Rebel Newsflash: Did 9/11 Justify the War in Afghanistan? (plus 66 more items) |  |
- Did 9/11 Justify the War in Afghanistan?
- Palestinian Refugees in Lebanon: Righting a Perpetual Wrong
- The Canadian Century
- Obama Can Shut Down Internet For 4 Months Under New Emergency Powers
- Toronto Transformed Into Locked Down Police State
- It Amazes Me How Israel Shamir Manages to Be So Right About So Much and Still Manages to Be So Wrong in His Final Analyses
- Turkey, America, and Empire's Twilight
- It's Time to Step up Diplomacy with Iran
- Welcome to 'Gasland': it could kill you!
- Congressman Rohrabacher: Almost All House Republicans Think Iraq War Illegal, Immoral
- The Torture of Abu Zubaydah: The Complaint Filed Against James Mitchell for Ethical Violations
- Oil Industry Insider and CFR Member Predicts Gulf Evacuation
- Occupied Palestine: Good News and Bad
- Lord Christopher Monckton: Real Data Disproves Al Gore's Global Warming Theory
- McChrystal Out, Monsatan, Napolitano vs. Franklin
- A Creepy Thought
- Breaking the Grip of the Jewish Intellectual Cultural Hegemony Machine
- Another Failed President?
- 'Americans Don't Flinch' – They Duck!
- Obama Misses the Afghan Exit Ramp
- Still Mesmerized by WMDs
- Why I Hate Harry Truman
- Israelis Keep the Trigger Tight
- Alan, Bob or Henry?: 'Would Jesus Concur Or Weep?' Revisited
- Gaza: Dangers of Foreign Influence?
- Global Pentagon Manhunt
- The Destruction of U.S. Border States
- WATCH OUT FEDERAL RESERVE: Senate agrees to expanded 'Audit the Fed' provision
- The Karzai Factor
- The David Petraeus I Know
- Lord Christopher Monckton: The Global Warming Take Over Grid - Alex Jones Tv 1/6
- Israel has missed every opportunity to free Shalit
- The public is dumb and therefore the public pays
- Moral Debts and Ethical Deficits
- Judge Andrew Napolitano: Obama's Impeachable Offenses Mount
- The LWOT: Faisal Shahzad pleads guilty; Supreme Court upholds "material support" law
- Fake calls to "ease" the Gaza siege
- The Oliver Stone Show
- Is Petraeus McChrystal's Replacement or Obama's
- Methane and Martial Law in the Gulf of Mexico
- Should Judge Martin Feldman be Impeached?
- Shep Smith 'Grossed Out' by Judge Napolitano 'Blaming Government, Standing Up for BP'
- Muddy Palestinian Authority Involvement in Gaza Blockade
- What Lies Ahead: A New Massacre or a Genocidal War?
- Naked Insecurity
- Beijing's Fake Media Reform
- What Really Happened in Urumqi?
- Our Ocean in Revery and Neglect
- What if Israel is behind the terrorists?
- Cops Resort To Planet of the Apes Style Policing To Let The Scum Public Know Who Their Bosses Are
- The Afghanistan Clock
- Towards the Eighteenth Brumaire of General David Petraeus?
- Thursday: 22 Iraqis Killed, 33 Wounded
- Thursday: 24 Iraqis Killed, 33 Wounded
- Film Maker Captures Absurdity, Empty Threats Of Police Terror Stop Laws
- Getting Beyond the Usual Suspects on Foreign Policy
- America Detached from War
- 'Manchurian Candidate' Shahzad confesses all
- Israel's Dubious Investigation of Flotilla Attack
- Is Success in Afghanistan Really a Question of Command?
- Kagan Calls Israeli Judge Dredd "My Judicial Hero"
- Petraeus Harbinger of Peace, Not Another Surge?
- High Court Injustice
- Rewriting Afghanistan's narrative, Why not love?
- From Great Man to Great Screwup: Behind the McChrystal Uproar
- DISCLOSE ACT Passed By House Today Compromises Free Speech
- An African iPhone? There's No App for That.
| Did 9/11 Justify the War in Afghanistan? Posted: 25 Jun 2010 10:13 AM PDT
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| Palestinian Refugees in Lebanon: Righting a Perpetual Wrong Posted: 25 Jun 2010 09:24 AM PDT
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| Posted: 25 Jun 2010 08:25 AM PDT  What the United States could learn from its northern neighbor. At the beginning of the 20th century, Canada was one of the richest countries in the world, enjoying boundless natural resources, a privileged place in the commercial empire established by still-dominant Britain, and access to the energetic American market. Against this backdrop, it didn't seem unreasonably boastful in 1904 when Prime Minister Wilfrid Laurier proclaimed that "the 20th century shall be filled by Canada." |
| Obama Can Shut Down Internet For 4 Months Under New Emergency Powers Posted: 25 Jun 2010 05:09 AM PDT  President Obama will be handed the power to shut down the Internet for at least four months without Congressional oversight if the Senate votes for the infamous Internet 'kill switch' bill, which was approved by a key Senate committee yesterday and now moves to the floor. The Protecting Cyberspace as a National Asset Act, which is being pushed hard by Senator Joe Lieberman, would hand absolute power to the federal government to close down networks, and block incoming Internet traffic from certain countries under a declared national emergency. |
| Toronto Transformed Into Locked Down Police State Posted: 25 Jun 2010 05:08 AM PDT
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| Posted: 25 Jun 2010 04:27 AM PDT  Israel Shamir has recently published an article which echoes many things which I have been saying for years and which agrees with my assessment of more recent events, including the gifts the Jews gave to Russia. Once before, I sharply criticized Mr. Shamir for telling us Ron Paul is our savior, and to his credit, he republished what I had to say. Here is Shamir's more recent statement, which agrees in many ways with what I have said before him: |
| Turkey, America, and Empire's Twilight Posted: 25 Jun 2010 03:05 AM PDT  When U.S. forces found themselves beset by a growing insurgency in Iraq following their lighting overthrow of Saddam Hussein, the most obvious parallel that came to mind was Vietnam: an occupying army, far from home, besieged by a shadowy foe. But Patrick Cockburn, the Independent's (UK) ace Middle East reporter, suggested that the escalating chaos was more like the Boer War than the conflict in Southeast Asia. It was a parallel that was lost on most Americans, very few of whom know anything about the short, savage, turn-of-the-century war between Dutch settlers and the British Empire in South Africa. |
| It's Time to Step up Diplomacy with Iran Posted: 25 Jun 2010 02:17 AM PDT  Things are heating up for Iran. The international community, responding to doubts over the intentions of the Iranian nuclear program, has passed three sanctions packages over the past three weeks. The United Nations Security Council began the push by passing a fourth round of sanctions against Iran, improving upon previous sanctions resolutions by limiting weapons shipments, tightening restrictions on shipping companies that work as front companies for illicit nuclear trade, and freezing the assets of specific individuals and entities linked to prohibited activity. |
| Welcome to 'Gasland': it could kill you! Posted: 25 Jun 2010 02:08 AM PDT  No, Gasland is not an unsafe theme park. It's the title of a jolting new documentary by filmmaker Josh Fox, which premiered on HBO a few nights ago. It left me with a sickening feeling about the industry that drills for natural gas. It makes you want to look at the list of countries you could move to. But then you say, hey, this is my country, too, made for you and me, as the song goes, so let's do something about this. |
| Congressman Rohrabacher: Almost All House Republicans Think Iraq War Illegal, Immoral Posted: 25 Jun 2010 12:24 AM PDT  Judge Andrew Napolitano's new Saturday show on the Fox Business Network is set to send shock waves through the political establishment this weekend when his guest – Republican Congressman Dana Rohrabacher – reveals that almost all House Republicans now believe that the invasion of Iraq was not only a mistake, but also illegal and immoral. |
| The Torture of Abu Zubaydah: The Complaint Filed Against James Mitchell for Ethical Violations Posted: 25 Jun 2010 12:10 AM PDT  To complement my recent article, "Abu Zubaydah and the Case Against Torture Architect James Mitchell ," analyzing the complaint filed with the Texas State Board of Examiners of Psychologists regarding ethical violations by Dr. James Elmer Mitchell, one of the architects of the Bush administration's torture program, I'm reproducing below the full complaint, primarily, as I explained in my article, "because of its detailed explanations of Mitchell's unprofessional activities," but also because it "covers extensively what was actually involved in the torture of Abu Zubaydah," beyond the short summary I cited at the start of my article. A PDF of the complaint is here . Please note that I have included hyperlinks and references where possible, but see the original for the full footnotes. This posting includes an audio/video/photo media file: Download Now |
| Oil Industry Insider and CFR Member Predicts Gulf Evacuation Posted: 24 Jun 2010 11:25 PM PDT 
Buried in an article on Gulf of Mexico scenarios and predictions, Joel Achenbach of the Washington Post quotes Matthew Simmons, founder and chairman emeritus of Simmons & Company International. In response to a tropical storm brewing in the Caribbean, Simmons says: "We're going to have to evacuate the gulf states. Can you imagine evacuating 20 million people?… This story is 80 times worse than I thought." |
| Occupied Palestine: Good News and Bad Posted: 24 Jun 2010 09:54 PM PDT  First the good. On June 22, the International Middle East Media Center reported that the UN Human Rights Council (that established the Goldstone Commission) approved "forming an international committee to probe the deadly Israeli" Flotilla attack, massacring and injuring dozens of nonviolent activists on board. Israel's Defense Minister Ehud Barak urged Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon to shelve it, saying: |
| Lord Christopher Monckton: Real Data Disproves Al Gore's Global Warming Theory Posted: 24 Jun 2010 09:05 PM PDT
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| McChrystal Out, Monsatan, Napolitano vs. Franklin Posted: 24 Jun 2010 08:50 PM PDT
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| Posted: 24 Jun 2010 08:15 PM PDT  Running a web based dissident site like Rebel News, I'm often wondering what is going to happen to the Internet. There are obviously some folks out there amongst our enemies that profoundly dislike how alternative media sites like ours have started to replace traditional corporate and government sponsored media. CNN, a quasi-corporate extension of the U.S. Department of Defence, for example is losing customers at a rate of 50% per annum. This doesn't just harm their advertising revenue, irrespective of the state of the economy, but renders them useless as a brainwashing tool of our ruling crime families. No wonder, people like Judeo-Fascist media tsar Rupert Murdoch have declared war to the alternative media. |
| Breaking the Grip of the Jewish Intellectual Cultural Hegemony Machine Posted: 24 Jun 2010 07:54 PM PDT  I came across an article in the Hoover institution's Policy Review entitled 'The Tea Party vs. the Intellectuals' by Lee Harris, who has recently written a book entitled The Next American Civil War: The Populist Revolt Against the Liberal Elite. Although the right has historically attempted to combat the brainwashing forces of the liberal intellectual elites on their own terms, the current social upheaval is something else: |
| Posted: 24 Jun 2010 07:00 PM PDT  In Year One of the Reagan Revolution, in which he was a shining star, Budget Director David Stockman told reporter William Greider: "Kemp-Roth (President Reagan's 1981 tax cut) was always a Trojan horse to bring down the top rate. ... It's kind of hard to sell 'trickle down.' So the supply-side formula was the only way to get a tax policy that was really 'trickle down.' Supply-side is 'trickle-down' theory." An astounding admission. The president's principal salesman of tax cuts was confessing that the altarpiece of the Reagan policy was a ruse — to cut tax rates of the richest Americans. |
| 'Americans Don't Flinch' – They Duck! Posted: 24 Jun 2010 06:00 PM PDT  Yesterday, accepting General McChrystal's resignation, President Obama said that McChrystal's departure represented a change in personnel, not a change in policy. "Americans don't flinch in the face of difficult truths or difficult tasks." he stated, "We persist and we persevere." Yet, President Obama and the U.S. people don't face up to the ugly truth that, in Afghanistan, the U.S. has routinely committed atrocities against innocent civilians. By ducking that truth, the U.S. reinforces a sense of exceptionalism, which, in other parts of the world, causes resentment and antagonism. |
| Obama Misses the Afghan Exit Ramp Posted: 24 Jun 2010 06:00 PM PDT  Is President Barack Obama so dense that he could not see why Gen. Stanley McChrystal might actually have wanted to be fired — and rescued from the current March of Folly in Afghanistan, a mess much of his own making? McChrystal leaves behind a long trail of broken promises and unfulfilled expectations. For example, there is no real security, at least during the night, in Marja, which McChrystal devoted enormous resources to conquer this spring. |
| Posted: 24 Jun 2010 06:00 PM PDT In the aftermath of 9/11, the Bush administration raised the specter of weapons of mass destruction (WMDs) – nuclear, chemical, and biological weapons – as the gravest threat to America. In his "axis of evil" State of the Union Address in January 2002, President Bush said: "States like these [North Korea, Iraq, and Iran], and their terrorist allies, constitute an axis of evil, arming to threaten the peace of the world. By seeking weapons of mass destruction, these regimes pose a grave and growing danger. They could provide these arms to terrorists, giving them the means to match their hatred. They could attack our allies or attempt to blackmail the United States. In any of these cases, the price of indifference would be catastrophic." |
| Posted: 24 Jun 2010 06:00 PM PDT  Today is the sixtieth anniversary of the war that never ended – the Korean war, to be exact, the first real face-to-face armed conflict of the cold war era. Although a truce was declared, a peace treaty was never signed, and the threat that Harry Truman's war will erupt once more hangs over our heads to this day. Yet the North Koreans are a threat mainly to themselves, as they rail and rant and launch provocations that are almost comical in their extravagance: Pyongyang, which routinely threatens to incinerate the South, has elevated bellicosity into an art form. However, these odd relics of a half-forgotten past are not what haunts us today: after all, the Korean peninsula is on the outer fringes of the Empire, and what happens there is of little consequence to most Americans. What has the Korean war to do with us, in the here and now? |
| Israelis Keep the Trigger Tight Posted: 24 Jun 2010 06:00 PM PDT  "Where is my daddy? Why is he not coming home? I want my daddy," sobs seven-year-old Yasmin, her big blue eyes filling with tears. She wakes up crying every night. "My life only began when I met him. I will never meet such a wonderful man again," Yasmin's mother Moira Julani tells IPS. |
| Alan, Bob or Henry?: 'Would Jesus Concur Or Weep?' Revisited Posted: 24 Jun 2010 05:45 PM PDT
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| Gaza: Dangers of Foreign Influence? Posted: 24 Jun 2010 05:38 PM PDT
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| Posted: 24 Jun 2010 03:59 PM PDT  The founder of a popular web site, which was set up for government, corporate and religious whistleblowers to leak classified documents that would otherwise have been buried, has been forced into hiding out of fear that his life is in grave danger following reports that the U.S. military is out to get him. During a June 18 telephone interview from Reykjavik, Iceland, Birgitta Jonsdottir described to this writer how a Pentagon "manhunt" for WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange has forced him to go underground. |
| The Destruction of U.S. Border States Posted: 24 Jun 2010 03:59 PM PDT
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| WATCH OUT FEDERAL RESERVE: Senate agrees to expanded 'Audit the Fed' provision Posted: 24 Jun 2010 03:59 PM PDT GREAT NEWS: the Senate committee that is currently working on a compromise Wall Street reform bill to reconcile with the House version has agreed to expand an audit of the privately owned and controlled Federal Reserve. While still not a total probe of the Federal Reserve System, the measure is being sold as a first step toward complete transparency of the U.S. central bank. Both the Senate and the House have already passed legislation that is intended to rein in the casino-like behavior on Wall Street. However, these two bills are noticeably different and have to be worked out in committee. |
| Posted: 24 Jun 2010 12:30 PM PDT  The Afghan president just lost his best friend in the U.S. government. And he's not happy about it. McChrystal is out. Petraeus is in. And Karzai is Karzai. |
| Posted: 24 Jun 2010 12:05 PM PDT 
From February 2007 to May 2008, Peter Mansoor was Gen. David Petraeus's right-hand man in Iraq. Now a retired U.S. Army colonel teaching at Ohio State University, Mansoor worked closely with Petraeus as the general's executive officer, assisting with the implementation of the "surge" strategy and preparing his congressional testimony -- including the grueling hearings in September 2007 that Petraeus later said were "the most miserable experience of my life." FP senior editor Benjamin Pauker caught up with Mansoor in the wake of Petraeus's dramatic nomination to take over command of U.S. forces in Afghanistan from Gen. Stanley McChrystal, who was fired by President Obama in the wake of a Rolling Stone profile gone wrong. |
| Lord Christopher Monckton: The Global Warming Take Over Grid - Alex Jones Tv 1/6 Posted: 24 Jun 2010 11:51 AM PDT
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| Israel has missed every opportunity to free Shalit Posted: 24 Jun 2010 11:19 AM PDT  The negotiations on the swap deal to free captive IDF soldier Gilad Shalit have been stuck since December; the way things look now, the affair is likely to drag on indefinitely. The negotiations on the swap deal to free captive soldier Gilad Shalit have been stuck since December. As far as is known publicly, nothing significant has happened since German mediator Gerhard Conrad gave Hamas Israel's answer (positive but with conditions ). |
| The public is dumb and therefore the public pays Posted: 24 Jun 2010 11:19 AM PDT  Having lost hope due to Prime Minister Netanyahu's deceit and trickery, perhaps the Israeli public will finally start to ask: Where to? And why? If the Israeli public accepts all of Netanyahu's initial claims with alarming apathy and blind obedience and then hastens to automatically adopt the exact opposite, then the prime minister is correct in his conclusion. And if the public is not even insulted by its prime minister's humiliating, disparaging and arrogant treatment of it, then indeed this is "an accident for the country" as the unfortunate policeman says to Artzieli the son, in the abovementioned song. |
| Moral Debts and Ethical Deficits Posted: 24 Jun 2010 11:11 AM PDT  Our heads are filled with stories about the danger of trillions of dollars in debt and deficits , with little if any mention of the real problem they represent. It is not the debt but what we are indebted for that threatens the future of our nation . If we owed hundreds of trillions of dollars - which may soon be the case - and every American was employed, housed, educated, cared for without question in time of ill health or economic need and safe from warfare and violence from inside the nation or out , such debt would not be any problem at all. |
| Judge Andrew Napolitano: Obama's Impeachable Offenses Mount Posted: 24 Jun 2010 11:10 AM PDT
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| The LWOT: Faisal Shahzad pleads guilty; Supreme Court upholds "material support" law Posted: 24 Jun 2010 10:43 AM PDT
This posting includes an audio/video/photo media file: Download Now |
| Fake calls to "ease" the Gaza siege Posted: 24 Jun 2010 09:44 AM PDT
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| Posted: 24 Jun 2010 09:41 AM PDT  South of the Border is no portrait of Hugo Chávez or the Latin American left; it's about how one U.S. director views the world. By far the most amusing scene in Oliver Stone's new documentary, South of the Border, features Venezuelan President Hugo Chávez riding what looks like a child's bike around his boyhood home in one of the country's poorer neighborhoods, or barrios. About mid-lap around the empty field where his home once was, now overrun with weeds, the bike buckles under Chávez's weight. He falls to the ground, landing on top of the now-disattached tires. The president erupts into chuckles, between laughs saying that it has collapsed under him. And now, he says, "Tengo que pagar!" -- joking that he'll have to pay for the broken bike, as if it were a vase he dropped at an expensive store. |
| Is Petraeus McChrystal's Replacement or Obama's Posted: 24 Jun 2010 09:37 AM PDT
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| Methane and Martial Law in the Gulf of Mexico Posted: 24 Jun 2010 09:26 AM PDT  Earlier this week Reuters reported on a massive amount of methane discovered in the Gulf of Mexico. Texas A&M University oceanography professor John Kessler said methane gas levels in some areas are "astonishingly high." Kessler recently returned from a 10-day research expedition near the BP oil gusher. Kessler's team measured both surface and deep water within a 5-mile (8 kilometer) radius of BP's destroyed wellhead. "There is an incredible amount of methane in there," Kessler told reporters. He said the level may be as much as one million times the normal level. |
| Should Judge Martin Feldman be Impeached? Posted: 24 Jun 2010 09:22 AM PDT  U.S. District Court Judge Martin Feldman, a 1983 Reagan appointee to the federal bench, issued what, on its face, would have to be regarded as an astounding decision [PDF] in which he blocked a six month moratorium on deep water off shore drilling, ruling that the Department of the Interior had erroneously assumed that because one rig failed, there was an imminent danger of others failing as well. This posting includes an audio/video/photo media file: Download Now |
| Shep Smith 'Grossed Out' by Judge Napolitano 'Blaming Government, Standing Up for BP' Posted: 24 Jun 2010 08:59 AM PDT Good for him. Now, at some point, he needs to hold his own "news" channel accountable for all the damage they've done as well... Eric Boehlert at Media Matters has some related thoughts on whether the BP disaster will turn out to be Fox's "tipping point".
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| Muddy Palestinian Authority Involvement in Gaza Blockade Posted: 24 Jun 2010 08:24 AM PDT  Israel and its American and Europeans zionists allies are not the only criminals involved in Gaza Blockade. The so-called Palestinian "President", Mahmoud Abbas and his cabinet, Egypt, and the Islamic Arab counties are all involved in one form or another in the horrific crime which is the Gaza blockade. According to Qudspress agency, EU diplomatic sources stated that the Palestinian "President" Mahmoud Abbas opposes the idea of Europe to require the establishment of a maritime route to the Gaza Strip under the supervision of the European Union. The sources said that Abbas sent the former leader of death squads Mohammad Dahlan, who is now a member of the Central Committee of the Palestine National Liberation Movement (Fatah) to Spain, which currently holds the EU presidency, to discourage them from moving ahead with the establishment of a maritime route to Gaza. |
| What Lies Ahead: A New Massacre or a Genocidal War? Posted: 24 Jun 2010 08:03 AM PDT  Will the Lebanese ship attempting to break the siege imposed on Gaza be the spark that ignites the fire of war in the Middle East? Whether the vessels attempting to break the siege of Gaza or any other insignificant as preposterous and contrived reasons will be the last straw that Israel holds as a justification for a bloody war against what it calls the "new alliance" (Syria, Turkey and Iran), this new Israeli war and the flood of human blood is inevitably coming. At the national, political and military levels, Israel has made sufficient effort to convince its American, European and some Arab and Islamic allies to take part in or support this dirty war. It has also completed its training and tactical planning for this new coming war. |
| Posted: 24 Jun 2010 07:57 AM PDT If you are planning to fly over the 4th of July holiday, be aware of your rights at airport security checkpoints. The Transportation Security Administration (TSA) has mandated that passengers can opt out of going through a whole body scanning machine in favor of a physical pat down. Unfortunately, opting for the pat down requires passengers to be assertive since TSA screeners do not tell travelers about their right to refuse a scan. Harried passengers must spot the TSA signs posted at hectic security checkpoints to inform themselves of their rights before they move to a body scanning security line. |
| Posted: 24 Jun 2010 07:35 AM PDT  One year later, here's what we still don't know about the bloody riots in China's Xinjiang region. Nearly a year after violent riots engulfed Urumqi, the capital city of China's restive Xinjiang region, major questions about China's deadliest ethnic unrest in decades remain unanswered. |
| What Really Happened in Urumqi? Posted: 24 Jun 2010 07:35 AM PDT  One year later, here's what we still don't know about the bloody riots in China's Xinjiang region. Nearly a year after violent riots engulfed Urumqi, the capital city of China's restive Xinjiang region, major questions about China's deadliest ethnic unrest in decades remain unanswered. |
| Our Ocean in Revery and Neglect Posted: 24 Jun 2010 07:26 AM PDT This month has been both a special time for our planet's ocean and one of great distress. June 7th kicked off a week full of events, celebrating Capital Hill Ocean Week, World Ocean Day (June 8th) and my grandfather's 100th birthday commemoration dive, end-capping the week on June 11th. Throughout the week, the beauty, majesty and fragility of our water world were center pieces of discussions and of revery. During our June 11th dive on the "Grand Canglouer" (location of my grandfather's first expedition in the early 50s) off Marseille, my father Jean-Michel, sister Celine, and I, were honored to be submerged with some of the original crew of Calypso such as our dear friend, Albert Falco. Not only was this an extraordinary moment for us as a family, but also one that was an intimate communion with the "undersea world". |
| What if Israel is behind the terrorists? Posted: 24 Jun 2010 07:10 AM PDT  Just for a moment, I want you to consider the possibility that maybe 99% of the terrorists in the world are manufactured fakes, a bloody theater to serve the interests not of fringe groups, but of entire nation-states? Now before you laugh and head off to get a coffee, just stop and think for a moment. Would any real group of oppressed people needing the support of world opinion to affect change intentionally set out to commit such an horrific atrocity that it destroys that very support? |
| Cops Resort To Planet of the Apes Style Policing To Let The Scum Public Know Who Their Bosses Are Posted: 24 Jun 2010 07:03 AM PDT  Restaurants and bars are whacked with county health violations if they so much as operate a dysfunctional dishwasher, and yet cops are given free reign to swagger through businesses on horseback in some kind of bizarre display of letting the scum know who their bosses are. Remember one of the early scenes in the classic movie Planet of the Apes? The apes on horseback ride roughshod over the scurrying humans, whipping them into submission, capturing them in huge nets, and reminding them that they are slaves. |
| Posted: 24 Jun 2010 07:00 AM PDT 
President Obama has now swapped one distinguished general for another. But he urgently needs to address the underlying issue dividing his administration: Is July 2011 a real deadline for U.S. troops to begin withdrawing, or just a clever domestic political ploy? By replacing Gen. Stanley McChrystal with Gen. David Petraeus, U.S. President Barack Obama has treated the most recent symptom of his Afghan malaise -- an insubordinate, or at least indiscreet, general. He has not, however, addressed the underlying malady: a conflicted policy and a divided administration. In deciding last November to send more troops to Afghanistan in 2010 and then begin to take them out in 2011, Obama fashioned a compromise between his advisors and sought to balance conflicting public pressures. His solution seemed to work politically -- but it also built an unavoidable tension into U.S. Afghanistan policy. |
| Towards the Eighteenth Brumaire of General David Petraeus? Posted: 24 Jun 2010 06:59 AM PDT  Prodded doubtless by forces above and behind the Oval Office, Obama has ousted General McChrystal in favor of General Petraeus, who now combines the post of CENTCOM theater commander with that of NATO commander in Afghanistan. This is a move deriving from the inherent fecklessness and incompetence of the Obama administration, especially from the imperialist point of view. Recent events have highlighted Obama's total lack of executive ability, leaving him weakened as he faced the bizarre flap about some barrack-room gripes by McChrystal's staff collected by a correspondent from Rolling Stone magazine. Because of Obama's weakness, he felt obliged to react to the scuttlebutt peddled by Rolling Stone, when a stronger president could have dismissed it or ignored it. As Fletcher Pratt once wrote, Abraham Lincoln was capable of laughing an attempted coup d'état out of existence with an off-color joke. Obama is far too weak for that. |
| Thursday: 22 Iraqis Killed, 33 Wounded Posted: 24 Jun 2010 06:46 AM PDT  The formation of the new government came across a new roadblock, this one over the failure of two large Shi'ite groups to compromise on the selection of the next prime minister. This new delay could mean further destabilization of Iraq's fragile security gains. At least 22 Iraqis were killed and 33 more were wounded in attacks that targeted security personnel. Also, Gen. David Petraeus, who once commanded American forces in Iraq, is now in charge of operations in Afghanistan. A merger between Shi'ite parties that could have resulted in a bloc that would deprive the sectarian Iraqiya party a place in the next government is apparently falling apart over the choice of prime minister. The Iraqi National Alliance (INA) does not want to give Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki, who nearly triggered a civil war in 2008 to undermine the Sadrists political aspirations, a second term as premier. Perhaps the best signal that there is a retreat from this super-coalition is the arrest of three Mahdi Army fighters in Baghdad. The INA is an alliance of Shi'ite group including followers of Shi'ite cleric Moqtada al-Sadr. The Mahdi Army is the armed wing of the Sadrists. |
| Thursday: 24 Iraqis Killed, 33 Wounded Posted: 24 Jun 2010 06:46 AM PDT Updated at 11:21 p.m. EDT, June 24, 2010 The formation of the new government came across a new roadblock, this one over the failure of two large Shi'ite groups to compromise on the selection of the next prime minister. This new delay could mean further destabilization of Iraq's fragile security gains. At least 24 Iraqis were killed and 33 more were wounded in attacks that targeted security personnel. Also, Gen. David Petraeus, who once commanded American forces in Iraq, is now in charge of operations in Afghanistan. |
| Film Maker Captures Absurdity, Empty Threats Of Police Terror Stop Laws Posted: 24 Jun 2010 06:10 AM PDT  Though section 44 of the Terrorism Act 2000 does not prohibit the filming of police, section 58A of the 2000 Act does. As of February 17 2009, Section 76 of the Counter Terrorism Act 2008 also prohibits photographing police and permits the arrest of anyone found "eliciting, publishing or communicating information" relating to members of the armed forces, intelligence services and police officers, which is "likely to be useful to a person committing or preparing an act of terrorism". |
| Getting Beyond the Usual Suspects on Foreign Policy Posted: 24 Jun 2010 05:53 AM PDT Late last week I was asked to write a short response to the question, "Is American foreign policy too ambitious?" In an opening line that was edited out of the final article, I wrote, "I'm not sure who else will answer this question, but I hope an Afghan and an Iraqi are among them." I continued: Given the tens of thousands dead, wounded, and displaced in Afghanistan and the millions dead, wounded, and displaced in Iraq since 2001, I wonder how an Iraqi or Afghan would answer this question. So too, I wonder how the family of a dead or maimed member of the U.S. military would respond? |
| Posted: 24 Jun 2010 04:03 AM PDT Admittedly, before George W. Bush had his fever dream, the U.S. had already put its first unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs) or drone surveillance planes in the skies over Kosovo in the late 1990s. By November 2001, it had armed them with missiles and was flying them over Afghanistan. In November 2002, a Predator drone would loose a Hellfire missile on a car in Yemen, a country with which we weren't at war. Six suspected al-Qaeda members, including a suspect in the bombing of the destroyer the USS Cole would be turned into twisted metal and ash -- the first "targeted killings" of the American robotic era. |
| 'Manchurian Candidate' Shahzad confesses all Posted: 24 Jun 2010 03:57 AM PDT In a strange turn of events the New York Times reports, Guilty Plea in Times Square Bomb Plot. Yes, defendant Faisal Shahzad, 30, put an immediate end to his trial for purportedly bombing (though no bomb went off) in Times Square. His Nissan SUV-bomb fizzled with his or someone's incompetency, or to get the desired effect with a minimum of blowback. Who could that possibly be? |
| Israel's Dubious Investigation of Flotilla Attack Posted: 24 Jun 2010 03:15 AM PDT
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| Is Success in Afghanistan Really a Question of Command? Posted: 24 Jun 2010 03:10 AM PDT I spent the better part of Wednesday morning trying to keep up with the flurry of news about General McChrystal's recall. Everyone wanted to know, would he stay or would he go? Between checking for updates on the New York Times and the Small Wars Journal and listening to George Packer and Fred Kaplan on NPR, I opened a package that had arrived in yesterday's mail. It was a book—A Question of Command: Counterinsurgency from the Civil War to Iraq, by Mark Moyer. As the title suggests, the book argues that the success or failure of a counterinsurgency strategy depends on the quality and commitment of the individuals leading the fight. |
| Kagan Calls Israeli Judge Dredd "My Judicial Hero" Posted: 24 Jun 2010 12:54 AM PDT  New video has emerged on the eve of the Senate Judiciary Committee confirmation hearings which shows Supreme Court nominee Elena Kagan praising an Israeli activist judge as "my judicial hero," underscoring Kagan's alarming hostility to the Constitution and her views on empowering appointed judges with political agendas. |
| Petraeus Harbinger of Peace, Not Another Surge? Posted: 24 Jun 2010 12:25 AM PDT Firing Gen. McChrystal and replacing him with Gen. Petraeus raises many questions. For example, some say that when he accepted the post as top commander in Afghanistan, it was made clear to Gen. Petraeus that he'd come away with no great success like he supposedly had in Iraq with the Surge. On the other hand, did Petraeus take the position on the condition that the United States would send more troops to Iraq and switch back to a counterterrorism strategy from counterinsurgency? But President Obama has stated that our Afghanistan strategy will remain the same. While that may be an attempt to appear strong and present a united front, will the administration, in fact, use this as an opportunity to begin the Great Drawdown? (After all, McChrystal is a ready-made fall guy for the failure of COIN.) |
| Posted: 23 Jun 2010 10:05 PM PDT Two June 2010 decisions show the workings of a right wing High Court, with five Federalist Society members - Chief Justice John Roberts, Antonin Scalia, Clarence Thomas, Anthony Kennedy, and Samuel Alito. Once confirmed, Elana Kagan will solidify their control when the Court reconvenes in October - her record exposing extremist positions, including outlandish anti-terrorism practices, unconstitutional federal litigation, and "love (for) the Federalist Society," affirming her endorsement of an organization supporting rolling back civil liberties; defiling human rights; ending New Deal social policies; opposing reproductive choice, government regulations, labor rights, and environmental protections; subverting justice in defense of privilege; and as Solicitor General, arguing against First Amendment rights without which all others are at risk - an ideology the Court endorses, one protecting privilege against the rule of law.
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| Rewriting Afghanistan's narrative, Why not love? Posted: 23 Jun 2010 06:21 PM PDT  We were advised : "Afghans don't use the word love." We still wrote "Why not love?" at Bamiyan Peace Park Later, vandals 'dripped' blood-red paint over our work… We mustn't be paralyzed by the desperate war narratives… We came to Kabul to buy a dove for Bamiyan Peace Park Faiz, what is the seed of peace? The seed of peace is love, is friendship Even a little of our love is stronger than the wars of the world! Why not love? Why not love? The coalition asks ' Why not COIN?' We the people must ask 'Why not love?' When we fall, we will get up again. Get up to listen & love again ! Why not love? |
| From Great Man to Great Screwup: Behind the McChrystal Uproar Posted: 23 Jun 2010 06:00 PM PDT  When the wheels are coming off, it doesn't do much good to change the driver. Whatever the name of the commanding general in Afghanistan, the U.S. war effort will continue its carnage and futility. |
| DISCLOSE ACT Passed By House Today Compromises Free Speech Posted: 23 Jun 2010 04:00 PM PDT  The House today passed a campaign finance bill that includes disclosure requirements which raise concerns regarding the right to privacy and speech. The Democracy is Strengthened by Casting Light on Spending in Elections (DISCLOSE) bill (H.R. 5175) includes an amendment obligating many advocacy organizations that wish to speak out on candidates and, in certain situations, political issues, to release the identities of many of their donors, while allowing a few large mainstream organizations to preserve the privacy of their donors. The amendment exempts organizations that have over 500,000 members, are over ten years old, have a presence in all 50 states and whose revenue from corporations and unions is less than 15 percent. By exempting larger mainstream organizations from certain disclosure requirements, the bill inequitably suppresses only the speech of smaller, more controversial organizations and compromises the anonymity of small donors.
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| An African iPhone? There's No App for That. Posted: 23 Jun 2010 03:35 PM PDT  Why Steve Jobs should let Africans buy his new toy. When I touched down in Lagos, Nigeria, this week, the first thing I did was buy a cell phone. The city's Saka Tinubu district hosts dozens of mobile vendors arrayed in small shops, piled high with all the major brands: Nokia, Motorola, Samsung. Among them is Belle-Vista Phone Warehouse, which styles itself as a "Blackberry Outlet." Young professionals stopped by after working hours to scoop up the Storm, the Curve, and other popular smartphones nestled in the display cases. Apple's iPhone -- ubiquitous in American cities, and about to become more so with the release of the product's much-anticipated version 4 today -- was nowhere to be seen. |
Downtown Toronto has been transformed into a police state ahead of the G8 and G20 conferences, with police given unprecedented powers to to arrest anyone near the security zone who refuses to identify themselves or agree to a police search.
Alex also talks with British consultant, policy adviser, writer, columnist, and hereditary peer, Lord Christopher Monckton. 
Welcome to another power-packed episode of the New World Next Week - the weekly video series from CorbettReport.com & MediaMonarchy.com that uncovers some of the most important developments in alternative news & open source intelligence. This week: Story #1: McChrystal Falls on Sword After Truthful Comments on Afghan War 
Professor Alan Dershowitz was so moved by my article that he responded to an email we at We Hold These Truths sent out to the subscribers of our "Pharisee Watch" & "Unheralded News" newsletters. The email contained the story published in the Palestine Chronicle. Dershowitz wrote us: "Subject: Re: Would Jesus Concur or Weep? These deaths were not collateral. They were deliberately intended by Hamas by its wilfull (sic) use of human shields. Anuyone (sic) who supports Hamas is complicit in the death of these babies--you included!"
A June 13 exclusive on Intelwire.com entitled 'Gaza Flotilla Official Was Foreign Fighter in Bosnia War' purports to reveal the history of Osman Atalay, executive board member of ÝHH, the Turkish NGO instrumental in organizing the aid flotilla to Gaza intercepted on May 31 by Israeli commandos. Collateral damage from the interception included 9 Turkish humanitarian activists.
Alex also talks with British consultant, policy adviser, writer, columnist, and hereditary peer, Lord Christopher Monckton. 
Alex talks with judge Andrew Napolitano about the impeachable offenses committed by obama since being in office, and if Obama will legalize 20 million "illegal aliens" with a stoke of a pen!
Faisal Shahzad pled guilty (plea available 
Ever since Israel's murderous attack on the Freedom Flotilla on 31 May, there have been increasing calls from many parties on Israel to end its siege of Gaza. This is strange as well as deceitful, for the siege is not Israel's alone.
Few decisions of the Obama administration have outraged the peace and human rights community as much as its successful efforts to block an international inquiry into May's Israeli aid flotilla attack. Instead, supported by leading Republican and Democratic members of Congress, the Obama administration has thrown its weight behind an investigative committee handpicked by right-wing Israeli Prime Minister Benyamin Netanyahu to examine the incident.| You are subscribed to email updates from Opinion To stop receiving these emails, you may unsubscribe now. | Email delivery powered by Google |
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