketball court. Some of what we did was out of real concern about the slaughter halfway around the world, some was real fear that we would have to be a part of that garbage, some of what we did in those days was sheer joy at rebellion and being part of a movement. We partied.




But this documentary chronicles the actions of people who had a whole lot more at stake - the men and women who had joined or were drafted into the military and found themselves fighting a war for no discernable reason at all. The military took a dim view of disobedience in the ranks and punishment was swift and hard.
Soldiers were given courts martial with charges of insubordination and mutiny, sometimes carrying death sentences. Draconian punishment didn't deter the movement as this film shows, because by war's end in 1975 the dissension had turned into revolution that had stopped the military machine in it's tracks.

It was inevitable for this viewer to compare that era with what's going on in Iraq and Afghanistan (and wherever the hell else the warmongers have planned), although the movie producers wisely avoided that, instead concentrating solely on the veterans' stories and experiences.
One would think that we as a society would have learned our lesson and would never have allowed the fascists to duplicate their scam 40 years on, but that's precisely what we did. Outwardly the similarities are striking. There's the same disgusting disregard for military and native health and the environment by using "depleted" uranium as casually as the pentagon sprayed the defoliant agent orange. When you think about it it's the same money scam, the same racism, the same wanton butchery as the empire goes about it's business of crushing opposition to an illegal and immoral invasion and occupation.

But ultimately there's a huge difference that's really striking as you watch the old footage and listen to the grizzled survivors, and it doesn't sit very well with me. I realized that what those troops did can never be duplicated now, even though they had to rely on mimeographs and word of mouth compared to today's instant communication tech. Sure, a lot of them were there in Vietnam because they had to be, they were draftees instead of willing participants and had more reason for dissent compared with today's volunteers, but that's not it.

A constant refrain heard from those guys was that it was morally repugnant to do what they were told to do. They bravely refused orders because it wasn't the right thing to do regardless of the consequences of that decision. Stockades and prisons were overflowing with soldiers and sailors who were jailed for their opposition to the war. People had the courage to make moral decisions and walked their talk.

I don't think that will happen now in any meaningful way. The pentagon learned it's lesson about public relations and can keep things like acts of disobedience and desertion quiet, but it's the internal wiring of the individual soldier that has changed the most. Even if the illegal orders are the same and the mental trauma will be the same when it finally hits home what they've done, I'm resigned to thinking most of the soldiers will submissively pull the triggers and drop the bombs and enable the carnage to continue the corporate racket. We've lost the spirit to resist and individuals will succumb to automoton behavior and mercenary impulse. They don't know that they have a choice.
Which is why this movie should be required viewing.

added - There's an understated factoid in this presentation that needs a little airing. During the 1968 Democratic convention in Chicago a unit of just returned soldiers from Vietnam was deployed to the city to back up the local police in case of civil disturbance. They were never used because the overlords didn't know what side they'd be on.

Amtrak Goons To Lean On Riders Because Of All Those Train Hijackings

More fascist crap. This isn't being done to protect anybody. This is happening to get people used to being pushed around, being told what to do and having no privacy.

Amtrak to unveil new security including random bag screening

"WASHINGTON (AP) - Amtrak will start randomly screening passenger carry-on bags.
The Associated Press reports the new security push includes officers with automatic weapons and bomb-sniffing dogs patrolling platforms and trains.
(...)
Anyone who's selected for screening and refuses -- won't be allowed to board. His or her ticket will be refunded."

Need To Take A Nap At Work?

Get some eyelid stickers

Get Set For The Eclipse That Saved Columbus

Too bad about that.

Next one won't be until December 21 2010

"The Moon will be in total eclipse from 0301 GMT to 0351 GMT. This will be visible east of the Rocky Mountains in North America, as well as in all of Central and South America, West Africa and Western Europe. The zenith of totality is close to French Guiana.

It will be in partial eclipse from 0143 GMT to 0301 GMT, visible west of the Rockies and from the eastern Pacific, and from 0351 GMT to 0509 GMT, visible across the rest of Africa and Europe and much of South and West Asia."

For the east coast:

Click on the links to view labels for other time zones: GMT, AST, EST, CST, MST, PST, Alaska, Hawaii.

Minnesota Police Stock Up On Tasers Before Republican National Convention

For a fleeting moment I saw this headline and thought those repugs are in for a rough time, but no.

"The purchase is expected to arrive in St. Paul just in time for the Republican National Convention prompting media speculation that the weapons are being purchased specifically for the convention. When asked by Fox 9 News whether the police will use the weapon at the convention particularly against protesters, police spokester Tom Walsh said, "Our hope is that no one will have to use any degree of force. If it becomes necessary, will that be one of the tools available to them? I suppose that's safe to say."

Skateboard Cop Hates Street Artists Too

Thug has a hardon for people hanging out and enjoying their day.




More cop follies. There seems to be a common thread with this bewildering avalanch of stupid cop tricks. People are being abused, beaten, tasered, arrested and killed not because they're breaking the law, but because the thugs think they're being disrespected.
In the following video the cop wants the fire truck to move to open up the lane. The emergency responders look like they have their hands full right on the road and the fire captain refuses to move the truck that's protecting his people. You can see the cop being told a couple of times to get lost and the sniffy shitbag arrests him.
Serving and protecting.

Obama Gets Zero Votes In Harlem

But people will still cling to their fairy tales

NYTimes February 16, 2008
"Black voters are heavily represented in the 94th Election District in Harlem’s 70th Assembly District. Yet according to the unofficial results from the New York Democratic primary last week, not a single vote in the district was cast for Senator Barack Obama.
That anomaly was not unique. In fact, a review by The New York Times of the unofficial results reported on primary night found about 80 election districts among the city’s 6,106 where Mr. Obama supposedly did not receive even one vote, including cases where he ran a respectable race in a nearby district.
City election officials this week said that their formal review of the results, which will not be completed for weeks, had confirmed some major discrepancies between the vote totals reported publicly — and unofficially — on primary night and the actual tally on hundreds of voting machines across the city."

Common Agenda Behind All The Military Conflict

International Forecaster

"The current conflicts have been used not only for profit and for graft and corruption with no-bid contracts, fraudulent billing, substandard services and outright thefts, but also to bankrupt our country and to weaken our forces by running our soldiers to a frazzle with ridiculously long tours of duty to the point that many of them develop PTSS or commit suicide if they aren't killed by an IED first or die later from depleted uranium exposure and poisoning. Other diabolical elitist purposes for the war are to keep our soldiers away from our shores where we need them for our defense, to deplete and wear out our munitions, supplies and equipment and to leave and render us vulnerable to any potential counterattacks and supply-line disruptions by forever spreading our operations too thinly. US forces can now be tied up completely at the drop of a hat while a domestic black-op-orchestrated act of terror like 911 is used to place us under martial law so foreign troops that have been imported to our shores from other countries and who are already here now can shoot and terrorize our citizens and drag them off to Halliburton-built detention camps while our economy and financial system crashes and burns, all as planned by the elitists."

Ever wonder if the Iraq and Afghanistan clusterfucks aren't "mistakes"? Ever wonder why the callous monsters carrying out this filth care so little for the military that they puposely send them, again and again, into poisonous, toxic wastelands, ill equipped and undertrained? Ever wonder why there are never resolutions but perpetual conflict against always more undefined and nebulous enemies?

It's planned to be this way.

Satellite May Be Shot Down Feb 20

U.S. to blast satellite after space shuttle leaves

"WASHINGTON (Reuters) - The United States will have the chance to shoot down a disabled U.S. spy satellite from next Wednesday, after the space shuttle Atlantis ends its current mission, a U.S. general said on Friday.
"The window will open when the shuttle is on the ground," said Army Lt. Gen. Carter Ham, director of operations for the Pentagon's Joint Staff."

This story keeps getting more suspicious by the day. The honchos sure seem to be very worried about something on this object that they're telling us is a spy satellite and I doubt very much if it's hydrazine like they say:

"Hydrazine is a very simple chemical that contains nitrogen and hydrogen,” Kenneth Ramos, a University of Louisville molecular biologist and VP of the Society of Toxicology, tells the Health Blog. It looks like water, more or less, and smells like ammonia."

Apparently it's not nearly as toxic as they claim although you really don't want to drink it or even inhale it. I've read that it easily breaks down, and workers at plants merely spray it with water to mop up a spill. In any case the stuff would most likely burn up during a fiery re-entry, so dire warnings are meant to keep people away from debris for some other reason. Top secret gizmos? Pictures of Planet X?

The shoot down is controversial too. They claim that it's in low enough orbit so that the shattered debris will enter the atmosphere in short order, yet they're worried about the shuttle. With my elementary understanding of physics, wouldn't an exploding craft in orbit explode upward as well as in other directions, spreading space junk that could collide with other craft? Russia seems to think it's a ruse for testing an anti-satellite weapon.

It could be that this thing has plutonium on board although a lot of sources claim those small Lightweight Radioisotope Heater Units (LWRHUs) are only used on interplanetary probes, and earth orbiting satellites use only solar power. Whatever the reason is, such clear concern from the bigwigs is unusual. Skylab was an uncontrolled re-entry and crashed in 1979 and I don't remember such concern back then, but possibly that was because they didn't have the technology to shoot it down. Maybe this thing has proof of UFOs aboard.

added - Then again, maybe the satellite is full of radioactive death. This is an email sent to UrbanSurvival:

"Plutonium 238 is/was used as a primary fuel in spy satellites. The hydrazine story is a smokescreen. Pu238 decays so fast (88-yr half-life) it is used to produce thermoelectricity by a process that boils a liquid and the condensation of the liquid (mercury used to be used) creates a thermal-gradient voltage. Two immense plants were under construction a couple of years ago, I believe either in Idaho or Montana to produce kilograms of Pu238 . As I remember these plants would need many tons of purified uranium in special reactors to produce kilograms of the stuff. It has no use except in satellites or on long-term space shots. The Russians were experimenting with Pu241, which is a beta emitter having a half-life of only 14 years, but it was literally “too hot to handle” except, maybe, as a weapon. Bulk grams of Pu238 are red hot for years. Pu241 is difficult to produce and forms hot plasma but its powerful beta emissions made its oxide as a coating a candidate for electrodes in satellite batteries.
A microgram of any of the Pu species lodged in a lung can produce cancer from both or either chemical and radioactive reactions."

The United States Of Israel

The grip that that "shitty little country" has on the US tightens every day.

The more people wake up to the ziofascist cabal running this country the more the criminals move to extend their influence and bleed the country dry. And one more time, being anti zionist is not anti semitic. Religion doesn't even enter into it except for judaism being a convenient cover for despicable politics and corruption. Apologists and stooges for fascism endlessly paint you as anti semitic if you don't support Israel's and by extension america's corruption 100%.
But I'd like to see someone call these people anti semitic:



Isn't it grand that US presidential candidates all travel to Israel to hand in their resumes, and are rated by how much they'll support zionist policies? Arent't we lucky that AIPAC, the American Israel Public Affairs Committee, has such a stranglehold on congress? Shouldn't we take comfort in the fact that so many criminals in and circling around this maladministration have dual citizenships with Israel? Here's just a short list of names you may recognize: Michael Chertoff, Henry Kissinger, Richard Perle, Michael Mukasey, Paul Wolfowitz, Douglas Feith, Dov Zakheim, Scooter Libby, Elliott Abrams. Everything these thugs have done and are doing exposes them as Israel firsters, putting that country uppermost in consideration before americans.

It's not like all this is unknown - books have been written and it's all out there in the public domain, it's just that you'll never hear about this stranglehold in the vile MSM. Oh, you'll hear endless gushing support for Israel, how it's our only ally in a sea of swarthy terrorists, but the topic of being tied at the hip to a racist, belligerent foreign nation whose unholy relationship dictates policies that are antithetical to principled behavior is strictly forbidden.

We've only begun to see how beholden to Israel our miserable mafia is, now that the zionists are gearing up to start a much wider war in the middle east. Israeli actions and intentions are so disgusting and obvious, even their toady palestinian collaborators are turning on them. The Israelis are set to initiate a vast slaughter in Gaza. Apparently killing them at checkpoints was too slow a process. Murdering that Hezbollah chief in Syria was a clear enough signal that Lebanon is in the crosshairs very shortly, as the IDF is chomping at the bit to make up for not achieving it's goals two years ago. Any bets Syria will be thrown in the mix this time?

US support for Israeli aggression is going to be far more than just rushing hundreds of thousands of cluster bombs to them, as was the case in the waning days of the 2006 bloodshed in Lebanon. Little kids still reap the benefits of that largesse today. My guess is that just like back then, when the IDF again finds itself biting off more than it can chew, the US will open the spigots wide for an unlimited flow of material for Israel to use. This country will also most probably take care of the Iran part of the equation, something that's been in the offing for a long time. Since the Persians will open their dollar free oil exchange shortly and the rest of OPEC need to be taught a lesson, sending in american cruise missiles to take out their Wall Street will neatly dovetail with watching our little "ally's" back.

As The Truth Will Set You Free points out, going to this site is quite illuminating. You can type in a topic and see just how many bills about it the congress is considering. Just a few numbers will show the real interests of our bought and paid for legislators:


Katrina - 291
Walter Reed - 251
Children + Health - 212
Israel - 327