Saturday, August 28, 2010

Senate To Sneak Through Internet Kill Switch Bill



Paul Joseph Watson
Infowars.com
August 26, 2010

The Senate is attempting to sneak through the infamous Internet kill switch cybersecurity bill by attaching it to another piece of legislation that is almost guaranteed to pass – the defense authorization bill – in an underhanded ploy to avoid the difficult task of passing cybersecurity on its own.

“It’s hard to get a measure like cybersecurity legislation passed on its own,” Democratic Senator Thomas Carper, who is co-chair of a Senate subcommittee with cybersecurity oversight, told Government Information Security.

That’s why lawmakers pushing cybersecurity have resolved to introduce the legislation as a “rider” to a Senate defense bill that is likely to be easily passed before the midterm elections.

Senators are still working to merge two different versions of the cybersecurity bill, one sponsored by Senator Joe Lieberman and another sponsored by Democrat Jay Rockefeller, into a single omnibus package, in preparation for a final vote when the Senate returns to session in mid-September.

“We’re very close to where we need to be in developing a joint proposal,” said Carper.

Lawmakers are in a race to pass cybersecurity before the midterms because if they wait until Congress returns after the November 2nd vote, the chances of getting the bill through “would significantly dim should the Republicans pick up a significant number of seats”. That leaves a four week window from the middle of September to the start of election campaigning for Senators to sneak through the legislation.

Lieberman’s version of the cybersecurity bill includes language that would hand President Obama the power to shut down parts of the world wide web for at least four months with no congressional oversight in the event of a cyber attack on critical infrastructure systems in the U.S.

Senators argue that they will be able to attach the Internet kill switch bill to the Defense Authorization Act because cybersecurity is a component of national security. However, the primary justifications behind treating “cybersecurity” as a national security matter are completely overblown and erroneous.

Proponents of cybersecurity have constantly argued that government needs to have more power over the Internet because cyber-terrorists could hack in and dismantle the entire U.S. power grid, large industrial plants, and the national water supply. This is a complete misnomer because, as a recent Wired News article highlighted, power grid and drinking water systems, “Are rarely connected directly to the public internet. And that makes gaining access to grid-controlling networks a challenge for all but the most dedicated, motivated and skilled — nation-states, in other words.”

As we documented in our piece on the issue, the threat from cyber-terrorists to the U.S. power grid or water supply is minimal. The perpetrators of an attack on such infrastructure would have to have direct physical access to the systems that operate these plants to cause any damage. Any perceived threat from the public Internet to these systems is therefore completely contrived and strips bare the real agenda behind cybersecurity – to enable the government to regulate free speech on the Internet.

This was revealed when Senator Lieberman told CNN’s Candy Crowley that the real motivation behind cybersecurity was to mimic the Communist Chinese system of Internet policing.

“Right now China, the government, can disconnect parts of its Internet in case of war and we need to have that here too,” said Lieberman.

As we have documented, the Communist Chinese government does not disconnect parts of the Internet because of genuine security concerns, it habitually does so only to oppress and silence victims of government abuse and atrocities, and to strangle dissent against the state.

The decision to try and sneak through the Internet kill switch bill as part of another package of legislation is undoubtedly a reaction to increasing awareness about how the terms of the bill would completely undermine the foundations of the Internet as an outlet of truly unregulated free speech.

*********************

Paul Joseph Watson is the editor and writer for Prison Planet.com. He is the author of Order Out Of Chaos. Watson is also an occasional host for The Alex Jones Show. Watson has been interviewed by many publications and radio shows, including Vanity Fair and Coast to Coast AM, America’s most listened to late night talk show.

Thursday, August 26, 2010

Post-Apocalyptic Predictive Programming For The Whole Family



Nicholas West
Activist Post
August 26, 2010

Predictive Programming

Hollywood is the magician’s wand (holly-holy) which has been used to cast a spell on the unsuspecting public. Things or ideas which would otherwise be seen as bizarre, vulgar, undesirable or impossible are inserted into films in the realm of fantasy. When the viewer watches these films, his/her mind is left open to suggestion and the conditioning process begins. These same movies which are designed to program the average person, can give the discerning viewer a better understanding of the workings and the plan of the world agenda. — Alan Watt

The Colony is an “experiment” where people are forced to live in a world minus even the most basic necessities, while being harassed by their fellow suffering man. In Season Two, colonists begin the ordeal with a 72-hour quarantine, followed by a government agency airlift to a “way station” that is the site of their rebuilding of society. They are given enough supplies for one week, and basically told to have a nice day.

Hollywood has a history of involvement with the New World Order as a visual think tank of future scenarios. Viewed through this lens, the ”experiment” is not to test the orchestrated reality of the characters placed in a survival situation, but to test the viewing public about what reality they will accept after certain predetermined events take place.

Predictive programming exists in all mediums, but it is Hollywood where the greatest numbers of people gather for passive entertainment. Hollywood history shows a disturbing connection with the themes that are introduced in movies and TV, and the world that is accepted by the masses thereafter.

This is a list of the seminal thought experiments put to film which have been instrumental in offering an apparently dystopian world where one’s first, human, reaction is “no one would accept that.” After the concept has been introduced, politicians and media-spin work in concert to say, “It won’t be like science fiction; it will benefit mankind.” Look at the following movie themes, then look around at what has already been accepted as “normal.”

THX 1138 (mandatory mind altering drugs to control a slave population -1971)

Soylent Green (overpopulation and Elite control -1973)

Wicker Man (Elite control over the population -1974)

Logan’s Run (population control via computer – 1975)

Network (Corporate Media control – 1976)

Brainstorm (transmitting the mind across a computer network – 1983)

Robocop (militarization of police – 1987)

They Live (mind control and data collection – 1988)

Johnny Mnemonic (data as a commodity – 1995)

Gattaca (genetic code as a commodity – 1997)

Devil’s Advocate (legislative control over society – 1997)

Eyes Wide Shut (rituals of the Elite – 1999)

Swordfish (government sanctioned crime to combat terrorism – 2001)

24 (good guys use torture to get information from terrorists – 2001)

Minority Report (high-tech police state using biometrics and “pre-crime” – 2002)

The Experiment (dynamic of prison abuse – 2002)

Control Factor (mind control through scientific dictatorship – 2003)

Jericho (factions within U.S. government set of a nuke false flag – 2006)

I Am Legend (benevolence of scientific intentions, martial law, and vaccines as the cure – 2007)

These examples suggest that Hollywood is a marketing tool for the New World Order. In the same way that news media was co-opted with psy-ops programs like Operation Mockingbird, the magic wand of Hollywood has been used to desensitize people to an impending reality. The Colony is the next level of preparation for the Endgame. And what might bring about this apocalypse? Well-regarded physicist, Michio Kaku, went on MSNBC’s The Dylan Ratigan Show to announce that UFOs are worth serious inquiry. This was done to support a new book release of generals, pilots, and government officials documenting decades of UFO encounters. All of this while a new trailer for the movie Skyline depicts aliens arriving on blue beams. What was the name of the NASA project that studied stage managing a fake rapture or alien invasion? Project Blue Beam.

10 Practical Steps That You Can Take To Insulate Yourself (At Least Somewhat) From The Coming Economic Collapse



The Economic Collapse
August 26, 2010

Most Americans are still operating under the delusion that this “recession” will end and that the “good times” will return soon, but a growing minority of Americans are starting to realize that things are fundamentally changing and that they better start preparing for what is ahead. These “preppers” come from all over the political spectrum and from every age group. More than at any other time in modern history, the American people lack faith in the U.S. economic system. In dozens of previous columns, I have detailed the horrific economic problems that we are now facing in excruciating detail. Many readers have started to complain that all I do is “scare” people and that I don’t provide any practical solutions. Well, not everyone can move to Montana and start a llama farm, but hopefully this article will give people some practical steps that they can take to insulate themselves (at least to an extent) from the coming economic collapse.

But before I get into what people need to do, let’s take a minute to understand just how bad things are getting out there. The economic numbers in the headlines go up and down and it can all be very confusing to most Americans.

However, there are two long-term trends that are very clear and that anyone can understand….

#1) The United States is getting poorer and is bleeding jobs every single month.

#2) The United States is getting into more debt every single month.

When you mention the trade deficit, most Americans roll their eyes and stop listening. But that is a huge mistake, because the trade deficit is absolutely central to our problems.

Every single month, Americans buy far, far more from the rest of the world than they buy from us. Every single month tens of billions of dollars more goes out of the country than comes into it.

That means that every single month the United States is getting poorer.

The excess goods and services that we buy from the rest of the world get “consumed” and the rest of the world ends up with more money than when they started.

Each year, hundreds of billions of dollars leave the United States and don’t return. The transfer of wealth that this represents is astounding.

But not only are we bleeding wealth, we are also bleeding jobs every single month.

The millions of jobs that the U.S. economy is losing to China, India and dozens of third world nations are not going to come back. Middle class Americans have been placed in direct competition for jobs with workers on the other side of the world who are more than happy to work for little more than slave labor wages. Until this changes the U.S. economy is going to continue to hemorrhage jobs.

The U.S. government has helped to mask much of this economic bleeding by unprecedented amounts of government spending and debt, but now the U.S. national debt exceeds 13 trillion dollars and is getting worse every single month. Not only that, but state and local governments all over America are getting into ridiculous amounts of debt.

So, what we have got is a country that gets poorer every single month and loses jobs to other countries every single month and that has accumulated the biggest mountain of debt in the history of the world which also gets worse every single month.

Needless to say, this cannot last indefinitely. Eventually the whole thing is just going to collapse like a house of cards.

So what can we each individually do to somewhat insulate ourselves from the economic problems that are coming?….

1 - Get Out Of Debt: The old saying, “the borrower is the servant of the lender”, is so incredibly true. The key to insulating yourself from an economic meltdown is to become as independent as possible, and as long as you are in debt, you simply are not independent. You don’t want a horde of creditors chasing after you when things really start to get bad out there.

2 - Find New Sources Of Income: In 2010, there simply is not such a thing as job security. If you are dependent on a job (“just over broke”) for 100% of your income, you are in a very bad position. There are thousands of different ways to make extra money. What you don’t want to do is to have all of your eggs in one basket. One day when the economy melts down and you are out of a job are you going to be destitute or are you going to be okay?

3 – Reduce Your Expenses: Many Americans have left the rat race and have found ways to live on half or even on a quarter of what they were making previously. It is possible – if you are willing to reduce your expenses. In the future times are going to be tougher, so learn to start living with less today.

4 – Learn To Grow Your Own Food: Today the vast majority of Americans are completely dependent on being able to run down to the supermarket or to the local Wal-Mart to buy food. But what happens when the U.S. dollar declines dramatically in value and it costs ten bucks to buy a loaf of bread? If you learn to grow your own food (even if is just a small garden) you will be insulating yourself against rising food prices.

5 – Make Sure You Have A Reliable Water Supply: Water shortages are popping up all over the globe. Water is quickly becoming one of the “hottest” commodities out there. Even in the United States, water shortages have been making headline news recently. As we move into the future, it will be imperative for you and your family to have a reliable source of water. Some Americans have learned to collect rainwater and many others are using advanced technology such as atmospheric water generators to provide water for their families. But whatever you do, make sure that you are not caught without a decent source of water in the years ahead.

6 – Buy Land: This is a tough one, because prices are still quite high. However, as we have written previously, home prices are going to be declining over the coming months, and eventually there are going to be some really great deals out there. The truth is that you don’t want to wait too long either, because once Helicopter Ben Bernanke’s inflationary policies totally tank the value of the U.S. dollar, the price of everything (including land) is going to go sky high. If you are able to buy land when prices are low, that is going to insulate you a great deal from the rising housing costs that will occur when the U.S dollar does totally go into the tank.

7 – Get Off The Grid: An increasing number of Americans are going “off the grid”. Essentially what that means is that they are attempting to operate independently of the utility companies. In particular, going “off the grid” will enable you to insulate yourself from the rapidly rising energy prices that we are going to see in the future. If you are able to produce energy for your own home, you won’t be freaking out like your neighbors are when electricity prices triple someday.

8 – Store Non-Perishable Supplies: Non-perishable supplies are one investment that is sure to go up in value. Not that you would resell them. You store up non-perishable supplies because you are going to need them someday. So why not stock up on the things that you are going to need now before they double or triple in price in the future? Your money is not ever going to stretch any farther than it does right now.

9 – Develop Stronger Relationships: Americans have become very insular creatures. We act like we don’t need anyone or anything. But the truth is that as the economy melts down we are going to need each other. It is those that are developing strong relationships with family and friends right now that will be able to depend on them when times get hard.

10 – Get Educated And Stay Flexible: When times are stable, it is not that important to be informed because things pretty much stay the same. However, when things are rapidly changing it is imperative to get educated and to stay informed so that you will know what to do. The times ahead are going to require us all to be very flexible, and it is those who are willing to adapt that will do the best when things get tough.

John McCain’s Attack On Liberty



Chuck Baldwin
August 26, 2010

Anyone paying attention knows that John McCain has been a Big-Government Globalist Neocon (BGGN) for virtually his entire senatorial career. As with many BGGNs hiding out in the Republican Party, McCain likes to talk about smaller government, but his track record is littered with the promotion of one big government program after another. But, what else would one expect from a member of the Council on Foreign Relations (CFR)?

McCain has introduced two bills in the US Senate that are about as Machiavellian as they could be.

Lately, however, McCain has outdone himself. He has introduced two bills in the US Senate that are about as Machiavellian as they could be. I am referring to S.3081, a bill that would authorize the federal government to detain American citizens indefinitely without trial, and S.3002, a bill that would authorize the federal government to regulate vitamins, minerals, and virtually all health and natural food products.

According to Examiner.com, “John McCain introduced a bill into the U.S. Senate which, if passed, would actually allow U.S. citizens to be arrested and detained indefinitely, all without Miranda rights or ever being charged with a crime.”

The Examiner report continued by saying “This bill, introduced by McCain, who despite overwhelming evidence, claims to be a ‘conservative,’ would not only take away our right to a trial, but would also allow the federal government to arrest and imprison anyone the current administration deems hostile.

“Of course, that would be the same administration whose Homeland Security Secretary has classified veterans, retired law enforcement, Ron Paul [and Chuck Baldwin] supporters, and conservatives as ‘terrorists.’”

The Examiner report concluded by saying “If it was not clear before, it should be now that John McCain has as little respect for the Constitution as he does for our borders.”

Amen!

If McCain gets his way, your constitutional right to a speedy trial by jury is gone, as well as your constitutional right to Habeas Corpus. But, of course, they would attempt to justify this by claiming it is being done in the name of national security and the war on terrorism.

See the Examiner report at:

http://tinyurl.com/examiner-mccain-s3081

Regarding McCain’s desire for the federal government to take over the vitamin industry, attorney Jonathan Emord wrote, “If you had any doubt about whether John McCain is a limited government conservative, you may put that doubt to rest–he is not. On February 3, 2010, John McCain introduced to the United States Senate the Dietary Supplement Safety Act of 2010. Reflecting upon this poorly written bill, I am struck by the fact that John McCain apparently sees little difference between fissile material and dietary supplements. He is intent on regulating supplements as if they were radioactive enriched uranium rather than bioactive vitamins, minerals, amino acids, and botanicals that more often than not help people.

“The Dietary Supplement Safety Act of 2010 enjoys support from the most liberal members of Congress. It is an invitation for the FDA to assume broad new powers and replicate here the system now operating in Europe over dietary supplements where dietary ingredients are presumed adulterated and unlawful to sell unless pre-approved by the government. In short, good bye free enterprise, good bye limited government, and hello more heavy handed, arbitrary and punitive FDA bias against the beleaguered dietary supplement industry.”

See Emord’s column at:

http://www.newswithviews.com/Emord/jonathan118.htm

Please remember, this is the same John McCain who, during the 2008 Presidential campaign, said he would “order the secretary of the treasury to immediately buy up the bad home loan mortgages in America.” Of course, McCain didn’t explain where this authority would come from, because such a proposal has no legal or constitutional authority. And, by the way, this one little sentence, if implemented, would cost taxpayers some $300 billion.

McCain also said he wanted to tap Mr. Climate Change Wacko himself, Al Gore, “to work in his administration on developing a new and much tougher U.N.-sponsored global warming treaty.”

(Source: Cliff Kincaid. See his column at:

http://www.newswithviews.com/Kincaid/cliff260.htm )

This is the same John McCain who addressed the Hoover Institution on May 1, 2007, and said if he were elected President, he would create a new international organization known as the “League of Democracies” (LD).

In advancing the LD, McCain said, “We should go further and start bringing democratic peoples and nations from around the world into one common organization, a worldwide League of Democracies.” He then added, “The new League of Democracies would form the core of an international order . . .”

See McCain’s speech to the Hoover Institution at:

http://www.cfr.org/publication/13252/

If McCain and his CFR buddies get their way, this new LD would be a United Nations on steroids! As I said all over America on the campaign trail in 2008, “John McCain is a globalist.” Of course, so is Barack Obama. In fact, every President since (and including) George H.W. Bush has been a full-fledged, rotten-to-the-core globalist.

And, yes, this is the same John McCain who was one of the primary movers and shakers (along with Obama, Lindsey Graham, and G.W. Bush) who attempted (and would again) to provide amnesty to illegal aliens and open America’s borders to illegal immigration.

And now McCain wants the federal government to take over the vitamin industry, and he wants to give the federal government the power to jail American citizens indefinitely without trial.

The citizens of Arizona can do the American people–and liberty itself–a great favor this year by giving Senator John McCain his walking papers. Big-Government dinosaurs like McCain are an albatross around the neck of freedom and constitutional government. If we don’t send them packing now, the shackles they put around our throats will become insufferable.

Feds Dismissing Illegal Alien Cases



Bob Ellis
Dakota Voice
August 26, 2010

It seems the Democrats/socialists in Washington D.C. are in a full court press to ignore the law they are sworn to uphold and allow illegal aliens free access to and rein of our country.

We knew the Obama Administration was suing the state of Arizona for trying to help enforce the immigration and border control law that the federal government has been doing its best to ignore.

Then we caught wind of a draft memo which showed the feds working on a backdoor amnesty program for illegal aliens, and then yet another memo surfaced after that.

Now the Houston Chronicle reports the cases of many illegal aliens are being dismissed by the federal government:

The Department of Homeland Security is systematically reviewing thousands of pending immigration cases and moving to dismiss those filed against suspected illegal immigrants who have no serious criminal records, according to several sources familiar with the efforts.

Culling the immigration court system dockets of noncriminals started in earnest in Houston about a month ago and has stunned local immigration attorneys, who have reported coming to court anticipating clients’ deportations only to learn that the government was dismissing their cases.

Raed Gonzalez is an immigration attorney and the liaison between the Executive Office for Immigration Review. He is quoted in the article:

Gonzalez said he went into immigration court downtown on Monday and was given a court date in October 2011 for one client. But, he said, the government’s attorney requested the dismissal of that case and those of two more of his clients, and the cases were dispatched by the judge.

The court “was terminating all of the cases that came up,” Gonzalez said. “It was absolutely fantastic.”

“We’re all calling each other saying, ‘Can you believe this?’?” said John Nechman, another Houston immigration attorney, who had two cases dismissed.

Attorney Elizabeth Mendoza Macias, who has practiced in Houston for 17 years, said she had cases for several clients dismissed during the past month and eventually called DHS to find out what was going on. She said she was told by a DHS trial attorney that 2,500 cases were under review in Houston.

“I had five (dismissed) in one week, and two more that I just received,” Mendoza said. “And I am expecting many more, many more, in the next month.”

What effect will this non-enforcement have on the dedicated people in our government who are trying to do their jobs?

Tre Rebsock, the ICE union representative in Houston, said even if the efforts involve only a fraction of the pending immigration cases, “that’s going to make our officers feel even more powerless to enforce the laws.”

If only our government were half as determined and dedicated to enforce the law as they were to ignore it, we wouldn’t have much of a problem in this area.

I don’t like to throw around the term “impeachment” lightly because it is a very serious undertaking. However, I’m beginning to think more and more that impeachment may be necessary and appropriate for our elected leaders who refuse–REFUSE–to enforce our nation’s laws, protect our borders and keep the American people safe.

Article II Section 4 of the U.S. Constitution discusses impeachment for ” treason, bribery, or other high crimes and misdemeanors.”

The dictionary defines “treason” first as “the betrayal of a trust.” These officials hold a trust from the American people to keep their oath to uphold the Constitution and the laws of our nation, and they have betrayed it.

According to Wikipedia, “high crimes and misdemeanors,” among other things, “…gives aid or comfort to its enemies, or which injures the country to the profit of an individual or group. In democracies and similar societies it also includes crimes which attempt to alter the outcome of elections.” Someone who illegally invades our country could easily be defined as an enemy, and these officials are giving aid and comfort to them by allowing them unhindered entry and harbor. Many strongly believe the liberals who support this dereliction of duty also stand to profit from their inaction by encouraging a voter constituency that may end up voting for them–voting legally or illegally (what do illegal votes really matter to these liberals when they are already ignoring illegal entry to our country?). They are doing this to alter the outcome of elections.

So you see, impeachment of President Obama and his accomplices in congress for their dereliction of duty (something punishable as a crime in the military) is not such a stretch, is it?

And it’s something we may very well need to pursue next year, regardless of the outcome of the November elections.

Wednesday, August 25, 2010

Obama Hauls Arizona Before the UN Human Rights Council



Ben Johnson, Floyd Reports
America’s Independent Party
August 25, 2010

Apparently Barack Obama is not content to make a federal case out of his immigration feud with Arizona; he just made it an international one.

The president’s first-ever report on U.S. human rights to the UN Human Rights Council contains a rich vein of offensive material. So far, one aspect has not been reported: our petty president used the situation to bash Arizona’s immigration law — and possibly transfer jurisdiction over the law from Arizona to the UN. Throughout the report, which sounds like an Obama campaign speech, the president discusses “the original flaw” of the U.S. Constitution, America’s tolerance for slavery, and his version of our long and despicable history of discriminating against and oppressing minorities, women, homosexuals, and the handicapped. After each complaint, he addresses how he is delivering us from ourselves, patting himself on the back for such initiatives as ending “torture,” promoting Affirmative Action, and passing health care legislation.

In his section on “Values and Immigration,” he praised the Department of Homeland Security’s efforts to provide better medical care for detainees and increase “Alternatives To Detention” (e.g., letting them go). Then he turned to the one state that has had the temerity to stand in his way of fundamentally transforming the American electorate:

A recent Arizona law, S.B. 1070, has generated significant attention and debate at home and around the world. The issue is being addressed in a court action that argues that the federal government has the authority to set and enforce immigration law. That action is ongoing; parts of the law are currently enjoined.

On Obama’s command, Attorney General Eric Holder has sued the State of Arizona for passing a law that he criticized without reading, and which merely upholds federal law. (He gave sanctuary cities a pass.) He now threatens an additional lawsuit against Sheriff Joe Arpaio for “racial profiling” when arresting illegal immigrants near the Mexican border.

Obama’s turns his skirmish with Jan Brewer from a states rights dispute into an international human rights cause. It also places Arizona’s law in the hands of the United Nations.

The national report is but the first step of the international government’s review process. On November 5, the United States will be examined by a troika of UN bureaucrats from France, Japan, and Cameroon (an oppressive nation which is a member of the Organization of Islamic Conference). This trio will consider three items: Obama’s self-flagellating report, reports written about America by UN tribunals or international governing bodies, and testimony from NGOs with a pronounced anti-American bias. It will also consider “voluntary pledges and commitments made by the State,” such as suspending an Arizona state law.

Then the French, Japanese, and Cameroon diplomats will draw up a plan of action for the United States to implement.

Nations are re-examined every four years. The Human Rights Council looks for voluntary compliance. However, its website asserts, “The Human Rights Council will decide on the measures it would need to take in case of persistent non-cooperation by a State with the” World Body.

When the Left cannot win at the ballot box (virtually every time), it overrules the people in the courts. Now that Obama is not sure he can prevail in the courts, he has overruled the American people by hauling Arizona and the two-thirds of Americans who support its law before the United Nations.

Adventures in the “feel good” society



Jerry Mazza
Infowars.com
August 25, 2010

I like to watch the Yankees on TV. I used to like visiting the stadium until they built the uber billion dollar baby and the ticket prices, food and drink soared.

What I also don’t like, at home or at the stadium, is the extra hour of commercials, advertisements for the “feel good” society’s goods and services, urging perennially happy, smiling consumers to buy more cars, rebuild their houses at Home Depot, Live Better at Wal-Mart, drink more beer (hotties will love you) and in general keep chasing the hedonistic, pleasure-seeking dream of endless plenty. It’s over, kids. Get back to earth. Mom’s looking for you.

We had a total loss of 221,000 jobs last month, according to the New York Times. And “Friday’s (8/6/2010) jobs report renewed pressure on lawmakers to consider the next steps they might take to bolster the economy. Along with the consideration of aid to states (a $26 billion education package), a fierce discussion is still to come whether to let the tax cuts enacted under President George W. Bush expire at the end of the year.” Did anyone need to debate that except the multi-millionaires and billionaires and their lackey politicians? No.

Re the extra hour of commercials, my son and I discovered that when we went to see the ace minor league Brooklyn Cyclones housed in the Municipal Credit Union (MCU) field, the game came in at two hours and six minutes, with a searing shut-out by the Cyclones (Short-Season A classification New York – Penn League) against Buffalo, in a nine-inning game, with lots of great glove-flashing on both sides. Of course, we had some cheer-leaders and a chunky pitch man for the local car dealership. Even with that, it was beautiful.

Cyclones MCU Park comfortably seats five thousand fans, has wide aisles, easily accessed from Surf Avenue next to the boardwalk, the classic Cyclone roller coaster towards left field, the freshly-restored red parachute tower towards right field (sans parachutes), the Wonder Wheel in the distance (center field), with a view of the ocean. We sat 17 rows back from home plate in field box seats that cost about twelve bucks each, parking five, and a great sausage sandwich about six, drinks about four, which for the two of us wouldn’t get one mezzanine seat at Yankee Stadium, or one upper deck front row box seat.

The park also drew lots of nice families, moms, kids, grandpas, grandmas, and a general feeling of well-being that my old borough of Brooklyn is famous for. In fact, a line of kids ran on the field with the Cyclones, providing them with the biggest thrill of their young lives, waving as they faded off to the sidelines.

But, the plastic-flashing “feel good” crowd at Yankee Stadium is still whooping it up in the boxes and suites, which these days are often empty. Yet, out at the Cyclones Field, the working and middle classes are still enjoying life, without the Steinbrenner sting. And we are not missing that extra hour of wall to wall TV commercials that add to the length of the game, which the commissioner of baseball and other aficionados are always bemoaning is too long. So we can still take pleasure in living, and in a truly diverse crowd, as the dusk falls, the multi-colored lights fade up and the moon smiles down at us. Long may we live and propagate.

Of course, if you wanted to think bad thoughts, there was always Ben Bernanke printing money and trying to buy more “feel good” prosperity. Our “bought and paid” for” stock market and economic recovery came at the expense of massive government borrowing and spending. As, Mike Larson of Martin Weiss’s Money Markets writes, Fed Insanity Crushes Stocks!

It seems that neither the Fed nor the Federal Government can stop throwing money away in pointless wars in Iraq, Afghanistan, Pakistan, mercenary armies, financing tax cuts to the rich and blaming it on Social Security, from which they would love to steal even more money, cash, the real kind, not the funny money they’re using, that will come back to bite us in the rear one ugly day like the one on which the market tanked 777 points.

But nobody can say no to the boys in the pleasure dome (not the one in Coleridge’s poem, Xanadu), but in Washington, D.C. where the boys are partying hard in the stately pleasure dome of the Capital. In fact, you can read how hard some of the boys like Ramh and Obama are partying in Man’s Country, a 30-year old gay men’s bath house in uptown Chicago, article courtesy of the distinguished investigative reporter and ex-Navy Intelligence officer, Wayne Madsen. Or you can find it at lawyer/investigative journalist Tom Flocco’s Rummormillnews.com.

It is Mr. Madsen’s point of view that the corruption, moral bankruptcy, and depravity depicted in this tale puts our nation at risk of blackmailing by the wrong powers. And so the participants’ adventures in the “feel good” life of Chicago’s “boys’ town” are in fact seriously endangering us all. For those interested, the news is here. It concerns the flightiness of some of our major politicians and high members of White House staff, some of whom have escaped the D.C. Pleasure Dome of recent. But the tentacles of this male bath house extend far and wide as you will see, at least for as long as this link lasts.

Apart from that, we return to our “field of dreams,” which was built so we could come and enjoy ourselves in a modest manner. We are still here, playing the role of “the salt of the earth,” capable of living within our means, not pursuing murder as a career, or plunging our nation and the world into the hell of bankruptcy and depression. In other words, we are not the elites, the illuminati, the Bilderbergs, the New World Order. We are just folks, the glue of American life that holds this circus together with our taxes, labor and love day after day, year after year, as the charlatans come and go, “talking in the room of Michelangelo,” as Eliot would say.

And may I remind you, both New Yorkers and visitors, that only two short blocks from Cyclones Field you can find Nathan’s Hotdog Stand, with probably the best dogs and all the trimmings in the world. And before the boardwalk is totally privatized by real estate developers who feel the neighborhood has “soul,” a quality in short quantity in the “feel good society” of celluloid images, hyped marketing strategies, and daily corruption, y’all come out and see us.

P.S., sports fans, there is also the Staten Island Yankees team, a beautiful free ferry ride away in Richmond County Bank Ball Park. From there, you can not only see the game of tomorrow’s stars but the Bay of New York, liners going by, and Lady Liberty hold her torch up high in spite of it all, the creeps, the low-lifes, the ten percenters (as Hem called them), the skimmers, the closeted bad boys, the busted politicians, the Chicago gang, Obama booster Tony Rezko (now in solitary), et al. And the thing is, I believe we the people, the glue of this whole show who turn up at work every day, pay our taxes, do our jobs, raise our families, feel good within our skin, on our own dimes not OPM (Other People’s Money), are going to win the game in the long run.

In fact, despite the billionaires’ attempts to scuttle Social Security, Medicare, Medicaid, and all genuine entitlements, we shall overcome as King said, and live to see the rabble of the rich in the chains they have earned, that is from the boardrooms of Goldman Sachs on down to the cells of rendition prisons. Just hang in everybody and do the right thing, as Spike Lee would say. Do the right thing and that will make you feel really good, like maybe you never felt before.

Jerry Mazza is a freelance writer, life-long resident of New York City. His book “State Of Shock – Poems from 9/11 on” is available at www.jerrymazza.com, Amazon.com and Barnesandnoble.com. He has also written hundreds of articles on American and world politics as an Associate Editor of Online Journal.

Arizona Man Fights to Keep Gadsden Flag Flying Outside His Home



FoxNews.com
August 25, 2010

An Arizona man fighting to keep a historical American flag flying outside his home vows he will not take it down unless a judge orders him to.

Andy McDonel of Leveen, Ariz., says he received a letter from his homeowner’s association, Avalon
Village Community Association, on Aug. 6 instructing him to “remove debris” from his suburban Phoenix home within 10 days or face a $25 fine.

“They were talking about the Gadsden flag,” McDonel told Fox News on Wednesday. “I fly it to honor the Founding Fathers of America, you know, the perseverance they went through. They sacrificed their honor, their lives and their fortune to establish this great nation.”

4th Amendment Violating Mobile X-Ray Scanners Hit The Streets



Paul Joseph Watson
Prison Planet.com
Wednesday, August 25, 2010

As we warned at the beginning of the year, X-ray body scanners currently being used and abused in airports across the world are set to hit the streets as American Science & Engineering reveals that “more than 500 backscatter x-ray scanners mounted in vans that can be driven past neighboring vehicles to see their contents” have been sold to government agencies.

In January, we divulged how the ultimate end use of the body scanners would not be limited to airports, and that they were going to be rolled out on the streets as mobile units that would scan vehicles at checkpoints as well as individuals and crowds attending public events.

Dutch police announced that they were developing a mobile scanner that would “see through people’s clothing and look for concealed weapons” and that it would be used “as an alternative to random body searches in high risk areas”.

The device would also be used from a distance on groups of people “and mass scans on crowds at events such as football matches.”

The plans mirrored leaked documents out of the UK Home Office three years prior, which revealed that authorities in the UK were working on proposals to fit lamp posts with CCTV cameras that would X-ray scan passers-by and “undress them” in order to “trap terror suspects”.

Now, according to a Forbes report, backscatter x-ray vision devices mounted on trucks are already being deployed inside the United States to scan passing individuals and vehicles in complete violation of the Fourth Amendment.

American Science & Engineering, a company based in Billerica, Massachusetts, has sold many of the devices to U.S. law enforcement agencies, who are already using them on the streets for “security” purposes.

“Without a warrant, the government doesn’t have a right to peer beneath your clothes without probable cause,” points out Marc Rotenberg, executive director of EPIC. “Even airport scans are typically used only as a secondary security measure. If the scans can only be used in exceptional cases in airports, the idea that they can be used routinely on city streets is a very hard argument to make.”

Watch a video demonstration of the device below.



“The TSA’s official policy dictates that full-body scans must be viewed in a separate room from any guards dealing directly with subjects of the scans, and that the scanners won’t save any images,” states the report. “Just what sort of safeguards might be in place for AS&E’s scanning vans isn’t clear, given that the company won’t reveal just which law enforcement agencies, organizations within the DHS, or foreign governments have purchased the equipment.”

However, as we reported right from the start and as was confirmed earlier this month, federal authorities have been storing checkpoint body scan images all along, proving that their claim that no images could be stored or transmitted was an act of mass public deception in order to grease the skids for the rapid introduction of the devices after the botched and highly suspicious underwear bomber incident.

As we have constantly reiterated, everything that we see unfolding in the airports is eventually designed to be used on the streets. People who had a blasé attitude about the privacy-busting body scanners, behavioral interrogations, and intrusive pat-downs occurring in airports on the basis that they could avoid them by not flying face a rude awakening once all this is in their face on a daily basis.

Body and vehicle scanners are just one tool authorities plan to implement on a widespread basis as part of our deepening decline into a hi-tech militarized police state.

Homeland Security is already implementing technology to be enforced at “security events” which purportedly reads “malintent” on behalf of an individual who passes through a checkpoint. The video below explains how “Future Attribute Screening Technology” (FAST) checkpoints will conduct “physiological” and “behavioral” tests in order to weed out suspected terrorists and criminals.

The clip shows individuals who attend “security events” being led into trailers before they are interrogated as to whether they are terrorists while lie detector-style computer programs analyze their physiological responses. The subjects are asked about their whereabouts, and if they are attempting to smuggle bombs or recording devices into the “expo,” proving that the technology is intended to be used at public events and not just airports. Individuals who do not satisfy the first lie detector-style test are then asked “additional questions”.



The use of such technology is not only a complete violation of the Fourth Amendment, it also eviscerates the notion of innocent until proven guilty, and therefore totally undermines everything America stands for. Given the widespread abuse witnessed in the first eight months alone after the roll out of airport body scanners, Americans need to boycott the companies producing these systems and also resist their deployment at every turn.

Fourth Amendment lawsuits such as the one filed by EPIC against the naked body scanners should be used as a tool with which to ensure that such systems are never allowed to become commonplace, unless we wish to see supposedly free countries turned into high-tech prison grids ruled over by corrupt government enforcers who treat citizens as slaves.

Creeping Militarism Invades Alaska Grade School



Kurt Nimmo
Infowars.com
August 25, 2010

In 1787, Thomas Jefferson lamented the fact that the newly minted Constitution lacked any specific provisions on standing armies. “I do not like the omission of a Bill of Rights providing clearly and without the aid of sophisms for… protection against standing armies,” Jefferson wrote Madison. “The spirit of this country is totally adverse to a large military force,” he told Chandler Price in 1807.

A soldier works with a kindergarten student at Chester Valley Elementary School in Anchorage, Alaska.

Now? We relish large armies and enthusiastically send them out to kill people and break things around the world. The government and the corporate media encourage us to “support our troops” as they illegally occupy foreign lands and engage in war crimes. George Washington’s admonition, expressed in his Farewell Address, that the United States extend commercial relations and have with foreign nations as little political connection — to say nothing of military — as possible is almost entirely forgotten.

In violation of Posse Comitatus — a law in the spirit of Thomas Jefferson’s warning about the militarization of civil society — the Pentagon works hand-in-hand with local law enforcement. Increasingly, militarized police are becoming an extension of the Defense Department, the Department of Homeland Security, and even the CIA and the FBI. Few seem to understand the grave danger of this tendency.

Now the military has invaded our grade schools. “A new partnership between the Anchorage School District and the U.S. Army Alaska will add a military presence to local schools,” reports the Alaska Star. “School and military officials said the program will help students academically. But having uniformed military in schools also will lend support to children of military members on deployment, they said, and give non-military kids an understanding of what soldiers do for the country.”

If schools in Alaska want to help students academically, they would bring in scholars and education experts, not soldiers. Ideally, students should be home schooled and completely divorced from the pernicious influence of the military and the federal government.

The effort in Alaska has little to do with test scores and literacy. It’s about inculcating the young to the presence of the military. Contrary to the warnings of Jefferson — who knew standing armies will invariably be employed to enslave the people — the U.S. military has over the span of several decades crept into nearly every public aspect of life.

The military instinct in society is now second nature, so much so that a high school in South Carolina has automatically enrolled students in a Junior Reserve Officers Training Corps with little outrage or opposition. “The entire freshman class at Carvers Bay High School has been automatically enrolled in the Junior Reserve Officers Training Corps, a military-sponsored program that trains high school students in military discipline and concepts,” The Sun News in Myrtle Beach, South Carolina, reported this week.

“The breaking men to military discipline is breaking their spirits to principles of passive obedience,” Jefferson wrote John Jay in 1778.

It is not merely soldiers or would-be-soldiers in training who are expected to be passively obedient. In fact, the whole of society is now expected to react with passive obedience to an out of control military and federal government. A militarized police state — where soldiers and military technology are integrated within society — is sold to us as normal and admirable, especially since the advent of September 11, 2001 when cave-dwelling Muslims supposedly attacked us from afar.

Jefferson’s “supremacy of the civil over the military” is now a thing of the past. The Pentagon has not only invaded our high schools, but may now be found in our grade schools teaching the very young and impressionable.

Tuesday, August 24, 2010

Flu Plan Scandal Ahead: An Urgent Warning



Joseph Mercola
LewRockwell.com
August 24, 2010

Barbara Loe Fisher, founder of the National Vaccine Information Center, discusses the outcome of last year’s swine flu debacle, and the potentially harmful changes that are being made to this season’s flu vaccine as a result



Source: Barbara Fisher Interview Transcript

Dr. Mercola’s Comments:

The World Health Organization (WHO) declared the swine flu pandemic officially over on August 9th. The swine flu, which we were warned would kill millions, if not tens of millions of people, turned out to be a complete “dud” as far as pandemics go, but health agencies and governments around the world still managed to create massive fear of this hybrid flu virus.

And, of course, vaccine makers made millions off their novel H1N1 vaccines.

For those in the southern hemisphere, like Australia, the flu season has already begun, and the health hazards of this year’s seasonal trivalent vaccine have already become evident.

For the rest of you, the flu season is nearing, and another round of advertisements for flu vaccines are about to hit the media.

Summary of a Failed Pandemic

Last year the United States contracted for the manufacture of over 170 million doses of swine flu vaccine. Probably the most significant accomplishment of this website was that we were able to contribute to the fact that only 90 million doses were used in the United States.

Armed with the facts, less than one-third of the US population fell for the fear mongering.

It quickly became very clear that this was in fact a very mild disease that was not going to kill people in large numbers. Yet the projected number of casualties in the US alone was declared to be between 60,000 to 90,000! And the campaign to hype up the fear and force the untested, unproven pandemic vaccine on the masses through any means reached previously unheard of proportions.

Within a week of Australia reporting that the virus appeared to be 40 times less lethal than originally feared, the WHO instructed countries to simply stop lab confirming suspected H1N1 cases, which meant that any and all flu-like symptoms were reported as pandemic influenza, padding the statistics.

STILL, despite this misrepresentation of the facts, last year’s flu season turned out to be one of the mildest in recent years!

Mexican Bullets Shut Down El Paso



Newsvine.com
August 24, 2010

Yes, this is another dispatch from the war zone along the Mexican border (where I live in El Paso, right across from Juarez, Mexico–a stone’s throw, or bullet path, away).

This story–from events over the weekend, but still making news today in El Paso–is beyond belief. I thought things were bad when the El Paso City Hall was splattered with bullets from a firefight across the river. But this weekend El Paso police SHUT DOWN part of downtown El Paso because of flying bullets from a gun battle in a house on a hill in Juarez–a gun battle that evidently lasted 30 minutes and illed at least three people in Juarez. No one was–a matter of luck–killed in El Paso, although there are reports that a shattered car window may have been from a bullet. It is evidently estimated (no, they can’t know) that about 50 bullets came over the border into downtown El Paso.

And Obama has the GALL to tell me it is SAFER along the border. The man is a piece of work. I have lived in the El Paso area of the Southwest for approximately 50 years. At NO time, during that entire period, do I remember this kin of thing happening. I think the last time anything close to it happended were in the days of Pancho Villa.

Microchipping the Hip Hop Community



Dutch The Deacon
Infowars.com
August 24, 2010

On August 21st 2010 I attended an annual traveling hip hop festival in San Bernardino, Ca. known as Rock the Bells. The event which spanned 4 US cities this year including San Francisco, DC, and NYC was promoted by a company knows as Guerilla Union. Since it’s inception in 2004, Rock the Bells has been a place where fans of underground hip hop both classic and current can come and enjoy their favorite acts and be exposed to a plethora of art, fashion and counter culture paraphernalia all with no visible corporate sponsorship which adds to the appeal of the event. Some of the notable acts who performed this year and who are also friends of the Alex Jones show were Immortal Technique and KRS-ONE.

Well Guerilla Union has shown its true colors as it waved the flag of controlled opposition in the midst of 25,000 fans. As I entered the NOS Event Center which housed the event I was appalled to find that cash was not being accepted for the purchase of food or beverages, instead; concert goers were informed that they would need to take their Federal Reserve promissory notes and exchange them for credits which would be loaded onto a card deemed the “GU” card. These cards were available at booths located throughout the venue and in the middle of the scorching 98 degree heat; the long lines were an inconvenience to say the least. As I approached the counter the thought dawned on me so I asked,” What if I have money on my card that I don’t use?” in which the reply was, “Oh don’t’ worry you can go to the booths marked refund at any time and they will give you the cash back.”

So here I am with my card which by the way had what looked to be a small microchip etched on the front of it and yy this time I was thirsty and in need of refreshment. I approached the concession stand and ordered a beer. The attendant took my card, slid it into a machine and said, “Ok your balance is $87.59.” That’s right amongst other crimes against humanity beers were warm and cost $12.50 for 20 oz.

Feeling outraged and confused by the fact that I was at an underground hip hop event being promoted by a company that I had come to know as one that went against the grain and snubbed its nose at the establishment, I proceeded to ask those around me how they felt about this GU card and the overwhelming consensus was what I expected one of disdain and disbelief.

After watching a few acts in the all but unbearable sun, hunger started to kick in. My wife and I scanned the vendors in search of something that sounded appealing and with a short line and we came upon a BBQ stand offering what looked to be a nice selection of delectable eats. In line in front of us was a pair of event staff employees as indicated by their apparel. We struck up a conversation regarding the GU card and how what money making scheme it was since most people wouldn’t be willing to stand in a long line to get the balance that remained on their card at the end of the night. One of the staff members defended the card and said,”Hey it’s my money and if I want it I’ll go get it!” I tried to explain my position and went into the fact that this was prophetic and a sign of things to come only to be met with sneers chuckles as if I was some weird conspiracy nut which is a typical response from the uninformed masses. Well wouldn’t ya know as if by design people in the line started leaving and saying as they passed by, “The powers out and no one can get food!” WHAT!?!? I couldn’t believe what was unfolding in front of my eyes.

I stayed in line waiting for my chance to as the concession stand attendant what the heck was going on! As we approached the front of the line I could hear the woman behind the counter saying, sorry the power is out we cannot serve anyone right now.” Just as she said this the two employees in front of me pulled out a card of their own. This card was very different, it was red in color but I could not make out what it said but was shocked at what played out next.

The gentleman flashed his card to the attendant and asked, “what about this card?” to which the woman replied, Oh sure we can take that card no problem” and proceeded to get the man and his co-worker a plate of food! I spoke with the woman and asked her when she expected the power back up to which she replied, “I have no idea”. I looked at the woman and told her “This is crazy; you don’t see anything wrong with this?” She had no response for me and as I made remarks regarding the prophetic nature of the event and how this was a sign of things to come I could see the event worker who at this time was enjoying his food shake his head as if to say this guy is crazy.

The hip -hop community has been targeted for indoctrination into the new world order!! If you look at Guerrilla Union’s Facebook page you will see some of the dissatisfaction. Coincidentally, you can no longer leave a message on their page!

This is dutch the deacon reporting to you live from the belly of the beast!!

Keep up the fight! Long live the Republic and the INFOWAR!!

Obama gains foreign support against 2nd Amendment


Obama and Mexican president Felipe Calderón.

JT Coyoté
Infowars.com
August 23, 2010

Virtually out of the inaugural gate, President Obama picked up the anti Second Amendment gauntlet and held it high on his first trip to Mexico City in April of 2009. In a meeting with Mexican President Felipe Calderón, he promised to urge the U.S. Senate to pass the international arms control agreement signed by Bill Clinton in 1997.

This agreement is titled the “Inter-American Convention Against the Illicit Manufacturing of and Trafficking in Firearms, Ammunition, Explosives, and Other Related Materials” better known as CIFTA. Though signed, it was thankfully never ratified by the Senate. This regional treaty, was adopted by the Organization of American States, yet the US and four other member states have not ratified it, at last accounting. Among the notable sticking points are disagreement over the lapsed U.S. assault weapons ban, cross-border trucking between Mexico and the US, and the ever present illegal drug and illegal immigration problem.

So now, to make this all palatable to the American People, it is couched in the rhetoric of fighting the international Drug War. An attempt to rationalize under the auspices of solving drug violence in Mexico the curtailing of firearms ownership in America. Blaming Americans not only as the market for illegal drug traffic from Mexico, but as the source of illegal firearms going back into Mexico. Yet, it is a well known fact that most firearms on the Mexican streets are supplied by European and Chinese arms manufacturers with little if any coming from, or through the legal arms network in America. However, much of the arms, munitions, helicopters, armored personnel carriers, and other “policing” paraphernalia utilized by the Mexican government is supplied by the U.S. government.

With that said, if this treaty is ratified and the U.S. is found to be in violation of even one small provision — like the provision that would outlaw ammunition reloading without a federal license — this treaty would empower the President to implement regulatory policy, law, without the approval of Congress. A dictatorial power to be sure, that will not stop the violence in Mexico, the border states, nor will it stop the flow of illegal drugs into America. It will only erode away at the Constitution and further disarm the law abiding American People.

With his latest over arching attack on the 2nd Amendment, President Obama is blocking a trade deal between arms merchants here in the U.S. and South Korea. He is wooing the South Korean government into blocking the deal. To stop the lawful purchase of 100,000 World War Two era, surplus M1 Garand and M1 Carbine rifles destined for the curio firearms market here in The States. He is disallowing the return of these antique American made auto-loaders, the very first of their kind, desirable and useful relics of a bygone time — this is unbelievable.

This President will pull out the stops to block legal relic firearms from importation into the U.S. through legal channels, but will not lift a finger to stop the illegal drug and illegal immigration traffic across our southern border. Perhaps the president is seeking to get these World War Two relic arms re-directed into the illegal Mexican arms market, so when giving a speech at a future treaty summit on arms control in the Americas, he can say in condemnation, that actual U.S. made arms are being used in Mexico.

Alexander Hamilton has the last word on this. He was right on the money when he stated, “The only constitutional exception to the power of making treaties is that it shall not change the Constitution…”

Monday, August 23, 2010

Serj Tankian - Empty Walls

Complete History Of The Soviet Union, Arranged To The Melody Of Tetris

Tea Party Sweeping US, Anger at GOP



Newsmax
August 22, 2010

The Wall Street Journal’s John Fund writes about “America’s Insurgent Pollster,” Scott Rasmussen.

Key points:

Rasmussen says “that only 23 percent of the people in this country believe today’s federal government has the consent of the governed.

“Americans don’t want to be governed from the left or the right,” Scott Rasmussen tells the American Legislative Exchange Council, a conference of 1,500 conservative and moderate legislators. “They want, like the Founding Fathers, to largely govern themselves with Washington in a supporting — but not dominant — role. The tea party movement is today’s updated expression of that sentiment.”

Fox News co-owner funded ‘Ground Zero mosque’ imam



Raw Story
August 22, 2010

The second largest shareholder in News Corp. — the parent company of Fox News — has donated hundreds of thousands of dollars to causes linked to the imam planning to build a Muslim community center and mosque near Ground Zero in Manhattan, says a report from Yahoo!News.

According to the report from Yahoo!’s John Cook, Saudi Prince Al-Waleed bin Talal, who owns seven percent of News Corp., “has directly funded [Imam Feisal Abdul] Rauf’s projects to the tune of more than $300,000.”

Cook reports that Prince Al-Waleed’s personal charity, the Kingdom Foundation, donated $305,000 to Muslim Leaders of Tomorrow, a project sponsored by two of Rauf’s initiatives, the American Society for Muslim Advancement and the Cordoba Initiative, which is building the Manhattan mosque.

Toxic legacy of US assault on Fallujah ‘worse than Hiroshima’



Patrick Cockburn
The Independent
August 22, 2010

Dramatic increases in infant mortality, cancer and leukaemia in the Iraqi city of Fallujah, which was bombarded by US Marines in 2004, exceed those reported by survivors of the atomic bombs that were dropped on Hiroshima and Nagasaki in 1945, according to a new study.

Iraqi doctors in Fallujah have complained since 2005 of being overwhelmed by the number of babies with serious birth defects, ranging from a girl born with two heads to paralysis of the lower limbs. They said they were also seeing far more cancers than they did before the battle for Fallujah between US troops and insurgents.

Their claims have been supported by a survey showing a four-fold increase in all cancers and a 12-fold increase in childhood cancer in under-14s. Infant mortality in the city is more than four times higher than in neighbouring Jordan and eight times higher than in Kuwait.

Dr Chris Busby, a visiting professor at the University of Ulster and one of the authors of the survey of 4,800 individuals in Fallujah, said it is difficult to pin down the exact cause of the cancers and birth defects. He added that "to produce an effect like this, some very major mutagenic exposure must have occurred in 2004 when the attacks happened".

US Marines first besieged and bombarded Fallujah, 30 miles west of Baghdad, in April 2004 after four employees of the American security company Blackwater were killed and their bodies burned. After an eight-month stand-off, the Marines stormed the city in November using artillery and aerial bombing against rebel positions. US forces later admitted that they had employed white phosphorus as well as other munitions.

In the assault US commanders largely treated Fallujah as a free-fire zone to try to reduce casualties among their own troops. British officers were appalled by the lack of concern for civilian casualties. "During preparatory operations in the November 2004 Fallujah clearance operation, on one night over 40 155mm artillery rounds were fired into a small sector of the city," recalled Brigadier Nigel Aylwin-Foster, a British commander serving with the American forces in Baghdad.

He added that the US commander who ordered this devastating use of firepower did not consider it significant enough to mention it in his daily report to the US general in command. Dr Busby says that while he cannot identify the type of armaments used by the Marines, the extent of genetic damage suffered by inhabitants suggests the use of uranium in some form. He said: "My guess is that they used a new weapon against buildings to break through walls and kill those inside."

The survey was carried out by a team of 11 researchers in January and February this year who visited 711 houses in Fallujah. A questionnaire was filled in by householders giving details of cancers, birth outcomes and infant mortality. Hitherto the Iraqi government has been loath to respond to complaints from civilians about damage to their health during military operations.

Researchers were initially regarded with some suspicion by locals, particularly after a Baghdad television station broadcast a report saying a survey was being carried out by terrorists and anybody conducting it or answering questions would be arrested. Those organising the survey subsequently arranged to be accompanied by a person of standing in the community to allay suspicions.

The study, entitled "Cancer, Infant Mortality and Birth Sex-Ratio in Fallujah, Iraq 2005-2009", is by Dr Busby, Malak Hamdan and Entesar Ariabi, and concludes that anecdotal evidence of a sharp rise in cancer and congenital birth defects is correct. Infant mortality was found to be 80 per 1,000 births compared to 19 in Egypt, 17 in Jordan and 9.7 in Kuwait. The report says that the types of cancer are "similar to that in the Hiroshima survivors who were exposed to ionising radiation from the bomb and uranium in the fallout".

Researchers found a 38-fold increase in leukaemia, a ten-fold increase in female breast cancer and significant increases in lymphoma and brain tumours in adults. At Hiroshima survivors showed a 17-fold increase in leukaemia, but in Fallujah Dr Busby says what is striking is not only the greater prevalence of cancer but the speed with which it was affecting people.

Of particular significance was the finding that the sex ratio between newborn boys and girls had changed. In a normal population this is 1,050 boys born to 1,000 girls, but for those born from 2005 there was an 18 per cent drop in male births, so the ratio was 850 males to 1,000 females. The sex-ratio is an indicator of genetic damage that affects boys more than girls. A similar change in the sex-ratio was discovered after Hiroshima.

The US cut back on its use of firepower in Iraq from 2007 because of the anger it provoked among civilians. But at the same time there has been a decline in healthcare and sanitary conditions in Iraq since 2003. The impact of war on civilians was more severe in Fallujah than anywhere else in Iraq because the city continued to be blockaded and cut off from the rest of the country long after 2004. War damage was only slowly repaired and people from the city were frightened to go to hospitals in Baghdad because of military checkpoints on the road into the capital.