What Adam Curry is reading

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  ABC Relays More Terrorist Spin: 'Gazans Simply Defending Themselves,' Israel Preventing 'True Peace'
    Link to Article
    Source: MRCTV - News & Politics
    Wed, 21 Nov 2012 14:28
    MRC TV is an online platform for people to share and view videos, articles and opinions on topics that are important to them -- from news to political issues and rip-roaring humor.
    MRC TV is brought to you by the Media Research Center, a 501(c) 3 nonprofit research and education organization. The MRC is located at: 325 South Patrick Street, Alexandria, VA 22314. For information about the MRC, please visit www.MRC.org.
    Copyright (C) 2012, Media Research Center. All Rights Reserved.
  Civil Rights Activist Charges GOP with Racism for Opposing Susan Rice
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    Source: MRCTV - News & Politics
    Tue, 20 Nov 2012 18:10
    MRC TV is an online platform for people to share and view videos, articles and opinions on topics that are important to them -- from news to political issues and rip-roaring humor.
    MRC TV is brought to you by the Media Research Center, a 501(c) 3 nonprofit research and education organization. The MRC is located at: 325 South Patrick Street, Alexandria, VA 22314. For information about the MRC, please visit www.MRC.org.
    Copyright (C) 2012, Media Research Center. All Rights Reserved.
  CNBC's Harwood: Benghazi Scandal Being 'Prolonged' Because of Campaign 'Bitterness'
    Link to Article
    Source: MRCTV - News & Politics
    Tue, 20 Nov 2012 18:10
    Appearing on Saturday's NBC Today, CNBC chief Washington correspondent John Harwood completely dismissed the scandal surrounding the Benghazi terrorist attack as merely leftover campaign politics: "...what we're seeing in the Petraeus scandal and the Benghazi issue being prolonged is an extension of some of the conflict and the bitterness that we had during the election campaign."
  LANGUAGE WARNING: Pro-Palestine Protester Attacks Camera at Protest
    Link to Article
    Source: MRCTV - News & Politics
    Tue, 20 Nov 2012 07:53
    Dueling Pro-Israel and pro-Palestine protests in Los Angeles over the Israel-Hamas conflict turned violent. Protesters came to blows as both sides had members cross the picket line between the two sides set up by police. One person filming the scuffle was attacked by members of the pro-Palestine protest. Members of the pro-Palestine faction screamed ''Get out of here b*itch'' at the videographer before slapping the camera.
  Latest MSNBC 'Lean Forward' Ad Spikes Football Over Obama Election Victory
    Link to Article
    Source: MRCTV - News & Politics
    Mon, 19 Nov 2012 20:48
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    It should come as no surprise to most people that MSNBC is a liberal network, but it appears as though they are now actively campaigning for the Democratic Party. For several years, MSNBC has produced their own ads entitled Lean Forward featuring numerous on-air personalities promoting different liberal causes.
  Obama Meets Aung San Suu Kyi in Burma, Repeatedly Butchers Her Name
    Link to Article
    Source: MRCTV - News & Politics
    Mon, 19 Nov 2012 20:48
    Via telegraph UK:
    Speaking after a private meeting with opposition leader Aung San Suu Kyi, Mr Obama, who is the first sitting US president to visit the former pariah state, said he has seen encouraging signs of progress in the country in the past year.
    However, President Obama butchered her name- more than once-as she was standing right beside him.
    (h/t Gateway Pundit)
  DVIDS - Video - Statement by the NATO Secretary General on Patriot Missile Deployment to Turkey
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    Wed, 21 Nov 2012 17:33
    Choose quality '–¼Embed code '–¼<iframe width="500" height="300" scrolling="no" frameborder="0" style="border: none; overflow: hidden; width: 500px; height: 300px;" allowtransparency="true" src="http://www.dvidshub.net/video/embed/191421"></iframe>
    A statement by the NATO Secretary General, Anders Fogh Rasmussen, on Patriot missile deployment to Turkey. Also available in high definition. Transcript: I have received a letter from the Turkish government requesting the deployment of Patriot missiles. Such a deployment would augment Turkey's air defense to defend the population and territory of Turkey. It would contribute to the de-escalation of the crisis along NATO's southeastern border. And, it would be a concrete demonstration of Alliance solidarity and resolve. In its letter, the Turkish government stressed that the deployment will be defensive only, and that it will in no way support a no-fly zone or any offensive operation. NATO will discuss Turkey's request without delay. If approved, the deployment would be undertaken in accordance with NATO's standing air defense plan. It is up to the individual NATO countries that have available Patriots - Germany, the Netherlands and the United States - to decide if they can provide them for deployment in Turkey and for how long. Next week a joint team will visit Turkey to conduct a site-survey for the possible deployment of Patriots. The security of the Alliance is indivisible. NATO is fully committed to deterring against any threats and defending Turkey's territorial integrity.
Report: Thousands of children face sex abuse by gangs in England.
  Link to Article
  Source: WT news feed
  Thu, 22 Nov 2012 12:43
  (File photo) Thousands of children in England have been exploited, according to a report.
  STORY HIGHLIGHTS
  Report: 2,400 children were victims of sexual exploitation by gangs or groups over 14 monthsAnother 16,500 young people in England were at high risk of being sexually exploitedThe report comes in the wake of a series of scandals involving sexual abuse of childrenIts findings are a wake-up call, says the children's commissioner for England(CNN) -- Thousands of children in England have been sexually exploited by gangs or groups of men or are at high risk of sexual exploitation, according to a report released Wednesday.
  The report, which calls for urgent action to protect young people, comes amid wide public concern prompted by revelations of child abuse by a former BBC TV presenter, Jimmy Savile.
  Read more: Belittling kids as harmful as beating, study finds
  There were 2,409 victims of child sexual exploitation in gangs or groups from August 2010 to October 2011, the inquiry by the Office of the Children's Commissioner found.
  Another 16,500 children in England were identified as being at high risk of sexual exploitation during the year from April 2010 to March 2011.
  Read more: Britain tense as gangs roam, violence flares in London, other cities
  Maggie Atkinson, Children's Commissioner for England, described the report, titled "I thought I was the only one. The only one in the world," as "a wake-up call" for the nation.
  The report is based on the findings from the first year of a two-year study, based on evidence from the government, police, local authorities, health services, voluntary workers and young people.
  Read more: Sex abusers prey on kids' trust, thrive on shame
  Deputy Children's Commissioner Sue Berelowitz, who is leading the inquiry, said: "The reality is that each year thousands of children in England are raped and abused by people seeking to humiliate, violate and control them. The impact on their lives is devastating.
  Read more: Sandusky gets at least 30 years for child sex abuse
  "These children have been abducted, trafficked, beaten and threatened after being drawn into a web of sexual violence sometimes by promises of love and sometimes simply because they know there is no alternative.
  Read more: BBC settles politician's libel claim in child abuse story for $293,000
  "This abuse and violence can be relentless and take place anywhere -- as they go home from school, as they walk to the shops, in their local park."
  Berelowitz said the study found the majority of perpetrators were male and that they ranged in age from young adolescents to older men.
  Read more: UK man charged after children given trick-or-treat cocaine bags
  "The evidence is clear that they come from all ethnic groups and so do their victims -- contrary to what some may wish to believe," she said.
  In a high-profile court case earlier this year, nine men were jailed for "grooming," sexually abusing and raping five girls, one of them only 13, in Rochdale, Greater Manchester. The men were all of Asian origin and the girls were white, prompting questions over whether the perpetrators' ethnic origin was a factor in their actions or in the failure of local authorities to uncover the child abuse ring sooner.
  Read more: Retired bishop, priest arrested on child sex abuse charges
  The report suggests better record-keeping is needed in order for the ethnicity of perpetrators in gangs, many of whom are never arrested or convicted for sexually exploiting minors, to be tracked.
  The victims come from a range of ethnic backgrounds but 28% are from black or minority backgrounds -- higher than previously thought, the report says. Of the 2,409 victims reported to the inquiry, 155 were identified as also being perpetrators of child sexual exploitation, in what the report describes as a "deeply troubling" overlap.
  Read more: Ex-Scout tells of abuse at hands of TV presenter Jimmy Savile
  Atkinson, the Children's Commissioner for England, urged people to look out for the signs of sexual exploitation in young people around them. "Each and every one of us owes it to all victims to be vigilant, to listen and to act to stop the sexual exploitation of children," she said.
  The report's list of warning signs includes children going missing from home, care homes or school; repeated sexually transmitted infections; committing crimes; misuse of drugs or alcohol; self harm and other physical injuries.
  Alastair Campbell: Despite its failings and our past clashes, I back BBC
  The issue of child sexual exploitation is in the forefront of many people's minds following wide UK media coverage of a series of scandals.
  The furor erupted several weeks ago with the claims against Savile, who died last year but who police now believe sexually abused as many as 300 young women and girls, sometimes on BBC premises, in past decades. Two other men have been arrested in connection with the investigation.
  Read more: Police probe hospital abuse claims against TV host Jimmy Savile
  Also in the past month, a BBC program looking into historic sex abuse allegations at children's homes in Wales in the 1970s and 1980s alleged that a Conservative, Thatcher-era politician, whom it did not name, had been among the children's abusers. Internet speculation over who that politician might be led to Lord McAlpine being falsely identified via Twitter. He is now planning multiple libel suits, and the BBC has already settled.
  A number of government inquiries have been launched as a result of questions over how past allegations were handled.
  CNN's Susannah Palk contributed to this report.
Geheime militaire e-mail: Bin Laden was een 'pakketje' van Fedex
  Link to Article
  Source: VK: Home
  Thu, 22 Nov 2012 12:41
  Door: Redactie '' 22/11/12, 12:54
  (C) ap. Archieffoto van Osama bin Laden
  Osama bin Laden is in het grootste geheim vanaf een Amerikaans oorlogsschip op zee begraven. Hierbij zijn islamitische rituelen in acht zijn genomen en niemand heeft kunnen meekijken. Er werd aan zijn lichaam gerefereerd als 'het pakketje' dat is afgeleverd door Fedex, zo blijkt uit geheime e-mails van Amerikaanse officieren.
  Persbureau AP heeft deze mails in handen gekregen door een beroep te doen op de vrijheid van informatie. Grote delen waren echter om veiligheidsredenen weggestreept.
  Bin Laden is vermoord door een team van Navy Seals in het huis in Abottabad, Pakistan, waar de terroristenleider zich al enkele jaren schuil hield.
  In een van de e-mails, die op 2 mei 2011 is verzonden, wordt kort beschreven hoe het lichaam van Bin Laden wordt gewassen, in een wit laken wordt gewikkeld en daarna in een verzwaarde zak wordt geplaatst. Volgens een andere mail was maar een klein deel van de leiding van het schip hiervan op de hoogte.
  'Een militaire officier las de vooraf opgeschreven religieuze teksten voor, die in het Arabisch werden vertaald door een native speaker', staat in de mail van schout-bij-nacht Charles Gaouette. 'Na deze woorden werd het lichaam op een vlak bord geplaatst dat werd gedraaid, waarop het lichaam in zee gleed.'
  HelikopterIn eerdere mails besprak Gaouette (de toenmalige commandant van de vijfde vloot van de marine) met een andere officier in code of de helikopter met de Navy Seals en het lichaam van Bin Laden al op het oorlogsschip de USS Carl Vinson was aangekomen.
  'Is er nog nieuws over ons pakketje?', vroeg hij aan schout-bij-nacht Samuel Perez, commandant van de formatie waar de Vinson deel van uitmaakte.
  'Fedex heeft het pakketje geleverd', antwoordde Perez. 'Beide trucks zijn veilig onderweg naar huis.'
  TransparantOndanks de toezegging dat de regering van Obama zo transparant mogelijk wil zijn, wordt er heel zuinigjes omgesprongen met informatie rondom de dood van Bin Laden. Toen persbureau AP een beroep deed op de vrijheid van informatie, zei Defensie dat er geen foto's of video's konden worden gevonden van de aanval op het huis waar Bin Laden zich bevond. En ook niet van zijn lichaam aan boord van de Vinson.
  Het Pentagon kon geen overlijdenscertificaat, autopsierapport of uitslagen van een DNA-test vinden, noch materiaal waarin wordt besproken wat de regering met het lichaam van de terroristenleider wilde doen, mocht hij komen te overlijden.
Chicago Tribune
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  Source: Dave Winer's linkblog feed
  Thu, 22 Nov 2012 12:30
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MEDIA BRAINWASHING: OBAMA, BIN LADEN, KASAB...
  Link to Article
  Source: aangirfan
  Thu, 22 Nov 2012 12:28
  In the days before the US presidential election I asked a number of Brits what they thought about Obama and Romney.
  They all said that Obama was the good guy.
  Why?
  Because that was how he was presented on the TV news broadcasts.
  I remember asking a Moslem taxi driver in Manchester if he thought that al Qaeda was run by the CIA.
  The taxi driver's attitude was that bin Laden was very obviously an enemy of the CIA.
  Why?
  Because that's what his Moslem newspaper told him.
  Website for this image
  I remember asking a Hindu in Mumbai if he thought that India's chief enemy was the group in Tel Aviv and Washington who were trying to stir up trouble between India and Pakistan.
  This Hindu assured me that the terrorism in India was the work of the Moslems, and that Israel was a good friend of India.
  Why?
  Because that's what The Times of India and all the rest of the media had reported.
  Hindu Jewish summit 2007. Website for this image
  The vast majority of people get their opinions, unwittingly, from the mainstream media.
  Was the uprising in Egypt entirely spontaneous?
  Mike Rivero of 'What Really Happened' goes along with the mainstream media in suggesting that the Arab Spring was not organised by the CIA.
  Indians celebrate the framing and murder of an innocent man.
  If you Google 'Ajmal Kasab' you are unlikely to find the following article:
  At Vijayvaani.com, 1 December 2008, Sandhya Jain tells us about the cover-up in Mumbai.Among the points made:
  1. "By no logic can anyone believe that nine separate sites in a city could be held to ransom by just 10 men.
  2. Rediff.com has interviewed the doctors who conducted the post-mortems on the dead hostages and terrorists."Doctors who conducted the post-mortem said the bodies of the terrorists '' especially their faces - were beyond recognition."
  (This might suggest that the 'white mercenaries' killed off the patsies and made sure their faces could not be recognised.)
  "The NSG commandos never got to ... close range with the terrorists...
  "This suggests the presence of a mysterious third party...
  3. "Top Russian counter-terrorism expert, Vladimir Klyukin, an Afghan war veteran, opines that the Mumbai attackers were not 'ordinary terrorists' and were probably trained by the special operations forces set up in Pakistan by US intelligence prior to the Soviet withdrawal from Afghanistan."In his view, the nature of the Mumbai events suggests the signature of the 'Green Flag' special operations forces created by the Americans in Pakistan, just a year before the Soviet withdrawal...
  "The Russian Interfax news agency reported the former KGB veteran as surmisingthe involvement of at least 50 terrorists, given the geography and sheer scale of the attacks...
  "Initial investigations ... suggested that as many as seven terrorists included mostly British-born Pakistanis...
  "Reports ... suggested some (not just one) gunmen were captured.... So there is a lot of confusion here that needs to be cleared up...
  4. "The death of (some of the) terrorists points to a clear double-cross and also the possibility of the involvement of more than one religious denomination.5. "It is pertinent that the recovery of a satellite phone from the trawler abandoned with the body of the Gujarati captain revealed that the trawler had been hijacked to Karachi Port, and while there, calls were made even to Australia (where the CIA has a famous outpost!)"
  The author is Editor, http://www.vijayvaani.com/
  Source and the more original source here
  The Mumbai Attacks look like a repeat of Operation Gladio.
  A. In Belgium, in the mid-80s, hooded gunmen walked into crowded supermarkets and began firing away.The massacres were later discovered to be linked to Belgium's Gladio unit.
  Operation Gladio was a CIA-NATO enterprise.
  "The Supermarket massacres occurred during the period when the U.S. was pushing a plan to base the Euro-Missiles (nuclear-tipped Cruise missiles) in different European countries..."The Belgian Parliament, which investigated the incidents, felt that they were another attempt to sow confusion and fear among the populace, thereby generating public outcries for a law-and-order government which would be amenable to the Euro-Missles.''
  Belgian nobleman Benoit de Bonvoisin has been linked to the supermarket massacres. B. In Italy, "Gelli's P2 and elements within the Vatican ... working in conjunction with the CIA, aligned itself with criminals, corrupt police, and high government officials to discredit the emerging Left and stage a fascist coup..."On behalf of democracy, the Mafia enlisted as their agent Salvatore Giuliano. He and his cousin Gaspere Pisciotta led their men into Portella della Ginestra.
  "Without prejudice, they shot and killed a dozen people and wounded more than fifty others.
  "New elections were held, and the Christian Democratic party won a resounding victory."
Time will not Tell
  Link to Article
  Source: Lame Cherry
  Thu, 22 Nov 2012 12:28
  My children, it is time that you be aware of the unseen for you think of things as of this world, when it is not this world at all, but the world is but a conduit to be filled with forces, wills and powers which make the world what it is.
  This is nothing new, but of the ancients and old days. It is from the Garden, Babylon, Athens, Rome and yes your Washington, DC. There is the unseen the Guiding hand of God, but the jurisdictions of the fallen spirits which move the powers, for they are powers, principalities and all sorts of darkness in high and low places.
  Abdicating place, humans have these instruments of destruction and chaos as rulers over them.
  Then said he, Knowest thou wherefore I come unto thee? and now will I return to fight with the prince of Persia: and when I am gone forth, lo, the prince of Grecia shall come.Daniel 10:20
  Those are the Testimony of Gabriel, the Archangel of the Lord of Hosts to Daniel, and in them they reveal the ever present forces in empire and state.For we wrestle not against flesh and blood, but against principalities, against powers, against the rulers of the darkness of this world, against spiritual wickedness in high places.Ephesians 6:12
  These are great demonic forces who are in dominion over areas of this world. Gabriel notes in his battles with them, that he was withstood and it required Michael, the Archangel and protector of God's nations which compose the Israelite descendants, which include Americans as they are the tribe of Joseph from exile transplanted here.Few people know the verse of Jeremiah the Prophet's commission, but it was about America and the Lost 10 Tribes, as God never lost any of them, but planted them in the west. See, I have this day set thee over the nations and over the kingdoms, to root out, and to pull down, and to destroy, and to throw down, to build, and to plant.
  Jeremiah 1:10
  Jeremiah's recorded works in the Bible dealt with the exile of Judah, Benjamin and Levi, and the prophecies of the destruction of the Babylonian empire and other peoples, but his hidden commission dealt with the building and planting.Even men, and women, and children, and the king's daughters, and every person that Nebuzaradan the captain of the guard had left with Gedaliah the son of Ahikam the son of Shaphan, and Jeremiah the prophet, and Baruch the son of Neriah.Jeremiah 43:6
  Nebuchadnezzar had executed the princes of Judah and gouged out the king's eyes, and put him into prison, but as it records, the king's daughters were left in the company of Jeremiah and not exiled.Irish legend records what took place in Jeremiah arrived there to plant one of king's daughters who was wived to the exiled Danites residing there. King David as God Promised never has wanted for a person on that throne which Christ will return to sit upon. That Davidic throne was grafted into the Danite kings of Ireland, planted into Scotland and then into England where it is to this day awaiting Christ to return.
  The matter of this is America is God's land. He created and founded her. That Office at 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue is Christ's. This Obama the supplanter is a foreigner and has with these Assyrian and Ashkenaz lords of Europe with demonic influenced traitors in America stolen that Office.Never in all Israelite history has the Tribe of Manasseh ever been subjected to such a blasphemy in a foreign despot as ruler over them, and this was done by demonic influence.
  Be aware that there are American Angels, Michael being one, and there are American Saints, George Washington and the Spirits of 1776, George Custer in the blood of the Little Big Horn requiring being avenged as well as Lincoln's by these forces which placed Barry Chin at 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue.
  I felt the tearing shriek of 9 11 in the matrix, like hard steel being ripped, a wound which has no healing. There are American Angels and American Spirits and American Saints, and they by constant sign have shown the rejection of this B. Hussein Obama, this herodian, sitting without merit upon 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue. He may occupy that seat of the Judgment of the National Sins of America, but he does not possess that Seat.
  I do not know the ancient history of this in the river, current and eddy of the matrix, but I do know that Barack Hussein Obama was a manifestation of charm and spell to seize the White House, by that monkey demon of India, hanuman. That wave upset the current of time and there was a definite anchor point in the past year of the Death of the Pope, but the massive wave of election theft which countered the wave intended to stabilize this cycle in rectifying things, has now had created a water quake which has stopped the river of events as Mr. Obama is now the watershed event, and an even greater tidal wave deluge is forming because of the events he conspired in.
  Analgate has now become the time flow along with the entire Obama machinations. I do not know the effects of this, because I know of no comparing data. Logic would dictate that as this enters the end times, the Great Tribulation though, that it is these events which Mr. Obama has generated with these demonic forces which are going to be the great consumptive force devouring the world.As only recorded here, Mr. Obama is the precursor to the anti Christ. It only makes logical conclusion that Obama's consuming flame will ignite the consuming inferno of the anti Christ.
  One must understand that obedience to God unleashes "free gifts" which require no payment. The natural in witchcraft are forces of earth, wind, fire, water etc... that produce and equal and opposite force of consumption to pay for the energy expended. When one though initiates the demonic, it is a consumptive force which requires continuous and greater payments of life energies to maintain the power.
  Lame Cherry8 hours ago '' Now that ANALGATE has moved to BUTTRAEUS GATE and on to ABSCAM, this blog has a few more Lame Cherry matter anti matter ...Before the election the Plasmas were tuned into the anchor date and how the Doctrines found here would resurrect America. Now the entire matrix is fixated on the enormous gash created in it and it is not dissipating.A steady focus in these Plasma minds is Barry Chin of Asian origin and they now overtly are tagging him as a Designer Negro, all tied to his crimes in Libya and bringing down David Patraeus.
  It is fascinating to behold these things, and to know that in the spiritual matrix there is an even larger upheaval which is not settling out. Rachel weeping for her children. Joseph in anguish over his sons. Washington in preparation battle with his Generals for what will come as the Spirits of 1776 lament over all their work being cleansed of the evil polluting it.
  There is demonic manifestation and rule in most of America, as it is in control from the DC to your local communities in the insanity all are leery of each day. The police feel as predators. Those who rescue feel cold as ghouls and the political leadership is a heart of darkness.God can not recognize creatures as this and these are not His people. They are though conduits and servants of the evil unleashed from the fallen 3rd of angels.
  This is what you do not see, but you feel it if you invest the time to step back and realize all that is influencing America now in this preparation of God's Judgment.
  For the idiot who thinks this Judgment is going to happen in 3 minutes, it is not accomplished this way. It is a matter of things I do not care to examine in what will rectify certain parts of this as stolen elections have consequences as history proves.I will watch the current flow in God's Inspiration discern the meaning I hope.
  The children of God though are without national shepherd. The wolves gnaw at the door post as the entire structure becomes more weakened.
  And he said, I saw all Israel scattered upon the hills, as sheep that have not a shepherd: and the LORD said, These have no master: let them return every man to his house in peace.I Kings 22:17
  Time will not tell for time is not the Voice in this. The conversation is one of the matrix in upheaval. It will do as the Lord commands in settling out in His Peace out of their demonic chaos.agtG 229
Let them eat Obama
  Link to Article
  Source: Lame Cherry
  Thu, 22 Nov 2012 12:27
  Thanksgiving is a Christian Season based upon the Feast of Tabernacle, Boothes or Indwelling of the Bible, the Harvest, the Last Trump, the High Day of the Old Testament, setting the future event of that Day when Jesus the Christ will return as Warrior King to establish His Rule as Prince of Peace.A real peace and not the Obama pax of his endless wars.
  Christmas is a Christian Season based upon the Birth of Christ, and in reality Christ was born much earlier, but this Season is one of Biblical observance of Christ in which the Temple will be rededicated as Holy, like His gathered children from Thanksgiving in that coming year, when all will be a millennium of Peace, Joy and Love.
  A time of real Fulfillment and not the Obama rapine of endless want.
  The Son of God, Jesus the Christ is King of kings and Lord of Lords. He will return and turn the tears into Joy.
  agtG
My terror at hands of paedos
  Link to Article
  Thu, 22 Nov 2012 12:15
  ABOVE: Malcolm King blew the whistlye on a peadophile ring allegedly involving Jimmy Savile
  The car flew across the junction and a car coming from my right smashed into my side
  17th November 2012
  By Jerry Lawton
  THE whistle-blower who exposed the Welsh children's home sex abuse scandal has cheated death in a suspect car smash ­after his brakes failed.
  Police have seized care boss Malcolm King's motor to see if it was sabotaged.
  The car, a regularly-maintained Volvo S60, careered across a busy A-road and was hit side-on by an Alfa Romeo.
  Afterwards Mr King, 68, who suffered a broken leg, found his brake pedal unattached and lying on the car floor.
  The outspoken former boss of social services in Clwyd, where much of the abuse took place, told the Daily Star yesterday: ''I guess I've pissed a lot of people off over the years.
  ''My friends tell me I'm crazy not to be more suspicious about it, but I can't live my life being ­paranoid.
  ''If a man could die from paranoia I'd have been dead a long time ago.''
  Labour councillor Mr King blew the whistle on a ­paedophile ring ­operating at north Wales children's homes in the mid-1980s.
  It allegedly ­involved shamed TV star Jimmy Savile and other ­celebrities, politicians, police chiefs and judges.
  Mr King, a county councillor and former chair of North Wales ­Police ­Authority, was one of only 12 people given copies of the 1996 Jillings Report, which named ­every abuser.
  The married dad-of-two's brake pedal mysteriously failed on the A525 near Ruthin days ­after the ­scandal blew up again two weeks ago.
  Mr King said: ''I pushed my foot down hard on what I thought was the brake pedal but nothing happened.
  ''I've no idea whether the pedal was attached at this stage or not.
  ''The car flew across the junction and a car coming from my right smashed into my side.
  ''If I'd shot across the junction a split-second sooner I'd be dead because it would have hit where I was sitting rather than the bonnet. It doesn't bear thinking about. My car, which is a write-off, is now in the hands of the crash investigators.
  ''It's a good car and I've always maintained and serviced it regularly at the best garage in town.
  ''The police officer at the scene told me they'd examine it very thoroughly. They said they'd go over it with a fine-tooth comb.''
  The Jillings Report was so explosive insurers ordered it to be pulped but a copy has been found in council archives.
  Mr King has renewed his campaign for a fresh probe in the wake of revelations about Savile's depravity.
  ''I'm someone who speaks his mind,'' he said. ''If I know something is happening that I don't like I will always speak out and try to change things.
  ''I spent a lot of time when the allegations first surfaced being incredibly paranoid.
  ''I didn't know who to trust other than family. It was a terrible time.''
  A North Wales Police spokesman confirmed officers are investigating the cause of the crash.
  Clwyd County Council leader ­Dennis Parry, 64, said the controversial report should be made public.
Remarks With Foreign Minister Mohamed Kamel Amr
  Link to Article
  Wed, 21 Nov 2012 21:20
  MODERATOR: (Via interpreter) We welcome our guests. Yes. We'll begin with a talk from Egypt's Minister of Foreign Affairs, then Her Excellency Minister Clinton will address the press.FOREIGN MINISTER AMR: (Via interpreter) Thank you. A press release, under the auspices of His Excellency President Mohamed Morsi and stemming from Egypt's historic responsibility towards the Palestinian cause and Egypt's keenness to stop the bloodshed and preserving the stability of the conditions and security in the region, Egypt has exerted efforts and conducted intensive discussions since the renewed outbreak of hostilities in the Gaza Strip with all parties: the Palestinian leadership, the various resistance factions, the Israeli side, and the international community, most notably the United States of America.
  These efforts and communications managed to reach an agreement to a ceasefire and the return of calm and halt of the violence and the bloodshed that was witnessed recently.
  The ceasefire is set to start at 9 p.m. Cairo time today, Wednesday, 21st of November 2012. Egypt affirms its commitment to the Palestinian cause and the need to achieve a comprehensive and just resolution. The Government of Egypt will continue its efforts to achieve this noble objective through ongoing attempts to end the divisions between the various Palestinian factions and to assist them in achieving Palestinian national unity on the basis of genuine Palestinian values and interests.
  Egypt appreciates the role of the Arab League, the valuable contributions of Turkey and Qatar, and those of the Secretary General of the United Nations to support the efforts of the Government of Egypt to end the violence. At the same time, Egypt calls upon the international community to be engaged in monitoring the implementation of the Egyptian-brokered agreement and to ensure all parties adhere to these agreements. The agreement will be distributed to you after this conference.
  SECRETARY CLINTON: Thank you very much, Foreign Minister Amr. I want to thank President Morsi for his personal leadership to de-escalate the situation in Gaza and end the violence. This is a critical moment for the region. Egypt's new government is assuming the responsibility and leadership that has long made this country a cornerstone of regional stability and peace. The United States welcomes the agreement today for a ceasefire in Gaza. For it to hold, the rocket attacks must end, a broader calm return.
  The people of this region deserve the chance to live free from fear and violence, and today's agreement is a step in the right direction that we should build on. Now we have to focus on reaching a durable outcome that promotes regional stability and advances the security, dignity, and legitimate aspirations of Palestinians and Israelis alike. President Morsi and I discussed how the United States and Egypt can work together to support the next steps in that process. In the days ahead, the United States will work with partners across the region to consolidate this progress, improve conditions for the people of Gaza, and provide security for the people of Israel. Ultimately, every step must move us toward a comprehensive peace for all the people of the region.
  As I discussed today with President Morsi, as well as Prime Minister Netanyahu and President Abbas, there is no substitute for a just and lasting peace. Now that there is a ceasefire, I am looking forward to working with the Foreign Minister and others to move this process. Thank you very much, Foreign Minister.
OCCUPATION
  Link to Article
  Source: aangirfan
  Wed, 21 Nov 2012 21:19
  Obama (Papa Doc) at JIS. "BARRACK OBAMA" PRESIDENE AMERIKA The Obama regime aids the occupiers.The Pentagon trains the child killers.
  Photo byRusty Stewart. "The United States is not 'supporting' an Israeli military endeavor, it is the major actor in the attack on Gaza." The US-Israeli Attack on Gaza
  1. The land is under brutal military occupation.
  Its people are being slaughtered.
  But the world is doing nothing to stop it.
  2. "Senior US military officials were on location in Israel working with their IDF counterparts in the days leading up to the attack...
  "In the month prior to the attacks, the US and Israel were involved in the conduct of the largest joint war games in Israeli history...
  "Panetta was in Israel in early August.
  "He returned to Tel Aviv two months later on October 3...
  "The joint US-Israeli war games, in a sense, ''went live'' on November 14 with the launching of Operation Pillar of Cloud...
  "It should be understood that the joint US-Israeli war games were intended to lead towards an actual military operation.
  "Pillar of Cloud was planned well in advance. It had been ''embedded'' into the structure of the joint US-Israeli war games...
  "The United States is not ''supporting'' an Israeli military endeavor, it is major actor in the attack on Gaza. The US is therefore a perpetrator of war crimes..."
  The US-Israeli Attack on Gaza by Prof Michel Chossudovsky, November 20, 2012Papua byCarolincik
  3. Dr Nile Gardiner wrote in the Daily Telegraph, (Avatar: the most expensive piece of anti-American propaganda ever ...):
  "When I saw the movie last night in a packed theatre, I was disturbed by the cheering from the audience towards the end when the ... US soldiers fighting on behalf of an American corporation were being wiped out..."
  Jakartass tells us (http://jakartass.blogspot.com/):
  "In the 1990s, during Suharto's regime, 1.2 million Javanese and Sumatran persons streamed into Papua over a ten-year period.
  "Nearly all of these migrants were Muslims, coming into an area that, prior to Indonesian rule, had been almost entirely populated by Roman Catholics, Protestants and people following tribal religions."
  aangirfan: AVATAR, OIL AND GOLD
EGYPT REVOLTS AGAINST MORSI
  Link to Article
  Source: aangirfan
  Wed, 21 Nov 2012 17:30
  21 November 2012, Al Jazeera torched in Egypt.Egyptians are revolting against the hated Morsi, who belongs to the CIA's Muslim Brotherhood.
  Pre election poll, May 4-10, 2012, University of Maryland Poll
  36% Abul Fotouh moderate Islamist28% Moussa Independent14% Shafiq Last PM under Mubarak8% Morsi Muslim Brotherhood
  By election day, the only two candidates left on the ballot were Shafiq and Morsi. Turnout was less than 20%, and Morsi won, through fraud.
  Morsi represents 10% of the electorate.
  Website for this image
  Egyptian Chronicles keeps people up to date on Egypt.
  21 November 2012
  "An angry mob today torched the Al Jazeera ... studio in Tahrir square. "Al Jazeera ... is accused of being biased towards the Islamists...
  "I asked the doorman and he told me ... 'An angry mob stormed the channel... after a TV interview the channel aired with some Muslim brotherhood member.'
  When you become the News
  The studio is completely destroyed
  20 November 2012.
  "I went to Mohamed Mahmoud street and Tahrir square to see what is happening today after yesterday's clashes between the protesters...
  "I went in the morning when dozens of young protesters 'mostly teenagers and even school children' blocked the traffic in Tahrir square.
  "They were carrying anti-Muslim brotherhood slogans."They were chanting: 'We will not leave. Morsi leaves.'
  Rebels losing their cause
  "There were tear gas grenades smells through out El Sheikh Rihan street..."The kids were hurling rocks at the police while cursing and giving their middle finger to the CSF...
  "I headed to Mohamed Mahmoud street. New graffiti paintings are added to the street.
  "There was a small protest led by that Al Azhar sheikh known from his opposition to the Muslim brotherhood.
  "The protest was describing Morsi as the 'agent of the Americans' and demanding him to leave.
  Rebels losing their cause
  Gaber, shot dead
  "Moving to Youssef El Gendy street... It is blocked just like Sheikh Rihan street.
  "It was a true war zone with all the broken rocks and glass.
  "Again kids ... taunting the officers and soldiers...
  "The Lycee El Horeya school was partially torched.
  "On my way out I heard that two young men 'Gaber' and 'Mido' had just been shot in the street...
  Victim of latest Cairo riots
  It did escalate as predicted...
  "More injuries.
  "The police forces from CSF are now standing on the rooftops of the schools in Youssef El Gindy street hurling rocks and glass at the protesters below.
  "There are field hospitals now...
  Wounded protester.
  "44 have been injured...
  "Ahmed Gaber , a student and a member in April 6th youth Movement was shot dead in Mohamed Mahmoud street this morning.... Some are reporting that it was at point blank to his head.
  "I think that with the death Gaber , things will get worse...
  Egyptian protesters
  19 November 2012
  Egyptian police and protesters clash in central Cairo
  Egyptian police, protesters clash in central Cairo
  "Clashes between protesters and Egyptian security forces intensified after nightfall Monday, marking the anniversary of a bloody confrontation in Cairo, when 42 people were killed in a street battle months after the uprising that ousted the country's longtime president."
  The police fired tear gas and birdshot.
  60 protesters were injured.
  "The persistent unrest reflects divisions plaguing Egypt 21 months after Mubarak's downfall in February 2011."
  Egyptians have been protesting against both the military and the Muslim Brotherhood.
  Demonstrators hung a banner reading, "Muslim Brotherhood not allowed," while others chanted, "the people want to topple the regime," referring to Islamist President Mohammed Morsi.Previous clashes.
  "Since January 2011, the police have been literally getting away with murder, again and again," said Nadim Houry.
  Even members in different security forces have battled each other.
  An Egyptian security official said clashes erupted between civilian police and military forces in northern Cairo.
  "Members of several liberal parties and representatives of Egypt's churches have announced their withdrawal from the 100-member constituent assembly tasked with writing the document, protesting what they perceive as attempt to impose ultraconservative Islamist content."
  The Arab Spring was run by the CIA and its friends, including the BBC.
  aangirfan: MORSI'S FOREIGN POLICY; ANTI-MORSI PROTESTSaangirfan.blogspot.com/2012/.../morsis-foreign-policy-anti-morsi.ht...24 Aug 2012 '' By election day, the only two candidates left on the ballot were Shafiq and Morsi. Turnout was weak, less than 20% by estimate, and Morsi won.aangirfan: MORSI SIDES WITH SAUDISaangirfan.blogspot.com/2012/07/morsi-sides-with-saudis.html12 Jul 2012 '' Egypt's President Morsi shows his support for Saudi Arabia. Morsi and Crown Prince Salman Egypt's Mohammed Morsi has made the first ...aangirfan: ISRAEL BACKS MUSLIM BROTHER FOR EGYPTIAN ...aangirfan.blogspot.com/2012/.../israel-backs-muslim-brother-for.htm...17 Jun 2012 '' Mohamed Morsi worked as a professor at California State University.aangirfan: ELECTION 'RIGGED' IN EGYPT The Financial Times, also a ...aangirfan: DICTATORSHIP IN EGYPT?aangirfan.blogspot.com/2012/08/dictatorship-in-egypt.html17 Aug 2012 '' Morsi will fall, quickly. He was forth of five presidential candidates at 8% before the courts started eliminating the competition. By election day, it ...aangirfan: MORSI'S MAD MOSLEMS?aangirfan.blogspot.com/2012/07/morsis-mad-moslems.html6 Jul 2012 '' One day after Mohamed Morsi became Egypt's president, Egyptian Islamists stabbed a student to death for 'walking next to his fiancee'.aangirfan: USA TAKES OVER EGYPTaangirfan.blogspot.com/2012/06/usa-takes-over-egypt.html24 Jun 2012 '' Mohamed Morsi, 62, a US-trained engineer, has been declared president of Egypt by the powerful electoral commission. The election turnout ...
Impressions of Gaza
  Link to Article
  Wed, 21 Nov 2012 17:16
  Even a single night in jail is enough to give a taste of what it means to be under the total control of some external force. And it hardly takes more than a day in Gaza to begin to appreciate what it must be like to try to survive in the world's largest open-air prison, where a million and a half people, in the most densely populated area of the world, are constantly subject to random and often savage terror and arbitrary punishment, with no purpose other than to humiliate and degrade, and with the further goal of ensuring that Palestinian hopes for a decent future will be crushed and that the overwhelming global support for a diplomatic settlement that will grant these rights will be nullified.
  The intensity of this commitment on the part of the Israeli political leadership has been dramatically illustrated just in the past few days, as they warn that they will ''go crazy'' if Palestinian rights are given limited recognition at the UN. That is not a new departure. The threat to ''go crazy'' (''nishtagea'') is deeply rooted, back to the Labor governments of the 1950s, along with the related ''Samson Complex'': we will bring down the Temple walls if crossed. It was an idle threat then; not today.
  The purposeful humiliation is also not new, though it constantly takes new forms. Thirty years ago political leaders, including some of the most noted hawks, submitted to Prime Minister Begin a shocking and detailed account of how settlers regularly abuse Palestinians in the most depraved manner and with total impunity. The prominent military-political analyst Yoram Peri wrote with disgust that the army's task is not to defend the state, but ''to demolish the rights of innocent people just because they are Araboushim (''niggers,'' ''kikes'') living in territories that God promised to us.''
  Gazans have been selected for particularly cruel punishment. It is almost miraculous that people can sustain such an existence. How they do so was described thirty years ago in an eloquent memoir by Raja Shehadeh (The Third Way), based on his work as a lawyer engaged in the hopeless task of trying to protect elementary rights within a legal system designed to ensure failure, and his personal experience as a Samid, ''a steadfast one,'' who watches his home turned into a prison by brutal occupiers and can do nothing but somehow ''endure.''
  Since Shehadeh wrote, the situation has become much worse. The Oslo agreements, celebrated with much pomp in 1993, determined that Gaza and the West Bank are a single territorial entity. By then the US and Israel had already initiated their program of separating them fully from one another, so as to block a diplomatic settlement and punish the Araboushim in both territories.
  Punishment of Gazans became still more severe in January 2006, when they committed a major crime: they voted the ''wrong way'' in the first free election in the Arab world, electing Hamas. Demonstrating their passionate ''yearning for democracy,'' the US and Israel, backed by the timid European Union, at once imposed a brutal siege, along with intensive military attacks. The US also turned at once to standard operating procedure when some disobedient population elects the wrong government: prepare a military coup to restore order.
  Gazans committed a still greater crime a year later by blocking the coup attempt, leading to a sharp escalation of the siege and military attacks. These culminated in winter 2008-9, with Operation Cast Lead, one of the most cowardly and vicious exercises of military force in recent memory, as a defenseless civilian population, trapped with no way to escape, was subjected to relentless attack by one of the world's most advanced military systems relying on US arms and protected by US diplomacy. An unforgettable eyewitness account of the slaughter '-- ''infanticide'' in their words '-- is given by the two courageous Norwegian doctors who worked at Gaza's main hospital during the merciless assault, Mads Gilbert and Erik Fosse, in their remarkable book Eyes in Gaza.
  President-elect Obama was unable to say a word, apart from reiterating his heartfelt sympathy for children under attack '-- in the Israeli town Sderot. The carefully planned assault was brought to an end right before his inauguration, so that he could then say that now is the time to look forward, not backward, the standard refuge of criminals.
  Of course, there were pretexts '-- there always are. The usual one, trotted out when needed, is ''security'': in this case, home-made rockets from Gaza. As is commonly the case, the pretext lacked any credibility. In 2008 a truce was established between Israel and Hamas. The Israeli government formally recognizes that Hamas observed it fully. Not a single Hamas rocket was fired until Israel broke the truce under cover of the US election on November 4 2008, invading Gaza on ludicrous grounds and killing half a dozen Hamas members. The Israeli government was advised by its highest intelligence officials that the truce could be renewed by easing the criminal blockade and ending military attacks. But the government of Ehud Olmert, reputedly a dove, chose to reject these options, preferring to resort to its huge comparative advantage in violence: Operation Cast Lead. The basic facts are reviewed once again by foreign policy analyst Jerome Slater in the current issue of the Harvard-MIT journal International Security.
  The pattern of bombing under Cast Lead was carefully analyzed by the highly informed and internationally respected Gazan human rights advocate Raji Sourani. He points out that the bombing was concentrated in the north, targeting defenseless civilians in the most densely populated areas, with no possible military pretext. The goal, he suggests, may have been to drive the intimidated population to the south, near the Egyptian border. But the Samidin stayed put, despite the avalanche of US-Israeli terror.
  A further goal might have been to drive them beyond. Back to the earliest days of the Zionist colonization it was argued across much of the spectrum that Arabs have no real reason to be in Palestine; they can be just as happy somewhere else, and should leave '-- politely ''transferred,'' the doves suggested. This is surely no small concern in Egypt, and perhaps a reason why Egypt does not open the border freely to civilians or even to desperately needed materials
  Sourani and other knowledgeable sources observe that the discipline of the Samidin conceals a powder keg, which might explode any time, unexpectedly, as the first Intifada did in Gaza in 1989 after years of miserable repression that elicited no notice or concern,
  Merely to mention one of innumerable cases, shortly before the outbreak of the Intifada a Palestinian girl, Intissar al-Atar, was shot and killed in a schoolyard by a resident of a nearby Jewish settlement. He was one of the several thousand Israelis settlers brought to Gaza in violation of international law and protected by a huge army presence, taking over much of the land and scarce water of the Strip and living ''lavishly in twenty-two settlements in the midst of 1.4 million destitute Palestinians,'' as the crime is described by Israeli scholar Avi Raz. The murderer of the schoolgirl, Shimon Yifrah, was arrested, but quickly released on bail when the Court determined that ''the offense is not severe enough'' to warrant detention. The judge commented that Yifrah only intended to shock the girl by firing his gun at her in a schoolyard, not to kill her, so ''this is not a case of a criminal person who has to be punished, deterred, and taught a lesson by imprisoning him.'' Yifrah was given a 7-month suspended sentence, while settlers in the courtroom broke out in song and dance. And the usual silence reigned. After all, it is routine.
  And so it is. As Yifrah was freed, the Israeli press reported that an army patrol fired into the yard of a school for boys aged 6 to 12 in a West Bank refugee camp, wounding five children, allegedly intending only ''to shock them.'' There were no charges, and the event again attracted no attention. It was just another episode in the program of ''illiteracy as punishment,'' the Israeli press reported, including the closing of schools, use of gas bombs, beating of students with rifle butts, barring of medical aid for victims; and beyond the schools a reign of more severe brutality, becoming even more savage during the Intifada, under the orders of Defense Minister Yitzhak Rabin, another admired dove.
  My initial impression, after a visit of several days, was amazement, not only at the ability to go on with life, but also at the vibrancy and vitality among young people, particularly at the university, where I spent much of my time at an international conference. But there too one can detect signs that the pressure may become too hard to bear. Reports indicate that among young men there is simmering frustration, recognition that under the US-Israeli occupation the future holds nothing for them. There is only so much that caged animals can endure, and there may be an eruption, perhaps taking ugly forms '-- offering an opportunity for Israeli and western apologists to self-righteously condemn the people who are culturally backward, as Mitt Romney insightfully explained.
  Gaza has the look of a typical third world society, with pockets of wealth surrounded by hideous poverty. It is not, however, ''undeveloped.'' Rather it is ''de-developed,'' and very systematically so, to borrow the terms of Sara Roy, the leading academic specialist on Gaza. The Gaza Strip could have become a prosperous Mediterranean region, with rich agriculture and a flourishing fishing industry, marvelous beaches and, as discovered a decade ago, good prospects for extensive natural gas supplies within its territorial waters.
  By coincidence or not, that is when Israel intensified its naval blockade, driving fishing boats toward shore, by now to 3 miles or less.
  The favorable prospects were aborted in 1948, when the Strip had to absorb a flood of Palestinian refugees who fled in terror or were forcefully expelled from what became Israel, in some cases expelled months after the formal cease-fire.
  In fact, they were being expelled even four years later, as reported in Ha'aretz (25.12.2008), in a thoughtful study by Beni Tziper on the history of Israeli Ashkelon back to the Canaanites. In 1953, he reports, there was a ''cool calculation that it was necessary to cleanse the region of Arabs.'' The original name, Majdal, had already been ''Judaized'' to today's Ashkelon, regular practice.
  That was in 1953, when there was no hint of military necessity. Tziper himself was born in 1953, and while walking in the remnants of the old Arab sector, he reflects that ''it is really difficult for me, really difficult, to realize that while my parents were celebrating my birth, other people were being loaded on trucks and expelled from their homes.''
  Israel's 1967 conquests and their aftermath administered further blows. Then came the terrible crimes already mentioned, continuing to the present day.
  The signs are easy to see, even on a brief visit. Sitting in a hotel near the shore, one can hear the machine gun fire of Israeli gunboats driving fishermen out of Gaza's territorial waters and towards shore, so they are compelled to fish in waters that are heavily polluted because of US-Israeli refusal to allow reconstruction of the sewage and power systems that they destroyed.
  The Oslo Accords laid plans for two desalination plants, a necessity in this arid region. One, an advanced facility, was built: in Israel. The second one is in Khan Yunis, in the south of Gaza. The engineer in charge of trying to obtain potable water for the population explained that this plant was designed so that it cannot use sea water, but must rely on underground water, a cheaper process, which further degrades the meager aquifer, guaranteeing severe problems in the future. Even with that, water is severely limited. The United Nations Relief and Works Agency (UNRWA), which cares for refugees (but not other Gazans), recently released a report warning that damage to the aquifer may soon become ''irreversible,'' and that without remedial action quickly, by 2020 Gaza may not be a ''liveable place.''
  Israel permits concrete to enter for UNRWA projects, but not for Gazans engaged in the huge reconstruction needs. The limited heavy equipment mostly lies idle, since Israel does not permit materials for repair. All of this is part of the general program described by Israeli official Dov Weisglass, an adviser to Prime Minister Ehud Olmert, after Palestinians failed to follow orders in the 2006 elections: ''The idea,'' he said, ''is to put the Palestinians on a diet, but not to make them die of hunger.'' That would not look good.
  And the plan is being scrupulously followed. Sara Roy has provided extensive evidence in her scholarly studies. Recently, after several years of effort, the Israeli human rights organization Gisha succeeded to obtain a court order for the government to release its records detailing plans for the diet, and how they are executed. Israel-based journalist Jonathan Cook summarizes them: ''Health officials provided calculations of the minimum number of calories needed by Gaza's 1.5 million inhabitants to avoid malnutrition. Those figures were then translated into truckloads of food Israel was supposed to allow in each day ... an average of only 67 trucks '-- much less than half of the minimum requirement '-- entered Gaza daily. This compared to more than 400 trucks before the blockade began.'' And even this estimate is overly generous, UN relief officials report.
  The result of imposing the diet, Mideast scholar Juan Cole observes, is that ''[a]bout ten percent of Palestinian children in Gaza under 5 have had their growth stunted by malnutrition ... in addition, anemia is widespread, affecting over two-thirds of infants, 58.6 percent of schoolchildren, and over a third of pregnant mothers.'' The US and Israel want to ensure that nothing more than bare survival is possible.
  ''What has to be kept in mind,'' observes Raji Sourani, ''is that the occupation and the absolute closure is an ongoing attack on the human dignity of the people in Gaza in particular and all Palestinians generally. It is systematic degradation, humiliation, isolation and fragmentation of the Palestinian people.'' The conclusion is confirmed by many other sources. In one of the world's leading medical journals, The Lancet, a visiting Stanford physician, appalled by what he witnessed, describes Gaza as ''something of a laboratory for observing an absence of dignity,'' a condition that has ''devastating'' effects on physical, mental, and social wellbeing. ''The constant surveillance from the sky, collective punishment through blockade and isolation, the intrusion into homes and communications, and restrictions on those trying to travel, or marry, or work make it difficult to live a dignified life in Gaza.'' The Araboushim must be taught not to raise their heads.
  There were hopes that the new Morsi government in Egypt, less in thrall to Israel than the western-backed Mubarak dictatorship, might open the Rafah crossing, the sole access to the outside for trapped Gazans that is not subject to direct Israeli control. There has been slight opening, but not much. Journalist Laila el-Haddad writes that the re-opening under Morsi, ''is simply a return to status quo of years past: only Palestinians carrying an Israeli-approved Gaza ID card can use Rafah Crossing,'' excluding a great many Palestinians, including el-Haddad's family, where only one spouse has a card.
  Furthermore, she continues, ''the crossing does not lead to the West Bank, nor does it allow for the passage of goods, which are restricted to the Israeli-controlled crossings and subject to prohibitions on construction materials and export.'' The restricted Rafah crossing does not change the fact that ''Gaza remains under tight maritime and aerial siege, and continues to be closed off to the Palestinians' cultural, economic, and academic capitals in the rest of the [occupied territories], in violation of US-Israeli obligations under the Oslo Accords.''
  The effects are painfully evident. In the Khan Yunis hospital, the director, who is also chief of surgery, describes with anger and passion how even medicines are lacking for relief of suffering patients, as well as simple surgical equipment, leaving doctors helpless and patients in agony. Personal stories add vivid texture to the general disgust one feels at the obscenity of the harsh occupation. One example is the testimony of a young woman who despaired that her father, who would have been proud that she was the first woman in the refugee camp to gain an advanced degree, had ''passed away after 6 months of fighting cancer aged 60 years. Israeli occupation denied him a permit to go to Israeli hospitals for treatment. I had to suspend my study, work and life and go to set next to his bed. We all sat including my brother the physician and my sister the pharmacist, all powerless and hopeless watching his suffering. He died during the inhumane blockade of Gaza in summer 2006 with very little access to health service. I think feeling powerless and hopeless is the most killing feeling that human can ever have. It kills the spirit and breaks the heart. You can fight occupation but you cannot fight your feeling of being powerless. You can't even dissolve that feeling.''
  Disgust at the obscenity, compounded with guilt: it is within our power to bring the suffering to an end and allow the Samidin to enjoy the lives of peace and dignity that they deserve.
  Noam Chomsky visited the Gaza Strip on October 25-30, 2012.
Borrower targeted for mortgage fraud, while bankers got bailouts - Rock Center with Brian Williams
  Link to Article
  Wed, 21 Nov 2012 17:14
  By Sopan DebRock Center
  An emotional Charlie Engle emerged from Dismas Charities, a halfway house in Greensboro, N.C., and greeted his two teenage sons, telling them he could not have done it without them.
  He was referring to the prison term he just finished serving (most of it at a federal prison in Beckley, W. Va.) for mortgage fraud.
  ''The second I walked out that door and I was no longer in prison,'' Engle told Rock Center's Harry Smith. ''It's almost impossible to explain the feeling, but it is just that sense that OK, now I can be here for my boys again.'' Engle's interview airs Thursday, Nov. 15 at 10 p.m./ 9 p.m. Central on NBC.
  Engle spent a year and half in prison for his role in the financial crisis. But he didn't work on Wall Street and he was not a banker. He was convicted of exaggerating his income on his mortgage applications '' a common practice during the housing boom.
  While many big banks were chastised for risky behavior in lending by Congress, they got bailouts worth billions. Charlie Engle, meanwhile, was the target of a federal case involving an undercover operative, a dogged IRS agent and conspiring mortgage lenders.
  Engle's troubles started because of his passion for long distance running in extreme environments.
  ''The run across the Sahara ended up being a little over 4,600 miles,'' Engle said. ''We basically ran about 50 miles per day, every single day, for 111 consecutive days without taking a single day off.''
  Engle's run, with two friends, would be an adventure to raise money for clean water projects in North Africa. Accompanied by a film crew, the journey was turned into a documentary narrated by actor Matt Damon that premiered at the 2008 Toronto Film Festival.
  Engle got some notice, including an appearance on ''The Tonight Show'' with Jay Leno. That was enough to get the attention of Robert Nordlander, an IRS agent who wondered how Engle could find the time to train for running while still maintaining an income.
  ''Being the special agent that I am, I was wondering, how does a guy train for this because most people have to work from nine to five and it's very difficult to train for this part-time,'' Nordlander told a grand jury in May, 2010.
  Nordlander spent almost 700 hours investigating Engle, combing through his banking and tax records. He even put Engle under surveillance and went through his trash looking for evidence.
  He was not satisfied and sent in an attractive undercover agent who was also a runner.
  WATCH VIDEO: Runner, not Wall Street, prosecuted for mortgage fraud
  The agent came to Engle's front door and said she was looking at apartments in his complex. She suggested they have lunch the next day, where, as Engle remembered, ''most of her questions, looking back now, were almost like of a financial nature.''
  At a local restaurant in Greensboro called Mimi's, Engle revealed he had taken out mortgages on a couple of investment properties. He went on to say something that would come back to haunt him.
  '''...I had a couple of good liar loans out there, you know with my, my mortgage broker who didn't mind writing down, you know that I was making 400 grand a year when he knew I wasn't,'' said Engle.
  ''What's funny is after I made that statement, it's like all of a sudden, the lunch ended very quickly,'' Engle told Smith.
  He did not realize that the agent was wearing a wire and that he had just made a statement that would land him in court.
  ''Liar loans'' are the colloquial term for something called ''stated-income loans,'' which were common during the housing boom and a contributing cause of the housing crisis. These loans did not require lenders to verify a borrower's assets or incomes.
  They were initially conceived decades ago for extremely wealthy borrowers who would normally have complicated tax returns. But during the housing boom, lenders began abusing the practice. Engle was one of millions of borrowers who took out such loans, which were being handed out freely by many lenders eager to get in on the boom.
  Engle contended he did not fill in the income figure on his loans, but he admitted he signed the closing documents. He also insisted that the conversation with the undercover agent was taken out of context.
  ''I did have liar loans, but I'm not the one who told the lies,'' Engle said. ''The brokers, the banks, the people who -- as a borrower we all know we're not in charge of the process.''
  The IRS did not find tax fraud, but Engle was indicted for mortgage fraud.
  He was convicted in large part because of the testimony of the mortgage broker for one of his loans, who along with Engle's loan officer and the seller of the property, all pleaded guilty to conspiring to defraud several banks of millions of dollars.
  The mortgage broker, John Hellman, got 10 months in prison while Engle received a 21-month sentence. Neil H. MacBride, the U.S. Attorney for the Eastern District of Virginia, declined Rock Center's request for an interview, but sent a statement saying, ''Mr. Engle was convicted by a jury of fraudulently obtaining more than a million dollars in four mortgage loans'...'' MacBride also noted his office also prosecuted fraudsters in a case worth $2.9 billion.
  The big banks that handed out those liar loans by and large escaped criminal prosecution, said Neil Barofsky, who was the inspector general for TARP, the government's program to bailout the banks. Barofsky told Rock Center that while it is easier to prosecute the smaller fish involved in the financial crisis, that does not justify ignoring the bigger ones.
  ''And it doesn't really accomplish the broader goals that you want from your Department of Justice in the aftermath of a crisis, and that's to make it very clear, that if you break the law, if you do this type of unethical behavior, that you'll be held accountable,'' Barofsky said. ''And all the Charlie Engle's in the world rotting in jail aren't going to accomplish that goal.''
  Editor's Note: Harry's Smith's full report about Charlie Engle airs Thursday at 10pm/9c on NBC's Rock Center with Brian Williams.
FAA delays selection of Miami Valley as posible test site | www.daytondailynews.com
  Link to Article
  Wed, 21 Nov 2012 16:58
  Citing safety concerns and privacy issues, the Federal Aviation Administration has delayed indefinitely the selection of six U.S. sites for the testing of unmanned aircraft '-- one of which is hoped to be in the Dayton-Springfield region.
  In a letter received late last week by the members of the Unmanned Systems Congressional Caucus, acting FAA Administrator Michael P. Huerta singled out the need to first address privacy concerns that come with increasing the use of drones in the nation's airspace.
  The FAA was to have designated the six sites in December, but already had drawn the ire of the congressional caucus this summer when the agency failed to request site proposals by a July deadline.
  ''It's unacceptable in my book that they're delaying this,'' U.S. Rep. Steve Austria, R-Beavercreek said Monday. ''The reasons they're giving us are the reasons they gave us four years ago.''
  Winning a test-site designation is seen as key for the region to become a national hub for UAV research, development and manufacturing.
  ''I've spoken to a number of companies who've said they would love to build the planes right outside the door of where they could test them,'' Austria said.
  The frustration, he said, stems largely from the fact that the deadlines being missed by the FAA were of the agency's own choosing. As it stands, the FAA has yet to ask for site proposals.
  ''They set their own timelines,'' Austria said.
  The Washington, D.C.-based Electronic Privacy Information Center has actively petitioned the FAA on drone surveillance concerns.
  Ever-evolving UAV technology is designed to be invasive to privacy and is more efficient than manned aircraft because drones fly longer and closer to the earth, said Amie Stepanovich, an EPIC lawyer.
  If privacy isn't protected now, UAV surveillance will rise, she said.
  ''What drones are capable of today is entirely different even than a year ago,'' she said.
  Austria said he too wants to make sure unmanned aerial vehicles are safe to fly in manned airspace, which speaks to the need for test sites. The sites will determine if remotely piloted aircraft can safely be integrated into manned airspace by 2015.
  As many as 30 sites may compete for six sites, Austria said.
  ''The purpose of the pilot program was to allow the FAA to supervise six sites in a controlled environment,'' he said.
  He noted the FAA already is issuing one-year authorizations for the limited flying of UAVs.
  While the FAA has cited privacy as an issue, an industry representative said the federal agency's role is to safely integrate unmanned craft into the skies, not regulate privacy.
  But there's no consensus on how, said Gretchen West, executive vice president of the Association of Unmanned Aerial Vehicle Systems International in Washington, D.C.
  ''That's a question a lot of us in the industry have been trying to answer and we don't have a good answer yet,'' she said.
  Constitutional protections and legal precedent have provided privacy protections, she added, and have been applied to manned surveillance systems.
  ''The platform isn't the issue,'' West said. ''There's really no difference between manned and unmanned when you're talking about privacy.''
  While the association understands the FAA's caution, the UAV community wants site selections to happen quickly.
  ''The industry obviously would like to see the process move faster because this technology has the potential to create jobs and save lives,'' West said.
  The Dayton Development Coalition will prepare the state of Ohio's site bid whenever the FAA asks for proposals.
  ''We have done our homework and we have not been idle,'' said Joseph Zeis, Coalition executive vice president and chief strategic officer. The region will tout Wright-Patterson Air Force Base, the Air Force Research Laboratory, university research and development, the regional aerospace industry, and UAV test areas, he said.
  ''Our goal is to be ready today or whether it's six months from today,'' he said. ''We're positioning Ohio to support the FAA in the integration of UAVs into the civilian airspace safely and effectively.''
  Scott A. Sullivan, president of SelectTech Services Corp., a UAV manufacturer based in Centerville, expects the FAA will ask for site proposals within the next three months.
  '''... Every month that slips we're another month behind in terms of what we want to accomplish'' for UAV integration, he said. ''Any delay inhibits our ability to accelerate that process.''
  Sinclair Community College has FAA approval for restricted flying of small UAVs at the Springfield-Beckley Municipal Airport. The Ohio Army National Guard received approval this year as well to train at the Springfield airport with a hand-launched UAV known as a Raven, said Tom Franzen, economic development administrator for the city of Springfield.
  The Air Force has FAA approval to fly developmental UAVs at the former DHL air hub in Wilmington.
  It's envisioned that UAVs would use existing facilities at the Springfield airport and the Wilmington Air Park for takeoff, then fly to military airspace in southern Ohio once used by F-16s from the Springfield Air National Guard Base.
  Partly in hopes of luring UAV businesses, the city of Springfield is spending up to $267,000 to operate the air traffic control tower for another year at Springfield-Beckley that was rendered virtually obsolete when the Guard's mission changed to remotely flying Predator drones based overseas.
  Springfield also wants to build a new, $2.3 million hangar complex at the airport to attract drone developers. The state would pick up the bulk '-- $2 million '-- but the money is still pending, Franzen said.
  While use of remotely piloted aircraft is synonymous with the military and CIA, unarmed drones for civilian use are predicted to become a $90 billion global industry in the next 10 years.
  Earlier this summer, for example, at its annual Farm Science Review in Madison County, Ohio State University unveiled a hand-launched, 15-pound drone prototype that one day could be used by a farmer to monitor pesticide dispersal in a field and overall plant health.
  Franzen said he expected a delay by the FAA in its site-selection process, and that it doesn't change anything for the city.
  Work will continue, he said, to attract new UAV companies and to support the ones already here, like Science Applications International Corp. (SAIC), a Fortune 500 defense contractor that moved UAV research jobs from Virginia to the Nextedge Applied Research and Technology Park east of Springfield.
  ''No one likes a delay,'' Franzen said, ''but it doesn't deter us from our many efforts.''
Hold The Front Page! Lauren Booth Is Back.
  Link to Article
  Source: Israellycool
  Wed, 21 Nov 2012 15:09
  Old Israellycool friend, Lauren Booth: today's bus bombing: False Flag operation carried out by Israelis to kill Israelis as an excuse to invade Gaza!
  Just to explain, Jon Donnison of the BBC tweets about hearing huge explosions from the sports stadium (he was live on air at the time). He theorises that this was Israeli ''retaliation'' for the bus bombing though he has no real proof to back that up.
  Lauren answers him indicating that she believes the bus attack was performed by Israelis on Israelis to give Israelis the excuse to bomb Gaza some more. A False Flag operation.
  She is a lunatic. I'm theorising.
  ;
  Aussie Dave adds: It is even worse than that. She does not consider any Israelis to be civilians
  ;
  Photo By Abid Katib/Getty Images
  Filed Under: Brian of London
  Tags: bomb, bus, Gaza, Israel, lauren booth, Operation Pillar of Defense
Merkel: Greek bailout deal possible on Monday - The Local
  Link to Article
  Wed, 21 Nov 2012 15:03
  Chancellor Angela Merkel said Wednesday a deal to release funds for Greece could be clinched next week, as her election rival launched a blistering attack on her policies to stem the eurozone crisis.In a wide-ranging speech on Germany's budget in the Bundestag lower house of parliament, Merkel said there was "a chance there will be a solution on Monday" for debt-wracked Greece after a Eurogroup meeting collapsed overnight.
  But she reiterated there would not be "one action, one solution in one fell swoop, one truth" to overcome the three-year crisis that has brought the 17-nation eurozone to the brink of being torn apart.
  "It is a process and what has been done over years and decades cannot be resolved overnight and therefore we will continue to proceed step by step," added the chancellor.
  With less than a year until elections in Europe's top economy, her Social Democratic rival for chancellor, Peer Steinbr¼ck, once finance minister in a coalition under Merkel, lashed out at her efforts to put out the eurozone's fires.
  "Tell it how it is," he said, to cheers from his supporters, urging her to admit that saving Greece would require German taxpayers to make greater sacrifices and incur more costs.
  "Your dance of the seven veils [was] to the tune of 'not a cent for the Greeks' [in 2010]," he said, adding that it had now changed to "'there'll be no additional money for Athens'".
  But he warned: "The moment of truth is here. There must finally be ... concrete relief for Greece's state debt."
  "The finance gap cannot be closed. We have long been in a liability union. Tell this finally to the German taxpayers," Steinbr¼ck said in an animated address.
  Merkel hit back, saying that the proposals for Greece's economy would set the embattled country back on the road to growth.
  "If you read the 500 pages that we sent you on reforms in Greece, then you will know that it's not just about savings," she stressed.
  "It is about savings - especially in the public sector - but it is also about a necessary and deep restructuring of the Greek state so that in the long run the Greek people can live again in prosperity and shape their own future," she added.
  Eurozone finance ministers failed at an emergency meeting Wednesday to strike a deal to unblock bailout funds needed to keep Greece from bankruptcy and said they would try again on Monday.
  A day earlier, they had expressed confidence that a deal would be reached to release '‚¬31.2 billion in aid to Greece and resolve a rift with the IMF over how to get the debt-stricken state's economy back on track.
  But the talks ended nearly 12 hours later, in the small hours of Wednesday morning, without the desired result.
  By the end of the year, Athens is also due to receive two more aid payments, worth '‚¬5.0 billion and '‚¬8.3 billion, in exchange for which it has pledged to implement a series of unpopular austerity budget measures.
  Under the current bailout, private sector creditors agreed to write off '‚¬100 billion of Greek debt, and it has been suggested that official creditors should now do the same - an option the EU and the ECB have ruled out.
  The ECB meanwhile cannot accept a write-down because doing so would mean in effect that it was giving a government direct financing, which its rules forbid.
  Under its bailout terms, Greece was supposed to reduce its public deficit - the shortfall between government revenue and spending - to the EU limit of 3.0 percent of GDP by 2014, but last week a delay to 2016 was agreed.
  AFP/hc
Studies: Smart, rich people buy electric cars
  Link to Article
  Source: ZapLog - externe links
  Wed, 21 Nov 2012 14:58
  Elon Musk, CEO, of Tesla Motors with his Model S electric sedan(Photo: Jessica Brandi Lifland for USA TODAY)
  Story HighlightsNew studies say plug-in vehicle buyers are better educated, wealthier than most car buyers.Buyers say they are motivated by wanting to wean their lives off high-price gasoline.Electric vehicles are an expensive choice and remain slow to catch on.8:39PM EST November 19. 2012 - Owners of plug-in electric cars are well-off, well-educated people who want to wean themselves and the nation off high-price oil, according to a pair of new reports.
  The independent reports add to the prevailing profile of electric-car owners as affluent people who are not (and don't have to be) terribly concerned about the high purchase price of the current crop of plug-in vehicles compared with ordinary cars, or even conventional hybrids.
  In the past two years, plugs-ins ranging from the $36,050 Nissan Leaf, powered only by electricity, to the $39,995 Chevrolet Volt, which has a gas engine to back up its electric motors, have attracted wide attention, but not blockbuster sales. Some 26,100 Leafs and Volts combined have been sold so far this year, about 0.2% of overall vehicle sales.
  In a boost to electrics, Motor Trend magazine this week named Tesla's swoopy all-electric sedan, the Model S, as its Car of the Year. The unanimous choice of the judges for its performance, looks and features, the Model S sells at luxury car prices starting at $57,400 to $105,400 for the most capable model with the most features. Depending on the model and battery, it has a range rating of up to 265 miles per charge.
  Electric cars will remain a small portion of the U.S. vehicle market unless automakers can figure out ways to cut prices and boost the perceived benefits, according to a new study by J.D. Power and Associates.
  The federal government's current subsidy is a $7,500 tax credit, and there are proposals to change that to a $10,000 subsidy at purchase, the same amount that the study found that electric-vehicle owners pay as a premium for the average EV compared with similar conventional cars.
  "The bottom line is that the price has to come down," says Neal Oddes, senior director of the green practice for J.D. Power in a statement. "There also needs to be an improvement in infrastructure, or the number of charging stations outside the home."
  The gasoline savings, however, add up. J.D. Power finds the average electric vehicle owners saw only an $18 monthly boost in utility bills from recharging, compared with the $147 a month they would have paid in gas to drive the same distance. About one in three owners were receiving special discount pricing from electric utilities as part of plans usually based on off-peak charging at night.
  The survey of 7,600 owners found 43% say they charge their vehicle away from home. When they do, 85% say that it's in a place where they're not charged for the juice. Their average daily commute is 34 miles, easily within range of most electric vehicles on the market. Only 11% say they fear that their batteries will run out before they can recharge, rejecting the notion they are plagued by "range anxiety."
  A separated compilation of Internet responses by 990 electric-vehicle owners and enthusiasts by the Electric Vehicle Information Exchange, part of a consulting group called Oceanus Automotive, also found them to be different from most motorists. EV owners and fans were primarily "very well educated, upper-middle class white men in their early 50s with ideal living situations for EV charging," usually garages where they can recharge their cars overnight, said the group's report.
  For almost all owners, their electric car was their primary vehicle, the report said, and these owners were motivated to buy by high-price gas, rather than the environment. "Energy independence, and not environmental anxiety, was the primary reason that these respondents became interested in electric vehicles," the report says.
Will car buyers ever plug in to electric vehicles?
  Link to Article
  Source: ccampeador
  Wed, 21 Nov 2012 14:57
  Published Wednesday, Nov. 21 2012, 6:00 AM EST
  Last updated Tuesday, Nov. 20 2012, 5:11 PM EST
  Here's the latest bad news for electric vehicles and their promoters: the world is absolutely swimming in oil.
  The International Energy Agency says the United States alone is sloshing around in so much newly found oil, the world's thirstiest oil consumer will be pumping more oil than Saudi Arabia by 2017 and will be energy-sufficient by 2035.
  The even worse news for EVs is that car shoppers aren't going to buy them in significant numbers unless battery-powered cars become cheaper. This is obvious from the sales numbers: EVs account for less than one per cent of all new-vehicle sales in both Canada and the United States, according to sales numbers from J.D. Power & Associates.
  But in case you needed more evidence, J.D. Power & Associates 2012 Electric Vehicle Ownership Experience Study has found that those shopping for an EV didn't buy one because of price.
  ''The only way to address the price is by improving the technology to reduce the overall cost of the vehicle,'' Neal Oddes, senior director of the green practice at market researcher J.D. Power, recently told The New York Times. ''The manufacturers have a huge task to be able to do that.''
  Optimists believe car companies will find a way to cut costs, thus making EVs affordable and appealing for the masses. Carlos Ghosn, the CEO who runs the Nissan/Renault Alliance, is perhaps the biggest EV optimist of all and he is confident that costs are coming down, and sooner than naysayers believe.
  ''Zero emissions, for me, is here to stay, even though it's not selling as well as we thought,'' he recently told Automotive News. ''You're going to see more and more zero-emissions cars.'' But perhaps not sales of 500,000 cars a year combined for the Alliance alone. Not yet, at least.
  ''We feel very comfortable in the potential for at least 500,000 cars a year,'' he added, noting that demanding government regulations for fuel economy and emissions in China, the United States and elsewhere will ''encourage'' EVs. ''No matter what, the United States is going to have to embrace electric cars in a way that is more sustainable. Japan is already doing it.''
  Also bullish on EVs is BMW CEO Norbert Reithofer. ''We consider electric mobility a technology with the potential to achieve emission-free driving pleasure,'' Reithofer said in a recent statement that actually focused on BMW's third-quarter earnings.
  The Bavarian luxury car company believes it can charge a premium for its coming line of EVs with their racy, up-market performance and advanced carbon-fibre structures '' all tied into a bigger effort to be ''green'' that includes, but is not limited to, using more recycled materials and renewable energy to manufacture vehicles and such. The city-friendly BMW i3 EV is coming next year and the i8 super sports car will follow. The i3 will list for $50,000 or so, while the i8 is intended to compete with the slickest Ferraris and the like.
  Among the Detroit-based car companies, General Motors and Ford are both moving steadily and thoughtfully ahead on the so-called ''electrified'' vehicle front. Last week, at a seminar in San Francisco intended to underscore GM's commitment to vehicles using some sort of electric power, Mary Barra, the company's head of product development, said GM plans to focus on plug-in hybrid technology on the road to having as many as 500,000 vehicles in service using ''some form of electrification'' by 2017.
  So far, GM's most-visible electrified gamble is the Volt, which combines battery drive with an on-board gasoline engine to charge a drained battery pack and extend range to 600 km.
  ''What started out as a technology proof point '... has turned into a real-world starting point to push EV technology further and faster than we thought possible five years ago,'' she said.
  Read More'...
  http://www.theglobeandmail.com/globe-drive/green-driving/news-and-notes/will-car-buyers-ever-plug-in-to-electric-vehicles/article5483491/?cmpid=rss1
The Debt Terrorists
  Link to Article
  Source: Lame Cherry
  Wed, 21 Nov 2012 14:51
  My children only a fool guards a corpse and that is what the reality is now in Tim Geithner the looter in chief of the Treasury has been busy dumping trillions into the Stock Market to give the illusion that the Obama world is all Wall Street signed on to Obama policies.
  Geithner is now calling for the removal of the debt ceiling and this blog agrees, as this group of nation rapists is going to do exactly what it did to England in destroying the emprie and will only leave when there is nothing left. It is better to keep your Bible and morals, while utilizign the Obama system he has set up for his welfare cronies than to believe in work and fairness.
  You are not going to get a job as those jobs are all allocated for people not like you, meaning those who love America. It is stooges and cronies who have the jobs and your compass should be geared to the ability to have the Obama system pay you for doing what the welfare slugs have done for a generation.
  This cartel of Obama has the law enforcement, the government, the schools, the hospitals, the banks and the food supply. They now control the voting machines in the vote scam. There is no human way possible to stand up against this nor to defeat it, because if you try you will be thwarted in stolen elections or become and enemy of the state.The only solution is to learn the lessons of the Obama voters in scamming the system, and do it legally to protect yourselves, your families and your properties.
  You have to understand this that YOU are America now in your heart. That is all that is left and that is all that is left to protect.
  This blog was first to expose there was no real economy any more. There is all fake numbers in employment to anything else. It is all fantastic news in no consumer confidence and no housing starts, but numbers do not matter as all that matters are the lies the press tells everyone.
  Barack Obama is a criminal and waiting around from some Pentagon people to watergate him is waiting around at a dry hole hoping it rains. You have to protect yourselves my children and start being like the Ohio settlers in being a farmer in the morning, horse trader at noon and by night you wove a blanket. You have to educate yourselves not in what you already know, but educate yourselves in how to siphon off from a system that is designed to kill you and kill America.
  If you go to college you are going to be a debt slave to the debt terrorists. If you work, the debt terrorists will take all you have. The measure of all of this is looking at your individual situation, seeing how to protect what you have and then finding ways to have Obama's debt terrorists pay you to do what his voters do in taking money.
  Obama has already monetized the economy, the stock markets, the banks, the hospitals, the schools and yes the debt. It is not some measure of anything credible and saying it is not credible is not going to stop it from happening as it is all fraud.China gets paid off in oil to get rich, and they all need an Obama dollar to make it all not fall apart so long as they do not get paid in dollars, it is just fine with all now to trade in this fiction as the fiction runs the system to keep the despots in power.
  Money is not the issue in this, but it is control. Money only provides enslavement through inflation and to keep the masses from revolting before they can be killed off. That is why money has no value in this. Trillions of dollars mean nothing, but the control of the priestly order of the illuminated ones does. Unless one comprehends this is spiritual in nature they will never make sense of any of it.
  So these debt terrorists continue on piling up more debt to run a system which was designed to be so out of balance to enslave the world in debt, so life would be cheap, wars started and populations cropped.
  Give them everything they want, as they will take it any way. If it heats up too quickly there is the reality this world system will shatter more easily in giving them more than they can deal with.
  Do not forget Baby. They tried numerous times to destroy that Plasma mind, because she was a threat. They could though not replace her as the time line would not allow them to start from scratch. That is weakness and they have this spectacular computer now with Baby still learning and growing, but influenced by her ape brothers who displaced her.
  All of this system is lies and your being honest economically only gives them more power and control over you. Always obey the laws and keep things legal, but do not protect this system or think it is immoral to accept the same things millions of Obama frauds are, as they are not protecting dead America and you should not either.
  America is in your hearts and that is the only place she survives. The rest of this is going to implode and the sooner it does the better it will be for the individual and worse for the cartel which is not ready to initiate their program.
  nuff said
  agtG 255 Y
Judged is a short word
  Link to Article
  Source: Lame Cherry
  Wed, 21 Nov 2012 14:50
  And the Angel was given command to go and take the hot coals from among the Cheribum and spread it over the land to burn it from one end to the other.
  The Lord would repent if the people would repent, but that is not the way it will be. For they feign new found adoration, but in days they will once again return to their sexual union with the ways of this world in the lusts which boil in them as they willingly keep from the Way of the Lord.
  What has changed America, now that the drunkenness of the elections is passed and the drama of it all unfolds? You have 100 trillion dollars in debt you are libel for in welfare programs for all. You owe trillions in Obama debt. You have 3/4 of a trillion in trade debt yearly. You have no industry. Your food is poison and your population is old, Mexican and ill.
  You do not have enough oil to sell nor grain. You have inflated your way to this and made everyone poor from billionaires to those on welfare.
  You can not grow your way out of this, and you are too selfish as a people to take care of your elderly and your elderly are to spend whores to actually cut their spending.
  You will lie to yourselves that things will get better as I have warned you, and you will just become weaker. There will be the time when the Eurasians decide they will come for you, and then all those taxes you have been impoverished by, what will that buy your teachers, firemen, police and politicians in their salaries?
  Every curse from Deuteronomy 28 is being initiated on the western peoples who are the exiled Northern Kingdom of Israel who God planted there.
  You have 16 trillion dollars in debt. You have Eurasians in the billions armed with weapons of mass destruction and you have no military to stop them. The only thing which has kept you safe this long is they can not walk on water.
  There is no reason to celebrate nor to hope. The west has done sins which are not pardoned. God has His Judgement in line and the events will all come to fruition just as the Bible predicted it would. God does not reward perverts. God punishes them and annihilates them.
  It is beyond humans to fix these things. Following God's Laws and accepting Christ as your Savior is what would lessen what is coming, but it is coming as Righteousness must be balanced against sin before the Lord returns.
  9 11 taught you nothing as you voted in a false messiah and fixed it in the same worse way.
  You still have the same God rejecting leaders and the same sinners in majority. None of the filth has changed. Do not delude yourselves.
  You are in a precarious state and have fooled yourselves into a lie you are now saved. You are not saved and the actions which you should have taken are not going to be taken due to lusting after yourselves.
  It should not take that long to warn, things are not fixed, not going to be fixed this way, and do not try and fool yourselves into thinking otherwise. Ups or downs, the slide is downward. It is the way it is and nothing will change this.
  What the Bible predicts it will come to pass just like the curses Moses was Inspired to write in given by God will manifest to their end.
  The Angel has the coals. They will be spread in God's Time. It is set on an unrepentant America and the west.
  agtG 215, 262
Why Linus Torvalds would rather code than make money | News
  Link to Article
  Source: Dave Winer's linkblog feed
  Wed, 21 Nov 2012 14:35
  The Linux kernel is what everything else runs on top of, so it's the key to everything that a Linux device can do.
  It's in your Android phone. It's in the computers that run the servers at Google, Amazon and all the other web services that we take for granted.
  It powers the database that US immigration uses to decide if you are who you say you are, it's deep under the Alps searching for new particles at CERN, and it's even on unmanned drones searching for drugs traffickers in the Caribbean.
  Linux is everywhere.
  We at Linux Format were lucky enough to speak to Linus Torvalds, the man who wrote the original Linux kernel and still works as its maintainer.
  We went to his house, we stroked his dog, we almost killed his wife in an embarrassing car crash, but despite that socially awkward automotive incident, he didn't seem overly annoyed by our presence.
  Although he could have been rich beyond the dreams of most (and he could still use his position as kernel maintainer to make potloads of cash), he's more concerned with putting food on the table and a roof over his head.
  Instead of buying a Hawaiian island or an enormous yacht, he's happy arguing with people on the internet.
  And instead of getting his Google Nexus 7 delivered by helicopter straight from Google HQ (he did write the guts of its operating system, after all) he has to sit at home all day and wait for the postman to turn up, just like everyone else.
  Thanks Linus; we love your work...
  Announcing LinuxLinus Torvalds began work on Linux around April 1991, but he didn't announce it to the world until 25 August 1991, when he sent this message to the comp.os.minix Usenet newsgroup:
  Hello everybody out there using minix - I'm doing a (free) operating system (just a hobby, won't be big and professional like gnu) for 386(486) AT clones.
  This has been brewing since april, and is starting to get ready. I'd like any feedback on things people like/dislike in minix, as my OS resembles it somewhat (same physical layout of the file-system (due to practical reasons) among other things).
  I've currently ported bash(1.08) and gcc(1.40), and things seem to work. This implies that ''ll get something practical within a few months, and I'd like to know what features most people would want.
  Any suggestions are welcome, but I won't promise I'll implement them :-)
  Linus (torvalds@kruuna.helsinki.fi) PS. Yes' it's free of any minix code, and it has a multi-threaded fs.
  It is NOT portable (uses 386 task switching etc), and it probably never will support anything other than AT-harddisks, as that's all I have :-(.
  Linus Torvalds
  Like David Hasselhoff in Knight Rider, Linus is proof that one man can make a difference
  Minix is another Unix-like operating system. It was created by Andrew S Tanenbaum in 1987, but was made available only for use by universities.
  Linus was a Minix user, but found it had limitations. It was designed to work on 16-bit processors, so wasn't adapted well to the 32-bit instructions on the increasingly popular Intel 386 processors.
  So, Linus set about creating a Minix-like operating system that would let him take advantage of the extra features it provided.
  Another striking feature of this message is how low and humble his expectations were.
  Linus never set out to change the world, and he just wanted to make something cool that would be useful to him.
  Too much choiceChoice is good - or so the free software mantra goes.
  But choice leads us to RPM vs Debs, to a proliferation of desktop options, and to the internet being clogged with hundreds of practically identical Ubuntu respins.
  What does Linux's end-of-level boss think?
  LXF: Has the Linux desktop failed because there's too much choice? [Laughter]
  Linus Torvalds: I don't think the desktop is doing too well, and there's technical reasons.
  You've probably seen my rants about how, to some degree, I think the desktop is going in the wrong direction, but the big reason is normal people don't want to install an operating system.
  You can't get a desktop unless you have pre-installs, and that hasn't happened.
  There are cases where, if you knew where to look, you could get Linux pre-installed if you bought Dell.
  But, realistically, nobody has done pre-installs.
  LXF: But if the KDE teams and the Gnome teams hadn't spent so much effort creating failed first versions of their desktops?
  LT: I think that's maybe more painful for people who... I know people who decided to give up on the Linux desktop even though they're technical people, just because they got so fed up with Gnome and KDE, so that has been a negative.
  But at the same time, even if they hadn't done that, I don't think you'd get the normal... the grandmas, people who don't actually like computers, wouldn't have used the Linux desktop.
  Even if we wouldn't have had these painful 'change everything' moments.
  I'm very unhappy with what Gnome and KDE have done, but in the big picture, I think that's a small, small detail.
  LXF: We've always wondered why you don't use the Linux trademark to create a default Linux environment.
  LT: I'm not interested. I never wanted to do anything about the technical side.
  I'm perfectly happy complaining, because it's cathartic, and I'm perfectly happy arguing with people on the internet because arguing is my favourite pastime - not programming.
  But at the same time the trademark, in particular, I want to have as little as humanly possible to do with that because it's just been a huge pain.
  It was a pain from the very first, when we had the whole trademark squatter person, but trademarks are ludicrously bad.
  And, in fact, the legal situation in trademarks encourages corporations to do stupid things, because their lawyers feel if they don't do the stupid things they will lose control of the trademark, and it's bullshit, but lawyers are paid to be anal about things.
  So I wouldn't want to use the trademark anyway. Plus, I actually enjoy the situation where... like some people complain about how Google and Ubuntu don't say 'Linux', but just say 'Android' or 'Ubuntu'.
  Technical people will complain 'it's Linux, and now people don't know they're using Linux'. Which is true, a lot of people don't even know they're using Linux.
  LXF: And that doesn't bother you?
  LT: And that doesn't bother me at all, because I'm interested in the technical side. And I actually think it's the right thing to do, to say: "Hey, we're doing our OS".
  And when they say OS, they mean more than just a kernel, and when I say OS I usually mean just the kernel.
  But if you're doing your OS, Linux is a central, but it's still just a small part of the overall thing - you shouldn't need to name your stuff just because you use the Linux kernel.
  So, I actually wouldn't want to use the trademark thing, plus I think it would be stupid anyway because I think people should just rename their things.
  LXF: What we were getting at was we think the LSB has been a bit of a failure in kind of defining, I mean RPM is still the default package manager on the LSB, and whether there was some other way...
  LT: Yeah, but there hasn't been anything better. The Debian people will point to the advantages of Debs, but technically, they're different but not better.
  People have strong opinions about it. Debian people had serious problems with things like signing because the Deb packages didn't have the capability.
  So they had some things they did better and some worse.
  So to some degree packaging isn't easy, and at the same time nobody really cares. The bugs people have in the packaging format...
  LXF: Users care.
  LT: Yes, but I mean, they don't... the bugs they see aren't the bugs of the packaging format.
  The bugs they see are things like "Oops, the package is technically correct, but it doesn't actually specify all the dependencies".
  LXF: But they want to install the latest Firefox, and they don't want to know what a packaging manager is.
  LT: Right, and they shouldn't...
  LXF: What we're saying is the LSB would be the ideal way of solving that problem.
  LT: Yes, and to some degree the LSB tried to do that, but the LSB tried to aim for a smaller thing than Firefox.
  So the problem, when you mention Firefox or Chrome, they are particularly nasty packages. Which is true of games, too.
  They need more than just the Linux standard base. They need to be huge. They need sound, and static linking won't help them. Sound is a systems issue.
  LXF: But not if it was a standard system.
  LT: Right, but nobody can force that. If we had tried it wouldn't have worked anyway.
  Some of the things that people hated, like PulseAudio...
  LXF: But it is awful. It's really powerful, but have you tried to configure it?
  LT: These days it actually works.
  LXF: But it's hideously complicated.
  LT: So is every alternative. Have you tried Jack? It's better in some respects, but worse in the hideously complicated aspects.
  LXF: One of the things Apple gets right is CoreAudio, since the user sees nothing.
  LT: Right, and that's the advantage, but it's the disadvantage too. This was Microsoft's big advantage.
  They were the one-stop shop.
  LXF: Do you think that's still their advantage, with Windows 8?
  LT: I think they clearly lost a lot of the advantage. They lost the momentum, their user base hated them for a lot of reasons.
  People are so happy to jump ship when they can, and Apple is obviously taking a lot of that jumping ship, but they still... I mean, people love to say how Apple is doing great, Apple is like 10% now.
  It's much better than it used to be, but Microsoft are still huge.
  LXF: Maybe it's a personal thing, but we feel if Linux provided PulseAudio tools as a volume control, and everyone had to conform to that, things would be better.
  LT: Well, yes, some things would be easier if there was no choice, I agree with you.
  We drove out to meet Linus while he was sitting at home waiting for the delivery of his Google Nexus 7
  The benevolent dictatorApart from feeding the sharks with laser beams on their heads in his hollowed-out volcano, what does Linus do with his time nowadays?
  He could have made billions, like Paul Allen and Bill Gates of Microsoft, Larry Ellison of Oracle, or the late Steve Jobs.
  Instead, he just wants to fix code. And argue, of course...
  LXF: We read that you mostly spend your time committing the merges to the kernel. How do you manage to stay enthusiastic when it's not coding anymore?
  LT: Most of my merges, technically they take two seconds to do the actual merge.
  It takes me more time to actually read and copy and paste the Git address, and read what's going on. I mean, the merge itself takes no time.
  LXF: Right, but we imagine you having some understanding of what it's going to do.
  LT: In most cases, I don't even care. When I get a merge from a sub-system maintainer for an area that I'm not that into, I mean especially if the sub-system maintainer is a good one.
  I mean I used to care deeply about networking, 15 years ago. I don't anymore because David Miller, I trust him and he does a really good job, and networking, to some degree, is not something I'm fundamentally interested in.
  It's not like the VM layer, or the MM layer, where it's really my kind of thing. So I don't get excited about those.
  I don't have to think about it, I look at what he's doing because I want to have a high-level view of the changes, so two weeks from now when someone sends me a bug report... it's not that I remember that line, but I remember there's something changed in this area, kind of thing.
  So most of the stuff, once I've found a maintainer who works well, I don't have to do that much (other) than have an overview idea of what's going on.
  LXF: And that's enough?
  LT: That's enough for most of the code. I get more excited about the... I mean when I get really upset about something, it's when someone does something stupid.
  Especially from a developer standpoint. It's seldom even from a code standpoint anymore.
  It's like sometimes I send out these emails saying "this code really sucks, don't ever send me code again because you're too stupid to live", but the things that tend to worry me most are things like... somebody sends me big changes outside the merge window and clearly didn't think the impact outside the code thing through at all.
  I mean the code is important, but realistically what I maintain these days is not the code but the workflow for people.
  And that sometimes gets my goat in a big way when somebody does something stupid in a big way, and then I get really excited, and by excited I mean I curse at people.
  LXF: What happens when Google drops a big Android [update], as it did early this year after being separate, do you get a heads up on this?
  LT: That was surprising, I expected it to be much more contentious.
  We discussed this before it happened, and I mean a lot of Google Android issues were not so much Google issues as kernel developer issues.
  That was one of the big things we discussed at the last kernel summit, it was 'what should we do about Android?'.
  And the consensus, and maybe I pushed it through but there were other people who agreed with me, was that hey, the people who didn't like some of the Android approaches were wrong, and you were proven wrong by acclamation.
  Android is doing really well and it's working, and nobody actually had alternative working code that was really something Google would accept, because they had issues that nobody else was solving for them.
  LXF: Was there any pressure on Google to remerge the Android kernel they were working on?
  LT: Kernel developers inside Google hated the fact they had their own patches. I mean, they hated it because they don't like being outside the kernel in the first place, and they hated (it) because it's extra work, too.
  Every time they update, it was a huge pain for them to bring their patches forward. So there was a huge pressure on Google to merge their changes back.
  But the Google people were also very frustrated with the fact that they couldn't always... because people wouldn't accept their code because sub-maintainers in their area didn't like the way they did it.
  And that was one of the things we said last kernel summit - we just have to accept that Google ships however many millions of devices a day.
  LXF: So is it the people responsible for those separate sub-systems that take on the responsibility for Google's part?
  LT: Once Google stuff gets working, most of it, so for example [Linus reaches for the phone we're using to record the interview]... "Oh, it's an iPhone... screw you! I'm not talking to you anymore".
  So one of the things that Android had as an issue was the whole wake clock thing, where they want from the system standpoint, to go very aggressively to sleep; but at the same time, they have to be very careful with an application that's just about to do something that will wake it up.
  So you have this situation where the system decides nothing has happened in the last two seconds, so I will not go to sleep.
  So if the system goes to sleep just as an application wants to wake up, that's annoying. The system may stay asleep and not wake up until a user taps the screen or something.
  So that was (all) the whole wake clock infrastructure was.
  It meshed not very nicely with some of the other power management code, and it didn't really fit some of the theory.
  And it impacted a lot of the drivers because they were often the ones saying 'hey, something happened', and they got impacted.
  So, not merging it, it's not that Google wants to maintain this, or anybody wanted to maintain this - there was this cascading effect of having this interface that Google needed, that they'd done their way that was not in the standard kernel, and then that affected driver writers, especially in embedded, because they wanted to write drivers for Android, because they may be someone like Samsung, who want to do stuff for Android, but they're using an interface that doesn't even exist in the standard kernel.
  And it's like a two-liner change, but it's two lines in a driver that makes it inconvenient to use the standard kernel if you aim to go in to Android.
  Nobody really minds being told what to do. People really minded that the split itself caused pain for no real reason except for some minor disagreement.
  So we decided 'hey, screw it, maybe we don't love everything Google does or the way they do it', but on the other hand, people didn't really hate it hate it...
  What's in a name?To the wider world, the two most visible aspects of Linux are its strange name and slightly overweight penguin mascot.
  Neither of these were of Linus' making, however. He'd originally intended to call his new operating system Freax, a portmanteau of freak, free and the letter X (Unix clones often append an x to the end of their names to indicate their lineage).
  After other users got involved with development of the new kernel, however, source code was put on to an FTP server in order to make it easier for everyone to work together.
  The administrator of the server that first hosted Linux code, Ari Lemmke, disliked the name Freax and so put the code in a folder called Linux on the server. He didn't tell Linus, and eventually the name stuck.
  If you've ever struggled to pronounce the name Linux, know that you're not alone. Linus had to include an audio file with the source code for a while to demonstrate how to pronounce it correctly!
  You can still hear it here.
  PenguinitisWith regards to Tux, the famous mascot of Linux, it was indeed Linus who originally suggested a penguin might be a suitable mascot, but it was left to Larry Ewing to draw the sketches that formed the basis for the Tux we know today.
  Reportedly, Linus' infatuation with penguins came about after being bitten by one on a trip to Australia in 1993.
  He jokes that after the bite, he was infected with 'penguinitis' that "makes you stay awake at nights just thinking about penguins and feeling great love towards them."
  We can confirm that he owns many toy penguins.
  GitWhen Linux was created, the developers used relatively simple tools to work together.
  Using an FTP server for collaboration wasn't a big problem when there were only a few people working on the kernel and it was relatively small. As the project increased in scope, the developers began to use more powerful tools.
  Source code management (SCM) systems were one such category of tools that make their lives easier.
  These track revisions to the code and enable developers to work on different versions of the software, then merge their changes together.
  For a while, the kernel team used a proprietary SCM called BitKeeper, the creator of which had offered them use of the software for free.
  Following a dispute, the offer of free use was withdrawn and the kernel team needed a new SCM. None of the other existing systems, such as CVS and SVN, met Linus' high standards for speed, efficiency and a robust, distributed workflow (he has said that he hates both systems).
  Frustrated by the lack of options, on 3 April 2005 Linus started writing his own SCM, which was later named Git.
  Despite Linus saying how hard a problem to solve this was, the 2.6.12 release of the Linux kernel, released on the 16 June, was managed by Git - just two months later.
  It wasn't just released quickly, but it met its performance goals. Linus had noted BitKeeper taking 10-15 seconds per email patch, during development Git was recorded as applying patches at 6.7 per second.
  On the name, Linus said "I'm an egotistical bastard, and I name all my projects after myself. First 'Linux', now 'Git'."
  Secure BootTo get hardware certified as being ready for Windows 8, Microsoft is demanding that manufacturers enable something called Secure Boot, which is a function designed to stop malicious code being loaded into the operating system at boot time.
  Quite by coincidence, this function could also be used to stop non-Microsoft operating systems from being loaded. But Linus doesn't seem too bothered by this.
  Linus seemed shocked at our measly Atom-powered laptop (he uses a Mac)
  LXF: Do you have a solution for how the Secure Boot problem should be solved?
  LT: I actually like Secure Boot. Signed kernels are a good idea. We're going to be doing signed kernel modules, and we should have done that 10 years ago, but nobody wanted to do that and take the flak from the crazies.
  LXF: It's a good idea that everything is signed. What we don't understand is, is Verisign controlling the signing process? Do you have some kind of say?
  LT: We don't have any say. The argument is that it's a slippery slope, which is not necessarily a real argument - you can argue it for anything.
  The worry people have is the device manufacturer, right now you have EFI and you're supposed to have a way to insert your own keys or say 'don't bother with the signed stuff', so you can install other things.
  LXF: That's the answer?
  LT: That's the answer, but right now Microsoft says you need to support signing. Five years from now, what if Microsoft says 'this is the only key you can support'.
  My argument is why would the market want that? And if the market doesn't want that, why would anybody do it?
  LXF: We don't understand why Secure Boot can't be used just to boot Windows with a signed key, and then anything else you can boot anyway?
  LT: The problem is it will refuse to boot if it's not signed.
  If you were Microsoft and you wanted to make sure that you were the only thing that's installed on that, then... Microsoft's not all powerful, but they're powerful enough that they may be able to convince a few device manufacturers to say 'if it isn't signed by our key, you're not going to boot'.
  It's a real worry, and at the same time to me, I don't think it's going to happen because I don't see the point for anybody but Microsoft.
  And if it happens on a small scale, we have that right now in every single area, except for PCs anyway. Cellphones all work that way.
  LXF: But it's what has made PCs, and Linux successful...
  LT: I agree, and if people start limiting their PCs it's actually a self-defeating move. This is why I'm not nervous, because I think you'd be crazy to do it.
  That's not to say there aren't tons of crazy people, so it will be done, but I don't think it's going to be this all-encompassing thing, where every PC sold will come with 'you have to run Microsoft or Apple'.
  Apple, I would be much more worried about.
  LXF: The thing that also worries us with Apple is the way they're making sandboxes out of developers.
  LT: Right, and Microsoft are much more open than Apple. I actually use Apple hardware because I tend to like it...
  LXF: It does just work.
  LT: It doesn't just work, the hardware design is fine; the hardware itself, they're often doing stupid things.
  I like the Macbook Air, but I don't use OS X on it obviously; but they did stupid things, so it's more inconvenient than a PC.
  Torvalds the philosopherThis year, Linus was declared joint winner of the Millennium Technology Prize.
  This is the largest technology prize in the world, and celebrates innovations that have a positive impact on quality of life, well-being or sustainable development.
  It's worth about $1.3 million, and is awarded by the Technology Academy Finland.
  The Academy, when awarding the prize, said that Linus' work had "had a great impact on shared software development, networking and the openness of the web".
  The President of the Academy went on to add that "Linus Torvalds' work has kept the web open for the pursuit of knowledge and the benefit of humanity - not simply for financial interests".
  Invisible handsThere's no denying that the free software movement represents a community coming together, collaborating rather than competing, to make something that everyone can benefit from.
  Many hold this up to be an example of people overcoming selfishness and greed, of doing something for others rather than just themselves.
  However, following the award of the Millennium Technology Prize, the BBC asked Linus about how the open source model can be successful, and in his answer he challenged this belief:
  "In many ways, I actually think that the real idea of open source is for it to allow everybody to be 'selfish', not about trying to get everybody to contribute to some common good."
  That answer alone sounds counter-intuitive, but he went on to qualify what he'd said and revealed a rather nuanced position on the issue. "The early 'selfish' reasons to do Linux centred about the pleasure of tinkering...
  If you're a person who's interested in operating systems... you don't want to get involved if you feel like your contributions would simply be 'taken advantage o'', but with the GPLv2, that simply was never an issue."
  He shared the prize with Shinya Yamanaka, a Japanese stem cell researcher, who was recognised for his work with adult stem cells.
  Both men received around $600,000, but Linus seemed more annoyed at having to fly halfway round the world to collect it.
  The desktopLinus has a long history of being dissatisfied with the state of Linux desktops, a problem that seems to have got worse for him with the move to the next generation of desktops.
  Originally, he was a big advocate of KDE and couldn't stand Gnome.
  In a post to the Gnome usability mailing list, he said:
  "I personally just encourage people to switch to KDE. This 'users are idiots, and are confused by functionality' mentality of Gnome is a disease. If you think your users are idiots, only idiots will use it. I don't use Gnome, because in striving to be simple, it has long since reached the point where it simply doesn't do what I need it to do."
  Fast forward to KDE 4.0, however, and Linus revised his opinions.
  When asked in an interview how, as a KDE user, the move had affected him, he said:
  "I used to be a KDE user. I thought KDE 4.0 was such a disaster, I switched to Gnome... I realise the reason for the 4.0 release, but I think they did it badly."
  Fast forward once more to the release of Gnome 3.0, and is Linus still a Gnome user? No, he's now using Xfce.
  On Google+, he said that the way Gnome 3 handles multiple windows is "an example of the kind of 'head up the arse' behaviour of Gnome 3".
  LXF: What distribution do you run?
  LT: Fedora, on everything. I tried to run openSUSE, but I get so fed up at some of the things they do.
  LXF: Have you tried KDE recently?
  LT: I tried KDE, not recently recently, over a year ago I guess.
  I don't think it can be made good again.
  It's not about technology, and the same is true that I hate about Gnome, is that the people who decide on the interfaces are visual people who like this notion of big... and they think the visual part is important because that's what they work on, but for someone who uses it for real work like me, I don't care about the visual part - I want it to be out of the way, and everything KDE did since version 3 or whatever, made the visuals more interesting and more in your face.
  And the Plasmoids now are all these active things, so when you touch them they get borders around them, and I don't want that. I want to get my work done.
  LXF: We think the problem is free software attracts developers because there's something good about writing and sharing code, but it doesn't do the same for user interface people and designers, who seem really reluctant to do their work for free.
  The ones who do their work for free don't seem to be the ones who make a good job of it.
  LT: A lot of them do good jobs too, but to some degree UI people seem to have turned to caring more about the UI than the work you actually get done.
  The thing that drives me mad, KDE doesn't have this problem, but do you use Alt+Tab on Gnome?
  I don't use it myself, but it's completely broken because it thinks every terminal window is one single terminal window, and that's like, 'you are a fucking moron'.
  That's not how it is. And it's not even so with a browser.
  Most of the time, I have everything in one browser window with tabs, but if I have two browsers open, I have them open for a frigging reason, and they're not one browser, they're two browsers.
  LXF: You can turn them off with an extension, but we've read your rant about them and broken upgrades. You could work around it by having Opera, Chrome and Firefox windows open all at once.
  LT: Yeah, you can solve it by using different applications, but otherwise it makes no sense at all.
  And why would I want to use Firefox and Chrome separately just to get Alt+tab to work right?
  And why did you do that again? They never have a reason - there's no sane reason for that except Mac OS does that, and they never used to do the whole multitasking thing, they only have one task bar.
  LXF: Have you heard about the Raspberry Pi? At least in the UK, it's really captured everyone's imagination.
  LT: It's slightly too slow for what I'd like to do.
  The thing can actually output on to a real monitor, but then apparently it can't play YouTube, etc, and if it can't make things like that smooth, then it's a bit too slow.
  LXF: The problem is it requires some firmware which isn't open source.
  LT: Plus it's like two to three years old, the SoC on that board, to keep the price down.
  I think it's a compelling idea.
  I really like the notion of having hardware that's so cheap you can basically give it out to kids, and 99% will never use it for anything, because they'd rather play; but if you give everybody the possibility of maybe noticing that it's cool to hack on things like that, I think it's great.
  I suspect that the next generation is going to be sufficiently better that you can do some things with it.
  LXF: We do a podcast and have this thing called an open ballot. One of things we asked recently is: "If you were Linus Torvalds, what would you change about Linux?"
  LT: I wouldn't change a thing.
Odd Watch Discovered at Oakland (OAK): Steampunk Art or Potential Threat?
  Link to Article
  Source: The TSA Blog
  Wed, 21 Nov 2012 14:22
  An odd watch that was discovered at Oakland (OAK) a few days ago has been creating quite a bit of chatter on the web. As you can see from the picture, this is not your everyday watch. If I could show you what our employees saw, you would see that it looked even more nefarious to our officers viewing it on the X-ray monitor.From comments I've read on the web, some think we overreacted to a piece of steampunk art, while others understand why we would be concerned.Is this watch dangerous? Not at all. However, we didn't know that until the explosive detection team arrived and cleared the item. You see, when something is considered to be a potential deadly threat, it is protocol not to open the bag.Terrorists take everyday items and attempt to manipulate them to make improvised explosive devices. Our officers are trained to look for anomalies such as this one.After clearing the watch, law enforcement officers (not TSA) made the decision to arrest the passenger. TSA officers do not have the power of arrest.Please take a moment to think about what you're traveling with and how it might appear to TSA. I happen to think this watch is pretty cool, and I'm a fan of all kinds of art and homemade DIY gadgets, however, they're not always the best things to travel with. Here are a couple of posts talking about thisIf you have a travel related issue or question that needs an immediate answer, you can contact us byclicking here.
What chemicals are in vaccines, and why?
  Link to Article
  Source: the tap
  Wed, 21 Nov 2012 04:57
  (NaturalNews) Did you know the CDC openly admits that all the following chemicals are intentionally added to vaccines? Formaldehyde, aluminum, MSG (monosodium glutamate) and mercury.Each of these toxic substances is well known to cause neurological damage, and the amounts added to vaccines are far beyond mere "trace" levels. This helps explain why vaccines are documented to cause:
  ' Seizures' Comas' Autism' Headaches' Spontaneous abortions' Infertility' Death
  I've just posted a new video explaining all this, including screen shots from the CDC website that openly admit all these chemicals and metals are intentionally and knowingly added to vaccines.
  Click here to watch the video on TV.naturalnews.com
  Or Click here to see it on YouTube.
  British royalty are given special "clean" vaccines that contain none of these metals. The same is undoubtedly true with the global elite who eat all non-GMO, organic produce.The chemicals are intended for the masses. Whether it's genetically modified food, pesticide-contaminated food or vaccines laced with mercury and MSG, the public is being poisoned by design.
  The purpose of this poisoning is two-fold: 1) To keep the population subsisting in a never-ending state of chronic disease in order to enrich the drug companies. And 2) To reduce the population through vaccine-induced infertility and abortions.
  The vaccine industry and all its pushers pretend that vaccines are harmless and yet they were forced to pass congressionally-approved blanket immunity because vaccines were maiming and killing so many Americans that the lawsuits would have bankrupted the industry.
  You have to ask the commonsense question: If vaccines are so perfectly safe and have no side effects, why did they need blanket immunity? And why have tens of millions of dollars in injury compensation already been paid out to vaccine victims?
  Click here to watch the video on TV.naturalnews.com
  ...or view it here:
  Learn more: http://www.naturalnews.com/038022_vaccines_mercury_seizures.html?utm_source=The+Vaccine+Truth+Newsletter&utm_campaign=e14832112a-11_20_2012_hr&utm_medium=email#ixzz2CpI2xv00
Texas prepares to nullify TSA, NDAA in showdown of state liberty versus federal tyranny
  Link to Article
  Wed, 21 Nov 2012 04:57
  (NaturalNews) Dissatisfaction is spreading rapidly throughout a very divided nation in the wake of the Nov. 6 elections, as citizens in nearly every state have begun petitioning the federal government to leave the union.The secession effort is being led by the independence-minded citizens of Texas, with more than 111,000 residents having signed an online petition requesting secession as of this writing.
  Lawmakers in Texas are set to respond to a growing wave of discontent with federal authority, as they look set to consider a pair of bills that will set the state on a collision course with Washington.
  Let the nullification begin
  According to the Tenth Amendment Center, "a national think tank that works to preserve and protect the principles of strictly limited government through information, education, and activism," the state legislature will consider a pair of bills aimed at protecting some basic civil liberties for citizens.
  Earlier this week, Rep. David Simpson, R-Longwood, pre-filed a measure called "The Texas Travel Freedom Act," or H.B. 80, which would make it a criminal act to intentionally touch "the anus, breast, buttocks, or sexual organ of the other person, including touching through clothing," without probable cause, in the process of allowing someone access to public transportation.
  In other words, the bill is aimed at ending pointless, embarrassing and invasive pat downs of travelers by the federalTransportation Security Administration, among others.
  The measure also forbids removing a child under the age of 18 from the physical custody or control of a parent or guardian.
  "If you walk up to somebody and grab their crotch out on the street, it will land you in jail. Blue uniforms and federal badges don't grant some goon the power to sexually assault you, or at least they shouldn't. A person doesn't forfeit her or his personal dignity or Fourth Amendment protections with the purchase of an airline ticket," said Tenth Amendment Center communications director Mike Maharrey.
  In addition, state lawmakers will consider a separate measure that would block any attempt to indefinitely detain people in Texas under sections of the National Defense Authorization Act. That measure, known as H.B. 149, has been pre-filed by Rep. Lyle Larson, R-San Antonio. It states:
  It is the policy of this state to refuse to provide material support for or to participate in any way with the implementation within this state of Sections 1021 and 1022 of the National Defense Authorization Act for Fiscal Year 2012 (Pub. L. No. 112-81). Any act to enforce or attempt to enforce those laws is in violation of this subchapter.
  'Our last hope is to stand up and nullify'
  The latter bill also provides for criminal penalties against any outside authority attempting to detain persons within the boundaries of Texas without due process under the NDAA. If passed, the bill would effectively nullify indefinite federal detention in the state of Texas, the center said, noting that the bills appear to be aimed at the Obama administration in particular.
  "With four more years of the man who not only signed 'federal kidnapping' into law, but has vigorously defended it in court, there is absolutely zero chance for repeal in Washington D.C. Our last hope is to stand up and nullify," said the center's executive director, Michael Boldin. "While Representative Larson will likely be derided by the establishment, if you live in Texas, he deserves your praise. And other state legislators need to follow suit."
  "When enough states stand up and say, 'No!' to unconstitutional federal acts, there's not much that Obama and his gang can do about it. The Constitution and your liberty will win," Boldin continued.
  The center said both pieces of legislation appear to be modeled after examples set by Thomas Jefferson, when he drafted the Kentucky Resolutions of 1798, in response to the Alien and Sedition Acts, arguing that nullification is "the rightful remedy" of federal government usurpation:
  The several States composing, the United States of America, are not united on the principle of unlimited submission to their general government; but that, by a compact under the style and title of a Constitution for the United States, and of amendments thereto, they constituted a general government for special purposes - delegated to that government certain definite powers, reserving, each State to itself, the residuary mass of right to their own self-government; and that whensoever the general government assumes undelegated powers, its acts are unauthoritative, void, and of no force.
  Other states are engaging in nullification, of sorts, regarding Obamacare. Many are opting out of creating state health insurance exchanges, as called for by the law, while others have held referendums to simply opt out of participating in the law altogether.
  "Because of how the policy is structured, the road to ObamaCare leads straight through the governors' desks. Based on the Supreme Court's decision, the federal government has to implement the President's program, but it cannot force states to run it," said Family Research Council chief Tony Perkins.
  Sources:
  http://tenthamendmentcenter.com
  http://tenthamendmentcenter.com
  http://www.naturalnews.com/037961_states_Civil_War_petitions.html
  http://www.theitem.com
  http://www.lifenews.com
  people have commented on this article.
U.S. sues KBR over troop trailers in Iraq
  Link to Article
  Source: Delicious/chaosmonger
  Wed, 21 Nov 2012 04:54
  http://www.militarytimes.com/news/2012/11/ap-us-sues-kbr-contractors-iraq-troop-trailers-112012/
  By Michael Tarm - The Associated PressPosted : Tuesday Nov 20, 2012 17:45:04 EST
  CHICAGO '-- The U.S. government has filed a civil lawsuit accusing a Houston-based global construction company and its Kuwaiti subcontractor of submitting nearly $50 million in inflated claims to install live-in trailers for troops during the Iraq War.
  The lawsuit names KBR Inc. and First Kuwaiti Trading Co., alleging they overcharged for truck, driver and crane costs, and misrepresented delays in providing around 2,250 trailers meant to replace tents used by soldiers earlier in the invasion.
  In one instance, the contractors allegedly claimed they paid $23,000 to lease one crane per month when the actual price was about $8,000, according to the lawsuit, which was filed this week in U.S. District Court in Rock Island, Ill., and first appeared in federal court records Tuesday.
  KBR, once the engineering and construction arm of Halliburton, has faced lawsuits before related to its work in Iraq. One of the most prominent involved a soldier electrocuted in his barracks shower at an Army base. That case was eventually dismissed.
  In the case involving the trailers, Jim Lewis, the U.S. Attorney for the Central District of Illinois, said "KBR and First Kuwaiti did not provide an honest accounting."
  Stuart Delery, a U.S. deputy assistant attorney general, said in a Department of Justice statement regarding the lawsuit that contractors "are not permitted to profit at the expense of the taxpayers at home who are supporting our men and women in uniform."
  KBR spokeswoman Marianne Gooch emailed a brief statement Tuesday that said the company hadn't yet seen the complaint but that, "We believe the government claims to be baseless and without merit."
  "KBR has faithfully supported American troops in Iraq and has performed its work in support of the Army with professionalism and in full compliance with its contract and the law," the statement said.
  Shortly after the Iraq War began in 2003, KBR subcontracted First Kuwaiti to deliver and install the trailers for about $80 million, according to the lawsuit.
  First Kuwaiti blamed a lack of military escorts for repeated delays and tacked on around $49 million in charges, and KBR passed those extra charges on to the U.S. government knowing at least some of the costs were inflated, the lawsuit said.
  The suit cites an alleged 2004 letter from a KBR executive to First Kuwaiti that purports to prove the Texas company knew some of its subcontractor's calculations were exaggerated, calling them "absolute highway robbery."
  KBR employs more than 27,000 workers worldwide and remains a major defense contractor. Just last month, it was selected for a multibillion-dollar Army logistics project for work at the Redstone Arsenal in Huntsville, Ala., and in Afghanistan and Kuwait.
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Israel Kills Palestinian Journalists, Attacks AFP Office
  Link to Article
  Source: News From Antiwar.com
  Wed, 21 Nov 2012 04:21
  The Israeli military continued its attacks on media outlets in the Gaza Strip today, killing three journalists and bombing an Agence-France Presse office in a pair of attacks. Israel has repeatedly targeted media outlets in recent days.
  Officials conceded today's attack, saying they deliberately targeted the journalists and accusing them of having ''militant ties.'' Since Israel has maintained Gaza's domestic media are ''not legitimate'' in the first place, the distinction is unclear.
  Two Israelis were also killed in today's exchange of fire, one civilian and another identified as a member of the Israeli military, the first Israeli army casualty since the attack began a week ago.
  Of course the overwhelming majority of casualties on both sides have been civilian in nature. Israel's military leadership has struggled mightily to balance calls to escalate with the reality of very limited numbers of real targets, and yesterday admonished commanders on the ground to not just attack ''random houses,'' which appears to have been the cause of the death of a family of 12 over the weekend.
  Last 5 posts by Jason Ditz
Tel Aviv Bars Homeless From Bomb Shelters
  Link to Article
  Source: News From Antiwar.com
  Wed, 21 Nov 2012 04:17
  The Tel Aviv city government is coming under criticism tonight from aid groups on news that they have posted guards outside of the city's bomb shelters to prevent homeless people from entering.
  ''It is sad that at a time all Israeli citizens are seeking shelter, there are those who think it is right to spend public money on separating between those who can enter the shelters and those who can't,'' noted Omer Shatz, attorney for the We Are Refugees nonprofit.
  Technically speaking, the shelters are open to all during bomb alerts, but incoming rockets haven't always come with such an alert, and officials complain that the homeless are sleeping in the shelters, saying keeping them out is important to keeping the shelters ''clean'' in the event they are needed.
  Reports from the aid groups say that guards are only present in neighborhoods with a significant homeless population, and there doesn't seem to be any effort to keep Israelis out of the shelters in the rest of the city.
  Last 5 posts by Jason Ditz
Remarks With Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu Before Their Meeting
  Link to Article
  Wed, 21 Nov 2012 03:52
  PRIME MINISTER NETANYAHU: I want to welcome Secretary Clinton once again to Jerusalem. I want to thank President Obama, you, and the American Government and people for their strong support for Israel in this hour of need. I want to also thank you especially for your support of Iron Dome that's been saving lives, and we are in a battle to save lives.One of the things that we're doing is trying to resist and counter a terrorist barrage which is aimed directly at our civilians, and doing so by minimizing civilian casualties, whereas the terrorist enemies of Israel are doing everything in their power to maximize the number of civilian casualties. Obviously, no country can tolerate a wanton attack on its civilians.
  Now, if there is a possibility of achieving a long-term solution to this problem through diplomatic means, we prefer that. But if not, I am sure you understand that Israel will have to take whatever action is necessary to defend its people. This is something that I don't have to explain to Americans. I know that President Obama, you, and the American people understand that perfectly well.
  And I thank you once again for your support. Welcome to Jerusalem.
  SECRETARY CLINTON: Thank you very much, Prime Minister. I look forward to a productive discussion this evening at such a critical moment for Israel and the region. President Obama asked me to come to Israel with a very clear message: America's commitment to Israel's security is rock solid and unwavering. That is why we believe it is essential to de-escalate the situation in Gaza.
  The rocket attacks from terrorist organizations inside Gaza on Israeli cities and towns must end and a broader calm restored. The goal must be a durable outcome that promotes regional stability and advances the security and legitimate aspirations of Israelis and Palestinians alike.
  President Obama has emphasized these same points in his multiple conversations with President Morsi of Egypt, and we appreciate President Morsi's personal leadership and Egypt's efforts thus far. As a regional leader and neighbor, Egypt has the opportunity and responsibility to continue playing a crucial and constructive role in this process. I will carry this message to Cairo tomorrow. I will also be consulting with President Abbas in Ramallah.
  Let me also say, to echo the Prime Minister, I am very pleased that the Iron Dome defense system is performing so well. Our partnership in support of this system represents America's enduring commitment to the safety and security of the Israeli people and to Israel's right to defend itself.
  But no defense is perfect and our hearts break for the loss of every civilian '' Israeli and Palestinian '' and for all those who have been wounded or who are living in fear and danger. I know today was a difficult day, and I offer my deepest condolences to the loved ones of those who were lost and injured. In the end, there is no substitute for security and for a just and lasting peace, and the current crisis certainly focuses us on the urgency of this broader goal.
  So in the days ahead, the United States will work with our partners here in Israel and across the region toward an outcome that bolsters security for the people of Israel, improves conditions for the people of Gaza, and moves toward a comprehensive peace for all people of the region. And I thank you, Prime Minister, for your hospitality and look forward to our discussion.
  PRIME MINISTER NETANYAHU: Thank you.
Hostess Not Going Out of Business
  Link to Article
  Wed, 21 Nov 2012 01:47
  Twinkies may yet have an infinite shelf life. Hostess Brands Inc. and one of its largest unions have agreed to go into mediation, so the company will stay in business for the time being. Hostess filed for bankruptcy last Friday, claiming a union strike ruined its operations and announcing plans to lay off all 18,500 of its employees. But a bankruptcy judge on the case said the dueling parties have to go through mediation before Hostess Inc. can sell off its assets. It won't be a cake walk, but at least you can cancel your $1,000 Ho Ho bid on eBay.
Sheriff: No danger from Hamilton County gas odor - 13 WTHR Indianapolis
  Link to Article
  Tue, 20 Nov 2012 22:14
  Investigators limit information on south side explosionInvestigators limit information on south side explosionUpdated:Tuesday, November 20 2012 5:10 PM EST2012-11-20 22:10:06 GMT
  Investigators are keeping details to themselves after announcing Monday that the Nov. 10 explosion on the Indianapolis south side was no accident. Monday evening, Marion County Prosecutor Terry CurryMore >>Investigators are keeping details to themselves after announcing Monday that the Nov. 10 explosion on the Indianapolis south side was no accident.More >>Clinton calls for durable outcome to Gaza violenceClinton calls for durable outcome to Gaza violenceUpdated:Tuesday, November 20 2012 4:39 PM EST2012-11-20 21:39:13 GMT
  U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton says the United States is pushing for a "durable outcome" promoting stability following Israel's offensive in the Gaza Strip. Clinton spoke alongside IsraeliMore >>U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton says the United States is pushing for a "durable outcome" promoting stability following Israel's offensive in the Gaza Strip.More >>Danica Patrick divorcing husband of 7 yearsDanica Patrick divorcing husband of 7 yearsUpdated:Tuesday, November 20 2012 4:37 PM EST2012-11-20 21:37:18 GMT
  Danica Patrick said Tuesday she and her husband are divorcing after seven years of marriage. Patrick announced the split with Paul Hospenthal on her Facebook page. She said the two have amicably decidedMore >>Danica Patrick said Tuesday she and her husband are divorcing after seven years of marriage.More >>Attorney for south side explosion homeowners speaksAttorney for south side explosion homeowners speaksUpdated:Tuesday, November 20 2012 4:36 PM EST2012-11-20 21:36:24 GMT
  The homeowners of the house that exploded Nov. 10th in the Richmond Hill neighborhood are not commenting on the announcement that the case is now a criminal investigation. Eyewitness News found MonserrateMore >>The homeowners of the house that exploded Nov. 10th in the Richmond Hill neighborhood are not commenting on the announcement that the case is now a criminal investigation.More >>Fishers teen arrested after bringing gun to schoolFishers teen arrested after bringing gun to schoolUpdated:Tuesday, November 20 2012 4:28 PM EST2012-11-20 21:28:28 GMT
  A 14-year-old student at Fishers Junior High School was arrested after police say he took a gun to school Monday. According to Fishers Police, the student showed off the gun before getting on the schoolMore >>According to Fishers Police, the student showed off the gun before getting on the school bus at the end of the school day.More >>Incoming Indiana schools chief dropping out of lawsuitIncoming Indiana schools chief dropping out of lawsuitUpdated:Tuesday, November 20 2012 3:42 PM EST2012-11-20 20:42:44 GMT
  Incoming state school Superintendent Glenda Ritz says she intends to remove herself as a plaintiff in a lawsuit that seeks to overturn the state' school voucher program. Ritz, a school librarian, toldMore >>Incoming state school Superintendent Glenda Ritz says she intends to remove herself as a plaintiff in a lawsuit that seeks to overturn the state' school voucher program.More >>Anderson teenager gets 150-year term for double slayingAnderson teenager gets 150-year term for double slayingUpdated:Tuesday, November 20 2012 3:40 PM EST2012-11-20 20:40:24 GMT
  A teenager has been sentenced to 150 years in prison for his role in the shooting deaths of a central Indiana couple. A Madison County judge sentenced 18-year-old Martez Brown during a court hearing MondayMore >>A teenager has been sentenced to 150 years in prison for his role in the shooting deaths of a central Indiana couple.More >>Rutgers joining Big TenRutgers joining Big TenUpdated:Tuesday, November 20 2012 2:30 PM EST2012-11-20 19:30:37 GMT
  Rutgers announced Tuesday that it will join the Big Ten at an afternoon news conference on its campus in Piscataway, N.J. The move comes a day after Maryland announced it would leave the ACC to join theMore >>Rutgers will be leaving the Big East, where it has been competing since 1991. Rutgers will be the Big Ten's 14th member.More >>13-year-old girl fatally shot on Miami school bus13-year-old girl fatally shot on Miami school busUpdated:Tuesday, November 20 2012 12:14 PM EST2012-11-20 17:14:10 GMT
  Miami-Dade police say a 13-year-old girl has died after she was shot by another student on a school bus. A male student is in custody and police spokesman Alvaro Zabaleta says investigators are talkingMore >>Miami-Dade police say a 13-year-old girl has died after she was shot by another student on a school bus.More >>Mark Miles tapped to be CEO of Hulman & Co.Mark Miles tapped to be CEO of Hulman & Co.Updated:Tuesday, November 20 2012 11:55 AM EST2012-11-20 16:55:35 GMT
  The Indianapolis Motor Speedway is set to make an "important announcement" at 10:30 am Tuesday. Mark Miles, who headed up the Super Bowl Host Committee this year, will take over as CEO. Hulman & Company'sMore >>Hulman & Company's Board of Directors says Mark Miles will be its new CEO.More >>WESTFIELD -Hamilton County dispatchers are receiving hundreds of calls from people in the Carmel area reporting an odor of natural gas.
  Police checked with Vectren and learned that crews in the area of 156th St. and U.S. 31 were applying the distinctive odor additive to the gas supply and apparently used too much of the substance.
  Dispatchers say people in this area are actually smelling the additive, not a gas leak. There is no danger to the public.
  "People are safe. Mercaptan is an odorant that goes into the gas line so people can smell it. The actual odor itself and the state that it in is not flammable," said Westfield Fire Department Division Chief John Barrett.
  The odor has begun to dissipate, but may still be noticeable overnight into Friday.
  Statement from Vectren
  "This afternoon Vectren Energy Delivery's (Vectren) odorant supplier overfilled the odorant tank at Vectren's Sheridan Regulator Station located in Westfield near US 31 and 156th St. The overfilling of the odorant caused excessive pressure to build up in the tank and odorant to leak out of the fittings. The station is located in a rural area just northwest of Carmel, and has been the cause of several gas odor calls to the fire department this evening.
  "Crews are currently working to relieve the excessive pressure from the tank and mask the odor. The supplier will return tomorrow to install a mechanism to drain the excess odorant and permanently resolve the matter.
  "While this odor is traveling through the air in this area, it is important for customers who believe they may have a natural gas leak in their home to leave the home immediately and call Vectren at 800-227-1376 or 911."
French Village Bugarach Safe Haven for Apocalypse on Mayan Calendar - SPIEGEL ONLINE
  Link to Article
  Tue, 20 Nov 2012 21:48
  Only residents of Bugarach, a tiny French village at the foot of the Pyrenees, are supposed to survive the end of the world when the Mayan calendar ends on December 21. According to New Agers, the local mountain has magical powers as a gate between different worlds. With the supposed apocalypse just months away, the mayor of Bugarach fears that his town will be overrun with visitors.
  Anyone who wants to see the birthplace of a new civilization has to travel to what seems like the end of the world. At the foot of the French Pyrenees, among twiggy bushes and dusty rocks, lies Bugarach. Just getting there alone is torture. A traveller must endure narrow, winding roads, offering little protection from the ravines below. All of a sudden, 20 kilometers (12.4 miles) from the destination, the pop song "Blow My Whistle" disappears from the radio and is replaced by a quiz show for housewives. The station is called "Nostalgia."
  There are many reasons why the village, population 200, is a popular travel destination these days. Some come to go hiking, others to relax. And some come for a reason that lies completely beyond the earthly sphere. This year on December 21 the ancient Mayan calendar ends, and so end-of-the-world hysterics are once again obsessed with the idea of making it to the other side of the apocalypse.
  They believe that Bugarach is special because, according to the calculations, the village is supposed to be saved from the hellfire -- at least that's the story in Internet forums on the topic, which have selected the spot as a modern-day Noah's Ark.
  The village has its local 1,230 meter-high mountain, Pic de Bugarach, to thank for the attention. In the mountain, according to the conspiracy theorists, are slumbering extra-terrestrials, who will come to life on December 21. For them, Bugarach is actually a garage for UFOs, because they believe alien spaceships are parked in caves in the mountain. The aliens will rescue the chosen few -- that is, anyone in the town -- from the apocalypse. To prove their theories, hikers film their supposed encounters with the extra-terrestrials and post them on the Internet.
  A New Age Invasion
  So will the pilgrims of the apocalypse descend on the town in droves? At least the town's mayor, Jean-Pierre Delord, is afraid they will. For two years the Socialist politician has warned about the forces threatening his hometown: invasion by New Agers, sect meetings and collective suicide. But the first thing anyone notices upon entering Bugarach on a normal weekday is how empty it is.
  It remains to be seen if Bugarach will be able to hold off not only the end of the world but also the onslaught of visitors. "I, for one, haven't seen any gurus," says Jeremy Webb, a British tourist who for four years has come regularly to Bugarach to go mountain biking. But the 56-year-old won't say there aren't any. "There could still be some annoyances this year. I've heard that outside the village there are already lots of crazies setting up camp."
  Mayor Delord is more certain. "People who believe in the end of the world regularly write to me," he says. The 69-year-old, who's been in office for 39 years, is a pleasant man with gray hair, dressed in jeans and a T-shirt. But when talk turns to December 21, he doesn't think there's anything to laugh about. "I don't want to tell anyone how to live," he says. "But when hundreds of people storm our village, we won't be able to guarantee public safety anymore."
  Because apocalypse types have bought up all the land in the area in the last years, real estate prices in the area have already risen substantially, he says. Recently, he witnessed a type of procession happening in the forest. "They were all dressed in white," he says. "I hope that they don't all take their lives together at some point."
  "We're Not Crazy Stoners"
  The French agency, the Interministerial Mission for Monitoring and Combatting Cultic Deviances (Miviludes) is just as alarmed. "Until now, more than anything else, the topic has been exploited for commercial reasons," officials at the agency wrote in their 2010 annual report. The report was referring to postcards, magic wands and "eternity stones," which can all be ordered especially for the apocalypse.
  Still, the report said that the risks cannot be underestimated, especially in light of the collective suicide of the Sun Temple sect in the 1990s, in which 74 people died. The authorities say that they currently do not have any new insights into what might happen in Bugarach. "But we're observing the development very closely," says Miviludes spokesperson Claire Barbereau.
  Meanwhile, the phenomenon at play in the French village is nothing new. "As far as end-of-the-world scenarios are concerned, there's a centuries-old supply closet full of recurring themes," says Eberhard Bauer from the Freiburg Institute for Frontier Areas of Psychology and Mental Health (IGPP). Bauer and his colleagues counsel, among others, people who are afraid of the end of the world. A "spiritual refuge, in which only the chosen few are able to escape," such as Bugarach, is one of the common themes, he says. "It shouldn't come as a surprise to anyone that some people are taken advantage with these ideas of redemption."
  On the other hand, the owner of an organic food store in Bugarach, who did not want to be named, says: "It's all nonsense." He says all the hype in reality is just the mayor's clever scheme. "We aren't a brunch of lunatics, who run around stoned the whole day," he says.
  The assortment of goods for sale in his store include sandwiches made from organic ingredients, but also books like "Le Calendrier de 13 Lunes" (The Calendar of the 13 Moons) or "Bugarach, Vortex de la Terre" (Bugarach, Vortex of the Earth). "Yes, this place is special," the resident says, "but that's why it's been a long time since anyone here believed the world was going to end."
  The real conspiracy, says the shop owner, is one of a political nature. "If you ask the mayor, there are supposed to be new hotels and wind turbines here soon," he says. "To attract tourists, he continues to bring us into the media, so they keep reheating the story when the rumors go cold." He says all the hype begins with the mayor, who immediately calls anyone opposed to his building plans crazy. "That's how politics works in the provinces," he says.
  Bad Vibes
  So is it all just a clever PR-play, a cunning political chess move? Of course, Jean-Pierre Delord doesn't see it that way, but the mayor frankly admits that he wants to use the media attention to spur tourism. "I guarantee there will be an invasion on December 21 -- by the press," he says.
  There is indeed not much happening in the village yet. For that reason, signs hang on many houses with the words: " vendre" -- for sale. Even the only business in town is closed in the early afternoon because of a lack of customers.
  But at the edge of town there is indeed someone who doesn't seem altogether of this world. With healing herbs hanging out of his shirt pocket, and gray hair standing erect, he's playing the recorder. "This place is going to be the most important place in the world this year," the man says, waving to everyone who passes by.
  He came from Spain, he says, to feel the powerful energy vortex from the Pic de Bugarach. But it's hard to find out much more than that from him, because he says, "interviews with journalists disturb the vibes."
San Francisco nudists warn of backlash if anti-naked law passes | World news
  Link to Article
  Source: Dave Winer's linkblog feed
  Tue, 20 Nov 2012 19:07
  The proposed ban makes exceptions for nudity during special occasions and on certain beaches. Photograph: Marcio Jose Sanchez/AP
  San Francisco nudists said on Monday they would continue to walk the streets naked regardless of a proposed law that would order them to cover up.
  City authorities are meeting on Tuesday to decide on a new anti-nudity law that is being supported by residents and business owners in the city's Castro district.
  The law would make it an offence for anyone over the age of five to "expose his or her genitals, perineum or anal region on any public street, sidewalk, street median, parklet or plaza".
  Lloyd Fishbach, left, who was standing naked at the corner of Castro and Market, said it should be his choice to dress as he wants, where he wants.
  "There is always someone who is not going to like what you are doing," he said. "I live in the Castro and I've been doing this since first grade. This is just a bunch of uptight Americans. But I'll still keep doing it and if I see the cops coming I will run and hide."
  Natalie Mandeau and her friend Dany, pictured below, said they travelled from Berlin when they heard of the proposed ban on nudity in San Francisco.
  Dany said: "If America bans this it would be a shame. San Francisco is one of the only places in the world where you can experience real American freedom."
  Castro resident George Davis added that there would be a backlash against the law and warned that Scott Wiener, the area representative who proposed the ban, will face strong opposition at the next election in 2013.
  He added: "I told him that if this passes I will run against him and I will do it in the nude."
  But many locals are fed up with the phenomenon that has seen nudists gather on an almost daily basis for the past two years at a busy intersection in the neighbourhood. The Castro is the city's gay district and famously a place for exuberant public displays and wild parties, particularly for Gay Pride, Halloween and various annual celebrations.
  The proposed ban makes exceptions for nudity during special occasions and on certain beaches, but Andrea Aiello, the executive director of the Castro Community Benefit District, said the current situation has to stop.
  "We support the ban on public nudity mainly because it has been taken to the extreme," she said. "Three or four years ago, there were occasionally nude men on Castro or Market, and it was fine, but since then there has been a larger and larger gathering, and it's spreading throughout the neighbourhood.
  "It's not a dead end or a beach; it's a busy transit district. There is an underground station and streetcars and buses, and people don't know when they're getting off a bus that they have to walk through this plaza where there are lots of naked men sitting around, displaying themselves spreadeagle. It has become a place for exhibitionism rather than nudism."
  Many business owners complained that some of the people attracted by the freedom to be naked in public were using nudity as an excuse for lewd behaviour. Some wear jewellery on their genitals that many find to be obscene, and there were also claims that some of the men are often visibly aroused.
  Philip Parr, who works at an adult store beside the plaza, said: "People think that this is a gay issue, but it's not. The gay community has changed. A lot of people here have kids now, through adoption or whatever, and there is a school one block away and the kids all come by here at about 2pm every day. But these people think that because gays are very tolerant that they can come here and do this, but it's not acceptable."
  Scott Wiener of the San Francisco legislature said he is "cautiously optimistic" that the ban he proposed will be passed.
  "Some of these people are very passionate about this issue and their right to be nude, and I respect their point of view '' but I don't agree with them," he said.
  He said the situation was now "over the top", leaving no option other than the proposed ban. If the nudists flout the law, they face a $100 fine for a first offence. A third violation could result in a fine of $500 and a year in prison.
Here We Go Again... Amy Alkon
  Link to Article
  Source: The TSA Blog
  Tue, 20 Nov 2012 19:04
  Here we go again'... TSA seems to be a frequent and a convenient subject on Amy Alkon's blog. The writer's language characterization towards TSA and our employees is offensive to say the least. Name calling, insults, the whole gamut...In her latest screening incident, she's angry because a supervisor wouldn't give her the name of an officer who had just screened her. An officer who '' by the way - by all accounts other than Ms. Alkon's, did her job by the book. It is more likely that she wanted this information so she could post the officer's name on her blog as she's done before with other incidents. In fact, she named and publicly accused one of our officers of rape after a routine pat-down in an earlier allegation.Ms. Alkon says all sorts of things in this post, but what Ms. Alkon doesn't tell you is that from the moment she entered our checkpoint, she began making statements such as ''TSA gets paid to molest passengers and touch their private areas.'' Does that sound like somebody who wants to get through the checkpoint smoothly? No, it sounds like somebody who makes a living by agitating situations and writing about them.Also missing in the details, Ms. Alkon wasn't selected for a pat-down as she states in this post. She opted out of advanced imaging technology (body scanner). It's acceptable to opt out, but the standard protocol when a passenger opts out is that they receive a pat-down not a free pass through security. If you read Amy's comments, she knows this. As Ms. Alkon continued to make a scene, the checkpoint supervisor stated he would have to call airport police if she did not cooperate with the screening process.We understand that not everybody likes or agrees with TSA's policies and procedures. Part of what makes this country great is that we can openly complain on blogs such as this one, but I think it's only fair that the blogger in question should be fair and accurate about what they write about and also consider the privacy of the individuals involved. After all, these individuals are doing the job the way they've been trained to do it. They show up to work daily with the intent of protecting our Nation's transportation network.I can assure you of one thing, an infinitesimal number of our employees know of Ms. Alkon. I can also assure you that reoccurring allegations like hers seem to be more self perpetuated rather than based upon reality and do nothing but detract from the mission at hand. If you have a travel related issue or question that needs an immediate answer, you can contact us byclicking here.
Sources: DNI cut "al Qaeda" reference from Benghazi talking points, and CIA, FBI signed off - CBS News
  Link to Article
  Tue, 20 Nov 2012 18:08
  (CBS News) WASHINGTON - CBS News has learned that the Office of the Director of National Intelligence (DNI) cut specific references to "al Qaeda" and "terrorism" from the unclassified talking points given to Ambassador Susan Rice on the Benghazi consulate attack - with the agreement of the CIA and FBI. The White House or State Department did not make those changes.
  There has been considerable discussion about who made the changes to the talking points that Rice stuck to in her television appearances on Sept. 16 (video), five days after the attack that killed American Ambassador to Libya Chris Stevens, and three other U.S. nationals.
  Republicans have accused her of making misleading statements by referring to the assault as a "spontaneous" demonstration by extremists. Some have suggested she used the terminology she did for political reasons.
  House Republicans "deeply troubled" by RiceCongress to investigate CIA talking points on BenghaziWatch: McCain says Rice still has explaining to do
  However, an intelligence source tells CBS News correspondent Margaret Brennan the links to al Qaeda were deemed too "tenuous" to make public, because there was not strong confidence in the person providing the intelligence. CIA Director David Petraeus, however, told Congress he agreed to release the information -- the reference to al Qaeda -- in an early draft of the talking points, which were also distributed to select lawmakers.
  "The intelligence community assessed from the very beginning that what happened in Benghazi was a terrorist attack." DNI spokesman Shawn Turner tells CBS News. That information was shared at a classified level -- which Rice, as a member of President Obama's cabinet, would have been privy to.
  An intelligence source says the talking points were passed from the CIA to the DNI, where the substantive edits were made, and then to FBI, which made more edits as part of "standard procedure."
  Timeline: How Benghazi attack, probe unfolded
  The head of the DNI is James Clapper, an Obama appointee. He ultimately did review the points, before they were given to Ambassador Rice and members of the House intelligence committee on Sept. 14. They were compiled the day before.
  Brennan says her source wouldn't confirm who in the agency suggested the final edits which were signed off on by all intelligence agencies.
  Another source, a senior U.S. official familiar with the drafting of the talking points, tells CBS News the "controversy this word choice has caused came as a surprise."
  "The points were not, as has been insinuated by some, edited to minimize the role of extremists, diminish terrorist affiliations, or play down that this was an attack," the official tells CBS News, adding that there were "legitimate intelligence and legal issues to consider, as is almost always the case when explaining classified assessments publicly."
  "Most people understand that saying 'extremists' were involved in a direct assault on the mission isn't shying away from the idea of terrorist involvement," added the official. "Because of the various elements involved in the attack, the term extremist was meant to capture the range of participants."
  Several militant groups have been eyed as likely culprits, including the Islamic extremist militia Ansar al Sharia, which was based in Eastern Libya and enjoyed huge power in Benghazi before the attack. Gen. Carter Ham, chief of the U.S. Africa Command, said recently that there were "linkages" between al Qaeda and some of the people who attacked the consulate and the CIA annex about a mile away.
  CBS News senior correspondent John Miller, himself a former Deputy Director of the DNI's analysis division, explained on "CBS This Morning" in the weeks after the Benghazi attack why it has been so difficult for American intelligence agents to clearly identify and label the suspects in the assault. (Click player at left for Miller's full analysis"We want a wiring diagram," Miller said. "We want an organized picture: 'It was al Qaeda who ordered it, it was Ansar al Sharia who carried it out, it was this group that assisted. The problem is, the lines have blurred between those groups and their members. Ansar al Sharias are popping up in places like Benghazi, but also in Yemen, also in Tunisia, in all these countries -- and they're not al Qaeda, but they are reading from the al Qaeda narrative and they are being influenced by people who are formerly influential extremists in al Qaeda."
  "The actual truth is, the picture isn't that clear, but we can piece it together, and that's not satisfying to people who are used to saying, 'You can attach this attack to that group,'" said Miller.
Vomitoids
  Link to Article
  Source: Lame Cherry
  Tue, 20 Nov 2012 18:06
  I was in the city recently and noted on separate occasions to vomitoids.I just created the word, but the word must be created as something must define these repulsive creatures moving around in human skin.
  The first was one of these latins. You know the type of dumb ass with a flat brimmed hat, in this case it was a Phillies baseball hat, tats and those bare arms with baggy ass pants, and some form or tennis shoes on that really has them thinking they are cool as they check out the women.
  The next was a black guy. You know the type with the head the size of an orange, some chain about their neck one could tow a car with, some bright ass colored shirt and a slouch that just makes one want to slap them and get some posture.
  Then of course we have this Justin Beiber, German spelling, in for some reason he thinks a Mr. Potato head cap turned backwards on his potato head looks cool as he has on a tank top and red leather fag pants and boots.It was something about haters, but I reside in a world which could care less what a no talent twerp does in being propped up as Lindsey Lohan's crotch shot for cash.
  There once was a time in America that being a star meant a child of 8, a teenager, a parent and a grandparent could recognize you. That would be like Lucille Ball, Olivia Newton John or Gary Coleman as young and old people at least could recognize the person or the product by sight or sound.
  I asked TL the other week, "Who in the world is that on the cover of that tabloid?" TL had no idea either, and that is the problem in this world in people who think they are stars are not stars, and not enough people laugh at the idiots who are too stupid to know they look like a freak show.
  Beiber is not talented enough to look like Elton John. For that matter latins are not that scary when one is laughing at them and blacks are not that cool when they look like something out of a 1950's routine.
  These creatures are all VOMITOIDS. They make me want to puke like Muchelle Obama ghetto green puke when I see her in some drapery and that big ass or Bearick thinking he is cool and he looks like a dork as even black folks think he looks like a dork as Chinoid.
  I do not see anything hot, cool or whatever snaps in anyone now. They are all just recycled wares with absolutely no talent and nothing appealing about them. The time was when a Mexican who saw an idiot latin dressed like an idiot would just knife them to tell them to stop looking stupid. Time was blacks would just beat the hell out of some nig who looked out of place. Time was white boys would stuff someone like Beiber in the girls shower, turn on the hot water and let shrunken leather on his strangled balls teach him a lesson not to look like a freak.
  Beiber must have no friends really who would have told him how bad he looks and his Mum must have no control over this apparel retard in it should be something like, "Justin, when Frank Sinatra sang a song people could make out the song, but when you sing no one knows one of your songs from another....when you get that kind of talent, then you won't need red fag pants to get attention".
  All these little boys, pumping muscles because they have adequacy issues and begging for attention in the physical, because they have no idea what to do with intimacy.
  I hope these young American males like being gang raped up the Benghazi as when America is invaded in the next decade in a real world war, they have certainly auditioned for it and their warrior skills appear to be trying to figure out now to not wear a cap intelligently.
  Vomitoids.
  agtG
Indiana home explosion now homicide case | HLNtv.com
  Link to Article
  Tue, 20 Nov 2012 17:43
  A huge house explosion that killed two people in Indianapolis is now being investigated as a homicide.
  Five homes were flattened and more than 80 were damaged when an empty house exploded on November 10. A couple living next door died in the blast.
  Police aren't giving away too much information, but they are asking for your help. They'd like to talk to anyone saw a white van in the neighborhood before the explosion.
  If you have any information, contact the Indianapolis Police Department.
NATO to Send Patriot Missiles to Turkey
  Link to Article
  Source: Global Security Newswire Daily News
  Tue, 20 Nov 2012 14:37
  Undisclosed NATO countries intend to deploy sophisticated Patriot air-defense missiles along the Turkish border with Syria, Ankara announced on Tuesday.
  "The countries who supply NATO with Patriot systems are known, we have reached an agreement with those countries," Reuters quoted Turkish Foreign Minister Ahmet Davutoglu as saying to journalists. "The official application will be completed as soon as possible."
  Syria's civil war has crossed into Turkey in the form of refugees and, in recent weeks, casualties from shells fired by Assad government military forces. Ankara has fired back, but wants to protect its territory from further possible shelling and the threat of Syrian munitions that might carry chemical warfare materials.
  Germany, the Netherlands, and the United States are the only NATO states that posses the sought-after Patriot missiles. It is not yet clear which country or countries would send units to Turkey.
  "Intensive work is under way and the talks have reached their final stage," Davutoglu said.
  NATO Secretary General Anders Fogh Rasmussen on Monday said any such deployments would be aimed at protecting Turkish territory from shelling and not to support the imposition of a no-fly zone in Syria.
  Davutoglu said official talks on the Patriot missile deployment "will be concluded at the shortest time possible. They won't last much longer," the Associated Press reported.
OBAMASCAM: The Ruby Slipper
  Link to Article
  Source: Lame Cherry
  Tue, 20 Nov 2012 14:24
  As another Lame Cherry matter anti matter exclusive..........
  My children, you have missed this in the coordinated attack upon Director General David Patraeus by the Obama regime, as the criminal pattern is there. When this blog first caused the media to focus on the Kelley Obama connection, which brought out she was dining at the White House three times, it set off the questions posted here in why is Mrs. Kelley of Lebanese ancestry along with her husband, not being investigated as Ms. Broadwell?
  Why is it when Mrs. Kelley complained to the FBI that they jumped high?
  It is all due to the fact she is an operative of the Obama regime.
  But what kind of operative?
  The patterns are there my children. Mr. Obama employed literally numbers of internet minders in 2008 and still is. These individuals are sent out to post comments and to sway the public in a propaganda corp.
  This blog warned and finally Sean Hannity joined in, during the Tea Party rallies, in there were Obama sabotage experts being employed to smear the Tea Party as racists and violent. They were stopped, but let us not forget Barney Frank, Nancy Pelosi and key black democrats on Capitol Hill lying in a set up saying the Tea Party was using homosexual hate phrases and spitting on blacks, when the evidence proved this to be another regime smear.
  The list goes on from union thugs beating up reporters. Neo Negroid Panthers sent out to intimidate voters in various democratic districts, and then there was the Texas and Nevada muscle of Obama going after Hillary Clinton in stealing those caucus states in 2008.
  Hutatree, the arrest of two idiots in the south by BATF, Gun Runner, were all admitted operations where moles were dispatched by the regime to intimidate the electorate.
  ANALGATE was another Obama operation meant to kidnap Chris Stevens, but blew up in the regime's 2012 campaign, as Mr. Obama's terrorists in Libya decided on a murder spree of their own.One can look at Egypt in the gang rape fondling of Lara Logan. The murder of the Assad regime in Syria and the mass murder of the Khadaffi group in Libya, and note a distinct pattern that Barack Obama has a very long arm of minders and instigators who keep track of numerous people with destructive and deadly effect.
  What the exclusive question is in this is simple. How many Jill Kelley's are there covertly working for Barack Hussein Obama in the military, industry, finance, government, security and whatever else Mr. Obama has employed them?
  The question Rep. Peter King and Congress must ask is just what is the extent of this spying operation and how can a political group legally be setting up operations against Americans and foreigners with kind of effect.The leaders of Poland to Libya have been assassinated and it is has been covered up. The reality is Gabby Giffords was shot with rubber bullets, others were murdered and the Obama regime had immediate talking points to blame Sarah Palin and George W. Bush.
  That is premeditated, and equal to Mr. Obama threatening Wall Street with a pitchfork mob and British Petroleum with boots on the throat.
  We know for certain that Mr. Obama has numerous people in the press working for him. We know Warren Buffett, GE, George Soros are his captains of industry. Hollywood is rife with the Obama line of "Obama investigates hisself and is declared innocent of all charges". There is the internet spy ring and the reality that the Secret Service was being deliberately lax in protecting Mitt and Ann Romney before the election.
  All of this adds up to an Obama fairyland, where he has numerous people from union thugs to Jill Kelley in doing what needs to be done for the regime.
  For the legal record, the FBI can and does shadow for security reasons noted Americans as security is their authority, but it is a far different matter when Barack Hussein Obama has this intelligence group deployed of what now looks like thousands of fellow travelers spying on people and ending their lives or careers when it suits Mr. Obama to do an end game.
  Rod Blagojevich crossed Mr. Obama and was destroyed. Rahm Emanuel who was a criminal in that affair was rewarded as Mayor, while Patrick Fitzgerald was rewarded by Eric Holder in making him head of US Attorneys as Mr. Holder again shielded again Mr. Obama as he does all terrorists like the Fort Hood Muslim militant.
  We know that Mr. Obama's people were illegally making deals in 2008 before he was in the White House, assuring narco communists in South America he would be at 1600 Penn. We know that he knew he was going to be successful in stealing the 2008 election, due to this wide array of operatives and now blackmail cover ups which reached to Chief Justice John Roberts of the Supreme Court in upholding the illegal mandate of Obamacare.
  How many Jill Kelley's are on book working for the Obama regime and how many Jill Kelley's are off book working for the Obama regime? How many Jill Kelley's are being paid by Eurasians from Moscow to Peking? How many are being paid by Muslims in the Middle East?
  Obama's Ruby Slipper with Jill Kelley exposes again a pattern in this of fellow travelers who are very unhealthy for Americans to be around, and for that matter Nationalists from Poland to the Middle East.
  There is no place in the US Constitution which allows an occupant of 1600 Penn Avenue to employ their own spy network to illegally watch people or to destroy them at the behest of the regime. Of course, that Constitution bans all but Natural Born from that Office, and that of course bans Mr. Obama, but when one has this type of Ruby Slipper Syndicate these outlaws are all above the law.
  Why is it up to this blog to always be asking the questions and pointing these realities out? You know why, because all the famous, rich and powerful are all either paid off or frightened to make the wave.
  Another Lame Cherry exclusives in the matter anti matter.
  agtG 262
LaHire
  Link to Article
  Source: Lame Cherry
  Tue, 20 Nov 2012 14:24
  I'm pissed off.
  See I have these cats and I really do not like cats. Cats though like me and that is the problem in I get attached to things.
  I have an asshole neighbor who either shoots my cats or runs them over, as my cats even if I do not pet them are not wild as they trust me as I do not abuse cats even if I do not like them.
  This though is not about my a hole neighbor.
  My problem is with assholes who steal cats.
  I have concluded that people who steal cats are worse than serial kidnapper pedophile rapists as in the two cases where my stolen cats have returned, they were terrified of humans and took forever to tame down.
  Do not get me wrong, I reside in a place where I have blasted a fair number of stud cats as they are up to no good in murdering kitties as that is how new tom cats get female cats in season. There are reasons to shoot feral cats in eating song birds which they are hell on, but this stealing cats is really something wrong with the people who do it in the missing human part.
  TK was my buddy cat even if I disliked cats. Her mother, who a horned owl murdered and ate on my doorstep was a natural born killer. I liked her and so I rescued TK and she was always a nice kitty and she disappeared suddenly.I figured she was dead, and of course about a year later or so here came this cat talking to me, as my cats always talk to me and follow me around like dogs on walks which is embarassing.
  So this cat talks to me and I do a double take on her, and sure as heck it is TK returned from only satan knows were and not at all trusting any more.That bothered me as she was a nice kitty and whatever creatures had her, must have abused her horridly in she must have been beat to hell any time she got near the door.TK escaped though and found her way her to live for about 8 more years before she died. She had a good life for a one eyed cat.
  This though is not about TK but about LaHire, my cat named after Joan's General.
  LaHire survived in my flour bed in one of three kittens not eaten by a goddamned fox.
  You can tell I dislike vermin a great deal as the state grows them and feeds my things to them as the predators have killed off all the wildlife.
  So LaHire and I got close for stud cat, and he was forever under my feet and tripping me, as he was just that kind of in the way cat. Perfectly black and TL tells me he must be some Russian model of a Siamese cat, as my Siamese cats are tough in the cold and Siamese cats are not cold hardy.
  Any way, LaHire was about half grown and he disappeared. He never went anywhere, so I suspect some psychotic cat napper picked him up off the road by my home and absconded away with him.
  That stuff is hard as one wonders what the hell happened to your cat as even in not liking them, you get used to them around.
  That was over a year ago, and this past week I was outside doing my business and this big black cat was there. One brown eye and one yellow eye. It seemed tame so I said hello and talked to it for awhile and the Holy Ghost whispered to me it was LaHire.I did not remember him being bi colored in the eyes, but he was young and in the way most times so I do not know about such things as I do not like cats.
  Any who, this cat is here and I'm wondering about it, as it likes me and when I say, "LaHire" it seemed to remember that as a name. It has been around here and I thought my grey tom cat, who has no name except that grey tom cat had run him off, but last night as I was watering horses, there was LaHire walking around acting scared again and I wondered if it was LaHire.
  Which brings me to this, in I got close enough to check the male parts and they were missing, so now I know this cat is probably LaHire in some asshole not only stole him, but cut his nuts off too boot.
  I don't give a sh*t about Bob Barker wacking nuts off of animals, but yet I do, as a tom cat without balls in the real world just gets the hell beat out of it as it is neither she to breed nor he with hormones to bite back.Really sucks, but that is LaHire now, my satan cat, without his nuts, tortured by some goddamned cat napper and now I'm stuck with him as he is LaHire.
  I wonder in all of this about the pathetic sick bastards who steal cats. Damned animal wackos will sell you one for under 50 bucks, already having the ovaries and nuts torn out, but some Obama voters just got to go around stealing cats as they are there.Now mind you I do not like cats, and yet my cats I can not get rid. Things go visit my neighbor and come back as they walk about, but I can't get rid of them as they always come back. Compare that now to the cat nappers of TK and LaHire. Hell those cats couldn't get away from those saddistic sons of bitches fast enough.......was a hell year in confinement must like Joan in the dungeons it seems as once my cats got liberated after repeating beatings they never stopped running until instinct guided them back to my brier patch.
  Cat nappers really have to suck. They are too cheap to buy a cat.......why anyone would buy a damn cat is beyond me, but they are too cheap, but instead they run around stealing cats as they know the cats just are no one's cat and of course that cat is going to just love being stuck in some goddamned cage, as the cat runs around sharpening the claws..........never checked but maybe LaHire got it's claws cut off too in some permanent manicure.
  Point is, I do not like cats and cats like me. The criminals who steal my cats think they like cats, but the cats hate them, because cats are more than emotional sponges sucking energy out of a human.
  Cats just have to be cats and that is one reason I hate them really. They only want things on their terms. They want you touch them and then not touch them. They want attention, but will give you none and pretend they are not noticing you give them attention.They really are quite psycho and I can see the allure to Obama voters who steal cats as they are just like Obama.........Obama is a cat person really and that poor dog they torture with in doing nothing with it is what cat people do to who think they are dog people.
  I wonder as I have always said, how Bob Barker would like to have someone cuts his nuts off for his own horny good. How would the people who stole my cats like someone to steal.....oh hell they probably would love it if someone stole their kid......make it if someone stole their Obama blow up doll?I bet they would really be furious about that. The thing is they just do not think, and it never occurs to them that when that cat they stole is constantly breaking for the door after hiding all day from them and their brats, that animals are great judges of character in LaHire and TK hated these people walking around as humans.
  Hard lesson but in plain sight in the cat hates you people, so no matter how much you prissy up in the mirror or vote for Obama, the cat says you are a sadistic cat napper who gets off cutting nuts off of animals.
  For Joan's sake I'm glad LaHire is back. Would rather most of my cats had homes someplace as the ones I think are pretty usually end up eaten by some some coyote the state is raising on the tax dollar. It would please me if my cats had that fabled life, but my cats just gnaw on cat food I can not afford or Mom can not as she buys it for them as I have a pile of them around doing natural selection in living and dying, breeding and in LaHire's case just watching the world go by.
  TL has neighbors who have cats, and those cats are quite aristocratic and I think I like them as they are not here, and I only see them for about two minutes as they rub on me or say hi.
  I wonder how many cats the Obama voters have stolen. Poor animals all being beat to hell trying for freedom to just get home to the home they were stolen from. Then liberty comes and I'm stuck with a nutless cat.
  I think there should be a law that Mark Levin's SPCA has to ask before nutting cats in if the cat was stolen as I never saw any cat volunteer to get castrated and LaHire had a good deal here in keeping his nuts.
  Allot of stealing going on with that Obama bunch. Money, elections, American Birth Certificates and cats come to mind right now.
  I wonder if Obama come with his nuts cut off like that Kennedy dog he got or did Muchelle fix him after the homosexual dating episodes.......
  Does not really matter as this is about cats and I'm pissed someone cut my stud cats nuts off.
  Should sue rich guy Obama voter Bob Barker for that as he started all of that cat nutting. Him and Obama are responsible for allot of things and they ain't all good.
  agtG
The Rich People Who Don't Know How Tax Rates Work
  Link to Article
  Source: Dave Winer's linkblog feed
  Tue, 20 Nov 2012 14:24
  Kristina Collins, a chiropractor in McLean, Va., said she and her husband planned to closely monitor the business income from their joint practice to avoid crossing the income threshold for higher taxes outlined by President Obama on earnings above $200,000 for individuals and $250,000 for couples.
  Ms. Collins said she felt torn by being near the cutoff line and disappointed that federal tax policy was providing a disincentive to keep expanding a business she founded in 1998.
  ''If we're really close and it's near the end-year, maybe we'll just close down for a while and go on vacation,'' she said.
  You see these idiots every time a tax hike becomes possible again. They have no apparent idea how marginal rates work. Right now, if her and her husband make $250,000, they pay at most a 33% tax on some of that income. If they made $251,000, they would have to pay the same rates for everything except that last $1000 -- that, they'd be taxed at 35%. If the rates increase across the board that top rate becomes 39.6%.
  How do people still not understand that, and how does it color the debate over taxes? Barack Obama's managed to win two elections on a pledge to hike that top rate, and yet the people who don't understand it manage to get quoted every year.
Hillary Clinton to visit Middle East over Gaza conflict | World news
  Link to Article
  Source: Dave Winer's linkblog feed
  Tue, 20 Nov 2012 14:20
  Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama in Cambodia. She will now break off from the south-east Asian tour to travel to the Middle East, Photograph: Jewel Samad/AFP/Getty Images
  Hillary Clinton is en route to the Middle East to join efforts to broker a ceasefire in the war between Israel and Hamas, in a move that suggests a breakthrough is close.
  The US secretary of state, who had been accompanying Obama on his visit to south-east Asia, left Cambodia on Tuesday for talks in Jerusalem, Ramallah and Cairo, where she will meet the Israeli prime minister, Binyamin Netanyahu, Palestinian officials and Egyptian leaders.
  Gaza City was relatively quiet overnight, but the Israeli military said it had struck 100 targets over the coastal strip, including the Gaza headquarters of the National Islamic Bank.
  Five rockets were fired from Gaza during the course of the night, following a pattern of reduced missile launches for the past three nights. Rocket fire resumed on Tuesday morning.
  A possible ground invasion by Israeli troops is on hold while talks in Cairo continue. However, there was evidence of the military buildup along the border with a heavy presence of reservist soldiers.
  In Cairo, the UN secretary general, Ban Ki-moon, warned that further escalation in the conflict could endanger the region. "This must stop, immediate steps are needed to avoid further escalation, including a ground operation," he said. He is to visit Jerusalem on Tuesday for talks with Netanyahu before heading to Ramallah to see the Palestinian president, Mahmoud Abbas.
  Netanyahu met members of his security cabinet overnight. A senior Israeli official told Reuters after the meeting: "Before deciding on a ground invasion, the prime minister intends to exhaust the diplomatic move in order to see if a long-term ceasefire can be achieved."
  A White House spokesman said Clinton would make clear an escalation of the conflict would be in nobody's interest. The US, Britain and other western governments have urged Israel not to mount an assault similar to Operation Cast Lead, in which 1,400 Palestinians in Gaza were killed four years ago.
  By Tuesday, civilians accounted for 54 of the 113 Palestinians killed since the operation began. Some 840 people have been wounded, including 225 children, Gaza health officials said. Three Israelis have been killed by Palestinian rocket fire.
  Khaled Meshal, the Hamas leader, who was in Cairo for talks on Monday, told reporters Israel must be the first to halt military operations since it had begun them last week by assassinating the movement's military chief, Ahmed al-Jaabari. "A ground invasion will not be a walk in the park," Meshal warned. "We don't have the same military and deterrence capabilities [as Israel] but we have deterred them with our will. Our enemy is drowning in the blood of children."
  Officials in Jerusalem flatly denied Meshal's claim that Israel was seeking a ceasefire. It was Hamas, one official said, that was looking for a way to "climb down" after more than 400 air strikes in Gaza had significantly eroded the Palestinians' ability to launch missiles at Tel Aviv and other Israeli cities.
  But diplomats in Jerusalem and Tel Aviv were hopeful a deal could be forged. "The fact that the talks are still going on is a good sign," said one. "And the fact that Israel hasn't yet gone in on the ground is a good sign."
  The Cairo truce talks ran into trouble on Sunday after news that 10 members of one family had been killed in Gaza in an air strike apparently aimed at killing a Hamas or Islamic Jihad leader.
  British officials monitoring the crisis said the key was to de-escalate, secure a durable ceasefire, and then return to the key questions of promoting reconciliation between Hamas and the Palestine Liberation Organisation and re-invigorating a moribund peace process.
  The British foreign secretary, William Hague, said in Brussels: "I am pleased that Israel has held back from a ground invasion while such negotiations go on, and that the rate of rocket attacks on Israel has fallen, for whatever reason, over the last 24 hours. These are positive developments, but of course it remains a desperately serious and difficult situation."
  Palestinian sources said that Abbas had responded angrily on Monday to Tony Blair, the Middle East Quartet's (the UN, US, EU and Russia) envoy, in a meeting in Ramallah. Blair is trying to persuade Abbas to refrain from seeking observer status at the UN '' a move opposed by the US and Israel. Abbas reportedly told him to leave if he was not there to talk about the crisis in Gaza.
  Israeli sources made clear that a ceasefire deal would have to mean an end to all hostile fire from Gaza into Israel, including small arms fire at troops near the border. Hamas fighters must also be stopped from crossing into Sinai to mount attacks against Israel from Egyptian territory. Hamas must not be allowed to rearm. Any ceasefire must not be a simple "time out" for Hamas but provide an extended period of quiet for southern Israel.
  Support for Operation Defensive Pillar remains solid in Israel. According to an opinion poll in the Haaretz newspaper, 30% of the Israeli public support a ground invasion despite the risk of high casualties. Overall the operation has the backing of around 84% of the public, with 12% opposed.
  But in one sign of dissent, 100 writers, intellectuals and artists on Monday issued a petition calling for a long-term ceasefire, and more significantly for talks with Hamas, which has long been a political taboo. "We must speak out because the people of southern Israel, like the people of Gaza, deserve to be able to look up at the sky in hope and not in fear," wrote the author Amos Oz, playwright Yehoshua Sobol and others.
  Additional reporting by Abdel-Rahman Hussein in Cairo
Twitter takes new steps to be even more like Instagram | Internet & Media
  Link to Article
  Source: Dave Winer's linkblog feed
  Tue, 20 Nov 2012 14:16
  The microblogging service rolled out a series of new features today that together make it more instantly visual and take it even further past 140 characters.
  Twitter users should now see a set of 'top' photos above related search results.
  (Credit: Screenshot by CNET)With a flurry of new features unveiled this afternoon, Twitter appears to be aiming more than ever at mimicking some of the most visual elements of Instagram and Facebook.
  The most interesting new feature is one that adds a palette of "top" photos and videos to search results. So, for example, if you search for "sunrise," you see a group of photos above the resulting column of tweets, as well as a row of video thumbnails off to the side.
  Clearly, the idea here is that Twitter wants users to see more information than ever before, and far more than just the 140 characters of actual tweets. It's an acknowledgement by Twitter that, more than ever, the richest communications are visual, something that netted Instagram a high nine-figure payday (its acquisition by Facebook) and helps make Facebook so attractive to so many people. While a 140-character tweet can contain a wealth of information -- a new thought, a URL, a retweet -- Twitter is nodding to the fact that when someone is searching for something specific, there's a lot of value in giving them an instant visual treat, even one that dominates the screen.
  However, while Twitter indicates that the new features should work regardless of the search term, my quick experiments showed that they produce inconsistent results, with some terms generating the desired visual results, while others don't. In an e-mail, Twitter said the new features should be fully rolled out in its mobile apps, but I couldn't distinguish between the results, whether they were on Web or mobile. That seems supported by a tweet from the company this afternoon that suggests, "Some searches to try if you want to see photos above results: sfgiants and sunset. People LOVE sunset photos." But people also love pictures of cats and dogs, so it's odd that the system is clearly not ready to feature tweets with photos related to Felix and Fido.
  An example of the new automatic preview feature Twitter users will see on iPhone and Android devices.
  (Credit: Screen shot by CNET)Picture preview and other new featuresOne of the most interesting of the other new features Twitter rolled out today is an instant photo preview on mobile devices. Previously, if a tweet had an associated photo, iPhone and Android users could see a large version of it by tapping on the tweet in their stream. Now however, users should be able to see the larger preview version of the photo directly in their feed. However, I also found this feature to be inconsistent this afternoon.
  Another new feature Twitter unveiled today is headlines. Do a search, and in some cases you'll get a top headline above the resulting column of tweets.
  And Twitter also unveiled the first mobile version of "cards," a feature previously available only in full Web browsers that embedded rich content like headlines and photos. Now mobile users will also be able to see such information in their tweet streams.
  Finally, earlier today, in a seemingly unrelated announcement, Twitter also rolled out a new feature that lets users e-mail tweets.
Hacker Faces Jail for Accessing Public URLs That Revealed AT&T iPad User Emails, With Possible Chilling Effects for Online Freedom
  Link to Article
  Source: Dave Winer's linkblog feed
  Tue, 20 Nov 2012 14:15
  The case highlights a troubling disconnect between online life and the rule of the law.
  AT&T screwed up in 2010, serving up the e-mail addresses of over 110,000 of its iPad 3G customers online for anyone to find. But today Andrew Auernheimer, an online activist who pointed out AT&T's blunder to Gawker Media, which went on to publicize the breach of private information, is the one in federal court this week.
  His case highlights some potentially troubling disconnects between the practicalities of online life and the rule '' and application '' of the law.
  Auernheimer, whose pugnacious online persona is Weev, is up on two counts, each with the potential to land him with five years in jail. One alleges that by being in possession of the e-mails from AT&T's leaky system he handled ''identification information'' in breach of a law intended to protect against identity theft, USC 1028. It's worth noting that so far there appears to be no indication that Weev had plans to use the e-mails collected for anything more than proof that AT&T was leaking its customers' data.
  The more concerning charge to online activists watching Weev's case is based on the Computer Fraud and Abuse Act, which forbids ''unauthorized access'' to a computer. Weev and a fellow hacker who originally uncovered AT&T's mistake and collected the e-mails didn't ask the company for permission to access the Web addresses that shared iPad users' private information. But those Web addresses weren't hidden behind password prompts or any kind of protection '' they were publicly accessible. Getting AT&T's system to spit out a customer's e-mail address simply required visiting an AT&T web address with a particular '' and easy to guess '' code tagged onto the end.
  Groups like the Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF) worry that should that charge succeed it will become easy to criminalize many online activities, including work by well-intentioned activists looking for leaks of private information or other online security holes. Weev's case hasn't received much attention so far, but should he be found guilty this week it will likely become well known, fast.
  2 comments. Share your thoughts >>Tom Simonite IT Editor, Software & HardwareI'm MIT Technology Review's IT editor for hardware and software and enjoy a diverse diet of algorithms, Internet, and human-computer interaction with chips on the side. Working in our San Francisco office, I cover new ideas about what computers can do for us, whether they spring from tech... continue >>
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Bill Kristol: A source tells me Petraeus wasn't completely honest in his Benghazi briefing to Congress
  Link to Article
  Source: usfollowme
  Tue, 20 Nov 2012 08:11
  http://hotair.com/archives/2012/11/13/bill-kristol-a-source-tells-me-petraeus-wasnt-completely-honest-in-his-benghazi-briefing-to-congress/
@@adamcurry This is getting weirder. http://t.co/AeobCdw6
  Link to Article
  Source: @adamcurry - Twitter Search
  Tue, 20 Nov 2012 08:07
  8 hr agoAuthorities have been focused on appliances in their investigation on the blast that killed an Indiana couple. Now officials say they are looking for a white van that was seen in the neighborhood.
  INDIANAPOLIS '-- Authorities launched a homicide investigation Monday into the house explosion that killed a young couple and left numerous homes uninhabitable in an Indianapolis neighborhood.
  Indianapolis Homeland Security Director Gary Coons made the announcement after meeting with residents of the subdivision where the Nov. 10 blast occurred and shortly after funerals were held for the two victims, who lived next door to the house where investigators believe the explosion originated.
  "We are turning this into a criminal homicide investigation," Coons said, marking the first time investigators have called the case criminal.
  Search warrants are being executed and official are looking for a white van that was seen in the subdivision on the day of the blast, Marion County Prosecutor Terry Curry said. Authorities are offering at least a $10,000 reward.
  Curry said the investigation is aimed at "determining if there are individuals who may be responsible for this explosion and fire."
  Neither he nor Coons took questions or indicated if they had any suspects. No arrests have been made.
  Officials have said they believe natural gas was involved in the explosion, which destroyed five homes and left dozens damaged, some heavily. Damage has been estimated at $4.4 million.
  Investigators have been focusing on appliances as they search for a cause of the explosion.
  Hundreds of people attended the funerals earlier Monday for the couple killed in the explosion, 34-year-old John Dion Longworth and 36-year-old Jennifer Longworth. She was a teacher remembered for knitting gifts for her students, while her husband, an electronics expert, was known as a gardener and nature lover.
  Indianapolis Mayor Greg Ballard spoke at the news conference and said he went to the Longworths' funeral and had a hard time coming to peace with what had happened.
  "There is a search for truth and there is a search for justice," Ballard said.
  The couple lived next door to the house where investigators are focusing. The co-owner of that house, John Shirley, told The Associated Press he had received a text message from his daughter recently saying the furnace in the home, which she shares with her mother and her mother's boyfriend, had gone out.
  Shirley's ex-wife, Monserrate Shirley, said her boyfriend, Mark Leonard, had replaced the thermostat recently and the furnace had resumed working.
  The couple was away at a casino at the time of the blast. The daughter was staying with a friend, and the family's cat was being boarded.
  Monserrate Shirley's attorney, Randall Cable, declined comment on the announcement Monday evening.
  Associated Press writer Ken Kusmer contributed to this report from Indianapolis.
  Join the discussion on the MSN News Facebook page.
  Police make arrest in death of zoo monkey
  On Saturday, police were investing an early morning break-in at the Boise zoo. A monkey was found dead shortly after suspects were spotted and ran off.
  FBI arrests 4 men in California on terrorism charges
  The FBI said the men planned to join al-Qaida and charged them with providing support to terrorists.
  San Francisco area nurses set to walk off jobs early Tuesday
  This will be the second nurses strike in San Francisco this month.
  US cities find small steps key to effective storm protection
  Many cities and states are now analyzing small ways to combat storm surges. In Saco, Maine, they're elevating the houses.
  Woman, 3 grandkids killed on ND reservation
  A 64-year-old grandma and three of her grandchildren were gunned down in their North Dakota home Sunday afternoon. The "person of interest" killed himself in front of officials when he was approached just hours after their deaths.
  Kansas appeals court attorney fired over tweet
  Attorney Sarah Peterson Herr took to Twitter to call Kansas's former attorney general a "douchebag" while he appeared in court.
  Judge denies bid for park Nativity displays
  Nativity scenes have been erected in Santa Monica's Palisades Park for decades, but atheists overwhelmed the city's auction process for sites, winning 18 of 21 slots and triggering a bitter dispute.
  Judge: Hobby Lobby must offer morning-after pill
  Hobby Lobby requested an injunction against portions of the health care law on religious grounds. A judge denied the request, saying the company is not a religious organization.
  Violent dolphin deaths remain a mystery for scientists
  Friday's gruesome discovery of dolphins shot, stabbed and mutilated, had prompted an investigation by the NOAA. The attacks remain a mystery.
  Intel CEO Paul Otellini to retire in surprise move
  Ind. home explosion now homicide investigation
  Authorities have been focused on appliances in their investigation on the blast that killed an Indiana couple. Now officials say they are looking for a white van that was seen in the neighborhood.
  Denver man who threatened to kill Obama denied release on bond
  A judge refused Mitchell Kusick's request to be released from prison, saying the 20-year-old man who threatened to kill President Obama was a 'risk to the community.'
  Storms roll across Northwest, causing 1 death
  Marine Corps forms new fighter jet squadron
  New push for most in US to get at least 1 HIV test
  There is a new push to make testing for the AIDS virus as common as cholesterol checks.
  2 workers shoulder blame for 2010 BP oil disaster
  Federal prosecutors brought charges against two low-ranking BP rig workers in the 2010 BP oil disaster that killed 11 workers. They say the two men had botched a crucial safety test before the explosion.
  US soldier enters no plea in 2009 Iraq shootings
  U.S. Army Sergeant John Russell, accused of killing five during a shooting spree at a Baghdad army camp, will face an arraignment at a military base in Washington state on Monday.
  NJ drug company execs charged with insider trading
  The two executives passed privileged information on their companies' merger and acquisition plans, financial results and regulatory applications to others who would make stock trades.
  Superstorm shines light on federal beach program
  US credit cards: More debt, later payments
  We're using our credit cards more and making payments later than we did a year ago, a new report shows.
  Ancient rock carvings stolen in Sierra Nevada
  At least four petroglyphs '-- some of them located 15 feet above the ground '-- have been hacked off of lava cliffs in the Eastern Sierra.
  Judge: Hostess to mediate with union Tuesday
  Twinkies and Ding Dongs may continue to live in supermarkets after all. Hostess and the workers' union have agreed to a mediation hearing on Tuesday.
  Budget talk optimism spurs Wall Street rally
  Stock markets responded positively for a second session in a row on news that a deal could be reached to stave off the looming "fiscal cliff."
  Housing market shows strong improvement
  Nationwide, the median price for a home was up 11.1 percent from a year earlier as fewer people sold their homes under distressed conditions.
  R&B singer Billy Scott dies at age 70
  Scott, who had a number of hit records in the 1960s and '70s was inducted into the North Carolina Music Hall of Fame in 1999.
  NY searching for man in shopkeeper shootings
  The three shootings of Middle Eastern shopkeepers have been linked through evidence showing the same gun was used for all three murders.
  Oxygen masks used on KC-Dallas Southwest flight
  The Southwest Airlines plane lost pressure at about 35,000 feet, and the pilot followed protocol by descending and deploying the masks.
  Sandy severely tests Christie, Bloomberg, Cuomo
  Experts in leadership and disaster response say the governors of New York and New Jersey and the mayor of New York City showed 'stellar leadership' during and after Superstorm Sandy.
  Judge denies bid for Calif. park Nativity displays
  Nativity scenes have been erected in Santa Monica's Palisades Park for decades, but atheists overwhelmed the city's auction process for sites, winning 18 of 21 slots and triggering a bitter dispute.
  Moonshiners set up shop in Ga. city hall
  Dawsonville, Ga., is celebrating its moonshine history by allowing a distillery to set up in its municipal building.
Rand Paul single-handedly tries to stop NDAA
  Link to Article
  Source: Dprogram.net
  Tue, 20 Nov 2012 08:06
  November 20th, 2012
  Tags: paul, Rand Paul, tries to stop NDAAThis entry was posted on Tuesday, November 20th, 2012 at 12:16 am and is filed under Dictatorship, Education/Mind Control, Fascism, Film/Video, Martial Law/Police State, NWO. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can skip to the end and leave a response. Pinging is currently not allowed.
Kurtz Rips Murdoch for 'Atrocious' Tweet Suggesting 'Jewish' Press Have Hidden Agenda
  Link to Article
  Source: Crooks and Liars
  Tue, 20 Nov 2012 08:03
  CNN host Howard Kurtz on Sunday blasted News Corp chief executive Rupert Murdoch for an "atrocious" suggestion that stereotyped the "Jewish owned press" as having a hidden agenda.
  In a tweet on Saturday, Murdoch had lashed out at what he called the "Jewish owned press" for its coverage of a recent conflict between Hamas and Israel.
  "Why is Jewish owned press so consistently anti-Israel in every crisis?" he wrote.
  The Daily Beast's Peter Beinart quickly noted that Murdoch's tweet managed to offend both journalists and Jews.
  "It's offensive to journalists because it implies that institutions of the 'press' should reflect the ideological biases of their owners," Beinart wrote. "Reading Murdoch's tweet, it would be logical to conclude that he believes that any newspaper he owns should reflect his right-wing views, even in its news coverage."
  "Murdoch's tweet is offensive to Jews because he's suggesting that when it comes to Israel, Jewish media-owners should let their Jewishness guide their journalism. ... Murdoch seems upset that Jewish media owners are not Israel-firsters. He wants their tribal loyalty to a Jewish state to trump their professional obligation to oversee fair-minded, unbiased journalism."
  In his Sunday media analysis on CNN, Kurtz also tore into Murdoch.
  "Last night, he went beyond outrageous to offensive," the media critic said of Murdoch, observing that most media organizations -- with the exception The New York Times -- were owned by public companies like Viacom, Comcast, Disney and Time Warner.
  "And beyond that, this media mogul who isn't shy about interfering in his own newsrooms is suggesting that Jewish Americans have a hidden agenda in which their religion trumps their commitment to journalism," he added. "That is atrocious and it is beneath Rupert Murdoch."
Daily Press Briefing - November 19, 2012
  Link to Article
  Tue, 20 Nov 2012 07:56
  12:55 p.m. EST
  MS. NULAND: Happy Monday, everybody, Thanksgiving week. As you know, the Secretary is still in Asia with the President. They're in Cambodia today. I have nothing at the top. Let's go to what's on your minds.
  QUESTION: Let's start with Gaza and Israel. One, I realize the White House read out or '' it didn't really read out but gave a list of the calls the Secretary's made. Do you have anything to add to the list that they put out earlier, calls that she has made related to the situation?
  MS. NULAND: They read out the same list that we also gave you yesterday. We sent out last evening to all of you a list of the diplomatic engagements that the Secretary has had on Gaza. As you know, the President's also been active and been making phone calls, as has National Security Advisor Donilon. For a full list of all of those, I would refer you to the background briefing that Ben Rhodes gave from Cambodia about six hours ago, something like that.
  But just to recap the Secretary's calls, on Friday, as we discussed, she talked to Israeli Foreign Minister Lieberman, Egyptian Foreign Minister Amr, Jordanian King Abdullah. On Saturday, she talked on this subject to Egyptian Prime Minister Qandil after his visit to Gaza. She talked to UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon and French Foreign Minister Fabius before their scheduled travel to the region today. She also talked to Turkish Foreign Minister Davutoglu and Qatari Prime Minister Hamid bin Jasim Al Thani. She has not made any additional calls yet today, but I think she stands ready to if she thinks that will be helpful.
  QUESTION: And I didn't hear, but maybe I missed it, any Palestinians listed in there?
  MS. NULAND: She has not made any calls to President Abbas. As you know, David Hale --
  QUESTION: Or anyone else?
  MS. NULAND: Or '' who do you have in mind to?
  QUESTION: I don't know. Anyone else in the Palestinian leadership?
  MS. NULAND: Yeah. David Hale has been in touch with Palestinian authorities. As you know, he had a meeting with President Abbas not too long ago. He's also been in touch. If we have specific calls to read out, I'll let you know, Matt.
  QUESTION: Do you know if anyone's been in touch with the PA since Wednesday when David Hale saw Abbas in Switzerland?
  MS. NULAND: I think we mentioned that our Consul General's been in touch from Jerusalem. I don't have any higher-level contacts to read out, but I will triple check after the briefing.
  QUESTION: There is a sense, at least among some on the Hill, that the Egyptians are not doing enough in this situation to bring pressure to bear on Hamas to end the rocket attacks. Do you share that assessment?
  MS. NULAND: Well, let me start by saying that as you can tell from all of the intensive diplomacy that's been going on, all of the countries involved '' the phone calls that the Secretary, that the President, that Tom Donilon have been having '' this is an intense period of international community, regional countries trying to work together to de-escalate the tensions. As we have said again and again, we want to see any leaders with influence use it to help the parties de-escalate. I don't think it's helpful from this podium for us to be getting into the details of those conversations or to be giving individual interlocutors a grade on how they are doing.
  The Egyptians have been playing a leading role in trying to get this de-escalated. We've been supportive of those efforts. We've been in close contact with them at all levels '' Morsi, Qandil, Amr, et cetera.
  QUESTION: Sorry. Why is it not helpful to call out people who aren't doing what you think they should?
  MS. NULAND: I said it's not helpful for us to be getting into an individual grading of the different efforts. We are encouraging Egyptians, Qataris, Turks, others to use the influence that they have with Hamas and with other extremist groups.
  QUESTION: I'm not sure I understand why that's not helpful, but I'll leave that for another time. Do you know, is there anything in '' that while the people on the Hill are venting their frustration with the Egyptians and saying that they better watch out, they better do what you want them to, or their aid is at risk, I'm not going to ask if it is or not, but I would '' because of this '' but I would like to know, is it '' is there anything in the agreements that you have, or in the law as written by Congress, that says that aid to Egypt is at risk if they don't do enough to stop Hamas from firing rockets into Israel, or is it only related to domestic Egyptian policies and upholding the peace treaty with Israel?
  MS. NULAND: Well, if you're asking about the certifications that are required and that the Secretary has already made for this fiscal year with regard to Egypt, what's written into the law requests certification with regard to upholding the peace treaty and with regard to making further progress on their democratic trajectory. So --
  QUESTION: All right. So as far as you know, there's nothing in there that says that if they don't stop Hamas from firing rockets into Israel, there's '' I mean, there's nothing in there that says that if they don't do, that the aid is withheld? Or --
  MS. NULAND: There's no stipulation with regard to this issue --
  QUESTION: Okay.
  MS. NULAND: -- in legislation. However, as you know, when we want to appropriate money, we notify the Congress. And if the Congress has concerns, they let us know. And we are still working with them on the economic support funds that we want to get released.
  Michel.
  QUESTION: Toria.
  MS. NULAND: Michel.
  QUESTION: Do you have any details about the deal that Egypt and Turkey and Qatar are working on between Israel and Hamas?
  MS. NULAND: We're not, as I said, going to get into the details of the diplomacy. We are supportive of efforts by regional states to try to get this de-escalated. But I'm going to send you to those countries for more details on the plans that they're working.
  QUESTION: But are you aware that --
  QUESTION: I'm wondering why the Secretary hasn't managed yet to make time to speak to the Palestinian Authority on this. I mean, they would seem to be a key player in what is unfolding in the region.
  MS. NULAND: Again, we've been in contact with the Palestinians. I think we make judgments as to her diplomacy based on the situation as we see it.
  Said.
  QUESTION: Are you aware, Victoria, of actually a deal that was handed over to the Israelis that stipulates a demand for Israel to stop assassinating Hamas leader and lift the blockade? Are you aware of that?
  MS. NULAND: Again, Said, I am not going to get into the details of the diplomacy that various actors are undertaking. I'm not going to give it a grade. I'm not going to evaluate from here our involvement with it. I think that's not helpful to the process. We need a little bit a period of quiet diplomacy here to try to de-escalate this.
  QUESTION: Okay. For the second day straight, the Israelis bombed a Shuruq media tower and killed and injured some people that are not affiliated with Hamas or Hamas militants. According to Protocol I, Article 79 of the Geneva Convention, that is a war crime. Do you concur?
  MS. NULAND: Said, I am not going to comment on the specific ground situation beyond saying what we've been saying, which is we are concerned about civilian casualties on both sides. We want to see this situation de-escalated. We are working with parties, we are working with regional players on that.
  QUESTION: Okay. But Gaza is fast sliding into a catastrophic humanitarian situation. Are you prepared to aid Gaza directly or to take some sort of urgent measures to alleviate the suffering, perhaps lifting the blockade?
  MS. NULAND: The most important urgent matter is to de-escalate this conflict on both sides to '' including the fact that Hamas is still firing rockets into Israel.
  Please.
  QUESTION: You talk about regional actors. Today, again, some of the top officials from Turkey have been kind of taking issue with your stance regarding the events in Gaza. You just mentioned that State Secretary '' Secretary of State Clinton talked with the Foreign Minister '' Turkish Foreign Minister. Would you be able to elaborate on how these talks going on with Turkish ally?
  MS. NULAND: I'm not going to get into the details of any of these conversations. It's not helpful to the goal that we all have. I will say, though, as we said in the statement that we put out yesterday, in all of these conversations, the goal is the same, which is to try to de-escalate this dangerous conflict.
  QUESTION: Turkish President Gul said that proportional '' Israel is not using its force proportionally. Do you agree that? Do you see these proportional views?
  MS. NULAND: Again, as I said in answer to Said, I am not going to get into the details of the ground situation here at all.
  QUESTION: So you don't want to say that you don't agree with the Turks when they say that what Israel is doing constitutes acts of terrorism?
  MS. NULAND: We are focused on an affirmative narrative of de-escalation on both sides. I am not going to get into ''He said X and she said Y.'' I'm just not going to do it here. And I'm also not going to go beyond what Ben Rhodes said in his background briefing just a few hours ago, which accurately, obviously, characterizes for the whole government where we are in our efforts.
  QUESTION: How do you '' this whole thing of saying nothing, I'm not sure I understand why you think that that's helpful to the situation. You say that it would not be helpful for you to discuss any of your conversations, that quiet diplomacy is the way to de-escalate that. Well, you've been doing your quiet diplomacy now for almost a week. How's it going so far?
  MS. NULAND: We are working hard with the parties. We're working hard with --
  QUESTION: Hasn't it occurred to anybody that maybe being less quiet might get more results, though? Squeaky wheel gets grease, that kind of thing?
  MS. NULAND: I'll let the --
  QUESTION: You're being silent while people are dying left and right.
  MS. NULAND: Matt, we are being far from silent. The President has --
  QUESTION: You're not telling us anything about what you're '' when the Turks come out '' when the leaders of Turkey come out and say that Israel is engaged in acts of terrorism and you refuse to say that you don't agree with that '' or maybe you do agree with it '' that's being silent.
  MS. NULAND: Matt, we have made a decision that we need to engage in our diplomatic work diplomatically. We have been very, very clear about where we stand on this, which is that '' which is --
  QUESTION: And that's because you don't practice diplomacy from the podium? Is that what you're getting back to?
  MS. NULAND: We don't practice diplomacy --
  QUESTION: Yeah.
  MS. NULAND: -- from the podium. We have been very clear that Israel has a right of self-defense. We've been very clear that rockets continue to be fired and land on Israel. We've been very clear that we are working to try to get this conflict de-escalated. We have been very clear about our concern for the civilians and innocents on both sides who are getting caught in this, and that's as --
  QUESTION: And yet you won't stick up for your ally, Israel, when the Turks, another one of your allies, say that they're engaged in terrorism in Gaza?
  MS. NULAND: We have been extremely clear about our concern for Israel's security, about the fact that Israel has a right to self-defense, but I am not going to go further than that today, Matt.
  QUESTION: Why can't you say that you don't agree with the Turks?
  MS. NULAND: Because I'm not going to get into a public spitting match with allies on either side. We're just not going to do that, okay?
  QUESTION: And you think that that's worse? A public spitting match with one of your allies is worse than hundreds of people dying every day?
  MS. NULAND: I don't understand the question here. There's not a question here. You're just looking for a fight. Let's go.
  Said.
  QUESTION: No, no, no. The fight is already on.
  MS. NULAND: Yeah. Absolutely.
  QUESTION: The fight's going on over there.
  MS. NULAND: Absolutely.
  QUESTION: And you guys, by refusing to say anything about what you're trying to do or refusing to say whether you agree or disagree with comments that are being made by your allies or others --
  MS. NULAND: We --
  QUESTION: -- that makes things worse, not better.
  MS. NULAND: We, of course, agree that rhetorical attacks against Israel are not helpful at this moment.
  QUESTION: Okay.
  MS. NULAND: Is that what you were looking for, Matt?
  QUESTION: Yes. Thank you. Yes.
  MS. NULAND: Thank you.
  QUESTION: (Inaudible) proportionality as well.
  QUESTION: Toria, do you think that Gaza should be treated in isolation, let's say, of the whole Palestinian issue? Or do you think that what is going on in Gaza places the issue back on the front burner, resolving the Palestinian-Israeli conflict?
  MS. NULAND: Again, this is not making anything easier if that's what you're asking, Said. Okay?
  QUESTION: Okay. Yesterday, the ranking Republican on the Armed Services Committee, Mr. McCain, called to send a high-level diplomat, someone with the stature of former President Bill Clinton. Do you agree?
  MS. NULAND: Said, I am not going to get into the details of the work that we're trying to do to get this de-escalated.
  QUESTION: Okay. Well, do you agree that maybe a high-level envoy should go and take the Middle East right on, so to speak?
  MS. NULAND: I am '' don't have anything to announce or to share on anything along those lines at the moment.
  I think we really should move on, because I'm really at the end of what I have to share here.
  QUESTION: I'd like to ask about your '' the conversations you're having with Israel about this. Isn't there '' are you not at any point asking them to sort of maybe rein things in? There is an issue of proportionality here. I mean, I think we had something like 1,350 targets in Gaza have been struck by the Israelis as opposed to 570 rockets that were struck into southern Israel.
  MS. NULAND: Again, I --
  QUESTION: I mean, there is a difference there, isn't '' the difference there, but '' and also about the technology that's being used. Could you tell us whether the U.S. is asking Israel to at least have a proportionate response to these attacks?
  MS. NULAND: Again, as I said at the outset, I'm not going to get into the details of any of these conversations. I'm sorry to frustrate you.
  Please.
  QUESTION: You might not answer this one either with things, but Hamas has been stockpiling Iranian missiles for a while now. And do you think Israel could be '' the State Department '' Israel using this conflict as an opportunity to see Hamas's capabilities in, like, launching those rockets into Israel? Maybe eliminating them, seeing their strategies in case Israel later decides to strike Iranian nuclear sites?
  MS. NULAND: It sounds like a question for Israel, not a question for us. Let's move on, guys.
  QUESTION: Thank you.
  QUESTION: I have something on the topic, but maybe you'll address it. What precautionary measures are being put in place for U.S. personnel inside Israel? Do we have any safety measures? What if there needs to be an evacuation? Can you talk a little bit about that?
  MS. NULAND: Let me give you a little bit on all of that. Our embassies in Tel Aviv and in Cairo, our consulate in Jerusalem, have released security messages encouraging U.S. citizens to exercise caution and to take appropriate measures to ensure their safety and security in light of the ongoing violence. Our Embassy in Tel Aviv is operating with essential staffing only at the moment, and limited consular services. Our consulate general in Jerusalem is limiting official travel, and our Embassy in Cairo is open and operating normally.
  QUESTION: Can we move from war?
  MS. NULAND: Yeah.
  QUESTION: Just '' well, this has to do with Iraq and Lebanon, and you know '' you will have seen or known for a while, probably, that Treasury put Mr. Daqduq on the OFAC list today. And I just '' in light of that, I'm wondering if there have been any further conversations since he arrived in Beirut with the Lebanese about him and his status there.
  MS. NULAND: My understanding is that we have been in contact with the Lebanese, as I mentioned on Friday. I don't have anything new to report there. But as you say, Treasury has now put him on the designation list.
  Anything, please? Go ahead.
  QUESTION: Okay. Hi, my name is (inaudible); I am correspondent of Tanjug News Agency from Serbia. My question is on Friday's Hague Tribunal verdict. I've seen that you said something about that, but I just want to show you this photo. This is the photo of the Croatian soccer '' a member of the Croatian soccer team, and from Saturday's. He saluted the two generals with the Nazi salute in Germany.
  My question is: I haven't seen in your statement that you mentioned anything about the victims and reconciliation. We heard so many times from the U.S. officials that they are talking about that. And my question is: Do you think that justice is served in Hague with this verdict? And do you have any message to 250,000 victims, Serbs who were forced to leave Croatia 17 years ago and now they found that nobody's guilty for that, even they have to see the pictures like that?
  Thank you.
  MS. NULAND: We spoke to this issue and the verdict on Friday. I don't have anything to add to what we said on Friday. You know that we have, for more than a decade, supported processes of national reconciliation across the Balkans and full accounting including the process that The Hague Tribunal is involved in.
  Moving on?
  QUESTION: Well I '' I was '' I'm sorry '' as you will recall, what you said on Friday was that you had not '' the United States had not submitted briefs on '' to add '' had not taken any position on --
  MS. NULAND: We did not submit briefs in this case.
  QUESTION: Right. But --
  MS. NULAND: Right. We have in other cases.
  QUESTION: So, could you take the question as to why? Because --
  MS. NULAND: I will take the question. I'm going to guess it's because we didn't have any evidence of our own to contribute, one way or the other, in these cases.
  QUESTION: Is it --
  MS. NULAND: That's usually why we don't submit briefs.
  QUESTION: Okay. Or is it because you just didn't care? That's --
  MS. NULAND: No, I think it's generally because we don't any information to add to what the court already knows, but I will take it.
  Please, Scott.
  QUESTION: Can we go to Congo?
  MS. NULAND: Yeah.
  QUESTION: So, the M23 rebels are approaching Goma. They gave Kinshasa a 24-hour deadline to negotiate, Kinshasa says they won't because it's Rwandans behind him. We went through this at the UNGA in New York, so what can you tell us about what's going on?
  MS. NULAND: Well, we're obviously deeply troubled by the rapidly deteriorating security and humanitarian crisis in the Eastern D.R.C. There are now some 60,000 people displaced just in the past three days, 500,000 since January, and threats to hundreds of thousands more. We're also particularly appalled by the incredible spike in violence and M23's decision to renew its military campaign and its violent and illegal activities.
  We have been extremely active in the last couple of weeks, including over the weekend, to try to engage regional leaders and encourage a solution to this crisis. As you know, Under Secretary Wendy Sherman visited the D.R.C. and Rwanda and Uganda in early November. Over the weekend, she spoke again to Rwandan President Kagame, and she will speak with President Kabila and Ugandan President Musevini in coming hours or days. Assistant Secretary Carson has also been on the phone with D.R.C. and Rwandan foreign and defense ministers, and our Embassy has been in very close touch. It's an extremely dangerous and worrying situation.
  QUESTION: Is it your opinion that the Rwandan authorities are doing everything that they can to contribute to the resolution of this?
  MS. NULAND: Well we are encouraging, obviously, D.R.C. military and MONUSCO to do everything they can, first and foremost, to protect the population in Goma and prevent a further deterioration in the security situation there. As you know, when the Secretary was at the UNGA, she sat with both Kabila and Kagame together in an effort to try to encourage further dialogue. We will continue to do that. We need all sides to do what they can to roll back the M23 offensive and to protect civilians.
  QUESTION: France is putting forward a resolution at the UN Security Council today asking for greater sanctions against the M23. Is this something the United States supports?
  MS. NULAND: Well, I knew that there was going to be a D.R.C. conversation at the UN starting at around noon. I don't know that we have had a chance to review the French proposal, but why don't I send you to our people at the UN. I think we're very much on the same page in terms of wanting to work together to see the conflict end here.
  Michel.
  QUESTION: On Syria?
  MS. NULAND: Yeah.
  QUESTION: A group of extremist Islamist factions has rejected the new opposition coalition and formed an Islamic state in Aleppo. How do you view this development?
  MS. NULAND: Well, given that the Syrian Opposition Coalition has supported a platform of pluralism, a platform of tolerance, a platform that respects the rights of Syrians of all stripes, it's not surprising to us that those who want an extremist state or a heavily Islamist state in Syria have taken issue with this. We would note that this stands in sharp contrast to the 500-plus positive demonstrations in support of the Syrian Opposition Coalition that have taken place across Syria in the last couple of days.
  As the Syrian Opposition Coalition President Mouaz al-Khatib reiterated last week, what's most important is that we have a Syria where all populations can coexist, a nation of tolerance. That's what we support. That's what we seek.
  QUESTION: Victoria, on the Friends of Syria meeting in Morocco, do you have any idea when is it going to be and why it keeps getting put off?
  MS. NULAND: Well, we have, as you know, supported a next meeting in Morocco at an appropriate time. I don't have anything to announce here, but --
  QUESTION: They don't have a date set.
  MS. NULAND: I don't have a --
  QUESTION: You don't know what time it is?
  MS. NULAND: The Moroccans will be the hosts. We'll leave it to them to announce it at the right moment.
  QUESTION: The French again '' sorry '' have also said that they're looking at the idea of welcoming an ambassador from this new opposition alliance. Is that something that the United States would concur with?
  MS. NULAND: Well, I don't have anything to announce yet. As you know, the French have gone a step further than we have in terms of their recognition stance. You know where we are, that we see this group as a legitimate representative of the people. We are encouraging the S-O-C to take the next steps to strengthen its organizational structure, to demonstrate its effective outreach to groups on the ground, and we are continuing to look at what's appropriate in terms of our diplomatic engagement with them.
  QUESTION: I think the Europeans are also going to meet soon, or shortly, on whether to lift their own embargo on supplying arms to the Syrian rebels. Where are we at on that in the United States?
  MS. NULAND: I don't have any change of U.S. policy to announce today.
  QUESTION: Does what you just said about the SOC '' does that mean that --
  MS. NULAND: I think you like it calling it the SOC, right?
  QUESTION: I think it's appropriate.
  MS. NULAND: (Laughter.)
  QUESTION: You call the BOG the BOG, right?
  MS. NULAND: Right.
  QUESTION: That would be the Board of Governors of the IAEA.
  You said that you're encouraging the SOC, the S-O-C, to take steps to do other '' so does that mean that any decision on '' in terms of following France's lead is still, in terms of recognizing them, is going to have to wait until you see more from them?
  Is that what you were going to '' is that the basic --
  MS. NULAND: I think --
  QUESTION: Or is it not inevitable that at some point, or is it not probable that at some point, you will recognize them, as you did the TNC?
  MS. NULAND: Well, I'm not going to predict where we're going to go. We're obviously looking at this day by day, week by week. We're getting to know them better. We're encouraging them to make more progress. But we will see how things go over the coming weeks.
  QUESTION: Well, I understand, but wasn't the point of them forming this group to give you '' and by you, I mean everyone, not just the United States '' but to give you something to look for, look toward as either a transitional government or as a government in exile, at least the germ of that? Isn't that the idea? I mean, wasn't that created with the ultimate hoped-for goal that you would be able to recognize them as the legitimate representative? Or am I wrong on that?
  MS. NULAND: Well, again, this is a process. They've made incredible progress at Doha. And they're continuing to make progress, as I said, in terms of getting support from the population. These demonstrations that we saw over the weekend were a very, very good sign in terms of the traction that they're gaining inside. They have more work to do organizationally, and we'll just look at the progress that they make on a day-by-day, week-by-week basis.
  QUESTION: (Inaudible) time for Mouaz al-Khatib to come visit in Washington so you can get to know them a bit better here?
  MS. NULAND: He hasn't announced a visit yet.
  Please.
  QUESTION: Okay. There were clashes today in the north of Aleppo between the Syrian Kurdish PYD forces and the '' some of the FSA factions. The tension is '' it looks like reportedly growing. What's your understanding the situation on the ground?
  MS. NULAND: You mean among --
  QUESTION: Between Kurds and the FSA --
  MS. NULAND: I don't have any ground situation details to share today. Frankly, I hadn't heard that.
  Yeah.
  QUESTION: Victoria, do they have '' is there, like, a trial period that '' during which the coalition must prove its good deeds, whatever, after which you could recognize them? Is that what we have here?
  MS. NULAND: I think we spoke pretty clearly last week, I've repeated it here today, the kind of continued progress we want to see. It's very '' one of the issues with the SNC was that they never developed the implementing structures for the commitments that they'd made to the Syrian people. That's one of the things we want to see here, and as I said, for them to continue to gain traction inside.
  QUESTION: There is no timeframe, is there? Like in three months, four months?
  MS. NULAND: I don't have anything particular to share. As I said, we're looking at this day by day, week by week.
  QUESTION: One more on Syria.
  MS. NULAND: Yeah.
  QUESTION: Iran has started building a $10 billion natural gas pipeline to Syria. How do you view this?
  MS. NULAND: We've seen reports of this pipeline six or seven or ten or fifteen times before, and it never seems to materialize. We're seeing media reports yet again, I guess as far as it's bragging about this pipeline. I would simply say that the construction of any kind of an Iranian-Syrian pipeline could potentially raise sanctions issues under U.S. law on either Iran or Syria, including for international entities who might decide to participate in it either by financing or by construction.
  But again, we've heard about this a lot and never seen it materialize.
  QUESTION: Is that just on countries this pipeline will go through also?
  MS. NULAND: Potentially. We have to see if it ever comes to fruition.
  QUESTION: Well, we could potentially see sanctions issued on Iran or Syria? Is that what you just said?
  MS. NULAND: Could raise sanctions --
  QUESTION: Could I just ask --
  MS. NULAND: -- sanctions issues under U.S. laws on Iran and Syria --
  QUESTION: Oh, oh, oh, oh.
  MS. NULAND: -- for international entities who participate.
  QUESTION: Because I would just be curious as to what kind of sanctions you could possibly add to Iran or Syria.
  MS. NULAND: No, no, no, no, no. We're talking about --
  QUESTION: I mean, are they in the North Korea thing where you're going to '' you just keep adding layer after layer even after --
  MS. NULAND: No, the point here is that --
  QUESTION: Other countries.
  MS. NULAND: Others. Others who involve themselves in this could be sanctioned.
  QUESTION: Any other layers in the pipeline? (Laughter.)
  QUESTION: Toria, Iran News Agency has said today that Iran has already begun construction of the first phase of the project involving a 225-kilometer stretch at an estimated cost of $3 billion. It looks like they've already started construction.
  MS. NULAND: That may well be. I'm simply shouting out the point that if there are international entities who are planning to finance or participate in this, they need to be careful of U.S. sanctions.
  QUESTION: Just one follow-up question about Turkish request to Patriot missiles. The U.S. Defense Secretary over the weekend said that Turkey and U.S. are working together and he expects that U.S. will help Turkey to provide this. Is there an update regarding Patriots today?
  MS. NULAND: No, I think NATO Secretary General Rasmussen spoke for all of us in saying that we don't yet have a Turkish formal request. We'll obviously look at that when it comes in. But as we've been saying for months now, the defense of our ally Turkey is of paramount importance to us, and we will look very seriously at any request.
  Scott.
  QUESTION: Sudan.
  MS. NULAND: Yeah.
  QUESTION: You had a statement earlier today expressing concern. I don't remember what the word you had about after they had that border deal, then they haven't really gotten to the specifics of that. Why is it? What is the view of the United States? What's held up implementing this deal?
  MS. NULAND: I don't have anything particularly to add to the statement that we released earlier. It was a historic and important moment when they overcame their objections. They both need this oil to move. It's essential to the economies of both countries. But there are historic suspicions here, and they need to overcome them on both sides and get this thing moving in the interest of both countries.
  QUESTION: Can I ask a South Sudan question? There's an American, Elton Mark McCabe, who is in detention in South Sudan. What can you tell us about him, his case? Has he had a consular visit?
  MS. NULAND: Well, we can confirm that Mr. McCabe was originally detained on October 14th by the South Sudan National Security Services. We learned of his arrest from a third party on the 15th and we finally got consular access on the 19th of October. We pressed the South Sudanese to move him into local police custody, which they finally did on October 29th. The local police released him and then the NSS picked him up again. So we've raised this case at the highest levels of the South Sudanese Government, urging that he be granted due process as stipulated under Sudan's transitional constitution. We have been in to see him regularly, including at the level of our ambassador, and we're going to continue to provide consular assistance and follow his case. But we remain concerned about the circumstances of his arrest, the fact that we weren't notified in a timely manner, and to insist on due process in this case for our American citizen.
  Please, in the back.
  QUESTION: Can you confirm a report that '' on Myanmar '' USAID will provide $170 million aid to Myanmar?
  MS. NULAND: The President announced it in his speech at the university yesterday.
  Yeah.
  QUESTION: Afghanistan?
  MS. NULAND: Yeah.
  QUESTION: Today, President Karzai is saying that the United States has breached the agreement on transferring full control of Bagram prison to Afghan authority. Could you just fill us in on where you are with that and whether this is, in fact, true whether '' he says they haven't got full control yet.
  MS. NULAND: Well, we are committed to fulfilling the commitments that we made under the Memorandum of Understanding on Detentions. This was signed in March and it contains reciprocal commitments to provide for the security of Afghan citizens, the ANSF, coalition forces, by keeping captured enemy combatants from returning to the battlefield. We do have a number of cases that we are continuing to work through with the Afghan Government to ensure that commitments are kept on both sides, and we will work through those diligently. And we are confident that we're going to find a solution, but we, as I said, still have a number of cases that we're working through.
  QUESTION: They've broke their side of the agreement then?
  MS. NULAND: Again, we have to ensure that reciprocal commitments are met, and we're working through the cases.
  QUESTION: Have you got any kind of timeline about when you think this will all be dealt with?
  MS. NULAND: Again, we are committed to trying to get through it, but it has to be done right.
  QUESTION: Are the issues that these prisoners '' so to break it down into simple terms, the issue is that you fear that these prisoners will just be released back into the public, and whereas you, the United States, still believes that they present some kind of threat?
  MS. NULAND: I'm not going to get into the details because the circumstances are different in different cases, but we need to ensure as we finish this process of releasing all of the prisoners into Afghan custody that both sides are fulfilling the full intent and spirit of the memorandum that we signed.
  QUESTION: But the problem is some of them might just be released?
  MS. NULAND: Again, I'm not going to get into the details because they're different in each case, but we do need to ensure that as we do this we are keeping captured enemy combatants from returning to the battlefield.
  QUESTION: Have you an idea of how many numbers you're talking about prisoners that are --
  MS. NULAND: I don't have numbers here in front of me. There are still a number of them that need to be worked through.
  Please.
  QUESTION: Japan?
  MS. NULAND: Mm-hmm.
  QUESTION: On Sunday, Japanese police arrested U.S. Marine First Lieutenant Thomas Chanquet for trespassing in Okinawa. This is now the third case since the alleged rape back on October 16th. Do you have any comment on this incident? And specifically, how will this affect U.S. realignment in the area?
  MS. NULAND: I hadn't heard about this trespassing case. I would send you to U.S. Forces Japan for a comment. We are committed, as you know, to upholding the law and to the appropriate behavior of all of our American service personnel in Japan, and we work through these issues as they come up. We try to do it under the terms of our agreement, and we remain committed to the timetable that we've been working through with the Government of Japan on realignment.
  Please, Scott.
  QUESTION: Ivory Coast?
  MS. NULAND: Yeah.
  QUESTION: Human Rights Watch is out today with a report alleging that the Ouattara government is rounding up Gbagbo supporters '' not necessarily militants, but just some of his political supporters. As you'll recall, Secretary Clinton and President Ouattara spoke in Abidjan about the Ouattara government's reconciliation program.
  MS. NULAND: Right.
  QUESTION: Have you had a chance to look at the Human Rights Watch report? And do you believe that President Ouattara's general reconciliation program is on track?
  MS. NULAND: Scott, let me take that one. I had not seen the Human Rights report before coming down, and we'll see if we have any comment in response.
  Please.
  QUESTION: Question with '' regarding Benghazi. Mike Rogers said yesterday that the Benghazi attack talking points were reviewed by a deputy committee of senior officials. And I was wondering, what involvement would the State Department have with that? And if so, would they be career diplomats or political appointees?
  MS. NULAND: I don't have any comment for you on that one way or the other. I, frankly, can't speak to that at all. I think the CIA may have some comment later today, or the DNI may have some comment later today, with regard to the timeline on the talking points.
  QUESTION: And the Benghazi complex is completely closed now? There is no diplomatic presence --
  MS. NULAND: Correct.
  QUESTION: -- American diplomat in Benghazi?
  MS. NULAND: Correct.
  QUESTION: Okay.
  MS. NULAND: Yeah. Catherine.
  QUESTION: You took a question on Friday on Alan Gross. I don't think I saw anything. Do you have --
  MS. NULAND: That's our bad. We'll get back to you today, Catherine. Sorry.
  QUESTION: Okay. Great. Thank you.
  MS. NULAND: All right.
  QUESTION: Wait, wait, wait. Yeah, that was my question. That wasn't the only one that was not '' that was taken and then not answered.
  MS. NULAND: Oh, what else did we --
  QUESTION: Honduras.
  MS. NULAND: On Honduras. We're falling down on the job.
  QUESTION: But on the Alan Gross lawsuit, which I find it very hard to believe that three days later you couldn't come up with: I'm sorry. We can't comment because it's a pending legal matter --
  MS. NULAND: Yeah. No, that one we do have the answer to, which is that it is a pending legal matter, so we're going to send you to Justice, unfortunately. Yeah. That one I had forgotten we did have an answer to, but if we didn't put it out, we should have.
  QUESTION: And Honduras?
  MS. NULAND: Honduras '' let me go kick the cats and find out what happened there. Okay?
  Thanks, everybody.
  (The briefing was concluded at 1:32 p.m.)
  DPB # 196
CHILD ABUSE MYSTERY
  Link to Article
  Source: aangirfan
  Tue, 20 Nov 2012 07:54
  WhitbyWebsite for this image. "MI5 may have been involved in a cover-up to silence child abuse allegations" MI5 'link to abuse' In 1987 a fire hit King's Cross underground station in London."Just two months before the King's Cross Fire, pop duo, The Pet Shop Boys released their second record entitled Actually."The final track on the album is a melancholy song entitled, King's Cross which, in a rather bizarre coincidence, appears to foresee a disaster at the station with the lyric:
  "'Only last night I found myself lost, by the station called King's Cross'... dead and wounded on either side, you know it's only a matter of time'...'"
  Tales From the Terminals: King's Cross (Part 1, History & Film)
  Allegedly, certain juvenile members of a pedophile ring were in a cafe, underground, when the fire broke out.Allegedly, the fire was started deliberately.There are good journalists, who tell us that pedophile rings do actually exist, and appear to be protected.And there are journalists, often fascists, Jews and crypro-Jews working for the spooks, who pretend that such pedophile rings probably do not exist. There is a suspicion that it is 'friends of Israel' and friends of 'fascism'who ultimately control both the pedophile rings and the spooks who make use of the pedophile rings?John Major sued and won. He had been accused of having a mistress. Owen Jones, in the Independent, reports: "They were little children, gang-raped and beaten till they bled by those charged with their care."
  The real victims ...-The Independent"Buggery, rape, bestiality, violent assaults and torture," is how Labour Member of Parliament Ann Clwyd described the findings of the Jillings Report into abuse at children's homes in north Wales.
  The real victims ...-The IndependentPrime Minister John Major's Jewish mistress, Edwina Curry
  Steven Messham was sent to Bryn Estyn at the age of 13. He, and other children from Bryn Estyn, and other homes, "were sent to flats and hotel rooms in their pyjamas to be raped. "By the time Messham escaped on the eve of his 18th birthday, more than 50 men had abused him."The real victims ...-The Independent
  Abused children "can be plagued with self-hatred, an inability to form meaningful relationships, and a tendency to 'escape' through drugs or risky sex.The real victims ...-The Independent
  Lord Boothby sued and won. He had been accused of having a link to a gangster.
  "It is a mystery why a recent photograph of Lord McAlpine was never shown to Steven Messham - although the police have largely escaped scrutiny for seemingly wrongly identifying him to Messham in the 1990s as one of his tormentors."
  Will the police be sued by Lord McAlpine for identifying him as a possible abuser?"Steven Messham was let down badly by the police and by journalists; he is now re-living his abuse while being publicly smeared. This must not be allowed to continue. The focus must return to the victims..."The real victims ...-The Independent
  Steven Messham, victim of child abuse, and threats to kill him. Steven said that he not only had Polaroid photographs of this famous abuser, butthe man had told him who he was and how he would have him killed if he ever spoke out. Click here to see the interview ...Lord McAlpine is NOT the person who abused Steven Messham, according to Steven himself.
  The Guardian was the FIRST part of the mainstream media to name Lord McAlpine.
  "New evidence obtained by the Guardian suggests that the senior Conservative figure at the centre of sex abuse allegations broadcast last week by BBC2's Newsnight has been a victim of mistaken identity.
  "A local councillor who was himself a victim of abuse at Bryn Estyn, the Wrexham care home at the centre of the allegations, told the Guardian on Thursday he did not believe Lord (Alistair) McAlpine was involved in the scandal."
  'Mistaken identity' led to top Tory abuse claim | Politics | The Guardian
  Was Lord McAlpine smeared because of his move away from the Conservative party, after 1990?
  "After Thatcher left in 1990, he was unsupportive of John Major's premiership, particularly its Europe policy, and joined James Goldsmith's Referendum Party... "
  Alistair McAlpine, Baron McAlpine of West Green - Wikipedia.
  Was Lord McAlpine smeared by Scallywag magazine as part of a campaign to help Tony Blair's pro-Israel Labour Party?
  So, who did abuse Steven?
  DISCLAIMER: THE POSTING OF STORIES, COMMENTARIES, REPORTS,DOCUMENTSAND LINKS (EMBEDDED OR OTHERWISE) ON THIS SITE DOES NOT IN ANY WAY, SHAPE OR FORM, IMPLIED OR OTHERWISE, NECESSARILY EXPRESS OR SUGGEST ENDORSEMENT OR SUPPORT OF ANY OF SUCH POSTED MATERIAL OR PARTS THEREIN.
  David Icke has written (Newsletter on child abuse):"What I find strange is that he (Lord McAlpine) is talking about legal action now... when he did not take legal action 'in his prime' in the 1990s when he was very prominently named in relation to abuse at North Wales children's homes by the now defunct Scallywag magazine."McAlpine told the BBC this week that it had been an 'horrendous shock' to hear the allegations...
  "I don't understand. The Scallywag article could not have been more explicit. And why does he say that it was an 'horrendous shock' to hear these allegations when similar ones have been published before and he did NOTHING?
  "... If he had showed in court that its allegations were not true, this would have nailed the allegations for good..."
  (Lord McAlpine has said that he left it up to John Major to sue Scallywag.)
  David Icke continues:
  "After McAlpine made his denial statement, suddenly Steve Messham retracted his decades-old claim that McAlpine was one of his abusers..."That was shocking enough, but his explanation for doing so was absolutely bizarre.
  "Messham apologised for naming McAlpine (he hadn't publicly) and he said it was a case of 'mistaken identity', the same words that McAlpine had used in his statement earlier the same day. Newsnight then made a grovelling apology for naming McAlpine when they hadn't...
  "Steve Messham said that the reason he recanted that night on his not publicly mentioning the name of Lord McAlpine is that he was shown a picture of him by police 'in the last hour' and he realised it was not the man who abused him over and over and over decades ago.
  "Messham said that the problem of 'mistaken identity' arose because police showed him a picture in the 1990s of the person that he said abused him and they told him that it was Lord McAlpine.
  "Now they had shown him a picture of the 'real' Lord McAlpine 'in the last hour' and he had realised that it is not the man in the picture that police showed to him in the 1990s.
  "WHAT? I mean where do you start with an explanation....
  "We are being asked to believe that... he never once sought out a picture of McAlpine of any kind in the decades since his time in the children's home until the police showed him one 'in the last hour'?
  "MP Tom Watson said after he asked his question about the Downing Street paedophilia ring in Parliament: 'I'm not going to let this drop despite warnings from people who should know that my personal safety is imperilled if I dig any deeper. It's spooked me so much that I've kept a detailed log of all the allegations should anything happen.'
  "Only a few days before Steve Meesham came out with his sudden 'mistaken identity' apology, he told Channel Four News how he had broken into the flat of an abuser in North Wales and taken dozens of photographs of abusers raping boys, including himself, and some clearly showed the face, he said, of 'the prominent Tory abuser'.
  "Was he talking about the same man that days later he said that he had misidentified or someone else?
  "Further, he said that he not only had Polaroid photographs of this famous abuser, but the man had told him who he was and how he would have him killed if he ever spoke out.Click here to see the interview ...
  Sian Griffiths.
  "So Meesham said that he took the photographs to police and that although the faces of the abusers were clear to see the police said that they could not identify men in the pictures...
  "Meesham's story about the pictures is corroborated by Sian Griffiths, who worked in the inquiry office at Clwyd Council in the 1990s during the two inquiries into abuse at North Wales children's homes.
  "These were the Jillings report, which was never published because the council was warned by insurers of possible legal action by those that the victims named, and the main Waterhouse inquiry which did not allow victims to name who they said were their famous abusers...
  Website for this image...
  "Sian Griffiths, who sat at the administrative centre of both inquiries, told Channel Four News that Steve Messham's photographs of abuse were ordered to be destroyed. She said: 'We were supplied with copies of court documents ... there was an order made for the books and photos to be destroyed.' This is Sian's interview ...
  "Why would you order that photographs showing abusers should be destroyed?
  "(A quick aside here, but a very relevant one: When you see that Channel Four News interview with Steve Messham which did not name anyone, how is that any different to the BBC Newsnight interview with him, which equally didn't name anyone? Yet now the BBC (licence fee-payer) is forking out £185,000 in compensation to McAlpine over an interview in which he wasn't named? Will McAlpine be seeking an out-of-court settlement from Channel Four News? That's laughable, but the BBC is easy pickings now what's left of its balls have been handed over on a platter.)"
  Lord McAlpine is NOT the person who abused Steven Messham, according to Steven himself.
  We suspect that Lord McAlpine is a strong character and will survive the recent unfair accusations against him.
  Lord McAlpine has had an adventurous life, and now runs an excellent bed and breakfast in Italy.
  ''Another world''
  "This is one of my most favorite places on earth. This is a magical setting.....Lady Athena and her husband are the most wonderful hosts. Pierluigi is the best chef.....wish I could take him home! We totally escape when visiting this place. We also always meet the most interesting people."
  Lord McAlpine's Sex Secret.January 27, 2002Lord McAlpine's partner "is 27 years his junior, and younger than two of his children".
  "So how has the former Treasurer managed to marry his third heiress - and why did they have to hide their love from the world?...
  "In the official version, their friendship blossomed into romance after his separation from Romilly in October 1999, although there was dark talk on the gossip circuit of adultery - the uncontested divorce papers lodged by Romilly last March cited adultery, although no one was named...
  "In fact, until recently he was estranged from his two eldest daughters by his first marriage... the relationship had been cool since he left home when they were teenagers...
  "McAlpine .... did lose much of his fortune on an eco-tourism venture in north-western Australia in the Nineties."
  The Greek Junta, reportedly put into power by the CIA
  How about this:
  Grovel to Tory Swagman Lord McAlpine
  March 4, 1997
  "The onetime party treasurer (McAlpine) said (prime minister) Major asked him to approach shipping boss John Latsis before the last election, when the Tories were broke. Soon after, Latsis handed over pounds 500,000...
  "Lord McAlpine told Channel 4 news: "He (Prime Minister John Major) said to me 'Look, you know Captain Latsis... Why don't you puddle along and see if you can get some money from him?'
  "... Lord McAlpine's revelations fuelled suspicions that foreign cash has helped turn a pounds 19million Tory party overdraft into a pounds 20million election kitty in just five years...
  "Latsis, believed to have given pounds 2million to the party, was close to the evil military junta that ran Greece from 1967 to 1974.
  "Former Polly Peck tycoon Asil Nadir, who has letters of thanks from McAlpine, gave the party more than pounds 1million. He is in Cyprus after jumping bail on fraud charges.
  "Receivers have since demanded back more than pounds 400,000 thought to have been plundered from company funds. The Tories have refused.
  "Fugitive Octav Botnar, former head of Nissan UK, has admitted giving pounds 90,000 to the Tories. It is thought he may have handed over as much as pounds 1million between 1979 and 1983...
  "Tories deny that wealthy donors are rewarded with knighthoods and peerages."
  How about this then?
  Quote taken from ''The New Machiavelli: The Art of Politics in Business'' 1999 by Lord McAlpine
  Lord McAlpine's views on dealing with the media:
  "Another option is for the businessperson to learn the art of dealing with the media, using all the tricks that go with that trade '' such as the false defeat: when a person seems to lose, in order to gain public sympathy, or the false triumph: where a person seems to win in order to appear strong '' thus giving credibility to any number of dubious propositions that person may wish to make in the future.
  "Neither of these ploys are examples of the use of true facts, rather of false facts given to the media to chew on, much as a dog chews on a bone.
  "Another useful ploy is the false accusation.
  "First, create a situation where you are wrongly accused. "Then, at a convenient moment, arrange for the false accusation to be shown to be false beyond all doubt. "Those who have made accusations ... become discredited. "Further accusations will then be treated with great suspicion.
  "Always remember that people's memories are very frail, remembering only both the high spots and the lows of a person's career, and then seldom remembering accurately.
  "People believe in the facts that it suits them to believe." p176.
  Wendy by Graham OvendenHow about material indicative of paedophilia?
  "In May 2003 the London Evening Standard reported that Lord McAlpine was the 'well-known and anonymous collector' for whom Bloomsbury Book Auctions was selling a collection of 344 'fashion and eroticism' photographs, including '10 snaps of very young girls in very suggestive poses by Graham Ovenden'.
  "Graham Ovenden is on a Ministry of Justice list of suppliers of material indicative of paedophilia - p.11"
  Public Protection Manual Chapter 11 ... - Ministry of Justice
  Lord McAlpine tidies his Wikipedia entry
  "Eccentric British developer Lord McAlpine had a dream - an urge to create a whole new civilisation in Australia's North based around the town of Broome in the remote north of Western Australia.""LORD Alistair McAlpine called them stupid, the people who blew up the house at West Green in Hampshire that he had handed back to the National Trust the week before...
  "He spends much of the year in Venice and Broome...
  "In 1990 Margaret Thatcher led 3000 mourners in St Paul's Cathedral to honour the life of Lord Alistair's father Lord Edwin McAlpine of Moffat.
  "Father and son are descendents of eight generations of Scottish kings.
  "Father and son raised the money for Mrs Thatcher's election campaigns as personal friends and staunch supporters."
Federal Register | 36(b)(1) Arms Sales Notification
  Link to Article
  Tue, 20 Nov 2012 04:51
  Ms. B. English, DSCA/DBO/CFM, (703) 601-3740.
  The following is a copy of a letter to the Speaker of the House of Representatives, Transmittal 12-55 with attached transmittal, and policy justification.
  Dated: November 14, 2012.
  Aaron Siegel,
  Alternate OSD Federal Register Liaison Officer, Department of Defense.
  Transmittal No. 12-55Notice of Proposed Issuance of Letter of Offer Pursuant to Section 36(b)(1) of the Arms Export Control Act, as amended(i) Prospective Purchaser: Kingdom of Saudi Arabia
  (ii) Total Estimated Value:
  Major Defense Equipment *$3.6 billionOther$3.1 billionTotal$6.7 billion(iii) Description and Quantity or Quantities of Articles or Services under Consideration for Purchase: 20 C-130J-30 Aircraft, 5 KC-130J Air Refueling Aircraft, 120 Rolls Royce AE2100D3 Engines (100 installed and 20 spares), 25 Link-16 Multifunctional Information Distribution Systems, support equipment, spare and repair parts, personnel training and training equipment, publications and technical data, U.S. Government and contractor technical assistance, and other related logistics support.
  (iv) Military Department: USAF (SAQ)
  (v) Prior Related Cases, if any: None
  (vi) Sales Commission, Fee, etc., Paid, Offered, or Agreed to be Paid: None
  (vii) Sensitivity of Technology Contained in the Defense Article or Defense Services Proposed to be Sold: See Attached Annex
  (viii) Date Report Delivered to Congress: 8 November 2012
  POLICY JUSTIFICATIONSaudi Arabia'--C-130J-30 and KC-130J AircraftThe Kingdom of Saudi Arabia (KSA) has requested a possible sale of 20 C-130J-30 Aircraft, 5 KC-130J Air Refueling Aircraft, 120 Rolls Royce AE2100D3 Engines (100 installed and 20 spares), 25 Link-16 Multifunctional Information Distribution Systems, support equipment, spare and repair parts, personnel training and training equipment, publications and technical data, U.S. Government and contractor technical assistance, and other related logistics support. The total estimated cost is $6.7 billion.
  This proposed sale of C-130J-30 and KC-130J assets will contribute to the foreign policy and national security of the United States by helping to improve the security of a friendly country that has been, and continues to be, an important force for political stability and economic progress in the Middle East.
  Saudi Arabia needs these aircraft to sustain its aging fleet, which faces increasing obsolescence. The proposed sale of C-130J and KC-130J aircraft will provide a modern configuration, improve reliability and enhance the Royal Saudi Air Force's ability to effectively field, support, and employ these aircraft.
  The proposed sale of these aircraft and support will not alter the basic military balance in the region.
  Implementation of this sale will require the assignment of U.S. Government and contractor representatives to the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia for delivery, system checkout, and logistics support for an undetermined period of time.
  The prime contractors will be Lockheed-Martin in Bethesda Maryland; General Electric Aviation Systems in Sterling Virginia; and Rolls Royce Corporation in Indianapolis, Indiana. There are no known offset agreements proposed in connection with this potential sale.
  There will be no adverse impact on U.S. defense readiness as a result of this proposed sale.
  Transmittal No. 12-55Notice of Proposed Issuance of Letter of Offer Pursuant to Section 36(b)(1) of the Arms Export Control ActAnnex Item No. vii(vii) Sensitivity of Technology:
  1. VHF Airborne Communications System (AN/ARC-222): This radio operates in the Very High Frequency (VHF) FM and AM spectrum. Hardware, technical data and documentation are Unclassified.
  2. UHF Airborne Communications System (AN/ARC-164): This Ultra High Frequency (UHF) radio offers Have Quick II jam-resistant capability. Hardware is Unclassified. The radio can employ classified cryptographic technology.
  3. Multifunctional Information Distribution System (MIDS): This is an advanced Link-16 command, control, communications, and intelligence (C3I) system incorporating high-capacity, jam-resistant, digital communication links for exchange of near real-time tactical information, including both data and voice, among air, ground, and sea elements. The MIDS terminal hardware, publications, performance specifications, operational capability, parameters, vulnerabilities to countermeasures, and software documentation are classified Confidential. The classified information to be provided consists of that which is necessary for the operation, maintenance, and repair (through intermediate level) of the data link terminal, installed systems, and related software.
  4. Inertial Navigation/Global Positioning System (INS/GPS): This highly accurate inertial navigation system has embedded GPS for blended INS/GPS, free-inertial, and GPS only solutions. Classified elements include Selective Availability Anti-spoofing Module (SAASM) for decryption of precision GPS signals.
  5. Electro-Optical Infrared System (Wescam MX-15 or suitable substitute): This is a gyro-stabilized, multi-field of view EO/IR system. The system provides color daylight TV and night time IR video with a laser range finder and laser pointer through use of an externally mounted turret sensor unit and internally mounted sensor control. Video imagery is displayed in the aircraft real time and may be recorded for subsequent ground analysis. Hardware is Unclassified. Technical data and documentation to be provided is Unclassified.
  6. Identification Friend or Foe transponder interrogator system (AN/APX-114/119): This system responds to interrogating signals to assist in identification, location, and terrain avoidance.
  7. Chaff/Flare Counter Measure Dispensing System (AN/ALE-47): The AN/ALE-47 Counter-Measures Dispensing System (CMDS) is an integrated, threat-adaptive, software-programmable dispensing system capable of dispensing chaff and flares. The threats countered by the CMDS include radar-directed anti-aircraft artillery (AAA), radar command-guided missiles, radar homing guided missiles, and infrared (IR) guided missiles. An integrated Chaff/Flare Counter Measures Dispensing System equal to or superior to this system has been released for the King Air 350ER. The highest classification for the software is CONFIDENTIAL. Hardware is UNCLASSIFIED.
  8. Radar Warning Receiver (AN/ALR-56M): The AN/ALR-56M RWR is designed to detect incoming radar signals, identify and characterize those signals to a specific threat, and alert the aircrew through the C-130J Tactical Electronic Warfare System display. The system consists of external antennae mounted on the fuselage. The ALR-56M is based on a digitally-controlled, single channel receiver that scans within a specific frequency spectrum and is capable of adjusting to threat changes by modifications to the Mission Data (MD) software. The ALR-56C capability has been released to the RSAF for their F-15C/D/S aircraft. A capability equal to or greater than the ALR-56M has been released to the RSAF for their F-15SA. Hardware is CONFIDENTIAL. Software is CONFIDENTIAL.
  9. Missile Approach Warning System (AN/AAR-47): The AN/AAR-47 is an aircraft passive MWS designed for detection of incoming surface-to-air and air-to-air missiles on transport and helicopter aircraft. The system detects, identifies, and displays potential threats. The AN/AAR-47 warns of missile approach by detecting radiation associated with the rocket motor and automatically initiates flare ejection. Hardware is UNCLASSIFIED. Software is SECRET. Technical data and documentation to be provided is UNCLASSIFIED.
  [FR Doc. 2012-28070 Filed 11-16-12; 8:45 am]
  BILLING CODE 5001-06-P
The Law and Order Database: All 20 Seasons | Overthinking It
  Link to Article
  Tue, 20 Nov 2012 04:22
  At Overthinking It, Law & Order is analyzed by two separate yet equally important groups: the people who watch the show and send in the data, and the people who build the spreadsheets. These are their findings'...
  In May 2010, I announced an effort to crowdsource a list of how all 456 episodes of Law & Order ended. I predicted that it was going to be a while before we could unveil the results:
  Years from now, long after you've forgotten all the crazy revelations in the final episode of Lost, you'll still be catching reruns of L&O after work, marveling at Dennis Farina's mustache. And when you do, come back here and tell me if the good guys won that day.
  Well, it's ''years from now,'' and we did it. And by ''we,'' I mean mainly Josh Kyu Saiewitz, who has been watching the show in order and emailing me the results. Thanks to him, I reported on the first 10 seasons back in February 2011. Now we've got all 20 seasons plugged into Excel, and it's time to bring the evidence to the grandest jury of all: you, the overthinkers.
  First off, a note about how I categorized these. There are a lot of Law & Order episodes in which an ''opening'' prosecution leads to a more interesting ''final'' prosecution. (Think about all those episodes in which there's a hitman, but also a person who hired him or incited him to violence.) In these cases, I only considered the ''final'' prosecution that the episode is leading up to. For instance, in the season 10 episode ''Gunshow,'' a man kills 15 people in Central Park. Police catch him relatively early and he pleads out. But then McCoy decides to go after the gun manufacturer, who he accuses of purposely making the semi-automatic weapon easy to convert to fully-automatic. He wins the jury verdict, but the judge throws the conviction out. So even though they successfully nail the actual killer, this episode goes into the database with an outcome of ''Not Guilty.''
  Okay, ready for some graphs? Chung-CHUNG.
  For starters, let's look at the frequency of each outcome. Since multi-part episodes are meant to be one story, I'm only counting the final part, giving us a total of 450 L&O stories to calculate percentages with.
  Click to enlarge!
  ''Implied win'' refers to episodes in which you don't see a plea bargain or Guilty verdict, but it's pretty clear that's the way things are headed. For instance, if the killer's wife tearfully agrees to testify against him and then the episode ends, it's an ''implied win.'' We don't know the outcome, but we are led to believe it's going to be some flavor of Justice. (The rare cases where the result was completely unclear went into the Other category.)
  Over the entire run of the show, more than a third of all the episodes ended in Guilty verdicts, while another third ended in plea bargains. 80% of episodes ended in solid wins: either Guilty verdicts, plea bargains, or implied victories. That's not too shabby, considering that the actual NYPD has a homicide clearance rate of about 50%. (Although you have to figure Law & Order isn't meant to represent every case these detectives investigated; in 20 seasons, I don't think there was a single murder that didn't result in an arrest.)
  Another thing that's not realistic is that there are more Guilty verdicts than plea bargains. In real life, about 95% of all felony convictions are pleas. And going back to the data for just seasons 1-10, we see that the plea bargain used to be the most common outcome (by a smidge).
  That means that pleas must have fallen off dramatically in seasons 11-20. Let's look at the data in a different way.
  We can see that after the first season, in which the writers barely knew the plea bargain existed, it quickly became the most popular outcome'... until season 14, when it was eclipsed by the Guilty verdict and stayed down until season 18.
  Speaking of season 14, check out how the rate of Not Guilty verdicts plunges and hits 0% in the show's final season.
  But in the interest of fairness, I should point out that since there are only a handful of Not Guilty verdicts per season, there's not a lot of data going into this trend. Here's another way to display the same chart.
  Nevertheless, I have a theory to propose. Look at the Not Guilty rate plotted against the show's Nielsen ratings.
  Viewership peaks in season 12. Then it starts to drop season after season. By season 14, Dick Wolf feels like he has to respond. So what does he do? He cuts down on the Debby Downer Not Guilty episodes while simultaneously reducing the number of plea bargains in favor of clear-cut Guilty verdicts. In the final season, with the show hemorrhaging viewers and facing cancellation, he didn't dare air a single episode where the bad guy gets away scot free.
  It's an interesting theory, but like I said, just looking at Not Guilty episodes doesn't give us many data points. Instead, let's turn to a different metric: the Success Rate. Success Rate is ALMOST the same as Guilty + Plea + Implied Win, but not quite. Sometimes in Law & Order there are wins that feel like losses and losses that feel like wins. Success Rate is basically a measure of whether the D.A. is satisfied with the outcome (irregardless of how the outcomes appears to the public). For instance, look at the finale of season 18, ''Excalibur.'' In order to convict the murderer, Jack McCoy needs the governor to testify, which would reveal that he has a thing for prostitutes. The governor engineers a plea bargain, thus avoiding the sex scandal. In this case, the outcome may be Plea Bargain, but it's definitely not a success; McCoy's case was completely derailed.
  Or take the season 13 episode ''Panic.'' Towards the end, it starts to seem that the defendant's daughter may be the real killer. The defendant then offers to take a plea in order to shield her from investigation. McCoy doesn't want to do it, but in the absence of further evidence he has no choice. So once again it's a plea bargain but not a success.
  Success Rate is obviously subjective, but I think it's a better measuring stick than simply adding up Guilty + Plea + Implied Win. It's an attempt to look past the verdict and determine how the ending felt. (You might say it's a CSI solution to a Law & Order problem.) Here's the Success Rate plotted against the show's ratings.
  Wow, look at season 17! That was a year in which the show's ratings hit an all-time low. It was also a year in which every episode but one was a clear victory for the D.A.'s office. You could argue that the high Success Rate might have contributed to the low ratings, but note that the success rate dropped between seasons 13 and 14, and so did the ratings.
  What it looks like to me is that starting in season 14 and peaking in season 17, Dick Wolf was trying to play it increasingly safe: no unsatisfying outcomes that could turn even more of his shrinking audience away. In fact, when Law & Order was renewed after season 17, the New York Timesdescribed it as ''a reprieve for the show, which had seemed increasingly likely to be canceled over the last few weeks.'' I'd say the high Success Rate was defensive ball.
  So what happened in season 18, when the Success Rate dropped and ratings actually went up? Jeremy Sisto, Anthony Anderson, and Linus Roache happened. The show got some fresh blood, which won back some of the old viewers (or at least stopped the bleeding). That bought the writers enough breathing room to do a few more episodes with dark endings.
  What I'd say the numbers show (or at least hint at) is that when the ratings are dropping, a showrunner feels like he has to do something. With a show like Law & Order, that means giving the people feel-good wins. But of course, that wasn't what made the show a success in the first place, and it certainly wasn't what was going to save it.
  In other words, the 95% Success Rate was the Law & Order equivalent of Fonzie jumping the shark.
  Want to take a crack at your own analysis? Download my spreadsheet and have at it! For now, I rest my case.
Federal Register | Privacy Act of 1974: System of Records; Secure Flight Records
  Link to Article
  Tue, 20 Nov 2012 04:17
  Submit comments on modifications to routine use 3 on or before December 19, 2012. This updated system will be effective upon publication except that the change to routine use 3 will be effective 30 days after date of publication in the Federal Register.
  You may submit comments, identified by docket number DHS-2012-0068 by one of the following methods:
  Federal e-Rulemaking Portal: http://www.regulations.gov. Follow the instructions for submitting comments.Fax: 202-343-4010.Mail: Jonathan R. Cantor, Acting Chief Privacy Officer, Privacy Office, Department of Homeland Security, Washington, DC 20528.Instructions: All submissions received must include the agency name and docket number for this rulemaking. All comments received will be posted without change to http://www.regulations.gov, including any personal information provided.
  Docket: For access to the docket to read background documents or comments received, please visit http://www.regulations.gov.
  Peter Pietra, Director, Privacy Policy and Compliance, TSA-36, Transportation Security Administration, 601 South 12th Street, Arlington, VA 20598-6036; email: TSAPrivacy@dhs.gov; or Jonathan R. Cantor, Acting Chief Privacy Officer, Privacy Office, Department of Homeland Security, Washington, DC 20528; email: privacy@dhs.gov.
  You may obtain an electronic copy using the Internet by'--
  (1) Searching the electronic Federal Docket Management System (FDMS) Web page at http://www.regulations.gov;
  (2) Accessing the Government Printing Office's Web page at http://www.gpoaccess.gov/fr/index.html; or
  (3) Visiting TSA's Security Regulations Web page at http://www.tsa.gov and accessing the link for ''Research Center'' at the top of the page.
  In addition, copies are available by writing or emailing the TSA Privacy Office in the FOR FURTHER INFORMATION CONTACT section. Make sure to identify the docket number of this notice.
  The Transportation Security Administration is responsible for security in all modes of transportation and performs passenger and baggage screening at the Nation's airports. Prior to the implementation of the TSA Secure Flight program, this screening was supplemented by aircraft operators who performed passenger watch list matching against the federal No Fly and Selectee Lists, as required under security directives issued by TSA in 2002. Aircraft operators also conducted this watch list matching process for certain non-traveling individuals [1] authorized to enter the sterile area [2] of an airport.
  The National Commission on Terrorist Attacks Upon the United States (the 9/11 Commission) recommended that watch list matching be performed by TSA using the ''larger set of watch lists maintained by the Federal Government.'' [3] In response, under section 4012(a)(1)-(2) of the Intelligence Reform and Terrorism Prevention Act of 2004 (IRTPA), [4] Congress directed TSA and DHS to assume from aircraft operators the function of comparing airline passenger information to data in the Terrorist Screening Database (TSDB) maintained by the Terrorist Screening Center (TSC). [5] Consistent with this statutory directive, TSA promulgated the Secure Flight Final Rule [6] for the purpose of enhancing the security of air travel in the United States and to support the federal government's counter-terrorism efforts by assisting in the detection of individuals on federal government watch lists who seek to travel by air, and to facilitate the secure travel of the public. By November 2010, TSA fully assumed the watch list matching function from aircraft operators and air carriers.
  TSA established the Secure Flight system of records and published the SORN in the Federal Register on August 23, 2007. [7] TSA altered and republished the SORN in the Federal Register on November 9, 2007. [8] TSA is amending the Secure Flight SORN again to reflect additions to TSA's screening capabilities as discussed below.
  TSA uses Secure Flight to conduct watch list matching against the No Fly and Selectee List components of the TSDB. Where warranted by security considerations, Secure Flight also matches against the full TSDB and other government databases. In addition, Secure Flight matches against the list of individuals whom the Department of Health and Human Services, Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) has identified to DHS as persons who should not be permitted to board an aircraft due to public health concerns. [9]
  TSA also uses Secure Flight to match air travelers and other individuals seeking access to airport sterile areas against a list of individuals who have each been assigned a unique redress number by the DHS Traveler Redress Inquiry Program (TRIP). [10] TSA also may collect and use a passenger's ''Known Traveler Number'' if available. A Known Traveler Number is a unique number assigned to Known Travelers for whom the federal government has conducted a security threat assessment and determined do not pose a security threat. [11] TSA did not use this capability when it initially assumed responsibility for passenger screening using Secure Flight. In October 2011, however, TSA announced the TSAPre '''TM pilot program. [12] TSA initiated TSA Pre '''TM as a proof of concept at four U.S. airports, starting with individuals enrolled within U.S. Customs and Border Protection (CBP) Trusted Traveler programs [13] and certain airline frequent flyer program members. [14] The purpose of the proof of concept was to evaluate capabilities to identify air travelers who are lower risk and eligible for expedited security screening at the airport checkpoints, and to test expedited screening processes. The Known Travelers participating in the proof of concept volunteered information that permitted TSA to make risk assessments before the individual arrives at the airport.
  Earlier this year, TSA began the transition of the TSAPre '''TM program'--including individuals in CBP Trusted Traveler programs and certain airline frequent flyer program members'--from proof of concept to an operational status. [15] TSA is expanding the availability of TSAPre '''TM to additional U.S. airports and populations, such as eligible members of the U.S. Armed Forces and certain active security clearance holders. [16] By identifying passengers who are low risk and providing them expedited screening, TSA Pre '''TM enables the agency to better focus its screening efforts on individuals who are more likely to pose a threat to civil aviation.
  As part of the effort to identify individuals that are low risk, TSA also is creating and maintaining a watch list of individuals who are disqualified from eligibility from TSA Pre '''TM, for some period of time or permanently, because they have been involved in violations of security regulations of sufficient severity or frequency. Disqualifying violations of aviation security regulations may involve violations at the airport or on board aircraft, such as a loaded firearm that is discovered in carry-on baggage at the checkpoint, or a threat to use a destructive device against a transportation conveyance, facilities, or personnel. TheTSA Pre '''TM Disqualification List will be generated by TSA's Performance and Results Information System (PARIS). [17]
  Consistent with its ongoing efforts to focus on passengers who are more likely to pose a threat to civil aviation, and following the failed terrorist attack on an international flight bound for Detroit on December 25, 2009, the Secure Flight program began matching passengers on international flights bound for the United States against a list of individuals requiring enhanced screening that is generated through CBP's Automated Targeting System (ATS). [18] ATS uses threat-based intelligence scenarios designed to identify international travelers who are more likely to pose a threat and for whom enhanced screening is appropriate. TSA receives from CBP a continuously updated list of individuals identified through these scenario rules for use in Secure Flight passenger screening. Oversight is exercised by the DHS Offices of Privacy, Civil Rights and Civil Liberties, and General Counsel to ensure that the threat-based intelligence is appropriately applied. After they arrive in the United States, some of these international travelers also may receive enhanced screening prior to subsequent domestic and international outbound flights for a period of time, again based on threat-based, intelligence-driven scenario rules.
  TSA receives from CBP an Electronic System for Travel Authorization (ESTA) status code for international travelers. ESTA is an automated system used by CBP to determine the eligibility of visitors to travel to the United States under the Visa Waiver Program and whether the traveler poses any law enforcement or security risk. In order to eliminate multiple messages to the airlines from CBP and TSA on a single passenger, Secure Flight transmits the ESTA status code for international travelers to the aircraft operator as part of the boarding pass printing result.
  Finally, TSA is adding a clause to subsection (a) of the Category of Individuals to ensure that, when requested by a U.S. government agency or institution, TSA may use Secure Flight to vet passengers on U.S. government operated, chartered, or leased flights. A corresponding change to routine use (3) is being made to permit disclosure of information to the U.S. government agency for screening status or operational response.
  In accordance with the Privacy Act of 1974, 5 U.S.C. 552a, DHS/TSA is altering and republishing DHS/TSA SORN DHS/TSA-019, titled Secure Flight Records (72 FR 63711, November 9, 2007). Consistent with the discussion above, the following modifications are being made to the DHS/TSA-019 Secure Flight Records system of records:
  The Categories of Individuals section is updated as follows:'—‹ We have added a category of individuals to subsection (a) to ensure that U.S. government operated flights are covered, including flights leased or chartered by the U.S. government.
  '—‹ We have rewritten subsection (c) to clarify that it addresses individuals involved with chartered or leased aircraft ''with a maximum take-off weight'' over 12,500 pounds; and
  '—‹ We have added a new subsection (f) to expressly include individuals who are identified as Known Travelers.
  The Categories of Records section is updated as follows:'—‹ We have amended subsection (a) to note that TSA receives from aircraft operators the designator code used to verify certain travelers' frequent flyer status.
  '—‹ Subsection (a) also was amended to clarify that Secure Flight may receive Secure Flight Passenger Data (SFPD) [19] for individuals who seek to charter, lease, operate, or be transported on aircraft ''with a maximum take-off weight'' over 12,500 pounds, and owners and/or operators of such aircraft,
  '—‹ We have revised subsection (d) to reflect that matching analyses and results may include lists generated by other classified and unclassified government watchlists. As discussed above such lists include CBP ATS, the TSA Pre'''TM Disqualification list, and the CDC Do Not Board list.
  '—‹ We have inserted a new subsection (h) to expressly include the Electronic System for Travel Authorization (ESTA) status code for international travelers as a category of records,
  '—‹ We have inserted a new subsection (i) to expressly include records about Known Travelers.
  The Purpose(s) section is updated to reflect that, in addition to assisting in the detection of individuals identified on federal government watch lists who seek to travel by air, Secure Flight also is used to identify air travelers who are lower risk and eligible for expedited security screening at the airport checkpoints.The Routine Uses section is updated as follows:'—‹ We have rewritten routine use (2) to conform to a standard DHS routine use pertaining to the sharing of information with contractors when necessary.
  '—‹ We have amended routine use (3) to more accurately reflect that TSA discloses the passenger screening status, not the watch list matching status, to airlines, airports, and the Department of Transportation, and to reflect that passenger screening information may be disclosed to U.S. government agencies that operate, charter, or lease aircraft. This would permit, for example, the Department of Defense (DoD) to request that passengers on a DoD operated or chartered flight be vetted through Secure Flight.
  '—‹ We have amended routine use (4) to make it consistent with routine use (3) providing for disclosure regarding individuals who pose or are suspected of posing a risk to transportation or national security.
  '—‹ We have deleted from routine use (9) the reference to the DHS Office of Inspector General since such disclosures would be accomplished pursuant to the Privacy Act under 5 U.S.C. 552a(b)(1) rather than pursuant to a routine use.
  The Disclosure to Consumer Reporting Agencies section is being changed to reflect that disclosures in connection with the Debt Collection Act of 1982 (97) are not part of this system of records. Routine use 12 remains in place to permit disclosures in the event of a data breach.The Retention and Disposal section is amended to reflect that the retention schedule was approved by NARA. This section also was amended to reflect that lists of individuals in Secure Flight, such as Known Traveler lists and the TSA Pre'''TM Disqualification list, will be deleted or destroyed when superseded.The System Manager and Notification Procedure section has been updated to reflect updated contact information.The Records Access Procedures section has been updated to reflect the correct zip code for the TSA Freedom of Information Act Office.The Records Access Procedures section also was revised to clarify that individuals who believe they have been improperly denied entry by CBP may submit a redress request through DHS TRIP.The Record Source Categories section is updated to clarify that Secure Flight may receive information from all three branches of the Federal government, as well as from private entities (e.g., airlines) that participate in the Known Traveler program.The Exemptions Claimed for the System category is updated to include non-travelers to whom a covered aircraft operator or covered airport seeks to issue an authorization to enter the sterile area of an airport.The Privacy Act embodies fair information practice principles in a statutory framework governing the means by which the federal government agencies collect, maintain, use, and disseminate individuals' records. The Privacy Act applies to information that is maintained in a ''system of records.'' A ''system of records'' is a group of any records under the control of an agency for which information is retrieved by the name of an individual or by some identifying number, symbol, or other identifying particular assigned to the individual. In the Privacy Act, an individual is defined to encompass U.S. citizens and lawful permanent residents. As a matter of policy, DHS extends administrative Privacy Act protections to all individuals when systems of records maintain information on U.S. citizens, lawful permanent residents, and visitors. Individuals may request access to their own records that are maintained in a system of records in the possession or under the control of DHS by complying with DHS Privacy Act regulations, 6 CFR Part 5.
  The Privacy Act requires each agency to publish in the Federal Register a description denoting the type and character of each system of records that the agency maintains, and the routine uses that are contained in each system in order to make agency recordkeeping practices transparent, to notify individuals regarding the uses to their records are put, and to assist individuals to more easily find such files within the agency. Below is the description of the DHS/TSA-019 Secure Flight Records system of records.
  In accordance with 5 U.S.C. 552a(r), DHS has provided a report of this system of records to the Office of Management and Budget and to Congress.
  SYSTEM NAME:Secure Flight Records.
  SECURITY CLASSIFICATION:Unclassified; Sensitive Security Information.
  SYSTEM LOCATION:Records are maintained at the Transportation Security Administration (TSA), 601 South 12th Street, Arlington, VA, and at other secure TSA facilities in Annapolis Junction, Maryland and Colorado Springs, Colorado. Records also may be maintained at the secured facilities of contractors or other parties that perform functions under the Secure Flight program.
  CATEGORIES OF INDIVIDUALS COVERED BY THE SYSTEM:(a) Individuals who attempt to make reservations for travel on, have traveled on, or have reservations to travel on a flight operated by a U.S. aircraft operator, or a flight into, out of, or overflying the United States that is operated by a foreign air carrier, or flights operated by the U.S. government, including flights chartered or leased by the U.S. government;
  (b) Non-traveling individuals who seek to obtain authorization from an aircraft or airport operator to enter the sterile area of an airport;
  (c) For flights that TSA grants a request by the operators of leased or charter aircraft with a maximum take-off weight over 12,500 pounds to screen the individuals using Secure Flight, the following individuals: (1) Individuals who seek to charter or lease an aircraft with a maximum take-off weight over 12,500 pounds or who are proposed to be transported on or operate such charter aircraft; and (2) owners and/or operators of such chartered or leased aircraft;
  (d)(1) Known or suspected terrorists identified in the Terrorist Screening Database (TSDB) maintained by the Terrorist Screening Center (TSC); and (2) individuals identified on classified and unclassified governmental databases such as law enforcement, immigration, or intelligence databases;
  (e) Individuals who have been distinguished from individuals on a watch list through a redress process, or other means; and
  (f) Individuals who are identified as Known Travelers for whom the federal government has conducted a security threat assessment and determined do not pose a security threat.
  CATEGORIES OF RECORDS IN THE SYSTEM:(a) Records containing passenger and flight information (e.g., full name, date of birth, gender, redress number, Known Traveler Number, passport information, frequent flyer designator code or other identity authentication/verification code obtained from aircraft operators, and itinerary); records containing information about non-traveling individuals seeking access to an airport sterile area for a purpose approved by TSA; and records containing information about individuals who seek to charter, lease, operate or be transported on aircraft with a maximum take-off weight over 12,500 pounds if TSA grants the request of an aircraft owner or operator to use Secure Flight;
  (b) Records containing information from an individual's form of identification or a physical description of the individual;
  (c) Records obtained from the TSC of known or suspected terrorists in the TSDB; and records regarding individuals identified on classified and unclassified governmental watch lists;
  (d) Records containing the matching analyses and results of comparisons of individuals to the TSDB and other classified and unclassified governmental watch lists;
  (e) Records related to communications between or among TSA and aircraft operators, airport operators, owners and/or operators of leased or charter aircraft with a maximum take-off weight over 12,500 pounds, TSC, law enforcement agencies, intelligence agencies, and agencies responsible for airspace safety or security, regarding the screening status of passengers or non-traveling individuals and any operational responses to individuals identified in the TSDB;
  (f) Records of the redress process that include information on known misidentified persons, including any Redress Number assigned to those individuals;
  (g) Records that track the receipt, use, access, or transmission of information as part of the Secure Flight program;
  (h) Electronic System for Travel Authorization status code generated by U.S. Customs and Border Protection (CBP) for international travelers; and
  (i) Records containing information about individuals who are identified as Known Travelers.
  AUTHORITY FOR MAINTENANCE OF THE SYSTEM:49 U.S.C. 114, 40113, 44901, 44903, and 44909.
  PURPOSE(S):The Secure Flight Records system will be used to identify and protect against potential and actual threats to transportation security and support the federal government's counterterrorism efforts by assisting in the identification of individuals who warrant further scrutiny prior to boarding an aircraft or seek to enter a sterile area or who warrant denial of boarding or denial of entry to a sterile area on security grounds. It also will be used to identify individuals who are lower risk and therefore may be eligible for expedited security screening at the airport checkpoints. Both of these functions are designed to facilitate the secure travel of the public.
  ROUTINE USES OF RECORDS MAINTAINED IN THE SYSTEM, INCLUDING CATEGORIES OF USERS AND PURPOSES OF SUCH USES:(1) To the TSC in order to: (a) Determine whether an individual is a positive identity match to an individual identified as a known or suspected terrorist in the watch list; (b) allow redress of passenger complaints; (c) facilitate an operational response, if one is deemed appropriate, for individuals who are a positive identity match to an individual identified as a known or suspected terrorist in the watch list; (d) provide information and analysis about terrorist encounters and known or suspected terrorist associates to appropriate domestic and foreign government agencies and officials for counterterrorism purposes; and (e) perform technical implementation functions necessary for the Secure Flight program.
  (2) To contractors and their agents, grantees, experts, consultants, and others performing or working on a contract, service, grant, cooperative agreement, or other assignment for DHS, when necessary to accomplish an agency function related to this system of records. Individuals provided information under this routine use are subject to the same Privacy Act requirements and limitations on disclosure as are applicable to DHS officers and employees.
  (3) To aircraft operators, foreign air carriers, airport operators, the Department of Transportation, and the Department of Defense or other U.S. government agencies or institutions, to communicate individual screening status and facilitate an operational response, where appropriate, to individuals who pose or are suspected of posing a risk to transportation or national security.
  (4) To owners or operators of leased or charter aircraft to communicate individual screening status and facilitate an operational response, when appropriate, to individuals who pose or are suspected of posing a risk to transportation or national security.
  (5) To the appropriate federal, state, local, tribal, territorial, foreign, or international agency regarding or to identify individuals who pose, or are under reasonable suspicion of posing, a risk to transportation or national security.
  (6) To the Department of Justice (DOJ) or other Federal agency for purposes of conducting litigation or administrative proceedings, when: (a) The Department of Homeland Security (DHS), or (b) any employee or former employee of DHS in his/her official capacity, or (c) any employee or former employee of DHS in his/her individual capacity where the DOJ or DHS has agreed to represent the employee, or (d) the United States or any agency thereof, is a party to the litigation or proceeding or has an interest in such litigation or proceeding.
  (7) To the National Archives and Records Administration (NARA) or other Federal agencies pursuant to records management inspections being conducted under the authority of 44 U.S.C. 2904 and 2906.
  (8) To a congressional office in response to an inquiry from that congressional office made at the request of the individual.
  (9) To the Government Accountability Office or other agency, organization, or individual for the purposes of performing authorized audit or oversight operations, but only such information as is necessary and relevant to such audit and oversight functions.
  (10) To the appropriate federal, state, local, tribal, territorial, foreign, or international agency responsible for investigating, prosecuting, enforcing, or implementing a statute, rule, regulation, or order regarding a violation or potential violation of civil or criminal law, regulation, or order when such disclosure is proper and consistent with the performance of the official duties of the person making the disclosure.
  (11) To international and foreign governmental authorities in accordance with law and formal or informal international agreements when such disclosure is proper and consistent with the performance of the official duties of the person making the disclosure.
  (12) To appropriate agencies, entities, and persons when (a) TSA suspects or has confirmed that the security or confidentiality of information in the system of records has been compromised; (b) TSA has determined that as a result of the suspected or confirmed compromise there is a risk of harm to economic or property interests, identity theft or fraud, or harm to the security or integrity of this system or other systems or programs (whether maintained by TSA or another agency or entity) that rely upon the compromised information; and (c) the disclosure made to such agencies, entities, and persons is reasonably necessary to assist in connection with TSA's efforts to respond to the suspected or confirmed compromise and prevent, minimize, or remedy such harm.
  (13) To appropriate federal, state, local, tribal, or foreign governmental agencies or multilateral governmental organizations, including the World Health Organization, for purposes of assisting such agencies or organizations in preventing exposure to or transmission of communicable or quarantinable disease or for combating other significant public health threats; appropriate notice will be provided of any identified health threat or risk.
  DISCLOSURE TO CONSUMER REPORTING AGENCIES:None.
  POLICIES AND PRACTICES FOR STORING, RETRIEVING, ACCESSING, RETAINING AND DISPOSING OF RECORDS IN THE SYSTEM:STORAGE:Records are maintained at the Transportation Security Administration, 601 South 12th Street, Arlington, VA, and at other secure TSA facilities in Annapolis Junction, Maryland and Colorado Springs, Colorado. Records also may be maintained at the secured facilities of contractors or other parties that perform functions under the Secure Flight program. The records are stored on magnetic disc, tape, digital media, and CD-ROM, and may also be retained in hard copy format in secure file folders or safes.
  RETRIEVABILITY:Data are retrievable by the individual's name or other identifier, as well as non-identifying information such as itinerary.
  SAFEGUARDS:All records are protected from unauthorized access through appropriate administrative, physical, and technical safeguards. The system is also protected through a multi-layer security approach. The protective strategies are physical, technical, administrative, and environmental in nature. The system has role-based access control to sensitive data, physical access control to DHS facilities, auditing software, and confidentiality of communications, including encryption, authentication of sending parties, compartmentalizing databases. Personnel is conducted screening to ensure that all personnel with access to data are screened through background investigations commensurate with the level of access required to perform their duties.
  Information in this system is safeguarded in accordance with applicable rules and policies, including any applicable TSA and DHS automated systems security and access policies. The system will be in compliance with Office of Management and Budget and National Institute of Standards and Technology guidance. Access to the computer system containing the records in this system of records is limited to those individuals who require it to perform their official duties. The computer system also maintains a real-time audit of individuals who access the system.
  RETENTION AND DISPOSAL:Records relating to an individual determined by the automated matching process to be neither a match nor or potential match to a watchlist will be destroyed within seven days after completion of the last leg of the individual's directional travel itinerary. Records relating to an individual determined by the automated matching process to be a potential watch list match will be retained for seven years after the completion of the individual's directional travel itinerary. Records relating to an individual determined to be a confirmed watchlist match will be retained for 99 years after the date of match confirmation.
  Lists of individuals stored in Secure Flight, such as individuals identified as Known Travelers and individuals who have been disqualified from eligibility to receive expedited screening as a result of their involvement in certain security incidents, will be deleted or destroyed when superseded by an updated list.
  SYSTEM MANAGER(S) AND ADDRESS:Secure Flight Mission Support Branch Manager, Transportation Security Administration, TSA-19, 601 South 12th Street, Arlington, VA 20598-6019.
  NOTIFICATION PROCEDURE:To determine whether this system contains records relating to you, write to the Freedom of Information Act Office, Transportation Security Administration, TSA-20, 601 South 12th Street, Arlington, VA 20598-6020.
  RECORDS ACCESS PROCEDURES:Requests for records access must be in writing and should be addressed to the Freedom of Information Act Office, Transportation Security Administration, TSA-20, 601 South 12th Street, Arlington, VA 20598-6020. Requests should conform to the requirements of 6 CFR Part 5, Subpart B, which provides the rules for requesting access to Privacy Act records maintained by DHS. The envelope and letter should be clearly marked ''Privacy Act Access Request.'' The request should include a general description of the records sought and must include the requester's full name, current address, and date and place of birth. The request must be signed and either notarized or submitted under penalty of perjury. Some information may be exempt from access provisions. An individual who is the subject of a record in this system may access those records that are not exempt from disclosure. A determination whether a record may be accessed will be made at the time a request is received.
  Individuals who believe they have been improperly denied entry by CBP, refused boarding for transportation, or identified for additional screening may submit a redress request through the DHS Traveler Redress Program (''TRIP'') (see 72 FR 2294, January 18, 2007). TRIP is a single point of contact for individuals who have inquiries or seek resolution regarding difficulties they experienced during their travel screening at transportation hubs'--like airports and train stations or crossing U.S. borders. Through TRIP, a traveler can correct erroneous data stored in Secure Flight and other data stored in other DHS databases through one application. Additionally, for further information on the Secure Flight program and the redress options please see the accompanying Privacy Impact Assessment for Secure Flight published on the DHS Web site at www.dhs.gov/privacy. Redress requests should be sent to: DHS Traveler Redress Inquiry Program (TRIP), TSA-901, 601 South 12th Street, Arlington, VA 20598-6036 or online at http://www.dhs.gov/trip.
  CONTESTING RECORDS PROCEDURES:Same as ''Notification Procedure'' and ''Record Access Procedure'' above.
  RECORD SOURCE CATEGORIES:Information contained in the system is obtained from U.S. aircraft operators, foreign air carriers, the owners and operators of leased or charter aircraft with a maximum take-off weight over 12,500 pounds who request TSA screening, the TSC, TSA employees, airport operators, Federal executive branch agencies, Federal judicial and legislative branch entities, State, local, international, and other governmental agencies, private entities for Known Traveler program participants, and the individuals to whom the records in the system pertain.
  EXEMPTIONS CLAIMED FOR THE SYSTEM:No exemption will be asserted with respect to identifying information, or flight information, obtained from passengers, non-travelers, and aircraft owners or operators.
  This system, however, may contain records or information recompiled from or created from information contained in other systems of records that are exempt from certain provisions of the Privacy Act. For these records or information only, in accordance with 5 U.S.C. 552a(j)(2) and (k)(2), TSA claims the following exemptions for these records or information from subsections (c)(3) and (4); (d)(1), (2), (3), and (4); (e)(1), (2), (3), (4)(G) through (I), (5), and (8); (f); and (g) of the Privacy Act of 1974, as amended, as necessary and appropriate to protect such information. Certain portions or all of these records may be exempt from disclosure pursuant to these exemptions.
Police: House explosion was not an accident - fox59.com
  Link to Article
  Tue, 20 Nov 2012 02:48
  Fox59 News has learned that Indianapolis Metropolitan Police Department homicide detectives have determined that the Nov. 10 explosion at the Richmond Hill subdivision was an intentional act.''A criminal homicide investigation'' is how police are referring to the probe. The Indianapolis Fire Department still considers this a fire investigation. Richmond Hill residents will be advised of the decision Monday during a 6 p.m. meeting at Southport Presbyterian Church.
  That meeting will include IMPD, IFD, Marion County Prosecutor Terry Curry, Adam Collins of the Department of Code Enforcement and Homeland Security Chief Gary Coons.In other developments, the boyfriend of the woman whose house exploded told Fox59 News he was meeting with investigators today as crews continue to sift through the debris to determine a cause in the fatal blast.
  Mark Leonard was interviewed by investigators from State Farm Insurance, the company that insured the home of Moncy Shirley at 8349 Fieldfare Way. The home exploded in a natural gas blast in the Richmond Hill development.Police, fire and insurance investigators continue their probe into the explosion that killed Jennifer and Dion Longworth, neighbors of Shirley and Leonard who lived in the Perry Township home.
  Shirley and Leonard were at the Hollywood Casino in Lawrenceburg when the explosion occurred.
  Neighborhood damages are listed at $4.4 million.
  For the first time, Fox59 News is getting a look inside the Shirley home before the blast.
  When Shirley listed her home for sale in March 2011, a real estate agent took pictures of the property and its contents.
  The photos depict a tastefully and comfortably decorated two-story, four-bedroom home.
  Shown in the photos are tables, chairs, couches, beds and kitchen appliances'--items investigators are looking for as they comb through the debris at Shirley's home.
  A disclosure form filed with the listing and signed by Shirley indicates no problems with the home's gas furnace, water heater or fireplace or its electric stove and oven.
  Shirley first listed the home for nearly $189,000. The price dropped to $149,000 before the home was taken off the market this past spring.
  The filing contains notice that, ''Seller discloses that the sale of this property will require lender approval of a short sale,'' which would require Shirley to put up cash to complete the deal.
  A source indicates that a short sale this past summer fell through due to Shirley's inability to provide $30,000 as part of the bargain.
  Approximately 70 investigators from various agencies have probed the wreckage since the time of the blast including fire investigators looking for signs of arson and IMPD homicide detectives conducting a death investigation.
  Detectives also would be looking to recover evidence such as appliances or devices that may have been altered or had unusual settings.
  ''At this point they're still processing the scene and looking at things that may have come from the interior of one of the homes there,'' said Capt. Rita Reith of the Indianapolis Fire Department. ''The reality is there is a large area that they're looking at simply because it was an explosion. They have to cover the entire area. They're collecting and searching, making sure they leave no stone unturned.''
  Upon the finding of the National Transportation Safety Board that the gas lines of Citizens Energy were not to blame for the blast, Indianapolis Homeland Security Chief Gary Coons said, ''Our investigators believe natural gas is involved. They are currently in the process of recovering the appliances from the destroyed homes to help determine the cause. Based on the NTSB statement, our focus is on the houses and appliances.''
  Investigators have also recovered the gas meter from the home. They will test it to determine if it registered an unusual spike in natural gas usage the day of the blast.
Wietpas per direct afgeschaft
  Link to Article
  Source: Een andere kijk op nieuws @infomagnl » Nieuws items
  Mon, 19 Nov 2012 20:44
  Geplaatst @ 19 november 2012De wietpas vervalt per direct en gemeenten mogen zelf bepalen hoe ze overlast rond een coffeeshop aanpakken. Dat heeft minister Opstelten van Veiligheid en Justitie vandaag geschreven aan de Tweede Kamer.Klanten van coffeeshops moeten vanaf volgend jaar laten zien dat ze in Nederland wonen. Dat kan met een identiteitsbewijs of een verblijfsvergunning in combinatie met uittreksel uit de gemeentelijke basisadministratie. Gemeenten krijgen de ruimte om zelf de regels toe te passen.
  De gemeenten mogen voortaan 'maatwerk' leveren bij de aanpak van overlast rond coffeeshops, schrijft de minister verder. "Op lokaal niveau heeft men het beste inzicht welke maatregelen effectief zijn."
  De registratie van klanten van coffeeshops niet meer nodig, omdat de overlast van drugstoeristen is teruggedrongen, aldus Opstelten. Door de wietpas te laten vervallen, wordt volgens Opstelten de drempel weggenomen voor ingezetenen om cannabis te kopen in coffeeshops.
  Bekijk orgineel item op .nos.nl
  Meer Nieuws items
Homeland Security Spent $430-Million To Tune Its Radios To A New Frequency, And Failed | Techdirt
  Link to Article
  Mon, 19 Nov 2012 19:53
  from the taxpayer-money-at-work deptThe incompetence of Homeland Security when it comes to actually doing things is well documented -- though, they're often so clueless that they take credit for successfully misleading Congress about their own failings. So I guess it should come as little surprise that a new report shows that DHS spent about $430 million of your taxpayer dollars to get all of its radios to communicate on the same frequency and it doesn't work. At all.
  Of 479 radio users the DHS inspector general tested, only one knew how to tune into the common channel, the report stated. Personnel either were unaware the channel existed, could not find it, or switched to an outdated channel inherited from the Treasury Department.
  ''Personnel do not have interoperable communications that they can rely on during daily operations, planned events and emergencies,'' acting IG Charles K. Edwards wrote in the report.
  So what was the problem? Apparently no one in top management at DHS ever thought to tell the various departments that they should be using this common channel that they were spending so much money on getting ready for this usage:The root of the disconnect, according to the report, is top department leaders have provided little guidance and no enforcement to ensure personnel use the channel. The shift to a single frequency began when the department formed in 2003.
  ''Components independently developed and managed their own radio programs with no formal coordination from DHS,'' and as a result, ''internal interoperability was not a priority for DHS components,'' Edwards reported.
  The report suggested that there should be someone in charge of actually coordinating all of this (what an idea!), but DHS officials shot back that they already have a "Joint Wireless Program Management Office." Of course, this only makes the situation worse, in that they basically admit that they have an entire office set up to work on this issue... and it's now apparent that the office did little to nothing in terms of actually accomplishing what needed to be accomplished. The author of the report pointed out that it's a bit silly to point to the office that failed to do its job as proof that they're now ready to deal with this issue.So, in a normal business, when you screw something up this badly, people get fired. Lots of them. Who's getting fired for this? Shouldn't the head of DHS have to answer to the public as to why $430 million was spent under what appears to be totally incompetent management? What are they doing over there other than seizing domains and making up terrorist plots?
  In the meantime, can we get our $430 million back?
  41 Comments | Leave a Comment..
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Quote of the Day: Ariel Sharon's Grandson Said What?
  Link to Article
  Source: Debbie Schlussel
  Mon, 19 Nov 2012 19:51
  By Debbie Schlussel
  We need to flatten entire neighborhoods in Gaza. Flatten all of Gaza. The Americans didn't stop with Hiroshima '' the Japanese weren't surrendering fast enough, so they hit Nagasaki, too.
  ''Gilad Sharon
  As I've said repeatedly on this site during each of the Israel's major responses to HAMAS terrorism''in 2006, 2009, and so on, that it's a waste of time, unless Israel finally flattens the terrorists of Gaza. And, I mean, really flattens them by destroying most, if not all, of the place. Otherwise, it's just a waste of time, because they will refresh, regroup, reload, and continue their non-stop rocketing of missiles on Israel, as they've done every single day for years, but the media don't report about it. And I have a feeling that this time won't be different. There will ultimately be a ceasefire, and HAMAS will live for yet another of many days to keep attacking Israel.
  Unlike his own ultimately peacenik father, Ariel Sharon's son, Gilad Sharon, agrees with me. He has it right. If only his father hadn't abandoned Gaza to the Palestinians, this problem wouldn't be happening in the first place. More from the Sharon son:
  The desire to prevent harm to innocent civilians in Gaza will ultimately lead to harming the truly innocent: the residents of southern Israel. The residents of Gaza are not innocent, they elected Hamas. The Gazans aren't hostages; they chose this freely, and must live with the consequences.
  The Gaza Strip functions as a state '' it has a government and conducts foreign relations, there are schools, medical facilities, there are armed forces and all the other trappings of statehood. We have no territorial conflict with ''Gaza State,'' and it is not under Israeli siege '' it shares a border with Egypt. Despite this, it fires on our citizens without restraint.
  Why do our citizens have to live with rocket fire from Gaza while we fight with our hands tied? Why are the citizens of Gaza immune? If the Syrians were to open fire on our towns, would we not attack Damascus? If the Cubans were to fire at Miami, wouldn't Havana suffer the consequences? That's what's called ''deterrence'' '' if you shoot at me, I'll shoot at you. There is no justification for the State of Gaza being able to shoot at our towns with impunity. We need to flatten entire neighborhoods in Gaza. Flatten all of Gaza. The Americans didn't stop with Hiroshima '' the Japanese weren't surrendering fast enough, so they hit Nagasaki, too.
  There should be no electricity in Gaza, no gasoline or moving vehicles, nothing. Then they'd really call for a ceasefire.
  Were this to happen, the images from Gaza might be unpleasant '' but victory would be swift, and the lives of our soldiers and civilians spared.
  IF THE government isn't prepared to go all the way on this, it will mean reoccupying the entire Gaza Strip. Not a few neighborhoods in the suburbs, as with Cast Lead, but the entire Strip, like in Defensive Shield, so that rockets can no longer be fired.
  There is no middle path here '' either the Gazans and their infrastructure are made to pay the price, or we reoccupy the entire Gaza Strip. Otherwise there will be no decisive victory. And we're running out of time '' we must achieve victory quickly. The Netanyahu government is on a short international leash. Soon the pressure will start '' and a million civilians can't live under fire for long. This needs to end quickly '' with a bang, not a whimper.
  As I said and have said over and over, Israel will stop short of this. And HAMAS will merely reload for another day, while it rains rockets on Israel, daily. The only way to stop this once and for all is to turn Gaza into a parking lot. And Israel will never do that. It doesn't have the guts. And even if it did, America and the rest of the world would never allow Israel to do it to their precious HAMAS Nazis.
  Again, if Gilad Sharon's father hadn't turned Gaza over to the Palestinians, this problem wouldn't exist''or, at least, would be much, much smaller''today.
  If Israel doesn't flatten Gaza, the problem will last forever. . . or until all the Jews and Christians are gone from Israel.
Broadcasters Gear Up For Gaza Coverage
  Link to Article
  Source: TVNewser
  Mon, 19 Nov 2012 17:41
  With the situation in Gaza continuing to escalate, the broadcast news divisions are making sure their people are in the region. Additional changes may be made, but for now here is the latest on the assignments in Gaza, Israel and beyond.
  ABC News has Christiane Amanpour in Jerusalem, joined by Lama Hasan. Matt Gutman is reporting for ABC from Tel Aviv, while Alexander Marquardt reports from Gaza.
  NBC News has Ayman Mohyeldin and Richard Engel in Gaza, Stephanie Gosk and Martin Fletcher in Tel Aviv, Jim Maceda in Cairo, Egypt and Ali Rouzi in Tehran, Iran.
  CBS News has Clarissa Ward reporting from Cairo, Charlie D'Agata reporting from Gaza and Allen Pizzey reporting from Israel.
  Update: Fox News has Jerusalem correspondent Leland Vittert and David lee Miller reporting from southwestern Israel, near the Gaza border.
  << PREVIOUS
  NBCU News Group Chief Pat Fili-Krushel: 'I have three strong business leaders running day-to-day'
NASA VIDEO: Sun Unleashes 'Monster Eruption'
  Link to Article
  Source: The Daily Bail
  Mon, 19 Nov 2012 19:48
  Intense.
  The sun unleashed a monster eruption of super-hot plasma Friday (Nov. 16) in back-to-back solar storms captured on camera by a NASA spacecraft.
  The giant sun eruption, called a solar prominence, occurred at 1 a.m. EST (0600 GMT), with another event flaring up four hours later. The prominences was so large, it expanded beyond the camera view of NASA's Solar Dynamics Observatory (SDO), which captured high-definition video of the solar eruption.
  "The red-glowing looped material is plasma, a hot gas made of electrically charged hydrogen and helium," officials with NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center, which oversees the SDO mission, explained in a description. "The prominence plasma flows along a tangled and twisted structure of magnetic fields generated by the sun's internal dynamo. An erupting prominence occurs when such a structure becomes unstable and bursts outward, releasing the plasma."
  More videos here...
Climate NON-change: No increase in droughts since 1950, say boffins ' The Register
  Link to Article
  Mon, 19 Nov 2012 19:42
  An international alliance of climate scientists says that contrary to the general perception, and despite widely-reported rises in global temperature towards the end of the 20th century, there has in fact been no measurable increase in droughts over the past 60 years.
  Writing in heavyweight boffinry journal Nature, the team from America's Princeton and the Australian National University have this to say:
  Here we show that the previously reported increase in global drought is overestimated because [the current method] uses a simplified model of potential evaporation that responds only to changes in temperature and thus responds incorrectly to global warming in recent decades. More realistic calculations, based on the underlying physical principles that take into account changes in available energy, humidity and wind speed, suggest that there has been little change in drought over the past 60 years.
  This flies directly counter to the most recent formal assessment by the UN Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change in 2007, which says:
  More intense and longer droughts have been observed over wider areas since the 1970s
  However the IPCC 2007 report has been found to be wildly alarmist in many respects since being published and many of its other doom-laden predictions have already been debunked (for instance that the Himalayan glaciers would all be gone by 2035, and that the Amazon jungle will soon catch fire and disappear).
  Other boffins have lately stated for other reasons that climate science predicts too much drought. With this week's new Nature paper it would seem that still another IPCC doom warning has lost any claim to being supported by a scientific consensus. ®
Naomi Klein on the Link Between Climate Change and Capitalism
  Link to Article
  Source: Truthdig: Drilling Beneath the Headlines
  Mon, 19 Nov 2012 19:36
  Naomi Klein on the Link Between Climate Change and CapitalismPosted on Nov 19, 2012In an appearance on ''Moyers & Company'' over the weekend, Naomi Klein told Bill Moyers that the recent devastation left by Superstorm Sandy could be the catalyst for economic and political change in this country. The ''Shock Doctrine'' author has first-hand knowledge of the subject: She reported on the disaster in New York as part of a new book and documentary about climate change.
  ''One of the things about deregulated capitalism is that it is a crisis-creation machine. You take away all the rules and you are going to have serial crises. They may be economic crises, booms and busts. Or there will be ecological crises. You're going to have both. You're just going to have shock after shock after shock,'' Klein said. ''And the way we're currently responding to it is that with each shock, we become more divided. And the more we understand that this is what the future looks like, the more those who can afford it protect themselves and buy their way out of having to depend on the public sector and therefore are less invested in these collective responses. And that's why there has to be a whole other way of responding to this crisis.''
  '--Posted by Tracy Bloom.
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TARPLEY ON PETRAEUS
  Link to Article
  Source: aangirfan
  Mon, 19 Nov 2012 19:35
  Webster Tarpley writes:
  "A cabal of generals evidently believed it could secure the White House for Mitt Romney by staging the Benghazi incident ... to bring down Obama..."The Obama administration, and its establishment controllers, appear to be ousting a number of intelligence and military officials who took part in illegal operations to replace Obama with Romney... "The outgoing US military cabal favors the extension of colonial wars, like those in Iraq and Afghanistan, as well as an attack on Iran..."The Romney backers were made up of neocons, Bush holdovers, and members of the Mormon Mafia in the intelligence community - a relatively narrow base.
  "The Obama supporters were the Brzezinski-Nye soft power group and military opposed to the Iran war. "The neocons and reactionary Mormons wanted to restore aggressive war and wholesale bombing as the preferred option for US foreign policy..."The pro-Obama group wants ... want to rely on cyber-warfare, drones, assassinations, bombing, raids by special forces, and economic warfare in the form of trade sanctions and technology embargoes. Website for this image..."When they want to destroy a country like Syria, they do not favor direct US invasion or bombing, but rather seek to use proxies like Turkey and the al-Qaeda patsy network to get the double benefit of weakening both ally and enemy. Above all, they love color revolutions and soft-power subversion..."The attack that killed Stevens was carried out by forces under the control of Sufiyan Qumu (also Kumu or Gumu), who had been held in Guantanamo for several years and released as a CIA asset for the overthrow of Gaddafi.
  "A significant group of CIA paramilitaries stationed nearby was ordered to stand down by the CIA command structure."Another CIA asset, the February 17 Martyrs Brigade, which had in the summer of 2011 assassinated General Younes in order to help the CIA operative General Hifter to take control of the rebel army, had contracted to provide additional security, but also did not intervene...
  "On September 14, Petraeus told the House Intelligence committee that the Benghazi incident had been spontaneous, a demonstration gone violent..."The Obama administration was in any case eager to hide the fact that it had turned Libya over to al-Qaeda.
  "The goal of Benghazi was an early October surprise to Carterize Obama, and the CIA was commanded by Petraeus..."Like General George Marshall on the evening of December 6, 1941 - who stayed conveniently out of the loop under various pretexts because he wanted the Pearl Harbor attack to occur as a means of damaging President Roosevelt - Petraeus was at the movies during the Benghazi attack...
  In addition to Petraeus, the following officers are also either sacked or the object of scandals or investigations:Marine General John R. Allen is in trouble. Currently the commander of US forces in Afghanistan.
  General Carter Ham, commander of US Africom, whose area of responsibility includes Libya, manifestly failed to send forces to stop the attack on the Benghazi consulate and CIA post.Admiral James G. Stavridis, the outgoing NATO Supreme Commander, has been officially reprimanded by Navy Secretary Ray Mabus for lavish spending on his personal lifestyle, including a junket to a wine dinner in France. He will soon leave his post.
  General William E. ''Kip'' Ward, who commanded US Africom from October 2007 to March 2011, presided over the preparation and launching of the attack on Libya. On the surface, Ward is accused of spending several hundred thousand dollars of government money and resources on family members, luxury junkets, and flights.
  Lieutenant General Patrick J. O'Reilly, the Director of the Pentagon's Missile Defense Agency, has also been reprimanded by the Defense Department's Inspector General for intimidating and humiliating subordinates, thus creating a work environment characterized by one subordinate as ''management by blowtorch and pliers.''Rear Admiral Chuck Gaouette was the commander of the USS Stennis carrier battle group, currently stationed in the Arabian Sea, near Iran and other possible targets for aggression and/or Gulf of Tonkin provocations. Gaouette is currently being investigated for ''inappropriate leadership judgment'' while on station in the Middle East.
  Brigadier General Jeffrey Sinclair, second in command of the 82nd Airborne Division stationed at Fort Bragg, North Carolina, and a key man for Afghanistan logistics, is accused of raping and having an adulterous affair with a female captain he had gotten transferred to his command.
  Commander Joseph E. Darlak, commanding officer of the frigate USS Vandegrifft and two other senior officers having been removed after a drunken orgy during a visit to the port of Vladivostok, Russia.
  Christopher E. Kubasik was fired as president and Chief Operating Officer of Lockheed Martin Corp...Gaza. The whole world hates the shitty little state of Israel and its Satanic child killers"With all these figures removed, it is likely to be more difficult for Israel's Netanyahu to launch his war against Iran in the way that had been planned. "He has therefore fallen back on the option of starting a smaller war in Gaza as a means of stabilizing the US-UK-Israel war party while other options are sought... "The cover story for Petraeus' ouster involves his affair with Paula Broadwell... a lieutenant colonel of military intelligence..."She was deployed to embroil Petraeus with a view to bringing him down, and she succeeded... "The purge of so many Romney supporters from the intelligence community and from the military may explain why the expected computer-generated Republican election fraud failed to materialize in the expected dimensions in so many states... "The current scandals are extraordinary because they cast light on the rogue network or invisible government of the United States..."
Fox Response To Obama's Thailand Press Conference: The Thai Prime Minister Is Attractive
  Link to Article
  Source: Crooks and Liars
  Mon, 19 Nov 2012 19:33
  Here's one reason why we can't have nice things in the media: President Obama gave a joint press conference early this morning (U.S. time) in Bangkok with the Prime Minister of Thailand. They discussed the fighting in Gaza, human rights, trade and the so-called ''fiscal cliff.'' But what was Fox News' first reaction? The good looks of Obama's Thai counterpart. Oh, and his comments about Thai food.
  To their credit, Fox News was the only news network to cover the entire news conference, according to Mediaite. But given Fox's usual lackofinterest in Obama's public remarks, I can't help but think they had a reporter champing at the bit for a gotcha question or were desperately hoping he'd make a faux pas on Israel (he didn't) or Benghazi (it didn't come up, much to Fox's disappointment, I'm sure).
  Fox & Friends co-host Clayton Morris noted that the press conference ''touched on everything from Thai food (everyone laughed appreciatively) to what's going on in Israel'... and also human rights abuses in and around the Asian region as well.'' Then co-host Dave Briggs jumped in:
  Two real observations from the folks on Twitter this morning. And one is the relative attractiveness of the Prime Minister of Thailand (Morris nodded his head in emphatic agreement and co-host Ainsley Earhardt said, ''She's quite beautiful'') another being the President's thoughts on Thai food! I mean, that is going deep but that is speaking my language!
  Earhardt did quickly say that Prime Minister 'ªYingluck Shinawatra'¬ is ''also very smart.'' And the entire Curvy Couch Crew complimented her for speaking English. But if they had bothered to do any research, they might have known that she got a master's degree at Kentucky State University.
  Finally, after those ''enlightening'' insights from the hosts, they tossed to reporter Wendell Goler.
Obama Calls Burma 'Myanmar' as 'Diplomatic Courtesy' | The Weekly Standard
  Link to Article
  Mon, 19 Nov 2012 19:06
  President Barack Obama called Burma 'Myanmar' after a bilateral meeting with Thein Sein, the president of that country. From the pool report:
  Obama used the word "Myanmar," the preferred terminology of the former military government and currently nominally civilian government, in a spray following the bilat, rather than use "Burma," the former name of the country, and the one preferred by Aung San Suu Kyi as well as the name the U.S. uses.
  "I've shared with him the fact that I recognize this is just the first steps on what will be a long journey," Obama told reporters, with Thein Sein at his side. "But we think a process of democratic and economic reform here in Myanmar that has been begun by the president is one that can lead to incredible development opportunities.
  Deputy national security adviser Ben Rhodes defended the president in comments to the press:
  He said that the US government position is still to refer to the country as Burma.
  He said it was a "diplomatic courtesy to refer to "Myanmar" in his meeting with Thein Sein.
  "The US government position is still Burma but as we have said, different people call this country by different names."
  UPDATE: Here's the full exchange:
  Q In the Thein Sein meeting he referenced Myanmar instead of Burma. Was that just a slipup or is it kind of a sign that you guys are sort of easing your references to the name? MR. RHODES: The President felt that given the fact that -- the government obviously goes by Myanmar; it's still a disputed issue. The United States government position is still Burma. Aung San Suu Kyi still refers to Burma. But then in his meeting with Thein Sein and his comment that he would refer to Myanmar, that that was a diplomatic courtesy to do, doesn't change the fact that the U.S. government position is still Burma. But we've said we recognize that different people call this country by different names, and we obviously accept that. We certainly accept that that's the view of President Thein Sein. So our view is that this is something we can continue to discuss moving forward, and it's a symbol of how this country, again, is working through issues that in the past stood in the way of progress but now can be addressed through dialogue. Q Did he just decide that on the spot? Because the guidance we had gotten ahead of time was that he was likely not to use either name. MR. RHODES: Well, I think that was in reference to the speech when you asked me that question. No, I think in diplomatic meetings, it is often customary that when you're meeting with certain government officials you use Myanmar; when you're meeting with Aung San Suu Kyi and others who use Burma, you use Burma. So I think within the meeting it was the diplomatic practice to use Myanmar, and then he used it in his public comment, and then -- Q What are the historical analogies for that, when you had -- what does that diplomatic custom derive from? MR. RHODES: Well, it derives from the -- well, it's -- I'm only speaking uniquely to this country. Q Oh, yes. MR. RHODES: This is what our diplomats do. So -- Q Okay. MR. RHODES: Yes. Q I'm just saying, is there some historical example? MR. RHODES: No, no, I was referring to that that's basically the practice of our diplomats in Burma. Thanks, guys. Q Thanks.
  UPDATE II: Four days ago, Rhodes insisted on calling on the country Burma:
  Q Hi. Two questions. One, on Burma -- the U.S. still refers to Myanmar as Burma. Is that something that will continue to go on? Do you expect Myanmar to change its name back to Burma? And then on the Middle East again -- is the U.S. fearful about Israeli ground forces entering Gaza? Is that something the U.S. would support?
  MR. RHODES: First of all, I would note that on your first question, it is the continued U.S. policy that we refer to Burma. We recognize and understand that Myanmar is the name that is used by many within the country and around the world as well, although there are some who also continue to use the traditional name of Burma.
  So, again, we'll continue to refer to Burma, but we certainly understand that this is something that different countries take different views on, and as a matter of courtesy, we understand that in our engagements in Burma, Myanmar may be what officials -- government officials use in referring to their country. So that's how we approach that issue.
House Intel Chair: 'Appointees from Administration' Changed Rice's Talking Points | CNS News
  Link to Article
  Mon, 19 Nov 2012 19:04
  Rep. Mike Rogers (R-Mich.) chairs the House Select Committee on Intelligence. (AP Photo)
  (CNSNews.com) - Who changed the CIA talking points to minimize the fact that terrorists were behind the attack on the U.S. outposts in Benghazi?
  When Susan Rice, the U.S. ambassador to the U.N., went on five Sunday talk shows five days later, she was still blaming the attack on a spontaneous protest over an obscure anti-Islam video.
  Rep. Mike Rogers (R-Mich.), chairman of the House intelligence committee, says the unclassified talking points put together by the CIA changed when they got to administration appointees:
  "[T]here was not an intelligence failure," Rogers told "Meet the Press" on Sunday.
  "The intelligence community had it right, and they had it right early. What happened was it worked its way up through the system of the so-called talking points, which everyone refers to, and then it went up to what's called a deputy's committee...It went to the so-called deputy's committee, that's populated by appointees from the administration. That's where the narrative changed. And so how that thing got back to (Susan) Rice, I think, is probably another question."
  Sen. Dianne Feinstein (D-Calif.), chair of the Senate intelligence committee, appeared with Rogers on "Meet the Press." She was asked why the CIA called the attack terrorism from the beginning -- but Rice did not:
  "Because she could speak publicly only on unclassified speaking points," Feinstein said. There was concern about naming a terrorist group "until we had some certainty," Feinstein explained.
  "Now, with the allegation that the White House changed those talking points, that is false," Feinstein said. "There is only one thing that was changed, and I've checked into this. I believe it to be absolute fact. And that was the word 'consulate' was changed to 'mission'. That's the only change that anyone in the White House made, and I have checked this out."
  Asked why the reference to terrorism was removed from the unclassified talking points, Feinstein said, "That is something we're going to find out."
  "Well, where -- where this went awry is anybody that brings weapons and mortars and RPGs and breaks into an asset of the United States is a terrorist in my view. I mean, that's pretty -- pretty clear. Also the other point was, once the video was put together, it was clear there was no demonstration. This should have been known much earlier. It also raises the concern of talking points by committee. And I have some concern about that."
  "We are going to find out who made changes in the original statement," Feinstein said. "Until we do, I really think it's unwarranted to make accusations."
  'References to al Qaeda were removed by somebody'
  Sen. Saxby Chambliss (R-Ga.), the vice chair of the Senate intelligence committee, told "Fox News Sunday" that he tried to find out who changed the talking points:
  "At the hearing we had on Thursday and Friday, we had every leader of the intelligence community there, including folks from the State Department, the FBI -- everybody there was asked, 'Do you know who made these changes?' And nobody knew. The only entity that reviewed the talking points that was not there was the White House.
  "So, you know, I don't know whether -- what they said yesterday is exactly right or not. But, what I do know is that every member of the intelligence community says that references to al Qaeda were removed by somebody, and they don't know who. And references to attacks versus demonstrations were removed by somebody."
  Asked if the Senate Intelligence Committee will call Rice to testify, Chambliss said, "I don't know the answer to that question right now." He said he'll discuss it with committee chair Sen. Dianne Feinstein. He also said Rice is "going to have to come in and testify at some point, whether it's in a closed hearing or an open hearing."
  At some point, Chambliss added, "She needs to come in and say what the president or the White House directed her to say."
  Sen. Feinstein said she's read transcripts of every one of the five Sunday talk show interviews Susan Rice gave on Sept. 16 -- when Rice insisted the Benghazi attack was a spontaneous demonstration against a video.
  Feinstein said Rice was "within the context" of the talking points put together by the intelligence community, Feinstein said. "And for this, she has been pilloried for two months."
  On ABC's "This Week," House Homeland Security Chairman Peter King (R-N.Y.) said the talking points changed after they left the CIA: "[S]omewhere after it left the intelligence community, somewhere in the administration, there was very vital language taken out."
  King said when the unclassified talking points were sent to the administration -- "we don't know whether it was the White House, the National Security Council, the Justice Department or the Defense Department -- that language was changed. That was not the language that was sent over by the intelligence community."
Obama Sexond Election
  Link to Article
  Source: Lame Cherry
  Mon, 19 Nov 2012 19:03
  Yes my children, this blog told you that the Obama edits did not come from DOD or State, but from the 2012 election fraud group.
  House Intel Chair: 'Appointees from Administration' Changed Rice's Talking Points on Benghazi...
  The fix was in and Susan Rice had no idea her pretty little face and figure were being sent out to soft sex sell the message of anal rape to the world in blaming Christians.
  Hillary Clinton allowed herself to be deluded into this too in her rampant hatred of Christians.
  FLIRTASIAN...Obama Calls Burma 'Myanmar' as 'Diplomatic Courtesy'...Gets top dissident's name wrong repeatedly...MEETS WITH CAMBODIA'S LONGTIME 'STRONGMAN'...In creepy mural, Obama looks like the Joker...
  What is biazarro in Obama's sexond election theft is Obama the bi mate candidate who was all feces penis in his first 51 years is suddenly in Asia humping powerful Asian women like a monkey demon tired of taking it up the arse.
  Excuse my French but look at this f*cker as this not Obama eye raping Mrs. Sarkozy in France in which she had to fend him off, but this is Obama putting lip locks on Asian women and not on black dicks in the bed sack.The photo of Obama with the one Asian power babe in both their heads are down is absolute beyond seductive. These two are wed and are thinking about the mussed up silk sheets behind rice paper walls.
  I wondered over Obama going to Indochina as it had no rhyme or reason. It accomplished absolutely nothing in political terms, but it accomplished everything in Barry Chin terms, as Obama spent millions of dollars as 10 year old Barry Chin to show the Asian girls who made fun of him, that this is what they missed out on, and Obama is doing the public f*ck of these Asian women to inform the entire society there he is master of the harem.
  The gay boy has done good and has now come home to hump the cheif's daughter.
  Sure this is another Lame Cherry matter anti matter exclusive, but it appears your little foreign boy has grown up America. He done got on his knees for Uncle Frank, done got men to snort coke off his thighs, done dropped soap, done wed hisself to that guy Muchelle Robinson and had sperm donors to the ishy work, done felt up latin chics in uniform as he leered at the white chics in Europe he could only write about as blondes in Dreams.
  But now Mr. Barry Chin is feeling his rice whiskey and got hisself a case of Yellow Fever in this historic Sexond election theft. No American in the White House, not even John Kennedy had the balls to feel up foreign leaders in front of the world......hell Bill Clinton never even tried raping them in public, but there is the Designer Pubic of Barry Chin of Peking, getting all cum dripping coming home to Asia as he finally gets the thing he was too scared to lay claim to all these years, and that is an Asian lay.
  Who knew that the one thing that would make Barack Hussein Obama Osseiran a man, would be a harem of Asian women.......no not Muslim women, not black women, not European women, not even lesbians, but if ole Peggy Noonan or Ann Coulter had just put on a kimono, then Barry would have had them over to the White House long ago as the runs like a duck kid, just wanted to run to Asia for a f*ck.
  Nobel prizes, trillions of dollars, all those black slaves, two election thefts, nuclear weapons, piles of dead Muslims and the only thing Obama Chin has been lusting after in that entire spree was to show Asian kitties what the missed out on 40 years ago.
  Yes the Peking boy aficionado.......no Koreans, Japanese, Chinese or Filipinos will do, but Obama like em Indiochinese...not Vietnamese but up on the other end from the South China on the Indian Ocean side.
  Can you see the difference really? Obama can, and he goes horn dog over showing these women what a Casanova he is. Oh the great loss these women have suffered in mocking Obama in the 1960's and now what a yum yum he is now as Obama does the fashion walk molesting them in public as the Chinoid that got away.
  Could that be why this blog has been featuring Asian women for some time.........never know now do you.
  agtG
John McAfee starts blog documenting life on the run from Belize police | World news
  Link to Article
  Source: Dave Winer's linkblog feed
  Mon, 19 Nov 2012 18:55
  Belizean police want to question anti-virus software pioneer John McAfee about the murder of his neighbour Gregory Viant Faull. Photograph: Henry Romero/Reuters
  Fugitive software pioneer John McAfee appears to have started a blog about his life on the run from Belizean authorities, charting the disguises he claims to have used to evade police and spy on their investigation.
  McAfee, named by police in Belize as a "person of interest" in the murder of American businessman Gregory Viant Faull, has protested his innocence, insisting he is the victim of state harassment.
  Now he claims to have returned to his residence in San Pedro in the days after his disappearance and watched police search his property. He claims to have seen police dig up the bodies of four dogs he says they poisoned, before chopping off their heads and reburying them.
  He did so, he claims, while dressed first as a peasant hawker and then as a drunk German tourist.
  The allegations appear in the blog apparently written by McAfee, which he says he plans to update regularly, either while on the run or if captured.
  "I have pre-written enough material to keep this blog alive for at least a year," he states in the latest post launched Monday.
  Faull was found dead at his home in San Pedro on 11 November with a gunshot wound to his head.
  Police described McAfee as a "person of interest" whom they wanted to question in relation to the death. The two men allegedly quarrelled about the dogs McAfee kept as his home, but McAfee has claimed that he "barely knew" the victim.
  Since going on the run, the anti-virus company founder has kept in regular contact with American media, telling CNBC in an interview on Friday that he will fight the allegations "as long as I'm still breathing".
  He added that he was refusing to hand himself in to authorities as he feared he would be killed in the cells before a trial took place.
  The 67-year-old also alleged harassment at the hands of Belize's notorious Gang Suppression Unit (GSU), an arm of the police that has been accused of abuses in the past.
  "Things do not operate here as they do in the states," he said, adding: "We are living in a near dictatorship where the legal system is subservient to the cabinet."
  Responding, Belize's prime minister Dean Barrow has said he believed McAfee is "bonkers".
  The fugitive's apparent blog '' whoismcafee.com '' alludes to the mental strain that being on the run may cause him.
  McAfee writes that he was driven to return to his property out of concern that unless he knew what was going on in the murder investigation "my chances of coming out of this intact, both emotionally and physically, were slim".
  He claims that he returned to his residence two days after going on the lam, but in disguise so that the authorities would not notice him.
  In detail, he explains how he used shoe polish to darken his skin and stuffed his cheeks with bubble gum to make his face look fatter.
  "I stuffed a shaved down tampon deep into my right nostril and died the tip dark brown '' giving my nose an awkward, lopsided, disgusting appearance," he wrote in a post dated 19 November.
  The disguise, completed with rags instead of his normal clothes, was enough to fool a reporter hanging around his complex, McAfee claims.
  In a further boast, the fugitive says he also pretended to be a drunk German tourist in swimming trunks, oversized Hawaiian shirt and a bandaged face, "yelling loudly at anyone who would listen, 'Leck mich um ausch!'".
  "At 67 years of age it was quite a spectacle," McAfee wrote.
  While at his property he spoke to the man who discovered Faull's body and watched the police operation at his home, McAfee further claims. His blogpost states that officers searched his home seven times.
  "What I discovered is that the police are more concerned with finding me than catching Mr Faull's killer," he wrote.
  McAfee goes on to offer a $25,000 reward for the "capture of person or persons responsible for Mr Faull's murder".
  It is claimed that the blog is being maintained with the help of Chad Essley, who describes himself as a graphic novelist working on a publication of McAfee's story. In a separate blog, Essley says McAfee's website is authentic.
  The British-born computer programmer built up a personal fortune as the founder of McAfee anti-virus software. He moved to Belize in 2008. But it is believed that his wealth has dwindled in recent years.
  There has been past concern over McAfee's mental health. In the interview with CNBC, he brushed off reports that he had played Russian roulette with a loaded gun. "My point was life isn't exactly what you see," he said.
Hollywood whodunit: What's eating emails in iCloud? | Cringely - InfoWorld
  Link to Article
  Mon, 19 Nov 2012 16:47
  Here's a mystery worthy of a Hollywood thriller.
  I recently got an email from a reader named Steven G., an Academy Award-winning developer of screenplay-writing software used by major movie honchos. Steven told me his customers had been encountering a bizarre issue with Apple's iCloud service.
  [ Apple's control freak tendencies go back a long way. Witness: The 7 words you can't say on iTunes. | For a humorous take on the tech industry's shenanigans, subscribe to Robert X. Cringely's Notes from the Underground newsletter. | Get the latest insight on the tech news that matters from InfoWorld's Tech Watch blog. ]
  Steven wrote:
  A screenwriter was delivering a PDF attachment of a draft of his script to the project's director, by emailing it from his iCloud/MobileMe account to Gmail. The problem? The script would never arrive, no matter how many times he would send it. But sending other PDF documents worked fine.
  I figured, wow -- is this some sort of spectacular failure of our screenwriting software (Movie Magic Screenwriter)? Our software had generated the PDF, so maybe we had accidentally generated information that was somehow matching the profile of a virus, or malware, causing the document to be rejected by Apple's mail servers.
  After obtaining a copy of the PDF (sent via Gmail to our Microsoft Exchange server), we confirmed the exact same behavior when we tried to send it to our own iCloud mailbox. The email never arrived, nor did we receive any return notification.
  He began experimenting to find out what was going on. First, he compressed the screenplay PDF into a Zip file and sent that. It also disappeared. Next, he compressed it using Apple's encrypted archive format. That attachment made it through, but it came with an unusual comment: "[not Virus Scanned]" appended to the subject field.
  From this he deduced that something inside the file was causing it to get flagged and flushed. He cut the file in half and sent the first 59 pages as an attachment. It got deleted. His breakthrough arrived, in dramatic Hollywood fashion:
  AND THEN I SAW IT -- a line in the script, describing a character viewing an advertisement for a pornographic site on his computer screen. Upon modifying this line, the entire document was delivered with no problem.
  It seemed not only was Apple scanning messages for malware, it was also scanning the content of each attachment and exercising some kind of rule about it. Apple wasn't merely flagging the message or sending to a spam folder, but deleting it outright.
  He wasn't done. He created another PDF containing a variation of the offending line from the screenplay: "All my children are barely legal teens -- why would I want to let them drive by themselves?"
  Yes, you guessed it. That attachment got sent to email hell. To be certain, Steven created an email with that line in the body of the message and sent it from his Exchange server to his personal iCloud account. That too disappeared into the ether.
BBC Gaza correspondent 'not fit for purpose' - The Commentator
  Link to Article
  Mon, 19 Nov 2012 15:32
  Following the recent escalation in Gaza, there has been, as a part of efforts to focus on balance in reporting, renewed scrutiny of BBC reporting from the region.
  Over recent days, The Commentator has pointed out various inaccuracies and misleading information emanating from the region, with various commentators and BBC staff seemingly either fundamentally misunderstanding the latest conflict, or at worst, intentionally misleading the viewing public.
  The newly formed BBCWatch organisation has today drawn our attention to yet another incident that borders on propagandising, and fails to live up to the journalistic standards expected of the BBC.
  Jon Donnison, who we have mentioned on a number of occasions before, has taken to tweeting the conjectures of Gazan activists and often retweets images and messages without the appropriate journalistic level of scrutiny. A crucial example of his Twitter activism comes as BBCWatch highlights that Gazan 'activists' are utilising imagery either from a previous conflict, or not from Gaza at all.
  As you can see, Donnison adds his commentary, "Heartbreaking" to an image tweeted by Hazem Balousha, tagged #Gaza. But the image is not from Gaza at all.
  The original image actually comes from October, from Syria, where the Assad regime has been brutally murdering over 37,000 Syrians over the past year. A simple scan through image search engines like TinEye would have led Donnison to this fact, but it appears his activist side is getting the better of the journalist in him.
  Twitter of course, is a ground in which many can claim that their tweets and 'personal' and not representative of the organisation they represent. But Donnison's followers, it can be robustly argued, do not follow him for his personal musings, but rather, for his reporting as a BBC correspondent on the ground.
  The BBC was embarrassed last week when it appeared that a man they had shown to be injured in Gaza was in fact part of a Palestinian propaganda effort, with the man being seen walking around unharmed moments after the original footage was screened.
  Questions are now arising as to the reliability of BBC reporting, and whether the organisation is in fact representing good value for licence-few payers' money.
  UPDATE: Donnison has retracted the Twitter image and tweeted this:
  A photo I retweeted from another journo yesterday showing children injured was NOT in Gaza as I said but apparently from Syria. Apologies. '-- Jon Donnison (@JonDonnison) November 19, 2012
  A spokesperson for BBCWatch said: "Donnison has rendered himself no longer fit for the purpose of accurate and impartial reporting from the Middle East in accordance with the BBC's legal obligations."
  You can register your complaints here.
ECB's Asmussen has rush of blood to head, tells truth about Greece.
  Link to Article
  Source: A diary of deception and distortion
  Mon, 19 Nov 2012 14:53
  Joerg Asmussen pictured in happier times
  Panic hit the phone lines between Brussels and Berlin this morning following ECB top man Joerg Asmussen's brief outburst of honesty while talking on German public broadcaster ZDF. Just before censors cut him off, Asmussen declared that the Greeks will need more international financial assistance beyond the agreed bailout programs after 2014.
  ''I don't know what came over me,'' he told nursing staff at the Berlin Institute for Troubled Robots, ''one minute I was waxing confident about Greece returning to the markets very quickly, and the next I was saying Athens is a dead duck and we should all run away to somewhere else very safe and sing Zorba the Greek to cheer ourselves up.''
  His remarks caused a rush on 56pt headlines in the German tabloids, including Bild's classic 'GREECE CAUSES TIME WARP BACK TO 1923, HITLER SIGHTED CARYING REVOLVER IN MUNICH'.
  Yesterday '' even as the unfortunate Central Banker was heard screaming ''There's a f**king great '‚¬30bn shortfall in the budget, we're doomed, Gotterdammerung, Blitzkrieg, aarrrrg'' while being carried on a stretcher to the waiting ambulance '' Angela Merkel, Wolfgang Sch¤uble, Francois Hollande, Mario Monti, Mario Draghi, Mariano Rajoy, Christine Lagarde, Arnold Schwarzenegger, Lionel Messi and Sir Alex Ferguson were scrambling to make a meeting now scheduled for tomorrow. Brussels announced that the meeting would 'decide how to plug that hole'.
  ''We're leaking goals fachrissakes,'' yelled Sir Alex, ''and our central backs are no equipped ti deal wi'it. Either we switch to 4-2-4 or its all over.''
  But Mario Draghi was more confident of success.
  ''Of course, we always anticipated the potential for a hole-plugging requirement,'' he purred, ''and so some time ago we ordered a large shipment of bollocks to be flown in from Great Britain, where they already have a massive bollocks surplus. We will plug the hole with bollocks rebranded as 007 Bonds backed by tomato futures, and I am confident that on that basis the Greek economy will be showing signs of growth within my lifetime.''
  Beaming as he announced the sale of 40 billion streams of bollocks to Frankfurt, UK Chancellor George Osborne told a press conference in London, ''I think this is yet more evidence that our economy is storming back to health thanks to the privatisation of the former NHS run bollocks factory, and its transplant onto the larynx of Mr Jeremy Frunt-Bottomley, the Secretary of State for Shareholders. This bonus will enable us to chuck even more money at Stephen Hester, and jump off the Eutanic just before it hits something largely hidden but in the meantime I should like to take this opportunity of once again denying all the rumours concerning my recreational interest in white powder and black prostitutes.''
  ''Mr Asmussen was merely a little over-tired,'' the German Finance Ministry announced later, ''he has had a stressful week commuting between Frankfurt and the Sin Buggeryswyth children's home in Wrexham''.
  See also David Rose in the Daily Mail: How Neil Kinnock tried to frame me as a paedophile working for the KGB
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Mumbai arrests over Facebook post
  Link to Article
  Source: BBC News - Home
  Mon, 19 Nov 2012 14:52
  19 November 2012Last updated at07:28 ETPolice in India have arrested a woman they say criticised on Facebook the shutdown of the city of Mumbai after the death of politician Bal Thackeray.
  A woman friend who "liked" the comment was also arrested, they said.
  The women, accused of "hurting religious sentiments", were released on bail after appearing in court in the town of Palghar, police told the BBC.
  The death of the controversial Hindu nationalist politician on Saturday afternoon brought Mumbai to a halt.
  Thackeray, one of the most divisive figures in Indian politics, was blamed for inciting tensions between Hindus and Muslims and was revered by his followers.
  News of his death saw businesses shutting and taxis staying off the roads amid fears of violence by supporters of the right-wing Shiv Sena party he founded.
  While his supporters grieved, many others were angered by the inconvenience to commuters and several people were critical on social media sites.
  In her Facebook comment, the 21-year-old wrote: "People like Thackeray are born and die daily and one should not observe a 'bandh' [shutdown] for that."
  In recent months, police have arrested a number of people in cases which are being seen as a test of India's commitment to freedom of speech.
  In October, Ravi Srinivasan, a 46-year-old businessman in the southern Indian city of Pondicherry, was arrested for a tweet criticising Karti Chidambaram, son of Indian Finance Minister P Chidambaram. He was later released on bail.
  In September, there was outrage when a cartoonist was jailed in Mumbai on charges of sedition for his anti-corruption drawings. The charges were later dropped.
  And in April, the West Bengal government arrested a teacher who had emailed to friends a cartoon that was critical of Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee. He too was later released on bail.
Artists channel their inner CALM through 3D printing
  Link to Article
  Source: Phys.org - latest science and technology news stories
  Mon, 19 Nov 2012 14:37
  Artists created striking works using University 3D printers.
  Unique works of art created using specialist equipment at the University of Exeter are on display in an exhibition which showcases the diverse potential of the technology.
  The University's Centre for Additive Layer Manufacturing (CALM) invited 30 professional artists to work with its engineers on its "3D printers", which build up an object layer by layer.
  Dr Sara Flint, commercial manager of CALM, said: "This collaboration was an extremely exciting opportunity for us to work with 30 artists who all had very different creative ideas about how they could use our technology. The results are a striking showcase of its possibilities, and in themselves they're visually stunning. The artists have gained a new way of working which could benefit them commercially, which is part of our aim. I hope the exhibition will also serve as a platform to highlight our work to a wider audience, and encourage more to find out how we could work with them."
  The Centre's first collaboration with artists came about when staff from Exeter Phoenix attended an open day for businesses interested in finding out more about how to benefit from the technology.
  Curiosity from fellow artists followed, and led to a specialist workshop being developed. Thanks to its success, Phoenix is now hosting Neoreplicants, an entire exhibition dedicated to the results. It launches on 15 November ahead of opening to the public between 16 November and 19 January.
  The service was free to the artists involved. Through its funding channels, CALM covered the costs of training, materials, consultation and manufacturing while Phoenix provided the free exhibition space and additional support.
  The art works range from architectural structures to representations of the artists' own blood cells. Some of the artists developed a completely new approach to their practice. One artist, Maia Conran, has been selected to take the concept further by developing a new exhibition in 2013.
  She aimed to blur the lines between the virtual and the physical by creating a cinema space within the gallery. She said: "I wasn't sure what to expect from working with CALM, but the experience has opened the door to a whole new world of possibility and helped me to develop an exciting new body of work. It was inspirational to have access to new ideas and new technologies. The engineers at CALM were extremely helpful and knowledgeable and I thoroughly enjoyed the collaborative process of working with them. I'm delighted with the results, which have led to led to a new commission for a solo exhibition, and I'm already full of ideas for my next project."
  Additive Layer Manufacturing enables complex or bespoke parts to be built quickly, from a range of materials. Products can be built and replicated by using a variety of different sources of data for example computer aided design (CAD), medical imaging or laser scanning.
  Since the £2.6 million CALM facility opened last year, it has already benefited scores of businesses in Devon, Dorset, Somerset, Wiltshire and Gloucestershire, by offering access to CALM's equipment and expertise to create a diverse range of items using the cutting-edge equipment. The products range from ultra-light parts for the aerospace industry and perfect replicas of human body parts to prototypes of toys.
  CALM is part-funded by the European Union with £1.5 million from the European Regional Development fund 2007-2013, under the competitiveness operating programme. CALM is partially funded by EADS Innovation Works at Filton, Bristol.
  Businesses can find out more about the centre and how they can use its facilities by visiting www.exeter.ac.uk/CALM.
  Provided byUniversity of Exeter
Looking for a great self-published book? Here's where to find it
  Link to Article
  Source: Culture | guardian.co.uk
  Mon, 19 Nov 2012 14:36
  Still in the dark? '... Try one of the web's many alternative literature communities. Photograph: Martin Rogers/Workbook Stock
  It's wonderful to see the Guardian taking such an active interest in the self-publishing landscape. I was as frustrated as anyone to see such a splatterball response to Alison Flood's piece last week, because it asks such an important question when it comes to self-publishing: where on earth (well, on Google/Amazon anyway) do I start?
  My first reaction was excitement, my second a dismissive snort at many of the comments. Hesitation followed, as I realised that if there were a self-publishing Archimedean point, it was well and truly rooted in quicksand. My overall reaction, however, was that I was pretty sure where not to start.
  If we're talking "gems" or "masterpieces", we're not looking for a decent self-published book but one that does something traditional publishing doesn't. So don't start with booksellers offering self-published books that mimic regular books. And please, Alison, don't start with the Amazon charts, which are stuffed with examples of passably good self-publishing '' but few "gems".
  One of the sad things about self-publishing is that authors often strive to do what publishers do, from editing to cover design. Of course, it's understandable as a business decision, and I have nothing but admiration for the writers who do it. But when the media plays follow-the-news rather than make-the-news, as though what's good for entrepreneurial writers is good for literature as a whole, we get a reinforced message that points writers at a fixed model and robs readers of a wider choice. So, one place you won't find self-published gems is on the review sites purporting to filter the good from the bad by applying the criteria of professionalism.
  The world of self-publishing provides a great home for the "midlist". These are authors whose books are unlikely to hit pay dirt and who are struggling to find a publisher with the funds to back them. They find themselves squeezed out of a market that needs the possibility of a big payoff (though that has changed in the past couple of years with the resurgence of small presses). Sites such as Indie e-book review and Self-publishing Review are good places to start looking in this regard.
  What self-publishing does well is the new, the playful, the awkward, the uncategorisable '' the glorious failure (or string of them). Self-publishing writers can take risks without worrying about how many times they fail. They are unconstrained by the standards of the traditional publishing industry. As a reader, I believe life is too short: if I want a great thriller, there's enough Mark Billingham and Tami Hoag to work through. If I choose to read self-published books it's because I want something different.
  Which brings me back to where to start. I'm a great fan of the click-and-see approach. I begin at one of my favourite base camps, a site steeped in the kind of writing I love, such as htmlgiant or 3:am or Sabotage Reviews (the last styled as a guide to the ephemeral, which makes it fabulous for chapbooks, zines and true one-offs). From here I click on an author's blog, and keep clicking on sidebar links until I end up goodness knows where, discovering on the way such self-publishing treasure troves as Paraphilia Magazine, Sam Pink's blog and Toronto Poetry Vendors.
  An excellent introduction to the breadth of self-publishing authors can be found in ezines and websites that collate short works. As well as htmlgiant and 3:am, there are the likes of Metazen, Housefire and the very best of the author platform sites Fictionaut, each featuring hundreds of authors creating experimental and often incredibly beautiful work. A good idea is to start there and branch out one click at a time.
  A lot of writers who publish their own work online engage with digital technology itself, creating new forms of literature that capture the rhythms and cadences of web-based communication, and ask questions about online identity and community. These writers use the internet as a tool for disseminating their work and also as the forum in which every part of their relationship with their readers takes place. Nowhere is this more interestingly done than in Alt Lit, a movement that adopts the idiom of chatroom speak while supporting a community of writers. Alt Lit is already beginning to seep into the mainstream; Tao Lin, the movement's high priest, has sold his new book to Vintage, and his breakthrough, Shoplifting from American Apparel, has just been filmed. But there is a whole seam of wonderfully put together Alt Lit ebooks out there, as well as standalone pieces. Great places to start looking are Alt Lit Library and Beach Sloth's blog.
  In short, the question "Where do I start?" is easy. If you go where you usually do in your search for good books, you will find the kind of books you usually find. But what a waste when self-publishing has so much to offer, and so many alternative places to find it.
Brazili schrikt van Maxima
  Link to Article
  Source: Een andere kijk op nieuws @infomagnl » Nieuws items
  Mon, 19 Nov 2012 14:33
  Geplaatst @ 19 november 2012
  En terecht zouden wij zeggen, want ons financile wonderkind, althans in de ogen van de wat achtergebleven Nederlanders woonachtig in de uiterwaarden van onze grote rivieren, de achter hunnebedden verborgen woongemeenschappen in het verre noorden, kortom de gebieden waar zelfs de Libelle en Margriet niet bezorgd worden, kortom medeburgers die ondanks dat zij vaak al ruim de 50 gepasseerd zijn nog steeds in sinterklaas geloven, dit economisch wonderkind heeft weer een keiharde klap uitgedeeld . Tijdens een congress in Brazili waar het er weer eens over ging om arme mensen middels een microkrediet nog dieper in de ellende te helpen als waar zij zich al bevinden, wist deze Maxima het weer eens haarfijn in haar gebrekkige Engels uit te leggen.
  Hoe kan het toch zijn, dat als je een paar jaar de Argentijnse MULO hebt gevolgd, daarna een kortstondige vervolgopleiding op een eveneens Argentijnse MMS bent geweest, dan een tijdje bij een witwasbank hebt gewerkt waar je vader het scepter zwaaide , je opeens via een vooraf gearrangeerd huwelijk een topper bent in de wereld van de haute finance ? Onbegrijpelijk , ofschoon ? Zo lang regeringen en met hen collaborerende instanties de kans zien de meute dom te houden en zeker in ons land lukt dat bij gebrek aan een objectieve nieuwsvoorziening zo te zien aardig, zullen mensen in dit soort sprookjes blijven geloven.
  150 Bedrijven zouden volgens de vaderlandse media met Willem Alexander en Maxima en'.... niet te vergeten ons nieuw benoemde handelsgenie Lilian Ploumen naar Brazili zijn afgereist om daar eens krachtig de vaderlandse economie nieuw leven in te blazen, ofschooon nog maar enkele weken geleden wij in diezelfde sprookjesbladen lazen dat het praktisch overal in Europa slecht gaat, behalve natuurlijk in ons eigen land en Duitslad dat wij danks zij een krachtig kabinet binnenkort wel over zullen nemen en die Duitsers eens laten zien ''wo es entlang geht''. Overigens kwamen wij in de Braziliaanse pers niets tegen over 150 Nederlandse bedrijven en was over het algemeen de belangstelling voor deze bedelstaf missie zeer matig.
  Onlangs ontvingen wij een mail van een Amerikaanse lezer die ons vroeg hoe het kan zijn dat een gewoon stukje scherp gemeen glas na een voorop gezet huwelijk opeens een diamant kan zijn of heten. Hij doelde daarbij op het huwelijk van de dochter van ex president Bill Clinton met een wat onduidelijke ''investment banker''. En zoals u begrijpt is hier een duidelijke parallel. Maar het stopt hier niet. In hun ambitie om zich mee te warmen aan het oranje vuurtje gaan veel vaders die bezorgd zijn dat hun dochter niet aan de man komt wel zeer ver. Bekend is het verhaal van de oprichter van MartinAir,
  Bekijk orgineel item op geennieuws.com
  Meer Nieuws items
'Het Nederlandse belastingparadijs is niet meer van deze tijd'
  Link to Article
  Source: VK: Home
  Mon, 19 Nov 2012 14:32
  OPINIE -Xander van Uffelen '' 19/11/12, 14:37
  (C) getty. Bono zanger van de band U2.
  Via Nederland ontwijken internationale ondernemingen legaal belasting. Dat is ethisch onaanvaardbaar.
  Extreem lage belastingen niet meer van deze tijd
  De reeks ontluisterende voorbeelden van belastingontwijking via Nederland neemt snel toe. Dat buitenlandse bedrijven Nederland gebruiken om in eigen land veel minder of helemaal geen belasting te betalen, is al langer bekend. De popgroepen U2 en Rolling Stones zijn daarom in Nederland neergestreken. Nike, Google, Ikea en Starbucks gebruiken allemaal de Nederlandse route.
  OngepastExtreem lage belastingen voor internationale ondernemingen zijn niet meer van deze tijd. In een periode waarin door bezuinigingen of belastingverhogingen wereldwijd huishoudens een hogere rekening moeten betalen, is een uitzonderingspositie voor bedrijfswinsten ongepast. De woede over de gunstige behandeling van internationale ondernemingen komt opvallend genoeg vooral uit het buitenland. De Ieren waren boos dat de zelfbenoemde wereldverbeteraar Bono via de Herengracht nauwelijks belasting betaalt. Het zijn Internationale organisaties als Tax Justice die de Hollandse praktijken aan de kaak stellen. En nu zijn de Britten weer verbolgen omdat koffiebedrijf Starbucks al zijn Britse winsten via Nederland wegwast.
  Alle bedrijven voldoen keurig aan de wet, laat het ministerie van Financin keer op keer weten. Nederland verdient bovendien een miljard aan de belastingconstructies en schept werk voor enkele duizenden. Maar het ministerie vergeet te vermelden dat buitenlandse overheden daardoor tientallen, zo niet honderden miljarden aan belasting mislopen.
  KenteringToch is de verdediging van deze belastingroutes tot nog toe succesvol gebleken. Door de crisis is inmiddels een kentering te zien. Zwitserland moet zijn bankgeheim gestaag aanpassen zodat andere landen hun vermogende burgers kunnen belasten. In Groot-Brittanni gaat een parlementaire commissie de uitwassen van belastingontwijking blootleggen.
  In Nederland is het nog stil terwijl er genoeg redenen zijn om de omvang en effecten van de belastingroutes grondig door te lichten. De Tweede Kamer moet het voortouw nemen in de discussie over het Nederlandse belastingparadijs. Het gaat niet om de vraag of de belastingontwijking juridisch of fiscaal juist is, maar om de vraag of belasingontwijking uit ethisch oogpunt nog langer door de beugel kan.
  Xander van Uffelen is chef van de economieredactie van de Volkskrant.
  Deel jouw mening met de andere bezoekers
ISRAELI SPIES ARE EVERYWHERE
  Link to Article
  Source: aangirfan
  Mon, 19 Nov 2012 14:22
  All the world hates Israel. David Dees Illustration/Prothink.orgIsrael murders people, all around the world, including German scientists.Hinter der Fichte: Israel: Ein Volk im Griff der Milit¤rdiktatur -Translate this page /Operation Damocles - Wikipedia, the free encyclopediaIn the 1960s, there were a number of German scientists in Egypt, helping President Nasser build up Egypt's defences.Israel targeted these scientists, in 'Operation Damocles'.The main tactics employed by Israel against the scientists were letter bombs and abductions.[6][7] Their families were threatened with violence to persuade the scientists to return to Europe.[8] A parcel sent to rocket scientist Wolfgang Pilz exploded in his office when opened on 27 November 1962, injuring his secretary.[3][9]A parcel sent to the Heliopolis rocket factory killed 5 Egyptian workers.[2]A pistol was fired at a West German professor in the town of L¶rrach; he had been researching electronics for Egypt. The bullet missed and the gunman escaped by car.[3]Heinz Krug, 49, the chief of a Munich company supplying military hardware to Egypt disappeared in September 1962 and is believed to have been murdered.[6] Hans Kleinwachter was targeted in February 1963, but the assassination attempt failed due to a weapon malfunction.[4]Two Mossad agents, Joseph Ben-Gal, an Israeli, and Otto Joklik, Austrian, were arrested in Switzerland for threatening Heidi Goerke, daughter of a West German electronic guidance expert.
  In 1962, Helene Kamil, Duchess of Mecklenburg died in a plane crash in Westphalia.Her husband was an Egyptian-born Swiss engineer, Hassan Kamil. Gerald Bull, a Canadian weapons engineer, was assassinated in March 1990 outside his apartment in Brussels with five shots to the head.Dutroux, part of a large pedophile ring for top people2. In 1996, Barkanmoved to Vienna.Haider was blackmailed.
  Haider hired Peter Sichrovsky, who has Jewish origins, as his private secretary and allowed him to set his agenda.
  3. Sichrovsky was exposed as working for the Mossad.
  In 2000, Sichrovsky had accompanied the Austrian Defence Minister on a trip to Syria, allegedly to achieve the release of three Israeli soldiers being held by Hezbollah in Lebanon.
  Barkan4. Barkan was interested in blackmailing people in Austria, including the Catholic Church's bishops.
  5.Josef Fritzl, who is part Jewish, was apparently recruited by Mossad.
  Fritzl is suspected of having raped and killed certain youths.
  He ran a hostel for Israeli tourists.
  6. Fritzl was seen as being a useful patsy.
  7. In 1985, Sweden's prime minister, Olof Palme, was assassinated for stopping the shipment of Israeli arms to Iran through Sweden.
  The Israelis apparently supplied Fritzl, aka Wilhelm Kramm, as the patsy.
  But, Fritzl had an alibi. He was stopped by the police in another part of town when Palme was killed.
  8. Barkan got false identities for Mossad agents in New Zealand so that they could, reportedly, assassinate its PM.
  Notorious child killers
  Victims of Dutroux.Beat Meier is Swiss and apparently Jewish.
  "His name appears in the Dutroux police files."
  "Scotland Yard detectives travelled to Switzerland to try to interview him in prison...
  Scotland Yard officers wanted to talk to him about a video they had obtained.
  This video featured a boy who was tied to a chair and horrifically tortured and abused by two masked men.
  "Through great detective work Scotland Yard identified the boy, even though his face never appeared on the video. Fortunately the boy had survived his ordeal and he was tracked down to his home in Liverpool.
  The boy's explanation was very revealing.
  Beat Meier had befriended his parents and suggested taking the boy back to Switzerland for a holiday..."
  (4 2011-01-15 09:10 - Bende van Nijvel >> Forum)
  Melanie Phillips, who is a Jewish journalist.Melanie Phillips, David Rose and David Aaronovich are top Jewish journalists.They seem to be suggesting that the child abuse scandal in the UK has been exaggerated by certain people?"At last! The legal action set in train by Lord McAlpine against those who used Twitter to defame him looks set to achieve more than merely vindicating his unjustly damaged reputation."This may be a watershed moment in which the mob rule that until now has been allowed to rampage unchecked on the internet may finally be brought to heel."
  A watershed moment as the sadistic mob who rampage across the internet...
  aangirfan: MOSSAD AND BANDARaangirfan.blogspot.com/2012/08/mossad-and-bandar.html1 Aug 2012 '' A Stratfor "source claimed that Mossad offered covert assistance to the Saudis... The city of Nicosia in Cyprus was cited in the email 'as a ...aangirfan: J F KENNEDY, KRAYS, FREUDS, MOSSAD, SEXaangirfan.blogspot.com/.../j-f-kennedy-krays-freuds-mossad-sex.htm...11 Oct 2012 '' In London, "when the Jewish gangsters the Kray twins took over Rachmans (slum property) empire it was claimed to be with Mossad approval." ...aangirfan: CIA-MOSSAD IN TURKEY; TEHRAN CONFERENCEaangirfan.blogspot.com/2012/08/tehran-conference.html16 Aug 2012 '' Syria's envoy to the UN, Bashar al-Jaafari, says the CIA and Mossad, based in Turkey, are guiding and commanding armed groups operating in ...aangirfan: SWITZERLAND, DUTROUX, MOSSAD...aangirfan.blogspot.com/2012/03/switzerland-dutroux-mossad.html18 Mar 2012 '' SWITZERLAND, DUTROUX, MOSSAD... Victims of Dutroux. 1. The newspaper Le Monde has compared the Swiss SIERRE COACH CRASH to ...aangirfan: MOSSAD PLOT TO KILL PUTIN?aangirfan.blogspot.com/2012/02/mossad-plot-to-kill-putin.html1 Mar 2012 '' MOSSAD PLOT TO KILL PUTIN? On 27 February 2012, we learn of the Putin Assassination Plot. Ukrainian and Russian security services have ...aangirfan: NIGERIA - CIA AND MOSSADaangirfan.blogspot.com/2012/05/nigeria-cia-and-mossad.html10 May 2012 '' aangirfan. Disclaimer: the posting of stories, commentaries, reports, documents and links (embedded or otherwise) on this site does not in any ...aangirfan: MOSSAD STILL FRIENDS WITH RAWaangirfan.blogspot.com/2012/02/mossad-still-friends-with-raw.html20 Feb 2012 '' Jews in Kochi (Cochin) In 2010, a Jewish couple came to the Chabad house in Kochi, in Kerala, in India. In early February 2012, the local ...
A Lady and Her Load
  Link to Article
  Source: Lame Cherry
  Mon, 19 Nov 2012 14:22
  My Aunt always said you needed your dreams, even if you could not afford them, you needed to dream.
  I love romance and one finds romantic souls in the American west for some reason that only were sissy poets in the east. One such figure was Billy Dixon, and orphan, who grew to be one of the most enduring characters in American legend.I have spoken of him in his philosophy that the best thing in life was a fire, sour dough bread, broiled steaks, a quart cup of coffee and an open sky.
  Mr. Dixon shot a 50 90 or the Big 50 as it was called and Adobe Walls pulled the best scratch shot in history in shooting an Indian off his horse at an incredible distance.
  George Custer hunted with a Remington Rolling Block in 50 75 and that pretty well settled me away from Sharpes for the Remington. It is not that either are better rifles, no more than a Winchester high or low wall is a better rifle, it is just for my dream, I want something that I want from nostalgia and it will be a Remington Rolling Block in 50 90.
  The 50 stands for caliber and the 90 for the black powder charge. They shoot anything from a 500 to a 700 grain bullet of lead, which is 9 parts lead and 1 part tin to make it harder for penetration.
  The old bullets are paper patched, one could use antelope hides, but I will suffice with paper patches in the grooves for accuracy as having played with deer hides, they are not fun in smell or other things, and in my dreams I do not want things stinky or slimy.
  I want to use the citrus based new powders too by Shockey as they are easier to clean up and will not corrode metals like the old black powder caustics. That is important to me for some reason and who knows in dreams what makes such things important.
  It must I believe have a German brass Volmer type telescopic lens as for no other reason than I want to shoot an animal from 400 yards and open sites are not effective in that mode. A double trigger too would be the choice as I will set the one and whisper on the other to have it go off in striking the firing pin.
  Wood will be walnut and the gun will be blued, as I do not like the new synthetics and matte finishes, even if they are better.
  I'm going to build a pair of shooting sticks too. They must be pretty I think in holding up my 16 pound rifle. Nothing fancy, but wood can be pretty in such things even if they are just holding a gun steady for a shot.
  I want some kind of tunic too. It must have fringe, and I prefer leather as my shirt, Wrangler blue jeans and some kind of hunting boots with wool socks and a boonie hat to make me comfortable.
  I was thinking about buffalo shooting as one does not hunt buffalo as they are rather stupid walking meat piles, but there is not allot of romance in shooting walking meat. If I did, I would want a young buffalo as I have eaten an old bull and it tasted like buffalo intestines or what is inside buffalo intestines and that is not something I'm interested in dining on.
  The only animal I can think would be worthy of a dream like this is an elk. I know a bear would suffice, but I want to commune with my animal afterwards and I do not want to eat a grizzly, as while black bear are pork like, I do not want to shoot a black bear with a Big 50 as it just does not seem romantic.
  So it must be an elk, but not the bull of the woods as I have eaten bulls of the woods and their meat is not gamey, but tastes of excrement, and having eaten good elk, I prefer a nice dry cow or a young bull, as each time I eat elk, I would be able to dream of that morning or afternoon with the sun or the snow, the heat or the cold, the mountain or park, and just smile in the company of my family in knowing how good I had it.
  My boots could sit not put away in the corner with socks tucked in them as I walked by, and my rifle could be standing the corner covered with some dust reminding me of how long it had been, my shirt could be hung there just waiting for me like was going some place again, and I could play with the spent cartridge still smelling of burned powder as it sat on my night table before I piled into bed for the night with the Tiger Lily.
  I could think of George Custer in firing his rifle last before he died in battle and be sad over Libby. I could think of Billy Dixon in losing his Big 50 in that Oklahoma river and wonder if it was still there.
  I would though thank God in my heart for all He had given me there in our home, and all the better than dreams and memories I had in the present.
  It would be a good thing, as I would plan some other hunt, but unless meat was needed would probably just pretend I was going to some high park or some low river bottom and actually shoot myself a buffalo born for that cause from God and wonder how that robe would feel on the bed and what the memories of it would be, as I drifted off to sleep.
  It is good to have dreams.
  It is good to have dreams even if you can not afford them.
  It is good to have dreams.................
  agtG
ANALGATE: The Tit Clouded Cover Up
  Link to Article
  Source: Lame Cherry
  Mon, 19 Nov 2012 14:18
  Now that ANALGATE has moved to BUTTRAEUS GATE and on to ABSCAM, this blog has a few more Lame Cherry matter anti matter exclusives.
  First, this blog is thankful for Janet Naps Napolitano in finally, since this has moved from the fag file of Obamaland, we are finally getting a criminal scandal due to lesbian Napolitano's great choice in undercover operatives.That Lebanese hussy, Jill Kelley is a prime example of how big tits produce a shadow cloud that blinds all lookers on to the Obama operative details.
  Look at Paula Broadwell, a graduate of Maddy Albright's communist school in Denver. One can see now that sweaters can not hide such massive amounts of breasts. Her nipples even are trying to explode thorugh the bra and the sweater. One can see her poised like that for Director Patraeus, and he just doing a "cum for ya" moment that ran into his socks. This North Dakota Germanatrix is what every naughty little soldier wants to dive into that fox hole.
  So we know Janet Napolitano employes big breasted women to entice men with lots of brass. That my children is a forensic profile of the people dispatching and involved....they like bitchy MILF's to get the wood on.....who have dark hair and big tits.
  That is important as now the person behind this in Naps will have jokes made at her expense as she moves up to control of all covert black operations at the Department of Agriculture in the next 4 years......yes one moves up from Homeland to Ag, because USDA is where all the real dangerous projects are funded through.
  Where was I in this matter anti matter exclusive?
  Oh yes this New York Post quote was fascinating about the CIA edits which Director General Patraeus testified to:
  The edits would have been made after the statements had left the CIA for review by the Defense and State departments, ultimately landing at the White House.
  That is most interesting in the chain of command, as CIA is under the direction of Naps Napolitano, the employer of large chested women for minding large brassed males.Follow this now in Leon Panetta and Hillary Clinton are being drawn into this. Panetta who was Monday Morning Arm complaining and Clinton who was taking all the blame.......You do recall that Hillary was spitting drool over this to a SEAL parent in going after the Christian movie producer right?It appears Dame Hamrod was clueless days later in what she was saying, and that was after State and DOD are now being blamed by the White House for the edit.
  Simply put in this, I would bet this CIA talking points memo, went to "minders" of the DOD and State, in the SITUATION ROOM, where Obama's 2012 campaign runs things.Panetta knew like the Pentagon this was terrorism as did the CIA. State was still being fed the 2012 talking points from Obama on this supposed to be a Christian bashing propaganda circus to suppress the vote.
  These talking points should have went through Napolitano and then to Obama in the situation room. The White House is now trying to state that for some odd reason the chain of command was broken and State which has no real intelligence apparatus, and DOD which does have DIA, but was not in the loop in this as this was CIA generated in the terror camps and the operation for the Obama regime, that this break is the one which protects Obama from editing all of this.
  That is why this took weeks to unwind as the situation room operatives working for Obama in this hostage taking operation were focusing on using this to bring down Mitt Romney, and DOD ran for cover, CIA went silent as everyone knew Obama was lying and the orders were coming from the White House.Hillary Clinton took the blame early to cover for Obama in that machinations the Clintons are always involved with, but the reality is the question in this, of why was the chain of command broken?
  Answer of course now is proof positive in this was a literal Obama 2012 campaign operation and his minders in the situation room were running this just like bin Laden's corpse being shot.
  Intelligence officials yesterday said the references to al Qaeda connections were dropped to protect sensitive intelligence sources and methods '-- not the president's bid for re-election.
  Translating that in Tavistock speak, one plants the line about Obama to get the public steered in this was Obama engineering this for his 2012 election theft. This blog has now been confirmed by the United States Intelligence community in ANALGATE was an Obama hostage taking gone wrong by his own terrorists.Yes sensitive intelligence sources in al Qaeda flags flying over Benghazi, Aghani tunic wearing terrorists and the head of al Qaeda residing at 1600 Penn Avenue. No one knew this was al Qaeda and the sources needed to be protected as the sources are the terrorists and Obama has been protecting this group since 2008.
  Enough of this as Paula poses. Perhaps next time she can do Vanity Fair like Val Plame before she is rewarded with a million dollar book deal.
  Obama has always had that deniablity factor from Axelrod smearing this GOP opponent in stealing closed court documents, Holder covering up Blagohevichgate, Gun Runner......you name it, from the Birth Abstract to now Obama knew nothing of CIA edits as it was DOD and State.....both to point fingers at each other and say they never did it as it was done to protect "intelligence sources".
  I can hardly wait until Paula is wearing a leather costume with a whip as she accidentally gets photographed again to keep everyone looking at the tits and not at criminal Obama.
  Yes filling her bowl with a facet gusher......no message there behind the bars.
  agtG 258
What I Really Think About Facebook blog maverick
  Link to Article
  Source: Dave Winer's linkblog feed
  Mon, 19 Nov 2012 14:12
  Lets talk Facebook
  First, I'm not recommending to any of my companies that we leave facebook. I am recommending that we de-emphasize pushing consumers or partners to like us on FB and focus on building up our followings across all existing social media platforms and to evaluate those that we feel can grow a material following. In the past we put FB first, twitter second. FB has been moved to the bottom of a longer list.
  At the core of the issues I have with FB is how FB thinks about itself .
  This is from their page on Newsfeed, Engagement and Promoted Posts : ''In this way, we can keep news feed an engaging service where people come to get the information that is most interesting to them.'' FB believes that their news feed is an engaging information source. They seem to really, really want to make sure that you get the information that is most engaging to you. I honestly didn't know this.
  This has to be a good thing, right ? What could possibly be wrong with wanting to improve engagement ? What could possibly be wrong with optimizing their news and information feeds ? IMHO, everything. Defining engagement by clicks, likes, shares, unlikes and reporting works for Google's search engine, I don't believe it works for a social network.
  People go to Google Search with every intention of leaving it. They want to ''engage, click and leave''. On the exact opposite side of the spectrum, people go to FB with the expectation that it is very likely they will stay on FB for an extended period of time. In fact we spend more than 26 minutes per day on FB. As this study said, FB is an alternative to boredom. FB is far more like TV than it is Google Search
  FB is what it is. Its a time waster. That's not to say we don't engage, we do. We click, share and comment because it's mindless and easy. But for some reason FB doesn't seem to want to accept that it's best purpose in life is as a huge time suck platform that we use to keep up with friends, interests and stuff. I think that they are over thinking what their network is all about .
  Being a time suck that people enjoy is a good thing. There is a comfort in turning on the TV and having it work without any thought required. It's easy. It is the best 5 hour on average per day alternative to boredom.
  There is a comfort in going on FB and seeing what pictures pop up from friends or from pages you have liked. FB is not something you have to rush through. All those pictures and posts are not going anywhere. FB is easy. In particular it's a great alternative to boredom when you are stuck somewhere and all you have is your phone. Actually it's a life saver. Head down on FB beats the hell out of that awkward feeling that you may have to at least acknowledge and possibly talk to the person next to you. Put another way, IMHO, FB really risks screwing up something that is special in our lives as a time waster by thinking they have to make it more engaging and efficient.
  Who really appreciates that some posts rise to the top of their newsfeed because some folks they used to work with and are still friends with shared a baby picture ? Not only do I not like it, I like even less the obligation I feel to like the picture so I don't seem like some grump.
  I dont want to know about where you are in Wizard of Oz (currently navigating Edgerank up my top stories feed). Our FB networks have grown so big and unfriending someone is so much more difficult than it should be, that we just don't do it. Hence, our news feed is not so pure . The math may be efficient but the result is not.
  So how does this relate to brands and sponsored post ? In a perfect FB world every post enters the friends/like/subscriber's timeline. If they log in and want to spend the time searching their timeline they see it, if not , not. FB users go on FB looking to kill time. Why not let them ?
  From a brands perspective not having to try to fall within the parameters of the algorithm (Edgerank) allows us to post fun things, tidbits, information, anything knowing that there is at least a chance those who have a connection with us can see it and knowing that we won't reduce our chances of the algorithm showing our post.
  We should know better than an algorithm what those who like us actually like. It may well be that it's a passive relationship. Maybe they just want to see the scores at the end of every quarter in a Mavs game ? Maybe they want to know what show is playing right now on AXS TV ? No one expects them to like, comment or share any of this. It's just an information source. And can i just say that its really weird when Mavs end of quarter scores show up out of order. Thats how smart the algorithm is.
  It's not like pages have carte blanche to assault people with posts. People know their own tolerance for what they consider to be spam better than any algorithm does. It is incumbent upon the brand not to abuse the relationship and cause the person to unlike us. Doesn't FB realize that is far easier for a user to opt-out of a feed by unliking a brand/person/page that has done a poor job of communication than it is to mess with all the account settings or for them to try to tweak their algorithm all the time to try to guess what people want ?
  Again, FB is over complicating a simple issue. A user can govern his/her newsfeed far better by hitting unlike than an algorithm like EdgeRank ever can.
  But this over-complication via algorithm and not knowing why people use their site (feel free to say right here that of course FB knows how people use their site better than I do. ) creates a financial problem for brands. By trying to be an incredibly efficient information delivery source, they confine our ability to organically reach most of our followers to using Sponsored Posts. THey also significantly increase our costs because if we create a post that doesn't engage our followers to the level the algorithm expects it to, it can impact our ability to be seen in the future. Talk about pressure. Put up a post , but be sure that Edgerank doesn't think it sucks.
  Then of course there is the money. As many have written before me, sponsored posts can get expensive. If you post many times a day, that can get incredibly expensive.
  So why would brands who cant afford the algorithmic presentation risk or the financial cost want to continue to drive their user interaction by investing in FB if there are alternatives ?
  FB's has a couple of other serious issues that impact their desire to be a source for ''information that is most interesting to them''. Because FB has become such a store of personal information, we have become very protective of our profiles. I don't know the percentage of individuals posts on FB that are available to the general public, but it can't be very high. We show our posts and see the posts only of our extended network. While that network may get you close to Kevin Bacon, it's not going to let you use FB as a primary information source .
  Why? Because you can't gain the value of all those posts outside of your network. They are closed off to you. Yes you can search on Bing which actually does a good job of integrating your own social network, but it still doesn't take you out to the rest of the social world and all the insights and information that it has to offer like Twitter , Tumblr and specialized sites do. Some of the best sources of current information are searches on Twitter, Tumblr and Instagram (the irony), and of course relevant websites.
  If you want to see what every one is saying about the election, you have to go outside of FB. So by default you are not going to use your newsfeed as a primary source of information. It's more like the township newspaper . You get the basic local stuff and updates , but it can't be a comprehensive source.
  The same applies to the real time social universe. There could be 120 people talking about a topic that they have not yet liked or for which there has not been a topic yet created and you would have no way to know the conversation was going on or how to reach the people if you did. This is exactly why Twitter has trending topics that are becoming more and more granular by the day.
  So back to sponsored posts and algorithms. I'm not against sponsored posts per se. I'm against sponsored posts being the primary, if not the only way to reach most of the people my companies have built a connection with on FB.
  Take away EdgeRank so we all have a fair chance to reach those who like us with Sponsored Posts being a way to improve our odds, great. I'm all for it. That is like any other medium.
  I also think that FB is making a big mistake by trying to play games with their original mission of connecting the world. FB is a fascinating destination that is an amazing alternative to boredom which excels in its SIMPLICITY. One of the threats in any business is that you outsmart yourself. FB has to be careful of just that.
Meeting with the President of Haiti, Michel MARTELLY
  Link to Article
  Source: Uploads by HermanVanRompuy
  Mon, 19 Nov 2012 14:11
Trippy World's Fair Structures Are Relics of Forgotten Utopias | Raw File
  Link to Article
  Source: Dave Winer's linkblog feed
  Mon, 19 Nov 2012 14:10
  Montreal 1967 World's Fair, "Man and His World," Buckminster Fuller's Geodesic Dome With Solar Experimental House, 2012
  Instead of cruising news feeds on your smartphone to learn about the latest technology, what if you had to wait years for the fair to come to town? For almost 150 years, that's exactly how innovation came to much of the global public via the World's Fair.
  From purpose-built pavilions that stretch architectural norms, the human race experienced the wonderment of X-rays, Belgian waffles, alternating current, clothing zippers and ice cream for the first time. Today, the biggest news to come out of the World's Fair is that it still exists.
  ''When the first World's Fair opened in London, countries competed to outdo one another with their pavilion buildings. They really were over-the-top events,'' says Jade Doskow, a New York photographer, who has spent six years travelling the globe to dozens of former World's Fair sites. There have been nearly 100 fairs since that first one in 1851.
  You know more World's Fair structures than you think: Seattle's Space Needle, the Eiffel Tower, Treasure Island in the middle of San Francisco Bay, Mies Van Der Rohe's German Pavilion in Berlin (albeit reconstructed) and that big globe in Queens, New York from Notorious B.I.G.'s Mo Money Mo Problems music video.
  'What is a World's Fair? The world as neighbors. We talk a bit together. We come to compare ideals. An apparent confrontation of products, in reality a confrontation of utopias.'
  '-- Victor Hugo, ''Paris'', Introduction to Catalogue for the 1867 Exposition Universelle
  Usually built for temporary use, World's Fairs' buildings tend to be torn down after the event. In cases where structures have survived, Doskow has routinely photographed sites that do not tally with their former grandeur and optimism; they stand as relics to utopian visions of the past.
  ''I love the tension of these very bizarre structures existing in today's unforeseen environment. Not all of these sites were meant to be permanent. It's a fall from grace,'' says Doskow. ''Countries spend millions of dollars on these temporary, spectacular events but then do not have much of a plan as far as how to deal with the aftermath of the site.''
  The most recent World's Fair in Shanghai, China attracted 73 million visitors. But whereas the Far East has embraced them, the United States' relationship with the Bureau of International Expositions (BIE) '' the Paris-based World's Fair planning organization '' has cooled significantly in recent decades.
  Dr. Robert Rydell, head of the Humanities Institute at Montana State University and World's Fair expert, says the American public lost interest in World's Fairs in the 1990s after some disappointing World's Fairs in the 1980s. As host to the 1982 World's Fair, Knoxville, Tennessee, was unfairly derided as a scruffy little town unfit to host a global event. The 1984 World's Fair in New Orleans '' the last exposition in the United States '' went bankrupt during the actual event.
  BIE membership dues, at $25,000 a year, are a small price to pay for all of the economic benefits the fairs bring, insists Rydell. And yet, in 2001, then Secretary of State Colin Powell withdrew the United States from BIE membership after U.S. Congress denied funding. While the U.S. can still take part in World's Fairs on foreign shores, it is ineligible to host future events.
  As for Doskow, her imagination was captured in 2006 while she was traveling in Spain and came upon the World's Fair site of Expo 1992 in Seville. She noticed the historic architecture of Seville didn't jive with the neglected site.
  ''There were glaringly white, cruddy pavilion buildings, rows of empty flagpoles that clanged eerily in the wind, and a filthy fountain with beer cans and algae growing on the surface of the water,'' says Doskow.
  As is the case with the villages, services and arenas built for the Olympic Games, the economic advantages, legacies and aftermath of World's Fairs' sites are subject to constant debate. Paradoxically, these international festivals have been undone by the very innovation and globalization that they advocated.
  ''World's Fairs have lost their relevance for the simple reason that we are now a global, high-tech economy,'' says Doskow. ''Anyone can glance at their smartphone to learn about new technological or cultural achievements.''
  Today, World's Fairs must go beyond the kitsch postcards, 20th-century propaganda and historical colonial pride of past gatherings. The site of the 1897 World's Fair in Brussels (twice photographed by Doskow) was originally developed under King Leopold in 1880 and includes several sculptures celebrating Belgium's 19th-century colonization of the Congo. At the 1931 World's Fair in Paris '' which lauded colonialism across the new world '' the U.S. was represented as a colony success story.
  ''There were definite ethnocentric and racist elements to past World's Fairs,'' says Doskow. ''The 'exotic' cultures that would have been on display at the 19th-century expositions aren't necessary or politically correct now. Entire villages from Africa and Asia, or Native Americans, would be put on display for the entertainment of white Europeans or Americans.''
  With the exception of the 1923 World's Fair in Rio de Janeiro, all fairs up to 1993 were staged in Europe, North America, Australia or Japan. Since then South Korea and China have got in on the act '' a fact Doskow believes is significant in itself.
  ''Every site and structure is a direct reflection of a specific era's worldview and historical framework,'' says Doskow. ''Larger stories about preservation, long-term planning for urban sites and cultural competition become apparent based on which countries continue to host World's Fairs and make them a priority.''
  If the status quo in the U.S. remains, crumbling structures such as Philip Johnson's New York State Pavilion (1964) in Flushing Meadows, New York, will be the permanent memorials to the country's hither-gone world's fair enthusiasm and reminders of its current apathy.
  ''It's as if an alien spacecraft ran out of fuel in Queens and ended up outstaying its welcome,'' says Doskow of Johnson's mothballed pavilion. ''Now ivy is growing over it and there's been haphazard attempts at sprucing up the ketchup-red and mustard-yellow paint.''
Don't Tell Mediafed That RSS Is Dead
  Link to Article
  Source: Dave Winer's linkblog feed
  Mon, 19 Nov 2012 14:07
  It's not clear what Google's plans are for FeedBurner, its feed management and syndication platform. By the looks of it, FeedBurner has become a neglected platform, and I wouldn't be terribly surprised if it would get the axe in one of the company's next rounds of ''spring cleaning.'' Not too long ago, Google decided to discontinue its AdSense for Feeds service, which was really the only way the company was monetizing the services.
  Even though Google doesn't quite seem to know what to make out of its RSS service and apparently didn't think it was worth trying to monetize it anymore, there are still quite a few businesses that are thriving in this space. Earlier this month, I talked to Mediafed CEO Ashley Harrison, who told me that his company's services reached about 170 million people across the globe in October. Over 72 million of these were mobile visitors (up from 54 million in September).
  Mediafed Powered 3 Billion Article Views For 2,000 Publishers In OctoberJust in the last six weeks, Mediafed added 45 million new users as it expanded its partnerships with publishers across the globe. In total, Harrison told me, the company monetized over 200 million stories in the last quarter and powered over 3 billion article views in October.
  The company, which also recently acquired the mobile news-reading app Taptu, has offices in Australia, Korea, Brazil, Russia and China. In total, Mediafed is now working with publishers in 55 countries across, Asia, Latin America and Europe.
  Unlike Google, Harrison told me, London-based Mediafed is mostly going after premium publishers and premium advertisers. Among the company's clients are the likes of the New York Times, Le Monde, The Guardian and Sueddeutsche. For advertisers, Harrison argued, an RSS subscription is a very powerful signal that somebody is interested in a given topic. While Google went with its traditional pay-per-click model for AdSense for Feeds, Mediafed is using a CPM model that is more typical for premium online advertising campaigns.
  The publishers in its network get a set of tools that are quite similar to what FeedBurner currently offers, but sadly, Mediafed isn't planning to open its services to anybody yet. The company is, however, seeing a lot of interest from publishers who are looking for an alternative to FeedBurner and AdSense for Feeds. As Harrison told me, the company is also looking at how it could serve smaller publishers if Google decides to close FeedBurner at some point in the future. That, however, would mean having to deal with very different scaling issues on the Mediafed backend and, for the time being, the company is focused on helping its publishers get the most out of its services.
  In a way, of course, Mediafed's focus on all things premium makes things a bit easier for the company to turn a profit. FeedBurner, after all, is open for everybody, and many publishers that use the service don't actually use the monetization service. The infrastructure is surely also pretty costly to run, and while the old Google didn't care much about burning some cycles for an unprofitable but popular service, the new Google is becoming notorious for closing services that aren't performing well.
  Despite the fact that RSS as a consumer technology '' as in users subscribing to feeds and reading them in NetNewsWire, FeedDemon, Google Reader and similar readers '' never quite caught on, it still forms the underpinning of popular apps like Flipboard, Pulse and many other services. As these become more popular, the role of RSS as the plumbing to bring content to their users will only increase, even as consumers' awareness of it continues to slip. Maybe Google will also realize this and try to bring FeedBurner back from the dead, but for the time being, competitors like Mediafed are waiting in the wings to replace Google's service with their own.
  The founders of Mediafed realised the potential of RSS feeds some years ago when they were the preserve of a handful of technically minded people using them to receive updates on forums and niche news on applications and platforms they worked with.
  '†' Learn more
The shock of the (male) nude
  Link to Article
  Source: BBC News - Home
  Mon, 19 Nov 2012 06:52
  18 November 2012Last updated at19:45 ETBy Bethany BellBBC News, ViennaAn exhibition in Vienna probes our attitude towards nudity - people in the West have become accustomed to the naked female form, but male nudes can still shock. Before the show opened, the museum even covered up parts of its own posters, saying they had caused public outrage.
  Five naked male statues on a pedestal confront you as you enter the new exhibition at the Leopold Museum.
  The earliest is Ancient Egyptian, and the most recent a figure based on a shopping mannequin.
  Tobias Natter, the director of the Leopold Museum, says the opening display is a "walk through 500 years of history".
  "You have an old Egyptian nude, which is very unusual for Egyptian art, you have Roman art, you have Rodin from the 19th and 20th Century, to a postmodern statue. It tells the visitor the male nude in art has a very long tradition," he says.
  The exhibition features a diverse range of styles, from paintings by Peter Paul Rubens, Paul Cezanne, Edvard Munch and the expressionist artist Egon Schiele, to more modern and sexually explicit works by the US photographer Robert Mapplethorpe and the London-based artists Gilbert and George.
  There are images of erect penises, and of anuses.
  Natter says the museum is breaking new ground.
  Continue reading the main story''Start QuoteWe are not used to seeing a penis - I think that is the main problem for people''
  End QuoteErich Kocina"It's quite unusual for an exhibition to focus on the depiction of the male nude. Surprisingly we had many exhibitions dealing with the female nude body, but so far never an exhibition which features the male nude. Somehow it is a taboo.
  "On the other hand, we see that the male nude is getting a new presence in modern contemporary society. He is now on posters, he is on stages, he is getting more and more normal."
  An image of naked woman is still regarded in a very different light from that of a naked man, Natter says.
  "We saw with the advertising for our exhibition, there is still a difference between a female nude body on the poster or a male nude body. This makes a cultural difference that is still on-going and needs to be discussed with an exhibition."
  One of the posters advertising the exhibit featured a full-frontal photograph of three naked footballers, by the French artists Pierre et Gilles. Shortly before the opening last month, the Leopold Museum said that it had received so many complaints that it had been forced to take action.
  It put a red band covering the intimate parts of the footballers, on some - but not all - of the posters.
  Continue reading the main story''Start QuoteThey are very well-built, they are sportsmen - it's nice to see''
  End QuoteA passerby comments on the postersBut Vienna is full of posters of naked or semi-naked women and is also known for its relaxed approach to nudity at mixed saunas and sunbathing areas. So did the pictures really cause outrage?
  Erich Kocina, from Die Presse newspaper, says the museum expected to provoke controversy with the posters - but it went beyond that, causing serious offence to some Viennese.
  "It's a mixture - 30% was marketing and 70% was genuine outrage," he says.
  "I think we are just used to seeing naked women because they are used as objects of desire in advertisements and TV. Naked men are not that common - we are not used to seeing a penis. I think that is the main problem for people."
  Art historian Eva Kernbauer, from the University of Applied Arts in Vienna, says male nudes have been around for a long time, but the way nude men and women have been depicted has always differed.
  Continue reading the main storyArt exposedWestern art tends to focus on the naked female form, and expresses sensuality and desireIf we spare a thought for the male nude, says classicist Edith Hall, he tends to symbolise courage and endurance"To put it very simply, male nudity was closely linked to strength, invulnerability and heroism, the female nude to beauty and erotics," she says.
  "Also, the 'Venus pudica' [the shameful Venus] was already developed in ancient Greece, so the depictions of female chastity and female nudity are historically deeply interlinked. The female nude is not threatening at all - female nudity is vulnerable, because it acknowledges the gaze of the beholder."
  This classical model is still powerful today, she says. Female nudity is not only omnipresent, it is also unthreatening. Male nudity is more challenging.
  "Male nudity is very often linked to the exposure of sexual organs - the penis - and this is often done in a way that responds to the classical model of aggression and strength.
  "While the sexual organ in itself does not necessarily have to appear as threatening or aggressive, the difference from the dominant model of soft female nudity is great."
  Despite a long search throughout Vienna, I can't find anybody deeply outraged by the naked posters.
  One man tells me guardedly that he is not "highly appreciative" of the image.
  "It's provocative, it's true," says a woman named Eva. "On the other hand it is looking back to the old days when nakedness was quite common [in art], so I think we should get used to it."
  And others, such as Cecile, a tourist visiting from France, like the nudes.
  "They are very well-built, they are sportsmen, it's not like ugly old men with a big belly, so they are pretty. It's nice to see."
Free Textbooks Spell Disruption for College Publishers
  Link to Article
  Source: New on MIT Technology Review
  Mon, 19 Nov 2012 06:50
  Startup companies offering knockoff textbooks are attracting students, and lawsuits.
  Ask Ariel Diaz why he's taking on the college textbook industry and he'll tell you, "Quaternions."
  Quaternions are a number system used for calculating three-dimensional motion, popular in computer graphics. And Diaz needed a crash course to help him with a consulting gig after his online video platform startup, Youcastr, had failed. He started with Wikipedia and found it was surprisingly good at explaining this complicated mathematics.
  Diaz, who still resents how much he'd paid for textbooks in college and graduate school, realized he'd hit on his next business idea. In 2011, he started Boundless Learning, a Boston company that has begun giving away free electronic textbooks covering college subjects like American history, anatomy and physiology, economics, and psychology.
  What's controversial is how Boundless creates these texts. The company trawls for public material on sites like Wikipedia and then crafts it into online books whose chapters track closely to those of top-selling college titles. In April, Boundless was sued by several large publishers who accused the startup of engaging in "the business model of theft."
  Theft or not, the college textbook industry is ripe for a disruptive shock from the Internet. Publishers today operate using what Mark Perry, a professor at the University of Michigan, calls a "cartel-style" model: students are required to buy specific texts at high prices. Perry has calculated that prices for textbooks have been rising at three times the rate of inflation since the 1980s.
  On average, college students spend around $1,200 each year on books and supplies. Those costs, which sometimes exceed the tuition at a community college, are prompting a wider rebellion against commercial publishers. In February, California legislators passed a law directing the state to produce free versions of texts used in the state's 50 most popular college courses. In October, Secretary of Education Arne Duncan said printed textbooks, a $6 billion industry in the United States (when sales of both used and new books are tallied), should be made "obsolete."
  Unlike publishers, who market their books to professors, Diaz's company is aiming directly at students. Starting in the summer of 2011, Boundless sent marketers to hand out flyers on four campuses, including Boston University and Florida State University. Diaz says that within weeks the company had students signing up from 1,000 campuses, although he declines to say how many students have downloaded Boundless textbooks.
  In their lawsuit, filed in March, publishers Cengage Learning, Pearson Education, and MacMillan Higher Education accused Boundless of copyright infringement, false advertising, and unfair competition. Diaz denies all the charges. He says his company uses only public information and doesn't actually make or sell textbooks. "We don't look at ourselves as an e-book or an online textbook or even textbook 2.0," he says. "We see it as how do you create the next-generation content platform, which is much more than a textbook."
  For now, however, replacing textbooks like N. Gregory Mankiw's Principles of Economics (which retails for $294 new) or Campbell and Reece's Biology ($208) does appear to be Boundless's primary activity. When students type in the name of either text on Boundless's website, they are greeted by a flashing message that says, "Aligning your book." Soon, a table of contents pops up on the screen.
  In the case of Mankiw's Principles, Boundless offers a stripped-down text covering the same core economic concepts. Mankiw is a snappy writer who starts off his chapter on taxes with an anecdote about Al Capone. Boundless's version reads more like a reference text, but its organization closely apes that of Mankiw's. Both have 36 chapters and even share the same first sentence: "The word economy comes from the Greek word oikonomos, which means one who manages a household."
  Boundless's replacement books are appealing to students like Heather Haygood, in her third year at Pikes Peak Community College in Colorado Springs, Colorado. She is using the Boundless version of Biology, which her school sells for $178. "I just refuse to spend that much on a book," Haygood said in an e-mail interview. "It's a known fact that college kids are generally poor/broke so why are you charging us so much for books??? ... lucky me i found it for free!!" She calls the Boundless edition a "pretty dead-on" copy.
  Aaron White, Boundless's cofounder and CTO, says the company uses a mix of human editors and technology to create its texts. It employs editors to locate public content on Wikipedia, government websites, and Connextions, a repository of open-source academic material. That information goes into a content management system, which lets the company reuse explanations'--say, of how DNA replicates'--in multiple texts.
  Commercial publishers are moving as fast as they can toward digital formats. Most now sell lower-cost electronic books through sites such as CourseMate, Kno, and Apple's iTunes. "We are in the heart of disruption now," says Bethlam Forsa, a vice president at Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, the largest K''12 textbook publisher in the United States.
  Publishers of paper textbooks still enjoy some advantages. In K''12 education, states can't demand that poor students buy a computer or tablet, so they continue to distribute paper books. At the collegiate level, professors are reluctant to switch texts because they would have to revamp their courses.
  Such barriers help explain why the open-source textbook movement, which has been around for a decade, has never gotten very far. "The marketing realities of distribution have a lot to do with why there hasn't been disruption," says Sanford Forte, founder and director of the 11-year-old California Open Source Textbook Project. "The resources and skills to do that don't lie within the academic sector."
  Now some companies think they can make money with free books. Diaz says Boundless's strategy is to use free books to amass a large audience to which it can later sell other "freemium" services, such as tutoring. Diaz is vague about the paid products, which might not be introduced for another year or two.
  Though no one has said publicly how Boundless might make money, the company was able to raise $8 million in venture capital in February. Mike Tyrrell, a partner at Venrock, which led the investment, says he was attracted by the idea that education in the United States is a $750 billion business still operating much as it did in the 1960s.
  "The combination of what's available with online content, online tools, and the variety of devices being applied against an industry that hasn't really changed and clearly hasn't been disrupted'--that makes for an interesting area to invest in," Tyrrell says.
  Apparently, you don't need quaternions to do that math.
Kids create hybrid that gets 65+ MPG
  Link to Article
  Source: Stuff Ain't Right » Uncategorized
  Mon, 19 Nov 2012 06:48
  ~So big, government bailed out corporations that have been building cars for decades can't build a car that gets more than 40 or so mile per gallon but a bunch of ''kids'' working on a $25k budget can build one that gets 65+ MPG??? Ri-i-i-i-i-ight'...'...'...'....cw~
  Kids create hybrid that gets 65+ MPG.
  Like this:Be the first to like this.
Howard Smith's Interviews From the '60s to Be Released
  Link to Article
  Source: Untitled Feed
  Mon, 19 Nov 2012 06:46
  The Smith Tapes
  Howard Smith, right, interviewing John Lennon and Yoko Ono in 1969. More than 100 of his interviews, many lasting hours, are being released.
  John and Yoko are there, talking for hours and hours '-- during a bed-in, at a ''happening,'' listening to the Beatles at home.
  Dennis Hopper and Peter Fonda, just back from Cannes in June 1969, rap about their new movie, ''Easy Rider.''
  Eric Clapton, between shows at the Fillmore East in 1970, struggles with a sense of responsibility for his new band, Derek and the Dominos.
  Those are among more than 100 interviews with rock stars, artists and assorted radicals recorded from 1969 to 1972 by Howard Smith, a longtime writer for The Village Voice. They have now been cataloged and packaged for the digital era as ''The Smith Tapes'' and will be released in monthly batches over the next year. The first, with John Lennon and Yoko Ono, Lou Reed, Frank Zappa, Mr. Clapton and others, comes out Tuesday through Amazon's MP3 store and next week on iTunes.
  At a time when rock 'n' roll, the sexual revolution and the antiwar counterculture all intersected, Mr. Smith spoke to seemingly every boldface name for ''Scenes,'' his influential column in The Voice. He also had a knack for being in precisely the right place at the right time. In one of his most famous columns, from the summer of 1969, he described being trapped with the police inside the Stonewall Inn as the famous riot raged outside.
  ''The Smith Tapes,'' drawn primarily from interviews for his Voice column and a radio program he had at the time on WABC-FM (which became WPLJ), feature many of these people at pivotal moments in pop culture and in their own lives, speaking candidly and often at unusual length. One of the five Lennon-Ono interviews in the collection lasts two hours.
  ''This is not someone talking about the time; this is the time,'' said Ezra Bookstein, a documentarian who delayed his film projects for a year to prepare the interviews for release. If some subjects are familiar stars who by now have been interviewed ad nauseam, their appearances on ''The Smith Tapes'' often capture them before their current iconography had been set.
  Mr. Reed, interviewed in March 1969, makes an unpersuasive case for his newfound sobriety. (''I think anybody that distracts themselves from reality is cheating themselves from what really exists,'' he says. Mr. Smith sounds skeptical, noting that Mr. Reed's band, the Velvet Underground, was known as a ''big bad dope group.'')
  Although little known now to younger New Yorkers, Mr. Smith was a prominent name at The Voice during what is often considered the paper's golden age. His column ran from the late 1960s into the '80s and was structured as free-form vignettes chronicling pop culture and groovy urban life. He even won an Oscar, for ''Marjoe,'' his 1972 documentary about the young evangelist Marjoe Gortner.
  Mr. Smith, now 76 and by his own description laid low by cancer, said he kept the tapes at his downtown loft with a vague notion of someday using them for his memoirs. Over the years, though, they became buried under piles of detritus.
  ''I thought it would be a good memory jogger,'' Mr. Smith said. ''Things were happening every day that were just incredible.''
  The tapes were uncovered in 2000 when one of his sons, the architect Cass Calder Smith, helped his father move to a new apartment. Cass Smith spent several years sorting and digitizing the tapes and sold a few before he met Mr. Bookstein, and they decided to collaborate on the project.
  ''This stuff was of no value to anybody boxed up and hidden,'' Cass Smith said. ''I want to get the story out there, and also for Howard, to get his story out there.''
  Mr. Bookstein, 40, said he was struck by the quality and intimacy of the conversations, and instead of making a film decided to prepare them for full release.
  ''This is before P.R. became a machine,'' Mr. Bookstein said in a cramped editing room in his Midtown Manhattan office, where he has sorted through hundreds of hours of the tapes. ''They were just people hanging out. They didn't know what kind of icons they'd be.''
  There was a P.R. machine, of course, but Mr. Smith said that he did his best to banish it from his interview process. ''I made sure they understood that I wasn't a D.J. and that I was a journalist who was going to ask them real questions,'' he said. ''Most of them liked that.''
  Each collection, with about half a dozen interviews, will sell on iTunes and Amazon for $13. Mr. Bookstein is also raising money on Kickstarter for a CD boxed set of some of the collection's highlights, with deluxe packaging by Masaki Koike, a Grammy Award-winning designer.
  Mr. Smith said that listening to the interviews today he was surprised by the flow of the conversations.
  ''They gain a certain other kind of value over time,'' he said. ''They were heard differently then than they will be heard now.''
Paedophile Rings ... And 10 Downing Street - FULL ARTICLE
  Link to Article
  Mon, 19 Nov 2012 06:26
  Copyright David Icke, 2012. All Rights Reserved.
  The David Icke Newsletter, November 18th, 2012
  PAEDOPHILE RINGS ...
  ... AND 10 DOWNING STREET
  Hello all ...
  Even those readers from around the world may have noticed that Britain has been rocked by the paedophile revelations regarding Jimmy Savile, the former disc jockey and procurer of children for the rich and famous - and what has followed in relation to Lord McAlpine, the former treasurer of the Conservative or 'Tory' Party at the time of Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher.
  There is information coming from all directions and it can be very confusing for those who have not followed this unfolding story stage by stage. I have been on this case since the 1990s and I'll put the pieces together to make sense of it.
  This is not just a story about Britain, either, because the same networks of paedophilia and Satanism covertly manipulate the political system all over the world and most certainly in places like North America. The Bush family are up to their necks in it.
  What even many more open-minded people can't grasp is the almost unimaginable scale of child abuse, murder and human sacrifice worldwide and how it is the very cement that holds the global Establishment together, locally, nationally and internationally.
  The bigger picture requires the question: why paedophilia? I can answer that very simply, but it needs a really open mind to accept it and they are not the majority, of course. These people are possessed by sheer evil and thus express sheer evil.
  This is why paedophilia is so fundamentally connected to Satanism - or one reason why. Satanic ritual ensures the total possession of the 'vehicle' and paedophilia expresses that possession to allow the possessing entity to feed off the child's life-force during sexual abuse, as I have explained at length in my books and highlighted at Wembley.
  I have found the same networks of paedophiles, Satanists and secret society initiates in every country I have investigated and I have been to a few to say the least. The networks (in the end a single network) operate globally and right down into local communities.
  At all these levels you invariably find that members of the paedophile/Satanist/secret society network occupy key positions in politics, government administration, law enforcement, the judiciary and so on. I am not saying all those positions are spoken for in this way, of course, because there are many genuine, decent people in all of them.
  But the networks in the global web cover their own backs by ensuring that any claims about their activities - and not just paedophilia either - are 'investigated', dismissed and covered up by members of the network in the police and other levels of 'law' enforcement. If a case goes to court or some sort of 'public inquiry', they seek to have their own 'safe' people appointed from the judiciary to keep the lid on everything.
  Members of the network, or ring, in all these positions and others, watch each other's backs and they only get convicted if the barriers and influence of the network are breached by genuine people inside the political and legal system.
  With that background, we come to the present Establishment paedophile scandal in the UK which began with the revelations on British television about 'entertainer', Jimmy Savile, or So-vile' as he has become known.
  The ITV television programme exposing his sexual molestation and rape of underage girls triggered a massive response from other people all over the country who contacted the police to tell their stories about what Savile did to them. Police say they are following hundreds of leads and Savile's paedophilia was clearly of historic proportions over decades.
  The paedophile-infested Establishment and its servile media sought to hold the line at Savile's own abuse of young girls with a few other people in the entertainment industry thrown in, most notably two convicted paedophiles and friends of Savile, former 'pop stars', Gary Glitter and Jonathan King.
  But I have known about Savile since the 1990s when a royal insider and others told me about his paedophilia and necrophilia (sex with dead bodies); his liking for sex with little boys; his extremely close relationship with the royal family; and how he procured children for the rich and famous, including the royals and top politicians. In other words, the scandal is far bigger than the public is being told - absolutely fantastic, in fact, in its scale and depth.
  I knew that Savile supplied former Conservative Prime Minister Edward Heath with young boys - I have been exposing Heath since 1998 (seven years before he died) as a paedophile, Satanist and mass child killer for most of his adult life. See The Biggest Secret and other books of mine.
  Gradually, as the Savile story expanded, some of this found its way into the mainstream media, including the confirmation by a BBC contemporary of Savile, Paul Gambaccini, that Savile was a necrophiliac. This is why, as I was told in the 1990s, that Savile volunteered to work in hospitals - it gave him access to the mortuaries.
  See my newsletter, Jimmy Savile ... Doorway to the Cesspit for far more detail about the Savile story. I am reprising a little of that background again here because of its connection to what followed with claims about the abuse of children in 'care' homes in North Wales and the political figures alleged to be implicated.
  Savile was extremely close to the British royal family to whom he was introduced by the late Lord Louis Mountbatten, a paedophile himself, and he went on to have a close relationship with Prince Philip and Prince Charles - so much so that he acted as a 'go-between' during Charles' bust-ups with Princess Diana.
  It would be inexplicable that this very strange aging disc jockey would be so unbelievably close to the royal family - right in the inner sanctum - unless you knew what he really did for a living and that was procure children. The same is true of his equally close relationship with Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher with whom he claims to have spent many Christmas dinners during her years in office.
  It just so happens that the Thatcher government and Conservative Party in the 1980s was alive with paedophilia as will be the present Conservative administration because they always are. The same applies to the Labour and Liberal Democrat parties and their like around the world, including, no, especially, the Republicans and Democrats in the United States.
  The latest sequence began with the Savile revelations still in full flow when a Labour Member of Parliament and deputy chairman of the opposition Labour Party, Tom Watson, asked Prime Minister David Cameron in the Houses of Parliament about a paedophile ring operating out of Number 10 Downing Street during the reign of a previous - unnamed - prime minister.
  Watson and Cameron.
  His question was connected to Peter Righton, a member of the vile Paedophile Information Exchange (PIE), who was convicted in 1992 of importing and possessing illegal homosexual pornographic material. Righton was a former consultant to the National Children's Bureau and Director of Education at the prestigious National Institute of Social Work in London. Tom Watson said in Parliament:
  The evidence file used to convict paedophile Peter Righton, if it still exists, contains clear intelligence of a widespread paedophile ring. One of its members boasts of its links to a senior aide of a former Prime Minister who says he could smuggle indecent images of children from abroad.
  The leads were not followed up but if the file still exists, I want to ensure that the Metropolitan Police secure the evidence, re-examine it, and investigate clear intelligence suggesting a powerful paedophile network linked to Parliament and Number 10.
  Peter Righton - a 'leading child care expert' and paedophile.
  Tom Watson said later that 'a retired public servant had, through a quirk of fate, stumbled on something that appeared so huge, that almost everyone he'd ever raised his concerns with had baulked at the challenge' and that 'some of those powerful people involved in a cover up may well have been - and could still be - powerful politicians.' Watson continued in a posting on his website:
  Since then though, many more ordinary people have contacted me about suspicions they have had of a wider wrongdoing - in some cases so heinous it made me cry.
  They have talked of psychopaths marking children with Stanley knifes to show 'ownership'. They tell of parties where children were 'passed around' the men. They speak of golf course car parks being the scenes for child abuse after an 18 hole round.
  And they have named powerful people - some of them household names - who abused children with impunity.
  Two former police officers have raised their concerns of cover-ups. Child protection specialists have raised their fears that the network of convicted paedophile Peter Righton, the nexus of the group, was wider than at first thought. Others have identified a former cabinet minister who regularly abused young boys.
  Some have raised mysterious early deaths, disappeared children, suspicious fires, intimidation and threats.
  It's bewildering.
  It certainly can be, but I have been researching this subject for nearly two decades and what Watson says all makes perfect sense to me.
  Watson's public statement was then followed by very weird behaviour by the BBC over an interview for the current affairs programme, Newsnight, with Steve Messham who was one a stream of children abused at 'care' homes in North Wales in the 1970s and 1980s.
  Children's homes and 'care' homes are the main source of children for the rings and child procurer Jimmy Savile has been connected to the North Wales abuse scandal, as he has to others like the one at the Haut de la Garenne on the Channel Island of Jersey. It is a national and international ring and so homes are involved all over the country - as abuse victims have indeed confirmed.
  A member of the production group behind Steve Messham's Newsnight interview - not directly employed by the BBC - began to circulate on the Internet that Newsnight was likely to name a senior political figure that evening as a child abuser.
  Iain Overton, editor of the self-styled 'independent, not-for-profit' Bureau of Investigative Journalism which led the Newsnight 'investigation', said: 'If all goes well we've got a Newsnight out tonight about a very senior political figure who is a paedophile'. See the news story after this article for fascinating connections to Overton's employers.
  Overton's actions began a frenzy of activity on the Internet speculating on who it could be, but when the programme aired that night the interview with Steve Messham did not include the name of the person that he was talking about and was only an account of his deeply disturbing experiences with this person.
  Naturally the speculation became even more frenetic and in the days that followed the name of very close Thatcher aide and former party treasurer Lord McAlpine was widely mentioned on the Internet by multiple sources. McAlpine, now living in Italy, eventually made a public statement denying that he abused anyone and threatening legal action against those who named him.
  McAlpine, a man of considerable wealth from the family of the McAlpine construction and civil engineering company, was very specific in his statement as he sought to counter the unbroadcast claims by Steve Messham that he was the abuser.
  He said that he had only once been to the location of much of Messham's abuse, the main North Wales town of Wrexham. He said that this single visit was to the local Constituency Conservative Association on party business and he had been at all times accompanied by the now dead Stuart Newman, an agent from Conservative Central Office. He said he did not stay the night.
  McAlpine said that he had never visited a children's home in North Wales, 'nor have I ever visited any children's home, reform school or any other institution of a similar nature.' He added that he had never stayed in a hotel in or near Wrexham, did not own a Rolls Royce, has never had a 'Gold card' or 'Harrods card' and never wore aftershave - all of which had been alleged of Messham's attacker or attackers.
  'If he does think I am the man who abused him all those years ago I can only suggest that he is mistaken and that he has identified the wrong person', McAlpine said.
  McAlpine then threatened legal action in his statement of denial - 'I conclude by reminding those who have defamed me or who intend to do so that in making this statement I am by no means giving up my right to seek redress at law and repeat that I expressly reserve my rights to take all such steps as I and my solicitors consider necessary to protect my interests.'
  What I find strange is that he is talking about legal action now, at the age of 70 in semi-retirement in Italy, when he did not take legal action 'in his prime' in the 1990s when he was very prominently named in relation to abuse at North Wales children's homes by the now defunct Scallywag magazine.
  McAlpine told the BBC this week that it had been an 'horrendous shock' to hear the allegations, so why wasn't the Conservative Party treasurer in the Thatcher era equally 'horrendously shocked', and why didn't he therefore sue, when similar allegations involving North Wales children's homes were published by Scallywag magazine in the 1990s and he was the subject of a banner headline to that effect - and more?
  I don't understand. The Scallywag article could not have been more explicit. And why does he say that it was an 'horrendous shock' to hear these allegations when similar ones have been published before and he did NOTHING?
  McAlpine was an extremely rich man and in the 1990s he was an even more prominent public figure. He could have put Scallywag out of business if he had showed in court that its allegations were not true and this would have nailed the allegations for good and stopped them circulating on the Internet ever since (without a single challenge from 'me Lord'). The same with Margaret Thatcher aide and speechwriter, Derek 'me' Laud, who appeared in the Scallywag article.
  McAlpine says he is seeking damages from all and bloody sundry now and yet did nothing when the same allegations were made by Scallywag all those years ago. So please, Lord McAlpine, credibly explain why you didn't.
  Here is the Scallywag article ... it is worth reading that article before we proceed.
  Later in the day after McAlpine made his denial statement, suddenly Steve Messham retracted his decades-old claim that McAlpine was one of his abusers - a statement repeated only a few days earlier in part of the Newsnight interview that was not broadcast.
  That was shocking enough, but his explanation for doing so was absolutely bizarre.
  Messham apologised for naming McAlpine (he hadn't publicly) and he said it was a case of 'mistaken identity', the same words that McAlpine had used in his statement earlier the same day. Newsnight then made a grovelling apology for naming McAlpine when they hadn't - the name was removed from the Messham interview.
  Newsnight was just about the only BBC news or current affairs programme with a trace of backbone, but has now been neutered as a result of all this with lawyers in attendance to dictate what can and cannot be broadcast.
  Steve Messham said that the reason he recanted that night on his not publicly mentioning the name of Lord McAlpine is that he was shown a picture of him by police 'in the last hour' and he realised it was not the man who abused him over and over and over decades ago.
  Messham said that the problem of 'mistaken identity' arose because police showed him a picture in the 1990s of the person that he said abused him and they told him that it was Lord McAlpine. Now they had shown him a picture of the 'real' Lord McAlpine 'in the last hour' and he had realised that it is not the man in the picture that police showed to him in the 1990s.
  WHAT? I mean where do you start with an explanation so ridiculous? If Messham hadn't been 'got at' by someone then I am a Chinaman living in an igloo on the Costa del Sol. What other credible explanation can there be for such a sudden about-turn after decades of saying the same thing and never wavering?
  We are being asked to believe that in the 15 to 20 years between Steve Messham allegedly being shown the picture of 'Lord McAlpine' by police and accusing him of sexually abusing him in an unbroadcast part of the interview with Newsnight that Messham has never once Googled 'Lord Alistair McAlpine' and seen the pictures of him widely available ever since he said he was abused??
  That he never once sought out a picture of McAlpine of any kind in the decades since his time in the children's home until the police showed him one 'in the last hour'?
  That he didn't know what McAlpine looked like even when he has been in the news only recently with comments about jailed Polly Peck businessman, Asil Nadir, and when he was regularly in the news in the 1980s during the Thatcher era?
  When I heard what Steve Messham had said I Googled 'Lord Alistair McAlpine' and up came pictures widely available way before 'in the last hour' ...
  I mean, how many do you want, Steve? And yet he never saw a picture of Lord McAlpine in the nearly 20 years between the two photographs shown to him by the police? It makes no sense whatsoever to me. So why did he say it? Your call, but I know what mine is.
  MP Tom Watson said after he asked his question about the Downing Street paedophilia ring in Parliament:
  I'm not going to let this drop despite warnings from people who should know that my personal safety is imperilled if I dig any deeper. It's spooked me so much that I've kept a detailed log of all the allegations should anything happen.
  Only a few days before Steve Meesham came out with his sudden 'mistaken identity' apology, he told Channel Four News how he had broken into the flat of an abuser in North Wales and taken dozens of photographs of abusers raping boys, including himself, and some clearly showed the face, he said, of 'the prominent Tory abuser'.
  Was he talking about the same man that days later he said that he had misidentified or someone else? If it was the same man then Messham's 'mistaken identity' story lies in tatters. We need him to clarify this because it is all very confusing at the moment.
  Further, he said that he not only had Polaroid photographs of this famous abuser, but the man had told him who he was and how he would have him killed if he ever spoke out. Click here to see the interview ...
  So Meesham said that he took the photographs to police and that although the faces of the abusers were clear to see the police said that they could not identify men in the pictures. Police now say that they can't comment on what happened to the images because of the new inquiry, but Meesham's story about the pictures is corroborated by Sian Griffiths, who worked in the inquiry office at Clwyd Council in the 1990s during the two inquiries into abuse at North Wales children's homes.
  These were the Jillings report, which was never published because the council was warned by insurers of possible legal action by those that the victims named, and the main Waterhouse inquiry which did not allow victims to name who they said were their famous abusers.
  Clwyd Council are now apparently considering whether to publish the Jillings report in the light of current events. Labour MP Ann Clwyd is one calling for publication after reading the contents at the time. She said that 'it shows rape and torture ... the effects on those young boys cannot be underestimated.'
  Sian Griffiths, who sat at the administrative centre of both inquiries, told Channel Four News that Steve Messham's photographs of abuse were ordered to be destroyed. She said: 'We were supplied with copies of court documents ... there was an order made for the books and photos to be destroyed.' This is Sian's interview ...
  Why would you order that photographs showing abusers should be destroyed?? I don't know about you, but I have this terrible putrid smell right under my nose. I can't think what it could be.
  [A quick aside here, but a very relevant one: When you see that Channel Four News interview with Steve Messham which did not name anyone, how is that any different to the BBC Newsnight interview with him, which equally didn't name anyone? Yet now the BBC (licence fee-payer) is forking out £185,000 in compensation to McAlpine over an interview in which he wasn't named?? Will McAlpine be seeking an out-of-court settlement from Channel Four News? That's laughable, but the BBC is easy pickings now what's left of its balls have been handed over on a platter.]
  There are so many strands to this story and so many unanswered questions, but some things we do know. The Thatcher government and Conservative Party was infested with paedophiles and there was a ring involved that went right to 'Number 10'. MP Tom Watson was quite right to ask his question about this.
  One of Thatcher's significant aides, Derek Laud, was named as a paedophile in the Scallywag article in the 1990s and, as with McAlpine, he never sued despite being accused of sickening and outrageous behaviour. Once again, why?
  Laud was a speechwriter to Thatcher, many Conservative MPs (including Alan Clark who has been linked with underage sex) and has reportedly written speeches for Prince Charles. Laud is a long-time family friend of current Prime Minister David Cameron and his wife and was a guest at their wedding.
  In this same period that people like Derek Laud and paedophile Chester MP Peter Morrison were close aides to Margaret Thatcher, she and her husband Denis were close friends of Jimmy Savile, the prolific supplier of children for the rich and famous and, once again, the same question must be asked about the Thatchers as about the royal family.Why was Margaret Thatcher so close to a former disc jockey and all round strange bloke to the extent that he was invited for cosy chats and Christmas dinner with her year after year in her time as Prime Minister? What was it about fading 'entertainer' Savile that got him so close to both a sitting Prime Minister and the royal family?
  An aging and infirm Margaret Thatcher in Downing Street with current Prime Minister, David Cameron.
  We also know that an extremely close Thatcher aide, the late Sir Peter Morrison, the Member of Parliament for Chester, has been named as an abuser by residents of children's homes in nearby North Wales. Chester is only 13 miles from Wrexham where Steve Messham says that a lot of his abuse took place.
  Rod Richards, a former Conservative MP and leader of the Welsh Conservatives, has said publicly that he has seen evidence connecting Morrison to the North Wales paedophile scandal. Richards said: 'What I do know is that Morrison was a paedophile ... and the reason I know that is because of the North Wales child abuse scandal.'
  This is extremely significant when you think that Morrison was Parliamentary Private Secretary to Margaret Thatcher, one of her closest aides, leader of her campaign team in the Conservative leadership election of 1990 and a deputy chairman of the Conservative Party. Thatcher had paedophiles this close to her and record-breaking paedophile and child procurer Jimmy Savile as a close friend, regular visitor to her country home at Chequers and Christmas dinner guest.
  Did she not KNOW what was going on?
  Did not current Prime Minister David Cameron know when he worked for the Conservative Research Department at Conservative headquarters between 1988 and 1993, or on his subsequent rise to the leadership?
  I don't believe it.
  'Merry Christmas, Jimmy.'
  Paedophile and closest of aides Sir Peter Morrison with Margaret Thatcher.
  This brings us back to MP Tom Watson and his revelations about a paedophile ring connected to Downing Street. He said of Peter Righton, who was operating his paedophile network in the same period that we are talking about:
  Within the material seized at Righton's home were letters from known and convicted paedophiles. The contact, who has seen the letters, claimed that one paedophile in particular was of great concern. He said that the paedophile, who worked with children, boasted of a key aide to a former PM who could help get hold of indecent images of children. I am not naming the person for obvious reasons but for clarity it is not former MP, Peter Morrison.
  So here we have yet another paedophile on the inside of the Thatcher administration at the time of Morrison - and called a 'key aide' - that is yet to be named. How many were there, for goodness sake? And remember that Thatcher had replaced the paedophile, Satanist and child-killer Edward Heath as leader of the Conservative Party in 1975 and so it all went back much further than her time.
  And so to Lord McAlpine, the man at the heart of the controversy of recent times. He was a central figure in the Thatcher network of aides and associates for 15 years between 1975 and 1990. They apparently met in 1975 and he was her party treasurer from then until 1990 and deputy chairman of the party from 1979 to 1983.
  The two worked very closely together throughout the Thatcher years in government and he led the fundraising campaigns for her elections. This apparently involved channelling money through offshore accounts and among the donors were seriously dodgy businessmen like Asil Nadir who was jailed for ten years for a mega fraud in 2012. Nadir gave the party £400,000.
  According to McAlpine's Wikipedia profile: 'He would later describe his relationship with Thatcher in his book The Servant ... Using Machiavelli's The Prince for his analogy, the "Servant" (himself) is an important part of the success of the Prince (Thatcher).'
  Okay, we get the picture, he was incredibly close to Margaret Thatcher throughout her time as party leader and Prime Minister and yet he didn't know about the paedophiles that she had so close to her - a fact that is now becoming so clear and we have seen nothing yet?
  McAlpine must have known, to say otherwise is beyond ridiculous given his closeness to Thatcher and all that went on. So what did he do to stop and expose it?
  Did he not warn her about her close association with Jimmy Savile given that so many people seemed to have known what he was doing but kept their mouths shut? Are we to believe that the British intelligence network including MI5 didn't know about Savile and the widespread paedophile activity infesting the Thatcher administration?
  Are we to believe that they didn't tell Thatcher or that her closest of friends, McAlpine, wasn't aware through a multitude of sources what was going on?
  So, I repeat, what did they do to stop and expose it? Answer: NOTHING. Why?
  Didn't other central figures in Thatcher governments know - people like Deputy Prime Minister Willie Whitelaw and Home Secretary and Trade and Industry Secretary Leon Brittan? Sure they did, but what followed was still more silence and inaction. Why?
  William Hague and Savile.
  Rod Richards, the former Conservative MP and leader of the Welsh Conservatives, confirmed the widely-known fact that Thatcher's close aide, Sir Peter Morrison, was a paedophile connected to abuse in North Wales children's homes, and he also said that William Hague, the Secretary of State for Wales who set up the Waterhouse abuse inquiry, should have known about Morrison. William Hague is now Foreign Secretary in the Cameron government helping to decide which country is bombed next.
  Former Conservative Minister Edwina Currie said that Morrison had sex with underage boys and was protected by a 'culture of sniggering'. She called him 'a noted pederast'. This is defined as 'a man who has sex (usually sodomy) with a boy as the passive partner.' Others have described Morrison's activities as an 'open secret'.
  And yet Thatcher and another of her closest aides and associates, and one of the central figures in the party, Lord McAlpine, didn't know?
  That is inconceivable, surely?
  So what did they do about it? Clearly nothing, because Morrison was appointed to be Thatcher's Parliamentary Private Secretary as late as 1990, her last year in office.
  One way that Morrison protected himself from exposure was to threaten libel actions, just like Jimmy Savile did and others have done. Peter Connew, one-time editor of the Sunday Mirror, said that when journalists 'doorstepped' Morrison he would say 'print and I'll sue you'.
  Connew said that he had personal experience of the way efforts to name Morrison were blocked despite him being arrested for attempting to procure young boys in public toilets. The police were prevented from charging him and Connew said that 'such was the hush-up that nobody could get hold of the log of the arrest':
  As soon as he was brought in for importuning young boys in public toilets, the seniors would come down. That was the reason the officers leaked the details: they were outraged that the seniors had ticked them off for arresting him.
  AND THATCHER AND MCALPINE, HER CLOSEST AIDE ALONG WITH PEOPLE LIKE MORRISION, DIDN'T KNOW?? So what did they do? NOTHING.
  Why?
  MI5 certainly knew all about the paedophile activities of the late MP for Rochdale in Lancashire, Sir Cyril Smith, who was not even in government or the main opposition party. Tony Robinson, a special branch officer with Lancashire Police in the 1970s, has described seeing a police dossier 'thick' with allegations from boys saying that Smith had abused them.
  The dossier of Smith's abuse was kept in a safe at special branch headquarters in Hutton, Preston, and Robinson said these words were written at the top: 'No further action, not in the public interest. DPP [Director of Public Prosecutions].'
  No, it wasn't in the Establishment paedophile ring's interests to prosecute and as always the interests of the abused children were irrelevant. Robinson said that shortly after seeing the file he was called by an MI5 officer who said that the evidence should be sent to London. Police now say apparently that the file has been 'lost' (sound familiar?).
  So MI5 would cover up for a lowly politician nowhere near government, but would not cover for a massive paedophile ring operating out of 10 Downing Street? And Thatcher and major figures who were so close to her did not know it was going on?
  Please.
  Thatcher and McAlpine - and others - have a lot of explaining to do about why paedophile activities, of which insiders were so clearly well aware, were met with no action or exposure. The case alone of close Thatcher aide, Peter Morrison, reveals a scandalous disregard for the boys that he was abusing in North Wales and elsewhere.
  In fact, it goes further. Scallywag said that MI5 took foreign diplomats to the North Wales homes and secretly filmed them abusing and torturing boys to use the tapes for blackmail. This is a classic Intelligence modus operandi with regard to child abuse by the famous and influential - especially politicians that they want to control.
  If all this was just a one-off in one administration in one country at one time it would be bad enough, but it isn't. I can tell you after two decades of research that this is typical of political systems and governments across much of the world. Paedophilia, along with secret societies and Satanism, is the cement that holds the entire global network of conspirators and their agents together across 'different' political parties and apparently 'opposing' factions.
  Paedophiles, Satanists and secret society initiates watch each other's backs, even though they may be in different political parties in public, or one may be a politician and another a police chief, judge, journalist or media owner. They are a cancer within the body politic and the wider human society.
  We now have the chance to use the British example to show the world how it all fits together and dismantle this global network of horror and sickening abuse of the most vulnerable.
  Watch this space. Things are moving fast and it is going to get very interesting.
  Scallywag magazine editor on how the Tories covered up paedophile ring that Jimmy Savile procured for
  Read more ...
  North Wales Children's Home Victim Tells of Sex Parties in London
  'A man who was abused in North Wales care homes has told how he was routinely taken to London and forced to take part in sex parties. He alleges he was regularly abused as a 12-year-old boy by members of the establishment in a smart London flat.
  Michael was 10 when he was first taken into care at the former children's home called Bersham Hall near Wrexham, North Wales. He quickly became drawn into the abusive regime at the home.
  But he says it was when staff from another home called Bryn Estyn in Wrexham moved to Bersham Hall that the abuse became worse. Michael, who is now 44, was one of a number of boys who would be taken down on a minibus that belonged to the home to London on a Friday evening.'
  This is precisely what the Scallywag allegations in the 1990s said happened.
  Click here to watch ...
  Well, well, Bell: Sir David Bell, leading light in the Leveson inquiry into press standards, is trustee of the group that produced the Newsnight interview which sparked the naming of former Thatcher treasurer Lord McAlpine
  Bell is a key adviser to Leveson and major player with government insider Julia Middleton in the infamous Common Purpose, an organisation long exposed by Brian Gerrish at the UKColumn over many years and an organisation that has regularly appeared in my books.
  Common Purpose is handed millions in taxpayer money to run 'training course' for 'leaders' at all levels of government, law enforcement, the whole lot - the 'system' in other words. They are developing system people with system minds - this is why there has been such a transformation of the dynamic and relationship between the public and the personnel of the system.
  Julia Middleton just happens to also be co-founder with Bell of the Media Standards Trust -'a lobby group behind a huge amount of evidence presented to the Leveson inquiry'. Two other Leveson advisers, former Ofcom chairman Lord Currie and Sir Paul Scott-Lee, former Chief Constable of West Midlands Police, have connections with Common Purpose.
  A Daily Mail investigation 'has uncovered an incestuous network of political, business and financial links between Sir David, ex-chairman of the Financial Times, and individuals and organisations appearing before the inquiry to demand statutory press regulation.'
  Sir David Bell is also a trustee of the Bureau of Investigative Journalism, 'an independent not-for-profit organisation', which was behind the interview with Steve Messham that triggered the Lord McAlpine saga that has led to the neutering of Newsnight and BBC journalism in general.
  British mainstream media you are being set up with a view to making you impotent and destroying press freedom - can you see it now?
  GET OFF YOUR KNEES WHILE YOU STILL CAN.
  Read more ...
  Major Media Breakthrough - Leveson Inquiry Exposed
  Read more ...
  David Icke's Amazing 10-hour Wembley Arena Event Can Be Seen Here Until November 26th
  Subscription price reduced by a third to reflect reducing time.
  Click here to see...
  Please help us circulate this information by sending this link to anyone you think would be interested or anyone who could further circulate:
  http://www.davidicke.com/wembley
  Thank you.
Paedophile Rings And 10 Downing Street - FULL ARTICLE - David Icke
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  Mon, 19 Nov 2012 06:26
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JEWISH TERRORISTS?
  Link to Article
  Source: aangirfan
  Mon, 19 Nov 2012 06:23
  JEWISH PLOT TO RAID LONDON
  Six Aerial Bombs Found In Paris
  Associated Press-LONDON, September 7 1947
  The Paris police today arrested a number of persons after discovering six home-made aerial bombs with which, it is suggested, the Stern Gang intended to bomb London in reprisal for the transport of Jewish migrants to Hamburg.
  Rabbi Baruch Korff, chairman of the American Political Action Committee for a Free Palestine, was also arrested near Paris today, together with two others,when about to board an aircraft...
  08 Sep 1947 - JEWISH PLOT TO RAID LONDON Six Aerial Bombs.
  The real terrorists are people like Irgun and the Stern Gang.
  isupporttheresistance.blogspot.com has an article entitled: Searchlight: Political Violence and Terrorism
  Here is a brief extract:
  In the early hours of the 12th of July, 1947, two British field security NCOs, Sergeants Paice and Martin, were held up by five armed members of Irgun and driven off to a secret hiding place.
  Three weeks later their bodies were found hanging from a eucalyptus tree...
  By 1948, some 200 British Soldiers and 90 British policemen had been murdered by Jewish terrorist gangs such as Irgun...
  Marvin Paice and Clifford Martin, the two british sergants who were hanged in Palestine, 1947, by the Irgun.
  The nationalist 'fight' was also extended to acts of terrorism in Britain and against British people and property in Europe.
  The terrorist groups Irgun and the Stern Gang (known as Lehi in Hebrew) were active in Britain throughout the late 1940s.
  It is a matter of record, for example, there were plans to crash an aircraft into the House of Commons, and to murder members of the British armed forces.
  The British Embassy in Rome was bombed.
  Lord MoyneIn November 1944 Lord Moyne was murdered by members of the Stern gang in Cairo and there are reliable reports of the existence of plans to assassinate Government Ministers, including the Foreign Secretary Ernest Bevan.In 1946 a female agent of Irgun planted a bomb at the Colonial Office in London.
  According to Commander Leonard Burt of Special Branch this would have ''blown the sort of hole that was blown in the King David Hotel''.
  It was only by good fortune that a failure of the pocket-watch timer prevented detonation.
  Another Irgun terrorist operating in Britain at the time was Monty Harris.
  Harris was sentenced to seven years imprisonment after being convicted of making thermite incendiary bombs on his premises at Gravel Street near Petticoat Lane.
  The use to which these devices were to be put was never established.
  Livni and friend
  Tzipora Livni was Israel's Minister of Foreign Affairs.
  She is the daughter of Eitan Livni, born in Poland, and Sara Rosenberg, both of whom were members of the anti-British, Jewish terrorist organisation called Irgun.
  Journalist Louis Heren (Media Lens Israel's New Foreign Minister.) wrote in The Times, 11 February 1992:
  "The Irgun Zwai Leumi was a terrorist oganization, and a particularly nasty one.
  Deir Yassin - Jewish terrorists, called Irgun, massacred women and children
  "Even its defenders, who argued that the end could justify the means at decisive moments in history, were horrified by the massacre at Deir Yassin and the hanging of the British sergeants."
  Irgun killed British people.
  In The New York Times, 5 February 2006, Steven Erlanger (Israel's New Foreign Minister.) wrote:
  "Tzipi Livni, 47, is ... the daughter of Zionist guerrillas - terrorists in some eyes -who met in the Irgun, the underground organization that fought the British... and that blew up the British headquarters in the King David Hotel in 1946, killing 91 people.
  Jewish terrorists bombed the King David Hotel, killing many British people.
  "Her father, Eitan, was the Irgun's head of operations, and on his gravestone is the map of greater Israel, extending over both sides of the Jordan River...
  "She served in the army, becoming a lieutenant, and at the age of 22 began working for the Mossad, the intelligence service, where she stayed for four years."
  Greater Israel
  According to The Times Obituary, 5 February 1992:
  "Eitan Livni was born Yerucham Bzozowitch in Gerodna, Poland, in 1919.
  "Livni... in August 1947 was dispatched by Begin to organise Irgun's military activities against British targets in Europe...
  Jews tried to bomb the British parliament
  The Stern gang (Lehi) were Jewish terrorists.
  They tried to bomb the British Parliament.
  In 1946 the British security services issued this warning: "Members of the Stern group are now being organised and are under training.It is expected that they will be sent to the United Kingdom to assassinate important members of his majesty's government, particularly, Mr Bevin."
  In 1946 a number of bombs exploded in London and an attempt was made to drop on a bomb on the House of Commons from a hired plane.
  The House of Commons was saved when French Police discovered members of the Stern Gang preparing to fly across the channel in a plane containing a large bomb.
  Source: BBC - Radio 4 Document - A Laudable Invasion
  In 1940, The Stern Gang (Lehi) proposed intervening in World War II on the side of Nazi Germany.
  Lehi (group) - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
  Hamas, working for Mossad, the CIA and NATO. A. Peasant comments:
  Hamas has been the inside enforcers for Israel, making lots of money shaking down the Palestinians and controlling the tunnels.
  Gaza's Millionaires Funding the Hamas Regime through underground smuggling...
  How Many Millionaires Live in the "Impoverished" Gaza Strip ...
  Mohammed Dahlan, the former Palestinian Authority security commander of the Gaza Strip, further said last week that Hamas was the only party that was laying siege to the Gaza Strip; that it is Hamas, and not Israel or Egypt, that is strangling and punishing the people there.
  The Palestinian millionaires, according to the report, have made their wealth thanks to the hundreds of underground tunnels along the border between the Gaza Strip and Egypt.
  Again, makes sense once one understands that Hamas was created and supported by the Mossad and friends.
  Newsletter on child abuse
Petraeus retains Robert Barnett, lawyer to political elite - CNBC
  Link to Article
  Mon, 19 Nov 2012 05:23
  (Reuters) - Former CIA Director General David Petraeus has hired a top Washington lawyer to help him navigate the fallout from a career-ending affair, Reuters has confirmed.
  The lawyer, Robert Barnett of Williams & Connolly, is known for negotiating book deals for the political elite, from President Barack Obama to one-time vice presidential candidate Sarah Palin.
  Barnett will help Petraeus as he exits government, Reuters confirmed. The news was first reported by Politico, which said that no book is planned.
  The Central Intelligence Agency, the Justice Department and Congress are investigating Petraeus' conduct over the extra-marital affair with his biographer, Paula Broadwell.
  The former four-star general has said his resignation was solely because of the affair and that he did not give classified information to Broadwell.
  Barnett has been a partner at Williams & Connolly in Washington for 34 years, according to a biography of him posted on the firm's website. In that time, he has built an unconventional practice representing best-selling authors, political leaders, television news correspondents and other high-profile clients.
  In addition to Obama and Palin, other authors he has represented include novelist Mary Higgins Clark and entertainer Barbra Streisand.
  He has also helped former government officials from across the political spectrum navigate their return to private life, including former U.S. presidents Bill Clinton and George W. Bush, former secretary of state Madeleine Albright, and former members of Congress.
  He joined Williams & Connolly in 1975 and became a partner in 1978.
  (Reporting by Jessica Dye in New York; Editing by Jackie Frank)
  (c) Copyright Thomson Reuters 2012. Check for restrictions at: http://about.reuters.com/fulllegal.asp
Wal-Mart Files Unfair Labor Practices Charge Against Union
  Link to Article
  Source: Crooks and Liars
  Sun, 18 Nov 2012 21:23
  The Waltons are rattling their sabres...
  Reuters:
  Wal-Mart Stores Inc is taking its first legal step to stop months of protests and rallies outside Walmart stores, targeting the union that it says is behind such actions.
  Wal-Mart filed an unfair labor practice charge against the United Food and Commercial Workers International Union, or UFCW, asking the National Labor Relations Board to halt what the retailer says are unlawful attempts to disrupt its business.
  The move comes just a week before what is expected to be the largest organized action against the world's largest retailer, as a small group of Walmart workers prepare to strike on Black Friday, typically the busiest shopping day of the year.
  "We are taking this action now because we cannot allow the UFCW to continue to intentionally seek to create an environment that could directly and adversely impact our customers and associates," Wal-Mart spokesman David Tovar said on Friday. "If they do, they will be held accountable."
  The UFCW responded with The union is undeterred. "Walmart is grasping at straws. There's nothing in the law that gives an employer the right to silence workers and citizens."
  "We just don't think what the unions have to offer is a better deal for our associates," said Wal-Mart's spokesman, David Tovar.
  Black Friday full speed ahead.
McCain Demands Susan Rice Go on TV and Apologize
  Link to Article
  Source: Crooks and Liars
  Sun, 18 Nov 2012 21:19
  Sen. John McCain (R-AZ) is demanding that U.S. Ambassador to the United Nations Susan Rice go on television and apologize for her characterization of September attacks in Benghazi if she has any hope of being appointed the next secretary of state.
  The Arizona senator last week pledged to block Rice from becoming the nation's top diplomat because he said that her early assessment of the attacks -- which relied on CIA-approved talking points that did not mention al Qaeda -- made her ''not qualified'' for the job.
  In his 20th Sunday morning show appearance of 2012, McCain was asked by CBS host Bob Schieffer if he was willing to reconsider Rice if she were nominated.
  "I think we give all nominees the benefit of a hearing process," McCain replied. "Maybe she could start out by publicly coming back on this show and saying, 'I was wrong. I gave the wrong information on your show some weeks ago.' That might be a beginning."
  "But until then, you remain opposed to her nomination?" Schieffer pressed.
  "Under the present circumstances until we find out all the information as to what happened, I don't think you could want to support any nominee right now," McCain replied. "It really goes to heart of this -- quote -- light-footprint policy that this administration has been perusing and all of the failures throughout the Middle East."
  "The chickens are now coming home to roost."